With globalization and the ever-increasing migration of professionals, issues related to learning an additional language and culture in professional contexts are prominent in many contemporary societies. Drawing upon data from an extensive research study of internationally educated professionals, this book examines the affordances and constraints to successful professional acculturation, and the relationships between identity, agency, and the acquisition of professional language and culture. The author provides a succinct review of socially informed theories of second language acquisition, and presents a unique analysis of identity and agency that incorporates the work of Erik Erikson and George Herbert Mead with Vygotsky's sociocultural theory and Lave and Wenger's community of practice framework. Given the pervasive problem of the underemployment of internationally educated professionals in many contemporary immigrant-receiving societies, this book makes a timely contribution that not only advances scholarship but also has important practical and policy implications.

With globalization and the ever-increasing migration of professionals, issues related to learning an additional language and culture for professional contexts are prominent in many immigrant-receiving societies. This study examines the professional acculturation experiences of internationally educated teachers (IETs) in the English public Kindergarten-to-Grade-12 and college systems in Ontario, Canada. The research questions focus on the affordances and constraints to successful professional acculturation, and on the relationships between identity, agency, and the acquisition of professional language and culture. Data for this qualitative study comprise in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 33 IETs from diverse ethnolinguistic and professional backgrounds, longitudinal case studies of 8 of these IETs, and in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 15 educational professionals who work with IETs, namely, administrators, mentors, and professional development facilitators. All textual data were coded for content using ATLASti software. My analysis is informed by Vygosky's (1978, 1986) sociocultural theory and Lave and Wenger's (1991; Wenger, 1998) concept of legitimate peripheral participation and community of practice (COP) framework. The findings are reported in three sections. First, dominant themes regarding affordances and constraints to professional acculturation are identified from the complete data set. Main constraints are differences in language and culture, interaction with students and parents, differences in teaching and learning styles, and discrimination. Key affordances are social support, resources, observation and practice, and beliefs. Second, findings and analysis of retrospective narratives of 3 IETs who were able to acquire an additional language and culture, and achieve professional success are discussed. Third, I focus on a longitudinal case study of one IET. The findings highlight the complex and dynamic relationships between individuals -- with their sociocultural histories, identities, and beliefs -- and the norms of the receiving COP. Recurring themes include the socially constructed nature of identity and agency, the key roles of power relations and emotions, the importance of community acceptance and support, including affirmation of professional identity, and the two-way process of change and transformation as a newcomer enters a COP. Implications regarding strategies for professional acculturation success include the need for immigrant professionals to have access to and to be affirmed and accepted by a COP.

This unique work analyzes the crisis in modern society, building on the ideas of the Frankfurt School thinkers. Emphasizing social evolution and learning processes, it argues that crisis is mediated by social class conflicts and collective learning, the results of which are embodied in constitutional and public law. First, the work outlines a new categorical framework of critical theory in which it is conceived as a theory of crisis. It shows that the Marxist focus on economy and on class struggle is too narrow to deal with the range of social conflicts within modern society, and posits that a crisis of legitimization is at the core of all crises. It then discusses the dialectic of revolutionary and evolutionary developmental processes of modern society and its legal system. This volume in the Critical Theory and Contemporary Society by a leading scholar in the field provides a new approach to critical theory that will appeal to anyone studying political sociology, political theory, and law.

This book employs the realm of English Language Teaching (ELT) as a discursive point of departure to explore how individuals, groups, entities and institutions apprehend, embrace, deal with, manipulate, problematize and resist glocal flows of people, ideas, information, goods, and technology. It apprehends and attends to tensions arising from the fluidly local-global construction and negotiation of borders of identity and interaction within a diverse array of contexts and English education therein. These tensions, whether conceptual or pedagogical, may arise in and through governmental and institutional policymaking, teacher training, or curriculum and materials development, and in the learning experience both within and beyond the classroom, as teachers and students engage with course content and each other.

Through several unique perspectives and contexts, this volume contributes to current understanding of agency in second language learning. It includes chapters discussing theoretical, analytical and pedagogical approaches, and will serve as a key reference for researchers of language learning and teaching.

This book is the first to explore the constitution of language learner agency by drawing on performativity theory, an approach that remains on the periphery of second language research. Though many scholars have drawn on poststructuralism to theorize learner identity in non-essentialist terms, most have treated agency as an essential feature that belongs to or inheres in individuals. By contrast, this work promotes a view of learner agency as inherently social and as performatively constituted in discursive practice. In developing a performativity approach to learner agency, it builds on the work of Vygotsky and Bakhtin along with research on ‘agency of spaces’ and language ideologies. Through the study of discourses produced in interviews, this work explores how immigrant small business owners co-construct their theories of agency, in relation to language learning and use. The analysis focuses on three discursive constructs produced in the interview talk–subject-predicate constructs, evaluative stance, and reported speech–and investigates their discursive effects in mobilizing ideologically normative, performatively realized agentive selves.

This textbook introduces the reader to concepts of sociocultural theory, through a series of narratives illuminating key concepts of the theory. This 2nd edition references recent studies that provide important instances of Vygotskian sociocultural theory in second language education and research, as well as questions for collaborative discussion.