Fluent Essays

Questions: 1.Where is the article published? ls the journal peer reviewed, meaning that other researchers have reviewed and commented on it before it was published? 2.What is the author's purpose in writing the article? 3. What research gap is being addressed or what research tradition is being extended in this article? 4. Who is the target audience for the article and what would they hope to get out of it? 5. What is the date of the article? 6. Who does the author cite for setting up their argument? 7. What are the research questions or what is the statement of purpose? 8. Does the author state which theories they are working with or what frameworks inform their research? What are they? 9. Who or what is the author studying? 10. How is the study set up? What did the participants do? 11. How were the data collected? What materials or instruments did the author use? Where can you find them?  12. How are the data analyzed? 13.What are the major results? 14. What information is in the tables and figures? Can you interpret those tables or figures?  15. What are the major claims of the article?  16.How do the findings address the research question(s) or purpose of the article? 17.What is the significance of the claims? 18. What limitations does the author note, if any? 19.How do the findings link to the previous research introduced in the introduction? TESOL QUARTERLY Vol. 29, No. 1, Spring 1995 Social Identity, Investment, and Language Learning* BONNY NORTON PEIRCE Ontario Institute for Studies in Education The author argues that second language acquisition (SLA) theorists have struggled to conceptualize the relationship between the lan- guage 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 some- times 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 ahistorical and unidimen- sional, 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 compe- tence. Everybody working with me is Canadian. When I started to work there, they couldn’t understand that it might be difficult for me to understand everything and know about everything what it’s normal for them. To explain it more clearly I can write an *Earlier drafts of this paper were presented at the Social Issues/Social Change Conference in Toronto, Canada, in July 1993, and the 28th Annual TESOL convention in Baltimore, United States, in March 1994. 9 example, which happened few days ago. The girl [Gail] which is working with me pointed at the man and said: “Do you see him?”—I said “Yes, Why?” “Don’t you know him?” “No. I don’t know him.” “How come you don’t know him. Don’t you watch TV. That’s Bart Simpson.” It made me feel so bad and I didn’t answer her nothing. Until now I don’t know why this person was important. Eva, February 8, 19911 No researcher today would dispute that language learning results from participation in communicative events. Despite any claims to the contrary, however, the nature of this learning remains undefined. Savignon, 1991, p. 271 H ow would second language acquisition (SLA) theorists conceptu-alize the relationship between Eva, an immigrant language learner, and Gail, an anglophone Canadian, both of whom are located in the same North American workplace in the 1990s? Because they have struggled to conceptualize the relationship between the individual language learner and larger social processes, a question such as this poses a problem for SLA theorists. In general, many SLA theorists have drawn artificial distinctions between the language learner and the language learning context. On the one hand, the individual is de- scribed with respect to a host of affective variables such as his/her motivation to learn a second language. Krashen (1981, 1982), for example, has hypothesized that comprehensible input in the presence of a low affective filter is the major causal variable in SLA. In Krashen’s view, this affective filter comprises the learner’s motivation, self-confi- dence, and anxiety state—all of which are variables that pertain to the individual rather than the social context. Furthermore, the personality of the individual has been described unidimensionally as introverted or extroverted, inhibited or uninhibited, field dependent or field inde- pendent. 2 With reference to these theories, Eva might be described as someone who is unmotivated with a high affective filter; perhaps an introverted personality who is unable to interact appropriately with her interlocutors. Or she might be portrayed as a poor language learner who has not developed sociolinguistic competence. 1Quoted in Peirce, 1993, p. 197. Eva explained that the man her co-worker pointed to had a “Bart Simpson” t-shirt on. Spelling mistakes in the original have been corrected. 2See Brown (1987) for an overview of the literature on personality variables and language learning. 10 TESOL QUARTERLY Other theories of SLA focus on social rather than individual variables in language learning. The social frequently refers to group differences between the language learner group and the target language group (Schumann, 1976). In this view, where there is congruence between the second language group and the target language group, what Schu- mann (1976) terms social distance between them is considered to be minimal, in turn facilitating the acculturation of the second language group into the target language group and enhanced language learning. Where there is great social distance between two groups, little accultur- ation is considered to take place, and the theory predicts that members of the second language group will not become proficient speakers of the target language. Supporters of the Acculturation Model of SLA (Schumann, 1978) might argue that despite the fact that Eva and Gail are in contact, there is great social distance between them because there is little congruence between Eva’s culture and that of Gail. For this reason, Eva might struggle to interact successfully with members of the target language community. Because of the dichotomous distinctions between the language learner and the social world, there are disagreements in the literature on the way affective variables interact with the larger social context. For example, although Krashen regards motivation as a variable inde- pendent of social context, Spolsky (1989) regards the two as inextrica- bly intertwined. Although Krashen draws distinctions between self- confidence, motivation, and anxiety, Clement, Gardner, and Smythe (quoted in Spolsky, 1989) consider motivation and anxiety as a subset of self-confidence. Although Krashen considers self-confidence as an intrinsic characteristic of the language learner, Gardner (1985) argues that self-confidence arises from positive experiences in the context of the second language: “Self-confidence . . . develops as a result of posi- tive experiences in the context of the second language and serves to motivate individuals to learn the second language” (p. 54). Such disagreements in the SLA literature should not be dismissed, as Gardner (1989) dismisses them, as “more superficial than real” (p. 137). I suggest that this confusion arises because artificial distinc- tions are drawn between the individual and the social, which lead to arbitrary mapping of particular factors on either the individual or the social, with little rigorous justification. In the field of SLA, theorists have not adequately addressed why it is that a learner may sometimes be motivated, extroverted, and confident and sometimes unmotivated, introverted, and anxious; why in one place there may be social distance between a specific group of language learners and the target language community, whereas in another place the social distance may be mini- mal; why a learner can sometimes speak and other times remains silent. Although muted, there is an uneasy recognition by some theorists that SOCIAL IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND LEARNING 1 1 current theory about the relationship between the language learner and the social world is problematic. Scovel (1978) for example, has found that research on foreign language anxiety suffers from several ambiguities, and Gardner and MacIntyre (1993) remain unconvinced of the relationship between “personality variables” (p. 9) and language achievement. The central argument of this paper is that SLA theorists have not developed a comprehensive theory of social identity that integrates the language learner and the language learning context. Furthermore, they have not questioned how relations of power in the social world affect social interaction between second language learners and target language speakers. Although many SLA theorists (Ellis, 1985; Kras- hen, 1981; Schumann, 1978; Spolsky, 1989; Stern, 1983) recognize that language learners do not live in idealized, homogeneous communi- ties but in complex, heterogeneous ones, such heterogeneity has been framed uncritically. Theories of the good language learner have been developed on the premise that language learners can choose under what conditions they will interact with members of the target language community and that the language learner’s access to the target lan- guage community is a function of the learner’s motivation. Thus Gard- ner and MacIntyre (1992), for example, argue that “the major charac- teristic of the informal context is that it is voluntary. Individuals can either participate or not in informal acquisition contexts” (p. 213). SLA theorists have not adequately explored how inequitable relations of power limit the opportunities L2 learners have to practice the target language outside the classroom. In addition, many have assumed that learners can be defined unproblematically as motivated or unmoti- vated, introverted or extroverted, inhibited or uninhibited, without considering that such affective factors are frequently socially con- structed in inequitable relations of power, changing over time and space, and possibly coexisting in contradictory ways in a single indi- vidual. Drawing on a recent study (Peirce, 1993) as well as my reading in social theory, I will propose a theory of social identity that I hope will contribute to debates on second language learning. This theory of social identity, informed by my data, assumes that power relations play a crucial role in social interactions between language learners and target language speakers. In March 1991, for example, when I asked Eva why the communication breakdown between her and Gail had taken place, Eva indicated she had felt humiliated at the time. She said that she could not respond to Gail because she had been positioned as a “strange woman.” What had made Eva feel strange? When I analyzed Eva’s data more closely, I realized that Gail’s questions to Eva were in fact rhetorical. Gail did not expect, or possibly even desire a 1 2 TESOL QUARTERLY response from Eva: “How come you don’t know him. Don’t you watch TV. That’s Bart Simpson.” It was Gail and not Eva who could deter- mine the grounds on which interaction could proceed; it was Gail and not Eva who had the power to bring closure to the conversation. If, as Savignon (1991) argues, language learning results from participa- tion in communicative events, it is important to investigate how power relations are implicated in the nature of this learning. I therefore take the position that notions of the individual and the language learner’s personality in SLA theory need to be reconceptual- ized in ways that will problematize dichotomous distinctions between the language learner and the language learning context. I argue that SLA theory needs to develop a conception of the language learner as having a complex social identity that must be understood with refer- ence to larger, and frequently inequitable social structures which are reproduced in day-to-day social interaction. In taking this position, I foreground the role of language as constitutive of and constituted by a language learner’s social identity. It is through language that a person negotiates a sense of self within and across different sites at different points in time, and it is through language that a person gains access to—or is denied access to—powerful social networks that give learners the opportunity to speak (Heller, 1987). Thus language is not con- ceived of as a neutral medium of communication but is understood with reference to its social meaning. I support these arguments with findings from a longitudinal case study of the language learning expe- riences of a group of immigrant women in Canada (Peirce, 1993). THE STUDY: IMMIGRANT WOMEN AS LANGUAGE LEARNERS From January to June 1990 I helped teach a 6-month ESL course to a group of recent immigrants at Ontario College in Newtown, Canada.3 After the course was complete, I invited the learners to participate in a longitudinal case study of their language learning experiences in Canada. Five women agreed to participate in the study: Mai from Vietnam, Eva and Katarina from Poland, Martina from Czechoslova- kia, and Felicia from Peru. My research questions were divided into two parts: Part I How are the opportunities for immigrant women in Canada to practice ESL socially structured outside the classroom? How do immigrant women 3The names of places and participants have been changed to protect tbe identities of partici- pants. SOCIAL IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND LEARNING 13 respond to and act upon these social structures to create, use, or resist opportunities to practice English? To what extent should their actions be understood with reference to their investment in English and their changing social identities across time and space? Part II How can an enhanced understanding of natural language learning and social identity inform SLA theory, in general, as well as ESL pedagogy for immigrant women in Canada? (Peirce, 1993, p. 18) The study lasted 12 months—from January to December 1991. A major source of data collection was a diary study: From January to June 1991, the participants kept records of their interactions with anglophone Canadians and used diaries to reflect on their language learning experiences in the home, workplace, and community. During the course of the study, we met on a regular basis to share some of the entries the women had made in their diaries and to discuss their insights and concerns. I also drew a substantial amount of data from two detailed questionnaires I administered before and after the study, as well as personal and group interviews, and home visits. One of the assumptions on which I based my research questions was that practice in the target language is a necessary condition of second language learning. As Spolsky (1989) argues, extensive expo- sure to the target language, in relevant kinds and amounts, and the opportunity to practice the target language are essential for second language learning: Learning cannot proceed without exposure and practice. These conditions, furthermore, are graded: The more expo- sure and practice, the more proficient the learner will become. Spolsky (1989) argues that the language learner can have exposure to and practice in the target language in two qualitatively different settings: the natural or informal environment of the target language community or the formal environment of the classroom. The focus of my research was on the natural language learning experiences of the women in their homes, workplaces, and communities. THE THEORY: SOCIAL IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND THE RIGHT TO SPEAK Social Identity as Multiple, a Site of Struggle, and Changing Over Time In examining the relationship between the language learners in my study and the social worlds in which they lived, I drew in particular on 14 TESOL QUARTERLY Weedon’s (1987) conception of social identity or subjectivity. Feminist poststructuralism, like much postmodern educational theory (Cher- ryholmes, 1988; Giroux, 1988; Simon, 1992), explores how prevailing power relations between individuals, groups, and communities affect the life chances of individuals at a given time and place. Weedon’s work, however, is distinguished from that of other postmodern theorists in the rigorous and comprehensive way in which her work links individual experience and social power in a theory of subjectivity. Weedon (1987) defines subjectivity as “the conscious and unconscious thoughts and emotions of the individual, her sense of herself and her ways of understanding her relation to the world” (p. 32). Furthermore, like other poststructuralist theorists who inform her work (Derrida, Lacan, Kristeva, Althusser, and Foucault), Weedon does not neglect the cen- tral role of language in her analysis of the relationship between the individual and the social: “Language is the place where actual and possible forms of social organization and their likely social and political consequences are defined and contested. Yet it is also the place where our sense of ourselves, our subjectivity, is constructed” (p. 21). Three defining characteristics of subjectivity, as outlined by Weedon, are particularly important for understanding my data: the multiple nature of the subject; subjectivity as a site of struggle; and subjectivity as changing over time. First, Weedon (1987) argues, the terms subject and subjectivity signify a different conception of the individual from that associated with humanist conceptions of the individual dominant in Western philosophy. Whereas humanist conceptions of the individ- ual—and most definitions of the individual in SLA research—presup- pose that every person has an essential, unique, fixed, and coherent core (introvert/extrovert; motivated/unmotivated; field dependent/ field independent), poststructuralism depicts the individual as diverse, contradictory, and dynamic; multiple rather than unitary, recentered rather than centered. By way of example (and at the risk of oversimpli- fication) a humanist might be attracted by a book with the title How to Discover Your True Self. A poststructuralist, on the other hand, might prefer a book titled It’s OK to Live with Contradictions. Second, the conception of social identity as a site of struggle is an extension of the position that social identity is multiple and contradic- tory. Subjectivity is produced in a variety of social sites, all of which are structured by relations of power in which the person takes up different subject positions—teacher, mother, manager, critic—some positions of which may be in conflict with others. In addition, the subject is not conceived of as passive; he/she is conceived of as both subject of and subject to relations of power within a particular site, community, and society: The subject has human agency. Thus the subject positions that a person takes up within a particular discourse SOCIAL IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND LEARNING 15 are open to argument: Although a person may be positioned in a particular way within a given discourse, the person might resist the subject position or even set up a counterdiscourse which positions the person in a powerful rather than marginalized subject position. Third, in arguing that subjectivity is multiple, contradictory, and a site of struggle, feminist poststructuralism highlights the changing quality of a person’s social identity. As Weedon (1987) argues, “the political significance of recentering the subject and abandoning the belief in essential subjectivity is that it opens up subjectivity to change” (p. 33). This is a crucial point for second language educators in that it opens up possibilities for educational intervention. I will demonstrate below that although it might be tempting to argue that Eva was essentially an introverted language learner, the data which follows provides convincing evidence that Eva’s social identity was not fixed; it was a site of struggle and changed dramatically over time— as did her interactions with anglophone Canadians. At the time of the Bart Simpson exchange, however, Gail was in a powerful subject position and Eva did not actively resist being positioned as “strange.” Because of the construction of Eva’s social identity in Canada as immi- grant, the social meaning of Gail’s words to her were understood by Eva in this context. Had Eva been, for example, an anglophone Cana- dian who endorsed public rather than commercial television, she could have set up a counterdiscourse to Gail’s utterance, challenging Gail’s interest in popular culture. However, because of the unequal relations of power between Gail and Eva at that point in time, it was Gail who was subject of the discourse on Bart Simpson; Eva remained subject to this discourse. Thus while Eva had been offered the opportunity to engage in social interaction, to “practice” her English, her subject position within the larger discourse of which she and Gail were a part undermined this opportunity: “It made me feel so bad and I didn’t answer her nothing.” This discourse must be understood not only in relation to the words that were said, but in relationship to larger structures within the workplace, and Canadian society at large, in which immigrant language learners often struggle for acceptance in Canadian society. From Motivation to Investment A logical extension of reconceptualizing notions of the individual in SLA theory is the need to problematize the concept of motivation. In the field of second language learning, the concept of motivation is drawn primarily from the field of social psychology, where attempts have been made to quantify a learner’s commitment to learning the target language. The work of Gardner and Lambert (1972) and Gard- 16 TESOL QUARTERLY ner (1985) has been particularly influential in introducing the notions of instrumental and integrative motivation into the field of SLA. In their work, instrumental motivation references the desire that language learners have to learn a second language for utilitarian purposes, such as employment, whereas integrative motivation references the desire to learn a language to integrate successfully with the target language community. Such conceptions of motivation, which are dominant in the field of SLA, do not capture the complex relationship between relations of power, identity, and language learning that I have been investigating in my study of immigrant women. In my view, the conception of investment rather than motivation more accurately signals the socially and historically constructed relationship of the women to the target language and their sometimes ambivalent desire to learn and practice it. My conception of investment has been informed by my reading in social theory, although I have not as yet found a comprehensive discussion of the term in these contexts. It is best understood with reference to the economic metaphors that Bourdieu (1977) uses in his work—in particular the notion of cultural capital. Bourdieu and Passeron (1977) use the term cultural capital to reference the knowl- edge and modes of thought that characterize different classes and groups in relation to specific sets of social forms. They argue that some forms of cultural capital have a higher exchange value than others in a given social context. I take the position that if learners invest in a second language, they do so with the understanding that they will acquire a wider range of symbolic and material resources,4 which will in turn increase the value of their cultural capital. Learners will expect or hope to have a good return on that investment—a return that will give them access to hitherto unattainable resources. Further- more, drawing on Ogbu (1978), I take the position that this return on investment must be seen as commensurate with the effort expended on learning the second language. It is important to note that the notion of investment I am advocating is not equivalent to instrumental motivation. The conception of instru- mental motivation generally presupposes a unitary, fixed, and ahistor- ical language learner who desires access to material resources that are the privilege of target language speakers. In this view, motivation is a property of the language learner—a fixed personality trait. The notion of investment, on the other hand, attempts to capture the relationship of the language learner to the changing social world. It conceives of the language learner as having a complex social identity 4By symbolic resources I refer to such resources as language, education, and friendship, whereas I use the term material resources to include capital goods, real estate, and money. SOCIAL IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND LEARNING 17 and multiple desires. The notion presupposes that when language learners speak, they are not only exchanging information with target language speakers but they are constantly organizing and reorganizing a sense of who they are and how they relate to the social world. Thus an investment in the target language is also an investment in a learner’s own social identity, an identity which is constantly changing across time and space. Communicative Competence and the Right to Speak Given the position that communication and social interaction are implicated in the construction of a language learner’s social identity, my research on immigrant women in Canada develops questions I have raised in earlier research (Peirce, 1989) about the way Hymes’ (1971) views on communicative competence have been taken up by many theorists in the field of second language learning over the past 15 years. I have argued (Peirce, 1989) that although it is important for language learners to understand the rules of use of the target language, it is equally important for them to explore whose interests these rules serve. What is considered appropriate usage is not self- evident but must be understood with reference to relations of power between interlocutors. I take the position that theories of communica- tive competence in the field of second language learning should extend beyond an understanding of the appropriate rules of use in a particular society, to include an understanding of the way rules of use are socially and historically constructed to support the interests of a dominant group within a given society. Drawing on Bourdieu (1977), I argue in this paper that the definition of competence should include an aware- ness of the right to speak—what Bourdieu calls “the power to impose reception” (p. 75). His position is that the linguist takes for granted the conditions for the establishment of communication: that those who speak regard those who listen as worthy to listen and that those who listen regard those who speak as worthy to speak. However, as Bour- dieu argues, it is precisely such assumptions that must be called into question. THE ANALYSIS: IDENTITY, INVESTMENT, AND LANGUAGE LEARNING Although the findings from my study are extensive (Peirce, 1993), I wish to highlight data that address the question, How can an enhanced understanding of natural language learning and social identity inform SLA theory? First, I will address how the notion of investment helps 1 8 TESOL QUARTERLY explain the contradictions between the women’s motivation to learn English and their sometimes ambivalent desire to speak it. Second, I highlight data from two of the participants—Martina and Eva—to analyze the relationship between investment, social identity, and lan- guage learning. Investment and Social Identity All the participants in the study were highly motivated to learn English. They all took extra courses to learn English; they all partici- pated in the diary study; they all wished to have more social contact with anglophone Canadians; and all of them, except Martina, indicated that they felt comfortable speaking English to friends or people they knew well. It is significant, however, that all the women felt uncomfort- able talking to people in whom they had a particular symbolic or material investment. Eva, who came to Canada for “economical advan- tage”, 5 and was eager to work with anglophones, practice her English and get better jobs, was silenced when the customers in her workplace made comments about her accent. Mai, who came to Canada for her life in the future and depended on the wishes of management for her job security and financial independence, was most uncomfortable speaking to her boss. Katarina, who came to Canada to escape a com- munist and atheistic system, and had a great affective investment in her status as a professional, felt most uncomfortable talking to her teacher, the doctor, and other anglophone professionals. Martina, who had given up a surveyor’s job to come to Canada “for the children,” was frustrated and uncomfortable when she could not defend her family’s rights in the public world. Felicia, who had come to Canada to escape “terrorism,” and had great affective investment in her Peruvian identity, felt most uncomfortable speaking English in front of Peru- vians who speak English fluently. The concept of motivation as currently taken up in the SLA literature conceives of the language learner as having a unified, coherent identity which organizes the type and intensity of a language learner’s motiva- tion. The data indicate that motivation is a much more complex matter than hitherto conceived. Despite being highly motivated, there were particular social …