Vous êtes sur la page 1sur 17

Three Fundamental Concepts in Second Language Acquisition and Their Relevance in Multilingual Contexts Author(s): Claire Kramsch and

Anne Whiteside Reviewed work(s): Source: The Modern Language Journal, Vol. 91, Focus Issue: Second Language Acquisition Reconceptualized? The Impact of Firth and Wagner (1997) (2007), pp. 907-922 Published by: Wiley on behalf of the National Federation of Modern Language Teachers Associations Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4626140 . Accessed: 22/02/2013 04:35
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Wiley and National Federation of Modern Language Teachers Associations are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Modern Language Journal.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Three FundamentalConcepts in Second Language Acquisition and Their Relevancein Multilingual Contexts
CLAIRE KRAMSCH ofGerman Department 5323 Dwinelle Berkeley University ofCalifornia, CA 94720 Berkeley, Email: ckramsch@berkeley.edu ANNE WHITESIDE as a Second Language English 375 AlabamaSt. City College ofSan Francisco San Francisco, CA 94110 Email: awhitesi@ccsf edu

This article considershow 3 fundamentalconcepts of second language acquisition (SLA), and the language learnerhave faredsince Firthand Wagthe nativespeaker,interlanguage, ner (1997). We reviewthe ascendancyof these concepts and theirrelationshipto the traditional dichotomiesof language learningversuslanguage use and individualmind versus We discussgeopoliticalchanges of the 1990s and the related social-context-as-environment. social theand constructionist theoriesto discourse-based theoretical shifts fromstructuralist to reframe ories,whichpaved the wayforFirthand Wagner.We examine subsequentefforts as social action,arguingthatsuch notionsas collaborative SLA as social processand knowledge and investment have reconceptualizedthe concepts of output,input, dialogue, affordance, roots.Looking at data frommuland motivation without, however, escapingtheirstructuralist we suggestthat 3 recorded in shops in California, tilingualexchanges betweenimmigrants with and relative be treated as fundamental discursive, categories, socially, historically concepts in. factored the subjectpositionof the researcher SINCE ITS INCEPTION, SECOND LANGUAGE acquisition(SLA) researchhas triedto take into account the fact that acquisition does not happen onlyin thelearner'smind,but in theinteraction of the mind and the social context(Brown, & Williams,1996). Althoughthe reMalmkjaer, search domain of language and mind is firmly established within and psychology, the linguistics to social dimensionofSLA has come prominently or so (forexcellent theforeonlyin thelast20 years reviews of the social turnin SLA, see Block,2003; Breen,2001; Siegel,2003). This social dimension of SLA is sometimes seen as being in tensionwith itspsychological as evidencedbythe counterpart, debate elicited Firth and hefty by Wagner(1997). This tension has been nowhere more apparent
TheModern 91, Focus Issue, (2007) Language Journal, 0026-7902/07/907-922 $1.50/0 Language Journal ?2007 TheModern

the sacred triadof than in debates surrounding concepts thatformthe foundationof psycholinguistic SLA: native versus nonnative speaker (NS vs. NNS), learner,and interlanguage. By foon these three concepts, cusing theircriticisms Firthand Wagnerdid much to illuminatethe social aspectsofa fieldthathad been predominantly in nature.Whathas been thefate psycholinguistic still have oftheseconceptssince 1997,and do they forSLA researchtoday? theoretical validity contextin This articlefirst givesthe historical which to understand the tension between language learning and language use in SLA prior to 1997. It then discussesthe impact that Firth and Wagner's (1997) articlehas had on the way we viewSLA's fundamental concepts.Takingthe concreteexample of immigrants learningto surin themultilingual environment vivelinguistically of a global economy, it exploresthe implications ofFirth and Wagner(1997) forthewaywe look at SLA data today.Last, it evaluatesthe theoretical

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

908 of the threeconceptsforfutureSLA revalidity search. HISTORICAL CONSIDERATIONS The originalpurpose of second language (L2) learningresearchwas to help improvelanguage instruction and to better control the variables thatwentintoinstructed SLA. Learnerswereconto acquire an L2 unceived of as NNS striving der the guidance of a teacher,who was usually thought of as an NS of the language. In the 1980s, the role of social contextwas addressed in variouswaysby psycholinguists exploringthe and classrooms learningthatwenton in curricula (Breen, 1985; Breen & Candlin, 1980; Canale & Swain, 1980), throughinput and interaction (Long, 1981) and throughthe developmentof and discoursecompetence (Allwright, pragmatic 1980; Edmondson, 1985; Kramsch,1981, 1985). All these researchefforts to define and characterizethe social contextof SLA were ultimately a teachable body of knowledge meant to identify thatwould help the learner's interlanguageapNS ways ofspeaking. evermoreclosely, proximate, The NS was seen as the warrant of authenticuse oflanguagein real-life situations. was Authenticity at first idfoundin NS use of standardgrammar, iomaticlexicon, and pragmatic appropriateness, even thoughmanypsycholinguists soon became concerned withthe social and culturalvariation to be found in both NNS and NS speech (e.g., Ellis, 1985; Rampton,1987; Selinker& Douglas, 1985; Wong-Fillmore, 1979). The viewof social contextas an environment (cf. Doughty& Long, 2003, p. 153) forlearning to take place in the mindwas thatwas ultimately predicatedon threebasic concepts: from The NS was to be different 1. NS target: who lives (1965) ideal speaker-hearer, Chomsky's "in a completelyhomogeneous speech commuand is unwho knowsitslanguage perfectly nity, condiaffected such irrelevant by grammatically shifts tions as memorylimitations, distractions, of attention and errors(random or and interest, in applyinghis knowledgeof the characteristic) language in actual performance"(p. 3). SLA's concept of the NS was not based on some decontextualizedUniversalGrammar, but, rather, on how real speaker-hearers used the language in everyday life.But the NS was stilla genericreof the NS suspiciously The spoken grammar ality. standardized ofthe resembledlinguists' grammar written language and the etiquetteconventions of middle-class verbal behavior.In a sense, the analysthad replaced the teacher in evaluating theNS target. towards progress

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal 2. Learner: The notion of the L2 learnerwas coined at a time when SLA wanted to distance itself fromresearchon teachingmethodsand focus instead on the one doing the learning (e.g., Tarone & Yule, 1989). Thus, the term learner, ratherthan student, was chosen to denote someone engagedin a psycholinguistic processofintera of whether nalizing body linguistic knowledge, in an academicsetting or in natural environments. That knowledge,or rather, its representation in the mind,was seen as the necessary prerequisite for the developmentof communicative competence,thatis, language use. Hence the argument made by Kasper (1997) in her response to Firth and Wagner (1997) thatthe A in SLA standsfor the individualacquisitionof linguistic, cognitive, and pragmaticknowledgethatcan be separated fromlanguage use. enBecause learnerswere seen as exclusively a the of gaged in process acquiring knowledge thatby definition theydid not have, it was only a small step to definelearnersbywhattheywere not. Hence the concept ofNNS, whichmeasured all learners againstan NS normofcommunicative competence.This norm,determinedbylinguists and language teachers, made NNSs intodeficient not envisionedat communicators. The difficulty, the time,is that,although the statusof learner was a temporary condition (presumably one day the learningwould be completedand one would no longer be a learner), NNS statuswas permanent. Someone who had not acquired the lanbecome birthcould not bydefinition guage from an NS, but onlya near-native speakerat the most. bothparties Thus, thedyadNS-NNS essentialized in an idealized statusthat occulted much variaand change. tion,conflict, 3. Interlanguage: Interlanguage was a psycholinguistic concept meant to validatelearners' errorsby consideringthemnot as reprehensible lapses but as positiveevidence of learning,that is, of the restructuring, generalizing,analyzing, of hypotheses and testing going on inferencing, in the mind. The originaldefinition by Selinker (1972)-"a hypothesized separate linguisticsystem based on the observable output which resultsfroma learner'sattempted productionof a target language norm" (p. 117)-was a nonjudgthatstressedthe coherence or mentaldefinition innerlogicofa learner'slanguage.The definition and Sharwood-Smith (1985)givenbyBialystok "the systematic language performance(in proofutterances) ductionand recognition bysecond language learnerswho have not achieved suffiof linguistic cient levelsof analysis knowledgeor controlof processingto be identified completely with nativespeakers" (p. 116)-focused on the

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Claire and AnneWhiteside Kramsch the gap betransitional natureof interlanguage, tweenNNS and NS performance. Both internal coherence and transitionality were whatanalysts features of interlanguage saw as the primary (see Block, 2003). They also enabled language teachers to understandhow best to intervenein orthe transition from der to facilitate interlanguage to fully developed language perforperformance mance. Note thattermsand expressionslike observable norm, ofa target language output, production condid not entail and language any performance even thoughone siderationof the social context, and perforcould argue thatoutput,production, mance were not only part of language learning but also of language use. discussions weretaking place Bythe1990s,hefty A regardingthe scope and formof SLA theory. issue of on milestone the TESOL Quarterly special SLA theory(Spolsky,1990) was followedby onfor we should strive going debates as to whether a unifiedtheory withpredictive (Beretta, power & Beretta, 1997;Long 1991; Gregg, Long,Jordan, 1990, 1993), adopt a new ontologyaltogether (Lantolf,1996, 2007), or "accept the existence of multipletheoriesand, above all, multipleperspectiveson research" (Block, 1996, p. 78). In to address addition, SLA research was starting concernsabout language and culture(Kramsch, 1993), language and identity(Norton Peirce, 1995;Rampton,1995), and languagesocialization (Poole, 1992). In the late 1990s,the social dimensionof SLA moved center stage when Firthand Wagner attackedhead-onthe distinction betweenlanguage and use at the 1996 Internalanguage learning tionalAssociationof Applied Linguistics(AILA) Congress in Finland. Two yearsbefore (March, 1994), a panel organizedby Leo van Lier at the annual conferenceof the AmericanAssociation of Applied Linguistics in Baltimorebroughttoand educagether scholars in psycholinguistics tionallinguistics' to discussexplicitly the relation betweenlanguage learningand language use in SLA. Althoughthe distinction betweenlearning and using a language had been made before,2 it was the first time that it was the object of a public debate. The common forumbroadened a discussion that had been confined to the dichotomy: cognitionversusinputand interaction, to a more complexdichotomy: as repknowledge resentation versusknowledgeas action, or individual mind versussocial context.At stake was whetherthe NNS was to be seen as a language learneror as a language user,and whether a theof practicewas better oryof the mind or a theory

909 forunderstanding therelationship betweenlearnand action. and use, ing representation Firth and Wagner,coming as theydid from withina European traditionin applied linguistics,were more orientedtowardthe social than manyof theirAmericancolleagues of the time. the data of theirEuropean colBy reanalyzing and Faerch Kasper (1983, as citedin Firth leagues, in & Wagner, 1997), a broaderethnographic perto recapturea social dimenwere trying spective, oriented sion that theyfelt even a functionally was branchof SLA like interlanguage pragmatics missing.Firthand Wagner's 1997 article represented a radical attack on traditionalSLA because it challenged SLA's "fundamental notions native oflearner, and interlannonnative, speaker, guage" (p. 286)." Theydenounced the reduction of real-life encountersand naturalsocial interactionsto meresourcesofinput,rather thanseeing them as processesof socialization,thatis, learnTo understand ing processesin theirown right. into the discussion fieldssuch whytheybrought as language socialization,conversationanalysis, task-based research,and researchon NNS idenwe have to rememberthatby the end of the tity, 1990s geopoliticalchangesin the learningof Enof economic opporglish,the rapid globalization in and shifts thesocial sciences tunity, disciplinary new vocabularies to explain SLA were offering processes. GEOPOLITICAL AND DISCIPLINARY SHIFTS thegeopoliticalsituation had Bythemid-1990s, and so interhad the focus of changed drastically est in SLA research.Firthand Wagner's (1997) bio-socialSLA" (p. 296), that push fora "holistic, is, their call for decenteringSLA and embedin a social, ecological conding it more firmly textof language and language-related practices, was echoed thesocial turnthatapplied linguistics takingat the time under a series of geopolitical shifts and disciplinary (see Block; 2003; Kramsch, 2000). On the geopoliticalscene, the 1990s saw the ofEnglishas an international exponentialgrowth conditions ofincreasing under multilinlanguage and migration(see, e.g., gualism,displacement, Coleman, 2006; Graddol, 2000). Mere mastery of a grammatical was no longerseen as a system or continued employguaranteeof employment ment on the job market (Canagarajah, 1993). More importantthan having the rightmental was the abilityto participatein representations to learn the communicative strateconversations, gies and tacticsnecessaryto be perceived and

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

910 accepted as a competentmemberof a commuof practice(Heath & Kramsch, 2004). nity Together with these geopolitical changes, the 1990s witnessedimportant in developments viewsand awayfromstructuralist sociolinguistics, toward discourse-basedand even constructionist views of the social world. In the late 1970s and the 1980s, the spectacularrise of discourse analysisand its application to SLA (e.g., Hatch, 1981; Larsen-Freeman, 1978; Kramsch, 1980) had of realraised hopes thatthe social construction discoursewould come into itsown in itythrough & Coupland, 1999; SLA (fora review, seeJaworski Trappes-Lomax,2004). It was hoped that SLA researchers would reconnectwiththe Hymesian of inquirythat had proethnographictradition vided the fieldwiththe notionof communicative wouldbe seen competence,and thatL2 acquirers not as learnersof a linguistic but as newsystem But the comers to a givendiscoursecommunity. in and of theory linguistics the power Chomskyan overthe social preof the cognitive preeminence vented discourse analysisfromhavingthe deep impactit could have had on SLA research. In addition, SLA research in the 1990s witnessed a shiftin interestawayfromtheoretical as the prilinguisticsand Westernpsychology toward more relevant socially mary disciplines by Sogrounded theories,such as those offered and and vietpsychology, sociology, anthropology also ecotheirattendant and branches, linguistic As a result, based theoriesofknowledge. logically influenceon SLA researchof we saw the growing of the social variousfieldsdedicated to the study of aspects language: thatis, the adaptation 1. Socioculturaltheory, ofthemindand Leon(1978) theory ofVygotsky's oftherelato tiev's(1978) activity theory thestudy in the and of activity tionship language,thought, of L2 knowledgefromthe social internalization to the psychological 2000). plane (Lantolf, thatis,theview 2. Language emergencetheory, thatlanguage learningis a complexand dynamic process in whichvariouscomponentsemerge at variouslevels (Ellis & Larsen-Freeman, 2006). thatis, the sociologi3. Conversation analysis, in everyday lifeand cal analysisof conversations itsapplicationto SLA (Gardner& Wagner, 2004; Markee,2000; Seedhouse, 2005; Wong,2000). in both itssociocul4. Language socialization, tural and sociocognitivestrands.The socioculand Schecter turalstrand, byBayley represented (2003), Duff (in press), Duff and Hornberger (in press), Watson-Gegeo(2004), and Zuengler and Cole (2005), defineslanguage socialization and culturalknowledgeare as theway"linguistic

91 (2007) TheModern Language Journal constructedthrougheach other,and languageacquiringchildrenor adultsare activeand selectiveagents in both processes" (Watson-Gegeo & Nielsen,2003,p. 157). The sociocognitive strand, representedby Atkinson (2002) and Atkinson, Churchill,Nishino, and Okada (2007), stresses in SLA the factthatthe social and the cognitive are mutually constitutive. 5. Language ecology,thatis, the criticalstudy of the interrelationship betweenthe L2 and the naturalenvironment of itsusers (Kramsch, 2002; Leather & van Dam, 2002; van Lier,2004). It is withinthis social turn in SLA research and Wag(Block,2003) thatwe have to read Firth thatthe"socialand contexner's (1997) assertion to language [are] unquestiontual orientations in the ably ascendancy"(p. 295). Since then,the in the social dimensionof SLA of interest growth in theway and is reflected has gained momentum SLA's threefundamental conceptshave been inin the last 10 years. terpreted RECONSIDERING SLA'S THREE FUNDAMENTAL CONCEPTS In theircritiqueof the exclusively or linguistic frame of SLA, Firth and Wagpsycholinguistic ner (1997) advocated broadening its threefundamental concepts to include the social and the cultural. NS Versus NNS Firthand Wagner's (1997) critiqueof the NS voiced in the early echoed some of the misgivings 1990s by Cook (1992), Davies (1991), Medgyes (1994), Rampton (1990), and others.The object of theircriticism was twolong-heldassumptions: thattheNS wasa stable, monolingualentity speaking a homogeneous standardlanguage, and that the NS of a first language (Li) should be the model for all L2 learners.We consider each of in turn. theseassumptions The NS notion was meant to shiftthe attenfromthe formal tion of teachersand researchers as describedin of the system linguistic properties to theliving and dictionaries properties grammars life oflanguage as itis actually spokenin everyday in a monolingual,homogeneousspeech commuBut, in fact,accordingto Firthand Wagner nity. (1997), theNS notionwastheproductofa prevailof SLA thatdid not ing monolingualorientation takeintoaccounttheenormousvariations among NSs withregardto theiradherence to any (standard) languageor languageuse. Much ofSLA was based on the "tendentiousassumptionthatNSs respondingon representa homogeneous entity,

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

and AnneWhiteside ClaireKramsch each and everyoccasion in a patternedand predictablefashion"(p. 292). Unlike rules of usage rulesofuse definitely thatcould be standardized, set of could not; therewas no "general,universal rules,"no "comparablebaseline of NS-NS interIn the actions"(p. 292) as therewasforgrammar. last 10 years,homogeneous speech communities nationals monocultural made up ofmonolingual, The speech have become less and less ofa reality. communities bySLA haveturnedout to envisaged be imaginedcommunities populatedbyimagined speakers-hearers(Kanno & Norton,2003), and researcherslike Pavlenko (2006) have accused linguistic theory of "militantmonolingualism" (p. xiii). in the last 10 years,the issue of Furthermore, ofrecogtheNS has been caughtup in thepolitics nition. Many of the world's NSs do not speak the standard language, which is in many cases an ex-coloniallanguage, nor do theyspeak only to industrialized one language. Manyimmigrants are NSs ofminority countries languageswhocodebetweenthe minorswitch or code-mixnaturally and thedominantlanguage (e.g., Spanglishor ity languages, Chinglish).They are NSs of minority NS status is notrecognizedbecause their buttheir literate languages languagesare not thestandard, the in and their NNS status taught schools, vis-i-vis dominantlanguage is associated withlow social statusand levels of education. Applied linguists of to valorizethenonstandard havefought variety of both theirLi and theirL2 and thesocial status such speakers (e.g., Valdes, 1995, 1998; Valdes & Geoffrion-Vinci, 1998). The debatessurrounding to the notionofNS have givenrenewedattention in SLA and have problematized variation the notionsofstandard languageand pedagogicalnorm (Gass, Bardovi-Harlig, Magnan,& Walz,2002). There are also increasing doubtsas to whether can be upheld as the any monolingual speaker asnorm forL2 learnerswho are, by definition, piring bilinguals (Cook, 1999; Kramsch, 1997; an increasing Seidlhofer,2001). Furthermore, number of language learnersare not monolingual nativespeakers of one L1, but are already to varying degrees in one or several proficient and languagesbesides theirmothertongue.Firth Wagner (1997) put into question the verynotion of targetcompetence in a sociallyoriented SLA. It is impossible,theyargued, to evaluate an NNS's performance fromthat independently of his or her interlocutor because theyare not only dependent on the environmentbut also on each other,according to a "divisionof labor the skillful and artfulapbetween participants, collaboration plicationof a mechanismto effect in talk" (p. 294). Collaborationand negotiation

911 are not onlyabout referential meaning.In Firth and Wagner'sanalysis, although it seemed as if whatthey wereexchanging theparticipants words, and perceptions: wereidentities wereexchanging "NNS/NS identities... appear to be exchanged, in the identities-instantiated while alternative talk-are made relevant" (p. 294). Thus,NNS and NS identities should not be taken as stable,precontingent, existingcategoriesbut as emergent, in a frames of participation interlocutor-relevant ecological game. highly

Versus LanguageLearner LanguageUser Firthand Wagner (1997) argued thatthe notion of learner had been reduced to a deconrules of grammar textualizedmind internalizing and applyingthose rules to produce grammatidiscourse callycorrectsentences.By considering had as a source of input,SLA researchers merely and the "effects of setting-related setting ignored ofdiscourse"(p. 294). Firth tasks on thestructure and Wagnerproposed to broaden the notion of language learner to mean someone engaged in ofmeanthecontingent, turn-by-turn negotiation learns the and who of conversational ing practice and achieve it to solve problems languagebyusing itself. tasksset bythe social setting Indeed, with the trend towardthe deinstitutionalizationof knowledgeand the call for emand other non-mainstream poweringminorities speakers, the term learnerstartedto sound in manyinstancescondescendingand reductionist. of nonstandardaccents and The stigmatization and their grammars equation withlack of education or lack of culture (e.g., Lippi-Green,1997) seemed unacceptable. Other notions were adCook (1992), vanced. Pavlenko(2006), following of a bilinthe notion multicompetent, proposed uses whatever communicaindividual who gual tivecompetence is required by the task,the acor the situationin variablesocial contexts tivity, in real life.Pavlenkoand Lantolf(2000) used the withthelearnerbeing metaphorofparticipation, in collaborative Variation a participant exchanges. and has now movedcenterstage:Code-switching unthemarking ofidentity nonstandard, through conventional waysof speakingare now seen as a ofthebilingual speaker(Zentella,1997). privilege Much of the broadened agenda proposed by Firthand Wagner (1997) forSLA in naturalsettingsis now to be foundin researchon bilingualism (Pavlenko, 2006). This field of research is interested in the cognitivemakeup of the bilinand discursive relagual individual,in linguistic in multilingualism, tivity, language socialization, emotions and identity, code-switching, echoing

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

912 Firth and Wagner'scall to focuson "multilinguality,language socialization,linguisticvariability, and 'nativeness"' 'foreignness' (p. 296). However, as Block (2003) and othersnoted, researchon does not investigate bilingualdevelbilingualism bi-or trilinopment,thatis,howsomeone becomes what it means to be bilingual.And that gual, only is always the rub froman SLA perspective. Versus Emergent Learning Interlanguage Given the misgivings many applied linguists now have regarding the notionsof NS and NNS, how has the notion target language,and learner, ofinterlanguage, definedas itis bytherelationof or NS language,faredin the a learnerto a target last10 years? Firth and Wagner(1997) arguedthat influenced was a metaphorheavily interlanguage in SLA by instructional and settings by transactionalencountersbetweenNSs and NNSs, where the power differential replicatesthe power difin classrooms.They argued that it did ferential not reflectthe emergent,contingent, complex In waypeople learn languagesin naturalsettings. one central notion of particular, interlanguage, has been contested. Fossilization, fossilization, defined by Selinker (1972) as a mechanismby which speakers "tend to keep in theirinterlanguage [certain] linguisticitems,rules and subfromtheir L1 (p. 177), was originally systems" seen as a permanent failure. Recent evidence shows that stabilizationmightbe a better concept (Long, 2003) because the claim of permademonstrated. nence has not been conclusively in fact what seen as a failure was Moreover, might combe evidence of an imaginative plurilingual petence (Houdebine, 2002; Kerbrat-Orecchioni, in particular, notbeing 1998) with code-switching, ofavoidanceor deficiency, buta display a strategy of identity (e.g., Zentella,1997). One could say that in the last 10 years reif not explicitly, searchershave been implicitly, fivecentralprocesses broadening the following of interlanguageto encompass other cognitive, emotional,social,and cultural processes:4 1. Language transfer, usuallyseen as transfer from L1 to L2 linguisticforms,has been extendedto a bidirectional transfer, includingfrom an L2 or thirdlanguage back to an L1 (Fuller, 1999; Pavlenko& Jarvis, 2002), withthistransfer in both directions, includingnot just linguistic rulesofpragforms but also conversational styles, maticuse,and conceptualmappings(see Gardner & Wagner,2004; House, Kasper, & Ross, 2003; Pavlenko,2002).

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal of training, to 2. Transfer originally referring the pedagogic method used in classrooms,has been broadened to encompass all effects of settaskson the structure of tingand setting-related discourse, which includes both positive effects such as in task-basedSLA (Bygate,Skehan, & effects such as in some Swain,2001) and negative talk or classroom discourse (Firth & foreigner Lantolf & 1997; 2002). Wagner, Genung, 3. Strategies ofsecond languagelearning, originallyseen as waysin which "learnersapproach the material to be learned" (Selinker, 1972, p. 179), have now included socially inflected strategieslike selective learning, for example, but refusing to learn the learningthe grammar, discourse (Canagarajah, 1993; Lin, 1999); learning only that which facilitatescomprehension ratherthan 2001); or "performing" (Seidlhofer, for actually"doing" learning, strategic purposes (Lantolf& Genung,2002). 4. Strategies of second language communicationwhenspeakingwith NSs havebeen expanded to include communication withotherNNSs and marker ofpoweror language choice as a symbolic 2003; Pavlenko,2002). identity (e.g., Kramsch, has been implicitly 5. Overgeneralization ap"TL to material"(Selinker, linguistic plied notjust or 1972, p. 179) but also to the overgeneralizing of social and culturalcharacteristics stereotyping of language in use (see 1 in thislist). SLA ? Broadening These changes in the notion of interlanguage correspond to new SLA theories that include other formsof learning thanjust the internalof knowlization of rules and the restructuring Sociocultural (SCT) theory edge representations. deposits that learning,as a mediated activity, velops fromthe social situationof interlocution along a zone of proximaldevelopment(Lantolf, the 2000). Sociocognitive theory reconceptualizes for as emergent NS target opportunities sociocoget al., 2007). Chaosnitive (Atkinson realignment theoryproposes that learning is an complexity process of linguistic, emergent,configurational social, and cognitive adaptationand restructuration on various scales (Larsen-Freeman, 1997). these do not agree as to whether SLA researchers new theoreticaladvances invalidate or enrich SLA concepts.For example, in the fundamental both Ellis (1997) and Doughtyand Long (2003), is treatedunder the the concept of motivation in SLA and isgenerally rubricindividual differences in naunderstood as being social-psychological is discussed ture. But in Ellis (1999), investment

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Kramsch and AnneWhiteside Claire in the chapter"Social Aspectsof Interlanguage," that the concept of interlanthereby suggesting be stretchedto accommodate itself can guage social phenomena like discourse,identity, style, and culture.In Doughtyand Long (2003), investmentis dealtwithbySiegel (2003) as an aspectof the social contextand is keptquite separatefrom In fact, the discussionof interlanguage. Siegel arof "the deficit view L2 gued, competenceimplicit and in the notionsof interlanguage, fossilization, in social holds non-native only particular speaker need to examine both contexts.SLA researchers and the functions of the L2 in social interaction itssymbolic beforeapplying such noassociations tions"(p.193). These newwaysof includingthe social dimenin how they sion in SLA differ considersocial catview) egorieseitheras stablegivens(structuralist or as discursiveconstructions(poststructuralist withinSCT have arview). Researchersworking conventional core constructs, SLA's gued against but theyseem to have maintainedthe categories NS target and the strucnormand interlanguage the social characteristo world turalist approach ticof traditional SLA. For example,Swain (2000) outputas collaborative dialogue reconceptualized their butadded "wesee [thestudents]'stretching' a collaborative interlanguage"(p. 101) through and problemsolving dialogue that"mediatesjoint Van Lier re102). (2000) knowledge building"(p. but placed the concept of inputwithaffordance, likeinput,are definedas "properties affordances, of the environment relevant to active,perceiving are not definedas disorganisms"(p. 252); they even though their relevance cursiveconstructs, is negotiatedby activeorganisms. Althoughshe draws on poststructuralist feminist Northeory, ton (2000), referring to the learner and his or hermultiple, and changingidentities, conflictual, stilltook a pretty structuralist viewof categories of identity and their multiplicity (Price, 1996). ofsymbolic Drawingon Bourdieu's (1991) theory motivation as investaction,she reconceptualized seems to hail ment,but her notionof investment of a more structuralist rationalactor theory than Bourdieu had in mind.It is difficult within structheoriesof SLA to capture the complex turalist of symbolic relationship power,subjectpositions, and languagelearningthatthegeopoliticaldeveltolight(see opmentsofrecent yearshavebrought nextsection). It maybe thatstructuralist approaches to SLA can onlybringus thatfarintounderstanding the constructed world of SLA. complex, discursively Theories witha more poststructuralist ecological orientation likechaos-complexity (Larsentheory

913 Freeman, 1997), language emergence (Ellis & Larsen-Freeman, 2006), and ecological theories of language (Kramsch,2002) offer not so much a new ontology(Lantolf & Johnson,2007) as a broader metaphorwithin which to explore how the cognitive, the emotional,the social, and the culturalare produced and reproducedin the discourse of everyday life. A CASE IN POINT To illustrate the challenges broughtabout in SLA bythisbroadeningof the threeconceptsunder discussion, we now turnto data thathave not been used bymainstream SLA. They traditionally werecollectedbyWhiteside(2006) as partof her to projecton MexicanYucatec Maya immigrants to learnenough language theUnitedStatestrying in the multilingual to make a living servicesector is typical of California. Their situation ofworkers in a global economythatknowsno nationalborders,no standardnationallanguages,and thrives at the informal economic and social marginsof nationalinstitutions. The data illustrate dramatithatSLA research facesnowacallythecomplexity

days. By some estimates,there are now 50,000 to in California,5 includ80,000Yucatecimmigrants some in the San Francisco 25,000 ing greater Bay area. Many come fromprimarily Maya-speaking towns and rural areas, where changes associated withthe passage of the NorthAtlantic Free Trade Agreement(NAFTA) have rendered agriculturallifeunsustainable. Heading northto Californiaforjobs in serviceindustries thatrelyon immiundocumented and, low-wage increasingly, workwithother NNSs grantlabor,theytypically of English,using Englishas a lingua francaand and pickMayaor Spanishwiththeircompatriots, at their bits of other ingup languages multilingual worksites.6 Based on a surveyquestionnaire distributed betweenJanuaryand March 2004 to 170 adults bornin theYucatanpeninsulawith Maya-speaking parentage,Whiteside (2006) attemptedto find out the language practices of the group.' She identified four focal Yucatecanswithwhom she workedcloselyforover2 years, themin following theirdailylives,helping them to organize comand exchanging lessonswiththem events, munity in Englishand Spanishliteracy forlessonsin Maya (forexample,withDon Francisco;see following). She gradually learned the relative valuesofMaya, social spaces. Spanish, and Englishin particular She foundthatMayawasused at home and among workteams,but oftenavoided in public,as it is in

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

914 theYucatanwherenegative racializedstereotypes link Maya withpoverty and ignorance (Gilemez Pineda, 2006). Spanish, on the other hand, alto blend with lows undocumented immigrants Latinolegal residents and citizens, solreinforcing withothermarginalized idarity Spanish-speaking Because Yucatec Spanish is markedand workers. treatment mayprovokediscriminatory by speakof Spanish,someYucatecans ers ofothervarieties choose to adopt newaccents.Englishprovidesan whenit suchdistinctions, escape from particularly It also is a linguafrancaused among immigrants. But has portablevalue as thelanguageoftourism. forwhomillegalstatus makes to thoseimmigrants residence uncertain,learningEnglish long-term is a low priority. Thus, when speakers of Maya or anyotherimmichoose touse Spanish,English, grantlanguages,theyare oftenmakingstrategic ratherthanideologicalchoices. In the following Don Francisco threeexcerpts, Yucatecan forthosewho a old and, (DF), 49-year knewhim fromtheYucatan,a successful farmer, takesthe researcher withhim through his neighborhood as he goes shopping for food for his DF frequently restaurant. shops popular informal on this street,spending a lot of money each and of meat,vegetables, week on large quantities masa for tortillas;he is thereforea preferred His statusis apcustomerwithlocal merchants. signaled by the way parent in the community, he moves throughspace, wearinghis black sombrero, chaperoning the researcheraround. On thatday,he was looking to get a good price on meat. As he entersTommy's Vietnamesegrocery are (a) Tommy, the Vietstore,the protagonists Canwho speaksVietnamese, namese storeowner tonese, Mandarin, English, some Spanish, and a fewwordsin Maya; (b) the Vietnameseclerk, and a little who speaksVietnamese, SpanEnglish, who speaksMaya, ish; (c) theYucatecanbutcher, Spanish,and a littleVietnamese; (d) Don Francisco,who speaksMaya and Spanish;and (4) the researcher(AW) who speaksEnAnglo-American and glish Spanish, and a littleMaya. (For transee theAppendix.) symbols, scription The threeexcerptsare part of the same short ofeach visit to thestore. We givea content analysis excerptfollowedbya discussionof how valid the notionsof NS, learner,and interlanguage might be in interpreting the data. In Excerpt 1, DF and AW have just entered DF introduces store. Vietnamese grocery Tommy's his visitor, AW, to the Vietnamese store owner, theVietnameseclerk;and theYucatecan Tommy; He knowsAW's rebutcher,a fellowtownsman. in the Mayalanguage and culture searchinterest

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal and is keen to showher howtheMayalanguage is It is clear thatDF aliveand wellin thecommunity. to has an impressive Rather thantrying presence. or English, he managesto make speakVietnamese othersspeak Mayaor Spanish.He uses simplified in line 1 withAW,and in line 11 Spanish syntax with the clerk. The Vietnamese clerk responds in line 4 in uncertainSpanish and shows even more uncertainty in Maya (line 6). She clearly feelsmore comfortable speakingEnglish,even if DF introduces the her Englishis farfrom perfect. butcherto AW in Spanish,the language he routinely speakswithher. In Excerpt 2, DF and the butcher are discussing things in Maya, their common native language, and AW and the clerk are conversing in English. AW and the clerk engage in a litof an tle history lesson (in English),reminiscent English conversationclass, on the parallels betweenMaya and Spanish on the one hand, and Chinese and Vietnameseon the other.AW falls role typical of at first into the information giving teacherese(lines 22-28), facilitating comprehentalk(e.g., line 26, 28). The sion through foreigner clerk'sbackchannel"o::h"s are eitherpoliteness and the acor else theyexpresssurprise markers, In line of new 29, she beknowledge. quisition if as to estabcomes more assertive ("yah"), trying lish equal footing withAW,or at least to impress checks "that's her, but AW's three confirmation her in lines 30 and 33, seem to reinstate right," as an Englishmaestra. authority In Excerpt 3, DF and the butcherhave been in Maya overthe price of meat.All of bargaining to Spanish.DF, havingcoma sudden DF switches withthe butcherin Maya, pleted his negotiations decides to buy a piece of meat and announces the Vietnamesestoreowner,in Spanto Tommy, ish, thathe willcome and get it laterin the day. in the storein He thentakesleave fromeveryone Maya.AW takesleave fromTommyand the clerk DF and in English. Thus, the two NS maestros, their native the visit in own close AW, languages. the twoVietnameseshopkeepersreBy contrast, in theirlanguage: spond to each of thecustomers Tommyrespondsto AWin English,and the clerk respondsto DF in Maya. DISCUSSION in differThese excerptscould be interpreted the ent waysdepending on how one interprets notions of NS, learner,and interlanguage.One conventionalway of looking at these data is as of actuallanguagelessonsgoingon at themargins In lines5-9, DF teaches transaction. a commercial

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Claire Kramsch and AnneWhiteside EXCERPT 1 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. DF: ((to AW, to clerk))ahi estaamiga(0.2) es miamiga referring this is my isfriend, friend) (Spanish: thank Clerk:((to another customer)) you DF: ((to clerk))ah (0.2) hola amiga hello friend) (Spanish: Clerk:((to DF)) hello (0.2) co(.)mo(.) esti ? how areyou?) (Spanish: DF: wanima'alob ? (Maya:howareyou,good?) Clerk: u:::m (0.2) howyousay ma'alob Tommy: (Maya:good) Clerk: ma'alob DF: ma'alob inVietnamese)) Clerk:((talkswith othercustomer DF: Eh (0.2) <esa es:: maestra>yo this is teacher me) (Spanish: Clerk:>oh yeah?< AW:yeah Clerk: yoube teacher? AW:I'm a teacher(.) yah Clerk: that's wo:::w. goo:::d. DF: ah (.) y:::eso and this) (Spanish: to butcher behindcounter))es Yucateco ((gestures he'sYucatecan) (Spanish: AW:oh si ? ohyeah?) (Spanish: DF: habla Maya hespeaks Maya) (Spanish:

915

in Maya.This the clerkhow to perform greetings lessondevelopsnaturally from theclerk's immediate need as an NNS learnertorespondto theMaya NS teacher (DF) in the L2, and fromher appeal to him for help ("how you say"). The response is givenin line 7 by anotherNNS, Tommy, who

provides sufficient input for the clerk to proan Initiation-Responseduce theword.Following Feedback patterntypicalof an instructional setDF validatesin line 9 thelearner'sutterance ting, in the previousline. In Excerpt 2, the English NS teacher(AW)similarly newknowledge imparts

EXCERPT 2 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30. 31. 32. 33. Clerk: (.) uh Spanish Mayais different AW: very different very very Clerk: o:::h AW: <before (.) way before wereMaya> Spanishpeople came there Clerk: uh huh (.) o:::h AW: <manythousand all> hundred years years(.) thenfive Spanish(.) that's Clerk: o:::h AW: befo::re? onlyMaya. Clerk:yah(.) looklikebefore all Chinese(.) no speakVietnamese Vietnam AW: that's that's right right DF: ((talking in Mayato butcher)) Clerk: looklikethat AW: that's right

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

916 EXCERPT 3 34.

91 (2007) TheModern Journal Language

DF: ((to butcher))dame esto givemethat) (Spanish: DF pays)) him the ((butcher piece ofmeatrequested, gives 35. Butcher: gracias thanks) (Spanish: toTommy)) toAWand referring 36. DF: ma'alob ((turning hablaun poquitomaya 37. su::esposa a little hiswife Maya) speaks (Spanish: 38. AW:oh si? yeah?) (Spanish: to butcher))pero no esposaeso 39. DF: ah (.) ah (.) ((pointing this butno(t)wife one) (Spanish: in Maya)) thebutcher 40. DF: ((talkswith 41. DF: ((to Tommy)) ah adios (0.2) yal ratolas cuatrode la tarde vengoa carne 42. comprar I come tobuy in the and later meat) uh,goodbye, afternoon four (Spanish: 43. DF: ((to clerk))bueno amiga OKfriend) (Spanish: si 44. Clerk: yes) (Spanish: 45. DF: si (0.2) diosbotik Tommy Tommy) (Maya:thanks oh ((laughter)) 46. Tommy: 47. DF: diosbotik (Maya:thanks) 48. AW:((to clerk))nice to meetyou 49. AW:((to Tommy))nice to meetyouTommy thank 50. Tommy: you 51. DF: ma'alob saama see youlater) (Maya:good ma'alob ata saama 52. Clerk:

to an NNS learner (the clerk),whose utterances the teacher evaluates and applauds in lines 30 and 33. But can we reallyspeak here of learnersand teachers, NNSs and NSs? Tommy and his cohave not asked to learn Maya,nor would worker to be learnersof Maya themselves consider they who exchangesMaya in thesecircumstances. AW, lessons for Spanish lessons withDF during the be called a learner of week, could legitimately she refrains situation, Maya,but in thisparticular in the lesson and speaks Enfromparticipating glishor Spanishinstead.Whatabout NS teachers? in introducedby DF as a maestra AWis explicitly line 13 and in AW line 11. Thisfactis confirmed by dulyadmiredbythe clerkin line 16. The kindof talkAW displaysin Excerpt 2 Englishforeigner to her utterances. flavor teacherly givesa distinct himself introduce does not other on the hand, DF, as a teacherof Maya,even thoughhe is an NS of In the thelanguageand likesto teachitto others. presence of the clerk,he uses Spanish foreigner

talk(lines 1, 11), a verbalbehaviorusuallycharaceven thoughhe of NS-NNS interactions, teristic himselfis not a nativespeaker of Spanish. (He learned it in school at age 14.) Anotherwayof looking at these data is to see them as the social achievementof a serviceenwhich entails counter in a multilingual setting, on certainroles,among whichare "doing" taking 1967; Heritage, learningand teaching(Garfinkel, 1984; Ochs, 1993). For example, in Excerpt 2, AW seems to be teaching the Vietnamese clerk about the historyof Maya and Spanish in the simplifiedEnglish used by NS teachers talking to NNS English speakers.But it is equally clear that the clerk does not perceive herself as a learner.The structural parallel betweenAW'sutterancesabout the Mayain Yucatan (lines 24 and about the Chinese 26) and the clerk'sutterances in Vietnam (lines 29 and 32) index equalityof conversational power.It establishesthe clerk as conversational equal ratherthan as learner,deher less-than-standard Englishinterlanguage spite

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Claire Kramsch and AnneWhiteside performance(e.g., lines 14, 29). It also matches hercultural pridewiththeprideoftheresearcher about Maya culture. However,throughher repeated backchannelings(uh huh,o:::h) the clerk seemsto accept,or at leastnot to contest, therole oflearnergivento her bythe teacher-a role that could also be seen as expressing or defcourtesy erence to someone who has been introducedas a maestra, or to a customer. Furthermore, byemher role,AWdisambiguates phasizingher maestra to DF, whichmightotherwise be sorelationship markedin terms ofclass,race,and ethnicity. cially We finda similar role performance in Excerpts 1 and 3 when DF takes on the role of Maya NS teacher.Indeed, the Maya lesson seems to serve as a way for DF to position himselfas a male maestro, Maya-speaking displayingan equal statuswith maestra. AW,thefemaleEnglish-speaking He seems to be displayinghis native language for and public relationspurposes,rather joviality than teaching Maya. In turn,Tommy and the clerk are willingto please a valued customerby engaging in what Rampton (1995) has called and to establisha non-White languagecrossing, fictive (or mainstream) co-ethnicity among immigrants(Smith,2006). The actorsin thisencounterare not onlyaligning themselves cognitively, linguistically, socially, and culturally withone another and with their environment et al., 2007), but they are (Atkinson also actingout variouspresentperceptions ofone anotherand memoriesof past language uses. DF and thebutcherhaggleoverthepriceofthemeat in their wouldhave private language,Maya,as they done in theirhometownback in Yucatan; they both switch to the official, public language,Spanwhen ish,a languagemore accessibleto theclerk, close the deal Simi(lines 34-35). theyofficially the clerktalksin her private larly, language,Vietwith namese, when she wantsto show solidarity her fellow (line 10), but she switches countrymen to the public language, English,withcustomers fromotherethnicities likeAW (lines 2, 10). Byperforming English,Maya,Spanish,or Vietthanonlylearning and usingthese namese,rather languages,the protagonists signal to each other which symbolicworld theyidentify with at the time of an utterance.Because the store is located in a predominantly area, Spanish-speaking DF's efforts to get Tommyto respond to him in Maya can be seen as a formof public resistance to Spanish colonial discoursesthathold Maya in low esteem.The clerk'suse ofVietnamesecan be seen as indexing eitherher national identity as role thatshe Vietnamese,or the special intimate wants to assumeand cultivate with herVietnamese

917 or the individualvoice she feels enticustomers, tled to retaineven in the presence of other customerswho do not understandVietnameseand who are trying to impose Spanish and Maya at thatmoment.This voice requires tactful negotiation in multilingual and an acute sense settings of the distribution of statusand symbolic power (Kramsch, 2003). It seems inappropriate to call the protagonists in this encounter NNSs or even learnersmeasured against what norm? They are, if anything, learning to get along with each other, indeed, to survivein a global workplacewhere are simultaneously at multiplesymbolicsystems work with ambiguous signs to be deciphered minutebyminute.Nor does the conceptofinterlanguageseem to applyto them.How shouldDF's nonstandardSpanish utterancesin lines 1 and 11 be understood?-as evidence of his Spanish interlanguage,as foreignertalk, or both? And what would be theirinitialstate betweenMaya, Spanish, English,and Vietnamese?What would be the target model? It is farmore important that the participants know a smattering of Spanish, Maya, Vietnamese, and English-not standard learnwhen it is appropriEnglish-and thatthey ate to use whatlanguage,with whom,in whatcirto makewhatkindofimpression, and cumstances, to display whatkindofidentity, role,or voice. It is here ofparamount to be perceivedor importance social actor,in whatever regardedas a legitimate of languagesyou speak,not language or mixture to become an objectively measurablenear-native on scale. speaker anyinterlanguage proficiency THEORETICAL VALIDITY OF SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION'S MAIN CONCEPTS TODAY These data seem to presenta problemforconceptslikeNS and NNS,learnerand interlanguage. Are theseconceptsstill validin our presentworld of multilingual whereeveryone is more migrants, or less nativeand nonnative, more or less novice and expert,more or less a capable peer? where it seems less important to learn a fulllinguistic than to participateas a legitimatesocial system actor in multiplecontextsof social life,verbally and nonverbally? wherelearningand using have become co-extensive? Goingbeyondthemeaning of the threefundamental SLA concepts in light of the researchwe have reviewed and the data we have discussedwould mean thatnativespeakers are not only individualswho speak a given language frombirth,but people who have learned otherlanguages,dialects,or sociolectsalong the

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

918 way,and who may not speak any standardvarietyat all. A language learnerwould be someone who not only accrues new linguistic knowledge, but who also feels,thinks, behaves in new ways, and who puts his or her variouslanguages in relation to one another and in relation to his or her many roles and subject positions.An interlanguage would be a language thatunfoldsnot onlyin themindbutalso in thebodyof a learner, thatis, in his or her perceptions, memories,and projectionslinked to the language and its past and presentuse. It would not develop in a more or less predictableprogression fromNNS to NS, fashbut would emerge in a dynamic, recursive ion throughreconfiguration of the total social, and emotionallandscape. cognitive, Butdoes all thisbroadeningofthefundamental researchers'attempts concepts of SLA facilitate to carve out a scientifically researchabledomain like NS forwhichtheyhave had to use categories and NNS, learner,and interlanguagein a very limited,specificway?Does it reflectthe reality of practitioners' to teach languages in attempts classroomswherethe NS target is alive and well, learnersare learners,and the originalnotion of makesa lot of sense? interlanguage It seems that the ascendancyof the social dimension in SLA has not invalidatedthe fundamental concepts of the field but has brought nature. Data like to the fore their structuralist those we have discussed suggest that the symand social aspects of SLA have bolic, historical, ecofroma poststructuralist, to be interpreted in one on logical perspective language learning, which categoriesof people, actions,and events reare not fixedbut are discursively constructed, wheresubjectpositions produced,and contested; to percep(not identities)are negotiatedrelative and a tionsof symbolic practicalsense of power the possibleand the feasible.In classroomsor in view environment where a deficit any normative the three of SLA is institutionally constructed, validity onlyinasmuch conceptshave theoretical as they reproduce the dominant discourse of In other environments, educational institutions. and workplaces, like grocery stores, playgrounds, these concepts do not reflectthe discourse of and fluidsubjectpositions, shifting opportunities, of our global times. tacticalcontingencies typical who An individual like Tommy or Tommy's clerk, uses a language not his or her own, is not necan NNS or a learner when servingcusessarily tomersin a grocerystore. The clerk's nonstandard English mightnot be an interlanguageat one. She mightbe "perall, let alone a fossilized forming" Spanishor Mayato please thecustomer. In turn,the VietnameseNS category applied to

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal not have muchrelevanceor weight Tommy might forDon Francisco,who perceivesall Vietnamese as Chinos.8 The traditional SLA concepts cannot deal withtheconstruction ofperceptions, the disand the exercise of affiliation, playsof symbolic store. grocery powerevidencedin Tommy's Of course, classroomstoo can be seen as a site for assumingsubject positionsand exercising symbolicpower. The generic entitiesoriginallyconceived by SLA research-NNS and NS, learner,and interlanguage-can also be seen as roles imposed byresearchers on the participants for the sake of scientific To whatextent inquiry. ecocan SLA researchadopt a poststructuralist, stance consonant with an era of logical shifting realities? It would mean perceptionsand slippery not so much broadening or reconceptualizing these SLA's fundamental conceptsas relativizing of the actors inconcepts to fitthe perspectives volved,includingthe researcher's perspective. Opening the Pandora's box of the social dimension of language acquisitionhas confronted need not SLA researchwiththe poststructuralist whatsocial contextit is inonlyto stateexplicitly and fromwhat subject positionsthe vestigating, are speakincludingthe researcher, participants, but also to or not to use decide whether ing, such categoriesas NS and NNS, learner,and interlanguage.Like any applied field of research, SLA's scientific conceptsare vulnerableto being and administrators who co-optedbypractitioners distort or politicizetheiroriginalmeaning; they ofmeanto a commodification are also vulnerable the scientific which hampers inquiryof the ing, themselves. researchers Takingthe social dimenthe claim to sion seriouslymeans interrogating of the fundamental SLA concepts, universality and adopting a more flexibleconception of the field based on an ecological understandingof Ultidiscursive, social, and historicalrelativity.9 the researcherperceivesand interprets mately, the social and educational contextof SLA based in thefield.It is this on hisor her ownpositioning needs and systemthat to be explicitly positioning in its for and accounted historical, atically placed context. political,and symbolic

NOTES on Awareness." "Perspectives SThe panelwastitled Richard were David Panelpresenters Schmidt, Birdsong, ReWallace. and Catherine Rod Ellis,Elsa Auerbach, were Chris Candlin andLeo vanLier. spondents 2 In particular hisdistinction (1987)with byKrashen andacquisition, but alsoRivers's between (1983) learning others. versus andbymany skill-using, skill-getting

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Claire Kramsch and AnneWhiteside


Otherefforts to reimagine and reframe processesassociatedwithuse-and-performance had been proposed beforethattime (see, e.g., Lantolf,1994), but within a different totally ontologicaltheory. 4 These fiveaspects of interlanguage wereviewedby Selinker (1972) as potentially leading to fossilization, butRampton(1987) remarked thatsociolinguists would viewthem as social processesof adaptationand alignment. 5F. Monlina OrtizMonasterio(personalcommunication,September14, 2006). 6A 2003 reportfromthe U.S. English Foundation, "Many Languages One America,"counted 112 different languages spoken in San Francisco,Oakland, and threeBayArea cities,based on Census 2000 Freemont, data. 7Because of the nonlegal statusof manyof theseimtherespondents had to be identified and conmigrants, tactedwithgreatpersonal tactand politicalawareness. All names are, needless to say, pseudonyms. the Vietnamesestoreowner, is in facteth8Tommy, nic Chinese. He attributedhis trilingualism(Vietto namese, Cantonese,Mandarin) ratherambiguously "go school." It is unclear whathis L1 is, but Englishis his fourth certainly language. 9 It should be clear fromthe preceding discussion thatbyrelativity we do not mean here onlythelinguistic that scientists likeLakoff(1987) and relativity cognitive Slobin (1996) have researched and to which Thorne in their work. The post(2000) and Lantolf(2007) refer structuralist stance suggestedby ecologicallyoriented approaches to SLA harksback to the criticaltheoretical writings of Foucault,Weedon, Butler, Giddens,and others.

919
Some thoughts on theory Block,D. (1996). "Notso fast!" and theheart relativism, culling, acceptedfindings and soul of SLA. Applied 17, 65-83. Linguistics, Block, D. (2003). The social turnin secondlanguageacquisition. Edinburgh,UK: Edinburgh University Press. Bourdieu, P. (1991). Language and symbolic power(G. Raymond & M. Adamson, Trans.). Cambridge, MA: HarvardUniversity Press. Breen, M. (1985). The social context for language Studies in Second learning--aneglectedsituation? 7, 135-158. LanguageAcquisition, contributions tolanguage learnBreen,M. (2001). Learner ing.London: Longman. Breen, M., & Candlin, C. (1980). The essentialsof a curriculum in language teaching. communicative 1, 89-112. Applied Linguistics, Brown,G., Malmkjaer, J. (Eds.). (1996). K., & Williams, & competence in second Performance language acquisition. Press. Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity M., Skehan,P., & Swain,M. (Eds.). (2001). ReBygate, tasks:Secondlanguagelearnsearching pedagogical and testing. London: Longman. ing,teaching of a Sri Canagarajah, S. (1993). Criticalethnography Lankan classroom: in student Ambiguities oppositionto reproduction ESOL. TESOL Quarthrough 27, 601-626. terly, Canale, M., & Swain, M. (1980). Theoretical bases of communicative approaches to second language 1, 1-47. teachingand testing. Applied Linguistics, N. (1965). Aspects CamChomsky, ofthetheory ofsyntax. bridge,MA: MIT Press. Coleman, J. A. (2006). English-medium teaching in European higher education. Language Teaching, 39, 1-14. LanCook, V. (1992). Evidence for multicompetence. 42, 557-591. guageLearning, Cook, V. (1999). Going beyond the nativespeaker in 33, 185language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 209. in applied Davies,A. (1991). Thenative speaker linguistics. UK EdinburghUniversity Press. Edinburgh, C., & Long, M. (Eds.). (2003). Thehandbook Doughty, of second Oxford:Blackwell. languageacquisition. Duff,P. (in press). Language socialization,participation, and identity: Ethnographicapproaches. In M. Martin-Jones, A.-M. de Mejia, & N. Hornberger (Eds.), Encyclopedia oflanguageand education.Discourse and education (Vol. 3). Heidelberg, Germany: Springer. N. (Eds.). (in press). EncyclopeDuff, P., & Hornberger, dia oflanguageand education. Languagesocialization(Vol. 8). NewYork:Springer. Edmondson,W. (1985). Discourse worldsin the classroom and in foreign in language learning.Studies Second 7, 159-168. LanguageAcquisition, D. (2006). Language Ellis, N. C., & Larsen-Freeman, emergence: Implicationsfor applied linguistics. Introduction to the Special Issue. Applied Linguistics, 27, 558-589. in interlanguage. Ellis,R. (1985). Sources of variability 6, 118-131. Applied Linguistics,

REFERENCES R. (1980). Turns, and tasks: of Patterns Allwright, topics, in language learningand teaching. participation In D. Larsen-Freeman (Ed.), Discourse analysisin second research MA: language (pp. 165-87). Rowley, House. Newbury D. (2002). Towarda sociocognitive Atkinson, approach to second language acquisition.TheModern Lan86, 525-545. guage Journal, Atkinson,D., Churchill, E., Nishino, T., & Okada, H. (2007). Alignmentand interactionin a sociocognitive approach to second language acquisition. The ModernLanguageJournal, 91, 169188. S. (Eds.). (2003). LanguagesocialR.,& Schecter, Bayley, ization in bilingual and multilingual societies. CleveMatters. don, UK: Multilingual A. (1991). Theoryconstruction in SLA: CompleBeretta, and opposition. Studiesin SecondLanmentarity 13, 493-511. guageAcquisition, M. (1985). InterlanE., & Sharwood-Smith, Bialystok, guage is not a stateof mind:An evaluationof the construct forsecond languageacquisition. Applied 6, 101-117. Linguistics,

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

920
Oxford: Ellis, R. (1997). Second languageacquisition. OxfordUniversity Press. Ellis,R. (1999). Itemversussystem learning:explaining freevariation. 20, 460-80. Linguistics, Applied communiFirth, A., & Wagner, J. (1997). On discourse, cation,and (some) fundamental conceptsin SLA research. TheModern Language Journal,81, 285300. M. (1999). Betweenthreelanguages:ComposFuller,J. in interlanguage. ite structure Linguistics, Applied 20, 534-561. Gardner, (Eds.). (2004). Second R.,& Wagner,J. language conversations. London: Continuum. H. (1967). Studiesin ethnomethodology. New Garfinkel, York:PrenticeHall. Gass, S., Bardovi-Harlig, K., Magnan, S. S., & Walz,J. (Eds.). (2002). Pedagogicalnorms for secondand and teaching. Amsterdam: foreign language learning JohnBenjamins. London: The Graddol,D. (2000). Thefuture ofEnglish. British Council. A. (1997). Gregg,K., Long, M.,Jordan,G., & Beretta, in SLA. Linand its discontents Rationality Applied 18, 537-558. guistics, and GiiemezPineda,M. (2006,April).Language,culture, in ruralYucatan. indigenous Paper presented rights of at the MayabBejlae: YucatanToday,University California, Berkeley. A book Hatch, E. M. (1978). Second languageacquisition: House. Malden, MA: Newbury ofreadings. Heath, S. B., & Kramsch,C. (2004). Individuals,instiand the uses of literacy. tutions, Journal ofApplied 1, 75-94. Linguistics, and ethnomethodology. New J. (1984). Garfinkel Heritage, Press. York:Polity Houdebine, A. M. (Ed.). (2002). L'imaginaire linguistique.Paris:L'Harmattan. House, J., Kasper, G., & Ross, S. (Eds.). (2003). MisDiscourse to in social life: approaches understanding talk.London: Longman. problematic on A., & Coupland, N. (1999). Perspectives Jaworski, In A. Jaworski & N. Coupland discourseanalysis. reader(pp. 1-44). London: (Eds.), The discourse Routledge. Kanno,Y.,& Norton,B. (2003). Imaginedcommunities Introduction. and educational possibilities: Jourand Education,2, 241nal ofLanguage,Identity, 249. foracquisition.TheModern Kasper,G. (1997). "A"stands 81, 307-312. Language Journal, verbales: C. (1998). Les interactions Kerbrat-Orecchioni, rituels. Paris:Colin. culturelles etechanges Variations Kramsch, C. (1981). Discourse analysis and second language teaching. Washington,DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. Kramsch, C. (1985). Classroom interaction and discourseoptions. Studiesin SecondLanguageAc7, 169-183. quisition, in language teachC. (1993). Context and culture Kramsch, Press. ing. Oxford:OxfordUniversity Kramsch,C. (1997). The privilegeof the non-native speaker.PMLA, 359-369.

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal


Kramsch,C. (2000). Second language acquisition,apand the teachingof foreignlanplied linguistics, guages. The ModernLanguageJournal,84, 311326. "How can we tellthe C. (2002). Introduction: Kramsch, dancer fromthe dance?" In C. Kramsch (Ed.), Language acquisitionand language socialization: (pp. 1-30). London: ContinEcological perspectives uum. role, and voice in crossKramsch,C. (2003). Identity, cultural (mis)communication.In J. House, G. in soKasper,& S. Ross (Eds.), Misunderstanding cial life: Discourse toproblematic talk(pp. approaches 129-153). London: Longman. and practice in second Krashen,S. D. (1987). Principles Cliffs, Englewood NJ:Prenlanguageacquisition. ticeHall. Lakoff,G. (1987). Women, fire,and dangerous things: reveal about the mind. Chicago: What categories of Chicago Press. University Lantolf,J. P. (1994). Sociocultural theory and second language learning:Introductionto the special issue. TheModern Journal,78, 418Language 420. all the P (1996). SLA theory building:Letting Lantolf,J. flowers bloom. LanguageLearning, 46, 713-749. and second (2000). Sociocultural language theory Lantolf,J. Oxford: Oxford Press. University learning. Lantolf, J. (2007). Re(de)fining language proficiency In H. in lightof the concept of "languaculture." Theconlanguagelearning: Byrnes(Ed.), Advanced and Vygotsky tributions (pp. 72-94). LonofHalliday don: Continuum. Lantolf, J., & Genung, P. B. (2002). "I'd ratherswitch An activity-theoretic of power, than fight": study success, and failurein a foreignlanguage classroom. In C. Kramsch (Ed.), Language acquisition and languagesocialization: Ecological perspectives (pp. 175-196). London: Continuum. Lantolf, J. P., & Johnson,K. E. (2007). ExtendingFirth to L2 and Wagner's(1997) ontologicalperspective classroompraxisand teacher education. Modern 91, 875-890. Language Journal, D. (1980). Discourse Larsen-Freeman, analysisin second MA: Newbury House. research. Rowley, language science D. (1997). Chaos-complexity Larsen-Freeman, and second language acquisition.Applied Linguis18, 141-165. tics, Leather, of J.,& van Dam, J. (Eds.). (2003). Theecology The Netherlands: Dordrecht, language acquisition. Kluwer. and perconsciousness, Leontiev,A. N. (1978). Activity, Prentice Hall. Cliffs, sonality. NJ: Englewood in thereproLin,A. M. Y. (1999). Doing-English-lessons ofsocialworlds?TESOL ductionor transformation 33, 393-412. Quarterly, R. (1997). English with an accent: Language, Lippi-Green, LonUnited States. in the and discrimination ideology, don: Routledge. and second lanLong, M. (1981). Input, interaction, guage acquisition.In H. Winitz(Ed.), NativelanAnnals of languageacquisition. guage and foreign

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Claire Kramsch and AnneWhiteside


theAcademy of Sciences(Vol. 379, pp. 259-278). Malden, MA: Blackwell. Long, M. (1990). The least a second language acquisitiontheory needs to explain. TESOL Quarterly, 24, 649-666. forSLA theories. Long, M. (1993). Assessment strategies 14, 225-249. Applied Linguistics, and fossilization in interLong, M. (2003). Stabilization language. In C. Doughty& M. Long (Eds.), The handbook ofsecondlanguageacquisition (pp. 487536). Oxford:Blackwell. Mahwah,NJ: Markee,N. (2000). Conversation analysis. Erlbaum. teacher. London: Medgyes,P. (1994). The non-native Macmillan. in language Norton, B. (2000). Language and identity and educational Gender, learning: ethnicity, change. London: Longman. Norton Peirce, B. (1995). Social identity, investment, and language learning. TESOL Quarterly, 29, 931. socialidentity: A language Ochs,E. (1993). Constructing socialization Research onLanguageand perspective. SocialInteraction, 26, 287-306. A. (2002). Emotionsand the bodyin Russian Pavlenko, and English.Pragmatics and Cognition, 10, 201236. Pavlenko, A. (2006). Emotionsand multilingualism. Press. Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity transfer. S. (2002). Bidirectional Pavlenko,A., & Jarvis, 23, 190-214. Applied Linguistics, Pavlenko,A., & Lantolf, J. (2000). Participationand reconstruction of selves. In J. Lantolf (Ed.), Socioculturaltheory and second language learning Press. (pp. 155-178). Oxford:OxfordUniversity Poole, D. (1992). Language socializationin the second 42, 593language classroom.LanguageLearning, 616. Price,S. (1996). Commentson BonnyNortonPeirce's "Social identity, and language learninvestment, 30, 331-337. ing." TESOL Quarterly, and not speakRampton,B. (1987). Stylistic variability ing "normal" English: Some post-Labovianapfor the studyof proaches and theirimplications In R. Ellis (Ed.), Second acinterlanguage. language in context quisition (pp. 47-58). EnglewoodCliffs, NJ:PrenticeHall. Rampton,B. (1990). Displacingthe nativespeaker:Exand inheritance. pertise,affiliation, ELTJournal, 44, 87-101. Rampton, B. (1995). Crossing: Language and ethnicity London: Longman. amongadolescents. W.M. (1983). Communicating in a second Rivers, naturally and practice in languageteaching. language:Theory NewYork:CambridgeUniversity Press. Seedhouse, P. (2005). Conversationanalysisand lan38, 165-187. guage learning.LanguageTeaching, Seidlhofer,B. (2001). Closing a conceptual gap: The case fora description ofEnglishas a linguafranca. International 11,133ofApplied Linguistics, Journal 158.

921
International Review Selinker,L. (1972). Interlanguage. 209-231. 10, ofApplied Linguistics, with"conSelinker, L., & Douglas, D. (1985). Wrestling text"in interlanguage theory. Applied Linguistics, 6, 190-204. Siegel,J. (2003). The social context.In C. Doughty& M. Long (Eds.), The handbook ofsecondlanguage acquisition (pp. 178-223). Oxford:Blackwell. Slobin, D. I. (1996). From "thoughtand language" to "thinking for speaking."In J. Gumperz & S. Levinson(Eds.), Rethinking linguistic relativity (pp. Press. 70-96). Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity Smith,R. C. (2006). MexicanNew York:Transnational lives of new immigrants. of Berkeley:University California Press. B. (1990). Introduction to a colloquium: The Spolsky, scope and formof a theoryof second language 24, 609-616. learning.TESOL Quarterly, and beyond: Swain,M. (2000). The output hypothesis diaMediatingacquisitionthroughcollaborative and logue. InJ.P. Lantolf(Ed.), Sociocultural theory secondlanguage learning(pp. 97-114). Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press. Tarone, E., & Yule, G. (1989). Focus on the language learner. Oxford:OxfordUniversity Press Thorne,S. L. (2000). Second language acquisitiontheIn J. P. Lanoryand the truth(s)about relativity. and second tolf(Ed.), Sociocultural theory language learning(pp. 219-245). Oxford: Oxford UniverPress. sity Trappes-Lomax,H. (2004). Discourse analysis.In A. Davies & C. Elder (Eds.), The handbook ofapplied linguistics (pp. 133-164). London: Blackwell. U.S. English Foundation. (2003). Many languages, one America. Retrieved February 27, 2007, from http://www.us-english.org/foundation/research/lia/sort_by_geography.asp Valdes, G. (1995). The teachingof minority languages as academic subjects:Pedagogical and theoretical 79,299challenges.TheModern LanguageJournal, 328. Valdes, G. (1998). The constructof the near-native speaker in the foreignlanguage profession: peron ideologiesoflanguage.ADFL Bulletin, spectives 29, 4-8. M. (1998). Chicano SpanValdes,G., & Geoffrion-Vinci, ish: The problem of the "underdeveloped"code in bilingual TheModern repertoires. Language Journal, 82, 473-501. van Lier, L. (2000). From input to affordance: Socialinteractive from an learning ecological perspective.In J.P. Lantolf(Ed.), Sociocultural and theory secondlanguagelearning(pp. 245-259). Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press. van Lier, L. (2004). Theecology and semiotics oflanguage A sociocultural The Dordrecht, learning: perspective. Netherlands: Kluwer. L. S. (1978). Mind in society. Vygotsky, Cambridge,MA: HarvardUniversity Press. K.A. (2004). Mind,language,and episteWatson-Gegeo, Towarda languagesocialization mology: paradigm

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

922
forSLA. The Modern LanguageJournal,88, 331350. Watson-Gegeo, K. A., & Nielsen, S. (2003). Language socializationin SLA. In C. Doughty& M. Long (Eds.), Thehandbook ofsecond languageacquisition (pp. 155-177). Oxford:Blackwell. A. (2006). "Wearethe Transnational Whiteside, explorers": Yucatec Calimultilingual Maya-speakers negotiating Univerfornia. Unpublisheddoctoraldissertation, of California, sity Berkeley. in J. (2000). Delayed next turnrepairinitiation Wong, native-non-native speaker English conversation. 21, 244-267. Applied Linguistics,

TheModern 91 (2007) Language Journal


L. (1979). Individual differencesin Wong-Fillmore, second language acquisition. In C. Fillmore, D. Kempler, & W. Wang (Eds.), Individual in language abilityand language bedifferences havior (pp. 203-228). New York: Academic Press. Zentella,A. M. (1997). Growing up bilingual.Malden, MA: Blackwell. Zuengler, J.,& Cole, K. (2005). Language socialization and second languagelearning. In E. Hinkel (Ed.), research in and Handbook second of language teaching learning(pp. 301-316). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

APPENDIX A Transcription Conventions (0.2) (.) ? (()) yeah >< <> of seconds elapsed timein tenths micropause raisedintonation fullstop marks intonation falling double parentheses containtranscriber's comments of immediately priorsound prolongation indicatessome formof stress, via pitchor amplitude underscoring faster speech slowerspeech in italics translations

This content downloaded on Fri, 22 Feb 2013 04:35:41 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Vous aimerez peut-être aussi