Christina Higgins – författare

The volume explores how new millennium globalization mediates language learning and identity construction. It seeks to theorize how global flows are creating new identity options for language learners, and to consider the implications for language learning, teaching and use. To frame the chapters theoretically, the volume asserts that new identities are developing because of the increasingly interconnected set of global scapes which impact language learners'' lives. Part 1 focuses on language learners in (trans)national contexts, exploring their identity formation when they shuttle between cultures and when they create new communities of fellow transnationals. Part 2 examines how learners come to develop intercultural selves as a consequence of experiencing global contact zones when they sojourn to new contexts for study and work. Part 3 investigates how learners construct new identities in the mediascapes of popular culture and cyberspace, where they not only consume, but also produce new, globalized identities. Through case studies, narrative analysis, and ethnography, the volume examines identity construction among learners of English, French, Japanese, and Swahili in Canada, England, France, Hong Kong, Tanzania, and the United States.

When analyzed in multilingual contexts, English is often treated as an entity that is separable from its linguistic environment. It is often the case, however, that multilinguals use English in hybrid and transcultural ways. This book explores how multilingual East Africans make use of English as a local resource in their everyday practices by examining a range of domains, including workplace conversation, beauty pageants, hip hop and advertising. Drawing on the Bakhtinian concept of multivocality, the author uses discourse analysis and ethnographic approaches to demonstrate the range of linguistic and cultural hybridity found across these domains, and to consider the constraints on hybridity in each context. By focusing on the cultural and linguistic bricolage in which English is often found, the book illustrates how multilinguals respond to the tension between local identification and dominant conceptualizations of English as a language for global communication.

When analyzed in multilingual contexts, English is often treated as an entity that is separable from its linguistic environment. It is often the case, however, that multilinguals use English in hybrid and transcultural ways. This book explores how multilingual East Africans make use of English as a local resource in their everyday practices by examining a range of domains, including workplace conversation, beauty pageants, hip hop and advertising. Drawing on the Bakhtinian concept of multivocality, the author uses discourse analysis and ethnographic approaches to demonstrate the range of linguistic and cultural hybridity found across these domains, and to consider the constraints on hybridity in each context. By focusing on the cultural and linguistic bricolage in which English is often found, the book illustrates how multilinguals respond to the tension between local identification and dominant conceptualizations of English as a language for global communication.