Do Bi/Multilingual Learners Play by the Rules of the Game? A Postmodern Approach to L1/L2 Use and Learner Investment

ABSTRACT

The concomitant relationship among language, identity and power has been intimately connected to the ELT world. The bi/multilingual learner identity negotiation has been viewed as a site of struggle from a postmodernist perspective. To this end, learners’ existing capital in relation to their involvement in new capital is a significant issue in educational inquiries. In this narrative inquiry, the researchers aimed to uncover bi/multilingual learners’ beliefs of L1/L2 use in relation to learner investment. The data were collected through a biographical narrative, a life story interview, a reflection paper and a semi-structured individual interview from five preparatory school students. The findings reiterated the pervasive situation of English as a form of social, cultural and academic capital. The benefits of L2 regarding a new identity and community, better job opportunities and empowerment appear to have a negative effect on participants’ view of L1 as capital. The paper concludes that language teachers should draw on the principles of translanguaging pedagogy and call attention to the whole ecology of languages as valuable assets for meaning making.

KEYWORDS:

• Capital
• language education
• learner beliefs
• learner investment
• native language

Acknowledgments

We would like to express our gratitude for the participants in the present study. We could not have had a smooth data collection procedure without their willingness and support. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for all their suggestions, which have greatly helped to enrich this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Büşra Müge Özdil

Büşra Müge Özdil is a senior instructor at Middle East Technical University Northern Cyprus Campus School of Foreign Languages. She is currently doing her PhD in the Department of Foreign Language Education at Eastern Mediterranean University in North Cyprus. Her research interests include critical pedagogy, learner investment, identity and peace education.

Naciye Kunt

Naciye Kunt is a professor of applied linguistics in the Foreign Language Education Department of Eastern Mediterranean University in North Cyprus. She earned her BA in English Language Teaching, Marmara University, Istanbul, Turkey; MA in TESL & TEFL and PhD in applied linguistics at the University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA. Her research interests include learner systems, second/foreign language teacher education, teachers’ identities, multilingualism, cultural pedagogies, social justice in TESOL, language learning in conflictual contexts, and young language learners.