Using Community-based Instruction to Promote Language Affiliation: Findings from Japanese Language Learners
A major challenge of the foreign language context, and teaching less commonly taught languages in specific, is engaging learners in the target culture and promoting meaningful use of the foreign language. This study demonstrates how community-based instruction, in the form of ethnographic observatio...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages
2016-10-01
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| Series: | Journal of the National Council of Less Commonly Taught Languages |
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| Online Access: | http://www.ncolctl.org/files/jncolctl-vol-20/Using%20Community-based%20Instruction%20to%20Pro-mote%20Language%20Affiliation%3A%20Findings%20from%20Japanese%20Language%20Learners.pdf |
| Summary: | A major challenge of the foreign language context, and teaching less commonly taught languages in specific, is engaging learners in the target culture and promoting meaningful use of the foreign language. This study demonstrates how community-based instruction, in the form of ethnographic observations and interviews and service learning, can promote learner’s language affiliation — a sense of identification with the target culture and language. As a result of interactions with the local target language community made possible by the community-based assignments, university-level Japanese language learners gained an understanding of the target culture based on their individual experiences. By engaging with a community of Japanese speakers, learners saw how Japanese language skills and an understanding of Japanese culture are relevant to their lives. Heritage learners felt a strengthened sense of belonging to the wider Japanese community. |
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| ISSN: | 1930-9031 1930-9031 |