Second Language Research Miles, C. Term Paper

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He is 37 years old, born in France, of Senegalese descent. His native language is French, but he also speaks Wolof, Fulani, and American English. He was from a middle class background and was educated in the French school system. He knew virtually no English when he arrived in 1997. he took a job as a factory line worker in the plant and learned English rapidly, using his skills to move up in the company.

The methodology for the study of this worker was an ethnographic case study intended to understand the individual dynamics of this individual at his place of employment, using theory-based or operational construct sampling. In this approach, the sample becomes representative of the phenomenon of interest, with the interest in this case being the subject's social identity in his second language. The two methods of data collection used are observation and interviews. The observations covered a period of six months from August 2000 through the end of January 2001. The subject was shadowed during working hours over this period, observing how he communicates within the speech communities of the cultures and contexts on the site. This provides a more complete picture of the influences exerted by the site on the subject or by the subject on the site.

This was followed by four interviews conducted during the observations in order to get data on a more personal level. The type of interview is one in which the subject can generate talk and select the conversational path he chooses, using what is fundamentally a narrative approach.

Analysis of this data was achieved using coding, first by constructing a descriptive reality of general codes existing at the site, and second by using the interview data to look more closely at the themes that emerge from the observations.

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The theme of language and identity was prominent through the coding process for both sets of data, and two general themes of identity surfaced, namely social awareness and the construction of relationships. Miles divides these themes into subcategories, noting first four distinct ways in which Mamadou built relationships though the building of trust, developing roles, the issue of respect, and through community involvement.

Interactions with others are noted. Mamadou gains a place in the community by first speaking French with the workers, showing his understanding of them. He also took on different roles associated with his position in the company and also reflecting how he was perceived by the workers.

Miles concludes that Mamadou would consciously negotiate his identity strategically and position himself in relation to other employees, doing so in a unique way. He achieved what he did through possessing social awareness implying knowledge of socio-cultural and sociolinguistic contexts. Miles finds that second language use and strategic competence are intricately linked in how we display ourselves in the target culture. Mamadou often positions his talk based on who he is and how others expect someone in his position to act. His workplace identity and speech are co-constructed. Miles says his study expands on the idea of strategic competence to include the concept of social identity. Miles finds that his study has implications for those involved in researching strategies of second language use and learning and for those involved in training immigrant workers, suggesting that second language social identity strategies may best be conceptualized as pertaining to the idea of communicative competence at the strategic level. He also says that the idea of communicative competence is extended to….....

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https://www.aceyourpaper.com/essays/second-language-research-miles-c-35687
   

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