Socializing Second Language Learning: Insights from an Intergenerational Intercultural Contact Model for Heritage Language Learning

Research on second language (L2) socialization typically adopts a sociocultural or social constructivist view in studying the process by which L2 novices acquire not only communicative competence, but also sociocultural knowledge of the target language (see e.g. Duff 2007; He 2008; Schieffelin & Ochs 1986; Zuengler & Cole 2005). In this process, experts or more proficient members of target language are thought to play a crucial role in socializing novices and implicitly and explicitly teaching them to think, feel and act in accordance with the values, ideologies and traditions of the group (Duff 2007). In terms of the language development of heritage language (HL) learners who are sociohistorically connected with the target language yet experientially displaced from it, a language socialization perspective can prove, as argued by He (2008), enlightening because of its emphasis on the interconnected processes of linguistic and cultural learning in interactional discourse practices. However, so far few studies in HL learning have explicitly adopted a language socialization approach and even fewer have examined patterns of HL use in informal settings. This paper presents an intergenerational intercultural contact model that makes use of the rich Australian multilingual and multicultural community resources through which Chinese is socialized as a heritage language. L1 Chinese older speakers and English Chinese heritage learners were paired and conducted naturalistic conversations on school premises over a period of one or two years. Drawing on the CA analysis of the conversations between these pairs, we attempt to explore how the old speakers (expert users) socialize the students (novice learners) into acquiring linguistic meanings embedded in cultural systems of understanding. We also intend to demonstrate how the elderly participants take on the ‘de facto teacher’ role as elicitor, informer, interrogator and evaluator (He 2004), and use different strategies to teach students cultural knowledge.