Being native and being foreign
Native JFL teachers’ linguistic identity at tertiary institutions in New Zealand and Australia
Pennington and Richards (2016) argue that if the medium of instruction (MOI) is
not the native language of the instructor, lack of proficiency in the MOI could bring about a lack of confidence. This study inquired how
native Japanese as a Foreign Language (JFL) teachers at tertiary institutions in New Zealand and Australia perceive their English
proficiency, how it influences their linguistic identity, and how the fact that they are native speakers of the target language influences
their linguistic identity. Based on responses from an online questionnaire with more than 50 respondents as well as 12 follow-up individual
interviews, this study argues that their linguistic identity is not narrowly conceived around their non-nativeness in English and nativeness
in Japanese, but constructed from more multi-faceted aspects of language teacher identity formation, especially by factors pertinent to the
very nature of the tertiary teaching environment in these countries.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Background
- 2.1Teacher identity
- 2.1Medium of instruction (MOI)
- 2.2Native and non-native teachers debate
- 2.3Native JFL teachers
- 3.Research design
- 3.1Research question
- 3.2Method
- 3.2.1Online questionnaire in Japanese
- 3.2.2Individual interviews in Japanese
- 3.3Participants
- 3.4Analysis
- 4.Results
- 4.1Non-nativeness in English
- 4.2Nativeness in Japanese
- 4.2.1Skills and knowledge directly associated with the nativeness of the language
- 4.2.2Skills and knowledge not directly associated with language nativeness
- 4.3Context
- 4.4Competences
- 4.5Evolving and multiple identities
- 5.Discussion
- 6.Concluding remarks
- Notes
-
References
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