In terms of the theoretical contribution of this study, framed in language
socialization theory, research on an EFL tertiary medical-issue-based course through oral presentation tasks is unique from two perspectives. On the one hand, scholars have only in recent years started to examine and theorize about the complicated, contingent nature of second language academic discourse socialization, so we have relatively limited knowledge about this area (Belcher, 1994; Belcher & Braine, 1995).
While much of the previous work in ESL contexts is data-driven, this study attempts to make contributions by addressing the limited research into EFL learners’
acquisition of oral academic discourse qualitatively. Accordingly, it adds to an emerging line of research that examines EFL learner’s participation and socialization within academia by taking oral presentations as a socially-constructed academic activity within such a specific content course.
Moreover, in this medical-theme-based language classroom, the issues of negotiating membership inside and outside the classroom have rarely been documented. Inside the classroom, since the language instructor is not a medical professional, how can she engage in and negotiate with medical majors? The medical majors, who play multiple roles (i.e., presenters, discussion leaders, listeners, and oral contributors), have better medical knowledge but less language knowledge than the instructor; therefore, how do they negotiate their expressions and ideas with the teacher and classmates? Does their negotiation process follow the conventional interaction mode in a traditional Taiwanese classroom: teacher initiation, student response, and teacher evaluation, especially in a large-size language classroom? If not, then what is the interaction and negotiation pattern in the classroom? This dimension is particularly significant because in the observed classroom, this student-dominant characteristic is very much in conflict with traditionally recognized Taiwanese classroom discourse. Therefore, when students fulfill the overriding position to control their oral presentation and lead discussions, the typically
acknowledged educational status of the teacher and students in Taiwanese culture is over-turned. Then, the question which follows could be of interest to find out how this occurs and in which perspective, the instructor activates (or yields) her mediating role during negotiation. Outside the classroom, this study aims to better understand how students prepare their oral presentation task. For example, do they work on an individual basis rather than depending on assistance from instructors and/or peers?
If they need assistance, what format do they prefer (e.g., email, face-to-face communication, or scheduled oral conferencing)? In Q & A session, how do they undergo a discussion since everyone has different experiences and expertise? To summarize, this dissertation presents a multi-layered picture of the negotiating membership between the instructor and students inside and outside classroom.
In addition to further exploring theoretical issues, this study also provides pedagogical implications regarding the importance of oral presentations in academia.
Oral presentations are recognized as an essential ability for academic community members. In the academic world, presentations take place in lectures, presenting information or results, summarizing, sharing knowledge, and attending conferences, among other situations. Therefore, oral presentations in university classrooms serve the role of placing learners in contexts that require authentic use of language in academia. Secondly, based on sociocultural theories in language learning, it is especially significant for researchers and educators to examine how to carry out oral presentations in a language classroom, not only to observe how an individual is challenged and transformed through a dynamic and negotiated process, but also how students’ as well as the instructor’s roles in the academic community change.
Meanwhile, from a practical perspective, the findings will be especially important for medical students because in their future careers, oral presentation skills are central to physician-physician communication; however, many studies have been
done regarding general English learning or graduate-level seminar classes (see detailed discussion in Chapter 2), but very little is known about how these skills are learned and about the doctors’ dilemma in making a definitive English oral presentation (Haber & Lingard, 2001). In the present study, how this skill helps EFL medical students in the academic community is investigated as well as the journey they experience to be a better presenter. Therefore, the medical major participants’
reflection on results can contribute to both medical and higher education.
In short, the primary goal of this study is to provide an in-depth examination of the learner experiences and of the development that occurs with oral tasks in an English medicine-related course in an EFL context. By drawing on various sociocultural theories, this study attempts to explore how these issues manifest themselves in the experiences of the medical students who participate in new academic communities, through oral presentations, and in a variety of ways.
Chapter 2
Sociocultural Perspectives on Academic Oral Discourse Research:
A Review of the Literature
Among the various oral activities in tertiary courses across disciplines, such as seminars, interviews, oral examinations, participation in discussions, etc, oral presentations can be seen as one of the most pervasive oral activities in regular university classes. Surprisingly, in reviewing the literature, it was found that oral academic discourse is peculiarly under-researched. Among the limited literature, most studies have been carried out with indexicality (e.g., deictics, speech acts, pronouns, turn-taking, etc.) to analyze oral linguistic characteristics (Basturkmen, 2002; Bygate, 1999) or quantify results by using questionnaires (e.g., Ferris & Tagg, 1996a, 1996b; Kim, 2006).
Differing from those research foci, this dissertation’s interest lies in the exploration of what and how students’ learning of academic oral presentations occurs
‘behind the scenes’. Framed in a sociocultural theory, it seems that depending solely on linguistic analysis or counting results in surveys is not sufficient to illustrate what the exact causes that influence students’ performance, which I view as an outcome derived from various factors. In this sense, sociocultural theories which view language learning as a fundamentally social, cultural, and temporal activity provide a relatively strong and mature stance to sustain the present study. The value of conducting studies from a sociocultural stance is well supported by Wertsch’s (1991) quote: “the basic goal of a sociocultural approach to mind is to create an account of human mental processes that recognizes the essential relationship between these processes and their cultural, historical, and institutional settings” (p. 6; see also Wertsch, 1990, 1998). From such a perspective, learners’ development and process of learning are taken to be situated within particular contexts or the social, cultural
world which is “constituted in relation with persons acting,” (Lave 1993, p. 5; see also, Lave, 1988; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Rogoff, 1990, 2003; Vygotsky, 1978).
Therefore, to better portray a holistic picture, I will discuss below some important aspects or concepts related to the theoretical perspective of language socialization and other sociocultural approaches. First of all, this study borrows from mainly language socialization theories as a conceptual framework. Some of the important theoretical constructs include second language socialization theory (Duff, 2003), the role of activity proposed by Ochs (Ochs, 1988), legitimate peripheral participation (LPP) on learning and taking classroom as a learning community (Lave & Wenger, 1991). In the following sections, explanation will be provided on each of the above mentioned constructs.
First of all, in Section 2.1, an overview of second language socialization to emulate an orientation as the theoretical conceptual framework to answer research questions and support the entire study is introduced. Considering second language socialization as a dynamic and complex process (Duff, 1996, 2003, 2007; Duff &
Hornberger, 2008), characteristics of the researched language classroom will be described. In addition, the features of key informants’ interaction in the classroom will be explained. The use of second language socialization theory will also help provide a strong stance to capture and illuminate various dimensions of socialization experiences.
In Section 2.2, I further explore how sociocultural theories discuss the importance of activity (i.e., activity theory) which is essential to the present study because it helps validate my explanation for taking oral presentations as a socially constructed activity. Following this and framed in sociocultural theory, Section 2.3 employs community-of-practice (CoP) theory to re-examine the typically recognized teacher-student position (i.e., expert-novice position) in a traditional Taiwanese
education setting. Also, it helps define the investigated classroom as a reduced version of an authentic academic community.
Finally, in Section 2.4, I review recent studies on academic oral discourse to indicate the imperative need to expand research on academic oral discourse. By doing so, we can have a better understanding of how this area has been studied.
Later, a review is provided with a focus on key traits and findings of several studies which have informed this investigation. All studies reviewed have framed themselves in a sociocultural stance, discussing how ESL learners’ acquisition of academic oral discourse influences their socialization into academia. Sharing a common orientation, a discussion is offered to distinguish reviewed studies and the present one in order to add further theoretical contributions to the existing body of work. At the end of this chapter, Section 2.5, a chapter summary is given.