Guiding Theories and Research

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Three factors contribute to healthy L2 acquisition; learner identity, cultural negotiation,

and public-private self-negotiation. The process of immigration and second language acquisition

involves the development of a second or modified identity in the learner. Immigrants second

language acquisition can be described as an adult life reorganization of identity (Akhtar, 1995,

p.1053). In order for a hyphenated identity to arise, in which the learner can honestly express

himself as one personality in both L1 and L2, continued updating and an ongoing psychic

dialogue with the past are necessary for healthy psychic functioning (p.1066).

In addition to L1 and L2 identity negotiation, English Language Learners must also

define themselves publicly and privately. One of the most important issues in the psychological

development of the multicultural individual is the emergence of the public and private selves

(Watkins-Goffman, 2001, p. 13). The negotiation of public and private self can be more

challenging to immigrants who must additionally work to adjust native identity and language to

the surrounding culture. Many immigrants attempt to integrate their public and private identities

as a key to successful acculturation (p.4). This is an instinctual attempt to hyphenated identity.

Watkins-Goffmans exploration of immigrant lives through their writing serves as an example of

the natural inclination of many immigrants to negotiate hyphenated identity through writing.

Many language learners face difficulty during the process of learning a new language

and culture because it challenges long held identity precepts. Rogers speaks of the tenacity with

which the individual holds to the concept of self around which he has organized experience

(Rogers, 1965, p.110). In order to maintain a healthy balance between current and developing

learner identity, care must be taken to incorporate important and closely held aspects of existing

self into the development of subsequent self. Learning, particularly if it is significant, is often a
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threatening thingThe educational situation which most significantly promotes significant

learning is one in which threat to self of the learner is reduced to a minimum (p.391). Growth is

key to learning, but cannot be forced or taught. Individual development can be fostered when the

teacher establishes a calm, reflective, patient, and understanding atmosphere of learning. This

research relies heavily upon the value of creating a safe learning environment in which learners

can evolve. By working individually with participants, developing personal relationships based

upon conversations about their intimate selves and experiences in English, and developing these

conversations into writing exercises, this research respectfully accesses the inner selves of

participants through their sharing of experiences, while encouraging the conscious development

of self. Narrative writing is intimate and so can only develop within an environment of trust.

Successful narrative writing is expressive and invites another person into the intimate world of

the writer (Britton, Burgess, Martin, McLeod, & Rosen, 1975, p. 141).

This research relies heavily upon the use of language to negotiate meaning. The purpose

of language is communication with self and community. This work focuses on the use of

personal narrative writing to access inner self and oral language to guide writing toward further

exploration of self. Language undoubtedly plays a role in the very acquisition of insight: its

generic properties and unique manipulability and transformability influence both the nature and

the product of the cognitive processes involved in generating new abstract propositions. Thus it

becomes possible through verbalization for thought to reach a level of clarity, precision,

generality, and transferability that transcends by far the quality of thinking that is possible

without the use of language (Anderson & Ausubel, 1966, p. 228). For language discoveries to

be internalized, learning must be personally meaningful. According to Ausubels Subsumption

Theory (1965), learning takes place when the learner relates new information to existing
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information stored in their minds. Meaningful learning is any learning that students can relate to

past experiences. Practicing storytelling in English is an ideal path to meaningful learning

because storytelling accesses student knowledge and past experiences. English language and L2

identity are related to existing personal experiences and narratives shared via oral, and then

written storytelling.

In order for L2s to fully acculturate themselves into mainstream society, they must

balance an existing L1 identity with a developing L2 identity. The process of L2 acquisition

involves an initiation into a new culture, at times at odds with existing cultural values. Within

the context of a new language, culture, and society, linguistic development may be stunted by

psychic unrest. Written speech, the abstract representation of speech development in the child

can be seen as a link to inner speech, the individuals most intimate communication with self.

The development of written speech demands conscious work. Enhancing the intellectuality of

ones actions, it brings awareness to speech (Vygotsky, 1986, p.183). The foundation of this

research is to examine the possibility of using this higher order communication process to access

inner self and express this discovery in English in order to solidify the healthy psychic

functioning required for hyphenated identity development in ELLs. Because written speech

must explain the situation fully in order to be intelligible, using written English speech to

access and explore private self can act as a bridge between private and public identity by

bringing the immigrants acculturation process to consciousness, enabling a healthy hyphenated

identity negotiation.

With greater consciousness of self, and through oral and written practice, acculturation

becomes attainable. Key to healthy immigrant acculturation, language is used to establish and

maintain relationships, to learn through expressive talking and writing, and to explore and shape
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inner life (Britton, 1982, p.4). Building a safe and trusting environment is key to facilitating

ELL learning. One-on-one interactions, and in depth conversations specific to individual student

needs provide a model for maintaining a strong and supportive relationship with an English

speaker, and provide opportunity for learning to occur through expressive speaking and writing.

The depth of the discussions, journaling, and prompt writing explored through this research

encourages students to explore inner self and voice in English. This conscious process has the

potential to empower students to develop a hyphenated identity (Akhtar, 1996), because it

blends existing experiences and concepts with developing experience and insight within the

English context (Ausubel & Anderson, 1966).

Xuemei Li(2007) explores bilingual writers struggles to reconcile L1 and L2 identity

through writing in their second language, and explains, writing mirrors the authors thoughts

and reflects the authors life experiences to a great extent (p.266). Lis research is centered

upon the theory of bilingual writers writing in their second language in search of attaining

status of a global soul (p.273). This is a metaphor for hyphenated identity postulated by

Akhtar (1996). While looking for home is a perpetual theme, being an exile is also a blessing,

a gift that not all are able to obtain. It is this state of being in exile that has given them the

chance to be different and to be able to find the different selves (p.273). Through deep self-

reflection aided by the conscious efforts of writing, it is possible for one to access and develop a

deeper, more conscious self. Deeper knowing, and development of self in relation to the world

around ones self gives meaning to life. Learning so intrinsically grounded in the search for self

and understanding has universal value.

The personal narrative is a powerful tool in personalizing the immigrants English

experience. We shape our lives into a kind of narrative in order to more fully posses our
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experiences (Britton, 1982, p.7). Using narrative to develop English skills provides students

with opportunity to practice expressive writing, helping them to negotiate existing and

developing personality within the English context. Exploration of inner self and communication

of this self in writing allows students to consciously develop self-understanding, making

negotiating identity within new or unfamiliar cultural contexts more accomplishable. If

expressive writing helps the writer to make sense of the world, then it is invaluable to

immigrants in navigating the unfamiliar territory of new culture, language, and ones place in

these. Expressive writing, may be at any stage the kind of writing best adapted to exploration

and discovery. It is language that externalizes our first images in tackling a problem or coming

to grips with an experience (Britton et al., 1975, p.197)

My role in this study is to nurture the growth and exploration of participants. Expression

of the self in and through a medium, constituting the work of art is itself a prolonged interaction

of something issuing from the self with objective conditions, a process in which both of them

acquire a form and order they did not at first possess (Dewey, 1934, p.65). My interventions are

based on the logic that, the main task of English teachers is to tap the creative and symbolizing

energies of each child so that he is able to clarify and deepen, relate and refine, order and present

his own experience (Abbs, p.1). In introducing my students to narrative writing, I hope to

provide them with a tool to unlock creative potential while deepening their life experience, by

using writing to bring the experience to consciousness. In a world in which symbols are being

reduced to signs, imaginative meanings to literal meanings, inward depths to outer surfaces, it is

vital that we attempt to keep alive primitive modes of perception and interpretation (Abbs,

p.50). The primary impetus behind development in language is to put it to work in interpreting

ones own world (Britton et al., 1975, p. 140). Narrative writing allows
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the writer to explore his inner self, while exposing it to his reader. This not only helps reveal the

writer to himself, but to the world, bridging the gap of isolation from host culture felt by the

immigrant.

Expressive writing allows for written language to follow the ebb and flow of the

writers consciousness, to articulate the concerns and interests of the writer, free of external

demands, in the same informal and implicit way as is characteristic of supportive talkand is

likely to be both the most accessible mode for young writers and the key to developing

confidence and range in using written language (Britton et al., 1975, p.141-2). Academic forms

of writing cannot do this. Due to their design and relationship to audience they may even alienate

one from his inner self. Students in the English classroom often feel disengaged from the subject

because of its formal academic presentation. Over correction and strict formatting and grammar

rules can disconnect learners from the communicative nature of written language (Ferris-

Roberts, 2006). In the midst of the chaos of trying to make sense of ones place in a new cultural

and academic atmosphere, many learners struggle with self-esteem and identity issues.

In the typical college level classroom, writing is taught as communication with another,

further alienating students from identifying themselves as writers. Students are taught to write

following a prescribed format for the intended audience, a teacher, who has the power to judge

their worth with a grade. The pressure of academic writing has the potential to disempower

students who are not secure in their language, academic, and writing identities. Learner ego is

fragile and can be severely damaged during the process of redefinition of self. If academic

writing is a learners only writing experience, the possibility of accessing the potential depth of

writing is compromised. Students must be encouraged to seek and define an individual voice

through the writing process. The pressures to write at an analogic level of the informative-and
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in the main for an audience of the teacher as examiner-were great enough both to inhibit early

expressive writing and to prevent any but minimal development into the more abstract levels of

the informative (Britton et al., 1975, p.197).