New Representation of Chinese Learners

Dr Luo Yingmei is interested in analysing how people’s experiences are framed and mediated within local sociocultural, educational and institutional contexts. She has adopted and adapted a theoretical framework that allows her to explore the intricate relationship between language, culture and people’s perceptions of the world. This framework enables her to see how alternate perceptions of the world can be embodied differently in different languages. Conceptualisations that are conveyed through different languages have great potential to augment current understandings of social realities, and to counter polarised cultural viewpoints in this globalised world. Taking a socially-oriented approach to researching teachers, learners and pedagogy, she is passionate about questioning the dominance of Western conceptions and theories in non-Western communities. This framework is particularly useful to examine the complexity of social realities in multicultural and multilingual contexts.

• 1 Is this your idea of English teaching.- 2 Setting the scene: The Qunxi program.- 3 Foreign friends.- 4 Headless flies.- 5 Precious golden sentences.- 6 Confined lively little butterflies.- 7 'We are similar to Western youngsters'.