Cross-cultural Identity Re/construction: Learning and Writing in an Additional Language

This book explores the identity reconstruction of graduate students in additional language (AL) contexts. It addresses not only the issue of language proficiency in self-representation, but also more complicated factors that influence self-positioning and perceived social positioning in an additional culture, as well as ways of establishing the self in academic writing. The research on which the book is based is grounded in language learning theories in second language education and identity theories in linguistics, sociology, and cultural studies. The author elaborates on the connections of personal identity and writer identity, and conceptualizes for AL speakers a mediated space that incorporates home culture and host culture but goes beyond the overlap of the two, as well as a mediated self that is achieved through negotiation with the available options in their respective social context. Such conceptualization sheds light on the understanding of identity issues among cross-cultural individuals. Professionals and students who are interested in this body of research should find the book useful.