Search results for "First language"
showing 10 items of 112 documents
Parental discourses of language ideology and linguistic identity in multilingual Finland
2018
Finland is officially a bilingual country but it is in practice multilingual. In the current study, we examined how mothers and fathers of mixed-language families linguistically identified themselves and others, and how ideological discourses and concepts historically and socially situated in Finland circulated through the parents’ talk. The parents of three families in which at least Finnish, Swedish and English were used on a daily basis were interviewed. A discourse nexus approach showed that the concept of ‘mother tongue(s)’ played a central role and that although all family members were in practice multilingual, there was a strong tendency across the couples to identify themselves and …
Complexity and interaction: comparing the development of L1 and L2
2011
In research into first and second language development, the focus has mainly been either on the formal features of learner language alone (both L1 and L2) or on the interaction between learners and their caretakers (L1) or native speaker peers (L2).These research traditions have been kept a part even though it has been widely acknowledged that both first and second languages are appropriated essentially in social interaction. This paper aims to strengthen the connection between social and formal approaches by combining interactional views with those focusing on the structural complexity of learner language. Some excerpts from L1 and L2 interaction data (in the Finnish language) are discusse…
A third space: discursive realizations of immigrant identity
2015
The relationship between additional language use and identity has long been of interest to scholars studying immigration and multilingualism. While oral language is frequently examined as a site for the negotiation of identity, written texts can also be studied for information about how language learners position themselves within their receiving culture. This study looks at the relationship between pronoun choice and identity in additional language academic writing by first generation immigrants in Norway, arguing that language learners signal solidarity with certain subject positions through their use of pronouns. Examining English-language texts discussing themes related to language pres…
Deviance, did you get it? An experiment in reading to learn
1991
Abstract This article reports an experiment in which an attempt was made to test reading a scientific text under as natural study conditions as possible. After reading a lengthy text from a Sociology textbook in English, five out of 25 Finnish college students understood a basic concept the way it had been defined by a sociologist; 4 weeks later, after going over the text the second time in Finnish, the number increased to 12. However, even after the second reading of the text in their first language, only half of the students had learnt the basic concept. This indicates that the problems in studying were not only linguistic problems; they seem also to have been study skill problems in gene…
Youth language in media contexts: insights into the functions of English in Finland
2007
ABSTRACT: Recent research has shown that the role of English in Finland is now changing. In particular contexts, it is sometimes used as a lingua franca, an intracultural means of communication, and an additional language, along with Finnish. An interesting domain in terms of the spread and changing role of English is also youth language – the focus of the present paper. Approaching youth language from a discourse-analytic and sociolinguistic perspective, this paper investigates an electronic game session, hip-hop lyrics, fan fiction and weblogs. As in youth language in other bi/multilingual speech communities, the paper argues that the uses of English in these Finnish youth language conte…
Learning english to speak to the world: reflections around the teaching of english as a global lingua franca
2020
Aquest article explora les implicacions de la dimensió global de l’anglès com a llengua franca mundial a l’hora d’ensenyar aquesta llengua en el nostre entorn educatiu. S’hi argumenta la neces-sitat de transcendir el paradigma del parlant nadiu com a model d’aprenentatge i ensenyament per a caminar cap a un model basat en l’usuari competent de la llengua, i s’aprofundeix en la figura del professor ideal des d’aquest punt de vista, així com els reptes que comporta a l’hora d’avaluar la competència lingüística i d’introduir-hi també la competència intercultural. This paper explores the implications of the global dimension of English as a world lingua franca in teaching the language in our edu…
L2 English derivational knowledge : Which affixes are learners more likely to recognise?
2016
Knowledge of derivational morphology is considered an important aspect of vocabulary knowledge both in L1 (mother tongue) and L2 (second or foreign language) English language learning. However, it is still not clear whether different derivational affixes vary in their (learning) difficulty. The present study examines whether Bauer and Nation’s (1993) teaching order of L2 English affixes can account for the difficulty learners have with recognising the affixes. The participants in the study were L1 Estonian and Russian learners of English at upper-secondary schools in Estonia (n = 62). Their performance was measured on a word segmentation task. There were significant differences in the numbe…
The simultaneous development of receptive skills in an orthographically transparent second language
2014
Learning to read in an orthographically very shallow language may seem easy. However, for adults who are non-literate in their first language (L1), have no experience of formal education, and have to acquire literacy in a new language (L2), learning to read at all can be a formidable task. In this article, the results of a case study of the outcome of the first 10 months of Finnish literacy training for five immigrant women (24–45 years of age) are presented. Relationships are sought between the participants' achieved reading skills, their oral receptive vocabulary, their knowledge of letters, their phonological working memory and their visual memory. The results of the study show that even…
Constructions of bilingualism in Finnish Government programmes and a newspaper discussion site debate
2014
The concept of bilingualism in Finnish political discourse is predominantly used in the meaning of official or state bilingualism, focussing on the two constitutionally defined ‘national languages’; i.e. Finnish and Swedish. Legally, both Finnish and Swedish speakers have a right for public services, such as schooling or health care, in their first language. On the other hand, several language ideological debates have taken place in recent years, challenging especially the status of Swedish in administration and education. These debates have reshaped the discourses on what counts as bilingualism. This paper analyses on one hand the historical discursive development of the “official will” pr…
Characteristics of Weak and Strong Readers in a Foreign Language
2016
This study investigated the cognitive (first language [L1] and foreign language [FL]), linguistic (L1 and FL), and motivational characteristics of weak FL readers in contrast to strong readers in 3 groups of L1 Finnish-speaking learners of English, aged 10, 14, and 17 years. This cross-sectional study covered a wide range of potential correlates, and therefore predictors, of FL reading based on previous research on reading in first, second (L2), and foreign languages. The weakest and strongest FL readers (1 standard deviation below or above the mean reading score) in each age group were selected for the comparisons reported in this article. The FL (English) skills other than reading were fo…