Meaningful Literacy and Agentive Writer Identity

Mextesol Journal

Shizhou Yang¹ 

[1] Payap University, Chiangmai, Thailand;

关键词: meaningful literacy;    agency;    writer identity;   

DOI  :  

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Studies on learner identity and studies on meaningful literacy seem to have gone on parallel tracks with little intersection between the two, leading to a lack of understanding regarding the impact of meaningful literacy on learners’ identities, particularly as writers in a foreign language environment. In this context, this article reports on a study in which the teacher examines how meaningful literacy in the form of life writing shapes his English as a foreign language (EFL) writers’ identity. The study used students’ writing samples and written reflections as the primary data and through the lens of a poststructuralist theory of learner and writer identity. The author found that extensive investment in life writing in a supportive social milieu, including both story writing outside class and free writing in class enabled EFL learners to achieve agentive writer identities, i.e., forming a new habit of writing, gaining confidence as a writer, and taking life writing as a craft. This positively and actively invested relationship with writing in a foreign language suggests that life writing should be made an option in English literacy education to promote L2 writers’ identity development.

【 授权许可】

Unknown