Social aspect of interlanguage

Social, Discourse, and psycholinguistic Aspect Of Interlanguage

Rod Ellis

By different sources:

Fresi yuliana rahma yusita &

Yayuk Fitriani, Rega Giyang Girana and Annisa Mustikanthi

The Elements

Interlanguage as a stylistic continuum

The aculturation model of l2 acquisition

Social identity and investment in l2 learning

Social Aspects Of Interlanguage

The prevaling persepective on interlanguage is psycholinguistic, as reflected in the metaphor of the computer. That is, researchers have been primarily concerned with identifying the internal mechanisms that are responsible for interlanguage devolopment.

Three rather different approaches to incorporating a social angel on the study of L2 acquisition can be identified:

First, views interlanguages as consisting of different styles which learners call upon under different conditions of language use.

Second, concern how social factors determine the input that learners use to construct their interlanguage.

Third, considers how the social identities that learners negotiate in their interactions with native speakers shape their opprtunities to speak and, thereby, to learn an L2.

Interlanguage As A Stylistic Continuum

Elaine Tarone has proposed that interlanguage involves a stylistic continuum. She argues that learners develop a capability for using the L2 and that this underlies all regular language behaviour. This capability, which constitutes an abstract linguistic system, is comprised of a number of different style which learner access in accordance with a variety of factors.

Elaine Tarone

The careful style, evident when learners are conciously attending to their choice of linguistic forms, as when they feel need to be correct.

Vernacular style, evident when learners are making spontaneous choices of linguistic form, as is likely in free conversation.

Elaine Tarone

Tarones idea of interlanguage as a stylistic continuum is attractive in a number of ways. It explains why learner language is variable. It suggests that an interlanguage grammar, although different from a native speakers grammar, is constructed according to the same priciples, for native speakers have been shown to posses a similar range of styles. It relates language use to language learning.

Tarone has acknowledged, the model also has a number of problems:

First, later research has shown that learners are not always most accurate in their careful style and least accurate in their vernacular style.

Second, is that the role of social factors remains unclear

Howard Giles

Another theory is howard giless accomodation theory. This seeks to explain how A learners social group influences of the course of L2 acquisition. For giles the key idea is that of social accomodation. He suggests that when people interact with each other they either try to make their speech similar to that of their addressee in order to emphasize social cohesiveness or to make it different in order to emphasize their social distinctiveness.

According to the giless theory, then, social factors influence interlanguage development via the impact they have on the attitudes that determine the kind of language use learners engage in.

Accomodation theory suggests that social factors, mediated through the interactions that learners take part in, influence both how quickly they learn and tha ctual route that they follow.

The Acculturation Model Of L2 Acquisition

A Similar Perspective On The Role Of Social Factors In L2 Acquisition Can Be Found In John Schumanns Acculturation Model. Schumann Investigated A Thirty Three Years Old, Costa Rican, Named Alberto, Who Was Acquiring English In The United States. Alberto Used A Reduced And Simplified Form Of English Throughout.

The Problems

he did not progress beyond the forst stage in the development of negatives

he continued to use declarative word order rather than inversion in question

he acquired vortually no aixilary verbs

and he failed to mark regular verbs for past tense or nouns for possession.

John Schumann

The main reason for learners failing to acculturate is social distance. A learners social distance is determined by a number of factors. Schumsnn also recognizes that social distance is sometimes indeterminate.

As presented by Schumann, social factors determine the amount of contact with the L2 individual learners experience and thereby how successful they are in learning.

Two Problems With Such A Model

First, it fails to acknowledge that factors like integration pattern and attitude are not fixed and static but, potetially, variable and dynami, fluctuating in accordance with the learnes changing social experiences.

Second, It fails to acknowledge that learners are not just subject to social conditions but can also become tha subject of them; they can help to construct the social context of their own learning.

Social Identity And Investment In L2 Learning

Eva, an adult immigrant learner of English in Canada. Eva felt humiliated in this conversation because she found herself positioned as astrange woman, someone who did not know who Bart Simpson was. She was subject to a discourse which assumed an identity she did not have.

Social Identity And Investment In L2 Learning

The notion of social identity is central to the theory Pierce advances. She argues that language learners have complex social identities that can only be understood in term of the power relations that shape social structures. A learners social identity is, according to Pierce, multiple and cintradictory. Pierces social theory of L2 acquisition affords a different set of metaphor. L2 acquisition involves a struggle and investment. Learners are not computers who process input data but combatants who battle to assert themeselves and investor who expect a good return on their effort.

Conclusion

Social cultural models of L2 acquisition, such as those of Giles, Schumann and Pierce, are intended to account for learners relative success or failure in learning an L2. That is, they seek to explain the speed of learning and the ultimate level of proficiency of different groups of learners.

Discourse Aspects of Interlanguage

The study of learner discourse in SLA has been informed by two rather different goals. On the one hand there have been attempts to discover howL2 learners acquire to rules of discourse that inform native-speaker language use. On the other hand, a number of researchers have sought to show how interaction shapes interlanguage development.

Acquiring discourse rules

There are rules or at least, regularities in the ways in which native speakers hold conversation. In the United States, for example, a compliment usually calls for a response and failure to provide one can be considered sociolinguistic error. Furthermore, in American English compliment responses are usually quite elaborate, involving some attempt on the part of the speaker to play down the compliment by making some unfavourable comment.

However, L2 learners behave differently. Sometimes they fail to respond to a compliment at all. At other times they produce bare responses

There is growing body of research investigating learner discourse. This show that, to some extent at least, the acquisition of discourse rules, like tha acquisition of grammatical rules, is systematic, reflecting both distinct types of errors and developmental sequences.

The role of input and interaction in L2 acquisition

A number of rather different theoretical positions can be identified. A behaviourist view trearts language learning as environmentally determined, controlled from the outside by the stimuli learners are exposed to and the reinforcement they receive. In contrast, mentalist theories emphasize the importance of the learners black box. They maintain that learners brains are especially equipped to learn language and all that is needed is minimal exposure to input in order to trigger acquisition. Interactionist theories of L2 acquisition acknowledge the importance of both input and internal language processing. Learning takes place as a result of complex interaction between the linguistic environment and the leraners internal mechanisms.

Two types of foreigner talk:

1-Ungrammatically foreigner talk

It is socially marked. If often implies a lack of respect on the part of the native speaker and can be resented by learners. It is characterized by the deletion of certain grammatical features such as copula be , modal verbs and articles, the use of the base form of the verb in place of the past tense form, and the use of special constructions such as no + verb.

2- Grammatical foreigner talk

It is the norm. various types of modification of baseline talk can be identified:

First, grammatical foreign talk is delivered at a slower pace.

Second, the input is simplified.

Third, grammatical foreigner talk is sometimes regularized.

Fourth, foreigner talk sometimes consist of elaborated language use

Krashen

According to Stephen Krashens input hypothesis, L2 acquisition takes place when a learner understands input that contains grammatical forms that + I. Karenshen suggests that the right level of input is attained automatically when interlocutors succed in making themselves understood in communication. Success is achieved by using the situational context to make messages clear and through the kinds of input modifications found in foreigner talk.

Other hypotheses

Michael Longs interaction hypothesis also empha