Global Language and Local Identities

This lecture is co-sponsored by the Confucius Institute
Date: Friday, November 18th, 2016, 10:00-11:00 AM
Location: Javits Lecture Center 110

Watch: Global Language and Local Identities

Lecture Abstract

Identity is a concept that has been defined in many ways and scholars have built theories of identity to explain persons’ and people’s sense of the term. In this lecture, I compare and contrast theories developed in second language acquisition, social psychology, anthropology, and communication sciences and conclude that each is grounded on the particularity of a social context. To expand the particular contexts studied by identity theorists, I consider the varied responses of individuals and groups to the influence of a hegemonic language. Although contact by speakers of a local language with a hegemonic language is sometimes seen as endangering the local language and threatening speakers’ identities, I reject that as a pessimistic
oversimplification. I reviewed these studies of persons in contact with hegemonic languages: Uyghurs in China in contact with Han Chinese, Quichua musicians in contact with Spanish in Ecuador and the United States, and Advertising copywriters in Korea, bloggers in Malaysia, and a Singaporean
poet in contact with World Englishes. They provide new insights into how local identities are contested and creatively constructed in contact with hegemonic languages.

About the Speaker: Richard Young

Richard F. Young, M.A. (Oxford), M.A. (Reading), Ph.D. (Pennsylvania), is professor of English Linguistics at the University of WisconsinMadison, where he teaches courses in English Linguistics, Sociolinguistics, Pragmatics, and Research Methods. His research focuses on the relationship between language and social context and has resulted in four books Discursive Practice in Language Learning and Teaching, Language and Interaction, Talking and Testing, and Variation in Interlanguage Morphology and over 70 articles. In his current research project, he seeks to understand the influence of formative experiences of English language learning on the current practice of Chinese teachers of English in Wuhan, China.