Topic
Identity and Language Learning
About: Identity and Language Learning is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 51 publications have been published within this topic receiving 8906 citations.
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TL;DR: The authors argue that second language acquisition (SLA) theorists have struggled to conceptualize the relationship between the language learner and the social world because they have not developed a comprehensive theory of social identity which integrates the language learners and the language learning context.
Abstract: The author argues that second language acquisition (SLA) theorists have struggled to conceptualize the relationship between the language learner and the social world because they have not developed a comprehensive theory of social identity which integrates the language learner and the language learning context. She also maintains that SLA theorists have not adequately addressed how relations of power affect interaction between language learners and target language speakers. Using data collected in Canada from January to December 1991 from diaries, questionnaires, individual and group interviews, and home visits, the author illustrates how and under what conditions the immigrant women in her study created, responded to, and sometimes resisted opportunities to speak English. Drawing on her data analysis as well as her reading in social theory, the author argues that current conceptions of the individual in SLA theory need to be reconceptualized, and she draws on the poststructuralist conception of social identity as multiple, a site of struggle, and subject to change to explain the findings from her study. Further, she argues for a conception of investment rather than motivation to capture the complex relationship of language learners to the target language and their sometimes ambivalent desire to speak it. The notion of investment conceives of the language learner, not as a historical and unidimensional, but as having a complex social history and multiple desires. The article includes a discussion of the implications of the study for classroom teaching and current theories of communicative competence.
2,461 citations
Book•
01 Jan 2000
TL;DR: Fact and fiction in language learning researching identity and language learning the world of adult immigrant language learners Eva and Mai - old heads on young shoulders mothers, migration, and language learner acquisition theory revisited claiming the right to speak in classrooms & communities as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Fact and fiction in language learning researching identity and language learning the world of adult immigrant language learners Eva and Mai - old heads on young shoulders mothers, migration, and language learning second language acquisition theory revisited claiming the right to speak in classrooms & communities.
2,287 citations
04 Oct 2013
TL;DR: In this paper, Kramsch et al. discuss the world of adult immigrant language learners and claim the right to speak in classrooms and communities in order to learn second language acquisition theory revisited.
Abstract: Preface Introduction 1. Fact and fiction in language learning 2. Researching identity and language learning 3. The world of adult immigrant language learners 4. Eva and Mai: Old heads on young shoulders 5. Mothers, migration and language learning 6. Second language acquisition theory revisited 7. Claiming the right to speak in classrooms and communities Afterword by Claire Kramsch
928 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that contemporary poststructuralist theories of language, identity, and power offer new perspectives on language learning and teaching, and have been of considerable interest in our field, and anticipate that the identities and investments of language learners, as well as their teachers, will continue to generate exciting and innovative research in the future.
Abstract: In this review article on identity, language learning, and social change, we argue that contemporary poststructuralist theories of language, identity, and power offer new perspectives on language learning and teaching, and have been of considerable interest in our field. We first review poststructuralist theories of language, subjectivity, and positioning and explain sociocultural theories of language learning. We then discuss constructs of investment and imagined communities/imagined identities (Norton Peirce 1995; Norton 1997, 2000, 2001), showing how these have been used by diverse identity researchers. Illustrative examples of studies that investigate how identity categories like race, gender, and sexuality interact with language learning are discussed. Common qualitative research methods used in studies of identity and language learning are presented, and we review the research on identity and language teaching in different regions of the world. We examine how digital technologies may be affecting language learners' identities, and how learner resistance impacts language learning. Recent critiques of research on identity and language learning are explored, and we consider directions for research in an era of increasing globalization. We anticipate that the identities and investments of language learners, as well as their teachers, will continue to generate exciting and innovative research in the future.
794 citations
Book•
06 Mar 2007
TL;DR: In this paper, the state of play and future directions of early second language learning research are discussed in the context of identity in the social sciences and in the early second-language learning research.
Abstract: Introduction 1. Identity in the social sciences today 2. Waking the dead: Identity in early second language learning research 3. Identity in adult migrant contexts 4. Identity in foreign language contexts 5. Identity in study abroad contexts 6. Second language identities: the state of play and future directions.
677 citations