Negotiation of power and solidarity in email

2014 ◽  
Vol 24 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-80
Author(s):  
Ikuko Nakane ◽  
Chihiro Kinoshita Thomson ◽  
Satoko Tokumaru

The issue of e-politeness has been attracting increasing attention in the field of foreign language teaching and learning. This article examines how students of Japanese as a foreign language in Australia negotiated power and solidarity in their email correspondence with ‘facilitators’ in Japan who provided support in essay writing tasks. Their relationships, which were neither completely status-unequal nor status-equal, offer a unique social context for an examination of politeness. The study examines whether and how power and solidarity shifted over the 12 weeks of email exchanges. The results show varying levels of rapport and orientations to politeness developing over time, as well as evidence of students applying implicit input from the facilitators’ email messages. The article also considers the impacts, on the politeness phenomena in the data, of students’ cultural backgrounds and prior exposure to casual Japanese. The findings are discussed in relation to the question of ‘appropriateness’ in fostering foreign language learner ability to negotiate power and solidarity in intercultural communication.

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dao Thi Dieu Linh ◽  
Do Nhu Quynh

In today’s globalized world, a foreign language learner needs to not only master the four basic language skills, but also enhance their intercultural communication competence if he/she really wants to become a successful communicator. As a respond to this situation, intercultural communication has become an important content in foreign language teaching and learning. Using Bryam's intercultural communication competence model in 1997, the researchers aim at investigating the awareness of students from the University of Languages and International Studies ​​- Vietnam National University Hanoi towards intercultural communication competence, namely its definition, its significance, as well as their evaluation of current teaching and learning practices. Through a questionnaire survey of 458 students, the findings show a growing awareness of students to this competence, yet an unsufficient training in language classroom as well as a lack of self-consolidation outside class. More multicultural extra-curricular activities and culture-interrelating activities in language classroom are what we suggest to better develop this competence.


2018 ◽  
pp. 24-40
Author(s):  
Alina Ganea

Cette étude interpelle une problématique incontournable tenant à l’enseignement à l’université, à savoir l’adaptation continue aux exigences du marché du travail, ce qui se traduit au niveau des contenus par une mise en concordance des objectifs d’enseignement avec les compétences professionnelles requises. Au niveau de l’enseignement d’une langue étrangère à des fins professionnelles, cette mise en concordance implique, entre autres, l’intégration de la dimension interculturelle dans les contenus dispensés afin de munir l’étudiant des compétences nécessaires pour qu’il/elle puisse (inter)agir dans le contexte multiculturel actuel du marché du travail. Dans ce contexte, cette étude propose, dans un premier temps, un retour théorique sur les concepts culture et interculturel envisagés comme des balises significatives dans l’enseignement actuel des langues étrangères et qui précisent, par les compétences spécifiques à atteindre, les nouvelles exigences auxquelles l’enseignement d’une langue étrangère doit satisfaire. Notre recherche se poursuit par un retour sur les spécificités de l’enseignement d’une langue étrangère à des fins professionnelles et fournira une proposition concrète d’alignement des contenus enseignés dans le cours Langues modernes (français) pour la filière de médecine de notre université aux objectifs de la compétence interculturelle. Une proposition de programme contenant des activités visant l’interculturel articulées autour des contenus initialement proposés pour cette spécialisation sera avancée. Developing intercultural competence in teaching French for professional purposes at university Our study investigates an essential problem related to university teaching, namely continuous adaptation to the labour market standards and requirements, which at the curriculum level involves a correlation between learning objectives and competency profile requested and expected in the professional world. With respect to foreign language teaching for professional purposes, this correlation implies, among other things, the integration of intercultural dimension in the contents taught in order to provide the student with necessary skills and enabling him/her able to efficiently (inter)act in today’s multicultural labour market, and finally meet the needs of contemporary world. In this context, our research firstly offers a theoretical approach to the concepts of culture and interculturel, which are envisaged as landmarks in today’s foreign language teaching philosophy and which specify, through their specific objectives to be achieved, new standards that foreign language teaching must comply with. Our study also offers a theoretical framework to the particularities of foreign language teaching for professional purposes. This enables us to reformulate the initial objectives associated to foreign language for professional purposes by integrating the objectives related to the development of intercultural competence. Finally, this study also proposes a concrete course content of medical French based on the course already delivered to the students studying medicine in Dunarea de Jos University of Galati. The course has been remodelled so as to meet the objectives of intercultural competence. In doing so, we firstly analysed the topics included in the course content with respect to aspects related to culture or intercultural communication, and afterwards we provided a list of cultural- and intercultural communication-oriented topics that could be articulated around the already proposed content of a French course for medicine. This proposal is also accompanied by a series of methodological recommendations that should be taken into consideration prior to designing a course for medical French. Key words: French for professional purposes; culture; intercultural; competence; teaching and learning.


2018 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-39 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathon Reinhardt

This review surveys and synthesizes the findings of 87 focal pieces, published primarily since 2009 and mid 2018, on the formal and informal use of social media—blogs, wikis, and social networking—for second and foreign language teaching and learning (L2TL), including studies on the use of educational sites like Livemocha and Busuu and vernacular sites like Facebook and Twitter. The article frames the review in the development of social media and the history of social computer-assisted language learning (CALL) research. Synthesis identifies common findings, including that social media can afford the development of intercultural, sociopragmatic, and audience awareness, language learner and user identities, and particular literacies. Presentation of the focal pieces and common findings is intertwined with discussion of problematic issues, and each section concludes with a summary and implications for future research and practice.


Author(s):  
Hapsari Dwi Kartika

This paper explains why learner autonomy is taken into account in language learning where English is a foreign language for the learners particularly in Indonesia. The definition of learner autonomy and its advantages to language learner in EFL contexts will be described within this paper. Many scholars from psychological education and English teaching and learning had proved that language learning can be improved by certain strategy. They revealed the correlation between the autonomous learning with students’ success in learning with different aspect. The definition of autonomy is similar to many different words such as self-regulated and self-determined. Finally, the writer suggests how teacher can promote the autonomous learning atmosphere in the classroom.Keywords: strategy, promoting autonomy, EFL context, Indonesia


Relay Journal ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 459-463
Author(s):  
Sam Morris ◽  
Sarah Mercer

In our June 2019 LAB session on Teacher/Advisor Education for Learner Autonomy, our featured interview was conducted with Sarah Mercer, Professor of Foreign Language Teaching and Head of ELT at the University of Graz, Austria. Sarah has published a wealth of papers in the field of language and teacher psychology, and co-edited many books including, most recently, New Directions in Language Learning Psychology (2016), Positive Psychology in SLA (2016), and Language Teacher Psychology (2018). Sarah was awarded the 2018 Robert C. Gardner Award for Outstanding Research in Bilingualism in recognition of her work. We were delighted that she was able to share her knowledge on the topic of language learner and teacher well-being with us during the session.


2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Prem Prasad Poudel ◽  
Madan Prasad Baral

Abstract In recent years, in Nepal, while some languages of the nation are on the verge of extinction, some foreign languages (such as Japanese, Korean, Chinese) are emerging as new attractions among the youths and adults and are widely taught in the marketplaces through the private sector initiative. Against this backdrop, in this article, we have examined the current foreign language teaching and learning situation drawing on qualitative empirical data obtained from the institutes involved in foreign language instruction in a city in Gandaki Province of Nepal. The data were collected from a survey in forty institutes, ten individual interviews and five focus group discussions. Drawing on the data, an ecological model was adopted, which focused on dynamic interaction, co-existence, and competition among languages, and findings were discussed in line with these aspects of ecological understanding. Findings revealed that learning foreign languages has been established as a conduit towards economic gains and opportunities for employment and education, which has largely been contributory towards reshaping the ecological relationship among the foreign languages in Nepal.


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