UK Linguistic Ethnography Forum

 

The UKLEF website has now moved.  This is an archive site. 

Please go to www.ling-ethnog.org.uk for the up-to-date site.

 

 

UKLEF Home

 

About us

Events

Participants

Email list

Papers

 

BAAL

 

First research seminar

British Association for Applied Linguistics 

University of Leicester

28-29 March 2001

Click on the name to see the participant's research interests.
 

Jo Arthur

Edge Hill College 

arthurj@edgehill.co.uk 

Francesca Bargiela 

Department of English and Media Studies, Nottingham Trent University, Clifton Lane, Nottingham NG11 8NS 

francesca.bargiela@ntu.ac.uk 

David Barton 

Department of Linguistics, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YT 

d.barton@lancs.ac.uk 

Jan Blommaert 

University of Ghent 

jan.blommaert@rug.ac.be 

Michael P. Breen 

University of Stirling 

m.p.breen@stir.ac.uk 

James Collins 

University at Albany/SUNY 

collins@albany.edu 

Mairian Corker 

Kings College London/The University of Central Lancashire 

mairian@deafsearch.demon.co.uk 

Angela Creese 

University of Leicester 

ac114@le.ac.uk 

Eve Gregory 

Goldmiths College, University of London 

eds01eg@gold.ac.uk 

Monica Heller 

University of Toronto 

mheller@oise.utoronto.ca 

Moira Inghilleri 

Goldmiths College, University of London 

m.inghilleri@gold.ac.uk 

Elena Ioannidou 

University of Southampton 

ei@soton.ac.uk 

Kathryn Jones 

Lancaster University 

k.e.jones@lancaster.ac.uk 

Maria Clara Keating 

University of Coimbra, Portugal / University of Lancaster, England 

mop94349@mail.telepac.pt 

Jenny Hye-Won Lee 

University of Southampton 

jhl@soton.ac.uk 

Theresa Lillis 

The Open University 

t.m.lillis@open.ac.uk 

Vally Lytra 

King’s College, University of London 

vally@lytra.fsnet.co.uk 

Deirdre Martin 

University of Birmingham 

d.m.martin@bham.ac.uk 

Marilyn Martin-Jones 

University of Wales (Aberystwyth) 

mqm@aber.ac.uk 

Janet Maybin 

Open University 

j.maybin@open.ac.uk 

Kate Pahl 

King’s College, University of London 

pahl@globalnet.co.uk 

Uta Papen 

King’s College, University of London 

uta.papen@kcl.ac.uk 

Ben Rampton 

King’s College, University of London 

ben.rampton@kcl.ac.uk 

Celia Roberts 

King’s College, University of London 

celiaroberts@lineone.net 

Srikant Sarangi 

Cardiff University 

sarangi@cardiff.ac.uk 

Stef Slembrouck 

University of Ghent (Belgium) 

stef.slembrouck@rug.ac.be 

Brian V. Street 

King’s College, London 

brian.street@kcl.ac.uk 

Karin Tusting 

Lancaster University 

k.tusting@lancs.ac.uk 

Guilherme Veiga Rios 

Lancaster University 

g.veigarios@lancaster.ac.uk 

Ann Williams 

Goldmiths College / King's College, University of London 

eds01aw@gold.ac.uk

Anita Wilson 

Lancaster University 

anita@wilsonhmp.freeserve.co.uk 


 

Participants: summaries of research interests

Name: Jo Arthur
Institution: Edge Hill College
Email: arthur@edgehill.ac.uk

A. Language and minority identity in the UK

My most recent research activity is an ethnographic study of the Somali community in Liverpool, where the main research site is a Somali community school. Micro-ethnographic observation of literacy lessons has been accompanied by audio- and video-recording and the analysis of bilingual classroom talk. Such community schools are important contexts for linguistic and cultural reproduction in minority communities but, with the notable exception of Li Wei’s 1993 account of Chinese community classes in Newcastle. they have received little research attention to date. Data concerning language values have also been gathered in the Liverpool Somali community using interviews and a questionnaire. The aim of the study is to build an understanding of the communicative and symbolic roles of languages and literacies in this community as part of the Somali diaspora within Britain and beyond.

Reference: Li Wei (1993) ‘Mother tongue maintenance in a Chinese Community School in Newcastle upon Tyne: Developing a social network perspective’. Language and Education, 7, 3.

B. Language in post-colonial classrooms

A prior and continuing strand of research interest concerns the critical analysis of bilingual discourse among teachers and learners in educational contexts where a former colonial language is the official medium of instruction. Analysis focuses on the nature of the pedagogy observed and on the social values embodied and reproduced in the discourse. To date few comparative studies of such contexts, such as Hornberger and Chick’s forthcoming study of Peruvian and South African classrooms, have appeared. Through my writing on education in Botswana and Tanzania, and through collaboration with colleagues researching in other contexts, I hope to add to this literature.

Selected publications

‘Codeswitching and Collusion: Classroom Interaction in Botswana Primary Schools’. Linguistics and Education, 8, 1, 1996.

‘ "I think there must be something undiscovered that prevents us from doing our work well": Botswana Primary Teachers’ Views on Educational Language Policy.’ Language and Education, 11, 4, 1997.

‘Institutional Practices and the Cultural Construction of Primary School Teachers in Botswana’, Comparative Education, 34, 3, 1998.

‘Researching biliteracy: Scenes from a mother tongue classroom’. Paper presented at the Open University ELTAL Seminar, 1 December 2000.

Name: Francesca Bargiela, M.A. PhD. Research Fellow
Institution: Department of English and Media Studies, Nottingham Trent University, Clifton Lane, Nottingham NG11 8NS
Email: francesca.bargiela@ntu.ac.uk

Research activity

Francesca Bargiela has been researching business discourse since 1990. In the first half of the Nineties, she acted as the UK collaborator, or the instigator, of four British Council-sponsored international research projects on written and spoken business communication which involved institutions from Belgium, Norway, The Netherlands and Portugal. In her company-based research, both in Britain and in Italy, she has adopted a combination of ethnographic tools such as semi-structured interviews, non-participant observation, shadowing and field-notes. She has collaborated with the Nottingham Business School on a cross-cultural analysis of HR managers in Britain and Italy. Her current research interests include business discourse, intercultural pragmatics, organisational communication and management ethics.

Selected publications

(2003) ‘Organizational discourses: constructing the organization’ (provisional title) Special issue of the International Journal of the Sociology of Language. Guest editor: F. Bargiela

(2002) ‘Business discourse: old debates, new horizons’. A Thematic Issue of the International Review of Applied Linguistics (IRAL), in preparation. Guest editors: F. Bargiela and C. Nickerson

(2001) Face and politeness. New insights for old concepts. Journal article. Submitted for publication.

(2001) Management, culture and discourse in international business. In: Stroinska, M. (ed.) Beyond Language and Culture, Oxford: Berghahn Books

(1999) Writing Business: Genres, Media and Discourses. Harlow: Longman, (with Catherine Nickerson, eds.)

(1998) Managerial sensemaking and occupational identities in Britain and Italy: the role of management magazines in the process of discursive construction. Journal of Management Studies, 35(3):285-301 (with Tony J Watson)

(1997) Managing Language: the Discourse of Corporate Meetings. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company, (with Sandra Harris)

(1997) The Languages of Business: an International Perspective. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, (with S. Harris eds)

Forthcoming symposia

(2002) What’s new in intercultural business communication? (provisional title; Joint Convenor with C. Nickerson, University of Nijmegen), Annual Conference of the ABC (Association of Business Communication) European Division, Arhus Business School, Denmark.

Name:David Barton
Institution: Department of Linguistics, Lancaster University, Lancaster LA1 4YT
Email: d.barton@lancs.ac.uk

My work has been concerned with understanding the nature of literacy in contemporary life. This has included a detailed study of the role of reading and writing in people’s everyday home and community lives in Lancaster, England.

I am interested in contemporary changes in literacy practices; the local enactment of global change; adult literacy education; qualitative research methodologies; redefining linguistics.

Publications

D. Barton (in press) Directions for literacy research: analysing language and social practices in a textually-mediated world. Language & Education.

D. Barton, M. Hamilton and R. Ivanic (eds) (2000) Situated Literacies. Routledge.

D. Barton and N. Hall (eds) (2000) Letter Writing as a Social Practice. John Benjamins.

D. Barton and M. Hamilton (1998) Local Literacies: Reading And Writing In One Community, London and New York: Routledge.

D. Barton (1994) Literacy: An Introduction to the Ecology of Written Language. Oxford: Blackwell.

Name:Jan Blommaert
Institution: University of Ghent
Email: jan.blommaert@rug.ac.be

Research interests

1. The theory and methodology of linguistic pragmatics

2. Intercultural and international communication

3. The study of ideologies related to inter- and multiculturalism: racism, nationalism

4. Language and politics in East and Southern Africa

5. Text and textualisation: anthropological perspectives

Publications

1991 How much culture is there in intercultural communication? In J. Blommaert & J. Verschueren (eds.) The pragmatics of intercultural and international communication: 13-31. Amsterdam: John Benjamins

1992 Codeswitching and the exclusivity of social identities: some data from Campus Swahili. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 13/1-2: 57-70 (special issue on codeswitching; Carol M. Eastman, ed.)

1995 (ed. with Jef Verschueren and Jan-Ola Östman) Handbook of Pragmatics: Manual. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 658pp.

1995 (ed. with Jef Verschueren and Jan-Ola Östman) Handbook of Pragmatics, 1995. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 320pp.

1999 (ed.) Language ideological debates. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter (Language, Power and Social Process series nr. 2), 447pp.

1999 Reconstructing the sociolinguistic image of Africa: Grassroots writing in Shaba (Congo). Text, 9/2: 175-200

2000 (With Ch. Bulcaen) Critical discourse analysis. Annual Review of Anthropology 29 (in press).

ftc. (with K. Maryns) Stylistic and thematic shifting as narrative resources: assessing asylum seekers’ repertoires. Multilingua (2001)

Name: Michael P. Breen
Institution: University of Stirling
Email: m.p.breen@stir.ac.uk

Current research

Language and literacy practices/demands in different subjects in first year of secondary school.
Language teacher thinking in relation to classroom practices and perceived requirements on their role within particular work situations.

Previous relevant research

Literacy practices in school, home and community (area 1 under references below).
Teacher interpretations and rationales for their work in relation to experiences of change and actual classroom behaviour (area 2 under references).
Classroom interaction and its possible outcomes for learning (area 3).

References

1. Literacy practices in home and school

Breen, M.P., Louden, W., Barratt-Pugh, C., Rivalland, J., Rohl, M., Rhydwen, M., Lloyd, S. and Carr, T. (1994) Literacy in its place: literacy practices in urban and rural communities, Vols 1 & 2. Canberra: Department of Employment, Education & Training.

Breen, M.P. (1997) The Pilbara Case Studies and The relationship between assessment frameworks and classroom pedagogy. In Breen, M.P, C.Barratt-Pugh, B. Derewianka, H. House, C. Hudson, T. Lumley, & M.Rohl. (1997) Profiling ESL Children: How Teachers Interpret and Use National and State Assessment Frameworks, Vols 1 & 2. Canberra: Department of Employment, Education, Training & Youth Affairs.

  1. Language teacher thinking and classroom practices

Breen, M.P., C. Briguglio, & R. Tognini. (1996). Becoming a Language Teacher in the Primary School: Role Change Implications for School Programs and Professional Development. (pp.111). Perth: National Languages & Literacy Institute of Australia. (ISBN 0-7298-0293-0)

Breen, M.P., B. Hird, M. Milton, R. Oliver, & A. Thwaite. (2001). Making sense of language teaching: From practices to principles. Revised version to be submitted to Applied Linguistics.

3. Classroom interaction

Breen, M.P. (1998) Navigating the discourse: On what is learned in the language classroom. In W.A. Renandya & G.M. Jacobs. (Eds) Learners and Language Learning. Anthology Series 39. (pp115-144). Singapore: SEAMEO Regional Language Centre.

Breen, M.P. (2001) Overt participation and covert acquisition in the language classroom. In M.P. Breen (Ed.) Learner contributions to language learning: New directions in research. London: Longman.

 

Name: James Collins, Professor of Anthropology and Reading
Institution: University at Albany/SUNY
Email: collins@albany.edu

Research activity

He is an anthropologist and linguist whose primary research efforts have been in critical studies of language and education and Native American languages and cultures. His recent publications includeUnderstanding Tolowa Histories (Routledge, 1998), an in-depth historical, ethnographic, and linguistic study of language, culture, and politics among a Northern California indigenous nation. "The culture wars and shifts in linguistic capital" was based on an ethnographic study of college writing programs and appeared in Culture, Dream, and Political Economy, a special issue of International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, 12(3) (1999). He has recently completed "Selling the market: Discourse, education standards, and social inequality", which utilized interaction and narrative analysis, and which will appear in Discourse and Critique a special issue of Critique of Anthropology 21(1&2) (2001). He is working on a paper involving intensive analysis of tutoring sessions with adolescents and developing ways of characterizing identity shifts in struggles over, and simple difficulties, with innovative pedagogy.

 

Name: Mairian Corker
Institution: Kings College London/The University of Central Lancashire
Email: mairian@deafsearch.demon.co.uk

Current research activity

My work is concerned with the social constitution and social determination of disability from a disability studies perspective, using a combination of Fairclough’s CDA and linguistic ethnography. I am currently completing a book, ‘Disabling Language? Analysing Disability Discourse’, which will be published by Routledge in 2001. As part of this project, I am engaging in a virtual ethnography on a number of disability-related email discussion lists, and plan to extend this project. A parallel project involves the development of the ethnography of reading, and of visual and spatial methodologies within ethnographic research to complement the current emphasis on oracy.

Previous research activity.

From 1998-2000 I worked with colleagues from the Universities of Edinburgh and Leeds on the ESRC funded Lives of Disabled Children project, work that has recently been awarded an ‘outstanding’ by the ESRC. Although a range of methodologies and theoretical approaches were used on this project, my own work employed linguistic ethnography. This work was primarily with deaf children aged 11-16 interacting in different languages and forms of language, and in a range of contexts that included home, school (both residential and mainstream) and the spaces in-between. However, I also worked with children who were blind and who had physical impairments or learning difficulties.

References

Corker, M. (1996) Deaf Transitions. London: Jessica Kingsley.

Corker, M. (2000) ‘Disability politics, language planning and inclusive social policy.’ Disability & Society, 15 (3), 445-462.

Corker, M. (2001a) ‘Discriminatory language, talking disability, and the quiet revolution in language change.’ In H. Trappes-Lomax, (Ed) Change and Continuity in Applied Linguistics. British Studies in Applied Linguistics 15. British Association for Applied Linguistics in association with Multilingual Matters, pp. 115-130.

Corker, M. (2001b) ‘Isn’t that what girls do? – disabled young people construct (homo)sexuality in situated social practice.’ Journal of Educational and Child Psychology, Volume 18(1), 89-107.

Corker, M. and Davis, J.M. (2001, forthcoming) ‘Portrait of Callum: The disabling of a childhood’. In R. Edwards (ed.) Children, Home and School: Autonomy, Connection or Regulation. London: Falmer.

 

Name:Angela Creese, Lecturer in Applied Linguistics and TESOL
Institution: School of Education, University of Leicester, 21 University Rd, Leicester,
LE1 7RF:
email: ac114@le.ac.uk

I have been involved in two (and a half) types of ethnographic research and these have been in London schools, primary and secondary.

1. The discursive construction of power in teacher partnerships: language and subject specialists in mainstream schools.

This work looks at the discursive construction of (EAL) language and (Curriculum) subject teachers in multilingual secondary school classrooms. It considers how teacher talk and issues of power impact on the implementation of an educational policy which intends to be inclusive.

The study used the tools of ethnography of communication (Hymes, 1968, 1974), a semiotic functional approach (Jakobson, 1971, 1981) and critical discourse analysis (Fairclough, 1995; Kress, 1995, 2000; Gee, 1999) to look at the positioning of teachers in teaching relationships in multilingual secondary schools. I show how teachers’ talk becomes associated with different knowledge discourses, which are in turn hierarchised. An argument is made that the pedagogic expertise of the EAL teacher is positioned as generic and non specialised knowledge, whereas the subject teacher’s knowledge is seen as particular and expert. A functional analysis of teacher talk was carried out to show how the subject and language specialists position themselves and are positioned differently in terms of core curriculum concerns.

2. Learning and Gender: A study of underachievement in Junior Schools (with Harry Daniels, Valerie Hey, Diana Leonard, Shaun Fielding and Marjorie Smith (1999, ESRC Report R000237346).

This work is concerned with the discursive practices of boys and girls’ in learning and friendship groups within school and classroom cultures. It approaches questions about gender and learning by showing the contested nature of group life. It evidences how teachers, girls and boys frame and reframe learning as forms of subjectivity with resulting pedagogic winners and losers. The ethnography of communication is read through feminist post-structuralism and neo-Vygostkian social cultural theory with a focus on positionality and classroom and social discourse. We make transparent the analytical process of transforming data from observations, interview transcripts and group learning activities into interpretations.

3. Teacher Support Teams in Secondary Schools. DfEE Research Project (with Brahm Norwich and Harry Daniels)

Teacher Support Teams (TSTs) are a way of supporting individual teachers who request support over a teaching concern relating broadly to special educational needs. This work looked at the development and evaluation of these teams in four secondary schools. My particular interest within the research team was the discourse of team meetings and the theorising of collaboration. This drew project used questionnaires, semi-structured interviews and observations.

Selected Publications

Creese, A. (forthcoming) ‘The role of language specialists in disciplinary teaching: in search of a subject?’, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, Vol. 21 (6).

Creese, A (forthcoming) ‘Teachers talking: communication in professional partnerships’. In C. Jones and C. Wallace (eds) Making EMTAG Work.Trentham Books.

Creese, A., Daniels, H., Norwich, B.(2000) ‘Evaluating Teacher Support Teams in secondary schools : supporting teachers for SEN and other needs’. Research Papers in Education Vol. 15 (3) pp 307 – 324.

 

Names:Eve Gregory and Ann Williams
Institutions and Emails: Eve Gregory (Goldsmiths) : eds01eg@gold.ac.uk; Ann Williams (Goldsmiths and King’s) : eds01aw@gold.ac.uk

Current research activity

We have recently finished the ESRC funded project ‘Siblings as Mediators of Literacy in two East London Communities’ (1998-1999) and are now both working on the Leverhulme funded ‘Literacy Practices at Home and at School: Community Context and Interpretations of Literacy’ (Jan.2000-Dec.2002). Findings from the Siblings Project are still in the process of being written up for journals (e.g. The International Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, The Journal of Reading Research and Changing English). Both projects aim to combine ethnography and conversation analysis, although conversation analysis on the Leverhulme project has not yet begun.

Previous research relevant to linguistic ethnography

The ESRC project ‘Family Literacy History and Children’s Learning Strategies at Home and at School’ combined approaches from ethnography and ethnomethodology quite successfully: detailed analysis of classroom discourse during literacy lessons revealed ways in which teacher and students co-constructed knowledge and ethnographic approaches provided a rich description of literacy practices in the lives of the teachers and families.

The project ‘The Role of Adolescents in Dialect Levelling’ (ESCR R000236180: 1995 – 1998) P. Kerswill, A. Williams and J. Cheshire) used an ethnographic approach to trace the adoption of non-standard London features by adolescents in Reading, Milton Keynes and Hull.

References

Gregory, E. & Williams, A. (2000) City Literacies: Learning to read across generations and cultures, London: Routledge

Gregory, E. & Williams, A. (2000) ‘Work or Play: Unofficial Literacies in Two East London Communities, in M. Martin-Jones & K. Jones (eds) Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds, Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Gregory, E. (1998) Siblings as Mediators of Literacy in Linguistic Minority Communities, Language and Education, Vol.12. No.1: 33-55

Kerswill, P & Williams, A. (1997) ‘Investigating Social and Linguistic Identity in Three British Schools’, in U.B. Kotsinas, A.B. Stenstrom & A.M. Karlsson (eds) Proceedings of Conference on Youth Language: Papers from a Research Symposium. Series MINS No. 43. Stockholm, University of Stockholm Press.

 

Name:Monica Heller
Institution: Centre de recherches en éducation franco-ontarienne and Dept. of Sociology and Equity Studies, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto
Email: mheller@oise.utoronto.ca

Current research

The commodification of bilingualism in the new economy; globalization, the new economy and bi/multilingual literacy; globalization, nationalism and linguistic minorities

Previous research

Twenty years of linguistic ethnographic work on language ideologies and practices in Canada, with a focus on francophone Canada, the workplace, education and civil society

Publications

M. Heller (In prep.) Éléments d'une sociolinguistique critique. Paris: Hatier.

M. Heller and M. Martin-Jones (eds) (2001) Voices of Authority: Education and Linguistic Difference. Westport CT: Ablex.

M. Heller (1999) Linguistic Minorities and Modernity: A Sociolinguistic Ethnography. London: Longman.

M. Heller (1999) ‘Alternative ideologies of la francophonie’. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3(3): 336-359.

M. Heller (1999) ‘Heated language in a cold climate’. In: J. Blommaert (ed.) Language Ideological Debates. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

 

Name: Moira Inghilleri
Institution: Goldmiths College, University of London
Email: m.inghilleri@gold.ac.uk

Current research activity

My current research is in the area of translation theory and practice. My focus is on interpreting in political asylum interviews, with a view to (re)define the activity of interpreting as a situated socio-cultural practice, and to analyse the role of the ‘interpreting norms’ of a given community that may be seen to underlie and inform the decisions interpreters make.

Previous research activity

I have been involved in a number of research projects which involved what would broadly be defined as linguistic ethnography. Much of this has occurred in primary and secondary school classrooms in the U. S. and the U.K. Amongst the U.S. projects I would particularly mention the following: The Discourse of the Science Classroom (with Sarah Michaels) - this investigated the relationship between student and teacher talk, social class and ethnicity and the organisation of knowledge in two science classrooms; Developing a Curriculum on Local History (with Jim Gee) - this project explored the relationships amongst members of a curriculum planning team comprised of university academics and students, school teachers and curriculum consultants) and their joint construction and negotiation of notions such as history, cultural identity and diversity. The project also included interviews with white-ethnic and African-African university students.

In the U.K. I worked on the ‘GCSE Oral Communication: Assessment and Interethnic variation’ (with Roger Hewitt). This project examined the potential for cultural bias in the new examination by analysing video recordings of Asian, African-Caribbean and white English school discussion groups. I also conducted a preliminary investigation, ‘The Colombian Community in London’ into the communicative relays (both verbal and written) which contribute to the internal social organisation of the Colombian community in London.

Relevant references

(2000) ‘Intersubjectivity: the holy grail of mutual understanding?’ in Language and Communication, 20, 133-148.

(1999) ‘Cultural and Linguistic Diversity Revisited’, in A. Tosi and C. Leung (eds), Rethinking Language Education, London, CILT, 59-69.

(1993) with Roger Hewitt, ‘Oracy in the Classroom: Policy, Pedagogy and Group Oral Work’, Anthropology and Education Quarterly, v.24, no.4, 308-317.

 

Name:Elena Ioannidou BA (Ed), MA (Ed), Doctoral Student
Institution: University of Southampton
Email: ei@soton.ac.uk

Current research activity

I am a third year Ph.D. student in the Research and Graduate School of Education. My doctoral research is on Language and Ethnic Identity among students in Cyprus. The methodology adopted was an ethnographic case study, focusing on one primary school classroom. Some of the data collection techniques used were: interviewing, classroom observation, focus groups, different classroom tasks, short questionnaires.

Relevant research activity

I contacted a socio-linguistic survey among Greek and Turkish Cypriot university students regarding their frames of references for ethnic identity and the role different linguistic varieties might have in that.
(The paper is in progress)

References

Ioannidou, Elena (1999) ‘The interplay of language, power and identity’, Centre of Language in Education, University of Southampton, June 1999.

In progress

Ioannidou, Elena ‘Language Policy and Ethnicity: The case of Cypriot Education’, proposed paper for the European Language Council Conference, August 2001.

 

Name:Kathryn Jones
Institution: Lancaster University
E-mail: k.e.jones@lancaster.ac.uk

Current Research

I am currently completing a series of case studies of the bilingual language and literacy practices of 10 businesses in North Wales for CELTEC (The North Wales Training and Enterprise Council) with a view to identifying implications for Welsh language and Welsh medium vocational training.

Previous research related to linguistic ethnography

A study of the bilingual language and literacy practices of people living and working in 2 villages in north Wales. My focus of analysis was upon the social processes of globalisation, and specifically i) how processes of globalisation are constituted in and through the discourse practices of people’s day-to-day routines, and ii) how globalisation processes are textually-mediated. This study combined various ethnographic & qualitative methods of data collection. Its theoretical framework drew upon Social and Cultural Theory, Literacy, Bilingualism and Critical Discourse Analysis.

A study of teaching and learning practices in primary, secondary and teacher training classrooms in Tanzania. This study combined a variety of ethnographic & qualitative methods of data collection with a discourse analysis of code-switching practices.

References

Martin-Jones M. & Jones K. (eds) Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds (Amsterdam: John Benjamins 2000), 395pp.

Jones, K. Becoming just another alphanumeric code: farmers’ encounters with the literacies and discourses of agricultural bureaucracy at the livestock auction. In Situated Literacies: Reading and Writing in Context. (eds D Barton, M Hamilton & R Ivanic) pp 70-90. London: Routledge (2000).

Jones, K. Texts, mediation and social relations in a bureaucratised world. In Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds (eds M Martin-Jones & K Jones) pp 209 – 228. Amsterdam: John Benjamins (2000).

Jones, K., Martin-Jones M., & Bhatt A. Constructing a critical, dialogic approach to research on multilingual literacies. In Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds (eds M Martin-Jones & K Jones) pp 319 – 351. Amsterdam: John Benjamins (2000).

Hodge, R. & Jones K. Photography in collaborative research on multilingual literacy practices: Images and understandings of researcher and researched. In Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds (eds M Martin-Jones & K Jones) pp 299 – 318. Amsterdam: John Benjamins (2000).

Jones, K. Text, talk and discourse practices: Exploring local experiences of globalisation. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Lancaster (1999).

 

Name:Maria Clara Keating
Institution: (Work) Group of Anglo-American Studies, Faculty of Letters, University of Coimbra, Portugal
(Postgraduate research) Linguistics Department, University of Lancaster, England
E-mail: mop94349@mail.telepac.pt

Research activity

I have just submitted my Ph.D. thesis in the Dpt. Of Linguistics, University of Lancaster and am waiting for the ‘viva’. This dissertation is the product of research on the language and literacy practices of a group of Portuguese migrant women living in London and focuses on the lived experiences with literacy that these women shared with me.

I have spent three years going in and out of London and accompanying a group of individuals throughout their lives and experiences with literacy. This means that I have gathered data from their households, but also their workplace, their places of leisure or their community associations over time. In the thesis, I have mainly focused on the in-depth interviews but I have also drawn many insights from the thick descriptions and the participant observation that I have done in the course of my fieldwork. One major tool supporting fieldwork was the use of research diaries and field diaries. I have tried from the start to assume both my subjectivity and the subjectivity of the participants in my study as a source for inquiry and debate. As my fieldwork happened over a long period of time, I have looked at my ethnography as a process in which the participants of the study, me and the materials produced in our interactions became ‘subjects of research’, ‘researcher’ and ‘data’, as we engaged in activities that configured us in those ways.

Previous research activity relevant to linguistic ethnography: In a previous research project, more sociologically based, I have compared the broader language and literacy practices of two Portuguese migrant communities in anglophone countries, one in London, England, and the other one in New Bedford, United States. The way I went about this broad study involved more general interviews about the construction of the Portuguese community as such, and about the ways Portuguese and English languages were valued by the people of the community. This was my first attempt to carry out qualitative and ethnographic research on language and literacy practices. In both New Bedford and London, I carried out interviews and lived with people in the community. I then followed up the research in London for my Ph.D. research.

References

Keating, Maria Clara (1990) Language Contact Between Portuguese and English. Portuguese Immigrants in London: A Case-Study. M.Phil dissertation. Unpublished manuscript, Linguistics Department, University of Cambridge, England

Keating, Maria Clara (1994) ‘Linguagem e diferença sexual’. In Revista Crítica de Ciências Sociais 40.

Keating, Maria Clara (1997) ‘As linguagens da emigração’. In Capinha, G., ed., Emigração e identidade, Research Report presented to the Centre of Social Studies of the Economics Faculty at the University of Coimbra, Portugal.

Keating, Maria Clara (forthcoming) ‘Linguagens relocalizadas: percursos discursivos de duas mulheres portuguesas em Londres’. In Santos, M. I. R. et al Entre ser e estar: raízes, percursos e discursos de identidade. Coimbra: Afrontamento.

 

Name:Jenny Hye-Won Lee
Institution: Research and Graduate School of Education, University of Southampton
Email: jhl@soton.ac.uk

Current research activity

For my PhD. research, I investigated the nature and quality of the language learning process and teaching practices both the teacher and students experience in primary foreign language classroom. This is an empirical case study that used naturalistic classroom observation method and multi-level analysis procedure. The findings show a significant relationship between social and contextual values (macro influences) and classroom interaction (micro process). (I’m at the stage of writing up the thesis).

We reported a contrastive ethnographic study of classroom foreign language learning, and discussed that how differently the ‘communicative approach’ was practised and how different notion of the ‘good language learner’ was constructed according to two different pedagogical contexts.

Reference of my work:

Bailey, K. and Nunan, D. (1996) Voices from the Language Classroom. Cambridge University Press.

Gass, S. (1997) Input, Interaction and the Second Language Learner. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.

Mitchell, R. and Myles, F. (1998) Second Language Learning Theories. Arnold.

The Modern Language Journal (1998) ‘The role of Input and Interaction in Second Language Acquisition’. Special Issue of the MLJ 82/3.

 

Name:Theresa Lillis
Institution: Centre for Language and Communications, The Open University
Email: t.m.lillis@open.ac.uk

Research activity relevant to linguistic ethnography

For the past six years I have been focusing on the problematics of ‘access’ and the language and literacy practices of higher education. My main research project (a Ph.D. study) took place over a period of 3 years and involved ten ‘non-traditional’ students writing in a number of academic disciplines/disciplinary areas: Language Studies, Law, Educational Studies and Women’s Studies, Social Work. Since completing the Ph.D. thesis, I have continued to explore the academic writing experiences of several of the participants who took part in the initial project, with data relating to some participants now spanning a period of six years.

Methodologically, the research has involved a number of ethnographic tools- literacy history interviews, collections of relevant documentary evidence, (course guidelines on essay questions, departmental feedback and advice sheets, tutors’ written comments) as well as regular informal contact with the participants in a range of contexts. However, the central methodological tool throughout this project has been that of face-to-face ‘talk around texts’. Broadly based on the method of the ‘discourse based interview’, such talk has involved cyclical meetings at regular intervals to discuss drafts of the student-writers’ assignments, tutor feedback and the writers’ thoughts and feelings about writing in academia. This talk has generated some 80 hours of text-focused discussion.

Theoretically, the research draws on, and engages with, New Literacy Studies (in particular academic literacy studies in the UK) Rhetoric, ‘Composition’ and ‘Basic Writing’ in the US and Critical Discourse Analysis. The analyses which I have carried out to date draw broadly on frames and notions from across this diverse work: I have used, for example, Bakhtinian notions of authoring alongside theorisations of ‘context’ from critical discourse analysis to make sense of the student-writers’ experiences; I have also appropriated analytic categories from sociocultural approaches to the analysis of teacher/student discourse in school classrooms, in order to explore the nature of the dialogue between teacher-researcher and student-writers.

I am aware that both my theorising and my methodology would benefit from critical commentary, both from myself and others, and hope that taking part in this seminar will provide a space in which to do so.

Relevant publications

(1997) ‘New voices in academia? The regulative nature of academic writing conventions’, Language and Education, 11, 3: 182-199.

(1999) ‘Essayist literacy and the institutional practice of mystery’, in C. Jones, J. Turner and B. Street eds. Student writing in the university: Cultural and Epistemological Issues. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

(Forthcoming 2001) Student Writing. Access, Regulation, Desire, London: Routledge

 

Name:Vally Lytra
Institution: King’s College, University of London
Email: vally@lytra.fsnet.co.uk

I am currently undertaking a research degree in the field of Modern Greek sociolinguistics at the Dept. of Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, at King’s College, London. In this context, I am examining different types of play frames (e.g. name-calling, teasing, performance oriented phenomena) employed by members of a linguistically and culturally mixed peer group comprised of Greek-Turkish bilingual and Greek monolingual pre-adolescents attending an Athenian primary school. Through the investigation of these play frames, I probe into the peer group members’ diverse identity constructions.

To collect my data, I conducted a 4-month fieldwork mainly in the primary school in question and to a lesser extent in the broader Greek-Turkish speaking community residing in that particular area. To analyse and interpret the data, I make use of insights from linguistic ethnography, conversation analysis and interactional sociolinguistics.

References

Lytra,V. (forthcoming) ‘Code-switching among Primary School Pupils: Three Languages in Contact.’ To appear: Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference of the Hellenic Association for the Study of English. Aristotle University. Thessaloniki (May 7-10, 1998).

Lytra, V. (forthcoming) ‘Making Sense of Everyday School Experience: Negotiating Interactional Space & Peer Group Alliances’. To appear: Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Greek Linguistics. University of Cyprus. Nicosia (September 17-19, 1999).

Lytra, V. (forthcoming) ‘Nicknames & Teasing: A Case Study of a Linguistically and Culturally Mixed Peer Group’. To appear: Discourse Constructions of Youth Identities. Eds. Georgakopoulou, A. & I., Androutsopoulos. Benjamins.

 

Name: Deirdre Martin
Institution: School of Education, University of Birmingham
Email: d.m.martin@bham.ac.uk

Current research activity

developing a bid around negotiating identities in families across generation and 3 language groups

writing about primary school bilingual pupils perceptions of language and identity

writing about bilingualism and special needs

exploring funding around literacies and texting

Previous research relevant to linguistic ethnography

interviewing bilingual children in schools about languages

interviewing linguistic monority parents and family members in their homes about patterns of language use

reflecting on working in a bilingual research team

researching ‘hard to reach’ bilingual communities

References

Martin, D., Stuart-Smith, J. and Dhesi, K. K. (1998) ‘Insiders an outsiders: translating in a bilingual research project’, in S. Hunston (ed.) Language at Work, Clevedon, Multilingual Matters/BAAL.

Martin, D. and Stuart-Smith, J. (1998) ‘Exploring bilingual children’s perceptions of being bilingual and biliterate: implications for educational provision’, British Journal of Sociology of Education 19, 2, 237-254.

Martin, D. (1996) "Zulu is the talk lovely": Investigating perceptions of being bilingual in Zulu/English speaking children in South Africa. EPU Working Paper, 13 (pp106).

 

Name:Marilyn Martin-Jones, Professor of Bilingualism and Education
Institution: Department of Education, University of Wales (Aberystwyth), Old College, Aberystwyth, Ceredigion, SY23 2AX
Email: mqm@aber.ac.uk

I have been involved in two types of ethnographic research in multilingual urban settings in Britain:

1. School and classroom based research (with Mukul Saxena) in the N.W. of England (1989-1992, ESRC Grant X204252001). The main aim of this research was to gain insights into the ways in which a local educational policy intervention (i.e. that of providing ‘bilingual support’ for children’s learning in the early years) was being translated into classroom practice, in classrooms where bilingual assistants were working alongside monolingual class teachers. The ethnographic fieldwork included: classroom observation, fieldnotes, interviews and the gathering of texts used, produced and talked about in these classes. The main body of data was a corpus of bilingual classroom talk (Panjabi/Urdu/English) from key teaching/learning events in different areas of the curriculum. (These events were audio & video-recorded over a two year period in 8 classes). The data analysis focused on: (1) the nature and purpose of the bilingual talk exchanged between learners and bilingual assistants; (2) the organisational practices and communicative routines of the classes (and the ways in which these were orchestrated by the monolingual class teachers); (3) the ways in which these practices and routines facilitated or constrained the use of the children’s home or community language. Classroom discourse analysis (e.g. identifying bilingual routines which emerged in events with particular participant structures) was combined with analysis of the ethnographic and textual material we gathered. Our interpretation and analysis of key events was shared and checked with the bilingual assistants and the class teachers before it was written up.

2. Ethnographic research (with Arvind Bhatt and David Barton) on multilingual literacy practices in homes, schools and workplaces in the E. Midlands (1989-1992, ESRC grants: R000 23 3833 & R000 22 1534). I coordinated two ethnographic projects on multilingual literacy in Leicester 1993-6. These focused on multilingual literacies in the lives of Gujarati speakers in the city. The first project, Multilingual Literacy Practices: Home, Community and School, was based in 12 households where Gujarati was spoken. The main body of data gathered during this project was a corpus of semi-structured interviews (in Gujarati & English). We also observed literacy events, kept fieldnotes, used still photography and gathered literacy materials. Two examples of the ethnographic writing based on this work are: (1) a paper on gender and multilingual literacy (my own contribution to the project); (2) an account (with Arvind Bhatt) of how different literacies entered the lives of the young people in these households (mostly young people of secondary school age or older) and the ways in which these young people drew on these literacies in different domains of their lives. In the second project, Literacies at Work in a Multilingual City, our ethnographic work was extended into local workplaces. The aim of this project was to investigate the language and literacy demands placed on Gujarati-speaking staff appointed to posts in the public sector with a specific brief to use the languages and literacies in their communicative repertoire at work. We focused on: (1) the intertwining of different spoken languages and literacies across the communicative events of their working lives; (2) their positioning as ‘mediators’ of particular kinds of texts produced in English; (3) the ways in which they responded to this positioning. As in the previous ethnographic work in Leicester, our data included semi-structured interviews, fieldnotes from observations of literacy events and still photography. We also experimented with the use of literacy diaries and diary-based interviews, as means of capturing daily work routines and, at the same time, bringing the voices of the participants into our account.

3. Most recent work

Over the last few years, I have mostly been involved in writing. I have written about issues of theory and method arising from the 7 years of ethnographic work described above. I have also endeavoured to give work on multilingual literacy and classroom-based research in multilingual settings greater visibility by publishing edited collections (see details below).

Selected publications

Ethnographic research in multilingual classrooms

Martin-Jones, M. and Saxena, M. (1996) ‘Turn-taking, power asymmetries, and the positioning of bilingual participants in classroom discourse’, Linguistics and Education, Vol. 8, no. 1. pp. 105 –123.

Martin-Jones, M. (1997) ‘Bilingual classroom discourse: changing research approaches and diversification of research sites’. In: N. Hornberger and D. Corson (eds) Research Methods in Language and Education (Volume 8 of The Encyclopedia of Language and Education). Kluwer Academic Publishers: Dordrecht, The Netherlands.

Heller, M. and Martin-Jones, M. (2001) Voices of Authority: Education and Linguistic Difference. Westport, CT: Ablex Publishing.

Ethnographic research on multilingual literacy

Martin-Jones, M. and Bhatt, A. (1998) ‘Literacies in the lives of young Gujarati speakers in Leicester’. In A. Durgunoglu and L. Verhoeven (eds) Literacy Development in a Multilingual Context. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Martin-Jones, M. (2000) ‘Enterprising women: multilingual literacy practices in the construction of new identities’. In: M. Martin-Jones and K. Jones (ed.) Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Jones, K., Bhatt, A. and Martin-Jones, M. (2000) ‘Constructing a critical, dialogic approach to research on multilingual literacy: participant diaries and diary interviews’. In: M. Martin-Jones and K. Jones (ed.) Multilingual Literacies: Reading and Writing Different Worlds. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

 

NameJanet Maybin
Institution Open University
Email address j.maybin@open.ac.uk

Research activity

I am currently involved in two personal research projects:

(a) I have been working for some years on data from an ethnographic study of 10-12 year old school children’s informal language practices. I used radio microphone recordings, interviews and participant observation over two school terms in monolingual middle schools. I am currently looking at the children’s collaborative performance of gender and also at their different uses of intertextuality to construct meaning. In the past I have looked at children’s accomplishment of collaboration through talk, their use of conversational narratives and their repetition, appropriation and reporting of other people’s voices in relation to their induction into institutional practices and discourses. In general I am interested in talk as a site for constructing knowledge and identities, and different ways of conceptualising the role of context, drawing on Vygotsky, Bakhtin and Volosinov and the Ethnography of Communication literature (e.g. Hymes, Heath, Street) and Goffman.

(b) I am also working on the construction of relationships and identity through personal letter writing, using data from personal correspondences between death row prisoners in the United States and their penfriends in Britain. This data includes responses from a questionnaire and interviews together with sets of letters. I also draw on ethnographic observations from prison visits. Having analysed themes from the questionnaires and interviews I am currently exploring processes within the letters themselves which contribute to intersubjectivity and the negotiation of identities.

Both of these projects involve textual analysis (of informal talk or letters) within a dialogic model of communication and an ethnography of communication framework.

Selected research publications

Maybin, J. (1998) ‘Children’s voices: talk, knowledge and identity’, in D. Graddol, J. Maybin and B. Stierer (eds) Researching language and literacy in context, pp 131-150, Clevedon, Multilingual Matters, 1994. Reprinted in J. Cheshire and P. Trudgill (eds) The sociolinguistics reader,: Vol 2: Gender and discourse, pp 278-294, London, Edward Arnold.

Maybin, J. (1999) ‘Death Row penfriends: some effects of letter writing on identity and relationships’, in D. Barton and N. Hall (eds) Letter writing as a social practice, pp 151-177, Amsterdam, Benjamins.

Maybin, J. (1999) ‘Framing and evaluation in 10-12 year old school children’s use of appropriated speech, in relation to their induction into educational procedures and practices’. in TEXT Vol 19(4).

Maybin, J. (in press) ‘What’s the hottest part of the Sun? Page 3! Children’s exploration of adolescent gender identities through informal talk’, in J. Sunderland and L. Litosseliti (eds) Discourse analysis and gender identities. Amsterdam, John Benjamins

 

Name: Kate Pahl
Institution: Department of Education, King’s College, London
Email: pahl@globalnet.co.uk

Current research activity

I am in the second year of a three year Ph.D. looking at the semiotic activity at home of six to seven year old boys in the context of literacy practices research and research on multi modality. The project is an ethnographic, longitudinal study of three boys and their meaning making across home and school sites.

Previous research activity

I conducted a small scale study of children’s meaning making in a nursery for my MA dissertation which was published in a book, ‘Transformations: Children’s Meaning Making in a Nursery’ (Trentham 1999)

References

Pahl, K. (1999) ‘Transformations: Meaning Making in a Nursery’, Stoke on Trent: Trentham Books Ltd.

Name:Uta Papen
Institution: King’s College, University of London (PhD student)
Email: uta.papen@kcl.ac.uk

Research activity

My current research deals with literacy and language use among adults and out-of-school youths in Namibia. My aims are to identify and to understand everyday life and work-related uses of both oral and written language. I compare these communicative practices with the forms of literacy and language introduced in the Namibian government¹s adult education programme. In one of my case studies, I looked at literacy and language use in tourism. Here, I am particularly interested in Œtourism literacies¹ and other work-related and commercial literacy practices, as they relate to the role of different languages in economic and commercial contexts, notably the status of English as the official language and the main language of tourism. The purpose is to understand the dynamics between local and community literacies on the one hand, and commercial, bureaucratic and educational uses of language on the other.

The theoretical and methodological basis of my work is derived from social anthropology, sociolinguistics and development studies. The principle research methods I use are ethnography and discourse analysis.

Previously, as a member of a research and training institute that had the mandate to serve policy-makers and practitioners, I was involved in research projects on literacy and adult education in developing and industrialised countries. As part of a team, my work aimed at facilitating the use of ethnographic and participatory methods in policy and practice oriented research. Among other projects, I participated in a study that investigated language policy and language use in schools and adult education programmes in multilingual societies.

References

Mauch, Werner and Papen, Uta. 1997. Common Learning - Collective Research: Innovating Adult Education. In: Mauch, Werner and Papen, Uta (eds.) Making a Difference: Innovations in Adult Education. Berlin, New York: Peter Lang, pp. 11-33.

Papen, Uta (2001) ‘Literacy-Your Key to a Better Future, Literacy, Development and Reconciliation in the National Literacy Programme in Namibia,’ in: Street, B. V. (ed.) Literacy and Development: Ethnographic Perspectives. Routledge: London.

Papen, Uta (forthcoming) ‘I fill in the Form, and it is Written in English’: Literacies of School, Tourism and Everyday Life in Namibia. PhD Thesis, King's College.

 

Name: Ben Rampton
Institution: King’s College London, School of Education, Franklin-Wilkins Building WBW, Waterloo Road, London SE1 9NN. Tel: 020 7848 3711 Fax: 020 7848 3182
Email: ben.rampton@kcl.ac.uk

Research activity

My research generally works on the Gumperzian premise that as it’s a key site for the negotiation of social order, relations and identities, a close look at situated interaction can throw new light on issues of more general social, cultural and educational debate. I’ve done three periods of intensive fieldwork focusing on urban heteroglossia among adolescents in youth clubs, playgrounds and schools in London and the South Midlands (1984-85, 1987, 1997-98), and most of my fieldwork involves participant-observation, interviews, radio-microphone recording, and playback sessions. My approach is grounded in interactional sociolinguistics and the ethnography of communication, though I’ve also drawn quite extensively on themes and concepts from cultural studies, anthropology and sociology. Along with Roxy Harris, Constant Leung and Celia Roberts, I’m part of the Urban Multilingualism Research Group at King’s, and our stated aims are (a) to develop applied and sociolinguistic frameworks adequate to the analysis of contemporary urban language, learning, literacy and interaction, and (b) to develop modes of intervention within language education policy and practice that are productively tuned to the local realities of urban institutional life.

My own efforts to contribute to this larger programme have been influenced by the ways in which my empirical data on urban heteroglossia resonate with wider debates about late/post-modernity. This coalescence of data and theory throws doubt on the traditional linguistic assumptions that (i) language study should be centrally concerned with systematicity in grammar and coherence in discourse, and (ii) that people learn to talk grammatically and coherently from extensive early experience of living in families and fairly stable local social networks, and it has led to critical engagement with prevailing sociolinguistic perspectives on ethnicity, speech community, intercultural communication, and code-switching. Urban heteroglossia involves a complex dialogue around self/us and the ‘other’, but there has been very little sensitivity to this in the massive linguistic literature on second/foreign/additional language learning, and so this has been a second field of engagement. Language education policy and practice constitute a third area, and here I’ve explored the interface between urban heteroglossia and the teaching of ESL, minority languages, language awareness, and foreign languages. Lastly, I’ve argued that ongoing epistemic shifts provide applied linguistics with a good opportunity to move beyond SLA+ELT to Hymes’ view of a ‘socially constituted’ linguistics and to a much fuller relationship with interdisciplinary research and intervention elsewhere in the social sciences.

Future plans include a project on ‘Interaction, Media Culture and Adolescents at School’ (2001-2002; Rampton & Harris; Spencer Foundation)

Representative publications:

Rampton, B. (1995) Crossing: Language and Ethnicity among Adolescents. London: Longman.

Rampton, B. (1997) ‘Retuning in applied linguistics’. International Journal of Applied Linguistics. 7 (1): 3-25.

Rampton, B. (1998) ‘Speech community’. In J. Verschueren, J-O Öla, J. Blommaert and C. Bulcaen (eds) Handbook of Pragmatics 1998. Amsterdam: John Benjamins

Rampton, B. (1999) ‘Sociolinguistics and Cultural Studies: New ethnicities, liminality and interaction’. Social Semiotics. 9 (3): 355-374

Rampton, B. (1999) ‘Deutsch in inner London and the animation of an instructed foreign language’. Journal of Sociolinguistics 3 (4): 480-504.

Rampton, B (2001) ‘Critique in interaction’. Critique of Anthropology 21 (1). 2001.

 

Name:Celia Roberts
Institution: King’s College London
Email: celiaroberts@lineone.net

At the moment I’m mostly doing research in medical settings. These have included: a study of the Royal College of General Practitioners’ oral examinations, looking at the complex discourses that constitute the exam as a possible basis for unfair discrimination against non-traditional candidates; a study of final year oral exams for medical students, again looking at the discourses of the exam as a topic in order to understand why certain groups perform less well; a new project looking at how doctors and patients manage the GP consultation where patients have limited English or a communicative style very different from the doctors. We shall be hanging around in surgeries and videoing consultations.

For the last 25 years, I’ve been doing linguistic ethnography of sorts, I think, - starting in multi-cultural factories where we were trying to understand the communicative environment of the workplace and the conditions for second language socialisation. Then, studies of gatekeeping interaction and second language socialisation more generally. I’ve also tried to link language learning to the methods of ethnography, trying to give language students an ethnographic spin.

References

(1992) (Early days) (with Davies and Jupp) Language and Discrimination. Longman

(1996) (with Brewer et al) Achieving Understanding. Longman

(1999) (with Sarangi eds) Talk, Work and Institutional Order. Mouton

(2000) ‘Professional Gatekeeping in Intercultural Encounters’. In Sarangi and Coulthard (eds) Discourse and Social Life. Longman

(2000) (with Byram, Barro, Jordan and Street) Language Learners as Ethnographers. Multilingual Matters.

 

Name: Dr Srikant Sarangi
Institution: Centre for Language and Communication Research, Cardiff University,
P.O. Box 94, Cardiff CF10 3XB
Email: sarangi@cardiff.ac.uk

Areas of research interest

Discourse analysis and applied linguistics; language and identity in public life; institutional and professional discourse (e.g., bureaucracy, health, social welfare, education etc.); intercultural pragmatics; racism and ethnicity in multicultural societies (with reference to healthcare and education); genetic counselling, Quality of Life issues around HIV/AIDS, primary care and general practice.

Selected publications

Coupland, N., Sarangi, S. and Candlin, C. N. (eds) (2001) Sociolinguistics and Social Theory. London: Pearson.

Roberts, C., Garnett, C., Kapoor, S. and Sarangi, S. (1992) Quality in Teaching and Learning: Four Multicultural Classrooms in Further Education. Sheffield: Department of Employment.

Sarangi, S. and Slembrouck, S. (1996) Language, Bureaucracy and Social Control. London: Longman.

Sarangi, S. and Roberts, C. (eds) (1999) Talk, Work and Institutional Order: Discourse in Medical, Mediation and Management Settings. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Sarangi, S. and Coulthard, M. (eds) (2000) Discourse and Social Life. London: Pearson.

Sarangi, S. and Roberts, C. (in press) ‘Discoursal (mis)alignments in professional gatekeeping encounters’. In C. Kramsch (ed.) Language Acquisition and Language Socialisation: Ecological Perspectives. London: Continuum.

 

Name:Stef Slembrouck, Professor
Institution: English Department, University of Ghent (Belgium)
Email: stef.slembrouck@rug.ac.be

Research activity

The role of discourse in the construction of identity categories in institutional contexts of gatekeeping and social surveillance (social work, bureaucracy, etc.). I take a special interest in the theoretical and practical relevance of ethnography and linguistic anthropological work for critical and reflexive approaches to the analysis of text, interaction and discourse.

Publications

2001 ‘Explanation, interpretation and critique in the analysis of discourse’. In: Critique of Anthropology, 21:1; 33-57.

2001 'Parent participation in social work meetings - the case of child protection conferences' (with C. Hall). In: European Journal of Social Work.

2000 'Data formulation as text and context: The (aesth)ethics of analysing asylum seekers' narratives' (with J. Blommaert). LPI Working Papers No. 2.

(eds., with M. Baynham), Speech representation and institutional discourse, special issue of Text, 19:4.

1996 (with S. Sarangi), Language, bureaucracy and social control. London: Longman.

 

Name: Brian V. Street
Institution: King’s College, London
Email: brian.street@kcl.ac.uk

Research activity

I undertook anthropological fieldwork in Iran during the 1970's, developing ethnographic perspectives on literacy as social practice in contrast with the autonomous model and ‘Great Divide’ perspectives dominant at the time (1985). These ideas were refined via notions of literacy events and practices in cross-cultural perspective (1988; 1993; 1995). More recently I have applied these perspectives to two domains nearer to home: 1) an ESRC project on the literacy practices of Mass-Observation correspondents (2000, with D. Bloome and D. Sheridan) based partly on text analysis of Archive documents and partly on ethnographic interviews and ‘directives’; 2) an ESRC research project (with Mary Lea) developing an ‘academic literacies’ approach to student writing and faculty feedback in Higher Education (1999, with Jones and Turner). I am currently engaged in a Leverhulme project that applies these approaches to ‘numeracy practices’ at home and school in three sites in the UK (with A. Tomlin and D. Baker) and on a DfID funded Community Literacies project in Nepal (2001). These projects and the John Benjamins series on Written Language and Literacy, for which I am co series editor, have, perhaps, contributed to a distinctive take on ‘linguistic ethnography’ and social literacies.

Selected publications

1985 Literacy in Theory and Practice C.U.P.

1988 "Literacy Practices and Literacy Myths", in The Written Word: Studies in Literate Thought and Action ed. R. Saljo, Vol. 23 of Language and Communication Series, Springer-Verlag Press, Heidelberg.pp. 59-72.

1993 (editor) Cross-Cultural Approaches to Literacy, CUP.

1995 Social Literacies: Critical Approaches to Literacy in Education, Development and Ethnography Longman; London.

1999 (with Jones, C & Turner, J, eds.) Students Writing in the University: Cultural and Epistemological Issues, John Benjamin Publications: Amsterdam;

2000 (with D. Bloome and D. Sheridan) Ordinary People Writing: Literacy Practices and Identity in the Mass-Observation Project, Hampton Press, Cresskill NJ.

2001 (editor) Literacy and Development: Ethnographic Perspectives , Routledge: London.

 

Name: Karin Tusting
Institution: Department of Religious Studies, Lancaster University
Email: k.tusting@lancs.ac.uk

Current research activity

Research Associate on the Kendal Project, a locality study of Kendal which takes a multi-method approach (primarily participant-observation with some questionnaire surveys, counts and other things) to study people’s beliefs and values and the impact these have on their lives. The project has 3 main components, studying the fields of church and chapel, the alternative spirituality field, and the general population. While the research is situated within Religious Studies, a lot of the theories we are working with are to do with changing discourses of religion (although the theories are not necessarily phrased in those terms), and I regularly argue that attention to language is and should be a crucial part of the project.

Previous research activity relevant to linguistic ethnography

My PhD, in the Linguistics department at Lancaster, supervised by David Barton, was a study of literacy practices in a Catholic parish community, looking at the role of different literacy practices in constructing identity in two communities of practice, the First Communion preparation course and the RCIA Enquirer’s course for converts, and within the parish as a whole, focusing on the parish newsletter. I tried to combine analysis of the texts themselves with analysis of the practices within which they were used, influenced by Wenger’s work on the role of reifications in negotiations of meaning within communities of practice (Wenger, E. (1998) Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) and Smith’s work on textually mediated social organisation (Smith, D. (1990) Texts, Facts and Femininity: Exploring the Relations of Ruling, London: Routledge). In each of my main sites, I identified a different way in which literacy practices played a significant role in the construction of identity.

References to my own work

Tusting, Karin (2000) "Time and the New Literacy Studies", in Barton, D., Hamilton, M. and Ivanic, R., Situated Literacies, London and New York: Routledge.

Tusting, Karin (2000) Written intertextuality and the construction of Catholic identity in a parish community : an ethnographic study, PhD thesis, Linguistics Department, Lancaster University.

 

Name:Guilherme Veiga Rios
Institution: Lancaster University
Email: g.veigarios@lancaster.ac.uk

Research activity

My current research activity is on people’s accounts and narratives of their everyday literacies in two socio-economically differentiated residential quarters in Distrito Federal (Brazil) - the part of the country where the government is headquartered. The research approach discusses the ways in which literacy is embedded (and disembedded) in social practices, through the analysis of elements such as material activities, social relations, values, beliefs and identities, which constitute and are constituted by those practices. As orienting theories, I adopt the social theory of literacy (Barton and Hamilton, 2000) and the discourse theory of Chouliaraki and Fairclough (1999). An important contribution to this theoretical framework is that of the New Literacy studies (Street, 1995; Gee, 1996). Basically, I have drawn upon critical ethnography (Thomas, 1993) as a research methodology, which I also carried out in previous work on language in classroom interaction of a community adult literacy programme in Distrito Federal (Rios, 2001).

References

Barton, D. and Hamilton, M. (2000) ‘Literacy practices’. In D. Barton, M. Hamilton and R. Ivanic (eds) Situated Literacies. London and New York: Routledge.

Chouliaraki, L. and Fairclough, N. (1999) Discourse in late modernity. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Gee, J. (1996) Social linguistics and literacies.2nd ed. London: Falmer Press.

Rios, G. (2000/1) Critical Language Awareness in Adult Literacy Classroom Interactions. Research and Practice in Adult Literacy 43, 6-8.

Street, B . (1995) Social literacies: critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography and education. London and New York: Longman.

Thomas, J. (1993) Doing critical ethnography. Newbury Park, California: Sage Publications.

 

Name:Anita Wilson
Institution: Linguistics Department, Lancaster University
Email: anita@wilsonhmp.freeserve.co.uk

I am an honorary Research Fellow of Lancaster University Linguistics Department, presently employed as Research Officer at University of North London and as Senior Research Officer for a charitable trust in Brighton. My current project is to investigate the vulnerabilities and resiliences of young women in prison and link the findings to improving staff/prisoner relations.

I have also recently been appointed by the Open University to act as tutor/supervisor on the Doctorate in Education program.

My recent research activities have been somewhat eclectic. They include work for the Home Office, designed to bring the voice of young offenders into the debate on appropriate care and control and two projects for the Prison Service and the Youth Justice Board which focused on defining and addressing the training needs of multi-agency professionals working with young offenders.

Although these projects have little direct association with linguistics, my preferred research methods - ethnographic, qualitative, ethical and contextualised - have been used to effect in a research domain more commonly associated with quantitative data collection and analysis.

My own work - researching the links between literacy, language and social identity in the prison setting - continues in spite of my salaried commitments! 10 years of participant observation is a hard habit to break and my long-term associations, collaborative enterprises and sustained correspondence with prisoners shows no sign of coming to an end. Prisoners continue to supply me with ideas, materials, language and experiences. Indeed, the rewards of such sustained relationships continue to surprise me and reinforce my belief that there is always some extra nuance waiting to be teased out of the data or some fresh methodological perspective demanding to be investigated.

Prison and ethnography are a volatile mixture and not traditionally well suited to publication. Consequently, the delight of seeing our work in print remains equally significant for both prisoners and myself. Those referenced here come with an incarcerative stamp of approval.

References

Wilson A. (1999) ‘Absolute Truly Brill to See from You Again’ – Visuality and Prisoners’ Letters’, in Letter-Writing as Social Practice, eds. Barton D. & Hall N. pub J. Benjamin.

Wilson A. (2000) ‘There’s no escape from Third-Space Theory – Borderland Discourse and the In-Between Literacies of Prison’ in Situated Literacies (eds) Barton, D., Hamilton, M., Ivanic, R. pub. Routledge

Wilson A., Dennison C. and Lyon J. (2000) ‘Tell Them So They Listen’, Home Office Research Study 201, HMSO

Wilson A. (forthcoming) ‘Nike Trainers – My One True Love, Without You I am Nothing’, in Discourse Constructions of Youth Identity, ed. Androutopolous J. and Georgakopoulo A., pub. J. Benjamin ‘Pragmatics and Beyond’ Series

 

Site created and maintained by Karin Tusting, k.tusting@lancaster.ac.uk.  Last updated 09/01/2007