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Orientation to Language Learning Over Time: A Case Analysis on the Repertoire Addition of a Lexical Item
Author(s) -
KOTILAINEN LARI,
KURHILA SALLA
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
the modern language journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.486
H-Index - 83
eISSN - 1540-4781
pISSN - 0026-7902
DOI - 10.1111/modl.12665
Subject(s) - emic and etic , repertoire , perspective (graphical) , linguistics , psychology , conversation analysis , cognitive psychology , orientation (vector space) , dynamics (music) , conversation , computer science , communication , sociology , artificial intelligence , pedagogy , philosophy , physics , geometry , mathematics , anthropology , acoustics
This article explores language learning as the speakers’ microlongitudinal project in interaction. Using conversation analysis (CA) as a method, we present a single‐case analysis on how a change occurs in the linguistic repertoire of 2 learners of Finnish. We discuss the challenges that the temporal aspect in learning poses within CA, such as the difficulty in documenting a change on the one hand, and on the other hand, the risk of losing the emic perspective of the participants if they do not orient to the change. By illustrating a complete learning project, which begins when the participants encounter a need to use a certain (for them, unknown) word and ends when they use the word independently in interaction, we will demonstrate how a change in the linguistic repertoire of the participants occurs, as a result of their own actions and orientations, without compromising CA's emic perspective. It will be argued that the unique capacity of CA to recover the participants’ sense‐making practices in interaction gives us a lens to not only document change but also to understand its internal dynamics.