[Xmca-l] Re: L2

[Martin John Packer]

Hi Adam,

So the emphasis is on how the L2 labels, categorizes, and generalizes - how it offers a new way to perceive and then conceptualize the world?  And the pedagogy involves making those language categories - those word meanings - explicit? 

This sounds appealing to me, as someone who struggles with the Spanish tu/usted contrast. Problem is, so far no one has been able to spell out these everyday concepts for me in explicit terms!  :)

Martin

On Nov 3, 2014, at 9:25 AM, Rémi A. van Compernolle <compernolle@gmail.com> wrote:

> Martin:
> 
> To me, the interesting issue is how concepts are appropriated from a second languacualture (Agar’s term) as psychological tools that mediate the choice of L2 forms in communication. So some of working in concept-based instruction draw from V’s analysis of everyday/spontaneous concepts as developed in socialization and scientific concepts, as developed in school, and then Galperin’s and Davydov’s work in education.
> 
> The insight for instructed L2 acquisition is that if we promote internalization of categories of meaning (scientific concepts related to how language creates meanings through grammar, pragmatics, etc.), learners gain a lot freedom to create L2 meanings, sometimes meanings that L1 users wouldn’t be inclined to make. From my perspective, at least, this is a lot more interesting than most L2 research that just looks at how forms are acquired, used, etc. because emphasis is placed on semiotic mediation.
> 
> Just as case in point, in my work on sociopragmatics, I developed a concept-based approach to teaching self-presentation, social distance, and power hierarchies, with French tu/vous ‘you’ pronouns as illustrative forms. The point was to have students appropriate these concepts as categories of meaning (e.g., how to be relaxed/casual vs formal, how be close to someone or socially distance) to guide the choice of language forms. So this reverses the traditional form-to-meaning approach to teaching language because we started with meanings and then explored how forms were important.
> 
> Does this make sense? It might be relatively commonsensical in the XMCA crowd, but in L2 acquisition, it’s a pretty novel idea because of the history of focusing on form.
> 
> Adam
> 
> Rémi A. van Compernolle
> Assistant Professor of Second Language Acquisition & French and Francophone Studies
> Department of Modern Languages
> Carnegie Mellon University
> Baker Hall A60M
> 412-268-1122
> 
> 
> 
> On Nov 3, 2014, at 8:42 AM, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co> wrote:
> 
>> Hi Adam,
>> 
>> Yes, I should have more clearly separated my two questions!
>> 
>> Can you help me understand the light that a sociocultural perspective throws on instructed L2 acquisition? There are one or two places where LVS suggested that learning a second language transforms ones understanding of the first language, but I haven't yet found that explored in Jim Lantolf's writing.
>> 
>> Martin
>> 
>> On Nov 3, 2014, at 8:07 AM, Rémi A. van Compernolle <compernolle@gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> Jim Lantolf and others of us work in a specific area of applied linguistics, namely instructed second language acquisition, which is about doing education to promote second/foreign language capacities, typically in formal settings like the classroom. It’s just one area of a much broader field.
>>> 
>>> Adam
>>> 
>>> Rémi A. van Compernolle
>>> Assistant Professor of Second Language Acquisition & French and Francophone Studies
>>> Department of Modern Languages
>>> Carnegie Mellon University
>>> Baker Hall A60M
>>> 412-268-1122
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Nov 3, 2014, at 7:29 AM, Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> I'm not an L2 researcher (or speaker, for the most part), but I work with quite a few. A few points:
>>>> 
>>>> 1. Foreign Language learning is but one of many L2 matters. There is also bilingual education, ESOL, EFL, etc. 
>>>> 2. The whole field of bilingual education characterizes the areas in which you say there is nothing, at least in the US.
>>>> 3. There might be ethical problems, at least for US Institutional Review Boards, in studying populations as vulnerable as they ones you describe, especially in getting them to sign consent forms that others are confident that they understand--and many immigrants are reluctant to sign papers they fear might cause them problems.
>>>> 
>>>> So, I think you're wrong on this, and hope that's what you're hoping for. p
>>>> 
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Martin John Packer
>>>> Sent: Monday, November 03, 2014 6:50 AM
>>>> To: David Kellogg; xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu
>>>> Subject: [Xmca-l] L2
>>>> 
>>>> Hi David,
>>>> 
>>>> I have to teach a class on second language learning this week in my course in Psychology of Language, so I've turned to Lantolf. My university library webpage has been down for maintenance this weekend so I've had limited access to his writing, but what I have been able to read has confused me. In a couple of articles I find reasonable summaries of LSV's ideas, but then Lantolf doesn't get around to applying these ideas to L2! Looking at abstracts in Google Scholar it seems that he's proposing that (1) L2 is learned in the ZPD (what isn't?), (2) L2 is a mediator (what isn't?), and (3) private speech occurs in L2 (okay, that could be interesting). I was expecting him to attribute some role to L2 in the higher functions, or to suggest that L2 mediates in a specific way, or...
>>>> 
>>>> What am I missing?
>>>> 
>>>> Plus, I have a growing suspicion that most L2 research is conducted on people willingly studying a foreign language in the classroom. Not much, or nothing, on people who are forced to abandon their mother tongue because they live somewhere where school, and/or work, is available only if they speak a dominant language. I'm hoping you'll tell me I'm wrong about this!
>>>> 
>>>> Martin
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
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