Identity Trajectories of Adult Second Language Learners

Learning Italian in Australia

By (author) Cristiana Palmieri

Publication date:

07 December 2018

Publisher

Multilingual Matters

Dimensions:

234x156mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9781788922197

This book explores the motivations of adult second language (L2) learners to learn Italian in continuing education settings in Australia. It focuses on their motivational drives, learning trajectories and related dynamics of identity development triggered by the learning process. Central to the study are adult L2 learners, who are still a largely under-researched and growing group of learners, and readers will gain a better understanding of the learning process of this specific group of learners and ideas for sustaining L2 adult learning motivation in continuing education settings. Furthermore, the book discusses the role played by the Italian migrant community in Australia in making Italian a sought-after language to learn. It explores how a migrant community may influence motivation, and highlights and expands on the notion of L2 learning contexts, showing the existence of sociocultural environments where second language learning trajectories are affected by the presence of migrant groups.

Chapter 1. Introduction: Learning a Language as an Identity Shaping Journey

Chapter 2. L2 Learning Motivation, Identity and Community: Reshaping Social Identity through L2 Learning

Chapter 3. Learning Italian outside Italy: Culture, Lifestyle and Italophilia

Chapter 4. Learning Italian in Australia: Theoretical Framework and Research Method

Chapter 5. The Ideal L2 Self and Italian Learning Motivation: A Quantitative Investigation

Chapter 6. Community and Identity: A Qualitative Exploration of Drivers for Learning Italian

Chapter 7. Italian Learning in Australia: Under the Spell of a Cultural Icon

Reference List

Appendix A - Questionnaire

This thorough analysis of the integrative search for expanded cultural homes probes why English-speaking adults in an Australian cosmopolitan city, facing the Pacific and oriented to Asia, choose to learn Italian. What new identities do they seek and forge? Palmieri sheds light on cultural enrichment reasoning via contemporary methods of second language identity formation.