Second Language Socialization and Learner Agency

This book examines how Russian-speaking adoptees in three US families actively shape opportunities for language learning and identity construction in everyday interactions. It focuses on how learners achieve agency in second language socialization processes and informs the fields of second language acquisition and language maintenance and shift.

Lyn Wright Fogle is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics/TESOL at Mississippi State University. She holds a PhD In Linguistics from Georgetown University and an MA in TESOL from American University. Her research focuses on sociocultural aspects of second language learning and bilingualism with an emphasis on second language socialization, learner identities, and language policy. She is a co-editor of the volume Sustaining linguistic diversity: Endangered and minority languages and language varieties (Georgetown University Press), and her work has appeared in journals such as The International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism and Language and Linguistics Compass.

Lyn Wright Fogle is an Assistant Professor of Linguistics/TESOL at Mississippi State University. She holds a PhD In Linguistics from Georgetown University and an MA in TESOL from American University. Her research focuses on sociocultural aspects of second language learning and bilingualism with an emphasis on second language socialization, learner identities, and language policy. She is a co-editor of the volume Sustaining linguistic diversity: Endangered and minority languages and language varieties (Georgetown University Press), and her work has appeared in journals such as The International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism and Language and Linguistics Compass.

Fogle’s fi ndings provide substantial insight for looking into the many factors that shape L2 socialization and for (re)considering the complex nature of socialization agency. Although the study focuses on transnational adoption, the analysis is also relevant for the study of other language socialization settings. For this reason, the book may be of interest for a broad audience in the field of SLA.

“Second Language Socialization and Learner Agency: Adoptive Family Talk” makes important contributions to the field of bilingual education and bilingualism. Furthermore, it engages with, clarifies, and argues for the construct of agency in language learning research. In so doing, Fogle generates truly poignant accounts that reflect the challenges of crossing linguistic, cultural, and national boundaries as these adoptees and adoptive parents develop family identities through everyday talk. This lucid account of an ambitious investigation may also serve well to inform emerging researchers in PhD programs and more senior scholars who wish to engage in comparable projects.This volume would be a stimulating supplemental text in a graduate course on qualitative methods, bilingualism, discourse analysis, or language learner identity. This work will be most accessible to readers with a solid theoretical background in second language acquisition and particularly social and cultural approaches to SLA, but it also offers valuable insights and suggestions to parents, teachers, social workers, and other professionals who may encounter such families.

This book provides a fascinating account of language socialization in an understudied but increasingly important and common context: in the families of transnational adopted children. The various forms of socialization and agency observed in the multiple-case study of three quite different families provide compelling evidence of how Russian-speaking children and their new (American) parents actively socialize one another, through modeling, resistance, accommodation, and negotiation of languages and types of interaction, based on their respective ideologies, identities, and sensibilities. The study offers a timely, well researched, and dynamic illustration of multilingual socialization and language use in contemporary society.

This is a highly innovative study of second language socialization involving an increasingly important group of learners. Through in-depth analyses of intimate family interactions, Fogle shows how dynamic the family language situation becomes when transnational adoptees enter the scene. Fogle's work is a valuable contribution to the growing field of family language policy and a must-read for those interested in multilingual families.

Fogle's groundbreaking work skillfully navigates unchartered waters in the field of applied linguistics. This close analysis of language use and language learning within transnational adoptive homes details the fascinating ways in which children and parents collaboratively make – and occasionally resist – family through language. Fogle's highly readable and engaging account highlights the active role children play in shaping their learning contexts and enriches our understanding of language learning processes.

Zuzanna Kiermasz, University of Łódź, Poland:

The book offers an innovative way of understanding and researching language socialization, and it is definitely worth attention as it does not put parents in the dominant position but highlights the role of youngsters in becoming members of a new community.