Volume 2011, Issue 208 - Affective Aspects of Second and Foreign Languages

The aim of this study is to examine within an ecological model the associations of dual language (Spanish/English) competences with the emotional and behavioral well-being of young children of immigrants in kindergarten. Latino children of immigrants (n = 228) from a public school-based community sample were assessed using standardized, comprehensive measures of Spanish and English oral language competence and normed teacher reports on five dimensions of emotional and behavioral well-being and school functioning (interpersonal, intrapersonal, and affective strengths, connection to family, and school functioning). Relevant contextual factors at home (maternal education, poverty, family structure) and school (teacher experience and practices, classroom composition), as well as child factors (non-verbal IQ, gender) were considered. Spanish and English competences accounted for moderate to large portions of variance in all dimensions of well-being. The contributions of child, home, and school variables to well-being were much smaller than language competence, and in most cases, not significant. Our findings suggest that dual language competence is critically associated with the emotional and behavioral well-being and school functioning of Latino children of immigrants.

This study investigates language preferences and perceptions in the use of the native language (L1) and second language (L2) by 386 bi- and multilingual adults. Participants declared that they were maximally proficient in L1 and L2 and used both constantly. A quantitative analysis revealed that despite their maximal proficiency in the L1 and L2, participants preferred to use the L1 for communicating feelings or anger, swearing, addressing their children, performing mental calculations, and using inner speech. They also perceived their L1 to be emotionally stronger than their L2 and reported lower levels of communicative anxiety in their L1. An analysis of interview data from 20 participants confirmed these findings while adding nuance. Indeed, differences in the use of the L1 and L2 and perceptions of both are often subtle and context-specific. Participants confirmed the finding that the L1 is usually felt to be more powerful than the L2, but this did not automatically translate into a preference for the L1. Longer stretches of time in the L2 culture are linked to a gradual shift in linguistic practices and perceptions. Participants reported that their multilingualism and multiculturalism gave them a sense of empowerment and a feeling of freedom.

This paper focuses on the practices of teaching and learning the Hebrew language at a non-Orthodox Jewish day school, showing the ways that Hebrew language ideologies intersect with categories of emotions, affect, and identity. Drawing from a corpus of ethnographic data collected over an 18-month period, this paper examines the ways in which local interpretations of what being Jewish entails for seventh and eighth grade students and their teachers are intricately tied to their feelings and beliefs regarding the Hebrew language. While predominant language ideologies explicitly support the importance of Hebrew at their school and within the Jewish community at large, and identify Hebrew as a marker of Jewishness, in practice feelings about the language are complex and entangled with conflicting beliefs about how Jewish identity is expressed in a variety of languages and practices. Ethnographic investigation of language use in religious educational settings is crucial to providing a lens through which to view these complex interrelationships between ideologies of languages, modes of representation, and religious identity.

This study examines cross-cultural communication in English between Americans and Brazilians through the lens of intercultural pragmatics. Three groups of speakers participated: native speakers of American English, native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese, and English learners who spoke Brazilian Portuguese as a first language. Using a mixed design including role plays and interviews and both quantitative and qualitative data, the study identified pragmatic transfer among the ESL learners, who also showed evidence of developing awareness of the sociolinguistic norms of the target language and its speakers.

We examine refusals negotiated and understood by adult female native speakers of American English and Japanese. In open role-plays produced by 8 pairs of Japanese and 8 pairs of American English speakers, a request was refused. Semi-structured post-hoc interviews with participants and interpretations were triangulated with bilingual experts. For all participants, a successful outcome involved a speech act set negotiated through several conversational turns. While both groups used fillers, softeners, hedges, and backchannels, fragmented utterances were more common among Japanese speakers. Americans frequently offered alternative plans and commented on the importance of honesty while Japanese participants often implied refusal, using postponement. Some American refusals were experienced as impolite by Japanese informants, while Americans identified the Japanese postponement strategy as problematic.

This study reports on the developing emotions and perspectives of 68 in-service teachers regarding their experiences in university-based Spanish classes as part of the ACCELA project (Access to Critical Content and English Language Acquisition) at UMass-Amherst. The program gave teacher-participants the opportunity to experience and reflect on the emotional intensity of their own initial language learning, and to personally connect with the challenges that the second language learners experience in their classes where restrictive language policies operate. The researcher argues that their display of growing insights about second language acquisition and their emotional development through interactions with community resources in both English and Spanish reveal their ideological positions in regard to L2 and its learning. This study enhances our comprehension of how language learning experiences can enrich teachers' appreciation of their students' challenges and perspectives. This article contributes to understanding the role of emotions in language learning, of ideology in the mutual development of second language teachers and learners, and of the interrelationship of learning in schools and communities.

How do non-native English-speaking teachers (NNESTs) establish their legitimacy as credible, qualified instructors in the contexts where they teach vis-à-vis the native speaker (NS) myth (Phillipson, Linguistic imperialism, Oxford University Press, 1992)? Using Vygotskian Sociocultural Theory (Vygotsky and Cole, Mind in society: the development of higher psychological processes, Harvard University Press, 1978; Wertsch, Vygotsky and the social formation of mind, Harvard University Press, 1985), this paper traces the development of an ESL writing teacher's professional identity and explores how his beliefs and attitudes in regards to the NS myth are connected with his professional identity and instructional practices. Based primarily on classroom observations, interviews, and a dialogic journal between the researcher and the teacher, I argue that the process of challenging the NS myth and negotiating a professional identity as a legitimate, qualified, and confident ESL teacher, though complex, is largely understudied. In order to address this gap in the literature, this study shows how the participant, the teacher of a graduate-level writing course, went from being a “blind believer” in the native speaker myth to challenging it, to attempting to empower his own students as expert speakers and users of the language. Nonetheless, his beliefs and attitudes toward the NS myth remained ambivalent and contradictory. Based on the analysis presented, I offer some implications for second language teacher education.