The role of learners' and teachers’ classroom emotions in Foreign language learning and teaching

Details

• Time: 17:00-18:00
• Date: Wednesday, 12 May 2021
• Venue: HS436

Abstract

I will talk about an emerging area of research in the field of foreign language learning and teaching, which was triggered by the introduction of Positive Psychology (PP). It has focused on the role of emotions in foreign language learning and teaching, beyond established concepts like foreign language anxiety and constructs like motivation and attitudes toward the foreign language (Gkonou, Dewaele & King, 2020; Li, 2020). As a result, a more nuanced understanding of the role of positive and negative learner and teacher emotions emerged, underpinned by solid empirical research using a wide range of epistemological and methodological approaches (Dewaele & Dewaele, 2020; Dewaele & Li, 2020; Dewaele et al., 2018, 2019).

Speaker

Jean-Marc Dewaele is Professor in Applied Linguistics and Multilingualism, Birkbeck University of London ̧ UK. He has been working in the field for close to 30 years and his research focuses on the dynamic effects of individual differences in multilingual language use and acquisition, with a focus on personality and emotion. He is particularly interested in gradual conceptual change and acculturation in the languages and behaviours of immigrants. He is also researching what contributes to successful foreign language learning and foreign language teaching. In one strand of this research, he has has proposed an innovative holistic perspective, focusing on both positive and negative emotions that foreign language learners and teachers experience in the classroom. A second strand has been the study of the linguistic, pragmatic and socio-cultural challenges multilinguals face in communicating and recognising emotions in different contexts. The final strand is a continuation of the former, namely the issue of multilingualism in psychotherapy. He is General Editor of Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development. He won the Equality and Diversity Research Award (2013) from the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy and the Robert C. Gardner Award for Excellence in Second Language and Bilingualism Research (2016) from the International Association of Language and Social Psychology.