Contrasting identities: a language teacher’s practice in an English for Specific Purposes classroom

Abstract

For language teachers who are concerned about referring to their own and students’ identities other than in the roles of ‘teacher’ and ‘student’ in the classroom, this conversation analytic study aims to give insights into the use of identity. Detailed analysis of the data of English for a Specific Purpose (ESP) classrooms indicates that contrasting the teacher’s and students’ non-default situated identities, such as senpai (‘senior’ in English) with kohai (‘junior’ in English) and sociologist with scientist, is a way for the language teacher to perform the role of ‘teacher’ effectively in ESP classrooms: the practice constructs an epistemic gradient among the teacher and the students and makes some actions accountable by the participants, who is ascribed a superior epistemic status with an identity. The study concludes with a discussion of the contribution the use of identity can make to ESP/LSP (language for specific purposes) and suggestions for ESP/LSP course development.

Keywords:

• identity
• epistemics
• English for specific purposes
• conversation analysis
• teacher training

Notes

1. These other predicates include ‘rights, entitlements, obligations, knowledge, attributes, and competences’ (Hester and Eglin 1997, 5).

2. In some situations, the situated identity and the transportable identity of a participant can be one single category. For example, if a Japanese person is introduced as a representative of Japan at an international conference, Japanese is regarded as both the person’s transportable identity and situated identity.

3. A cross-coupling reaction in organic chemistry involves synthesising reactions of two different organics with the aid of a catalyst.

4. In that senpai is not a visible or audible feature of Fujino, it is not her transportable identity. Rather, it is a situated identity that she is supposed to perform within the context of the university or the department in which the class is offered.

5. Beppu’s laughter occurs after his confirmation, by nodding, that he is asking Asano to reply to his question about the plant absorbing radioactive materials. It may be that his laughter is triggered by an interactional problem caused by Asano, specifically by Asano’s (re)action to being asked a question by Beppu. Asano is the teacher but his request for confirmation as to whether Beppu is asking him the question is inconsistent with his situated identity teacher. Thus, Asano’s categorical contradiction may be the cause of Beppu’s laughter. Ikeda’s and Fujino’s laughter in lines 143 and 144 occurs almost simultaneously with Beppu’s, suggesting that they also share the understanding of the problem caused by Asano’s (re)action. However, without concrete interactional evidence, it is impossible to determine whether the laughter is due to the problem, or simply due to embarrassment.

6. It may be that, since Asano pointed to Fujino last, Fujino interprets this as a turn allocation and takes the turn. On the other hand, it may be that Fujino is performing her identity as senpai, fulfilling the associated epistemic obligation by providing the kohai participants with an answer.