Publisher's Synopsis
Language socialization research takes a sociohistorical (or cultural-historical) approach to human development. That is, the development of individuals is held to be inseparable from the socioculturally organized and historically developing activities in which they engage, tools they use (including language), and institutions of which they are a part. The child is seen as an active appropriator of the knowledge and skills of her community, constituting her own understandings thereof as she engages in activity with others. Because the child's understandings may differ from those of her more expert interlocutors, she is not the only one to be changed through socialization: her interlocutors and the very practices in which they engage may also be transformed. The notion of practice is central to the paradigm. Practices are meaningful actions that occur routinely in everyday life, are widely shared by members of the group, have developed over time, and carry normative expectations about the way things should be done. Language socialization research endeavors to understand these patterns in relation to local social and cultural systems (such as kinship, religion, schooling, the economy) Language Socialization across Cultures focuses on the ways in which children are both socialized through language and socialized to use language in culturally specific ways. The contributors examine the verbal interactions of small children with their caregivers and peers in several different societies around the world, showing that these interactions are socially and culturally organized, and that it is by participating in them that children come to understand sociocultural orientations. In order to make a fuller interpretation of second language socialization processes in intercultural communication contexts, this book looks into the basic assumptions of language socialization and the tenets of intercultural transformation studies before arguing for the feasibility of weaving the two research paradigms to create a more inclusive theoretical framework of intercultural language socialization. An elaboration of such a framework holds promise to enable a more panoramic interrogation of the joint development of L2 learners' language competence and sociocultural knowledge in complex intercultural communicative contexts. This effort will not only expand and enrich the two research paradigms themselves, but also compensate for the dearth of research in this interdisciplinary field. The chapter contained in this Book presents the language socialization research, which documents and theorizes the diversity of cultural paths to communicative competence and linguistic/cultural community membership. Language socialization research takes a sociohistorical (or cultural-historical) approach to human development. That is, the development of individuals is held to be inseparable from the socioculturally organized and historically developing activities in which they engage, tools they use (including language), and institutions of which they are a part. The child is seen as an active appropriator of the knowledge and skills of her community, constituting her own understandings thereof as she engages in activity with others. Because the child's understandings may differ from those of her more expert interlocutors, she is not the only one to be changed through socialization: her interlocutors and the very practices in which they engage may also be transformed. The notion of practice is central to the paradigm. Practices are meaningful actions that occur routinely in everyday life, are widely shared by members of the group, have developed over time, and carry normative expectations about the way things should be done. Language socialization research endeavors to understand these patterns in relation to local social and cultural systems (such as kinship, religion, schooling, the economy) Language Socialization across Cultures focuses on the ways in which children are both socialized through language and socialized to use language in culturally specific ways. The contributors examine the verbal interactions of small children with their caregivers and peers in several different societies around the world, showing that these interactions are socially and culturally organized, and that it is by participating in them that children come to understand sociocultural orientations. In order to make a fuller interpretation of second language socialization processes in intercultural communication contexts, this book looks into the basic assumptions of language socialization and the tenets of intercultural transformation studies before arguing for the feasibility of weaving the two research paradigms to create a more inclusive theoretical framework of intercultural language socialization. An elaboration of such a framework holds promise to enable a more panoramic interrogation of the joint development of L2 learners' language competence and sociocultural knowledge in complex intercultural communicative contexts. This effort will not only expand and enrich the two research paradigms themselves, but also compensate for the dearth of research in this interdisciplinary field. The chapter contained in this Book presents the language socialization research, which documents and theorizes the diversity of cultural paths to communicative competence and linguistic/cultural community membership. Language socialization research takes a sociohistorical (or cultural-historical) approach to human development. That is, the development of individuals is held to be inseparable from the socioculturally organized and historically developing activities in which they engage, tools they use (including language), and institutions of which they are a part. The child is seen as an active appropriator of the knowledge and skills of her community, constituting her own understandings thereof as she engages in activity with others. Because the child's understandings may differ from those of her more expert interlocutors, she is not the only one to be changed through socialization: her interlocutors and the very practices in which they engage may also be transformed. The notion of practice is central to the paradigm. Practices are meaningful actions that occur routinely in everyday life, are widely shared by members of the group, have developed over time, and carry normative expectations about the way things should be done. Language socialization research endeavors to understand these patterns in relation to local social and cultural systems (such as kinship, religion, schooling, the economy) Language Socialization across Cultures focuses on the ways in which children are both socialized through language and socialized to use language in culturally specific ways. The contributors examine the verbal interactions of small children with their caregivers and peers in several different societies around the world, showing that these interactions are socially and culturally organized, and that it is by participating in them that children come to understand sociocultural orientations. In order to make a fuller interpretation of second language socialization processes in intercultural communication contexts, this book looks into the basic assumptions of language socialization and the tenets of intercultural transformation studies before arguing for the feasibility of weaving the two research paradigms to create a more inclusive theoretical framework of intercultural language socialization. An elaboration of such a framework holds promise to enable a more panoramic interrogation of the joint development of L2 learners' language competence and sociocultural knowledge in complex intercultural communicative contexts. This effort will not only expand and enrich the two research paradigms themselves, but also compensate for the dearth of research in this interdisciplinary field. The chapter contained in this Book presents the language socialization research, which documents and theorizes the diversity of cultural paths to communicative competence and linguistic/cultural community membership.
