Languaculture : Re(de)fining Advanced Proficiency Jim Lantolf Penn State University

1. Languaculture: Re(de)fining Advanced ProficiencyJim LantolfPenn State University

2. Distinguished Language Proficiency ACTFL Shows strong sensitivity to social and cultural references and aesthetic norms by processing language from within the cultural framework. ILR Use the language fluently and accurately on all levels normally pertinent to professional needs. Organizes discourse well, using appropriate rhetorical speech devices, native cultural references, and understanding.

3. The EncirclementLanguage Segregated from Culture Saussure Builds the Wall • Language = inventory of systematically organized symbols Bloomfield Builds a Higher Wall • “ripped” language out of the ethnographic research program [of Boas] • linguistics = the study of the sound system and grammar. • study of meaning assigned to psychology (Agar 1994, see also Crowley 1996)

4. Consequences for Language Teaching Encased-linguistics framed the way applied linguistics construes language. • Pedagogy • Language Assessment

5. Triumph of Structure(Fauconnier & Turner 2002) • We live in an age of the triumph of form. In mathematics, physics, music, the arts, and the social sciences, human knowledge and its progress seem to have been reduced in startling and powerful ways to a matter of essential formal structures and their transformations… scientific knowledge is only a matter of finding deep hidden forms behind ostensible forms.

6. Meaning, Mind & Culture Anthropology argues that culture is meaning Antipsychological stance • Pushed psychology out of anthropology • Geertz, sustaining Saussure’s dualism, insisted meaning resides exclusively in signs and relations between them • Cognitive Anthropology -- meaning resides in individuals & collectives (Strauss & Quinn 1997) • Cultural Psychology – organic & dialectical relationship between psychological and cultural processes meaning organizes and imbues humans with mental intentionality (Vygotsky 1987)

7. Learning a Second Language • Learning inside-the-wall • Make a few minimum frame changes, and you’re ready to communicate (Agar 1994). • Inside the wall most aspects of language are perceptual, indexical, iconic, or denotative • FL learners rely on word definitions because the experience in which concepts emerge are not open to this group (Kecskes & Papp 2000). • – Fork = Gabel, tenedor, forchetta, etc. • L2 laid down on L1 inner speech (Ushakova 1994)

8. Learning Outside the Wall Re-establish connection between language and culture – languaculture (Agar 1994) • The Challenge: • Development of new L2 conceptual base (Lantolf 1999) • Learner centeredness: concern with learning richness of the L2 system’s symbolic resources rather than with ‘creatively’ expressing personal meanings or applying learning strategies and styles, a frequent interpretation in FLED (Byrnes 2002)

9. Conceptual Proficiency • Conceptual Proficiency = know how the target language reflects or encodes its concepts on the basis of metaphorical structuring and other cognitive mechanisms. Conceptual knowledge also serves as a basis for grammatical and communicative knowledge. (Kecskes & Papp 2000)

10. Problem of L2 Conceptual Development • Are new conceptual systems learnable ? • Does this entail experiential replication ? • If so, which experiences are open to adult L2 learners ? • Are new conceptual systems teachable ? (Valeva 1996)

11. Motion Events Six criteria: • Figure: object moving/located with respect to another object (ground) • Ground: reference object in relation to which the figure moves • Path: trajectory of figure • Motion: changes of locatedness • Manner: how motion is performed • Cause: efficient origin of change in motion or location (Talmy 2000)

12. Talmy’s Motion Event Typology • Verb-Framed Languages: conflate path of motion with verb and express manner lexically, through gesture or not at all. • Romance Languages (Spanish, French, Portuguese, Rumanian, Italian, Catalan, etc.); Japanese, Korean, Turkish • Satellite-Framed Languages: conflate manner of motion with verb and express path through a satellite mentioning the ground against which figure moves. • English, German, Dutch, Russian, Chinese

13. Motion Event Examples S-Language The cat crawled/scrittered up inside the drainpipe [Figure] [Manner] [Satellite … Ground] V-Language (Type 1) El gato subio el canalon. The cat climbed up the drainpipe [Figure] Path Ground V-Language (Type 2) payswukwan sok-ulo tul-e ka-se<e> drainpipe interior-via enter-INF go-and (a cat) goes into the drainpipe

14. Manner of Motion • The cat rolls out of the drainpipe • El gato sale rodando del canalón The cat exits rolling from the drainpipe • koyangi-ka tasi ccwulwulwuk nayly-e cat-NM again ONM descend-INF wa-ss-eyo. come-PST-POL

15. Thinking for Speaking • Slobin (1996): in activity of speaking, thinking takes on a particular quality as experiences are filtered through languages into verbalized events. • TSF not merely influence how people talk about events but how they experience those events “they are likely to talk about later” (Slobin, 2003, p. 179).

16. Manner Saturation • English lexicon highly saturated with conflated manner verbs: trudge, shinny, swagger, plop, scamper, leap frog, slog, skip, barrel, etc. • Spanish lexicon has conflated manner verbs, but not saturated: tambalearse, trepar, agitar • (Slobin 2003)

17. Gesture/Speech Interface • Growth Point: integration of distinct verbal and imagistic “semiotic architectures” into a single meaning system (McNeill 1992) • Gestures: “material carriers of thinking” and therefore provide "an enhanced window into mental processes“ (McNeill & Duncan 2000)

18. Gesture and Motion • V-languages: gestures synchronize with path verbs & optionally used to express manner. • S-languages: gestures synchronize with path satellites or conflated manner verb, depending on focus (McNeill & Duncan 2000)

19. Negueruela, Lantolf, Jordan & Gelabert (2004) Spanish L1 > English L2 3 Speakers Residing in U.S. 1 > 6 years English L1 > Spanish L2 3 Speakers Enrolled in Spanish Graduate Program; min. 1 year abroad English L1 control = 3 Spanish L1 control = 3 Task: Narrate Frog Goes to Dinner

20. L1 Speakers Path L1 Spanish: La rana [se ha metido en el saxofon] The frog [got into the saxophone] PATH = hand cupped describes trajectory, other hand mimicking the bell of the saxophone) L1 English The frog … jumps out of boy’s pocket, through the restaurant, into a saxophone (Path = three strokes, one on each satellite – hand emerges from pocket with index finger extended, moves away from body, moves downward index still extended

21. L2 Speakers: Path Spanish L1: the [frogappears] … from inside the salad. PATH = hands move toward face English L1: y me parece que se va a caerse [pa detras] Path = hand and body leaning back with stroke of gesture on invented satellite

22. L1 Speakers: Manner Spanish L1: la ensalada [echa un desastre] ‘the salad [is a disaster] Manner = hand shaking English L1: the plate’s [kind of tumbling a little bit] Manner = hand shaking

23. L2 Speakers: Manner Spanish L1: and [the cup, the plate, the fork are all falling off the table] MANNER + PATH = four consecutive strokes with both hands, palms facing each other, vigorously moving upward English L1: la ensalada [está ... como en medio aire] ‘the salad [is ... like in mid-air]’ MANNER = hand shaking palm down

24. Choi & Lantolf: L2 Korean & L2 EnglishPath Gestures L2 Korean: [RH ku phai/phu] [<u> a<a>n-ulo tul-e ka pipe inside-via enter-INF go-and ^se<e> /silpeysuthe-ka][<a> Sylvester-TC Sylvester enters inside the pipe. Right hand, with all fingers extended, moves up passing through left hand which is holding a shape of a pipe: path only information.

25. Choi & Lantolf: Path Gestures L2 English • climbing <uh> up the building [# <uuhh>] [RH / through the gutter / ] While left hand holds a gutter shape, right hand, with all digits extended, rises up from lap and moves up through left hand: path only information.

26. Choi & Lantolf: Manner Gestures L1 Korean kulayse mak [BH oll-a ka-nun][RHtey so ascend-INF go-and So (the cat) went up and Both hands, with chopping motions, move upward to depict Sylvester’s climbing up the drainpipe: manner + path information marked in gesture only L1 English so you [BH see this [big] [bulge] [coming] up the gutter] • Both hands, with palms facing each other, draw a shape of bulge three times while moving up: manner + path information.

27. Choi & Lantolf: Manner of Motion L2 Korean [mak oll-a ka-ss-eyo] intensly ascend-INF go-PST-POL (the cat) went up Both hands wave up and down, imitating Sylvester’s paws climbing up the pipe while moving up: manner + path information.[Manner fog] L2 English [BH so # (gesture) /][RHthe cat was climbing through the* / gutter but then<n> somehow the b^ird knew it # s^aw it # so] Both hands, with chopping motion, imitate Sylvester’s paw: manner only information. Right hand vertically rises up and holds in the position: path only information.

28. Choi & Lantolf: Manner Salient L2 English so <uuhh> the cat was <uuhh > %laugh he* he* # so <uuhh> the cat was <uuhh> [/ I mean /rolling o* ][ //(stroke starts) on the s]treet <uuhh> # Both hands, with all digits extended, sweep from left to right: path only information.Both hands repeat the previous path only gesture: path only information. [No Manner conflated Path Gesture typical of English

29. Choi & Lantolf: Manner Salient • L2 Korean [RH mak / kilnay][ ly-e wa-ss-eyo / ] intensely road descend-INF come-PST-POL (the cat) came down the road • Right hand, with an index extended, bounces up and down while diagonally moving down from left to right: manner + path information. Right hand repeats a smaller version of previous gesture, with less bouncing: manner + path information. [RH mwe kunikka mwusun <m> mwe<we> # kwu<wu>*ha-myense amwuthun] what so what m what *roll (wrong form) do-while anyway • Right hand, with an index extended, continuously draws circular motions: manner only information. NB:Manner Fog acceptable in Korean but not for speaker, who searches for low frequency Korean verb to roll

30. Fictive Motion • Fictive Motion: metaphorize what is factive stationariness as if it were in motion; thus reflecting “a cognitive bias toward dynamism” (Talmy 2000: 101). • FM emerges when a speaker holds two discrepant representations in mind • Belief about real nature of referent • Representation of the literal reference of the linguistic forms used in the utterance

31. Fictive Motion • The fence RUNS along the floor of the valley. • Literal representation = fictive • Belief representation = factive • Thus, fictive motion is integrated with factive stationariness

32. Categories of Fictive Motion • Emanation • Pattern Paths • Frame-relative motion • Advent Paths • Access Paths • Coextension Paths

33. Coextensive Path(English/Spanish) • The highway goes from State College to Bellefonte. • La carretera va desde SC hasta Bellefonte. • The electric cord runs from the TV to the wall. • *El cable eléctrico corre de la tele a la pared. • El cable eléctrico va de la tele a la pared. • (Talmy: 105)

34. Emanation Path • The tree threw its shadow across the roof. • *El árbol tira/echa/arroja su sombra a lo largo del tejado. • El árbol proyecta su sombra a lo largo del tejado. • His shadow fell on her face. • Tenía la sombra de él en su cara. • The wallpaper shows through the paint • El papel se ve por debajo de la pintura • (sensory path).

35. Pattern Path • As I painted the ceiling, ants slowly progressed across the floor. • Mientras pintaba el techo, las hormigas iban avanzando lentamente por el suelo. • As I painted the ceiling, paint spots slowly progressed across the floor. • *Mientras pintaba el techo, las manchas de pintura iban progresando através del suelo. • Mientras pintaba el techo, iban cayendo manchas de pintura por todo el suelo e iban formando progresivamente una hilera.

36. Advent Paths • The palm trees clustered together around the oasis. • Las palmeras se apiñaban alrededor del oasis. (De repente había un montón de palmeras alrededor del oasis (use gesture)) • The beam falls away from the wall. • La viga está atravesada con respecto al muro. (Gesture with one hand vertical and the other slanted agains it. Needed because ‘atravesada’ can impart the idea that the beam passes through the wall

37. SLA • Inside-the-circle: Linguistic Proficiency • Grammar, phonology, lexicon • Ultimate attainment = control of lexico-grammatical properties of new language • discourse, pragmatics, identities ??

38. SLCA • Outside-the-circle: Conceptual Proficiency • Conceptual knowledge and meaning, including gesture/speech interface • Ultimate attainment = making acceptable choices “within the nexus of intended meanings available resources, and privileged forms of expression as the L2 speech community has evolved them” (Byrnes 2002). • Thinking/communicating through the new languaculture • Teaching = bringing students to the language rather than the language to the students