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SUMMARY:Gender Construction and its Negotiation in the Course of Second La
 nguage Learning - Huajing Zhao\, Faculty of Education\, University of Camb
 ridge
DTSTART:20101122T170000Z
DTEND:20101122T183000Z
UID:TALK26796@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Ewa Illakowicz
DESCRIPTION:The study of a foreign/second language should lead to a positi
 ve understanding of not only the linguistic knowledge of the target langua
 ge (TL) practices and the TL-mediated public personae they wish to project
  (Kasper and Rose 2002\; Block 2007). With the promotion of communicative 
 language teaching (CLT) which aims to develop learners’ ability to use l
 anguage in real communication\, it raises the crucial issue of the way lea
 rners act socially and how they negotiate their social identities\, includ
 ing gender identity\, in a different cultural and social context. The soci
 ocultural background in China (i.e. gender issues are treated as unmention
 able and are under-researched\, especially in the education field) and the
  wide adoption of CLT in English teaching in Chinese schools make research
  on gender and second language education  in China particularly urgent and
  meaningful. \n\n\nMy work investigated Chinese adolescents’ constructio
 n of their gender identity and the way it is negotiated in the course of l
 earning English as a foreign language (EFL) from a sociolinguistic\, socio
 cultural and sociopsychological point of view. It foregrounds the EFL clas
 sroom and the school as places of social and cultural reproduction and exp
 lored the extent to which the learning of EFL and the discourse of the EFL
  classroom mediate Chinese students’ gender awareness and performance. I
 t documented the unseen connections between the micro-level of the student
 s’ face-to-face verbal and non-verbal interactions and the macro-level o
 f the role of learning EFL that can play in students’ construction and n
 egotiation of their gender identity.\n\nA case study design was used with 
 multiple types of observation and interview\, and focus groups conducted i
 n a state secondary school in south-east China. Altogether\, 27 pairs of s
 tudents took part in the research. Communicative tasks and the popular Ame
 rican TV soap ‘Friends’ were used to elicit data. Sensitivity to the s
 ociocultural research context and individual participants’ circumstances
  was maintained throughout the data collection\, analysis and interpretati
 on.  \n\nAs a whole\, the study showed that SLL pedagogy which integrates 
 CLT can be a major tool for opening up opportunities for the improvement o
 f gender awareness in cultures where gender and sex are not linguistically
  differentiated. It can be educationally valuable with regard to making st
 udents and teachers think about a number of social and intercultural issue
 s alongside cross-linguistic issues. The fieldwork of the research showed 
 that interventions directed at attracting students’ attention to gender 
 roles and the way they behaved in interactions in English highlight an edu
 cational function of the place of EFL in the curriculum which is so far un
 recognised in China. \n
LOCATION:Faculty of Education\, 184 Hills Road\, Cambridge\, room GS4
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