Composing in a Foreign Language: An Insider–Outsider Perspective

Abstract

This paper examines the composing processes of a learner of modern Greek from two different perspectives, that of a strategies researcher and that of the writer herself. The researcher uses established typologies to examine the data, and the writer produces a 'thick' analysis of the same material. The main aim of the study was to juxtapose these two separate analyses in order to evaluate the differing and complementary ways in which they might shed light on the writing process. The study therefore focuses on differing awareness of the processes and strategies rather than on the details of language used. The data were collected over a period of five months using nine tape-recorded think-aloud protocols, which themselves were homework tasks written in the context of an evening class. It is argued that the combination, or triangulation, of outsider and insider analysis can provide a richer description than the use of one source alone because it offers both explanatory categories and a contextualised autobiographical account; and, further, that a learner's own analysis can serve to generate hypotheses or research questions. Some implications are drawn for further research of this kind and, briefly, for pedagogy.