Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories 9819914051, 9789819914050

Table of contents :
Acknowledgments
About This Book
Contents
Abbreviations
List of Figures
List of Tables
1 Introduction
1.1 Research Background
1.2 Significance of the Study
1.3 Organization of the Book
References
2 Human Agency and Its Linguistic Representations
2.1 Conceptualizing Agency
2.1.1 Agency in Philosophy
2.1.2 Agency in Sociology
2.1.3 Agency in Applied Linguistics
2.2 Investigating Agency of Chinese English-Majors
2.2.1 Agency of Second Language Learners
2.2.2 Agency of Chinese Learners of English
2.2.3 Agency of Chinese English-Majors
2.3 Investigating Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives
2.3.1 Agency in Discourse
2.3.2 Agency in Oral Discourse
2.3.3 Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives
2.4 Summary
References
3 Understanding Agency: A Theoretical Framing
3.1 Theoretical Foundation
3.1.1 Agency as an Identity Dilemma
3.1.2 Identity, Investment, Imagined Community
3.1.3 Linguistic Realization of Agency
3.1.4 Common Grounds
3.2 Theoretical Framework
3.3 Re-Conceptualizing Agency
3.4 Summary
References
4 Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing
4.1 Research Questions
4.2 Analytical Framework
4.3 Participants
4.4 Procedure and Methods
4.4.1 Data Collection
4.4.2 Data Selection
4.4.3 Data Analyses
4.4.4 Data Interpretation
4.4.5 Data Organization
4.5 Summary
References
5 Agency Construction
5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency
5.1.1 Hunter’s Delight
5.1.2 Proactive Voices
5.1.3 Transitivity Constructions of High Agency
5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency
5.2.1 Erica’s Bewilderment
5.2.2 Inactive Voices
5.2.3 Transitivity Constructions of Low Agency
5.3 Blending High and Low Levels of Agency
5.4 Discussion: Identity Making and Agency Construction
5.5 Summary
6 Agency Navigation
6.1 Intra-discoursal Navigation
6.1.1 Vivian’s Desire
6.1.2 Ambivalent Voices
6.1.3 Logico-semantic Navigations of Agency
6.2 Cross-Discoursal Navigation
6.2.1 Harper’s Trajectory
6.2.2 A Panorama
6.2.3 Online Learning Experience
6.3 Discussion: Identity Transformation and Agency Navigation
6.4 Summary
References
7 Conclusion
7.1 Research Findings
7.2 Reflections: Agency, Identity and English Learning
7.3 Concluding Remarks
7.4 Contributions and Implications
7.4.1 Theoretical Contributions
7.4.2 Methodological Contributions
7.4.3 Pedagogical Implications
7.5 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Research
References
Appendices
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
References

Citation preview

Qiuming Lin

Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories

Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories

Qiuming Lin

Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories

Qiuming Lin Guangdong University of Foreign Studies Guangzhou, China

This work is supported by Humanities and Social Science Research Founding from Chinese Ministry of Education under Grant No. 21YJA740018 ISBN 978-981-99-1405-0 ISBN 978-981-99-1406-7 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. The registered company address is: 152 Beach Road, #21-01/04 Gateway East, Singapore 189721, Singapore

Acknowledgments

This book is developed from my doctoral dissertation, whose completion would never have been possible without the help and support of many people. I would like to take this opportunity to extend my heartfelt gratitude to all of them. First and foremost, I am deeply indebted to my supervisor Professor Ouyang Huhua for guiding me in my academic and personal growth. His learned scholarship and extraordinary critical thinking have exerted great influence on me. He has shown me what research should be like through seminars, lectures and private tutoring. This book would not have been the same without his guidance and criticisms over the earlier drafts. He never pushed me or blamed me in my difficult periods of low productivity. I am grateful to his understanding, patience and encouragement. I consider myself to be the most fortunate in having him as the mentor for my PhD study. The accomplishment of the book is also depended upon invaluable inspirations and suggestions of many other professors. A special note of thanks goes to Professor Yu Shengming. His heuristic teaching in the course of Discourse Analysis for postgraduate students has ushered me to the fascinating field of discourse studies and inspired me to examine human agency from the perspective of Systemic Functional Linguistics. My sincere thanks also go to Professor Chen Jianping, Professor Huo Yongshou, Professor Wu Jianguo and Professor Zhu Xiaoyan, as well as two anonymous external reviewers for the manuscript of the book. Their constructive comments and suggestions are most appreciated. I am also much obliged to my dear students, particularly the participants of the research. During their college years, they spared their precious time and shared with me their personal stories of learning English, which have provided the study with abundant data. Now they have left the university and are leading their own lives in different parts of the world, but the lovely meetings with them in the school canteen, café, library, etc. over the years have become sweet and unfading memories among us. My gratitude finally goes to my beloved parents, husband and daughter. Their pride and faith in me and their unconditional support are always the source of my courage and strength in continuing my way to a career in academia. The process of v

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Acknowledgments

bearing my son was all the way accompanied by producing the book, both of which have been huge but exhilarating endeavors to me. It is no exaggeration that this book is just like a twin brother of my son. It is dedicated to my family.

About This Book

This book is based on a longitudinal research with the author’s English-majoring students, who had built and varied their images of active or passive language learners with certain linguistic devices in their accounts of English learning stories. The research is aimed to obtain an adequate discursive description of agency construction and navigation in autobiographic oral narratives, as well as to achieve an in-depth understanding to the agency issues of Chinese English-majors. By integrating relevant theories from cultural psychology, second language acquisition and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), this research has established a three-level theoretical framework: agency construction at clausal level, agency navigation at discoursal level and structural mediation at contextual level. This framework operationalizes the notion of agency on individual clauses in narrative discourses and attributes learner agency to their multiple, contradictory and ever-changing identities. The general research objectives have been developed into four specific research questions. First, how do the English-majors construct different levels of agency in individual clause in the telling of their learning stories? Second, how do they alter or maintain their agency level within one narrative discourse? Third, how do they navigate their agency dilemma across narrative discourses in different situations? Forth, what contextual factors influence agency construction and navigation in their learning stories? To answer question (1) and (2), the author elicited significant English learning stories from life-history interviews with the participants, and then employed SFL’s system of transitivity and system of logico-semantic (LS) relations to analyze the narrative data. To answer question (3) and (4), the author conducted follow-up interviews with the narrators and then applied qualitative analyses to the reflective data, with the focus on the diverse identities and the structural factors that mediate learner agency. The research has produced specific and comprehensive findings to the research questions. At the clausal level, the English-majors configure diverse transitivity patterns with certain “Process” and “Participant role” to construct different levels of agency in their learning stories. At the discoursal level, the narrators navigate the agency dilemma by employing certain LS relations of “enhancing,” “extending,” vii

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About This Book

“elaborating” or “projecting” between adjacent clauses within a narrative discourse, and by varying their actual or imagined identities across narrative discourses. At the contextual level, multifarious structural factors at the layers of “self ,” “setting” and “situation” interact with each other, jointly shaping learners’ identities and manipulating agency construction and navigation. The research findings have fully demonstrated that agency is a dynamic construct negotiated by the English-majors with the social world. It is the result of their identity positioning and repositioning within a complex and ever-changing context, and significantly correlated with their investment in English and their English learning process. The research has made theoretical and methodological contributions to linguistics and applied linguistics, and also offered pedagogical implications for foreign language education. It provides a dynamic perspective and a linguistic approach to study agency of the second language learners, and gives inspirations for enhancing the agency of English-majors in the English learning context in contemporary China.

Contents

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.1 Research Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.2 Significance of the Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1.3 Organization of the Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1 1 3 4 5

2 Human Agency and Its Linguistic Representations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 Conceptualizing Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.1 Agency in Philosophy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.2 Agency in Sociology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.1.3 Agency in Applied Linguistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 Investigating Agency of Chinese English-Majors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2.1 Agency of Second Language Learners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2.2 Agency of Chinese Learners of English . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.2.3 Agency of Chinese English-Majors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 Investigating Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives . . . . . . . . . 2.3.1 Agency in Discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.2 Agency in Oral Discourse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3.3 Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7 7 8 9 10 12 12 14 15 16 16 17 17 19 20

3 Understanding Agency: A Theoretical Framing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 Theoretical Foundation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.1 Agency as an Identity Dilemma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.2 Identity, Investment, Imagined Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.3 Linguistic Realization of Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1.4 Common Grounds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 Theoretical Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.3 Re-Conceptualizing Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

25 25 25 27 28 29 30 32 32 33 ix

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4 Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.1 Research Questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.2 Analytical Framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3 Participants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4 Procedure and Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.1 Data Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.2 Data Selection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.3 Data Analyses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.4 Data Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.4.5 Data Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

35 35 36 38 38 39 41 42 42 43 43 44

5 Agency Construction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.1 Hunter’s Delight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.2 Proactive Voices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.3 Transitivity Constructions of High Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.1 Erica’s Bewilderment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.2 Inactive Voices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2.3 Transitivity Constructions of Low Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.3 Blending High and Low Levels of Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.4 Discussion: Identity Making and Agency Construction . . . . . . . . . . . 5.5 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

45 45 45 53 56 61 61 68 71 75 77 79

6 Agency Navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 Intra-discoursal Navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1.1 Vivian’s Desire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1.2 Ambivalent Voices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1.3 Logico-semantic Navigations of Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 Cross-Discoursal Navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.1 Harper’s Trajectory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.2 A Panorama . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2.3 Online Learning Experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Discussion: Identity Transformation and Agency Navigation . . . . . . 6.4 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

81 81 82 86 90 100 100 109 119 122 123 125

7 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.1 Research Findings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2 Reflections: Agency, Identity and English Learning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.3 Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4 Contributions and Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4.1 Theoretical Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.4.2 Methodological Contributions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

127 127 128 130 131 131 133

Contents

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7.4.3 Pedagogical Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134 7.5 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136 Appendices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Abbreviations

BEC EFL ESL ESOL GW IELTS LS SFL SLA TEM-4/8

Business English Certificate English as a Foreign Language English as a Second Language English for Speakers of Other Languages A key university in south China International English Language Testing System logico-semantic Systemic Functional Linguistics Second Language Acquisition Test for English-Majors 4/8 Band

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List of Figures

Fig. 3.1 Fig. 3.2 Fig. 3.3 Fig. 3.4 Fig. 4.1 Fig. 5.1 Fig. 5.2 Fig. 5.3 Fig. 5.4 Fig. 5.5 Fig. 5.6 Fig. 5.7 Fig. 5.8 Fig. 5.9 Fig. 5.10 Fig. 5.11 Fig. 5.12 Fig. 5.13 Fig. 5.14 Fig. 6.1 Fig. 6.2 Fig. 6.3 Fig. 6.4 Fig. 6.5 Fig. 6.6 Fig. 6.7 Fig. 6.8 Fig. 7.1 Fig. B1 Fig. B2 Fig. B3

Agency as a dynamic sense of control (Bamberg et al., 2011) . . . Meta-functions of text in SFL (Halliday, 1979) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Process of agency construction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Process of agency navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Research procedure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frequencies of different Process types in Excerpt 1 . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frequencies of different Process types in Excerpt 7 . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 12 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Frequencies of different LS relations in Excerpt 13 . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 14 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 16 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 17 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 18 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Harper’s agency fluctuations across discourses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Relation between agency, identity and structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Process types in transitive model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . System network of agency in voice system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . System network of projection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

26 29 30 31 40 48 53 54 55 55 56 57 63 67 68 69 70 70 71 84 84 86 87 88 89 90 106 128 140 140 140 xv

List of Tables

Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table 6.1 Table 6.2 Table 6.3 Table B1 Table B2 Table C1 Table C2 Table C3

Analytical framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Participants information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . General tendency of agency in Harper’s stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Harper’s identity transformation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Structural factors mediating English-majors’ agency . . . . . . . . . . Process and participant in transitivity system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Logico-semantic system of expansion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Transitivity analysis of Excerpt 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Transitivity analysis of Excerpt 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Logico-semantic analysis of Excerpt 13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

37 39 106 109 119 141 142 142 150 155

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Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 Research Background As an EFL teacher working for over 20 years in the English Faculty of GW, a prestigious university in south China which is well known for its foreign language and culture education, I have heard numerous stories told by my students when we exchanged small talks on various occasions. They told me why they came to GW for their tertiary education, why they chose English as their major, how they perceived English language and culture, what they thought about the courses and the teachers, what they expected for their English learning, how they learned English in and out of class, how they used English in daily life, so on and so forth. There are joyful stories, sad stories, ambitious stories and gloomy stories. We are so excited that our team has advanced to the final contest of English Pronunciation and Intonation! We practice for hours every night. Now I just hope we can give our best performance in the next week’s final. I have been obsessed with American TV series recently. I watch them one episode after another, one series after another. I have learned a lot of colloquial expressions of American English. Sometimes I even speak fluent American English in my dream! It’s really amazing. I have made a new friend recently. He’s a Canadian learning Chinese in our university. The first time when we met, he said my English was very good. I don’t know whether he meant it or was just being polite, because later he always speaks with me with his poor Chinese. How much I wish I can practice English with him! The final examination is coming. I am nervous again. I don’t know how to go over the lessons and achieve a high score in the exam. The exam has nothing to do with the lessons we take. Although I have spent a lot of time and efforts in reviewing the lessons, it is just not paid off. I am always struggling near the pass line. ……

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_1

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1 Introduction

I am always deeply carried into their story world, feeling cheered, grieved, inspired or depressed. Anyone who has listened to their stories can undoubtedly sense different levels of agency in different stories, and very often, fluctuations of agency level in one single story. Sometimes they sound active, confident, powerful and hopeful in learning, and sometimes they sound passive, confused, impotent and helpless. How exactly do the narrators position themselves as agentive or non-agentive in their storytelling? How do they alter these positionings through their accounts? What linguistic resources do they resort to in agency making and variations? Having been trained as a linguistic researcher, I realize that such investigations must be engaged with proper linguistic techniques of analysis, especially with textual micro-analysis. Without a meta-language of some kind, discussing these issues is extremely difficult, and may even lead to the unfortunate split between “meaning” and “form”. My training within Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) has convinced me that its grammatics has considerable potential for such work. SFL has been concerned with language as “a complex adaptive system” (Matthiessen, 2009), a system not only for carrying meaning, but also for creating meaning. The exploration of grammar in SFL starts from the standpoint of how language creates and expresses meaning. According to SFL, grammar is the powerhouse where meanings are created, while the clause is the central resource for making meanings (Matthiessen, 2009; Thompson, 2008), since “critical aspects of representation, concerned particularly with questions of the agency of grammatical participants and the relative focus (foregrounding/ backgrounding) on those participants involve highly specific grammatical features at the level of the individual clause” (Poynton, 1993: 6–7). SFL further contends that language has the experiential function to make representation meaning. Language comprises a set of resources for referring to entities in the world and the ways in which those entities act on or relate to each other. At the simplest level, language reflects our view of the world as “consisting of ‘going-on’ (verbs) involving things (nouns) which may have attributes (adjectives) and which go on against background details of place, time, manner, etc. (adverbials)” (Thompson, 2008: 86). This experiential function of language is achieved by a system network called “Transitivity”, which is a means of conveying ideas about who acts, speaks, sees, reflects, etc. in individual clauses. An analysis of transitivity patterns “helps readers understand human interactions in social contexts and can be used to uncover ideological meanings within them” (Nguyen, 2012: 86). In other words, transitivity analysis can give a careful examination to the linguistic features that help to constitute subjectivity and agency. With a huge system network of meaning potentials, SFL is a fine-grained approach to tease agency out in texts. It provides a comprehensive tool-kit to bridge meaning and form, to be more specific, to bridge agency and English learning stories in the current study.

1.2 Significance of the Study

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1.2 Significance of the Study Agency is a very important notion in explaining various kinds of human thoughts and actions. With agency, humans make decisions and enact their decisions on the world. It is the power that people have to think and act which shape their experiences. The transformative potential of agency has been emphasized by Giddens (1984), who believes that human agents have the capability to bring changes to their situation or environment. In second language learning, agency has been considered as a precondition to learners’ efforts to take control of their learning process, and as a defining attribute of agents that places them in the position of being subjects who can think, desire and act, rather than objects that are acted upon (Gao, 2013). Therefore, studies on agency of second language learners can provide a better understanding to the efficiency of learners. Efficient language learners have been found to be those who are aware of themselves as active agents and who are then able to exercise that agency through various strategies to actively shape and construct their learning experiences as well as their motivational and affective responses. To effectively manage learning and regulate emotional responses, “learners must be aware of their own agency and must believe themselves capable of exercising that agency in all learning contexts.” (Bown, 2009: 580). Agency is also a very important notion in explaining various aspects of human cognition and language. It has a great impact on the way we observe and interpret the world around us, since different ways of understanding agency may result in different world-views. It is “one of the cognitively fundamental factors which constitute an important part of our epistemic attitudes towards the outside world” (Yamamoto, 2006: 2). As human mind can be observed through different patterns of language use, agency has become a matter of significant interest in anthropological linguistics. There have been proofs of pervasive influence of agency on the structures of language. Different languages have exhibited strikingly different tendencies towards the semantic, pragmatic and sociolinguistic manifestations of agency, and every single language has provided diversified morphological and syntactic devices to express or suppress agency. The expression and suppression of agency in languages actually reflect particular mind-sets of their speakers—their preoccupations, perspectives and values. It follows that a systematic analysis of language learner agency on the basis of linguistic empirical research seems tenable, worthwhile and significant. This book reports a longitudinal research which covers a linguistic approach to examine how learner agency is manifested in autobiographic oral narratives and influenced by contextual factors. The research has two objectives. One is to obtain a “thick” discursive description of agency making and its dynamics in story-telling. The other is to achieve an in-depth understanding to the agency issues of Chinese English-majors in contemporary China. To meet the research objectives, I traced three groups of English-majors in a Chinese university in different periods of time from 2012 to 2020. I conducted

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life-history interviews with them in groups and then elicited significant English learning stories from the interviews for agency analyses. Follow-up interviews were also launched with some participants individually in order to explore the factors manipulating learner agency. By integrating relevant theories from cultural psychology and second language acquisition with SFL, the research has established theoretical and analytical frameworks at three levels: agency construction at clausal level, agency navigation at discoursal level and structural mediation at contextual level. These frameworks have operationalized the notion of agency at the level of individual clause in narrative discourse, and have attributed learner agency to learners’ multiple, contradictory and ever-changing identities. SFL analyses are applied to the English-learning stories to examine linguistic features of agency construction within individual clause and agency navigation within single narrative discourse. Qualitative analyses are also employed to investigate the English learning journey of individual learners to observe agency navigation across narrative discourses, with the focus on learner identities and the contextual factors varying across time and space. The research has yielded specific and important findings—learner agency is constructed discursively in the narration of their English learning stories and navigated constantly by their changing identities within a complex socio-cultural context. At the clausal level, narrators configure particular transitivity patterns to construct distinctive levels of agency. At the discoursal level, they navigate their agency dilemma by transforming their identities within a narrative discourse or across discourses. At the contextual level, multifarious structural factors interact with each other, jointly shaping learner identities and affecting learner agency. The research findings have fully demonstrated that agency is not a fixed entity that English learners possess, but a dynamic construct constantly negotiated by the learners with the social world. It is the result of their identity positioning and repositioning within a complex and ever-changing context. The current research is an attempt to make connections between agency in discourse and agency in language learning, so its significance is dual. Linguistically, it has provided an innovative way to examine the dynamics of agency construction and navigation of second language learners through fine linguistic analysis of SFL. Pedagogically, it sheds light on the agency issues of English learners and gives important implications for teaching English as a foreign language in contemporary context of China.

1.3 Organization of the Book This book is organized in seven chapters. In this beginning chapter, I have explicated the research motivation and background, and also highlighted the importance of the current study on learner agency.

References

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Chapter 2 is a justification for the research: first, why investigating the dynamics of agency construction and navigation; secondly, why targeting at the Chinese Englishmajors; thirdly, why employing oral autobiographic narratives as the research data; and finally, why adopting the perspective of SFL. After justifying my research, I try to establish both theoretical and analytical frameworks for the study. Chapter 3 first introduces three fundamental theories, on the basis of which the theoretical framework for this research is built. Drawing upon this framework, a working definition of “agency” is proposed, which operationalizes the notion at the level of clause. Chapter 4 begins with the research questions that the study aims to address. Then the analytical framework for this research is mapped out, specifying the analytical tools for each research question. A detailed account for the research design is given at the end of the chapter: how the research data is collected, selected, analyzed, interpreted and organized. The succeeding two chapters are devoted to answer the research questions. Chapter 5 deals with how agency is constructed at the clausal level. In this chapter, excerpts of English learning stories are analyzed to demonstrate how the narrators employ distinctive transitivity patterns to construct different levels of agency. Then I discuss how agency construction in the narratives is related to narrators’ identity positioning. Chapter 6 deals with how agency is navigated at the discoursal level. More stories with significant agency fluctuations are presented to illustrate how the narrators navigate the agency dilemma via various logico-semantic relations in a narrative discourse. Agency navigation across narrative discourses is also investigated in this chapter, with the focus on identities of the English-majors and structural factors that mediate leaner agency. At the end, the relation between agency navigation and identity transformation is discussed. The concluding chapter of the book first gives a summary to the research findings. Then reflections are drawn on the significant relations between agency, identity and English learning. After that, the contributions of the current study and the implications of its findings are particularized. Finally the limitations of the study are pointed out, and possible directions for future research are suggested.

References Bown, J. (2009). Self-regulatory strategies and agency in self-instructed language learning: A situated view. The Modern Language Journal, 93(4), 570–583. Gao, X. (2013). Reflexive and reflective thinking: A crucial link between agency and autonomy. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 7(3), 226–237. Giddens, A. (1984). The constitution of society: Outline of the theory of structuration. University of California Press. Matthiessen, C. (2009). Meaning in the making: Meaning potential emerging from acts of meaning. Language Learning, 59, 206–229.

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Nguyen, H. (2012). Transitivity analysis of “Heroic Mother” by Hoa Pham. International Journal of English Linguistics, 2, 85–100. Poynton, C. (1993). Grammar, language and the social: Poststructuralism and systemic functional linguistics. Social Semiotics, 3, 1–21. Thompson, G. (2008). Introducing functional grammar. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. Yamamoto, M. (2006). Agency and impersonality: Their linguistic and cultural manifestations. Benjamins.

Chapter 2

Human Agency and Its Linguistic Representations

In the previous chapter I have explained where the inspiration of this research comes from, how the research is conducted and what the research is striving to achieve in the end. But what exactly is agency, the subject matter of the research? Where is it located? How is it manifested? How can it be described and measured? These are important questions I must get straight at the outset of my study. In this chapter I first review how agency has been defined and conceptualized in previous literature. Then I review how human agency has been studied from two dimensions in a zoom-in manner respectively. The first dimension is “who”, the target of investigation, i.e., whose agency is observed. The second dimension is “what”, the object of investigation, i.e., through what vehicle agency is examined.

2.1 Conceptualizing Agency According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the word “agent” in English was first used in 1471 when it was written in a treatise on alchemy, meaning “a force capable of acting on matter”. Gradually it has been generally defined as a “person who or thing which acts upon someone or something; one who or that which exerts power; the doer of an action”. From “agent” derives the word “agency”, which is “the state of being in action or exerting power”. It is assumed that agency can be found everywhere. When entities interact with each other and cause changes in each other, they can be identified as agents and patients. However, the term “agency” is used in a much narrower sense in the fields of philosophy, sociology and applied linguistics.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_2

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2.1.1 Agency in Philosophy In philosophy “agency” is generally used to denote the “performance of intentional actions”. This denotation can be traced back to ancient philosophers Hume and Aristotle, and related with modern philosophers Anscombe and Davidson (Schlosser, 2015). According to the “standard conception” established by Anscombe (1957) and Davidson (1971), agency is an “intentional action initiated by the agent with mental representations”. This conception of agency, however, has been argued over the following points in the past few decades. The first point of controversy is whether agency is an intentional action. The “standard conception” construes agency in terms of the intentionality of action. If an entity has the right functional organization, it has the capacity to act intentionally; if an entity has the capacity to act intentionally, it is able to exercise agency. Therefore certain desires, beliefs, and intentions of an entity would result in certain movement of the entity. However, opponents of the “standard conception” argue that actions are not mere happenings, so this conception cannot capture the nature of agency. They further claim that reasons should not be mental states or event, but facts or states of affairs, so reasons for actions are not the same as causes of actions (Alvarez, 2010; Dancy, 2000). The second point of controversy is whether agency is initiated by the agent. The “standard conception” argues that agency involves the agent’s initiation of action, and the agent’s initiation is caused by the relevant desire-belief pairs (Davidson, 1971; Dretske, 1988) or by the relevant intentions (Bishop, 1989; Enç, 2003). Opponents argue that an agent’ initiation of action is not equal to acting with intentions or for reasons. They contend that an agent may exercise agency spontaneously for no reason and without any intention. Agency consists in the power of initiation, but that does not mean that the agent is activated by reasons or intentions (Lowe, 2008; O’Connor, 2000). This alternative conception of agency denies any explanations of agency from the perspective of causal relations between mental states and events. The third point of controversy is whether agency involves mental representation. The “standard conception” interprets agency in terms of mental representations, which are intentional mental states and events that have representational contents, such as the agent’s desires, beliefs and intentions. Opponents argue that there are agents who do not have mental representations. Firstly, there are non-human agents that do not have desires, beliefs and intentions. Secondly, there are human agents who are not activated by intentional mental states and events. Thirdly, mental representations cannot account for all instances of agency (Chemero, 2009; Hutto & Myin, 2014). The divergent views on agency above suggest that there are different levels of agency in philosophic discussion. The “standard conception” only explains the intermediate level—“intentional agency”. There are higher or more advanced levels of agency, e.g. self-controlled, autonomous and free agency, and there are also lower or more primitive levels of agency which do not possess any mental representations. The current study about learner agency tends to lean on more advanced levels of agency, as second language learners usually have strong desires, beliefs and intentions.

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2.1.2 Agency in Sociology In social science, agency has been defined in similar ways: the “ability of individuals to exercise choice and discretion in their everyday practices” (Pickering, 1995), the “socio-culturally mediated capacity to act” (Ahearn, 2001), the “capacity to initiate purposeful action that implies will, autonomy, freedom, and choice” (Lipponen & Kumpulainen, 2011), etc. These definitions and alike all emphasize human agency as the capacity of individuals to make their own free choices and act independently. As a “capacity” implies the potential that a person has, instead of what he actually does, agency is regarded not as a set of actions, but as a potential within a person (Barker, 2005). Agency is often discussed by sociologists in contrast to “structure”, which embodies influential factors like social class, religion, gender, ethnicity, ability, customs, etc. that prompt or restrict an agent’s decisions and behaviors. Sewell (1992) discusses the dialectic relation between “agency” and “structure” by defining structure as “sets of mutually sustaining schemas and resources that empower and constrain social action and that tend to be reproduced by social action” (p. 19). He expounds that the current structures influence social actions by either empowering or constraining them. Meanwhile, the current structures can also be reshaped by social actions. The interactions between structures and social actions are achieved through human agency. According to Sewell, “to be an agent means to be capable of exerting some degree of control over the social relations in which one is enmeshed, which in turn implies the ability to transform those social relations to some degree” (p. 20). This capability is human agency. He also suggests that agency has two sources— virtual schemas and actual resources. “Agency arises from the actor’s knowledge of schemas, which means the ability to apply them to new contexts….agency arises from the actor’s control of resources, which means the capacity to reinterpret or mobilize an array of resources in terms of schemas” (p. 20). Sewell’s account about the sources of agency (schemas and resources) provides important clues for excavating the structural factors for language learner agency in the current study. Stressing the reconstructive, transformative potentialities of human agency, Emirbayer and Mische (1998) conceptualize agency as “a temporally embedded process of social engagement, informed by the past (in its habitual aspect), but also oriented toward the future (as a capacity to imagine alternative possibilities) and toward the present (as a capacity to contextualize past habits and future projects within the contingencies of the moment)” (p. 963). They believe that human beings are always living simultaneously in the past, present and future and they keep adjusting the various temporalities of their existence to one another. Sometimes people may be more oriented towards the past; sometimes they may be more directive towards the future; sometimes they may be more evaluative of the present. “Actors may switch between and reflexively transform their orientations towards action, thereby changing their degrees of flexible, inventive, and critical response toward structuring contexts” (p. 1012). This temporal view gives a better understanding to the power that agents have in an imaginative or reflective world, and provides a dynamic perspective to the current study of agency.

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2.1.3 Agency in Applied Linguistics In the field of applied linguistics and language education, it is hard to find an explicit definition of agency in existing literature, but the following researchers have attempted to offer working definitions with different foci to guide their empirical research in recent decades. In the preface to the book “Applied Linguistics as Social Science” by Sealey and Carter (2004), applied linguists Candlin and Sarangi conceptualize agency as “the self-conscious reflexive actions of human beings” and structure as “the enduring, affording and constraining influences of the social order” (p. xiii). This definition relates agency to human actions and foregrounds the reflexive capacities of human beings. van Lier (2008) advocates that language learners’ agentive capacity to act differs from any notion of linguistic competence as something that a language learner can possess. Agency, according to him, is “action potential, mediated by social, interactional, cultural, institutional and other contextual factors” (p. 171). He also cautions against treating apparent action (e.g. active participation in a language classroom) as learner agency at work, as one can express his agency by deliberately not acting. In his latter discussion of central concepts in ecology of learning, van Lier (2010) defines agency as a movement (a change of state or direction, or even a lack of movement where movement is expected) of organism in order to live and grow. He argues that agency is a “more general and more profound concept than the closely related terms autonomy, motivation and investment. One might say that autonomy, motivation and investment are in a sense products (or manifestations) of a person’s agency” (p. 4). Huang (2011, 2013) proposes that learner agency entails action that arises from deliberation and choice. While this is not strictly a definition of agency, such a conceptualization “enables a close scrutiny of language learners’ responses to the constraints and opportunities in the particular research context, which in turn offers a useful way to problematize and look critically at actual language and teaching situations” (Huang, 2011, p. 230). Through the lens of complexity theory, Mercer (2011) conceives of learner agency as a complex system composed of a number of constituent components, each of which is itself a dynamic complex system. In particular, motivation, affect and selfregulation emerge as the “controlling” components of this learner’s agentic system. “Learner agency exists as latent potential to engage in self-directed behavior but how and when it is used depends on a learner’s sense of agency involving their belief systems, the control parameters of motivation, affect, meta-cognitive or selfregulatory skills, as well as actual abilities and the affordances, actual and perceived, in specific settings” (p. 435). Larsen-Freeman (2019) further calls for a Complex Dynamic Systems Theory’s (CDST) conceptualization of agency. CDST maintains the structure-agency complementarity while bringing to the fore the relational and emergent nature of agency. It further characterizes agency as spatially-temporally situated, multidimensional and heterarchical.

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Lantolf and his colleagues’ perspectives on agency emphasize individuals’ engagement in the social world. Agency is never a “property” of a particular individual; rather, it is “a relationship that is constantly co-constructed and re-negotiated with those around the individual and with the society at large” (Lantolf & Pavlenko, 2001, p. 148). Lantolf and Thorne (2006, pp. 142–143) further argue that agency is “about more than voluntary control over behavior, although to be sure this is a critical component of what it means to be an agent. The concept also entails the ability to assign relevance and significance to things and events.” This emphasis on personal relevance and significance brings the definition of agency close to some of the interpretations about the multidimensional notion of autonomy. Indeed there are many similarities between the notions of agency and autonomy in socio-cultural settings. They both imply freedom from constraints and the capacity of making choices based on one’s intentions and purposes; they both address the key issues of “control”, “choice” and “self-initiation”; they both take diverse forms for different individuals, and even for the same individual in different contexts or at different times. Therefore the boundary between agency and autonomy is often blurred and muddled. Some researchers conceptualize agency and autonomy in much the same way (Toohey, 2007; Toohey & Norton, 2003). However, in spite of the similarities shared, agency and autonomy are in most cases treated as two distinct terms in the field of applied linguistics and language education. Benson (2007, 2011) defines “autonomy” as a capacity to control one’s own learning and regards agency as “the root of autonomy”. Based on Benson’s conception, Huang (2011, p. 242) states that “as the ‘raw material’ for autonomy, agency is more concrete, specific and observable, while autonomy is a capacity that entails long-term development.” Huang and Benson (2013) further expound that “one may take actions consciously for a certain purpose (the exercise of agency), but there is no guarantee that one is in control of the process (autonomy), although self-conscious and personally relevant actions may often enhance one’s controlling capacity (autonomy)….The development of autonomy depends on the exercise of personal agency, although agency itself may not be sufficient for autonomy” (pp. 15– 16). Autonomy in language learning allows learners not only to take control of language learning but also open access to learning opportunities and seek culturally alternative paths to learning by changing contextual/structural conditions (Gao, 2007b). Such interaction between learners and contextual/structural conditions underpinning autonomous language learning consist of four components: context, setting, situated activity and self (Gao, 2013). These four components consistently interact with each other, leading to the emergence of temporal, contextual reorganization and changes in the learners. As a result, the exercise of autonomy is always emergent and relative to individual learners in particular contexts because the nature of such capacity is developmental and its exercise is subject to ongoing contextual mediation (Benson, 2007; Gao, 2007a; Sealey & Carter, 2004). This explication of interaction between language learners and contextual/structural conditions provide a multi-dimensional framework for the current study to examine the mediating factors on language learner agency.

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In spite of diversified conceptualizations and theorizations in the field of applied linguistics, there is a general consensus that agency, as the source of learning actions, is constantly negotiated during the process of learning and affected by various contextual factors. These essential ideas about agency have been invoked in the current research.

2.2 Investigating Agency of Chinese English-Majors 2.2.1 Agency of Second Language Learners As agency has increasingly come to be regarded as a necessary construct in understanding language learning, plenty of studies have examined learner agency from diverse perspectives and with different emphases in the field of second language acquisition. Some studies are concerned with learner agency in classroom context. In classrooms for foreign language learning, there are explorations for innovative teaching models or strategies in order to enhance learner agency. For instance, an empirical study in a Spanish course in an American college shows that “flipped” or inverted classroom (IC) models allow for higher degrees of learner agency and facilitate deeper levels of processing in foreign language learning (Moranski & Kim, 2016). Another mixed-methods intervention study with Iranian learners of English suggests that elementary language learners’ willingness to communicate can be effectively enhanced in the short run with communication strategy training through classroom activities (Sarab & Sani, 2022). In classroom for second language learning, studies are more focused on how learners express their agency in the class and the significance of the agency expression. In an article about the language learning of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK, Baynham (2006) discusses the agency of the learners who interrupt the orderliness in the ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) classes. Although these interactional moments may disrupt the unfolding of the lesson, they reveal high levels of learner agency and open up possibilities to negotiate with the teacher what counts as knowledge and how knowledge is distributed in the classroom. Simpson (2011) explores how adult immigrants bring their life stories into their ESOL classes and argues that by introducing migration narratives in classroom discourse, the learners attempt to resist their rather limiting institutional positioning and negotiate complex ones reflecting a biographical history of multiple belongings. Some studies are concerned with learner agency in the context of social networks, including online environments. Norton and Toohey (2001) argue for the importance of examining the ways in which learners exercise their agency in forming and reforming their identities in social contexts, and the relations between the constraints and possibilities offered by the learners’ environment and their agency as learners. In response to the demands of the new social order in the twenty-first century, spurred

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by technology and marked by mobility and super diversity, Darvin and Norton (2015, 2016) propose a comprehensive model of investment, which addresses the needs of learners who navigate their way through online and offline contexts and perform identities that have become more fluid and complex. New modes of productivity and socialization and the compression of time and space have shaped identities, allegiances, and notions of citizenship in profound new ways. As learners traverse local and global boundaries, occupying multiple online and offline spaces, this fluidity of movement provides new constraints and affordances in learning that impact their commitment to language learning. In addition to the theoretical inquires, there have been empirical research with significant results. Through observing the kinds of learning afforded by asynchronous international computer-mediated communication among Japanese, Mexican, and Russian learners of English, a model of the interrelationship between structure (cultures-of-use of computer technologies, local contexts), students’ agency, and learning through international online interaction has been developed (Basharina, 2009). Empirically grounded conceptualizations for the influences of digital technologies on learners’ motivation in language learning have also been offered, arguing that online media creation provides scope for leaner agency and spaces for identity construction in young people’s communication and social networking (Henry, 2019). Some studies examine general factors influencing learner agency in language learning. In self-instructed language learning, contextual factors such as learners’ self-beliefs and social support influence the kinds of strategies that learners employ, so learners’ self-regulatory agency is mediated through processes of social-interactive support and social regulation (Bown, 2009). In formal language education, specific structures within classrooms and schools have impacts on learner agency, or their ability to access and appropriate resources to meet their learning and social needs. These structures include resources such as space, time, and a schema of caring created by teachers’ practices, and roadblocks such as poor instructional practices, a lack of empathy of students’ experiences, and diminished access to the curriculum (Wassell et al., 2010). Some studies focus on leaner agency in developing particular language skills, such as writing. A framework for “writer agency” has been developed (Shapiro et al., 2016), which articulates relationships between critical components of agency, namely action, awareness and optimal conditions in writing practices. The authors also discuss how writing instructors can create optimal conditions for multilingual student agency. In addition, it has been suggested that L2 learners’ engagement and their exercise of agency in processing and producing L2 writing can be promoted by the broader network of linguistic and non-linguistic resources in L2 writing tasks (Jang, 2022). The studies reviewed above have further affirmed that agency has become a focus of interest in the field of second language acquisition. Drawing upon various theories and methods, learner agency has been observed not only in the classroom, but also in the out-of-class context. In accounting for learner agency, not only the internal factors (such as motivation, affect, self-regulation, etc.) but also the external factors

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(such as space, time, instructional practices, curriculum, resources, etc.) have been explored. However, observing language learner agency and its transformations from a linguistic approach is lacking in prior literature.

2.2.2 Agency of Chinese Learners of English English has been taught as a compulsory subject throughout the primary, secondary and tertiary education in China for decades, and there has been a wealth of studies on agency of Chinese learners of English. These studies have covered a wide range of Chinese learners at different levels, including primary school pupils and middle school students, vocational and technical school students, under-graduate as well as post-graduate students in college and university. The status quo of English learning agency of Chinese learners has been deeply concerned by Chinese educators for long. Large-scale surveys among learners of English at elementary and intermediate levels have generally presented gloomy pictures. According to an investigation in a vocational school, less than half of the respondents show interest in English learning, and most of them are not satisfied with the current situation of English learning and teaching, particular with the cramming method of teaching, monotonous teaching content and the pressure from college-entrance exam (Lin, 2015). In a college of science where students are all nonEnglish-majors, only a quarter of respondents demonstrate a relatively high degree of agency by indicating that they always take initiatives in learning English, have confidence and perseverance in learning English well and arrange their learning activities in good order (Guo, 2008). Nevertheless, case studies with learners at advanced levels have yielded more optimistic results. A qualitative study on five M.A. students’ enactment of learner agency in the course of Academic English Reading and Writing has revealed that learners could make conscious reflection, select and use the mediational sources in the class and their participation in after-class activities result in their agentive reflection (Li & Yang, 2022). Factors affecting agency of Chinese learners of English have also been fully reported. Among the many factors, learners’ intrinsic qualities seem most decisive. It has been found that basic psychological needs (autonomy, competence, relatedness), autonomous and controlled motivation are all significantly correlated with learner’s agentic engagements (Fan & Long, 2022). While agency enables learners to undertake language learning efforts, learners may be still unable to control the learning process since their efforts are mediated by contextual conditions (Gao, 2007, 2010a, 2010b). In the classroom context, teachers play a critical role in activating students’ agency by means of teaching content (e.g. Zhang, 2000), ways of commenting and evaluating (e.g. Fan, 2012), teaching methods and techniques (e.g. He, 2008; Liu, 2013; Yang et al., 2015). Sociocultural factors are also significant as learner agency in the classroom is attributed to the effects of learning goals and agentive actions, both of which are influenced by the sociocultural mediation of cultural artifacts, others, and self (Qin et al., 2022). Moreover, objective factors such as gender, economic

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conditions, and lengths of time in university also have some impacts on learner agency (Zhou et al., 2012). The majority of the studies about agency of Chinese learners of English have exhibited the tendency of viewing agency as being static at least for a certain period of time. Chinese researchers are inclined to conducting experiments or administering questionnaires in order to find out the enactment of or the factors for English learning agency of Chinese learners. In their research, agency is often regarded as a stable and constant “state” of the learner. Studies emphasizing the changes and fluctuations of agency in Chinese learners of English are sparse.

2.2.3 Agency of Chinese English-Majors As a group of students who take English language, literature and culture as their principal field of study, English-majors in college are supposed to have the highest level of agency on English learning among all Chinese learners. However, agency cannot be taken for granted for this group of learners, for it is constantly negotiated during the process of learning and affected by various contextual factors as indicated in Sect. 2.1.3. Up to now, Chinese English-majors have remained largely understudied in agency research, although quite a few studies have been found on its close-related concepts, such as autonomous learning, self-regulated learning, self-identity, etc. Most of the related research is quantitative using the tools of questionnaires or self-rating scales. According to a survey, English-majors’ awareness of autonomous learning is still relatively low due to their traditional dependence on teachers (Chen & Zhang, 2003). Factors facilitating or hindering the autonomous learning of Englishmajors include self-efficacy, self-motivation, learning strategies, attitude towards autonomous learning, confidence in taking charge of their own learning, shared intention of teaching objectives and requirements and academic achievement (Guo, 2007; Wu & Zhang, 2009). Experiments with English-majors have shown that multi-media teaching in the network environment can better promote learner agency and improve their practical language abilities (e.g. Chen et al., 2015; Tong, 2014). There are a few qualitative studies on the long-term development of learner autonomy or learner identity. It has been reported that English-majors often describe their first-year English learning as passive, examination-oriented and autonomylacking. With participations in a series of activities which help constructing their identity during subsequent years in college, their agency has been developed and their autonomy has been strengthened (Huang et al., 2018). Learners’ affective state and regulation, learners’ behavioral change and learners’ constraints, external push and support are the four focal factors which interact with each other and facilitate or impede the development of autonomy across time (Tung & Huang, 2022). It is suggested that the process of English learning is the process of ever-going interaction of learner agency with the macro- and micro-context, in which self-identities of the English-majors are constructed (Gao et al., 2003).

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To sum up, the agency issues of Chinese English-majors have not been directly and fully addressed. Although related concepts have been studied, the research methods tend to lean on questionnaires and statistics, with a few ethnographic researches. Within the few qualitative researches, the narrative data from in-depth interviews mainly undergo content analysis featured by theming and coding. In fact, a careful and fine linguistic analysis to the text can also shed light on the notion of agency, especially on the process of how agency is discursively constructed and navigated. In the following section, we can see that a wealth of agency studies in fields out of language education have been done in this manner.

2.3 Investigating Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives 2.3.1 Agency in Discourse Sociolinguists have expanded on notions of agency in the social sciences by considering the linguistic construction of agency. Al Zidjaly (2009) suggests that agency is also linguistic in that “agency is best conceived as a collective process for negotiating roles, tasks, and alignments that takes place through linguistic or nonlinguistic meditational means” (p. 178). In fact, for decades linguistic anthropologists and sociolinguists have been writing language not only as a set of formal structures, but also as a form of social action, a cultural resource, and a set of socio-cultural practices (Schieffelin, 1990, p. 16). They examine specific speech events in order to illuminate how people think about their own and others’ actions. By analyzing grammatical markers, pronoun use, turn taking, narrative structures, dispute resolution, overlapping utterances, and other linguistic features, linguistic anthropologists have looked to language for concrete examples of effective and ineffective social actions. Ahearn (2001) explicitly suggests that it is important for scholars interested in agency to look closely at language and linguistic form. It is helpful to look closely at language (both its grammatical structures and its patterns of use) in order to gain a better understanding of how people perform their identity and construct their agency. There have been considerable agency studies on written discourse such as history textbooks, newspaper stories and novels. For example, Oteiza and Pinto (2008) find that history textbooks highlight some social actors while silencing others by using certain transitivity pattern to avoid assigning responsibility in the discourse. This is one of the main linguistic resources to objectivize and existentialize certain conflictive events so as to construct agency and provide explanations in textbooks. Franzosi et al. (2012) have developed Quantitative Narrative Analysis (QNA), a computer-assisted tool, to measure agency based on narrative grammars in newspaper stories. Their study has proved QNA to be able to produce results that reveal meaningful patterns about Actors and Processes. Hardstaff (2014) shows the gradual development of the material agency and verbal agency of Cassie, the protagonist in a novel, by

2.3 Investigating Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives

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comparing the number and percentages of different Process types among Cassie and other characters in different chapters. The studies reviewed above have two important implications for the current research. First, transitivity analysis with emphasis on the presentation of Participants and Processes is a very effective means for analyzing agency construction in discourse. Second, the number and percentages of different Process types can help to present a general pattern about transitivity features of a particular discourse.

2.3.2 Agency in Oral Discourse It has been generally assumed that writing systems affect, to some extent, the ways people make sense of themselves and others. In writing, people are more “capable of making lists, charting changes, categorizing everyday experiences, developing a new form of memory, and ensuring the transmission of memories between generations” (Ong, 1982). Moreover, people make linguistics choices under more conscious control. In contrast, oral talks occur in a more spontaneous and unconscious way. Assuming that agency is achieved in interactions, a number of scholars have tried to observe agency in real-time conversations with different linguistic foci. With a focus on turn-takings and stance-shifts, Strauss and Xiang (2006) investigate how ESL students construct and develop agency through dialogues with their instructor in the writing conferences, from earlier being uncertain, confused, and negatively selfevaluated to later being confident, assertive and expressing more authorial ideas. With a focus on linguistic devices used to position themselves as agents, Miller (2010) explores how the immigrated business owners construct agency by making rational and responsible choices in their story worlds during their interaction with the interviewer. With a focus on pronominal forms as positioning devices, Comparini (2013) argues that the justifications with pronominal forms contribute to constructing agency and social relations with each another in sponateous mother-child talk. The studies of agency in conversations have two implications for the current study. First, agency is dynamically constructed and constantly negotiated by the speakers. Second, the linguistic devices that speakers use to position themselves and others contribute to constructing agency and social relations with each another.

2.3.3 Agency in Oral Autobiographic Narratives It has been argued that in daily conversations a spatial–temporal dimension is usually lacking for constructing a continuous sense of self and identity. It is hard for speakers to create and display a sense of who they are in turn-by-turn dialogues. Oral narrative, as a discursive form of acting in the world, plays a central role in identity construction and has become a privileged form of discourse for identity and agency analysis (Bamberg et al., 2011; Schiffrin, 1996). It performs social functions in people’s lives.

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Every day people tell stories to create and perpetuate a sense of self. This is a sense of a continuous self–fusing one’s past, future and present identities. Constructivists view narratives as the narrators’ interpretations of the social world. They are not only tools for reflecting on people’s lives, but constructive means for the creation of characters in space and time (Bamberg & Georgakopoulou, 2008). As a crucial component of identity, agency has also been investigated through interview-elicited narratives. Women agency is one of the fields that linguistic anthropologists and social linguistics are most concerned with. There are studies on battered women (e.g. Hydén, 2005; Semaan et al., 2013), single women (e.g. Reynolds et al., 2007), lesbians (e.g. Lieblich et al., 2008), university female students (e.g. Jacques & Radtke, 2012), female politician (e.g. Davids, 2011), etc. A common approach in all these researches is what is termed “narrative inquiry”, which is featured by one-to-one open-ended in-depth interviews, audio-recorded and later transcribed and searched for meaningful patterns in discourse. Researchers orient their analysis mostly on the content of the interviews, and explore women’s construction of agency in the context of competing and changing social discourses. Different analytic tools in critical discursive psychology are applied, such as interpretative repertoires, ideological dilemmas, subject positions, etc. Various theories are drawn upon to interpret the interview data, including Foucault’s notion of power relations, Butler’s accounts on the paradox of subjection and post-feminism. On the contrary, agency studies on men are rare. McKendy (2006) bases his research on life-story interviews with male prisoners who have committed violent crimes. By closely examining the informants’ wording and phrasing in their narratives, the researcher finds what he calls “narrative debris”, such as pauses, inconsistencies, self-interruptions, repetition, etc. The study suggests that imprisonment not only means physical confinement, but also entails ideological and discursive confinement. Applied linguists and language educators who are interested in learner agency or teacher agency have also employed narrative data in their studies. Barkhuizen (2013) suggests that language learning stories can reveal the process of second language acquisition, as well as the ever-changing socio-cultural features embedded in the process. In investigating on a college student’s English learning trajectory with the narrative approach, Qin (2015) has found that the relationship between agency and identity is non-linear while both play important roles in foreign language learning. Through investigating stories of school teaching, Huang and Yip (2021) have revealed that four properties of human agency (intentionality, forethought, self-reactiveness, and self-reflectiveness) influence teachers’ proactive, reactive, and passive agency. In prior literature, the most commonly used method of data analysis in oral autobiographic narrative research is content or thematic analysis, in which narrative data is analyzed by coding and categorizing data extracts and reorganizing them under thematic headings. The analysis of agency focus on the content, or the “themes” that merged in the talk, and the social and cultural discourses by which agency of the speaking subject is built on. Barker and Galasinski (2001) are among the few to have brought oral narrative data into a close micro-linguistic analysis for agency research. They interviewed local

2.4 Summary

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residents all aged over 70 in a border village in Poland, and collected their accounts about the events of the WWII. After conducting transitivity analysis and ergative analysis from SFL to the narrative data, researchers suggest that the conflict between Polish and Ukrainian inhabitants in Bircza was constructed as being the Ukrainians’ doing. Poles were reduced to passive participants being engaged in events. From the review above, we can see that oral autobiographic oral narration is an important means for agency construction, and SFL provides a powerful microdiscourse analytic approach to examine agency out of the narratives. Unfortunately, SFL has rarely been applied to such type of discourse in agency research so far. Barker and Galasinski (2001) have made an initial attempt in this regard, but they just conduct analysis to selected individual utterances. Only when a large quantity of utterances of the discourse is analyzed can a general pattern of agency features and agency fluctuations throughout the discourse be revealed.

2.4 Summary This chapter of literature review has been dedicated to justify my research orientations: first, why investigating the dynamics of agency construction and navigation; secondly, why targeting at the Chinese English-majors; thirdly, why employing oral autobiographic narratives as the research data; and finally, why adopting the perspective of SFL. All my research orientations are based on the following research gaps I have identified when reviewing the existing literature. In the first place, the much-debated term agency is still fuzzy and blurry despite multifarious theorizations of the notion in different disciplines. Further conceptualizations are necessary, and explicit operational definitions of the term for systematic analyses in specific contexts are strongly desired. Secondly, agency studies of second language learners are mostly from a pedagogical perspective, rarely from a linguistic perspective. Agency is studied from learners’ actions rather than their talks. The research methods usually come from ethnography, including observation, field work, questionnaires and interviews. Thirdly, most agency studies of Chinese learners of English take a static view to explore the status quo, factors, manifestation, or role of agency. Very few take a dynamic view to examine the changes and fluctuations of agency of individual learners. Their research methods are mainly quantitative investigation with the help of statistics, rather than qualitative inquiry into lived experiences based on narrative data. Fourthly, the agency issues with Chinese English-majors have not been paid due attention. Although there are studies on its close-related concepts, there is an overall lack of agency studies with this particular group of EFL learners. Fifthly, SFL has already been frequently and successfully applied in analyzing agency in written discourse or prepared speech, but much less in spontaneous oral discourse. Most of agency studies from the SFL perspective only conduct analysis

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to selected individual sentences or utterances. There is lack of studies on general patterns of agency features or agency fluctuations throughout a discourse. The summary above has provided good reasons to investigate agency construction and navigation in Chinese English-majors through their oral autobiographic narratives and from the perspective of SFL.

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Lantolf, J. P., & Thorne, S. L. (2006). Sociocultural theory and the genesis of second language development. Oxford University Press. Larsen-freeman, D. (2019). On language learner agency: A complex dynamic systems theory perspective. The Modern Language Journal, 103, 61–79. Li, C., & Yang, l. (2022). A case study of learner agency in an academic English reading and writing course from the lens of sociocultural theory. Modern Foreign Languages, 45(3), 394–405. Lieblich, A., Zilber, T., & Tuval-Mashiach, R. (2008). Narrating human actions: The subjective experience of agency, structure, communion, and serendipity. Qualitative Inquiry, 14, 613–631. Lipponen, L., & Kumpulainen, K. (2011). Acting as accountable authors: Creating interactional spaces for agency work in teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education, 27, 812–819. Lin, L. (2015). A survey on the status quo of English learning agency for the freshmen in vocational schools. Journal of Heilongjiang College of Education, 34(3), 172–173. Liu, Y. (2013). How to promote students’ agency in English learning. Read and Write Periodical, 10(7), 111. Lowe, E. (2008). Personal agency: The metaphysics of mind and action. Oxford University Press. McKendy, J. (2006). “I’m very careful about that”: Narrative and agency of men in prison. Discourse Society, 17, 473–502. Mercer, S. (2011). Understanding learner agency as a complex dynamic system. System, 39, 427– 436. Miller, E. R. (2010). Agency in the making: Adult immigrants’ accounts of language learning and work. TESOL Quarterly, 44, 465–487. Moranski, K., & Kim, F. (2016). ‘Flipping’ lessons in a multi-section Spanish course: Implications for assigning explicit grammar instruction outside of the classroom. The Modern Language Journal, 4, 830–852. Norton, B., & Toohey, K. (2001). Changing perspectives on good language learners. TESOL Quarterly, 35(2), 307–322. O’Connor, T. (2000). Persons and causes: The metaphysics of free will. Oxford University Press. Ong, W. (1982). Orality and literacy: The technologizing of the word. Methuen. Oteiza, T., & Pinto, D. (2008). Agency, responsibility and silence in the construction of contemporary history in Chile and Spain. Discourse Society, 19, 333–358. Pickering, A. (1995). The mangle of practice: Time, agency, and science. University Chicago Press. Qin, L. (2015). Relationships between English learner agency and identity in socio-cultural perspective. Foreign Language Education, 36, 60–64. Qin, L., Zhao, Y., Ouyang, X., & Yao, L. (2022). Development of English learners’ agency in the cloud-based flipped classroom: A sociocultural theory perspective. Modern Foreign Languages, 45(3), 381–393. Reynolds, J., Wetherell, M., & Taylor, S. (2007). Choice and chance: Negotiating agency in narratives of singleness. The Sociological Review, 55, 331–351. Sarab, M., & Sani, B. (2022). Enhancing elementary EFL learners’ willingness to communicate through communication strategy training. English Teaching & Learning. https://doi.org/10.1007/ s42321-022-00133-6 Schieffelin, B. (1990). The give and take of everyday life: Language socialization of Kaluli children. Cambridge University Press. Schiffrin, D. (1996). Narrative as self-portrait: The sociolinguistic construction of identity. Language in Society, 25, 167–203. Schlosser, M. (2015). Agency, The stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. In Edward N. Zalta (Ed.). https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2015/entries/agency/ Sealey, A., & Carter, B. (2004). Applied linguistics as social science. Continuun. Semaan, I., Jasinski, J., & Bubriski-McKenzie, A. (2013). Subjection, subjectivity, and agency: The power, meaning, and practice of mothering among women experiencing intimate partner abuse. Violence Against Women, 19, 69–88. Sewell, W. (1992). A theory of structure: Duality, agency, and transformation. American Journal of Sociology, 98, 1–29.

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Chapter 3

Understanding Agency: A Theoretical Framing

By reviewing the existing literature and identifying the research gaps in the previous chapter, I have argued that it is significant to examine the agency of Chinese Englishmajors through their oral autobiographic narratives of English learning stories. For this purpose, a theoretical framework needs to be set up to provide a new understanding to the notion of agency under the current study. This chapter first introduces some fundamental theories which jointly lay the foundation for the research. By integrating the theories I establish a theoretical framework and further propose a working definition for the key concept “agency”.

3.1 Theoretical Foundation The theoretical framework for the current research is established by integrating three theories from different fields: (1) the theory of identity dilemma (Bamberg et al., 2011) from cultural-psychology, (2) the identity theory of language learning (Norton, 1995, 2000, 2010) from second language acquisition (SLA) and (3) Hallidayan Systemic Functional Linguistics from linguistics. I first give a brief overview to the important concepts and ideas of these theories that are related to this research. Then I highlight the commonalities of the theories, which bring them together to underlie the current study.

3.1.1 Agency as an Identity Dilemma Bamberg et al. (2011) propose that the process of identity construction is best conceptualized as the navigation or management of a space between different dilemmatic positions: (i) agency and control; (ii) sameness vs. difference between me and others;

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Sense of control

Fig. 3.1 Agency as a dynamic sense of control (Bamberg et al., 2011)

I

WORLD High

S2 S1

S3

Low

S = situation

(iii) constancy and change. In this view, agency is taken as one of the three dimensions of personal identity. It is an identity dilemma, within which individuals define a sense of self that balances in between two endpoints of a continuum (see Fig. 3.1). Some people may lean towards a world-to-person direction of fit. These people view themselves as recipients or undergoers who are constrained by social structures of the world. Others may lean toward a person-to-world direction of fit. They regard themselves as constructors or controllers who re-structure and re-shape the world. Agency is thus interpreted as a sense of “self” and concerned with “control”. It often appears as a subjective force, which turns people into actors when it is strong, and turns people into patients caught in a structure when it is weak. This sense of control, therefore, is dynamic varying from situation to situation across time and space. Bamberg et al. (2011) also point out that agency has been studied as constructed in discursive activities and negotiated among speakers in social contexts. When choosing discursive devices from existing repertoires, speakers face what has been termed “agency dilemma”. Choosing discursive devices that lean towards the worldto-person direction of fit constructs a low-agency role, a position as less influential, powerful, responsible, or sometimes, as less blameworthy. On the contrary, picking discursive devices that lean towards the person-to-world direction of fit constructs a high-agency role, which is strong, manipulative, and self-determined. In either case, depicting events in which a “self” is involved and placing this “self” in relation to others requires a choice of positioning. The analysis of these discursive choices shows how the agency dilemma is being navigated and a sense of self as actor or as undergoer comes to the surface. To recap, this theory of identity dilemma takes agency as one dimension of identity, which is a continuum in which people constantly define a sense of self between “world” and “I”. This self-definition is dynamic, varying from situation to situation. When people depict events, they position themselves as different agentive beings through choice of discursive devices. This dynamic and discursive view about agency has become the core of the theoretical foundation for the current study. From a cultural-psychological perspective, this theory explicates “what is agency” for the current study.

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3.1.2 Identity, Investment, Imagined Community Norton’s identity theory of language learning (1995, 2000, 2010) also contributes an important part to the theoretical foundation of the current study. Norton argues that learners’ identities are central to second language learning. They are socially constructed in inequitable relations of power, changing over time and space, and possibly coexisting in contradictory ways in a single individual. In this theory, three important and interrelated terms, namely identity, investment and imagined community, are particularly useful for my discussion of the relationship between learner identity and language learning.

3.1.2.1

Identity

Norton (1995, 2000) uses the term “identity” to denote how a person understands his or her relationship to the social world, how that relationship is socially constructed across time and space, and how the person understands possibilities for the future. She argues for “the conception of the language learner as having a complex social identity that must be understood with reference to larger, and frequently inequitable social structures which are reproduced in day-to-day social interactions” (Norton, 1995: 13). Identity is produced in a variety of social sites, which are structured by relations of power in which the person takes up different subject positions. Some of the subject positions may be in conflict with others, and the person might accept or resist the identities that they are positioned. Norton points out three characteristics of identity which are particularly relevant to SLA: the multiple, non-unitary nature of identity; identity as a site of struggle; and identity as changing over time.

3.1.2.2

Investment

Norton (1995) introduces the economic term “investment” to indicate the socially and historically constructed relationship of learners to the target language and their sometimes ambivalent desire to learn and practice it. She argues that if learners invest in a second language, they expect to have a good return on that investment. They expect to acquire a wider range of symbolic resources (e.g. language, education and friendship) and material resources (e.g. capital goods, money, real estate, money), which will in turn enhance their conception of themselves and their desires for the future. Norton further contends that learner’ investment changes over time, being influenced by various factors such as power relations between the language learners and native speakers.

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Imagined Communities

The term “imagined communities” was first coined by Anderson (1991). It refers to groups of people, not immediately tangible and accessible, with whom we connect through the power of the imagination. Norton (2010) argues that these imagined communities are no less real than the ones in which learners have daily engagement, and might even have a stronger impact on their investment in the target language and their learning trajectories. A learner’s imagined community invites an imagined identity, and a learner’s investment in the target language must be understood within this context of future affiliations and identifications, rather than prevailing sets of relationships. The three concepts mentioned above—identity, investment and imagined community—are closely interacted. During the process of language learning, learners keep negotiating a relationship with the social world, and constantly define and refine themselves across time and space. They also affiliate themselves to certain imagined communities and identify themselves as future members of those communities. Consequently they have multiple, struggling and changing identities. These identities, being actual and just imagined, pose favorable or adverse impacts upon learners’ investment in the target language, thus shaping their learning trajectories. An investment in the target language is in fact an investment in the learner’s own identity. From the field of SLA Norton’s identity theory helps to explain “how agency works” in the current study.

3.1.3 Linguistic Realization of Agency Systemic functional linguists have a common interest in how people use language in accomplishing everyday social life. This interest leads to four main theoretical claims about language: that language use is functional; that its function is to make meanings; that these meanings are influenced by the social and cultural context in which they are exchanged; that the process of using language is a semiotic process, a process of making meaning by choosing. These four claims can be summarized as that language use is functional, semantic, contextual and semiotic (Eggins, 2005). According to Halliday (1979), language has three meta-functions. The first is to construe experience in terms of what is going on around us and inside us. The second is to interact with the social world by negotiating social roles and attitudes. The third is to create messages with which we can package our meanings in terms of what is New or Given, and in terms of what the starting point for our message is, commonly referred to as the Theme. These three functions of language are referred to as “ideational”, “interpersonal” and “textual” meta-functions respectively (see Fig. 3.2). Through its ideational meta-function, language provides an interpretation of human experience. People use language to talk about what they experience in the world, including things, people, events in the external world and feelings, attitudes,

3.1 Theoretical Foundation

29

Fig. 3.2 Meta-functions of text in SFL (Halliday, 1979)

experiential ideational meta-functions

logical

interpersonal textual

and thoughts in their internal world. This meta-function of text includes experiential function and logical function. The experiential function of text is realized by what is termed “transitivity”, which is a means of conveying ideas about who acts, speaks, sees, reflects, etc. Identity or agency construction in discourse is concerned with how the speakers construe themselves, their experience and their environment. This is an experiential matter that can be analyzed with transitivity patterns of clause. An analysis of transitivity patterns allows for a close examination of the linguistic features that help to communicate subjectivity and agency. The logical function of text is realized by logico-semantic (LS) relations, a system concerned with the nature of links between clauses combined into clause complexes. LS relations are indicative of transitions between clauses in the unfolding of a text. As a narrative text unfolds, we can expect to see changes in the selections of terms in the system of LS relations (Matthiessen, 2002a, 2002b). Agency navigation within a discourse is a logical and semantic matter, which should be analyzed with LS relations. In a nutshell, the function of language is to make meanings and meanings are made in clause. The ideational function of language includes experiential function realized by transitivity patterns and logical function realized by LS relations. These crucial ideas about language have contributed significantly to the current study in methodology. As a linguistic theory for text analyses, SFL provides a specific discursive lens to examine “what makes agency” in this study.

3.1.4 Common Grounds As highlighted above, the three theories have provided answers to three essential questions from their own perspectives: what is agency, how agency works, and what makes agency. Although coming from different fields and with different emphases, these theories share important common grounds and thus can be interlocked with each other. The first commonality is about discursive construction of agency. The theory of identity dilemma advocates that identity construction is achieved by discursive choices in varying situations. SFL holds that language is a system of choice, and meaning is made by linguistic choices in a complex network of systems. As agency

30

3 Understanding Agency: A Theoretical Framing

is a dimension of identity and a kind of meaning, it can be inferred from both theories that agency can be studied as a construct resulting from linguistic choices. The second commonality is about the multiple and dynamic nature of agency and identity. According to the theory of identity dilemma, individuals keep navigating their positioning between the “high” endpoint and “low” endpoint of the agency continuum, and present different levels of agency in different situations. The identity theory of language learning also advocates that language learners’ identity is nonunitary and always changing. A language learner holds various identities, which may affect and be affected by their process of language learning. The third commonality is about the mediating role of social context. The theory of identity dilemma states that identity is negotiated among speakers in social context; the identity theory of language learning holds that identity is socially constructed; SFL argues that meanings are influenced by the social and cultural context in which they are exchanged. It is a consensus in all theories that the process of identity construction is mediated by contextual factors.

3.2 Theoretical Framework By integrating the crucial ideas and concepts from the three theories based on their common grounds, a theoretical framework is built for the current research. The framework consists of three levels: agency construction at clausal level (see Fig. 3.3), agency navigation at discoursal level (see Fig. 3.4), and structural mediation at contextual level (see both Figs. 3.3 and 3.4). The clausal level is embedded in the discoursal level, while the clausal level and discoursal level are both rooted in the contextual level. Figure 3.3 illustrates the process of discursive construction of agency. When a learner is about to utter a clause during the narration of language learning experience in a particular social context, he positions himself in a certain identity (identity positioning) by navigating in three identity dilemmas under the influence of a set of structural factors. As one of the dilemmas is agency dilemma, this stage also involves agency positioning, i.e., the learner places himself at a certain level of agency. Identity positioning leads to discursive choice, which means that the learner

identity positioning

discursive choice

identity construction

agency positioning

transitivity pattern

agency construction

Fig. 3.3 Process of agency construction

3.2 Theoretical Framework

31

LS relation clause 2 LS relation clause n

identity re-positioning

clause 1

intra-discoursal agency navigation

discourse 1

discourse 2

discourse n

clause 1

clause 1

clause 2

clause 2

clause n

clause n

cross-discoursal agency navigation identity transformation Fig. 3.4 Process of agency navigation

picks discursive devices to give the accounts. Among various discursive choices, there is the choice of transitivity pattern, through which agency is realized. With the utterance of the clause, a certain identity of the learner is constructed (identity construction), and thereby, a certain level of agency is also constructed (agency construction) as a consequence of a particular transitivity pattern of the clause. When the learner utters the next clause, he may re-position himself in another identity (embodying another level of agency) under the influence of another set of structural factors. This new identity (containing agency) positioning leads to varied choices of discursive devices (including transitivity pattern), and then to identity (including agency) re-construction again. Figure 3.4 demonstrates the processes of both intra-discoursal and crossdiscoursal agency navigation. Within a narrative discourse, each clause usually follows the previous one by a certain type of logico-semantic (LS) relation. It is through these LS relations between adjacent clauses that the learner re-positions himself in different identities and navigates among different levels of agency. Although identities change and agency fluctuates within a discourse, the discourse still presents a certain tendency of agency in general on account of the agency level that the majority of the clauses construct. When the learner gives accounts to another language learning story under a varied situation, the learner may perform a different set of identities so that the discourse may present another tendency of agency. In this

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3 Understanding Agency: A Theoretical Framing

way the learner goes through identity transformation over time, which concomitantly entails agency navigation across discourses.

3.3 Re-Conceptualizing Agency Drawing on the theoretical framework for agency construction and navigation as introduced in the above section, a working definition for agency can be provided to guide the current research at two levels: conceptual and operational. At the conceptual level, agency is defined in this research as a dynamic sense of control over the world. It is an identity dilemma, in which the individual constantly constructs and negotiates a relationship with the world. It is discursively constructed and navigated, and mediated by contextual structures. At the operational level, clause is the basic unit for agency analysis. Agency is operationalized as the transitivity of a clause within narratives, i.e., the configuration of a clause, including who is positioned as doing which kind of things, in relation to what, or whom. Different transitivity patterns will realize different levels of agency. Through transitivity analyses, we can explore how the individuals present themselves as “doing things” or “being engaged” in events in their narratives.

3.4 Summary This chapter has laid down a theoretical framework and a working definition of agency for the current study. Based on the common grounds of the theory of identity dilemma (Bamberg et al., 2011), the identity theory of language learning (Norton, 1995, 2000, 2010) and Hallidayan SFL, an integrated framework has been proposed for investigating agency construction and navigation at three levels: clausal, discoursal and contextual. The framework specifies that agency is constructed within individual clauses and navigated within a discourse as well as across discourses in varied situations. Agency construction and navigation is the result of language learners’ identity positioning and reposition under the influence of structural factors in the context. This theoretical framework has built connections from discourse to agency, then to identity, and finally to language learning, so as to seek explanations and inspirations for agency issues in English learning and teaching in China.

References

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References Anderson, B. (1991). Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. Verso. Bamberg, M., De Fina, A., & Schiffrin, D. (2011). Discourse and identity construction. In S. Schwartz, K. Luyckx & V. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research. Springer Verlag. Eggins, S. (2005). An introduction to systemic functional linguistics (2nd ed.). Continum. Halliday, M. (1979). Modes of meaning and modes of expression: Types of grammatical structure and their determination by different semantic functions. In A. D. J. Edward Carney & D. Addcroft (Eds.), Function and context in linguistics analysis. Cambridge University Press. Matthiessen, C. (2002a). Combining clauses into clause complexes: A multi-faceted view. In J. Bybee & M. Noonan (Eds.), Complex sentences in grammar and discourse: Essays in honor of Sandra A. Thompson. Benjamins. Matthiessen, C. (2002b). Lexicogrammar in discourse development: Logogenetic patterns of wording. In G. Huang & Z. Wang (Eds.), Discourse and language functions. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. Nguyen, H. (2012). Transitivity analysis of “Heroic Mother” by Hoa Pham. International Journal of English Linguistics, 2, 85–100. Norton, B. (1995). Social identity, investment, and language learning. TESOL Quarterly, 29(1), 9–31. Norton, B. (2000). Identity and language learning: Gender, ethnicity and educational change. Pearson Education. Norton, B. (2010). Language and identity. In N. Hornberger & S. Mckay (Eds). Social Linguistics and Language Education. (pp. 349–369). Multilingual Matters. Norton, B. (2015). Identity, investment, and faces of English internationally. Chinese Journal of Applied Linguistics (Quarterly), 38(4), 375–391.

Chapter 4

Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing

Now that the theoretical framework and the working definition for agency have been worked out, an analytical framing is in need to observe the agency in question. In this chapter, I specify the research questions according to the research objectives. Then I map out an analytical framework corresponding to the research questions based on the established theoretical framework, and then expound how I am going to answer these questions with a careful research design.

4.1 Research Questions As indicated in Sect. 1.2, the current study has two objectives. One is to obtain an adequate discursive description of agency construction and navigation in Chinese English-majors’ narration of their learning stories. The other is to achieve an in-depth understanding to the agency issues of this particular group of English learners. Now the research objectives can be developed into the following four specific research questions at different levels, with the posterior question at a higher level above the anterior. Q1. How do the narrators construct a high/low/neutral level of agency in individual clause in the telling of their learning stories? Q2. How do the narrators turn up/down or maintain their agency level within one narrative discourse? Q3. How do the narrators navigate their agency dilemma across narrative discourses in different situations? Q4. What contextual factors influence agency construction and navigation in the narrators’ learning stories?

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_4

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Q1 addresses the issue of agency construction. As agency construction is realized in individual clauses, this question is presented at clausal level. The agency under investigation is divided into three levels—high, low and neutral. Although agency is a continuum that does not have finite grades according to the theory of identity dilemma (Bamberg et al., 2011), there are two reasons for the three-level division here. On one hand, the broad distinction between “high” and “low” levels is essential and fundamental. The “high” level covers any grade that is nearer to the “high” endpoint than to the “low” end point along the continuum, while the “low” level is the opposite. The “neutral” level is set for those clauses around the mid-point of the continuum that present neither high nor low level of agency obviously. On the other hand, the general distinction of three levels is more distinct and convenient than more subtle divisions. Three levels of agency are relatively easy to distinguish and categorize, and they are also sufficient for analyses given the research objectives. Q2 and Q3 address the issue of agency navigation, which takes place at discoursal level. In more specific terms, Q2 is at intra-discoursal level, dealing with navigation between clauses within a single discourse. It tries to find out how agency level alters or maintains throughout the discourse by inquiring into the relations between adjacent clauses. Q3 is at cross-discoursal level, dealing with navigation across discourses by an individual learner in varied situations. It attempts to find out how learner agency navigates its way across different narrative discourses by probing into learners’ learning trajectories and their identity transformation over time. Q4 addresses the issue of structural mediation at contextual level. As agency construction and navigation result from identity positioning and repositioning under the influence of structural factors, this question explores the factors which would exert impacts on learners’ language learning through shaping their identities and thus affecting their agency.

4.2 Analytical Framework To address the research questions, an analytical framework (see Table 4.1) is worked out corresponding to the theoretical framework. Research question Q1 examines agency construction, which requires a close analysis of the transitivity pattern of individual clause. Thus the system network of transitivity from SFL (see Fig. 1 and Table 1 in Appendix B) will be employed. The two major elements of transitivity are Process and Participant. In analyzing agency structures through transitivity, the focus falls predominantly on the Participants and the roles they are attributed to in relation to a particular Process. There are two different modes of modeling transitivity: the transitive model and the ergative model. The two models complement one another, making up the general system of transitivity together. In the transitive model, SFL makes a distinction between six types of Processes, each associated with different Participant roles. Each type of Process is characterized by Process-Participant configurations. Ergative analysis offers a complement to the transitive analysis. In ergative model, every Process is seen as

4.2 Analytical Framework

37

Table 4.1 Analytical framework Research questions

Theoretical foundation

Analytical instruments

Q1 about agency construction at clausal level

Agency construction is realized by transitivity patterns of individual clauses

System network of transitivity

Q2 about agency navigation at intra-discoursal level

Agency navigation is System of LS relations realized by LS relations between adjacent clauses

Q3 about agency navigation at cross-discoursal level

Agency construction and navigation is the result of identity positioning and repositioning

Q4 about structural mediation at contextual level

Identity positioning is mediated by structural factors

Transitive model Ergative model Voice system

Qualitative analysis

structured in the same way, on the basis of just one variable. This variable relates to the source of the Process, or “causation”: what it is that brought it about. An “Actor” is engaged in a Process, but the question at issue is: is the Process brought about by the “Actor”, or by some other entity? To address this question, two Participant roles in the ergative model—Medium and Agent—are useful. “Medium” is the entity through which a Process is actualized. “Agent” is the Participant that causes things to happen as the external agency in the Process. An Actor in the transitive analysis may be, in ergative analysis, an Agent or a Medium. Apart from the system of Process and Participant, there is the Voice system within the system network of transitivity, which adds an extra layer to the examination of the discursive representation of “how things happened”. Research question Q2 explores agency navigation at intra-discoursal level, for which the system of LS relations is employed. Halliday and Matthiessen (2008) have mapped out the resources of clause complexing systematically (see Table 2 in Appendix B). Clauses are linked to one another by means of some kind of LS relations to form clause complexes. A clause complex is a combination of two or more clauses into a larger unit, with their interdependence normally shown by explicit signals such as conjunctions. By exploring these relations we can construe the flow of events in the development of text at the semantic level. Research question Q3 investigates agency navigation at cross-discoursal level with a focus on learner identities, while Q4 examines structural mediation at contextual level with a focus on structural factors. For both question one needs to go beyond the text into the context, and linguistic analyses of any kind will not suffice any more. Qualitative analysis will be conducted in order to reveal relevant themes hidden in the narrative data.

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4 Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing

4.3 Participants There are three groups of participants for the research, who were all English-majors from the English Faculty in GW. One group of the participants was freshmen when the current study started at the beginning of the academic year 2012–2013. I invited the first-year students in my Communicative English class as participants. Five of them (four females and one male) volunteered in my study. The participation was completely voluntary, and the participants were informed in advance that they needed to get ready to share their real-time stories of English learning in group regularly for four years until they graduated from the university. The second group of participants was seniors who were just about to graduate in June 2014. They were also my students when they were freshmen. As they were leaving the campus soon, I invited them for a group interview to recall their English learning experiences during the university years. Four students (three males and one female) joined the gathering voluntarily. The third group of participants was sophomores during the spring semester in 2020. Throughout that semester all courses in GW were carried out online under the impact of COVID-19 pandemic. I invited six students (four females and two males) who had WeChat (a popular app for social communication in China) connection with me for the research. I asked them to share their real-time stories of online English learning in group through WeChat each month during the semester, and they all readily consented. Table 4.2 shows the information of the participants of these three groups. The number of interviews varies among the first group of participants, as there were occasions that one or two of them were absent from the interviews for one reason or another during the four years. Leslie was absent for a whole semester in the third-year, because she studied in a university in Taiwan during that period on an exchange-student project.

4.4 Procedure and Methods The research procedure is illustrated by the following flowchart (Fig. 4.1). As indicated in the flowchart, the research has two sets of data to deal with: narrative data from life-story interviews, and reflective data from follow-up interviews. Both sets of data go through a process of five stages: data collection, selection, analyses, interpretation and organization.

4.4 Procedure and Methods

39

Table 4.2 Participants information Group 1

2

3

Name (pseudonym)

Gender

Year in university

Number of life-story interviews

Vivian

Female

Year 1–4

17

Erica

Female

Year 1–4

18

Leslie

Female

Year 1–4

14

Harper

Female

Year 1–4

20

Tony

Male

Year 1–4

20

Maxim

Male

Year 4

1

Hunter

Male

Year 4

1

Tang

Male

Year 4

1

Blair

Female

Year 4

1

Echo

Female

Year 2

4

Yvonne

Female

Year 2

4

Agnes

Female

Year 2

4

Ida

Female

Year 2

4

Brian

Male

Year 2

4

Ethan

Male

Year 2

4

4.4.1 Data Collection For research questions Q1 and Q2, I elicited English learning stories from group interviews with the participants. Data collection with the first group of participants began from September 2012 when they just entered GW till June 2016 when they were about to graduate. During this period of nearly four years, I met them in group basically once a month. The meetings were suspended during the summer and winter vocations, as the participants all left the campus for home. Besides, the meetings were also canceled from November 2015 to May 2016 due to my maternity leave. At the group interviews, I asked them to tell stories, sharing their desires, fears, joys and frustrations in English learning. All the meetings were held at comfortable and relaxed settings, such as the café or canteens on campus. I elicited stories by asking very general questions, like “how are you doing with your English learning this month? Is there anything or any person that affects your English learning? Are you happy with it? Tell me the story about it.” They were encouraged to give accounts as detailed as possible. When the participants told stories, I just listened and tried not to interrupt. If the stories were told in a simple and general way, I would ask them to give more details after they finished. Each group interview lasted for about 1.5 h. All the interviews were audio-recorded with the consent of the participants. Data collection with the second group of participants was conducted through a group interview in my office on June 27th, 2014 when the participants just attended their graduation ceremony. I first asked about their feelings upon graduation, such

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4 Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing

Data collection

life-story interviews

follow-up interviews

Data selection

significant stories

relevant issues

transcription

Data analyses

LS analysis

transitivity analysis

transitivity patterns

LS relations

transcription

coding & categorizing

identities

structural factors

interpretation for agency level

Data interpretation

verification by narrators

establishing relations

agency level

Data organization

findings for Q1

findings for Q2

findings for Q3

findings for Q4

Fig. 4.1 Research procedure

as “how do you reflect on your English learning trajectory? Have you enjoyed your time in GW, or do you have any regrets at this moment when your study in GW is drawing to a close?” Then I elicited specific stories by asking “recalling all these years in GW, are there any unforgettable English learning experiences? Who or what are most influential for you in English learning? Are there any moments when you

4.4 Procedure and Methods

41

were once very active or passive in English learning?” The interview lasted for two hours and was also audio-recorded with the consent of all the participants. Data collection with the third group of participants lasted for one semester in the first half of 2020. I interviewed the participants on a monthly basis through Group Call in WeChat, and elicited their learning stories by similar questions to those for the first group. Each group interview lasted for about one hour and there were four interviews that were conducted till the end of the semester. All the interviews were also audio-recorded. In order to answer research questions Q3 and Q4, I further conducted follow-up interviews with some participants individually and had the interviews audio-recorded as well. In discussions of agency, as Ahearn (2001) suggests, “it is important to ask how people themselves conceive of their own actions and whether they attribute responsibility for events to individuals, to fate, to deities, or to other animate or inanimate forces.” Therefore, in the follow-up interviews I asked very specific questions regarding the narrators’ wording in their narratives. For example, in the interview with Vivian (2014-06-12), for the two successive clauses “I should … I myself like participating in these activities”, I asked Vivian “why did you say you ‘should’ participate at first? From where does the obligation come? Why did you switch to the word ‘like’ immediately? Why do you enjoy these activities?” I also asked more general questions like “what do you think about your English learning recently?”, “Do you think you are more active or more passive than last time when we met?”, “What gives impetus to your learning?”, “What makes you lose enthusiasm in learning English?” etc.

4.4.2 Data Selection In dealing with the narrative data, I listened through the recordings or voice messages with the purpose of choosing the most significant stories for analysis. During data selection, the Critical Incident Technique (or CIT) was employed. Flanagan (1954) defines CIT as a set of procedures for collecting direct observations of human behavior in such a way as to facilitate their potential usefulness in solving practical problems and developing broad psychological principles. By an incident is meant any specifiable human activity that is sufficiently complete in itself to permit inferences and predictions to be made about the person performing the act. To be critical the incident must occur in a situation where the purpose or intent of the act seems fairly clear to the observer and where its consequences are sufficiently definite to leave little doubt concerning its effects. Fook and Cooper (2003) suggest that in the university setting, a critical incident might include: an aspect of project or group work that goes particularly well; an aspect of project or group work that proves difficult; a piece of work that one finds particularly demanding; a piece of work which increases one’s awareness, or challenges one’s understanding of social justice issues; or an incident involving conflict, hostility, aggression or criticism. They further point out that “critical incidents” need not be dramatic events, but they must have significance

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4 Observing Agency: An Analytical Framing

for the participants. They may be events which have made the participants stop and think, or which have raised questions for them. They may make participants question an aspect of their beliefs, values, attitude or behavior. They must in some way have had a significant impact on the personal and professional learning of the participants. According to this criterion, I have chosen sixty-five significant stories (excerpts) out of all the life-interviews. In dealing with the reflective data, I listened to the recordings for a general idea of the various issues involved. I retained the issues that are related to learner agency, identity, English learning and structural conditions, and removed those that are considered as irrelevant.

4.4.3 Data Analyses Once a significant story has been selected, it is transcribed and coded with the narrator’s name plus the date of interview. Then it goes through the stage of analyses, which consists of two parts: transitivity analysis for agency construction and LS analysis for agency navigation. In transitivity analysis, the excerpts of stories are firstly broken down into clauses and then analyzed clause by clause. In each clause, the Process type and Participant roles are identified so that the transitivity pattern for the clause can be specified. The general transitivity features of the whole excerpt can also be revealed by comparing the occurring frequency of different Process types. In LS analysis, the clauses of the excerpts that are closely related are grouped together into clause-complexes. Within each clause-complex, the LS relations of adjacent clauses are identified. On the other hand, the reflective data is also transcribed for data analyses. I coded and categorized the data in terms of their main messages, with focus on various categories of identities and structural factors.

4.4.4 Data Interpretation For the narrative data at this stage, each of the clauses is assigned with a certain level of agency, i.e., whether it is high, low or neutral. Firstly, I determined the agency level for each clause based on the results of transitivity analysis. My decisions were then provided to the narrators themselves for verification in follow-up interviews. In these follow-up interviews, I asked the narrators whether they would agree on my judgment about the agency level of each clause. If there were disagreements or doubts, I would ask for their own self-perception—at what agency level they would like to place themselves when uttering the clause. Meanwhile, I also asked what is in their mind when they uttered the clause, or what prompted them to utter such a clause. This kind of reflection has two purposes. One is to help the narrators to determine the agency level when they felt uncertain. The other is to extract every

4.5 Summary

43

possible factor that influences learner agency. All the final decisions on the agency level of the clauses are approved by the narrators. For reflective data at this stage, I managed to establish connections between categories of data, i.e., between learner agency and identities, identities and structural factors, identities and language learning, etc.

4.4.5 Data Organization For the narrative data, after the agency level for each clause has been settled, the clauses that construct the same level of agency are categorized according to their common transitivity features. Hence the transitivity patterns that are used to construct different levels of agency can be summarized respectively. Based on the agency level of each clause as well as the LS relations between adjacent clauses, the LS relations to realize agency turns or maintain agency levels can be also concluded. By this stage, research questions Q1 and Q2 can be answered. For reflective data, I organized the categories and relations that had been excavated through data interpretation. For Q3, the emphasis is on the categories of identities and how their switch relates to agency navigation. For Q4, the emphasis is on categories of structural factors and how they shape identities and mediate agency. Following both Sewell (1992)’s theory of agency and structure and Gao (2013)’s explication of interaction between language learners and structural conditions, I categorized structural factors into two aspects—schemas and resources, with each aspects at three layers—situation, setting and self . By this stage, research questions Q3 and Q4 can also be answered.

4.5 Summary This chapter has introduced the research design and method for the study. After specifying the research questions, a comprehensive analytical framework is sketched out based on the theoretical framework. Then a detailed research procedure is drawn up in search of the answer to each research question. Research question Q1 is about agency construction at clausal level and Q2 is about agency navigation at intra-discoursal level. These two questions are linguistic inquiries, and need to be answered through fine text analysis. Research question Q3 is about agency navigation at cross-discoursal level and Q4 is about structural mediation at contextual level. These are inquiries into the issues of learner identities and structural factors, so qualitative analysis is applied. The five-stage research procedure is carefully designed so as to ensure its typicality and credibility. Only the significant stories have been selected for research, and the researcher’s interpretations of the data are approved or verified by the narrators.

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References Ahearn, L. M. (2001). Language and agency. Annual Review of Anthropology, 30, 109–137. Bamberg, M., De Fina, A., & Schiffrin, D. (2011). Discourse and identity construction. In S. Schwartz, K. Luyckx & V. Vignoles (Eds.), Handbook of identity theory and research. Springer Verlag. Flanagan, J. C. (1954). The critical incident technique. Psychological Bulletin, 51(4), 327–358. Fook, J., & Cooper, L. (2003) Bachelor of social work fieldwork manual. Dept. Social Work, School of Primary Health Care, Monash University. Gao, X. (2013). Reflexive and reflective thinking: A crucial link between agency and autonomy. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 7(3), 226–237. Halliday, M., & Matthiessen, C. (2008). An introduction to functional grammar (3rd ed.). Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press. Sewell, W. (1992). A theory of structure: Duality, agency, and transformation. American Journal of Sociology, 98, 1–29.

Chapter 5

Agency Construction

This chapter is dedicated to answer the first research question about how the Englishmajors construct different levels of agency in individual clauses in the telling of their learning stories. It demonstrates how the stories are analyzed and how the clauses are interpreted with ample examples. Then, transitivity patterns are generalized for construction of a high, low or neutral level of agency respectively. Finally I discuss how agency construction by the English-majors in their narration is related to their identity making.

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency This section examines how a high level of agency is constructed in individual clauses. Several learning stories are selected from the life-story interviews with the participants for demonstration. These excerpts are considered to have a high tendency of agency as most of its clauses construct high levels of agency as found through transitivity analyses and upon the approval of narrators themselves. The processes of data analysis and interpretation are illustrated with one of the excerpts in full details. Then high-agency clauses are examined in order to find out what transitivity patterns contribute to a high level of agency.

5.1.1 Hunter’s Delight Hunter was from a remote village in Guangdong Province. He was rather shy and seldom spoke in class. He studied very hard but his grades always remained among the lowest in the class. For a long period of time he felt inferior and unconfident with his English learning. However, there was one thing he felt superior and proud of—his skill of playing table tennis. He was fond of playing table tennis, and as a © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_5

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5 Agency Construction

core member of the table tennis team of GW, he participated in a couple of matches and gained prizes. The following excerpt is from his narration about playing table tennis with some overseas students in his first year in university. It is presented in the original Chinese language. For the ease of non-Chinese readers, the excerpt has been translated into English. In order to keep the clause structure of the original text in the English translation to the utmost, the following rules have been adhered to during the translation. First, the number of the clauses is maintained. For example, “他们说的, 一般 都是很简单的英语” is translated into “what they spoke was usually very simple English”, rather than “They usually spoken very simple English”. The latter translation, although more natural and concise in English, has combined the original two Chinese clauses into one. Second, the order of the clauses is maintained. For instance, “他们有什么事情都喜欢找我” is translated into “(when) they had something (to be done), (they) liked to resort to me”, instead of the more idiomatic expression “(they) liked to resort to me (when) they had something (to be done)”. Third, the configuration of the clause is maintained. All the Participants and Process verbs remain basically in their original positions, although the circumstantial elements may be adjusted in the translation according to idiomatic usage in English. For example, “口音很重” is translated into “(their) accents were very strong” instead of the more common expression “they had very strong accents”. Above all, it is important to note that the English translation of the excerpts is only for reference. It is always the original Chinese clauses that are analyzed. Excerpt 1 (Hunter, 14-06-27). 我很喜欢打乒乓球嘛。当时我记得, 七教一楼有间乒乓球室, 是留学生专用的球桌, 后 来我就经常去那里打。因为我打得比一般外国人要好, 所以他们跟我关系比较好, 所 以我觉得, 我在那段时间, 是非常愿意, 是非常乐意去学英语, 并且也非常享受。虽然 很多那些黑人啊还有那些印度人啊, 讲的英语跟我们听力课上的英语很不一样, 口音 很重, 有时候还要叫他们说两次, 但是我发现, 跟他们讲英语的时候, 他们是很照顾 我们的。他们说的, 一般都是很简单的英语, 用词也是, 不会用很晦涩的词。所以那时 候我就发现, 可能我们学的词汇早就已经支撑我们去表达一些日常用语了。所以在那 段时间, 我跟他们讲的时侯, 我就觉得自己学的英语是真正可以用到的。然后有时候, 我还会教他们打一下乒乓球啊, 就会去查一下这个动作用英语怎么讲啊。所以那段时 间, 应该是我学英语最愉快的、最有成就感。就只有那段时间, 就是大二第一学期末吧 。后来就没有去了, 热情慢慢消退。但是那段时间, 还是认识很多那些外国人, 然后跟两 三个留学生还是挺好的吧。他们有什么事情都喜欢找我, 当然他们主要目的是想我教 他们汉语, 但是呢, 比如说他们要出去买点东西, 他们想去那个中国移动营业厅去办理 一点手续啊, 他们会叫上我, 叫我帮忙做中间人沟通一下。有时候跟他们去吃一下晚餐 啊, 我还去过他们宿舍去玩。所以我觉得真正的英语交流, 就没有想象中那么难, 而且 我觉得, 在外国人面前讲英语比在都是中国人面前要容易很多, 不会有任何压力, 因为 你讲得懂的话, 他们会觉得你很厉害。如果我跟他们说“我讲的不是很好啊”, 他们就会 说“唉, 你怎么那么说话呀, 你讲的比很多人都好啊, 很多学生我跟他们讲根本都讲不 了, 大家都沟通不了啊。”然后那时候我就觉得很有趣。对, 但就是这个时间比较短暂。 English Translation of Excerpt 1. I like playing table tennis. At that time I remember, on the first floor of Building No.7 there was a table tennis room. (It) was a table only for overseas students. Later I often went there to play (table tennis). I played better than ordinary foreigners, so their relation with me was quite good. So I feel that I, at that period of time, was very willing (to learn English).

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

47

(I) was very delighted to learn English and (I) enjoyed it very much. Although the English that many black people and the Indians spoke was very different from the English in our Listening class…. (Their) accents were very strong. Sometimes (I) needed to ask them to repeat. But I found, when (I) spoke English with them, they were very considerate for us. What they spoke was usually very simple English, so were their vocabulary. They would not use very obscure words. So at that time I found, perhaps the vocabulary we had learned had already supported us to express some daily usage. So in that period of time, when I talked with them, I felt the English I had learned could be really used. Then sometimes, I also taught them to play table tennis. (I) would check (the dictionary) how an action was described in English. So that period of time should be the most pleasant and most rewarding (when) I learn English. (And it) was only in that period. (That was) near the end of the first semester of the second year. Afterwards (I) didn’t go there. (My) enthusiasm slowly vanished. But in that period, (I) got to know many foreigners, and (I) was quite close with two or three overseas students. (When) they had something (to be done), (they) liked to resort to me. Of course their main purpose was expecting me to teach them Chinese. However, for example, (when) they needed to shop out, (or when) they wanted to go to China Mobile Service Hall to get something done, they would ask me along. (They) would ask me to help to communicate as interpreter. Sometimes (I) dined out with them and I also went to their dorm for fun. So I think real English communication is not as difficult as in imagination, and I think, to speak English in front of foreigners is much easier than in front of Chinese. (You) don’t have any pressure, because if you can be understood, they would think you are awesome. If I said to them “I don’t speak (English) well”, they would say “hey, how could you say that? You speak better than many people. Many students, I am unable to speak with them. We can’t communicate.” Then at that time I felt interesting. Yes, but this period of time is relatively short.

5.1.1.1

Transitivity Analysis Within Clause

We now apply the transitivity analysis to Excerpt 1 (see Table C1 in Appendix C). First, the text is broken down into clauses in the first column. As a clause is centered on a verbal group, a clause is recognized by identifying the verb and then marking the clause boundaries. All the clauses are listed in their order of occurrence. For any clause which is embedded in another clause, the order of the clauses is depended on the occurrence of the verbs. For each clause, the Process (carried by the verb) and the Participants are underlined in the English translation. The hidden Participants or even Process in Chinese are shown with parentheses “( )” in English translation. Second, the Process type (and its sub-type) and Participant roles in each clause are identified with the transitive model (see Fig. B1 and Table B1 in Appendix B), labeled in the second and third columns. The Process type precedes its sub-type by a colon “:”, and a Participant role is assigned to each specific Participant with a two-bar equals sign “=” in each row. Third, each Participant is re-analyzed with the ergative model (see Table B1 in Appendix B), labeled in ergative roles in the fourth column in the same row. Finally, each clause is examined all the way through the agency system (agency, voice, and agentivity) (see Fig. B2 in Appendix B) in the fifth column with the colon “:” showing the hierarchy of delicacy.

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material

transformative

mental

Type

desiderative emotive

cognitive

relational

Process

creative 25%

identifying

perceptive 27%

attributive

28%

behavioral verbal

18%

existentia N=67 clauses

2%

0

5

10

15

20

Fig. 5.1 Frequencies of different Process types in Excerpt 1

From the transitivity analysis above, we can examine the allocation of each Process type in this excerpt by occurring frequency (see Fig. 5.1). Relational, mental and material are the three principle types of Process in this excerpt. With almost equal shares, they occupy 80% of the text. The verbal clauses take up 18% while there is only one existential clause and no behavioral clause.

5.1.1.2

Interpretation for Agency Level

We now examine the agency level constructed within each individual clause. An agency level, High (H), Neutral (N) or Low (L), will be assigned to each clause after in-depth interpretation by the researcher and later credibility check with Hunter, the narrator himself. That is to say, the agency level assigned to each clause can be regarded as representing the agency level in Hunter when he made that particular part of utterance. The interpretation is organized according to Process types as followed. • Transformative material Process /5/ later I often went there to play (table tennis) /6/ because I played better than ordinary foreigners /25/ (the vocabulary we had learned) had already supported us to express some daily usage /29/ (the English I had learned) could be really used /30/ then sometimes, I also taught them to play table tennis /31 (I) would check (the dictionary) /37/ afterwards (I) didn’t go there /39/ but in that period, (I) got to know many foreigners /49/ sometimes (I) dined out with them /50/ and I also went to their dorm for fun

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

49

These clauses share similar transitivity patterns. Assuming the roles of the Actor and Agent at the same time, Hunter described how he actively made contact with overseas students (as in clauses /5/, /30/, /39/, /49/, /50/), and how he learned English voluntarily (as in /31/), so he built a highly agentive role for himself. Clause /25/ and /29/ are a bit different in constructing agency. Although the subjects of the clauses are both the English language, one is the Actor in the operative clause /25/ and the other is the Scope in the receptive clause /29/. As in both clauses the Agents are the narrator Hunter, it is Hunter who used English to express himself for daily communication. By recognizing his competence in using English, he also constructed a high level of agency. In clause /6/ Hunter identifies himself as a better table tennis player compared with average foreigners, showing his self-confidence in table tennis skill and thus positioning himself in a high agency role. Clause /37/ is the only clause with low agency among all the transformative material clauses. Hunter said he didn’t go to play table tennis with the overseas students afterwards. With the same linguistic device in constructing a high-level agency as in /5/ but adding a negation, he performed the opposite act, i.e., positioning himself in an inactive role. • Creative material Process /24/ perhaps the vocabulary we had learned /28/ the English I had learned /34/ (when) I learn English All the three creative material clauses have the first person as the Actor and Agent, “learn” as the Process, and “English” or “English vocabulary” as the Goal and Scope. The only difference is that the Actor of /24/ is the plural pronoun “we”, indicating that Hunter described a general situation of most English-majors, not just of himself. So the clause is neutral at agency level. However, /28/ and /34/ have the singular “I” as the Actor, so the clauses are considered as high at agency level. • Cognitive mental Process /2/ at that time I remember /8/ so I feel /27/ I felt /51/ so I think /53/ and I think All the cognitive mental clauses in this excerpt are of “Senser + Process” type. The Sensers are consistently the narrator “I”, so it is Hunter who is engaged in all these cognitive mental Processes. When he was telling the story, he kept reflecting on his relationship with English.

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As the Phenomena of these clauses are projected in a succeeding clause, these cognitive mental clauses don’t carry any agency by themselves. Therefore, they are neutral in terms of agency. • Desiderative mental Process /9/ I, in that period of time, was very willing (to learn English) /44/ expecting me to teach them Chinese /45/ however, for example, (when) they needed to shop out /46/ (or when) they wanted to go to China Mobile Service Hall to get something done In clause /9/ Hunter constructed a high level of agency by expressing his willingness to learn English. In clauses /44/, /45/, /46/, the Sensers are all “they” (the overseas students). Hunter only described the expectations or the needs of other people, which had nothing to do with his agency. So these clauses are all considered as neutral. • Emotive mental Process /1/ I like playing table tennis /10/ (I) was very delighted to learn English /11/ and (I) enjoyed it very much /38/ (my) enthusiasm slowly vanished /42/ (they) liked to come to me Hunter expressed his pleasure to play table tennis in /1/ and to learn English in /10/ and /11/. These clauses are thus high at agency level. Clause /38/ is a description of the change of Hunter’s mental state. It shows that he was no longer enthusiastic in playing table tennis with overseas students or learning English. So the agency level drops to low in the clause. Clause /42/, with the Senser being the overseas students again, has nothing to do with Hunter’s agency, so it is assigned neutral. • Perceptive mental Process /16/ but I found /23/ so at that time I found /57/ they would think /66/ then at that time I felt interesting Like the cognitive mental clauses, the perceptive metal clauses, with the exception of /66/, are of “Senser + Process” type. As the Phenomena are projected in succeeding clauses, these clauses don’t carry any agency. For this reason they are all neutral. The exception /66/ does contain the Phenomenon, which is “interesting”. This clause reveals Hunter’s secret delight when his English proficiency was commended

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

51

by the foreigners. This really gives confidence and encouragement to Hunter, so he constructed an agentive role in the clause. • Identifying relational Process /4/ (the ping-pong table) = a table only for overseas students /13/ (the English that many black people and Indians spoke) /= the English in our Listening class /20/ (what they spoke) = very simple English /21/ their vocabulary = (very simple vocabulary) /35/ (it) = in that period /36/ (that) = near the end of the first semester of the second year /43/ their main purpose = (expecting me to teach them Chinese) Clauses /13/, /20/ and /21/ are concerned with Hunter’s opinion about what kind of English is spoken by the overseas students. First, it is not the same as the English in his listening class. Since this is a mere description of fact, /13/ is neutral in agency. Second, it is very simple. This indicates that Hunter was completely able to understand their English. Regarding other’s English as “simple”, Hunter constructed a high profile for himself in /20/ and /21/. Clause /4/ explains for whose use is the ping-pong table. Clauses /35/ and /36/ explain when that period of time is. As they are all factual description, they are neutral in agency. Clause /43/ is Hunter’s speculation of the purpose for the overseas students to come to him. The Token is not in this clause, but in the subsequent one. The Carrier itself is neutral in agency too. Attributive relational Process /7/ their relation with me ← quite good /14/ (their) accent ← very strong /18/ they ← very considerate for us /33/ that period of time ← the most pleasant and most rewarding /40/ (I) ← quite close with two or three overseas students /41/ they ← having something (to be done) /52/ real English communication ← not as difficult as in imagination /54/ to speak English in front of foreigners ← much easier than in front of Chinese /55/ (you) ← not having any pressure /56/ you ← can be understood /58/ you ← awesome /67/ this period of time ← relatively short Hunter made comments to a few things through attributive clauses in this excerpt. First, his relation with the overseas students. Their relation was “good” and “close” as described in /7/ and /40/. The Attributes are positive, so the agency level is high. Second, English communication with foreigners. In Hunter’s opinion, it was not difficult as imagined (as indicated in /52/); it was easier than with Chinese (/54/);

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it didn’t oppose any pressure (/55/).These all demonstrated that Hunter was quite comfortable with speaking English with foreigners. This also constructed a high agentive role for him. Third, the overseas students. Their English carried strong accent (/14/); they were considerate for us (/18/); they had something to be done (/41/). Clause /18/ implies that the overseas students are “superior” in terms of English proficiency, so when they talk to “us” (the Chinese students), they would “look after” “us” by using simple words and sentences. This clause constructs a low profile for Chinese students like Hunter himself, so it is assigned “low” in agency. Clause /14/ and /41/ carries no agency as they are just facts. Fourth, that period of time. It is pleasant and rewarding (/33/) but short (/67/). Clause /33/ shows Hunter’s delight and contentment in learning English, so it is high in agency. Clause /67/ explains the length of that period. As it is quite objective, it is neutral in agency. Fifth, “you”, the second person that Hunter used to refer to Chinese students in general. If you can be understood (/56/), you would be awesome (/58/). This is a conditional clause. It visualizes a high level of language proficiency and thus a high level of agency is constructed in Hunter’s imagination. So they are assigned “high”, though they are just conditional. • Verbal Process /12/ although the English that many black people and the Indians speak /15/ sometimes (I) need to ask them to repeat /17/ when (I) spoke English with them /19/ what they speak /22/ (they) would not use very obscure words /26/ so at that period of time, when I spoke with them /32/ how to describe an action in English /47/ they would ask me along /48/ (they) would ask me to help communication as interpreter /59/ if I said to them /60/ I don’t speak (English) well /61/ they would say /62/ hey, how could you say that /63/ you speak better than many people /64/ many students, I am unable to speak with them /65/ we can’t communicate There are four main types of verbal clauses according to who are the Sayer and the Receiver, and what is the Verbiage. The first type is with the foreigners as the Sayer and English as the Verbiage (/12/, /19/, /22/). This type of clauses is neutral in agency. The second type still has English as the Verbiage but “I” as the Sayer (/17/, /26/, /60/). /17/ and /26/ focus on the action “speak” so they are neutral. Differently, /60/ emphasizes how the Sayer speaks English. With a negation, Hunter comments his oral English in a negative manner. He expresses his lack of confidence in his English proficiency and thus constructs a low level of agency.

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

53

High Neutral

1

10

20

30

40

50

60

67

Low Fig. 5.2 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 1

The third type has the overseas students as the Sayer and “me” as the Receiver, either overt or covert (/47/, /48/, /61/). They are all neutral. The fourth type is just the other way round, with “I” as the Sayer and the overseas students as the Receiver (/15/, /59/). While /59/ is neutral too, /15/ is different. It shows Hunter’s active communication with the overseas students. When he failed to understand them, he would ask them to repeat. The clause is highly agentive.. Clause /32/ is an odd one that doesn’t belong to any type above. It is a non-agentive receptive clause, in which the hidden Sayer is people in general. There is a Target “an action” and the Verbiage is English expressions. With the passive voice, Hunter focuses on the Target instead of on the Sayer, Verbiage or Process. This clause is an objective and neutral expression and contains no agency. The rest four verbal clauses (/62/, /63/, /64/, /65/) are special too as they are Verbiage of another verbal clause /61/. They are the direct quotation of the Sayer of /61/, the overseas students. Since they are factual report, they are also neural in agency. • Existential Process /3/ on the first floor of Building No. 7 there is a table tennis room This existential clause is a factual description of the location of the table tennis room. As it doesn’t contain any human agency, it is neutral at agency level. From the interpretation above (with approval from the narrator Hunter), the agency level of each clause has been settled. In Excerpt 1 there are 27 clauses at high agency level, 4 clauses at low agency level, and 36 clauses being neutral. The agency fluctuations can be visualized by the following line chart (see Fig. 5.2). We can see from the line chart that the agency level stays high generally. This means Hunter placed himself in a high tendency of agency when he told the story.

5.1.2 Proactive Voices This section is going to display more but shorter excerpts of English learning stories told by the participants. All the excerpts are processed in exactly the same way as demonstrated with Excerpt 1 in the precious section. Nevertheless, clause-by-clause transitivity analyses and interpretations are reduced here while the results will be

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5 Agency Construction

High Neutral

1

5

10

13

Low Fig. 5.3 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 2

illustrated by line charts of agency level. From the line charts we can see that these stories generally present a high tendency of agency as there are much more clauses at high level than at low level of agency. The following are five excerpts in their original Chinese version (all in Putonghua except the last one in Cantonese) as well as in English translation, with the clause number and its agency level (H for high, N for neutral and L for low) marked at the end of each clause in the English version. Excerpt 2 (Tony, 13-07-30). 我努力地锻炼口头表达能力, 很积极地参加各种活动以及各种讲座。别人不愿意去的, 我就去; 别人不愿意做的, 我来做。我很快融入集体, 也有自己的朋友圈。但我依旧一个 人学习, 一个人思考。因为我觉得, 只有心平气静的时候才能全面地考虑问题。 I strenuously practiced my oral expressive ability /1H/. (I) actively participated in all kinds of activities and lectures /2H/. (Wherever) others were not willing to go /3N/, I would go /4H/. (Whatever) others were not willing to do /5N), I would do /6H/. I quickly assimilated into the class /7H/. (I) also had my circle of friends /8H/. But I still study individually /9H/. (I) think individually /10H/….because I felt /11N/, that only when (I was) peaceful in mind /12H/, could I comprehensively consider a problem /13H/.

Tony maintains a high level of agency throughout this excerpt. Many of the clauses are of material Process type with “I” as the Actor, which positions the narrator as an earnest learner of English in clause /1/ and /9/, active participant of activities and lectures in /2/ and /4/, as well as a devoted class member in clause /6/ and /7/. Tony did not just act, but also think actively. He assumes the role of Senser in mental clauses from /10/ to /13/ and identifies himself as in independent thinker who knows his own mind (Fig. 5.3). Excerpt 3 (Leslie, 13-09-03). 对大学适应了, 开始投入学习。每天都会信心满满地对自己说, 加油!不开心的时候或 是遇到不顺心的事情时, 都会强迫自己嘴角上扬。知道消沉总是没有用的, 所以希望自 己每天都是积极向上。 (I) have been accustomed to university (life) /1H/. (I) begin to devote myself into study /2H/. Every day (I) will confidently say to myself “go ahead!” /3H/ When (I am) unhappy /4L/ or when (I) encounter unpleasant things /5L/, (I) will force the corners of my mouth to rise /6H/. (I) know /7N/, that depression is always useless /8H/, so (I) hope /9N/ I will be positive every day /10H/.

This excerpt is mainly made up of mental and material clauses. With positive mentality as Phenomenon as in /1/ and /10/, Leslie, as the Sensor, positions herself in an agentive and positive state. By assigning the role Actor to herself as in /2/ and /6/, Leslie identifies herself as a devoted person and has built an image of an optimist

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

55

High Neutral

1

5

10

Low Fig. 5.4 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 3

High Neutral

1

5

10

14

Low Fig. 5.5 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 4

even in adversity. With the Verbiage “go ahead” in the verbal clause /3/, Leslie, as the Sayer, performs the role as a cheer-leader for herself. All these clauses bring the discourse up to a high tendency of agency (Fig. 5.4). Excerpt 4 (Maxim, 14-06-27). 大一刚进来的时候就觉得, 哇, 广外的人英语好厉害呀!那时感觉大家很能说, 我变得 很大胆去说。我们有非常多的机会去做 presentation 或者 group discussion 之类的, 我 们会有很多机会去表达自己的idea。我慢慢地会去说, 经常会去用。大家很厉害呀, 很 想自己也去表达, 去说。 When (I) just entered university /1N/, (I) felt /2N/, “wow, people in GW are awesome in speaking English!”/3H/ At that time (I) felt /4N/ everybody was eloquent /5H/. I became bold to speak /6H/. We had many opportunities to give presentations /7H/ and to hold group discussions /8H/. We had many opportunities to express our ideas /9H/. I gradually learned to speak (English) /10H/. (I) often used (English) /11H/. As everybody else was awesome /12H/, I would like to express (in English) too /13H/, to speak (English) /14H/.

The majority of clauses in this excerpt are mainly mental Process and relational Process. Maxim constructs a role as a courageous speaker of English with emotive clause /6/, and wishes to become a more proficient speaker with desiderative clauses /13/ and /14/. Meanwhile, with the possession of various “opportunities” as Attributes, Maxim, as the Carrier, positions himself in a favorable environment for English learning. All of this places Maxim at a high level of learner agency (Fig. 5.5). Excerpt 5 (Harper, 15-11-24). 上次座谈会回去以后, 我觉得我确实是有一点改变。就是我会每天练口语。我不会挑 那种很难的句子, 很难的文章来练, 而是从简单句说得好开始练。我们报刊每个星期 都有 presentation 的嘛。我会问他们拿他们的 ppt, 就说假如是我, 我会怎么讲。我会这 样练一下。以前只是在宿舍里面想而已, 现在就真得会出去宿舍外面, 走廊那里或者 楼梯那里, 自己练那样子。 After (I) am back from the meeting last time /1N/, I feel /2N/ that I do have some changes /3H/. That is /4N/ I am practicing spoken English every day /5H/. I will not choose those very difficult sentences or very difficult article for practice /6N/, but start from being fluent with

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High Neutral

1

5

10

15

Low Fig. 5.6 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 5 simple sentences /7H/. We have presentations every week at the Journals Reading course /8N/. I will ask them for their PPT /9H/. If (the speaker) was I /10N/, how would I present /11H/. I will practice in this way /12H/. In the past I would just think in the dorm /13N/, but now I will go outside of the dorm to the corridor or staircases /14H/, and practice by myself /15H/.

Harper identifies herself as a conscientious practicer of spoken English in this excerpt, which is featured by operative material clauses with the verb “练” (meaning “practice verbally” in the context) occurring for five times. With the verb “think” in the mental clause /13/, Harper positions herself only as a thinker of English in the dormitory before, but now she repositions herself as a practicer of spoken English outside of the dorm in material clauses /14/ and /15/. The level of agency has been elevated to a great extent (Fig. 5.6). Excerpt 6 (Blair, 16-03-29). 因为喺学校入边识咗好多啲外国朋友, 因为我自己口语上嘅优势相对来讲, 我觉 得嗻係可以交流得比较冇咩障碍。我又本身自己好中意交朋友, 因为有沟通, 大家一 起玩啊, 一起去旅游啊, 或者出去食饭。咁交流嘅时候我觉得嗻係可以接触到更加多 嘅嘢囖。所以我会更加想去提高我自己口语, 或者係英语方面嘅能力。 Because (I) get to know many foreign friends on campus /1H/, because relatively speaking, oral English is my strength /2H/, I feel /3N/ that (I) can communicate (with foreigners) without barriers /4H/. I myself like making friends /5H/, because there are communications /6H/. We play together /7H/, go travelling together /8H/, or eat out (together) /9H/. When communicating /10N/, I feel /11N/ I can come in contact with more things /12H/. So I am more willing to improve my spoken English or English ability /13H/.

Blair describes a virtuous cycle in making foreign friends in the excerpt. First, with identifying relational clause /2/ and attributive relational clause /4/, Blair identifies herself as barrier-free communicator with English. Next, she describes herself as a sociable person by actively engaging herself in material Process of “playing”, “travelling”, “eating out” together with her foreign friends. Then, she imagines an identity of an even more proficient English speaker with a desiderative mental clause /13/. A high level of agency has been maintained all the way through the excerpt (Fig. 5.7).

5.1.3 Transitivity Constructions of High Agency After data analysis and interpretation of all the selected stories, the transitivity patterns that construct a high level of agency can be generalized. These patterns

5.1 Constructing a High Level of Agency

57

High Neutral

1

5

10

13

Low Fig. 5.7 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 6

are presented by Process type as followed. For each pattern, a few example clauses are given with the English translation below the original Chinese. Altogether there are eleven patterns (numbered from A to K) of the six Process types generalized from the participants’ stories.

5.1.3.1

Material Process

A. Actor/Agent (narrator) + operative material Process (verbs related to English learning) This pattern is most common among agentive material clauses. Assuming the roles of both the Actor and Agent (typically in the subject position), the narrator identify himself/herself as the one that does the deed, and the one that brings about the change. Hence a high level of agency is constructed. The following are example clauses of this pattern from the collected English learning stories. 1. 几乎每一个细节我都会逐字逐句去查 (Tony, 14-10-24) almost for every detail I would check word by word, sentence by sentence 2. 我会每天练口语 (Harper, 15-11-24) I will practice oral English every day In these clauses, the narrator uses the first person “I” in the subject position and makes it the Actor and Agent of the operative Process. However, the narrator may also use the second person “you” to refer himself/herself, like the following examples. 3. 只要你提前做好工作 (Harper, 15-11-24) as long as you make preparations in advance 4. 然后期末的话就是你系统地学习那些知识 (Vivian, 15-10-17) then in the end of the semester you learn the knowledge systematically 5.1.3.2

Mental Process

In a large proportion of mental clauses in the stories, the Phenomenon is taken as individual clauses, which may belong to another Process type. Therefore, the mental clauses sometimes only contain the Senser and the Process verb, which may not present any level of agency. This type of mental clauses is not the focus of discussion in this study. The mental clauses discussed here, however, are those that contain the

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Phenomenon with the Senser and Process verb in the same clause, or those mental clauses which are the Phenomenon of a larger mental clause. There are various ways for mental clauses to construct a high level of agency in English learning. The following patterns have been found in the selected stories. • Cognitive mental Process B. Senser (narrator) + cognitive Process + Phenomenon (positive ideas and attitudes towards English learning) 5. 更能感觉到自己学习英语这个迫切性 (Harper, 15-11-24) I can feel more earnestly the urgency of my learning English 6. 大学四年之后学习英语的主动性提高了 (Vivian, 16-06-22) after four years in university my initiative of learning English has been raised A larger number of cognitive mental clauses carry modal verbs like “应该” (meaning “should”), “必须” (meaning “must”), “可以” (meaning “can”), “需要” (meaning “need”), etc., showing that the narrator is clearly aware of his or her mission and determined to work hard as shown in the following examples. 7. 作为本科生, 应该需要了解(怎么去搜集资料) (Tony, 14-06-12) as college students, (we) should get to know (how to search for information) 8. 我现在还觉得要不断地学习 (Tony, 15-10-17) (I still feel that) I should learn continuously • desiderative mental Process C. Senser (narrator) + desiderative Process (verbs expressing “willingness” or “intention”) + Phenomenon Some desiderative mental clauses are featured by the verb “想” (meaning “want”), or “愿意” (meaning “will”) such as the following examples. 想和他(上课老师)进行一种交流 (Vivian, 14-10-24) I wanted to have a kind of communication with him (the teacher) 10. 大三这一整年, 我特别愿意花时间在笔译里面 (Erica, 15-10-17) in Year 3, I was very willing to spend time on translation 9.

Others express “intentions”, “plans” and “expectations”. These clauses normally take the Process verbs “决定” (meaning “decide”), “打算” (meaning “plan”), “想” (meaning “intend to”), or “要” (meaning “will” or “must”). 11. 大四的话肯定是要把自己的英语能力提高 (Vivian, 15-10-17) in Year 4, (I) definitely need to have my English ability improved 12. 所以我会更加想去提高我自己口语 (Blair, 16-3-29) so I wanted more to improve my spoken English • Emotive mental Process

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59

D. Senser (narrator) + emotive Process (verbs expressing “interest”, “pleasure”, “contentment”, “confidence” and “courage”) + Phenomenon Example clauses expressing “interest” include: 13. 我就喜欢像那种导读课 (Tony, 14-06-12) I like courses like the introduction course 14. 我对外国好有兴趣首先 (Blair, 16-3-29) first of all I am very interested in foreign countries Example clauses expressing “pleasure” include: 15. 我非常喜欢去用(英语) (Maxim, 14-06-27) I am very delighted to use (English) 16. 但是我在那个过程当中还是挺快乐的 (Vivian, 15-11-24) but during that process, I am quite happy Example clauses expressing “contentment” include: 17. (虽然讲得还不是很流利,)但是对我自己来讲我已经满意了 (Hunter, 14-0627) (I didn’t speak very smoothly,) but for me I am contented 18. 自己都叫做, 相对来讲, 比较满意咁样样 (Blair, 16-3-29) I am, comparatively speaking, quite contented Example clauses expressing “confidence” include: 19. 现在去听新闻那些比较有信心 (Tony, 16-06-22) now to listen to stuffs like news (I) am quite confident 20. 我跟其他人比会自信一点 (Leslie, 16-06-22) compared with other people I am more confident Example clauses expressing “courage” include: 21. 脸皮也慢慢厚起来了 (Tang, 14-06-27) my face skin has got thick 22. 我变得很大胆去说 (Maxim, 14-06-27) I became more courageous to speak out 5.1.3.3

Relational Process

• Attributive relational Process E. Carrier (narrator) + attributive Process + Attributes (“competence” or “autonomy”) 23. 能自信说出来 (Tang, 14-06-27) (I) can speak out with confidence 24. 我可以好自主咁去选择 (Blair, 16-3-29) I can make choices on our own

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F. Carrier (English learning) + attributive Process + Attributes (“importance” or “simplicity”) 25. 我依旧把学习放在第一位 (Tony, 15-10-17) I still place study on the first position 26. 现在英语对我来说更重要了 (Harper, 16-06-22) now English is more and more important for me G. Carrier (narrator) + attributive Process + Attributes (favorable possession such as “benefits”, “advantage”, “opportunities”, “time”, etc.) 27. 我们会有很多机会去表达自己的idea (Maxim, 14-06-27) we have many chances to express our own ideas 28. (有空)跟他们交流一下也是有好处的 (Harper, 15-10-17) it has benefits to communicate with them (when (I am) free) • Identifying relational Process H. Token (English learning) + identifying Process + Value (positive) 29. 读书也不是一件苦差事 (Vivian, 15-10-17) study is not a bitter business 30. 学习也可以是一件很快乐的事 (Harper, 14-06-12) study can be a fun 5.1.3.4

Behavioral Process

Behavioral Process is located at the boundary between material and mental. A highagency behavioral clause usually takes the narrator as the Behavior, partly like the Actor and partly like the Senser, who behaves consciously and initiatively. I. Behavior (narrator) + behavioral Process (behaviors beneficial for English learning) 31. 每天晚上都在看美剧friends (Maxim, 14-06-27) every night (I) watch the American soap opera “Friends” 32. 我会思考译出来之后全文的衔接 (Tony, 14-10-24) I will consider the cohesion of the whole text after translation 5.1.3.5

Verbal Process

These are clauses of saying. In constructing a high level of agency, it is always the narrator who initiates the saying. A very common pattern is that the narrator is the Sayer, and English language is the Verbiage.

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency

61

J. Sayer (narrator) + verbal Process + Verbiage (English language) 33. 有时候问他(笔译老师)为什么这样子 (Tony, 14-06-12) sometimes (I) asked him (the teacher of Translation course) why it is as such 34. 梦里面也是在说英语 (Maxim, 14-06-27) in my dream (I) also speak English 5.1.3.6

Existential Process

Existential clauses represent that something exists or happens. In constructing a high level of agency, the Existent is usually an entity that is beneficial for narrator’s English learning. K. Existent (entities beneficial for English learning) + existential Process 35. 课堂上有很多表现自我的机会 (Harper, 16-06-22) there are many chances in the class to display myself 36. 只要有机会去积累这种经验 (Harper, 15-11-24) as long as there is chance to accumulate this kind of experience

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency In this section, we examine how a low level of agency is constructed in individual clauses. As in the previous section, we select some excerpts which are considered to have a low tendency of agency after data analysis and interpretation. Again, one excerpt is analyzed and interpreted in details to show how agency is realized by transitivity patterns. Then we look at more excerpts and finally focus on low-level clauses in order to deduce the transitivity patterns they share.

5.2.1 Erica’s Bewilderment Erica is from a medium-sized city in Guangdong Province. Since childhood she had been eager to become a forensic expert in the future, so forensic medicine was what she would like to study as specialty in college. However, her parents wanted her to major in English in college and obtain a stable job in the government in her hometown after graduation. Erica was an obedient daughter and always followed her parents’ opinions. That’s why she came to GW and major in English, although it was not her interest at all. The following excerpt is from her narration about her experiences and feelings after she just entered GW as a freshman.

62

5 Agency Construction Excerpt 7 (Erica, 13-09-03). 刚踏入大学的时候, 还没有完全从每天题海战术的高三生活里回过神来。突然之间回 到像初中那样一切靠自觉的生活, 真心觉得无从适应。浑浑噩噩中, 每天看着周围的 同学, 几点准备起床, 收拾上课, 每节课前都得问在哪个课室上课, 也不知道什么时候 该拿课本出来翻一翻, 瞅两眼。因为高中学的是理科, 大学学的却是文科专业, 所以很 多时候没有感受到理科生的存在感。有时候上课周围发言声此起彼伏, 觉得自己比米 粒还渺小。这个时期受环境和周围人作用还是很大的。一方面觉得, 大学没有想象中 的那么自由, 就算是不喜欢的课, 也没有逃课的机会, 因为要点名, 也找不到逃课的理 由, 看周围那么优秀的同学。另一方面自己不知道怎么做, 时间安排上有沉重的无力 感, 而且这种无力感在考试前夕会明显加重, 可能是因为懒散惯了, 突然要我什么东 西都来个规划, 就不知所措, 无从下手了, 所以只能看看周围人, 然后各种邯郸学步。 English Translation of Excerpt 7. When (I) first entered university, I hadn’t completely recovered from the life with excessive assignments in the third year in senior high school. Suddenly I came back to the life [[that everything depends on self-consciousness]] as in junior high school, (I) sincerely felt that (I) could not accommodate (to the university life). While I was muddling along, I observed my classmates around every day: what time they got up, (they) got ready for class. (I) had to ask before every class in which classroom (we) had class and (I) didn’t know either when (I) should take the textbook out, (I should) turn (the pages), (I should) skim (the textbook). Because what (I) learned in senior high school were science subjects, but what (I) learned in university are arts subjects, so very often (I) didn’t felt the existence of a science student. Sometimes in the class (my classmates’) voices arose and subsided around me. (I) felt I was smaller than a grain. In this period (it) was tremendously that I was affected by the environment and the people around. On the one hand (I) felt university (life) was not as free as in imagination. Even the class I didn’t like, there was no chance for skipping, because (the teacher) would call the roll. (I) also couldn’t find an excuse for skipping class. (I) saw many excellent students around. On the other hand I didn’t know what to do. (I) had a strong sense of helplessness in time arrangement, and this sense of helplessness would aggravate before exams. Probably (it) was because (I) was used to being lazy. Suddenly (when it) forced me to plan for everything, (I) didn’t know what to do, (and I) found nowhere to start. So (I) could only observe people around, and then (I) followed suit everywhere.

5.2.1.1

Transitivity Analysis Within Clause

After applying transitivity analysis to Excerpt 7 (see Table C2 in Appendix C), we can find out the allocation of each Process type as illustrated in Fig. 5.8. There are 43 clauses in this excerpt, among which material, mental and relational Processes are the three principle types. Mental Process ranks the first, occupying 40% of the text. It is followed by mental Process, with a share of 26%. Relational Process ranks third, with a share of 16%. There are four existential clauses and three behavioral, and the last one is a verbal clause.

5.2.1.2

Interpretation for Agency Level

The interpretation for the level of agency constructed within each individual clause is again organized by the Process type.

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency

63

creative transformative

material mental Process Type

cognitive

relational

idf

attributive

emt

26% perceptive

40%

16%

7%

behavioral verbal

2%

existential

9% 0

5

10

15

20

N=43 clauses emt = emotive, idf = identifying Fig. 5.8 Frequencies of different Process types in Excerpt 7

• Transformative material Process /6/ (I) could not accommodate (to the university life) /9/ what time they got up /10/ (they) got ready for class /12/ in which classroom (we) had class /26/ [that I was affected by the environment and the people around] /31/ because (the teacher) would call the roll /39/ suddenly (when it) forced me to plan for everything /41/ (and I) found nowhere to start /43/ and then (I) followed suit everywhere Clauses /6/ and /41/ are very similar in that they are both negative with the narrator “I” as the Actor. They showed Erica’s bewilderment when she just started university life. She could not adjust herself to the new environment and start her new life. She got lost and could not in charge of her own life. What she could do was to tail behind others as mentioned in /43/. All the three clauses construct a very low level of agency. Clause /26/ is a receptive material clause with an overt Agent. Here “I”, the subject of the clause, is the Goal or the Scope, but not the Actor or the Agent. The Agent is “the environment and people around”, which had produced influence on me. Unlike the operative clauses which highlight the Actor, the receptive clauses emphasize the Goal or the Scope, the undergoer of the Process. Therefore Erica positions herself in a low-agency role in this clause. Clause /31/ is a clause with a hidden subject, which assumingly should be the teacher, as it is usually the teacher who would call the roll in the class. Thus the

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Actor of the clause should be the teacher. Then “me” becomes part of the Goal in the clause, because the teacher would call “my” name. It is for this reason that Erica had no chance to skip the class. Hence it is the teacher, not “I” who decides on “my” presence or absence in the class. Therefore, the teacher is also the Agent in the clause, and “I” was placed in a passive position. Clause /39/ is also a clause without an overt subject. The object is “me”. “I” was forced to make plans for everything. From the context, we can infer that the hidden subject is the new situation in university. It is this new situation that requires students to be autonomous and well-organized. But Erica was certainly not this type of students, so she felt unable to adapt herself to it. She positioned herself in a very passive position in this clause. Clause /9/ and /10/ are concerned with the daily routine of Erica’s roommates. These are what Erica, as an outsider, observed, so these Processes have nothing to do with her agency. Clause /12/ is question that asked by Erica. Although the questioning implies confusion and thus low-agency in Erica, the question itself (the objective clause) is neutral. • Creative material Process /17/ because what (I) learned in senior high school /19/ but what (I) learned in university These two creative material clauses are both Carriers of another two identifying relational clauses. As Carriers only, the two clauses contain no agency at all. • Cognitive mental Process /2/ I hadn’t completely recovered from the life with excessive assignments in the third year in senior high school /3/ suddenly I came back to the life [[that everything depends on selfconsciousness]] as in junior high school /4/ [[that everything depends on self-consciousness]] /7/ while I was muddling along /13/ and (I) didn’t know either /14/ when (I) should take the textbook out /15/ (I should) turn (the pages) /16/ (I should) skim (the textbook) /34/ on the other hand I didn’t know what to do /40/ (I) didn’t know what to do All these cognitive mental clauses have “I” as the Senser. Erica kept reporting her cognitive status in her narration. In /2/ and /3/, she said she hadn’t recovered from the life in senior school, which everything’s planned for her already, and she felt as if she was back to the life in junior school, which she needed to be responsible for herself. This means she’s unable to be adapted to new life immediately and she felt lost in this transformation.

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65

A low level of agency is then constructed by Erica. Clause /4/ is an attributive clause which modifies the junior school life—“everything depends on self-consciousness”. Although this is a highly agentive clause, it is the description of Erica’s past, not her current state. What Erica was experiencing now was “muddling along” without any purpose as mentioned in /7/. This state of aimlessness and passiveness is a strong indication of low agency. In this short excerpt, Erica expressed “I didn’t know” three times as in clause/13/, /34/, /40/. They revealed that she were confused and bewildered in the new environment. These cognitive mental clauses constructed a low level of agency. Clauses /14/, /15/ and /16/ share the modal verb “should” which implies a sense of obligation—it is Erica’s duty to take the textbook out, turn the pages and skim them, though she didn’t know when she should do that. She just felt that it is something expected of “her” as a student. By using the modal verb, Erica puts herself in an obliged position without too much control of herself. So these clauses are all low in agency. • Emotive mental Process /29/ even the class I didn’t like There is only one emotive mental clause in this excerpt. In this clause Erica expressed her unlikeness of certain classes with a negation. Lack of interest and enjoyment in class is also in indication of low agency. • Perceptive mental Process /5/ (I) sincerely felt /21/ so very often (I) didn’t felt the existence of a science student /23/ (I) felt /27/ on the one hand (I) felt /35/ (I) had a strong sense of helplessness in time arrangement /36/ and this sense of helplessness would aggravate before exams Some perceptive clauses leave the Phenomenon as an individual clause in the subsequent objective clause (/5/, /23/, /27/), while others contain the Phenomenon in the same clause (/21/, /35/ and /36/). In the former case, the clauses are neutral, because the Process “feel” itself doesn’t contain any agency. In the latter case, things are different, because what is felt usually embodies a certain level of agency. /21/ is a negative clause. The Phenomenon is the existence of a science student. That is to say, Erica, as a science student, didn’t have the sense of existence. This indicates a very low agency. In /35/ and /36/, the Phenomenon is the sense of helplessness and the aggravation of it. This indicates that Erica was incapable to manage time and control things, which is a sign of low agency. • Identifying relational Process

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/18/ (what I learned in senior high school) = science subjects /20/ (what I learned in university) = arts subjects The two identifying clauses are reports of facts. Here Erica reported a fact that what she learned in senior high school and what she learned in university are totally different. So the clauses are neutral at agency level. • Attributive relational Process /24/ I ← smaller than a grain /25/ (that I was affected by the environment and the people around) ← tremendously /28/ university (life) ← not as free as in imagination /37/ (I had a strong sense of helplessness in time arrangement) ← because (I was used to being lazy) /38/ (I) ← used to being lazy In clause /24/, Erica compared herself with a grain. With the attributive Process, she assigned the Attribute “smaller than a grain” to herself, hence constructing a low level of agency. Clause /38/ also has “I’ as the Carrier and the Attribute is lazy. Such an Attribute indicated inactiveness, and this is a downright sign of low agency. The Carrier of clause /28/ is university life. By assigning the Attribute “not as free as imagined” to it, Erica puts herself in a constrained role, thus constructing a low agency for herself. Clause /25/ assigns the Attribute “tremendously” to the Carrier of “being affected by the environment and the people around”. This attributive Process qualifies the degree of affection. As the Process of affection is low in agency, the qualification reinforces this low level of agency. Clause /37/ attributes a possible reason to the sense of helpless in time arrangement, and the reason is the subsequent clause /38/. So the clause /37/ is neutral itself. • Behavioral Process /8/ I observed my classmates around every day /33/ (I) saw many excellent students around /42/ so (I) could only observe people around The three behavioral clauses are very similar. They have the same Behaver “I”, the same Process verb “看”, which means “see” or “observe” in English, and the same Behavior “the classmates around me”. Erica’s behavior implies that she has lost the ability of more independent actions. She didn’t have a mind of her own and couldn’t be in charge of her life. What she could do was to observe others and admires them. Hence Erica marginalizes herself in the communal life of university, and positions herself as an outsider and an on-looker. Therefore these clauses are all low in terms of agency level.

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67

• Verbal Process /11/ (I) had to ask before every class There is only one verbal clause in the excerpt. The Verbiage is in the subsequent clause /12/ “in which classroom they had class”. It is the minimum for a student to know where to have class. Yet even this minimum is out of Erica’s knowledge. Her questioning means that she was always in a muddle-headed state. She was neither active in behavior nor clear in mind. In this verbal clause Erica constructs a low level of learning agency. • Existential Process /1/ when (I) first entered university /22/ sometimes in the class (my classmates’) voices arose and subsided (around me) /30/ there was no chance for skipping /32/ (I) also couldn’t find an excuse for skipping class The beginning clause /1/ of the excerpt introduces where Erica’s story starts. It starts from the Erica’s entry into GW, which is a factual description, so it is neutral. Clause /22/ seems neutral as it describes a fact that her classmates took turns to speak out in the class, but it implies that Erica’s voice was not heard. The existence of others’ voice actually mirrored the absence of her voice. Her silence made her seem to be submerged in the ebb and flow of the voices. She didn’t speak or act in the class. Therefore Erica placed herself in an insignificant position. A low level of agency is hence constructed. /30/ and /32/ are both negative existential clauses. There are neither chances nor excuses for Erica to skip classes. This implies that Erica had no interest to attend the classes at all. She did that only because there was no alternative. She attended the classes due to the lack of chance or excuse of skipping them. This indicates low learning agency. To sum up, in this excerpt there is one clause at high agency level, 29 clauses at low agency level, and 13 clauses being neutral. The agency fluctuations are visualized by the following line chart (see Fig. 5.9). We can see that the agency almost stays at the low level throughout the narration, which means the speaker constructed a low tendency of agency when she told the story.

High Neutral

1

10

Low Fig. 5.9 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 7

20

30

40

43

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5 Agency Construction

5.2.2 Inactive Voices The following five excerpts are selected from other low-agency stories of the participants. Again, the line charts representing the results of data analyses and interpretations have been presented here with brief interpretations for agency level. Excerpt 8 (Vivian, 13-08-01). 当我意识到我已经不再是新生时, 自己好像就处在一种被动状态, 感觉做什么事情都 被一种压力所驱赶着去完成, 很多时候就只是为了完成任务而去行动, 结局就是很多 时候就只得到结果而忽视甚至是遗忘了过程。特别是在学习上, 在学习上的创造力和 主动性大大减弱, 我自己也知道这与我在学习上的信心不足有着直接的联系。我希望 自己能够像以前一样依旧能够轻轻松松, 信心满满地去学习, 去为周围的同学解答疑 问。但是当我发现现在的自己相比较于以前的自己, 相距甚远, 心中无疑会泛起阵阵苦 涩, 甚至会怀疑自己在语言学习上的能力。 When I realize /1N/ that I am no longer a freshman /2N/, I seem to be situated in a passive state /3L/. (I) feel /4N/ that whatever I do /5N/, I am compelled to finish it by a kind of pressure /6L/. Very often I act only for the sake of completing task /7L/. The consequence is /8N/ usually I only get the result /9L/, while ignore or even forget the process /10L/. Especially on studies, my learning creativity and initiative have decreased considerably /11L/. I know /12N/ this has direct connections with my lack of confidence in studies /13L/. I hope /14N/ I can still study with the same ease and confidence as before /15H/, and I can still answer the questions of my classmates’ /16H/. But when I find /17N/ that I at the present is far away from me in the past /18L/, I will undoubtedly feel bitter in heart /19L/, and even suspect my ability in language learning /20L/.

The majority of clauses in this excerpt are mental Process of different types. A low level of agency was constructed by negative Process verbs such as “compell” in /6/, “ignore or even forget” in /10/, “suspect” in /20/, or by negative Phenomena such as “a passive state” in /3/, “a kind of pressure” in /6/, “lack of confidence” in /15/, “bitter in heart” in /19/. The only clauses that carry high agency are two desiderative clauses /15/ and /16/, in which Vivian pictures an identity of a confident and competent learner who she used to be but now she is far away from (Fig. 5.10). Excerpt 9 (Erica, 14-10-17). 我上堂课被抽到(做口译练习)了。每次被抽到都会脑子空白很长一段时间。之前明明 自己想好了, 然后就什么都没了, 又得重新想。我从高中过后就没自己举手主动回答 问题。一般都是老师抽我, 然后我就 “呵。 。 。 。”。 In the last class I was chosen (to do interpreting exercises) /1L/. Every time I am chosen /2L/, my brain will become blank for a long time /3L/. I am obviously already prepared /4N/, but then everything’s gone /5N/, and I had to prepare again /6L/. Since senior high school, I

High Neutral

1

5

Low

Fig. 5.10 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 8

10

15

20

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency

69

High Neutral

1

5

10

Low

Fig. 5.11 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 9

have never raised my hand to answer questions voluntarily /7L/. Generally it was /8N/ that the teacher chose me /9L/, and then I would give a gasp of surprise /10L/.

In this excerpt Erica constructs a passive and inactive role by describing her performance in class. The verb “抽” (meaning “choose”) occurred for three times. In the first two occurrences in /1/ and /2/, Erica positions herself as the Goal in the receptive Process. This suggests that doing interpreting exercise was not out of her intention but was imposed by the teacher, the hidden Actor and Agent. In the third occurrence in /9/, Erica simply positions the teacher as the Actor and herself as the Goal in the operative Process, indicating that she was not in control of doing exercises in class. She also uses an operative material clause /7/ with herself as the Actor but a verb in negation “never raised my hand” to deny high agency in the class since senior high school (Fig. 5.11). Excerpt 10 (Leslie, 15-10-17). 我觉得这学期可能课有点多, 有种被课推着走的感觉。而且作业还蛮多的, 很多时候 要赶作业。课外时间大部分花在实习跟找工作上面。因为这一块占时间比较多, 那剩 下用来做作业啊、学习的时间肯定会更少。反正就感觉时间都被填满了。有时还没会 没有时间做作业。 I feel /1N/ that in this semester there are too many classes /2L/. (I) have a sense of /3N/ being driven by classes /4L/. Besides, there are quite a lot of homework /5L/. In many occasions (I) need to rush my assignments /6L/. Most of my spare time is spent on internship and job-seeking /7N/. Because it takes up much time /8L/, the time left for assignments and study is certainly less /9L/. Anyhow (I) feel /10N/ that my schedule is filled /11L/. Sometimes (I) even don’t have time to do assignments /12L/.

Leslie presents her problem of time management in this excerpt. On the one hand, she positions “many classes” and “quite a lot of homework” as Existence in /2/ and /5/ in existential Process. On the other hand, with a receptive clause /7/ and an operative clause /9/, she positions internship and job-seeking as Actor while her time as Goal. This suggests that she had no autonomy to allocate her time for different tasks. In the end, with “time” as a positive Attribute but a verb in negation, Leslie, the Carrier in the relational clause /12/ constructs a low level of agency by expressing a sense of anxiety and helplessness (Fig. 5.12). Excerpt 11 (Erica, 15-10-17). 找实习的时候, 它如果是有要求英文专业的话, 它连那个实习公告都全部是英文的。 有一些可能用中文我会很明白它想表达什么, 但是看英文, 我总会觉得对我来说有点 模凌两可的感觉。我不知道它到底那个表达是不是我理解的那样。反正可能就是对自 己很不自信, 然后总会觉得, 万一我理解得有偏差。我现在对英语真的是这样, 我经常

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High Neutral

1

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Fig. 5.12 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 10

High Neutral

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Fig. 5.13 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 11

怀疑我自己的能力。我不管是做听力还是什么, 我总是怀疑说, 我听到的就是我理解 的那个意思吗?我觉得我现在就是这种状况。 When I looked for internship /1N/, if it requires English-majors /2N/, the poster is written completely in English /3N/. In some (places) if it was written in Chinese /4N/, I would understand very well /5H/ what it wanted to say /6N/. But reading English /7N/, I would always feel it ambiguous to me /8L/. I don’t know /9L/ whether what it expressed /10N/ is /11N/ what I understood /12N/. Probably I was not confident in myself /13L/. I always felt /14N/ that I might have understood it in the wrong way /15L/. This is /16N/ really what I feel about English /17L/. I often doubt about my ability /18L/. No mater it is listening or what /19N/, I always doubt /20L/, is what I hear just what I understand /21N/? I feel /22N/ I am just in this state now /23L/.

In this excerpt Erica describes her self-skepticism when looking for internship. She uses verbs in negation such as “I don’t know” in mental clause /9/ and “I was not confident” in relational clause /13/. She also uses negative Process verb “doubt” in mental clauses /18/ and /20/ for her ability and her English comprehension. This constant state of self-skepticism throughout the discourse places her in a low level of agency (Fig. 5.13). Excerpt 12 (Blair, 16-03-29). 所有考试对于我来讲都係一个低期。因为我硬係觉得, 我好唔擅长笔试。我次次考试, 好似喱次专八咁样样, 因为病完之后我自己有阴影, 觉得会, 硬係就觉得唔舒服。有一 段时间我嘅笔试, 其实长期笔试都唔係好好, 我就会有一种感觉, 我点样考, 都考唔到 太好咁样样。其实真係几打击。我觉得, 我点样复习, 好似cecl咁样, 都好似上唔到去。 Every exam is a low period to me /1N/, because I always feel /2N/ I am not good at written test /3L/. Every time I took a written test /4N/, such as TEM-8 this time, I had (psychological) shadows /5L/, feeling /6N/ that I was not comfortable /7L/. For a period of time, my written tests, in fact for a long period of time, my written tests are not good /8L/. I have a feeling /9N/ that no matter how I try /10H/, I will not achieve a high score /11L/. In fact it is really striking (for me) /12L/. I think /13N/, no matter how I prepare /14H/, such as for CECL (an English course), the scores seem unable to be higher /15L/.

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency

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High Neutral

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Fig. 5.14 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 12

In this excerpt Blair employs a number of relational clauses in various ways to construct a low level of agency in taking written exams. In identifying clause /1/, she identifies the Token “every exam” as “a low period”, which is a negative Value. Positioning herself as the Carrier but with a negation “not”, she assigns a positive Attribute “good at written test” in /3/ and “comfortable” in /7/ to herself. Similarly with a negation in /8/, she assigns a positive Attribute “good” to the Carrier “my written tests’. She assigns a negative Attribute “psychological shadows” to herself in /5/, and “unable to be higher” to her scores in /15/. Through all these transitivity patterns Blair identifies herself as a poor performer in written exams (Fig. 5.14).

5.2.3 Transitivity Constructions of Low Agency After analyses of all the selected stories, the following transitivity patterns that realize low-level agency have been summarized according to the Process type. Altogether there are sixteen patterns (numbered from A to P) generated from the participants’ English learning stories and two clauses are given as examples for each pattern.

5.2.3.1

Material Process

A. Goal/Medium (narrator) + receptive material Process In receptive material Process, the narrator, being the subject of the clause, takes the role of the Goal (or Medium in ergative model) instead of the Actor (or Agent in ergative model) of the Process. The Actor or the Agent is usually hidden in the context. 1. 我上堂课被抽到(做口译练习)了 (Erica, 14-10-24) In the last class I was chosen (to do interpretation exercises) 2. 然后课后又被作业压得不行 (Leslie, 15-11-24) then after class (I) was pressed heavily by homework B. Actor/Agent (Others) + operative material Process + Goal (narrator) In this pattern, the narrator, as the Goal of the Process, is in the object position of the clause, while other entities, playing the role of the Actor and the Agent, are in the subject position.

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3. 大三特别是专业课压得你喘不过气来 (Leslie, 15-11-24) in Year 3 the major courses in particular press you out of breath 4. 因为从小我爹哋一直都逼得比较严 (Blair, 16-3-29) because from childhood my dad has always been pushing me C. Actor/Agent (narrator) + operative material Process (verbs in negation, expressing “inactivity” or “failure”) 5. 我从高中过后就没自己举手主动回答问题 (Erica, 15-10-17) since senior high school I have never raised my hand and answered questions voluntarily 6. 我可能不会非常主动跟外国人交流这个样子 (Vivian, 15-10-17) I probably would not communicate with foreigners very voluntarily D. Actor/Medium (narrator) + operative material Process Although the narrator plays the role of Actor in the operative material Process, s/he is not the Agent. The narrator is only the Medium though whom the Process is carried out. There is a hidden external Agent that enforces the Process. In the following examples, the hidden Agents are those people in power, including teachers, mentors, and interviewers. 7. 很多时候要赶作业 (Leslie, 15-10-17) very often (I) have to rush my homework 8. 你必须要考试 (Tang, 14-06-27) you have to take exams 5.2.3.2

Mental Process

• Cognitive mental Process E. Senser (narrator) + cognitive Process (negative verbs expressing “not knowing”, “confusion”, “maladjustment”) + Phenomenon 我到现在都还不知道我该怎么去学高英课 (Erica, 14-10-24) I have never known how to learn the Advanced English Course 10. 到现在还适应不了高英课 (Erica, 14-10-24) I have never got adapted to the Advanced English Course 9.

• Desiderative mental Process F. Senser (narrator) + desiderative Process (negative verbs expressing “lack of”) + Phenomenon (positive mentality) 11. 已经对自己的英语学习没有任何期待了 (Hunter, 14-06-27) (I) have already no expectations for my English learning now

5.2 Constructing a Low Level of Agency

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12. 我就会慢慢放松对自己的要求 (Erica, 15-10-17) I would slowly loosen the requirements for myself • Emotive mental Process G. Senser (narrator) + emotive Process + Phenomenon (negative emotions or mentality) 13. 我没有激情也没有兴趣去做这样的事儿(提问) (Vivian, 14-10-24) I had neither passion nor interest to do this (asking questions) 14. 我现在已经对这门课完全很失望 (Erica, 15-11-24) I am now completely disappointed with this course • Perceptive mental Process H. Senser (narrator) + perceptive Process + Phenomenon (negative perceptions such as difficulties, helplessness, doubts, no improvement or use) 15. 觉得有种被课推着走的感觉 (Leslie, 15-10-17) (I) have a feeling of being pushed by courses 16. 我经常怀疑我自己的能力 (Erica, 15-10-17) I often doubt my ability 5.2.3.3

Relational Process

• Attributive relational Process I. Carrier (narrator) + attributive Process + Attributes (negative ones such as “incapability”, “powerlessness” or “inferiority”) 17. 我自己口语好弱 (Leslie, 15-10-17) my spoken English is rather weak 18. 上了大学以后的学习能力已经是直线下降了 (Erica, 15-10-17) my learning ability after entering university has been dropping vertically J. Carrier (others) + attributive Process + Attributes (positive ones such as “competence”, “controlling” or “superiority”) 19. 广外的人英语好厉害呀 (Maxim, 14-06-27) People in GW are awesome in speaking English 20. 甚至他们比我说的还能更好 (Erica, 15-10-17) they are able to speak even better than me K. Carrier (narrator) + Process (verbs in negation) + Attributes (positive possessions such as “benefits”, “improvement”, “advantage”, “opportunities”, “time”, etc.)

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21. 有时还没会没有时间做作业 (Leslie, 15-10-17) sometime (I) even don’t have time to do homework 22. 大学四年没有对英语有太多的主动性 (Vivian, 16-06-22) during four years in university I have not much initiative • Identifying relational Process L. Token (related to English learning) + identifying Process + Value (negative) 23. 对于我来说, 来广外学英语本身就是一个错误的选择 (Erica, 14-10-24) for me, coming to GW to study English was a wrong choice in itself 24. 跟外国人交流是一件特别困难的事情 (Harper, 15-10-17) communicating with foreigners is a particularly difficult matter 5.2.3.4

Behavioral Process

M. Behavior (narrator) + behavioral Process (behaviors unbeneficial for narrator’s English learning) 25. 我不怎么看英文的书和电影的 (Leslie, 13-09-03) I seldom read English books or watch English movies 26. (有一段时间一看英语)就犯困 (Vivian, 14-10-24) (for some time as soon as I read English) I would get sleepy 5.2.3.5

Verbal Process

N. Sayer (narrator) + verbal Process (negative verbs) 27. 我讲得不是很好啊 (Hunter, 14-06-27) I don’t speak (English) well 28. (一般都是老师抽我,) 然后我就“呵。 。 。 。” (Erica, 15-10-17) (usually it’s that the teacher chose me,) and I “err…” 5.2.3.6

Existential Process

O. Existence (powerful entities around narrator) + existential Process 29. 外面会英语的人一大把 (Erica, 15-10-17) outside there are a great deal of people capable of English 30. 有时候上课周围发言声此起彼伏 (Erica, 13-09-03) sometimes in the class (my classmates’) voices arose and subsided (around me) P. Existence (narrator’s freedom or power) + existential Process (verbs in negation)

5.3 Blending High and Low Levels of Agency

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31. 根本没有时间让你去做那些 (Vivian, 15-10-17) there is no time at all for you to do those things 32. 也没有逃课的机会 (Erica, 13-09-03) there was no chance for skipping class

5.3 Blending High and Low Levels of Agency During data analyses, a mixed level of agency has been found in a small proportion of clauses. This type of clauses does not construct a purely high or low level of agency. Instead, opposite levels of agency are presented in different parts of the clause, and the overall agency level of the clause seems to be “neutralized”. For this reason, this type of clauses is also labeled “neutral” in terms of agency level in data interpretation. There are various ways to blend high and low levels of agency into a single clause. The first way is to juxtapose a positive and a negative Participant or Process verb in a clause. 1. 这几年的英语学习真的是让我欢喜让我忧 (Blair, 16-3-29) English learning in these years both delights and depresses me 2. 面试也是对英语学习的一种压力和动力 (Hunter, 14-06-27) interview, to English learning, is both a pressure and a motivation In the emotive mental clause /1/, there are two verbs in the Process. The verb “delight” constructs a high level of agency while the other verb “depress” presents the opposite. Two levels of agency are blended in the clause, creating agency fluctuations and implying that the journey of English learning is full of ups and downs. In the identifying relational clause /2/, the Token “interview” has two Values: “pressure” and “motivation”. The former is a negative Value, delivering a sense of compulsion and thus constructing a low agency level. The latter Value, on the contrary, is positive conveying a sense of enthusiasm and thus constructing a high agency level. The two levels of agency are mixed and thus the clause is neutralized. The second way to blend high and low levels of agency is that the Process verb or Participant itself simultaneously embodies high and low agency levels. 3. (但是我认为作为一个大四的, 我是他们的师姐,)我是有责任, 就是站出来 (Harper, 15-10-17) I have the responsibility to stand out 4. 逼都要逼住自己学落去先咁样样 (Blair, 16-3-29) (I) force myself to go on learning In the attributive relational clause /3/, the Attribute “responsibility to stand out” embodies two levels of agency at the same time. The sense of duty indicates a low agency level, but the narrator’s action of offering herself constructs a high agency level.

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In the transformative material clause /4/, the Actor and the Goal is the same person—the narrator herself. This creates double meanings. First, the narrator is forced to learn, which presents a low level of agency. Second, it is not any external entity that forces the narrator to learn, but the narrator herself. By placing the narrator as the Actor of the Process, a high level of agency is constructed too. The third way to blend high and low levels of agency in a single clause is to take an active Process but a passive Circumstance, including passive purpose as in clause /5/ and /6/ and passive manner as in clause /7/ and /8/. 5. 我为了去完成某个任务就是要去接触英语 (Vivian, 15-11-24) I need to get in touch with English in order to complete a certain task 6. 只能是为了完成那个作业去找那些文章 (Harper, 15-11-24) (I) looked for those articles only for the purpose of finishing the homework Clause /4/ and /5/ are both material and are similar in their ways to achieve a mixed level of agency. Their material Process verbs, “to get in touch with English” and “to look for those articles”, are active, hence constructing a high level of agency. However, the purposes of the Processes, “in order to complete a certain task” and “only for the purpose of finishing the homework”, imply a sort of obligation, which reduce the degree of agency to a certain degree. 7. 偶尔看一下英语的电影 (Vivian, 15-11-24) (I) watch English movies occasionally 8. 有些时候顺便学一下它的某些地道的表达 (Vivian, 15-11-24) (I) sometimes learn some idiomatic expressions incidentally In clause /7/ & /8/, the Processes verbs themselves create a high degree of agency as the narrators initiate acts of English learning. However, the adverbs “occasionally” and “incidentally” bring the agency level down by indicating that the narrators are actually not exerting their best efforts in doing so. The fourth way is to moderate the degree of agency by negation or exception.

我不会挑那种很难的句子, 很难的文章来练 (Harper, 15-11-24) I would not choose those very difficult sentences or articles for practice 10. 除了考试没有其他东西能够激励我去学英语 (Erica, 15-10-17) nothing else but examinations can stimulate me to learn English 9.

Clause /9/ is a material one with the narrator as the Actor/Agent. The clause, if without the negation, would be very high in agency. The negation does not turn the clause into the opposite level, i.e., a low level of agency. It only lowers the degree of high level, while still maintaining some degree of agency. Clause /10/ is a mental one with the narrator as the Sensor. The clause would be very low in agency if without the exception. It is because of the exception that the low level of agency has been somehow lifted, thus maintaining some degree of agency.

5.4 Discussion: Identity Making and Agency Construction

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5.4 Discussion: Identity Making and Agency Construction So far we have investigated how a high, low and a neutral level of agency is constructed in individual clauses. Through the clause-by-clause analyses and interpretations of Hunter’s and Erica’s excerpts, we can see that when constructing different levels of agency in different clauses, the learners have positioned themselves in different identities. When they utter the clause, the identity is made and the agency level is constructed. In Hunter’ story-telling, he constructed multiple identities as he produced successive clauses. Sometimes he identified himself as an enthusiastic and good player of table tennis, as in clauses “I like playing table tennis”, “later I often went there to play (table tennis)”, “because I played better than ordinary foreigners”, “I also taught them to play table tennis”. Sometimes he identified himself as a voluntary learner of English, as in clauses “(I) was very delighted to learn English”, “I would check the dictionary (how an action was described in English)”, “that period of time should be the most pleasant and most rewarding (when I learn English)”. Because his table tennis skill was acknowledged and admired among the foreign students, Hunter enjoyed playing and communicating with them and felt the need to improve his English level. The identity of a good player of table tennis resulted in the identity of a voluntary learner of English, and together they constructed an active role and a high level of agency for both playing table tennis and learning English. However, Hunter also underwent identity struggling as we can find contradictory identities constructed in the discourse. Sometimes he identified himself as an inferior speaker of English as in clauses such as “(although the English that many black people Indians speak) was very different from the English in our Listening Class”, “sometimes (I) needed to ask them to repeat”, “they were very considerate for us”. Sometimes he positioned himself as a competent speaker of English as in clauses “(what they spoke) was usually very simple English”, “(perhaps the vocabulary we had learned) already supported us to express some daily usage”, “to speak in front of foreigners is much easier than in front of Chinese”. These two identities were contrary to each other, causing Hunter to construct opposite levels of agency. Erica also performed multiple identities in her account. Different from Hunter’s case, her identities were concordant and coherent throughout the discourse. There was the identity of “an addle head”, as in clauses like “(I) hadn’t completely recovered from the life with excessive assignments in the third year in senior high school“, “while (I) was muddling along”, “(I) had to ask before every class (in which classroom we had class)”. There was the identity of “a failed adapter”, as in clauses like “(I sincerely felt that I) could not accommodate (to the university life)”, “(I) had a strong sense of helplessness in time management”, “(I) didn’t know what to do”. There was the identity of “a small potato”, as in clauses like “so very often (I) didn’t felt the existence of a science student”, “(I felt) I was smaller than a grain”. There was the identity of “a freedom loser”, as in clauses like “university (life) is not as free as in imagination”, “there was no chance for skipping (class)”. There was also the identity of “a passive follower”, as in clauses like “I observed my classmates

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around every day”, “and then (I) followed suit everywhere”. These unisonous selfidentifications were constructed alternatively in the discourse, and worked together to push Erica towards the world-to-person direction of the agency continuum. As a result, in her narration Erica constructed a low-agency profile in an uninfluential and powerless position. More identities of the English-majors in their story-worlds can be found from other excerpts and clauses. For example, Tony labeled himself as a participator, a learner and a mediator in Excerpt 2. Leslie conceptualized herself as a cheer-leader and optimist in Excerpt 3 but a time-tracer and a freedom loser in Excerpt 10. Maxim regarded himself as an elementary English learner and a bold speaker of English in Excerpt 4. Harper identified herself as a diligent English learner and practitioner in Excerpt 5. Blair positioned herself as a proficient English speaker and a friendmaker in Excerpt 6, but a poor examinee in Excerpt 12. Vivian positioned herself as an elder student and a self-skeptic in Excerpt 8. Erica conceptualized herself as a passive learner in Excerpt 9 and an inferior job candidate in Excerpt 11. Apart from actual identities, there were also imagined identities in the learners’ narration. Leslie’s imagined identity of a business woman pushed her to take the BEC test. Erica’s imagined identity of a student studying abroad engaged her in preparing for IELTS. Vivian’s imagined identity of a postgraduate drove her to prepare for the postgraduate entrance exam. Blair wanted to live abroad in the future. Her imagined identity of an overseas Chinese urged her to improve her spoken English. These imagined identities were as impactful as the actual ones upon the learners’ construction of agency in their narratives. Through data analyses and interpretations, it has been found that narrators with positive identities normally employ transitivity patterns that construct a high level of agency. For example, they tended to assume the roles of Actor and Agent in operative material clauses so as to build an active and initiative role in the Process. They used words to express willingness, pleasure, confidence and intentions in mental clauses so as to construct enthusiastic, happy, confident and hopeful roles. Moreover, they used favorable Attributes more frequently in making relational clauses so as to construct a positive and enjoyable world around them. On the other hand, with negative identities the narrators were more likely to pick transitivity patterns that construct a low level of agency. For instance, they normally placed themselves in the roles of Goal and Medium and others in the roles of Actor and Agent in material clauses, so that they appeared more passive and reluctant in the Process. They would like to take negative Phenomenon in mental clauses so as to express a sense of obligation, disappointment, disinterest, regrets, etc. Besides, they were inclined to assign positive Attributes to others, but negative ones to themselves and things in relational clauses. Consequently they portrayed other people as superior, competent and controlling, but themselves as inferior, weak and helpless, and also made things as difficult and boring. Furthermore, they used more negations in the clauses so as to create self-denial and self-incredulous images. In short, learners’ identity positionings would exert important influence on their discursive choice during the narration of their learning stories. With different transitivity

5.5 Summary

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patterns in the clause configuration, the learners construct high, low or neutral levels of agency.

5.5 Summary In this chapter, we have answered the first research question by extracting transitivity patterns that construct different levels of agency in individual clauses of different Process types. It has been found that in material clauses, Actor/Agent (narrator) + operative Process is the dominant pattern to construct a high level of agency, while Goal/Medium (narrator) + receptive Process and Actor/Agent (Others) + operative Process + Goal (narrator) are two major ways to construct a low level of agency. In mental clauses, the pattern Senser (narrator) + Process (positive) + Phenomenon or Senser (narrator) + Process + Phenomenon (positive) produces high agency, while Senser (narrator) + Process (negative) + Phenomenon or Senser (narrator) + Process + Phenomenon (negative) brings about low agency. In relational clauses, Carrier (narrator) + attributive Process + Attributes (positive) or Token (English learning) + identifying Process + Value (positive) are high, while Carrier (narrator) + attributive Process + Attributes (negative), Carrier (others) + attributive Process + Attributes (positive) or Token (English learning) + identifying Process + Value (negative) are low. The agency level of the clause can be also “neutralized” when a high and a low level of agency are blended within a single clause. This kind of neutral level can be achieved with different patterns too, such as active Process with passive Circumstances. It is via different transitivity patterns that the learners construct different levels of agency in individual clauses in the narration of their learning stories. Data interpretations have shown that agency construction via transitivity patterns results from the narrator’s identity positioning. Diverse identities, either actual or imagined, are performed when the English-majors tell of their English learning experience. Positive identities usually contribute to high levels of agency, while negative identities to low levels of agency.

Chapter 6

Agency Navigation

The pervious chapter has examined agency construction at clausal level. This chapter is endeavored to explore agency navigation at discoursal level, which includes two sub-levels: intra-discoursal and cross-discoursal. The first section is devoted to answer the second research question about how the English-majors navigate among different levels of agency within one narrative discourse. Various LS relations between adjacent clauses to alter or maintain the level of agency are summarized at the end of the section. The second section deals with agency navigation across narrative discourses in varied situations. Through qualitative analyses focusing on learner identities and structural factors that mediate agency fluctuation, this section provides answers to the third and the fourth research questions about how and why the English-majors navigate their agency dilemma across narrative discourses in different situations. Finally I discuss the relation between identity transformation and agency navigation by English-majors in the narration of their learning stories.

6.1 Intra-discoursal Navigation In telling of their English learning experience, very often a narrator creates ups and downs of agency level in one single discourse. In this section, some excerpts with obvious fluctuations of agency will be selected for demonstration. As in the previous chapter, one excerpt is analyzed in details to show how the agency navigation within the discourse is achieved by LS relations between adjacent clauses. Then from more narrative data, the LS relations used to turn up, turn down and maintain the agency level will be categorized respectively.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_6

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6.1.1 Vivian’s Desire Vivian comes from Chongqing, a municipality in southeast China. She is the only child in her family. She is a very active and out-going girl and good at dancing. As soon as she entered GW, she was admitted into the Dancing Team of the university. Since then she was often busy with training or rehearsals for various dancing performances. And she also worked part time in the League Committee of the university and helped with the organization of all kinds of students’ activities. In the eyes of her counselor, teachers and classmates, she was an energetic girl and active in joining extra-curricular activities. At the time of the interview in June, 2014, she was towards the end of her second year in university, and just participated in a drama contest. The drama contest has been an annual event in the English Faculty for over ten years. As one of the four traditional contests in the faculty, it initially enrolled only the third-year students. In recently years it has becoming more and more significant and influential on campus and students are getting more and more enthusiastic about it. A small number of active and talented second-year students can also take part in it, either on the forestage or on the backstage. Vivian was one of them. In the interview, Vivian talked about the contest. She was eager to join this event. According to her, she wanted to gain some experiences from the contest so that she could fully display her talent in the same event next year. She wanted to play a leading role, but to her disappointment, she got a minor role to play in the drama. However, this experience still had a significant impact on Vivian. Excerpt 13 (Vivian, 2014-06-12) 我最近参加了6月6日的戏剧大赛, 戏剧大赛, 我们也知道, 是英文学院的传统赛事。我 觉得作为英文学院的同学嘛, 也应该······我本身都比较喜欢参加这些活动, 所以说我 也报名参加了。在这次大赛当中, 虽然我只是一名演员, 群众演员的身份参加到其中, 但是每一场, 每一场的排练都必须去参加。当初的话, 我面试的是一个主演, 但是因为 毕竟是针对大三同学的赛事, 所以说他们的主演基本上都是大三的, 然后那个导演最 终把我安排到一个群众演员的角色。当初我也有其他事, 然后我想既然不能演主要的 角色, 其实去演群众演员也没有什么关系, 只要不要占我太多时间, 因为那段时间我也 比较忙。但是, 真正进去之后我觉得, 它确实会占用很多时间, 这不是重点, 重点是我 收获了很多。他们剧组的核心成员对我影响很深, 特别是那个导演, 他是一个很有魄 力的人。剧本是编剧根据沙翁的经典剧本改编, 我通看了一遍剧本, 真的是很羡慕, 真 的是很钦佩他们, 能够把英语真的是当作自己的一种工具。觉得她们很厉害, 觉得我 能达到她们的高度就很满足了。我进去之后很大的改变就是, 在我看来, 英语不是学 习上的负担。能把英语学好, 当作我自己能够游刃有余使用的一种工具, 对于我来说 是一件幸福的事。我越来越喜欢英语了。 English Translation of Excerpt 13 I took part in the drama contest on June 6. The drama contest, as we all know, is a traditional event in the English Faculty. I think, as (I am) a student in the faculty, (I) should … I myself like participating in these activities. Therefore I entered my name for it. During this contest, although I was just an actress, and (I) participated in it as a minor role, but each, each rehearsal had to be attended. Originally, what I interviewed for is a leading role, but after all (it) is a contest for third-year students, so the leading actors and actresses are generally the juniors. Then the director finally assigned me to a minor role. At that time I also have another engagement, so I thought, as (I was) unable to play a leading role, (being arranged) to play a minor role had not much bearing in fact, as long as it wouldn’t take up too much

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of my time, since I was quite busy at that time. However, after I really got in, I felt that it did take up much time. This is not the point. The point is I have gained a lot. The core members of the crew have influenced me deeply, especially the director. He is an enterprising person. The script is, the adapters adapted (the script) from the classical Shakespeare’s play. I read through the script. (I) really envy (them). (I) really admire them. They are able take English as a tool of their own. I think they are awesome. I think, if I am able to reach their level, (I) would be content. After I got in, a great change in me is, as I view it, English leaning is not a burden. (If I)am able to master English, and take it as a tool that I am able to use skillfully, for me (it) is happiness. I like English better and better.

6.1.1.1

Logico-semantic Analysis Between Clauses

It should be noted in the first place that logico-semantic (LS) analysis in this study is not independent. Rather, it is based on and always applied after transitivity analysis, through which the agency level for each clause has been determined. Then LS analysis is applied to Excerpt 13 (see Table C3 in Appendix C). First, all the clauses in excerpt are listed in the second column. Then they are clustered into clause-complexes in the first column according to the topic-relatedness of the neighboring clauses. A clue to help grouping is the transitional markers linking the clauses. Clauses within a complex are highly logically interdependent, and this interdependency is normally shown by explicit signals (Thompson, 2008: 196). Another clue comes from the punctuation of the transcription. According to Thompson (2008: 196), “…In written language, we can typically equate the graphological sentences with clause complexes.” For the reason, the clauses that are combined into a Chinese sentence (marked with a Chinese period at the end) are regarded as belonging to the same complex. Then the LS relation (see Figure 3 and Table 2 in Appendix B) for every successive pair of clauses (nexus) in each clause complex is identified in the third column. The first clause in each complex is not assigned any relation as it is considered as topically distant from the preceding clause and it starts a new complex. Finally in the fourth column, the agency level (H for high, L for low, N for neutral) that has been settled by previous transitivity analysis (omitted here) is attached to each clause, so that it will be more expedient to examine how agency fluctuations are achieved by LS relations between clauses. In expert 13 there are altogether 52 clauses, which are grouped into 13 clause complexes. There are 39 nexuses (pairs of adjacent clauses) that have gone through LS relation analysis. We can examine the allocation of different LS relations by occurring frequency (see Fig. 6.1). The figure shows that the text is developed primarily by the LS relation of ‘enhancement’ and secondly by ‘projection’.

6.1.1.2

Agency Fluctuations via Logico-semantic Relations

Transitivity analysis to Excerpt 13 has specified that there are 16 clauses at high agency level, 22 clauses at low agency level, and 14 clauses being neutral. The agency fluctuations can be visualized by the following line chart (see Fig. 6.2).

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expansion LS Relation

elaboration

p e

extension

add

enhancement projection

15%

clar adv

temp

r

15%

m reas

idea

result

cond

39%

31%

fact

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10111213141516

N = 39 nexuses p=exposition, e=exemplification, clar=clarification, add=addictive, adv=adversative, r=replacive, temp=temporal, m=manner, reas=reason, cond=condition Fig. 6.1 Frequencies of different LS relations in Excerpt 13

High Neutral

A

B

C

D

E

F

G

H I

J

K

L

M

Low Phase I

Phase II

Phase III

Fig. 6.2 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 13

From the line chart we can perceive three distinct phases in this excerpt. Agency fluctuates quite violently during phase I from clause complex //A// to //F// (clause /1//29/), in which Vivian talked about why she took part in the drama contest, how come she played a minor role, and how she consoled herself into accepting the minor role. Then agency keeps at a relatively low level in phase II from //G// to the earlier part of //J// (clause /30/-/40/), in which Vivian talked about how she felt after becoming a member of the cast. In the last phase, by contrast, agency turns up from the latter part of //J// to //M// (clause /41/-/52/) in which Vivian expressed her desires for English learning. • Phase I—ups and downs The excerpt starts from clause /1/ with high agency, which is an operative material Process with “I” as the agent. Then through the LS relation of ‘clarification’, /1/ is followed by /2/, which is interrupted and projected by /3/ as a reported idea. In these two clauses, Vivian explains that English drama is a traditional event of the English Faculty as it is known to all, and accordingly the agency of the utterance turns neutral. The first agency turn occurs in clause complex //B//. When Vivian talked about why she participated in the drama contest, she first used the verb “should” in clause

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/6/, which is a desiderative mental Process. The verb implies that it is “my” duty to take part in this event, something desirable or expected from “me” as an Englishmajor. By using the verb, Vivian puts herself in an obliged position without much freedom of choice. Clause /6/ is introduced by the LS relation of ‘result’, as a consequence of /5/. This means the obligation is caused by the identity of being an Englishmajor in the English Faculty. However, Vivian doesn’t continue her words. She stops after the verb “should”, and initiates a new clause /7/ with another verb “like”, which is an emotive mental Process. The verb “like” suggests speaker’s preference or wish for activities such as the contest. By using this verb, Vivian constructed herself a voluntary role with high agency. She did it simply because she liked it. She enjoyed this kind of activities. There’s neither obligation nor compulsion. Clause /7/ follows /6/ by the LS relation of ‘replacive’, and it is by replacing the passive “should” with the active “like” that the speaker directly switched from a low-agency role to a highagency role. And this high agency continues into /8/ by the LS relation of ‘result’. Out of her intrinsic and spontaneous feeling of “like”, Vivian entered her name for the contest voluntarily. In the next clause complex //C//, agency navigates from neutral in /10/ to low in /11/ by the LS relation of ‘adversative’. Although Vivian participated in the contest of her own accord, she felt obliged to show up for each rehearsal, especially as a minor role. It seems that once she was in, she lost her freedom. This has been further proved in //D//, in which agency navigates from high in /12/ all the way to low in /16/. Vivian wanted to play a leading role in the drama, and it was a leading role that she interviewed for. By the LS relation of ‘adversative’, she explains that the leading roles are usually taken by third-year students because the contest is primarily a third-year event. By the LS relation of ‘temporal: later’, Vivian introduces the final passive settlement in /16/: she was assigned to a minor role by the director at last, in which a low-agency role is constructed. In clause complex //E//, Vivian talks about how she consoled herself into accepting the minor role. She was also actively engaged in other activities at that time /17/, so by a LS relation of ‘condition: negative’, Vivian says it doesn’t matter /21/ to be arranged to play a minor role/20/ as long as it would not take up too much of her time/22/. Accordingly, agency keeps low or neutral all the way through the clauses. //F// is another cause complex with agency turns. Vivian navigates her agency dilemma by a ‘temporal: later’ relation, from actively joining in the contest to being occupied by it unwillingly. However, by an ‘adversative’ relation Vivian immediately ‘adds’ that “this is not the point”. She continues to ‘clarifies’ “the point” in /28/, and then the last clause /29/ becomes the climax in this phase, in which agency increases by ‘projecting’ what “the point” is: “I have gained a lot”, which is highly agentive. • Phase II—remaining down This phase begins with a low agency clause /30/ to elaborate the contest’s influence on the speaker. By ‘exemplification’, Vivian singled out the director in /31/ and in order to clarify /31/, she described the director as an enterprising person in /32/. So Vivian keeps agency low as she presents others as “impressive” and “influential” to

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her. Clause complex //H// is a neutral one, as Vivian ‘projects’ a fact that the script is adapted from the classic Shakespeare’s play by the adapters. Then in //I//, Vivian expresses her admiration for the script adapters, by ‘adding’ two mental Processes “envy” in /36/ and “admire” in /37/, and giving her ‘reason’ in /38/ to keep the low agency role. And this low agency continues into the earlier part of //J//. With the same technique, Vivian keeps constructing a low self-image by ‘projecting’ her feeling that “they are awesome” in /40/. • Phase III—turning up Things begin to change in the latter part of //J//. In ‘addition’ to feeling that the script adapters are awesome/40/, Vivian thinks that if she could reach their level/42/, she would be content/43/. Vivian constructs a high agency role in her imagined world as discussed in Sect. 5.1.2, and this high agency is boosted up by the LS relation of ‘condition: positive’. The following clause complexes continue this high agency. With a ‘temporal: later’ relation, Vivian ‘projects’ /46/ a significant conceptual change in her /45/ after she joined the cast /44/: English is not a burden /47/. In the next clause complex//L//, Vivian tells us what happiness is for her. A high agency role is built again in Vivian’s imagination by employing the LS relation of ‘condition: positive’ again: “if I am able to master English” /48/, then “for me (it) is happiness” /51/. Vivian also ‘elaborates’ by ‘exposition’ and ‘clarification’ that ‘to master English” means “to take it as a tool /49/ that I am able to use skillfully /50/”, which are all agentive clauses. The last clause complex //M// consists of just one clause, which is an emotive mental Process in which Vivian constructs a high agency role: she likes English better and better /52/. This is the end of Vivian’s story, with her gains from participating in the drama contest.

6.1.2 Ambivalent Voices In the previous section, with Vivian’s story we have examined clause by clause how agency fluctuations at intra-discoursal level are achieved by LS relation analysis. In this section, we are going to look at a few more stories, in which narrators express their ambivalence in English learning, causing agency fluctuations throughout the discourse (Fig. 6.3).

High Neutral

1

5

10

Low Fig. 6.3 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 14

15

20

25

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Excerpt 14 (Blair, 16-03-29) 之前有一次国际会议, 嗰时係喺学校入边选志愿者, 一开始我冇乜希望, 后尾我觉得 好神奇, 居然入咗。跟住到正式会议嗰阵时, 我哋因为人数唔多, 叫做所谓志愿者, 其 实乜嘢都做囖。跟住就一切就从会务开始, 会务布置同埋翻译一起。我嗰阵时係专门 负责一个叫阿塞拜疆嘅领事, 从头到尾我觉得, 从我接佢开始, 到一路完成成个任务嘅 陪同, 即係可以无障碍咁沟通嘅时候, 我自己都好有成就感。所以我就觉得, 喱个时候 我自己啲英文真係有哋作用。嗰晚最后结束有个所谓嘅酬谢 party, 跟住我觉得, 哇, 真係觉得, 喱个英文, 可以带到我一个好高嘅平台, 真係好少机会能够同到啲咁高层 嘅人接触, 我觉得带咗俾你一个好嘅结果之后就觉得要更加好。 There was an international conference/1N/. (They) chose volunteers in our university /2N/. At first I had little expectation /3L/. Later I felt unbelievable /4H/ that I was chosen /5N/. When it came to the formal meeting /6N/, because we were not in larger number /7N/, as so-called volunteers, we had to do everything /8L/. Then everything began from conference affairs, conference arrangement and interpretation all together /9N/. At that time I was responsible for an Azeri consulate /10N/. From the beginning to the end, I felt /11N/, starting from my picking him up /12N/, all the way to completing the whole mission /13N/, (we) could communicate without barriers /14H/. I myself had a sense of achievement /15H/. Therefore I feel /16N/, that in this occasion my English is useful indeed /17H/. On the last night, there was a reciprocal party /18N/. Then I felt /19N/, wow, (I) really felt /20N/ that the English language could bring me to a high platform /21H/. There were very few chances to be in touch with people in such high ranks /22N/. I felt /23N/ that after it brought you a good result /24H/, (you) expected the better /25H/.

In this excerpt, Blair describes her experience of using English to serve an international conference, in which her agency level went all the way up after initial fluctuations. At first, as a college student Blair didn’t get her hopes up for being a volunteer in the conference. Her agency rose by the LS relation ‘enhancing:temporal:later’ from /3/ to /4/ as it turned out that she was in. After engaged with the conference affairs, Blair found herself as odd-job worker who had to do everything because they were short of hands. With the relation of ‘enhancing:cause:result’ from /7/ to /8/, her agency went down, but soon it went up again with ‘enhancing:cause:same time’ from /13/ to /14/ as Blair found herself as a barrier-free communicator when assisting the Azeri consulate. Then with a sequence of mental clauses in which Blair expresses her feelings towards the English language using the LS relation ‘projection:idea’, she identifies herself as a beneficiary of English learning and keeps turning up the agency level in the rest of the excerpt (Fig. 6.4).

High Neutral

1

5

Low Fig. 6.4 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 15

10

13

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High Neutral

1

5

10

15

Low Fig. 6.5 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 16

Excerpt 15 (Vivian, 14-10-24) 之前上那些课的时候我都不喜欢提问, 我觉得没意思啊, 基本上问的那些问题都一样 的, 都是一个板子, 老师的答案我也都差不多知道, 我没有激情也没有兴趣去做这样的 事儿。但是英国概况老师她会问一些问题, 我真的想回答, 想和她进行一种交流。上课 我都有问她问题, 因为我真的想知道答案。 In the past when I took those courses /1N/, I didn’t like asking questions /2L/. I felt it uninteresting /3L/. Basically the questions asked /4N/ were the same /5N/. They were from the same model /6N/, and the teachers’ answers I could almost know /7L/. I had neither the passion nor the interest to do such things /8L/. But the teacher of the course of Survey of Britain, she would ask some questions /9N/, and I really wanted to answer /10H/, and had a kind of communication with her /11H/. In the class I asked her questions /12H/, because I really want to get the answer /13H/.

In this excerpt Vivian makes a contrast between her initiative of questioning in different courses. In the first half, she constructs a low level of agency by mental Process to express her lack of interest in some courses. Employing the LS relation of ‘enhancing:cause:reason’ from /2/ to /3/ and ‘enhancing:cause:result’ from /7/ to /8/, Vivian maintains a low agency level by performing the role of an apathetic learner in the class who didn’t have the inclination for questioning teachers. Then with the relation of ‘extending:addition:adversative’ from /8/ to /9/ and /10/, Vivian repositions herself as an interested student who would like to have communications with the teacher in the course of “Survey of Britain”. The agency level maintains high in the second half of the excerpt through the relation of ‘elaborating:exposition’ from /10/ to /11/ and ‘enhancing:cause:reason’ from /12/ to /13/ (Fig. 6.5). Excerpt 16 (Erica, 15-10-17) 然后每次考试, 如果对答案的话, 我都觉得我阅读做得好烂。过后, 刚好那段时间想考 雅思, 然后觉得我首先要准备好阅读那一块, 可能也就只有那段时间会格外地去抓紧 时间提高阅读能力。但是过后可能没有考试, 我就会慢慢放松对自己的要求。大三这 一整年, 我特别愿意花时间在笔译里面。我在做作业的时候, 一个词我不懂, 我可能会 拓展到它用在不同行业里的不同意思。我可能会很愿意去学习。 Every time I took an exam /1N/, if I checked the answer /2N/, I always found /3N/ I did very badly in the reading part /4L/. Then later, I planned to take the IELTS /5H/, so I felt /6N/ I need to prepare well for the reading part first /7H/. It was possibly only in that period of time /8N/ that I would grasp time to improve my reading comprehension /9H/. But later, probably because there was no exam /10N/, I would gradually ease up on myself /11L/. During the third year, I was especially willing to spend time on translation /12H/. When I was doing homework, a word I don’t understand /13N/, I might get to know its different meanings in other lines /14H/. I could be very willing to learn /15H/.

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High Neutral

1

5

10

12

Low Fig. 6.6 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 17

This excerpt presents a contrast of learner agency in the training of different skills. Erica positions herself as a poor reader of English at a low level of agency. With the relation ‘temporal:later’ from /4/ to /5/ and from /9/ to /10/, her agency is first boosted and then reduced because of the presence and absence of exams. In contrast, Erica identifies herself as an active learner of translation at a high level of agency. Through the relation of ‘extending:addition:additive’ from /14/ to /15/, she maintains the high level by repeating and emphasizing her willingness to make efforts on translation drilling (Fig. 6.6). Excerpt 17 (Hunter, 14-06-27) 面试也是对英语学习的一种压力和动力。大四之前我一向都很少说英语, 对英语没有 兴趣。但是, 英语专业出去的面试必须要用到英语。大四是我大学四年讲英语讲得最 多的时候了, 我的口语在大四也有了提高。虽然讲得还不是很流利, 但是对我自己来 讲我已经满意了。面试给人压力, 它会逼你去学。 Interview, to English learning, is both a pressure and a motivation /1N/. Before Year 4, I seldom spoke English /2L/. I didn’t have interest in English /3L/. However, when Englishmajors take interviews /4N/, they have to use English /5L/. The fourth year is the period /6N/ that I speak most English during the four years in university /7H/. My spoken English has got improved in Year 4 /8H/. Although I still don’t speak very fluently /9L/, I am content for myself /10H/. Interview gives people pressure /11L/. It will force you to learn /12L/.

In this excerpt Hunter describes his changes in English speaking as a consequence of job interviews. He identifies himself as a reluctant English speaker before going for the interviews in Year 4. He carries on a low level of agency from /2/ to /3/ with the LS relation of ‘enhancing:cause:reason’ by stating that he seldom spoke English because he was not interested in it. Then he repositions himself as a frequent English speaker in Year 4. He carries on a high level of agency from /7/ to /8/ with ‘enhancing:cause:result’ by indicating that as he spoke much more English, his proficiency got improved. Then Hunter turns the agency level up from /9/ to /10/ by the relation ‘enhancing:condition:concessive’ to emphasize he was content about himself in spite of not a fluent English speaker yet (Fig. 6.7). Excerpt 18 (Vivian, female, senior, 15-11-24) 感觉我这个月和英语接触的就是作业, 就是老师布置的翻译作业。虽然自己有时间, 我也不知道为什么不愿意把时间花在英语学习上面。英语是我本身不会去花, 或者不 愿意主动去花什么时间去学习的, 但是当我为了去完成某个任务, 就是要去接触英语, 我在那个过程当中还是挺快乐的, 比如说做那些作业呀。

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High Neutral

1

5

10

14

Low Fig. 6.7 Agency fluctuations in Excerpt 18

I feel /1N/ that the only contact I have with English /2L/ /is homework /3N/. It is the translation homework /4N/ assigned by the teacher /5N/. Although I have time /6H/, I don’t know /7N/ why I am not willing to spend time on English learning /8L/. English is (something) I would not spend /9L/ or be unwilling to spend time voluntarily to study /10L/. But when I, in order to complete a certain task /11H/, make contact with English /12H/, I am quite happy during that process /13H/, for example, doing the homework /14H/.

Vivian expresses her ambivalence towards English learning in this excerpt. With the relation ‘enhancing:condition:concessive’ from /6/ to /7/and /8/, she constructs a low level of agency by stating that she didn’t want to spend time on English although she had time. And this low level of agency retains through ‘elaborating:exposition’ from /8/ to /9/, and ‘extending:alternation’ from /9/ to /10/ by restating in different ways her unwillingness in learning English. Then with the relation of ‘extending:addition:adversative’ from /10/ to /11/, Vivian turns up the agency level by identifying herself as a task lover, who liked to use English to fulfill tasks. By positioning herself as a happy learner when completing the tasks, she keeps the agency up with ‘enhancing:temporal:same time” from /12/ to /13/. The example of homework carries on the high agency level by ‘elaborating:exemplification’ from /13/ to /14/.

6.1.3 Logico-semantic Navigations of Agency We can see from the above stories that agency level is rarely constant throughout a narrative discourse. Sometimes it switches from high to low, sometimes from low to high, and sometimes remains almost the same across a number of clauses. What kinds of LS relations are there between clauses to make this happen? We are now going to summarize these relations by different trends of agency navigation. For each LS relation, one or two nexuses will be provided as examples.

6.1.3.1

Turning Agency Up

An upward trend of agency navigation includes agency level turning from low to neutral (L → N), from low to high (L → H) and from neutral to high (N → H).

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• Expansion system In the expansion system, four types of LS relations have been found to turn agency up. A. extending: addition: adversative 1. 虽然大部分的时候我都听不懂, 但还是会每天坚持听新闻。(Harper, 14-0612) although most of the time I couldn’t understand /L/ → but I still insisted listening to the news /H/ B. extending: variation: subtractive 2. (英语是我本身)不愿意主动去花什么时间去学习的, 但是当我为了去完成 某个任务 (Vivian, 15-11-24) (English is something I would) be unwilling to spend time voluntarily to study /L/ → but when I, in order to complete a certain task /H/ C. extending: variation: replacive 3. 我觉得作为英文学院的同学嘛, 也应该······我本身都比较喜欢参加这些活 动 (Vivian, 2014-06-12) (I think, as (I am)a student in the English Faculty,) (I) should …/L/ → I myself like participating in these activities /H/ D. enhancing: temporal: later 4. 开始的时候我觉得没什么意思, 后来渐渐喜欢上了这门课 (Leslie, 13-0903) initially I found it uninteresting /L/ → later (I) gradually came to like this course /H/ The first type of relation is ‘adversative’, in which the subsequent clause runs counter to the previous one. In the first clause of Example 1, Harper said that the English news was too difficult for her to understand. This is an expression of incapability, which indicates a low level of agency. In spite of the incomprehension, Harper said in the second clause that she kept on listening to the English news. Her endeavor reveals a high level of agency in English learning. With the Chinese linguistic markers “虽然” (meaning “although”) and “但是” (meaning “but”), which imply a “P and conversely Q” relation, the narrator has turned the agency up to a high level. The second relation is ‘subtractive’, in which the subsequent clause indicates an exception to the situation stated in previous clause. In Example 2, Vivian expressed her unwillingness in spending time in learning English in the previous clause, which represents a low level of agency. In the subsequent clause, however, she mentions an exceptional occasion, i.e., when there was a task to complete, in which she would devote time to English learning. Here the agency level is turned up with the “P but not all P” relation. The third type is ‘replacive’, in which the subsequent clause rectifies the previous one by adding a corrected statement. In Example 3, Vivian first used the word

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“should” to imply obligation, a low level of agency, in participating in the activities, but before she finished the statement, she corrected the word and replaced it with another word “like”, which represents a high level of agency out of intrinsic fondness. Thereafter the agency level has been turned up with the “not P but Q” relation. The fourth type is a temporal relation in the ‘enhancing’ category, referring a ‘later’ happening. In Example 4, the first clause presents a low level of agency by Leslie saying that she had no interest in the course. However, in the second clause she told of a contrary situation that she came to like the course, which is an indication of high level of agency. The two clauses are connected by the temporal marker “later” and the agency turn is realized by the “P and subsequently Q” relation, which means a change has taken place as time goes by. • Projection system The up-turning of the agency level occurs in all the three types of projection relation: idea, locution and fact. A. idea 5. 在我看来, 英语不是学习上的负担 (Vivian, 14-06-12) as I view it /N/ → English leaning is not a burden /H/ 6. 所以希望自己每天都是积极向上 (Leslie, 13-09-03) so (I) hope /N/ → I will be positive every day /H/ B. locution 7. 我就会跟自己说, “这没有什么大不了的” (Harper, 15-10-17) I will say to myself /N/ → “this is not a big deal” /H/ 8. 每节课前都得问在哪个课室上课 (Erica, 13-09-03) (I) had to ask before every class /L/ → in which classroom (we) had class /N/ C. fact 9. 重点是我收获了很多 (Vivian, 14-06-12) the point is /N/ → I have gained a lot /H/ 10. 上了大四以后一个很大的转变就是, 我不再为学习而学习 (Vivian, 14-0612) a great change in me in the fourth year is /N/ → that I no longer study for the sake of study /H/ In idea projection, the mental clauses in Examples 5 and 6 are both neutral, but the ideas are positive. Hence the agency turns up as the idea projected. In locution projection, Example 7 is similar to 5 and 6 in that the verbal clause is neutral while the projected locution is high at agency level. Example 8 is different. Erica was so muddle-headed that she had to ask before every class which classroom to have class. The verbal clause reveals a kind of confusion, so it is low at agency, while the projected locution, the question itself, is neutral. Hence the agency level turns up from low to neutral with the projection relation. In fact projection, the two Examples

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9 and 10 are both identifying relational clause. With the neutral “be” as the Process verb, the first clauses are consequently neutral. The second clauses in both examples are positive statements, so agency turns up as the facts are projected.

6.1.3.2

Turning Agency Down

A downward trend of agency navigation includes agency level turning from high to neutral (H → N), from high to low (H → L) and from neutral to low (N → L). • Expansion system In the expansion system, two types of relations have been found to turn agency down. A. extending: addition: adversative 11. 群众演员的身份参加到其中, 但是每一场, 每一场的排练都必须去参加 and (I) participated in it as a minor role /N/ → but each, each rehearsal had to be attended /L/ 12. 有很多想参加的活动从预期的参与者变成了旁观者 (Harper, 13-07-31) (there were many activities that) I wanted to participate in /H/ → (but) I turned from a prospective player to an onlooker /L/ B. enhancing: condition: concessive 13. 我点样考, 都考唔到太好咁样样 (Blair, 16-03-29) no matter how I try /H/ → I will not achieve a high score /L/ 14. 我点样复习, 好似cecl咁样, 都好似上唔到去 (Blair, 16-03-29) no matter how I prepare /H/, such as for CECL → the scores seem unable to be higher /L/ The first type is ‘adversative’, the subsequent clause stating in contrary to the previous clause. In Example 11, the first clause is neutral as it blends both high and low levels of agency. The material Process of “participation” is active, but the manner “as a minor role” is passive, as the role is assigned by the director to Vivian, which she was unwilling to accept. With the blending of active and passive elements in the same clause, this clause is “neutral”. In the subsequent clause, however, the agency gets down with the linguistic marker “但是” (meaning “but”). Despite the minor role, Vivian was still required to take part in each rehearsal. She expressed a low level of agency with a kind of obligation here. In Example 12, Harper constructed a high degree of agency in the first clause, as she showed her strong desire to participate in many activities. However, things went by contraries. Due to reasons of some kind, she could only be an onlooker. The second clause is running against the first one, and the agency level turns down dramatically with the “P and conversely Q” relation. The second type of relation is ‘concessive’ in the category of condition, one of the sub-types of enhancing relation. In this relation, the first clause is a concessive condition, and the second clause is an unfulfilled expectation. In Examples 13 and 14, Blair said even if she tried very hard and prepared very well, she could not achieve high scores in the exams. The first clauses are both high at agency level, although they

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are just assumptive. The second clauses are low because they have revealed Blair’s frustration in English learning. The results are always contrary what she expected. Thus the agency level is turned down with the “if P then contrary to expectation Q” relation. • Projection system The down-turning of the agency level also occurs in all the three types of projection relation. A. idea 15. 我觉得它确实会占用很多时间 (Vivian, 14-06-12) I felt /N/ → that it did take up much time /L/ 16. 真心觉得无从适应 (Erica, 13-09-03) (I) sincerely felt /N/ → that (I) could not accommodate (to the university life) /L/ B. locution 17. 有时候问他(笔译老师)为什么这样子 (Tony, 14-10-24) sometimes I will ask him (the teacher of translation course) /H/ → why it is (translated) in this way /N/ 18. 如果我跟他们说”我讲的不是很好啊” (Hunter, 14-06-27) if I said to them /N/ → “I don’t speak (English) well” /L/ C. fact 19. 之后我的变化就是不再参加任何的英语比赛 (Tang, 14-06-27) afterwards a change in me was /N/ → that I didn’t participate in English contests anymore /L/ 20. 一般都是老师抽我(回答问题) (Erica, 14-10-24) generally it was /N/ → that the teacher chose me (to answer questions) /L/ In all the above examples Except 17, the first clauses are neutral at agency level, as the Process verbs are all neutral (the mental Process verb “feel” in Examples 15 and 16, the verbal Process verb “say” in Example 18, and the identifying relational Process verb “be” in Example 19 and 20). The second clauses all present a low level of agency, because as projected ideas, locution, and fact, they construct a passive role for the narrators in one way or another. Example 17 is different. The agency level goes from high to neutral in the nexus. The first clause is high at agency level because Tony took the initiative to ask the teacher questions, which shows he was very eager to learn. The question itself, as projected locution, is neutral.

6.1.3.3

Maintaining Agency Level

Agency level may carry through a couple of clauses without obvious fluctuations. Compared with agency turns, more LS relations are found to maintain the agency level.

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• Expansion system A. elaborating: exposition 21. 能把英语学好, 当作(我自己能够游刃有余使用的)一种工具 (Vivian, 14-0612) (if I) am able to master English /H/ → and take it as a tool /H/ (that I am able to use skillfully) 22. 我现在已经对这门课完全很失望, 它跟我预期的完全不一样 (Erica, 15-1124) I am now completely disappointed with this course /L/→ it is totally different from my expectation /L/ Exposition is one kind of elaborating relation in the expansion system. In this relation, the subsequent clause gives further explanation to the previous clause, so the agency level remains the same. In Example 21, Vivian expressed her wish in the first clause that she hoped to be able to master English, which is high at agency. Then in the second and also the third clause Vivian explains what she means by mastering English— using it as a tool skillfully. This “P i.e. Q” relation of exposition keeps the agency at the same high level. In Example 22, Erica expressed her disappointment in the course in the first clause, and immediately in the succeeding clause she gives explanation, which inherits the low agency level from the preceding clause. B. elaborating: exemplification 23. 但是我在那个过程当中还是挺快乐的, 比如说做那些作业呀 (Vivian, 1511-24) I am quite happy during that process /H/ → for example, do the homework /H/ 24. 他们剧组的核心成员对我的影响很深, 特别是那个导演 (Vivian, 14-06-12) the core members of the crew have influenced me deeply /L/ → especially the director, especially the director (has influenced me deeply) /L/ Exemplification is another kind of elaborating relation, in which the second clause elaborates the first clause by giving an example. In Example 23, Vivian said she was happy during that process, and then to exemplify “that process”, she mentioned “doing the homework” with the linguistic marker “for example”. So the agency still remains the same in the exemplification. In Example 24, Vivian said she was influenced deeply by the core members of the crew. This is passivity represents a low level of agency. Then in the subsequent clause, Vivian mentioned a particular person—the director as an extreme example, as the director is most influential to her. With the “P e.g. Q” relation, the agency level keeps on in the nexus. C. elaborating: clarification 25. 特别是那个导演, 他是一个很有魄力的人 (Vivian, 14-06-12) especially the director (has influenced me deeply) /L/ → he is an enterprising person/L/ 26. 环境和他人对我的影响是很大的, 改变了我很多想法 (Harper, 13-07-31) the influence from the environment and other people on me is very huge /L/ → (they) have changed many of my ideas /L/

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The third type of elaborating relation is clarification, in which the first clause is elaborated by the second one in more precise and specific words. In Example 25 Vivian said the director influenced her most deeply in the first clause, and then in the subsequent clause, she clarified more specifically what type of person the director was. By constructing a capable and powerful role for the director, Vivian keeps herself in a low position. Thus the agency level also keeps low in the clarification. In Example 26, Harper stated that the environment and other people had a strong impact on her. This susceptibility indicates low agency, and it carries on into the next clause, in which Harper clarifies in what ways they had impact on her—changing her ideas. Thus agency level is maintained with the “P viz. Q” relation of elaboration. D. extending: addition: additive 27. 真的是很羡慕, 真的是很钦佩他们 (Vivian, 14-06-12) (I) really envy (them) /L/ → (I) really admire them/L/ 28. 改变了我很多想法, 扭曲了我对大学的美好印象 (Harper, 13-07-31) (they) have changed many of my ideas /L/ → distorted my favorable impression of university /L/ Besides ‘elaborating’, ‘extending’ relation is also found to maintain the agency level. There is the ‘additive’ relation under the category of addition. In Example 27, Vivian juxtaposed two clauses together by using the same syntactical structure while only changing the Process verbs (which are two near-synonyms) to emphasize her admiration for the script-editors. Therefore, her low level of position as well as agency has been advanced further with the relation of ‘additive’. In Example 28, Harper said many of her ideas had been changed, which reveals her helplessness and frustration. And this feeling is carried on in the subsequent clause which indicated that her favorable impression of university had been distorted too. The low level of agency is maintained through the “P and Q’ relation. E. extending: alternation 29. 英语是我本身不会去花, 或者不愿意主动去花什么时间去学习的 (Vivian, 15-11-24) English is (something) I would not spend /L/ → or be unwilling to spend time voluntarily to study /L/ Alternation is also one type of extending relation, in which either the first or the second clause is true. In Example 29, Vivian said she would not spend time on English learning in the first clause, and then in the second, she said she was unwilling to spend time voluntarily on English learning. These two physiological states sound similar and they both present a low level of agency. However, they have differences, and either of them is true in different occasions. The low level of agency was retained through the “P or Q” relation. F. enhancing: temporal: later 30. 带咗俾你一个好嘅结果之后就觉得要更加好 (Blair, 16-03-29) after it brought you a good result /H/ → (you) expected the better /H/

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31. 所以只能看看周围人, 然后各种邯郸学步 (Erica, 13-09-03) so (I) could only watch people around/L/ → and then (I) followed suit everywhere /L/ Temporal relation under the category of enhancing is also found in agency maintenance. In Example 30, Blair mentioned that her proficient oral English brought her benefits. Subsequently, she expected her English to be better. The two clauses both embody a high level of agency, and they are connected with the “P subsequently Q” relation by temporal linguistic marker “after”. In Example 31, Erica expressed her inactivity that instead of taking actions automatically, she could only watch people around her and then followed suit. The low level of agency is carried on from the first to the second clause through the “P subsequently Q” relation. G. enhancing: temporal: same time 32. 即係可以无障碍咁沟通嘅时候, 我自己都好有成就感 (Blair, 16-03-29) when (we) could communicate without barriers /H/ → I myself had a sense of achievement /H/ 33. 但当我意识到我已经不再是新生时, 自己好像就处在一种被动状态 (Vivian, 13-08-01) but when I realize that I am no longer a freshman /L/ → I seem to be situated in a passive state /L/ There is another temporal relation—same time, in which the second clause happens whenever the first clause takes place. In Example 32, Blair said she could communicate with foreigners without barriers, and at this time, she would have a sense of achievement. The high agency level is carried on with the “P meanwhile Q” relation. Example 33 is the same except the agency level maintained here is low. Vivian said she realized she was no longer a freshman, and at this time, she seemed to be put into a passive state. The first and the second clauses take place almost simultaneously and the agency level retains. H. enhancing: cause: reason 34. 我都不喜欢提问, 我觉得没意思啊 (Vivian, 14-10-24) I didn’t like asking questions /L/ → I felt it meaningless /L/ 35. (我现在还觉得)要不断的学习, 因为我依旧把学习放在第一位 (Tony, 1510-17) (I now still feel that I) need to keep on learning /H/ → because I still place study on the first position /H/ Under the category of ‘enhancing’ there is causal relation, which includes ‘cause’, ‘result’ and ‘purpose”. In Example 34, Vivian said in the first clause that she didn’t like asking questions in class, which is an indication of low agency and this low agency can find its course in the second clause, in which Vivian explains that she thought questioning is meaningless. The cause itself is also low at agency. In Example 35, Tony thought that he need to keep on learning in the first clause, and then gives the reason in the second clause—he still gave priority to learning. Both the clauses

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reveal a high degree of agency, and their connection is achieved by the “result P because Q” relation. I. enhancing: cause: result 36. 我本身都比较喜欢参加这些活动, 所以说我也报名参加了 (Vivian, 14-1024) I myself like participating in these activities /H/ → therefore I entered my name for (the contest) /H/ 37. 特别是在一所好的大学, 必然会有很多的强者, 这对我的影响是巨大的 (Harper, 13-07-31) especially in a good university, there must be many competent people /L/ → the influence of this was huge on me /L/ These are examples of ‘result’ relation. In Example 36, Vivian mentioned that she liked taking part in activities, which showed a high level of agency. And this high agency is the motivation for her participating in the drama contest mentioned in the second clause. Hence the high agency level is carried onto the “result” clause. In Example 37, Harper found that there were many competent people in a good university, and the consequence of this finding was a huge impact on her. This continuation of low level of agency is realized by the “because P so result Q” relation. J. enhancing: cause: purpose 38. 但是当我为了去完成某个任务, 就是要去接触英语 (Vivian, 15-11-24) but when I, in order to complete a certain task /H/ → make contact with English /H/ Example 38 is of ‘purpose’ relation. The first clause is an intention, which is to complete a certain task. The second clause is an action, which is to make contact with English. Both the intention and the action are high at agency level. With the linguistic marker “in order to”, the agency level is maintained with the “because intention P so action Q” relation. K. enhancing: condition: positive 39. 只要有机会去积累这种经验, 还是挺不错的。(Harper, 15-11-24) as long as there is chance to accumulate this kind of experience /H/ → it would be nice /H/ 40. 如果只是为了应付的话, 会觉得很无聊 (Tony, 15-11-24) if only for muddling through /L/ → (I) will feel bored /L/ ‘Condition’ is another type of ‘enhancing’ relation. It’s an imagined situation rather than real happenings. It could be a positive, negative or concessive assumption. Here are examples of ‘positive’ assumption. In the first clause of Example 39, Harper imagined a situation in which there were chances to accumulated experiences. Then in the second clause she commented that it would be nice. There two clauses are both high at agency level, connected with the ‘if P then Q’ relation. In Example 40, Tony thought that if he studies only for the purpose of muddling through, he would feel bored. We can see that the low level of agency in the condition stated in the first clause is sustained in the result stated in the second clause.

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• Projection system In the projection system, we also found examples of agency maintenance. That is to say, the projected idea, locution or facts carry the same level of agency as in the mental, verbal or relational Process. A. idea 41. 戏剧大赛, 我们都知道, 是英文学院的传统赛事 (Vivian, 14-06-12) the drama contest , as we all know /N/ → is a traditional event in the English Faculty /N/ 42. 我多么希望自己也可以像他们那样说一口流利的英语 (Leslie, how much I hope /H/ → I can speak fluent English like them /H/ In Example 41, the mental Process is neutral with the cognitive verb “know”. The projected idea, as a piece of fact that doesn’t involve any human agency, is also neutral. So the agency level retains with the projection of knowledge. In Example 42, the mental Process is high at agency level with the desiderative verb “hope”, and what is projected in the second clause is a positive aspiration, which also embodies a high level of agency. Therefore the two clauses are maintained at high level of agency with the projection of idea. B. locution 43. 每天都会信心满满地对自己说, 加油! (Leslie, 13-09-03) every day (I) will confidently say to myself /H/ → “go ahead!” /H/ 44. 有的时候我又会忍不住抱怨, 怎么那么多事情都堆到我的头上? (Leslie, 13-09-03) sometimes I couldn’t help complaining /L/ → why so many things were piled on my head? /L/ In Example 43, in spite of the neutral verb “say”, Leslie presented a high level of agency in the verbal Process with the adverb “confidently”. The locution “go ahead” is a self-encouragement, which is positive and active. With the projection of the locution, the high agency level has been carried on. In Example 44, the Process verb “complain” is negative, placing the verbal clause at a low level of agency. The locution is a rhetorical question, expressing discontent and depress. Thus the low level of agency is maintained very naturally through the locution projection. C. fact. 45. 剧本是编剧根据沙翁的经典剧本改编 (Vivian, 14-06-12) the script is /N/ →the adapters adapted(the script) from the classic Shakespeare’s play /N/ 46. 然后它又要求是广外的学生 (Harper, 15-10-17) and it required /N/ → that it should be a student in GW /N/ Examples 45 and 46 are both factual descriptions—one is about the script, and the other is about the recruitment. As usual, the identifying relational Process verb “be” is neutral, and the projected facts are neutral too. Hence, the agency level doesn’t change in the fact projection.

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6.2 Cross-Discoursal Navigation This section is going to investigate agency navigation at cross-discoursal level. We will look at what English learning experiences the participants had over four years in university, and how their agency and identities navigated their way in the narrations of their learning stories across time and space. Meanwhile, we try to discover the structural factors that mediate identity transformations and agency fluctuations in the learning trajectories of these English-majors. For this purpose, we need to go beyond text and dip into the context, and make clear what had happened to the learners and what were in their mind when they told the stories.

6.2.1 Harper’s Trajectory Harper, one of the participants, is selected for detailed case analysis and discussion. We now trace her English learning trajectory over four years in GW and see how her agency changed. Altogether 12 excerpts from the life-story interviews are chosen, with three excerpts at different periods in each year. After giving a coherent account of her 4-year experience in GW, we will analyze each excerpt to find out what identities Harper was assuming during the narration of her learning stories.

6.2.1.1

Harper’s Agency Fluctuations

Harper was 19 years old when she came to GW from a small county near Guangzhou. Before that she studied in the best middle school in the county, and did well in all subjects. Her scores on the subject of English were always among the top three in her grade, and because of this, as she said, she had a sense of achievement. With her dream to become a middle school teacher of English in the future, she was very excited to be enrolled by GW and became an English-major. Before entering the university, Harper was agentive and confident in her studies. After achieving a high score in the College Entrance Examination, she was even more self-recognized. People around her also thought highly of her and her parents gave her the right to act on her own, such as deciding which universities to apply for and what subject to major in. Finally, she chose GW to study English upon the advice from her middle school teachers. • Year 1 Harper’s high degree of agency continued into the beginning of her university life. She was active both in and after class. She studied English industriously, made friends enthusiastically, and vigorously applied for various students’ clubs and societies. This is how she described her mentality in the first interview.

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Excerpt 19 能来 GW 读大学, 我感到很骄傲很开心。作为 the English Faculty 的英语专业学生, 我 必须要把英语当作我的首要任务学好。当然, 在大学里面还要多学点其它东西, 我感 觉那些社团都挺有意思的, 好多都想试一下, 所以就报名了。我还主动去结识新朋友, 与他们交流。我要好好利用这大学四年, 不能虚度光阴。 That I can come to GW to study /1N/ I feel very proud and happy /2H/. As an English-major in the English Faculty, I must take English as my primary task /3H/ and learn it well /4H/. Of course, in university, (I) need to learn many other things /5H/. I feel /6N/ those clubs and societies are rather interesting /7H/. Many of them (I) would like to have a try /8H/, so I entered my name for them /9H/. I also take initiatives to make new friends /10H/, and communicate with them /11H/. I will make good use of these four years /12H/ and will not waste my time /13H/.

To Harper’s disappointment, however, most of her applications for the students’ clubs were unsuccessful because she couldn’t pass the interviews. She began to realize the fierce competition in the university, especially in a good university like GW. She expressed her disappointment in the second interview. Excerpt 20 这里有很多的强者, 这对我的影响是巨大的, 很多想参加的活动我从预期的参与者变 成了旁观者, 很多的憧憬都变成了泡影。环境和他人对我的影响是很大的, 改变了我 很多想法, 扭曲了我对大学的美好印象, 我成了不折不扣的受动者。 Here there are many excellent students /1L/. Its impact on me is huge /2L/. For many activities that I wanted to attend /3H/, from an expected participator I became an onlooker /4L/. Many of my expectations turned out to be just bubbles /5L/. The influence on me from the environment and other people is massive /6L/. They have changed many of my ideas /7L/, and distorted my beautiful impression of university /8L/. I have become a hundred-percent patient /9L/.

Not only applications for joining the students’ clubs but also English learning were not as smooth as Harper expected, either. The teaching styles and methods were unfamiliar. The courses proceeded very fast, and teachers’ requirements were more challenging compared with those in the middle school. Harper was not feeling good any more. She was most frustrated in the Pronunciation course and the Listening course. She was shocked to learn that her pronunciation of almost each consonant and vowel was wrong, and she could hardly understand the news in the Listening course. The failures in the club interviews also made her lose self-confidence in the English class. She became timid and reluctant to express herself or answer questions. And she was very nervous and shy when making a class presentation. She gradually felt hard to follow the courses, and didn’t know how to prepare for the exams and live up to teachers’ expectations. After a few months’ adaptation and adjustment, things became slightly better in the second term. Harper came to realize that she had aimed too high and expected too much, so she felt upset and lost. Now she had a better and clearer understanding of herself, and could make much more practical goals according to her capability. Towards the end of the first year, Harper gradually brought things in control again. She had a lot of plans for the coming summer vocation, and she believed she could make the best use of the vocation.

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Excerpt 21 我觉得自己现在就像是一个战士, 得到了一个休战的机会, 停了下来去审视自己。我 又开始有了很多新的想法与目标, 如在这个假期学车, 学点大二要学的西班牙语, 看英 文原版名著, 练口语。假期给了我一个缓冲的空间, 让我静下来思考, 自己到底拥有什 么, 真正需要什么, 缺了什么, 然后是补什么, 怎样去补。 I felt /1N/ myself now like a fighter /2H/, who has a chance to rest /3N/and examine myself /4H/. I begin to have new plans and goals again /5H/, such as learning driving in this vocation /6H/. I (also plan to) study Spanish /7H/ which I am supposed to learn in Year 2 /8N/, read original English novels /9H/, and practice oral English /10H/. The summer vacation gives me a buffer zone /11N/, and let me mediate /12H/ what I have /13N/, what I really need /14N/, what I lack /15N/ , what I need to make up /16H/ and how to make it up /17H/. • Year 2

After a good rest and a full preparation in the summer vocation, at the beginning of Year 2, Harper did quite well to adapt herself to new courses, new teaching styles, and new life rhythm. Excerpt 22 在课程方面最大的不同就是多了一门二外: 西班牙语, 能够修到自己想学的一门语言, 虽然是从零开始的, 我也很有热情和动力地去学, 并且感受到了其中的乐趣。阅读课 和听力课的教学模式与之前相比大有不同, 任务变得比较重, 特别是听力课, 而我都能 按时完成, 并且觉得时间还是比较充裕的, 可能跟协会和其它事情还没开始有关。 In terms of course the biggest difference is /1N/ that there is one more foreign language (to learn): Spanish /2N/. Being able to learn a language /3H/ I want to learn /4H/, although starting from zero /5L/, I have great enthusiasm and impetus to learn it /6H/, and feel the pleasure in it /7H/. The teaching modes of the Reading course and the Listening course are quite different /8N/ compared with the past /9N/. The tasks become heavier, especially the Listening course /10N/. I can finish (the tasks) on time though /11H/, and feel /12N/ time is still ample /13H/. (This) might be because/14N/ other things have not commenced /15N/.

This kind of good feeling didn’t last long, however. Soon Harper got promoted in her badminton club and became the director of the club. As there were fewer courses in the semester, she could spend more time in studying in the library. Besides, she began to plan for the development of the badminton club. However, things didn’t proceed as well as she expected. Excerpt 23 社团的工作开展得没有预期中的好, 导致我不得不花更多的时间和精力去解决面临 的种种问题, 时间也已由不得我去自由支配, 渐渐地扛起这个责任的压力也就越来越 大, 大到我甚至一度怀疑自己是不是应该放弃。而说到学习, 我觉得自己投入的时间 跟上半学期差不多, 但学习效率还是不太高。 The (badminton) club doesn’t progress as well as expected /1L/. (This) makes me have to spend more time and energy /2L/ to solve all kinds of problems /3H/. Time is no longer at my free disposal /4L/. Gradually the pressure to shoulder the responsibility /5H/ is greater and greater /6L/. (It is) even so great /7L/ that I once suspected /8L/ whether I should give up /9L/. As for study, I feel /10N/ that the time I devoted /11H/ is similar to that in the first half of the term /12N/, but my learning efficiency is still not very high /13L/.

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Harper did try to learn from other students’ learning methods, and she also tried to sum up her own learning strategies. Nevertheless, there were few that she felt effective and could insist on. Her greatest feeling in the second half of the semester was that she was always driven by time and forced to do all kinds of things, but the results often turned out unsatisfactory. In a flash, the second year was drawing to an end. Harper realized that things couldn’t go on like that anymore. At this moment, she had a new understanding towards study. Excerpt 24 准备期末考, 觉得要收心了。学习的比重增加了很多。学习的感受和以前不一样。学 习不单单是应付考试, 对自己今后的人生同样也会有挺重要的影响。现在更多的是关 注, 例如我读一篇文章, 我不仅仅会想它会不会涉及到考试内容, 而是想是不是能拓宽 我的知识面之类的。学习也可以是一件很快乐的事。 The final exam is coming /1N/. (I) feel /2N/ that (I) need to bring my mind back /3H/. The proportion of studies increases a lot /4H/. Feelings about study are not the same as before /5N/. Study is not only for exams /6H/. (It) also has important influence on my future life /7H/. What (I do) more now /8N/ is close attention /9H/. For example, (when) I read an article /10H/, I not only think /11N/ whether it will be involved in the exam /12N/, but whether it will broaden my horizon /13H/. Study can be a pleasure /14H/. • Year 3

In the third year, the English-majors began to take specialized courses. Harper needed to spend more efforts on study. However, as usual, her efforts were not paid off. She seemed to get lost again. Excerpt 25 时间过得好快, 我的大三已经开始一个月了。这个月没有达到我预期那样子, 我感到 有些失意。目前最大的困难就是赶上学习。随着专业课的增加, 要完成的工作量也随 着增加, 要花很多的时间。因为我缺乏计划和方法, 所以比其他同学要花更多的时间, 但却没有获得比他们更好的效果, 所以真的很难过。 Time passes very quickly /1N/. One month has passed in my third year in university /2N/. This month didn’t live up to my expectation /3L/. I feel upset /4L/. At the moment the biggest difficulty is to catch up in my study /5N/. With the adding of specialized courses /6N/, my workload to be fulfilled /7L/ also increases /8L/, on which (I) need spend a lot of time /9L/. Because I lack of plan and skill /10L/, I need to spend much more time than other fellow students /11L/, but I didn’t have better returns than them /12L/. So I am really sad /13L/.

This condition lasted for almost one term. Harper lost her impetus on study. In fact, she lost interest in almost everything. She looked in low spirits and remained silent all day. She just acted passively, until a “senior school brother” inspired her. Excerpt 26 最近, 我跟一个师兄聊了很多, 他对我最大的影响就是让我明白要想每天都快快乐乐 的, 就要坚持做好自己感兴趣的事。他曾问我: “你感兴趣的是什么?”我没有回答, 因为 我想到的都是太宽泛的。我的想法是, 既然没有, 何不在自己学习的专业上培养出那 种兴趣, 这样不是既是在做好了份内事, 又是在做自己感兴趣的事吗?一直以来, 我好 像过于把学习当成是责任, 而不是自己真正想要的, 所以才经常会觉得累, 没有动力。

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Recently I chatted a lot with a “senior school brother”/1N/. His deepest influence on me /2N/ is to make me understand /3N/, that if I want to be happy every day /4H/, I need to insist doing well in things /5H/ that I am interested in /6H/. He once asked me /7N/: “what are you interested in?”/8N/ I didn’t answer /9N/, as the answers I came up with /10N/ were all too general /11N/. An idea occurs to me /12N/, that as I don’t have (any specific interest now) /13L/, why don’t I develop interest out of my major /14H/? Will this be doing well what I am supposed to do /15H/, while doing what I am interested to do /16H/? In the past, I seemed to have been taking study as my duty, not as something I really want/17L/, so (I) often felt tired /18L/ and lacked of motivation /19L/.

After Harper had such an inspiration, she began to re-plan her life and her study again. She tried to convert English into her real interest, and learned all the courses wholeheartedly. Shortly afterwards, her days were given meaning and purpose again. In the meanwhile, Harper began to get some opportunities to use her English skills for work purpose. Excerpt 27 前几天一个在电池公司上班的朋友请我帮个忙, 帮她把几份合同翻译成英文。我答应 了, 而且没有接受任何报酬。我觉得朋友之间互相帮助是应该的, 何况做些翻译工作 可以提高我的英文水平, 何乐而不为呢?我上网查询那些专业词汇的翻译, 尽量不犯错 误而让我的朋友失望。虽然有时候我翻译得很累很烦, 但我告诉自己, 这是锻炼的好 机会。通过五天的努力, 我终于完成了任务, 交给朋友的时候, 他说: “我就说你一定能 做到!谢谢你的帮助。”虽然是短短几句话, 却给我了很大信心。 A few days ago a friend in a battery company asked me to do him a favor /1N/, helping him to translate some contracts into English /2N/. I agreed /3H/, without accepting any rewards /4H/. I think /5N/mutual assistance between friends is precisely fitting /6H/, not to mention /7N/ that doing some translation can improve my English level /8H/. Why don’t I do it /9H/? I searched the internet for the translations for those technical terms /10H/, trying my best /11H/ not to make any mistake /12H/ and let my friend down /13H/. Although sometimes I was tired and bored with translating job /14L/, I told myself /15N/, this is a good chance for practice /16H/. After five days’ hard work, I finally completed the task /17H/. When I handed (the translation) over to my friend /18N/, he said /19N/: (“I said you could make it! Thank you for your help.”) Although it’s just a few words /20N/, (they) gave me strong confidence /21H/. • Year 4

In the last year in GW, Harper was even busier than ever. Nevertheless, she still kept the director position in the badminton club. Excerpt 28 自己是大四的, 其他干事只是大二、大三那样子。当有一个留学生想了解一下我们协 会的情况的时候, 通常我们第一反应都是, 没有人敢跟他说, 因为不知道怎么用英语跟 他说。但是我认为作为一个大四的, 我是他们的师姐, 我是有责任, 就是站出来, 不论说 得好不好, 都是先说一下, 就让其他人补充那样子。就是一种责任咯, 我觉得。还是让 自己有那种胆量出来说。我作为那里面学得最久的都不敢说, 他们就更不敢说, 对不 对?他们会说 “师姐, 你去说吧”, 然后我说 “我不想去”, 然后就不好了, 对不对? I am a senior student /1H/, while other students are just sophomores or juniors /2N/. When a foreign student wants to learn about our club /3N/, usually our first reaction is /4N/ that none of us dare speak to him /5L/, because (we) don’t know how to say it in English /6L/.

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However, as a senior student, I am their “senior school sister” /7H/. I have the responsibility to stand out /8H/, no matter whether I say it well or not /9N/, I should say something /10H/, and let others to replenish /11N/. This is a kind of responsibility /12H/, I think /13N/. (I) need to have the guts to speak English /14H/. If I, as the one who learns English for the longest time /15N/, am afraid to speak /16L/, they are even more afraid, aren’t they /17N/? They will say /18N/: (“sister, you tell (him)”.) (If) I say /19N/ “I don’t want to”/20L/, it’s not right, isn’t it /21H/?

Apart from being occupied with her work in the badminton-club, Harper also had an internship as a teaching assistant in a private tutorial school. Her job was to provide help to the foreign teachers by doing miscellaneous collaborating work. Excerpt 29 那些外教有些是不怎么懂中文。然后我就通过把这个课的教案解释给他们听, 还有教 他们做材料的过程中, 我觉得口语也有锻炼到。而且我知道了我怎么表达他们会容易 点理解。而且我觉得自己胆子也大了很多。最近跟那些外国人接触也挺多, 这也算是 一种进步吧。其实那个不算是正式的工作, 但是我觉得只要有机会去积累这种经验, 还是挺不错的。 Some of those foreign teachers know little Chinese /1N/. Through my explaining the course plan to them /2H/, and teaching them to prepare materials /3H/, I felt /4N/ my spoken English has been practiced /5H/. Besides, I get to know /6N/ how I express myself /7H/ can make them understand more easily /8H/. Moreover, I feel more audacious /9H/. Recently I have frequent contacts with the foreigners /10H/, and this can be regarded as a progress for me /11H/. In fact, that is not an official job /12N/, but I think /13N/ as long as I have such chances to accumulate experience /14H/, that would be nice /15H/.

Harper finally got an official teaching position in that private tutorial school upon graduation. In the last interview at the end of four years in GW, Harper talked cheerfully about the TEM-8, a test of highest level for English-majors in China. She felt lucky and elated that she had passed it. She thought that was the best reward for all her efforts in English learning throughout these years. Excerpt 30 我寒假的时候就开始有意识地去准备专八, 但当时挺迷惘的, 不知道该怎么准备, 所以 就去问师姐, 师姐就把她的经验告诉我, 所以考前两个月去买那些模拟卷来做, 有回那 种以前备战高考的感觉, 真的很认真。考试之前, 我已经在脑海里模拟出一套那个做 题的顺序, 哪一个部分要花多少时间。看完之后还是非常紧张, 不知道结果会怎样。后 来知道自己通过了, 特别开心。 During the winter vocation I began to have the awareness to prepare for the TEM-8 /1H/. But I was confused at that time /2L/, not knowing how to prepare for it /3L/. Then I asked one “senior school sister” /4H/, and she told me her experience /5N/. So two months before the exam, I bought some mock exam papers for practice /6H/. I found the feeling of preparing for the college entrance examination back /7H/. I was really very conscientious /8H/. Before the exam, I have mimicked in my mind the procedure of doing the exam paper /9H/, allocating time for each section /10H/. After the exam, I was still nervous /11L/, having no idea of the result /12L/. Later when I knew /13N/ that I passed it /14N/, I was extremely happy /15H/.

Those are part of Harper’s stories over four years in GW, full of joy, bitterness and struggles. We can feel clearly the fluctuations of agency and see her growing along the process of English learning. After analyzing and interpreting each clause in all

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Table 6.1 General tendency of agency in Harper’s stories Excerpt

Total number of analyzed clauses

High level

Neutral level

Low level

General tendency of agency

19

13

11

2

0

High

20

9

1

0

8

Low

21

17

10

7

0

High

22

15

6

8

1

High

23

13

3

2

8

Low

24

14

8

6

0

High

25

13

0

4

9

Low

26

19

6

9

4

High

27

21

12

8

1

High

28

21

7

10

4

High

29

15

10

5

0

High

30

15

8

3

4

High

High Neutral

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

Low Year 1

Year 2

Year 3

Year 4

Fig. 6.8 Harper’s agency fluctuations across discourses

the 12 excerpts, we can calculate the number of clauses at high, low and neutral level of agency respectively. It should be noted that in any excerpt that includes quotations of others (e.g. Excerpt 30), the clauses in the quotations are left out for analyses, as what they reflect is others’ ideology instead of the narrator’s. Besides, as neutrallevel clauses don’t account much for the agency level of the discourse, we judge the general agency tendency for each excerpt mainly by comparing the numbers of high-level clauses with low-level clauses (see Table 6.1). The fluctuations of agency across the 12 excerpts are visualized by Fig. 6.8. From the line chart we can see that Harper started and ended both with high levels of agency over the four years, with frequent and violent fluctuations in between.

6.2.1.2

Harper’s Identity Transformation

We now study each excerpt closely, and with the clues from the follow-up interviews, we explore what identities and contextual factors were in play during Harper’s narrations.

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In Excerpt 19, Harper showed her excitement and ambition when she just started her university life. She explicitly positioned herself in two new identities. First, she was a college student in GW. Second, she was an English-major in the English Faculty. Since GW has been renowned for graduates with excellent English skills, and the English Faculty has been the oldest faculty in GW to bring up English-majors, Harper took pride in these new identities. Moreover, as English is still the most popular international language, Harper had great expectations for her future and was determined to devote herself in English learning. Harper also dreamt to be a versatile person and thought that English skill alone was not enough for future competition in the society, so she hoped to acquire more skills and enhance her abilities by joining various students’ clubs and societies in university. In Excerpt 20, Harper mentioned her failure in the interviews applying for joining the students’ clubs. Harper described other students as “strong”, and positioned them as winners of the interviews and participators of the activities. On the contrary, she defined herself as a loser and an on-looker. She lost her passion and her confidence because of the failures. She was changed into a “patient”, who was vulnerable to the influence from outside. This kind of self-identification came from her setbacks in fierce peer competitions. While others seemed so excellent and active, she had to be inferior and passive. In Excerpt 21, Harper was in a position for reflection and determination. She called herself a “fighter”. This self-identification gave her strength and courage. A fighter never gives up. A fighter is always striving for victory. So she made new plans and set up new goals. Harper also had an imagined identity in her mind—a multilingual in the future. As Spanish is another widely-used international language, she wanted to learn it by herself in advance. In the meanwhile, she didn’t forget that English was her major. Thus she planned to invest in both languages in the coming winter vocation. In Excerpt 22, Harper was at the starting point of a new academic year. Her enthusiasm and impetus in learning Spanish was aroused by her imagined identity– a potential multilingual. She dreamt to master at least two popular foreign languages, so that she could gain an edge in the fierce competition in the future society. She also mentioned the difference of the teaching modes and the heavier workload in the new term, but she could still keep things in control as a good time manager due to her positive learning attitudes. In Excerpt 23, Harper was provided with a new identity—the director of the badminton club. This new identity gave her a lot of responsibilities and pressures. She had to devote her energy and efforts to the well-being of the club. Although Harper claimed that she didn’t spend less time on English, she admitted that her learning efficiency had got little improved. In other words, she identified herself as an inefficient learner as she had always been. In Excerpt 24, Harper exhibited a new learning conception. She realized that she was not only a student, but more importantly, also a learner. A “student” means just doing homework and taking exams, while a “learner” is more than that. For a learner, reading an article is for knowledge, and study is for future life. With this

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new conception, Harper was more motivated in her study. She began to enjoy being a learner, not just being a student. In Excerpt 25, Harper was in difficult situation again. She invested a lot in English but gained little. She attributed her poor academic performance to her ineffective learning habits and methods. She felt more and more upset with her study, and became less and less confident in her aptitude. Her identity of an inefficient learner was consolidated. In Excerpt 26, Harper was at a turning point. She was helped out by a “senior school brother”. Enlightened by the conversation with him about “happiness” and “interest”, Harper was making a transition from a disinterested and dispirited student to a motivated and enthusiastic learner. In Excerpt 27, Harper told of her experience of doing translating work. In her narration, Harper defined herself firstly as a reliable friend. To her, a friend is always ready to help. So when her friend asked her for help, she accepted without hesitation. Secondly, she defined herself as a qualified translator. She tried her best to solve problems and overcome difficulties in translation. She wanted to prove her English competence through this opportunity. It was the dual identities—a reliable friend and a qualified translator—that drove Harper to put all her heart and soul into the translating work. In Excerpt 28, Harper told another story of using English, in which she was again performing duel identities. First, she was the director of the badminton club, which meant she was the primarily responsible person. Second, she was the only senior student in the club, which suggested she should be the most proficient English speaker. This sense of obligation and seniority compelled Harper to muster her courage to face the foreigners and answer their questions in English. In Excerpt 29, Harper became an intern, who had more chances to communicate with foreigners in English for work purpose. Being a teaching assistant, she helped the foreign teachers in every possible way. Harper had always been dreaming to become an English teacher in the future. This imagined identity also made her consider this internship as a step towards her dream-job and prompted her to spare no effort to work. In Excerpt 30, Harper resumed the identity of a university student. As an Englishmajor in GW, she was supposed to pass the TEM-8 and get the honorable certificate. The imagined identity of TEM-8 holder placed Harper in a highly agentive position, and impelled her to prepare for the exam more assiduously than ever. Throughout these 12 excerpts, we can see that Harper kept constructing and reconstructing distinctive identities under the influence of various structural factors. These identities and their mediating factors are outlined for a quick review in Table 6.2.

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Table 6.2 Harper’s identity transformation Excerpt Agency Identities

Structural factors

19

H

• College student in GW • English-major in the English Faculty • Potential versatile person

• GW as a cradle for graduates with excellent English skills • The English Faculty as the oldest faculty to bring up English-majors in GW • English as the most popular international language • Competitive society

20

L

• Loser • On-looker • Patient

• Peer competition

21

H

• “Fighter” • Potential Spanish-speaker • English-major

• Self-motivation • Spanish as another widely-used international language • English as the most popular international language

22

H

• Potential multilingual • Time-manager

• Spanish as another widely-used international language • Learning conception

23

L

• Director of the badminton club • Inefficient learner

• Social responsibility • Poor academic achievements

24

H

• Student • Learner

• Learning conception • Self-motivation • Poor academic achievements

25

L

• Inefficient learner

26

N

• Disinterested and dispirited student • Influence from others to motivated and enthusiastic learner

27

H

• Reliable friend • Qualified translator

• Social responsibility • Self-motivation

28

H

• Director of the badminton club • Senior student

• Social responsibility • Peer pressure

29

H

• Teaching assistant • Potential middle school teacher of English

• Work responsibility • Job expectation

30

H

• English-major in GW • TEM-8 holder

• National English tests

6.2.2 A Panorama Is Harper’s trajectory a patterned change or a random one? Are there any commonalities in her agency navigation shared among other English-majors? After analyzing all other participants’ data, certain common patterns of agency navigation have been found. At the same time, more identities of the English-majors and the structural factors that mediate their agency and identity navigation have come to surface.

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6.2.2.1

6 Agency Navigation

Common Patterns of Agency Navigation

Like Harper, most participants started their university life with a relatively high level of agency. They were thrilled to have realized the identity of being a university student which had only been an imagined one. Now they could experience the university life in person, for which they once had a lot of imaginations and expectations. Consequently they did everything with passion. Most of them showed respect for their teachers and had curiosity in every course. They also made resolutions and plans for their life. They studied hard and engaged themselves in all kinds of events actively. Therefore, the accounts of their learning stories in this period usually presented high levels of agency. After the initial thrills and activeness, most students experienced a “low” period in the first year. Some might experience it sooner (probably after one month, like Harper), some might later (probably after one semester, like Vivian). In this period, their feeling of freshness was gone. They had been familiar with their classmates and teachers. They knew how the courses ran and what were expected of them. At the same time, most of them came to realize that they were no longer conspicuous as they had been in the middle school. Compared with the past, their fellow students seemed more excellent; their teachers taught in different ways; their courses had more challenging requirements. They found their pervious learning methods no longer working and began to feel uncomfortable with their own performance. Meanwhile, the balance between study and extracurricular activities was broken because of excessive social engagements. They gradually lost their control and became anxious. As a result, most of the learning stories narrated in this period demonstrated low levels of agency, with different degrees of self-skepticism or self-denial. After this common period of confusion and depression, every student went through their own unique learning experience. Some students might re-adjust well and reboot their learning agency. For example, Tony quickly realized that study in university was no easier than in senior middle school. He found his listening comprehension and speaking ability were especially poor, so he kept practicing his pronunciation in the sports ground for three or four hours every week, took part in the English Corner (an event for practicing oral English with native speakers) every Friday evening, and persisted in speaking English with his roommates in the dormitory. In the later semesters, he also took numerous optional courses according to his interest, and actively attended academic lectures. All the way through the years in GW, Tony generally exhibited high learning autonomy and maintained a positive and optimistic attitude. Nevertheless, there were low times for Tony too. For example, in the third year when he found the Advanced English course didn’t live up to his expectation, he lost his interest and initiative in taking this course. Some students might continue to suffer from mal-adaptation and remained low in agency. For example, Erica didn’t like English at all. She came to GW and majored in English simply in obedience of her parents. She was interested in science subjects and dreamt to be a forensic expert. She felt the English courses boring and she couldn’t learn anything from them. As she said, she didn’t know what studying in GW was for. Through the years, she was unwilling to spend time on anything related to

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English. She killed her time on movies, songs, WeChat and micro-blogs. Her English learning stories were usually full of helplessness, passiveness and frustration. Despite a general low tendency of agency, there were moments that Erica was cheered. In an interview in the second year, she mentioned that her teacher of the writing course marked her assignments very carefully and gave her really encouraging remarks each time. Although the scores she got were not high, she felt deeply inspired and became more earnest in doing the writing assignment next time. As we can see from Tony’s and Erica’s examples, the learners inevitably experience ups and downs during their journey in university, even if their agency remains at a high or low level for most of the time. Towards graduation in the last year, most students tended to show a high level of agency again. This was largely due to their frequent use of English in their job interviews or in their internship. As Hunter said, “Interview is both a pressure and a motivation for English learning. Before Year 4, I seldom spoke English. I didn’t have interest in English. However, when English-majors take job interviews, they have to use English. The fourth year is the period that I speak most English during the four years in university. My spoken English has got improved. Although I still don’t speak very fluently, I am content for myself. Interview gives people pressure. It will force you to learn.” Because of the need of using English in job hunting or in actual work, students deeply felt the necessity and urgency of improving their English proficiency and therefore devoted themselves back into English learning before they ended their university life. As a consequence, their accounts of English learning experience usually reflected a high level of agency in the last days in university.

6.2.2.2

Learner Identities

The agency fluctuations in the English-majors’ narration of their English learning stories are accompanied by and as a result of identity transformations. The identities in which the English-majors keep positioning and repositioning themselves include both actual and imagined ones. • Actual identities The most prominent actual identities for the English-majors involve demographic, social, psychographic and behavioral identities. Demographic identities Demographic identities are self-profiles that the learners derive from their population features like age, gender, race, nationality, etc. This type of identities is relatively stable and constant. When Harper talked about how she overcame the setbacks in English learning, she assumed an adult identity. She said “I am not a child any more. I should be strong enough to endure agony and adversity. The difficulties in studies are not a big deal. I will never give up.” For Tang, being a man means being bold and fearless. He said “boys are more thick-skinned. I don’t care much about the face. I don’t want to lose a chance to practice my oral ability with any foreigner.” It was this

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gender identity that encouraged him to approach foreign strangers and communicate with them actively. Social identities Social identity is the learners’ sense of who they are based on their group membership. The learners have diversified ways to identify themselves in relation to others according to what they have in common, e.g. college students, English-majors, senior or junior students, and event- or work-related identities, etc. In Excerpt 16, Blair told of her working experience in the international conference. With the identity of an “allround volunteer” in the conference, Blair worked in every possible way for the Azeri consulate with her English skill and other abilities. In Excerpt 19, Hunter recalled his job hunting experience. He positioned himself in the identities of a “job-seeker” and “English-major” simultaneously, who had to use English in job interviews and who is supposed to over-perform other candidates in terms of English proficiency. These identities gave Hunter stronger imputes than ever to learn English and practice spoken English during that period of time. Psychographic identities Psychographic identities are the learners’ self-conceptualizations based on their psychological attributes, e.g. optimist vs. pessimist, competent vs. poor learner, winners vs. losers (in a figurative sense), etc. This type of identities is most unstable and inconstant and varies from situation to situation. For instance, Leslie conceptualized herself as a “confident and optimistic” person when she described her spirit at the beginning of the second year. She said “every day I confidently say to myself ‘go ahead!’. When I am unhappy or when I encounter unpleasant things, I will force the corners of my mouth to rise. I know that depression is always useless, so I hope I will be positive every day”. However, when it came to the end of the third year, Leslie became self-skeptical and self-denial because of her part-time job of teaching middle school students in a tutoring agent. She identified herself as an “unqualified tutor” in her accounts: “I always feel that I am not good enough. My English is not well-grounded. Sometimes I even don’t know how to do their grammar-related tasks. If I don’t have the answer, how can I teach them?” Behavioral identities Behavioral identities are the learners’ self-identifications according to features of their behavior or performance, e.g. diligent or efficient learner, active leader vs. passive follower, participator vs. on-looker, etc. For instance, in Excerpt 17 when Vivian talked about her communication with teachers in different courses, she switched between the opposite identities of “active communicator” and “noncommunicator”. These identities were brought about by varied teaching contents and styles in different courses, and led to Vivian’s distinctive performances in the class. In Excerpt 18, when Erica described her performance in fulfilling different tasks, she positioned herself in the identities of a “poor reader” as well as a “hard-working translator”. These identities resulted from her different aptitudes for reading and translating skills, and resulted in her different investments in the training of these skills.

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• Imagined identities Among the imagined identities, academic, profession and socio-cultural identities are found to be most impactful for the English-majors. Academic identities Academic identities are the appropriation of academic values and practices within a sense of self, reflecting the willingness and commitment to the practices of the academic community, e.g. postgraduate, overseas student, certificate-holder, etc. A certain level of English proficiency in speaking and writing is normally a threshold to this academic community. It is a universal goal for the English-majors to pass TEM8 in Year 4 and graduate with the certificate. For most of them, this test is given priority in the last semester, in spite of their miscellaneous social engagements in this period, such as taking internship, job-hunting, applying for studying abroad and so on. Erica said “the TEM-8 certificate is something that I must attain. Otherwise I have no difference from non-English-majors.” The imagined identity of a TEM-8 holder compels the students to drop their business temporally and prepare for it. Some students plan to continue their academic study after graduation and pursue for a master degree. Vivian was one of them. This imagined identity of a post-graduate drove her to prepare for the postgraduate entrance exam since she was in Year 3. “My family always wants me to become a postgraduate. They say I can find a better job with higher income with a master degree. I think they are right. So now I am still focused on my studies without looking for any job.” As the exam involves English proficiency test, Vivian never slackened her efforts in English learning. Professional identities Professional identities are the learners’ self-conception based on the way they performs a job or operates within a career field, e.g. teacher, translator, businessman, government official, etc. The second language proficiency is usually one of the prerequisites in fulfilling this type of identities. For example, Tang had been dreaming to become a pilot since childhood before going to university. However, this profession seemed beyond his reach after he was admitted to GW as an English-major. So in the second year Tang changed his job expectation. He wanted to find a Spanish-related job after graduation, being a fan of Spanish soccer team and fascinated by Spanish culture. He totally lost his interest in English at that time as he said “Spanish is more interesting. I am crazy about it. I spend all my time and try every means to learn Spanish. I even slipped into the classes for Spanish-majors in another faculty. I am bored whenever I see English now.” The imagined identity of a proficient Spanish speaker diverted his investment from English learning to Spanish learning. Life is full of surprises, however. Just before graduation Tang was recruited by the Xiamen Airlines Company to be a pilot-to-be. His long-cherished dream was about to be realized! He was going to be sent by the company to the United States to receive a one-year training course. “To become a pilot”, said Tang, “I must complete the course and pass the evaluations. All this will be instructed and administered in English. I need to make up English now.” It was the imagined professional identity of pilot that urged Tang to devote himself back into English learning.

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Socio-cultural identities Socio-cultural identities are the sense of belonging to a social or cultural group. It is related to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality or any kind of social group that has its own distinct culture, such as immigrant, multilingual, social elite, etc. This type of identities usually has a direct impact on learners attitudes towards the target language and the culture associated with it. For instance, Blair wanted to go abroad after graduation. “Many of my relatives live in Canada. They have told me a lot about their life. I am interested in their culture, and I’d like to experience the way they live and study there.” Her imagined identity of an overseas Chinese urged her to upgrade her spoken English to a higher and higher level.

6.2.2.3

Structural Factors

All sorts of identities of the English-majors, either actual or imagined, can trace their source in the structural context for their English learning. After the qualitative analyses of the reflective interview data, numerous structural factors have been excavated to account for the English-majors’ identity transformation and agency navigation. Following both Sewell (1992)’s theory of agency and structure and Gao (2013)’s explication of interaction between language learners and structural conditions, these factors are categorized into two aspects—schemas and resources, with each aspects at three layers—situation, setting and self . Schemas are virtual and intangible factors, while resources are material and actual ones. Situation refers to social, cultural, political and economic environment about language learning. Setting is the immediate conditions for language learning. It may refer to physical learning settings, cultural artifacts, material conditions and so on. It also encompasses social relationships between the learners and their teachers, peers, and friends. Self is individual factors, such as learners’ strategies, their willpower and capacity to act in and control the learning process. This is also where identities are located. • Schemas Situation It has been found at the situation layer that the changing status and use of English in mainland China today constitute the schemas that have major impacts on the agency of English learners. There are two dominating yet mutually competing master discourses related to the status and use of English. One master discourse is that English is at a decreasing status in mainland China. Senior students come back from the job fairs with the message to their juniors that very few working posts recruit English-majors. Even if they recruit English-majors, they also have other requirements, e.g. computer skills, communicative skills, organizing and managing abilities, or even relevant work experience. Possessing only English knowledge and skills can hardly meet the requirements of the jobs. Besides, many employers attach importance to the reputation and status of universities. “They only consider graduates from universities of the “985 program” or “211 program”, said the faculty secretary, “and this is unfair for our graduates, who are no worse

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than the students from those universities.” It is this market trends and orientation of social values that cause worries and anxieties to many English-majors in GW, which is not listed in either of the programs. Most of the students think learning English alone in four years in university is not worthy, since commanding only English skills upon graduation is not competitive enough. The natural reaction is that they take up a second major: accounting, laws, trade, etc. They strive for all kinds of certificates. They join various social activities with the aims to develop other abilities and accumulate “work experience”. All this leads to the decline of agency in learning English. In spite of its decreasing status in China, English is still the most popular international language. This is the other master discourse. As the native language of two super powers of the world, English is the language of pop culture, especially among the youth. Maxim said, “Many of us like to watch English movies and TV series, listen English pop songs, and follow the western fashion. We are fascinated by the pop culture and following closely the western living style”. What’s more, English is still the common language of IT field in the world. Tony said, “If you don’t know English, you can hardly follow the latest technology. All the advanced technology is accompanied by English specification, and the working language in international conferences and online exchange platforms is English.” Therefore, English is still the most popular international language, and this prompts the college students to command the English language. Under the influence of these two mutually competing factors, the identity of English-major could have different meanings for the learners. On one hand, they realize the necessity to grasp English and obtain the TEM-8 certificate. They may position themselves as potential proficient users of English and successful professionals on the world stage. On the other hand, they think mastering English alone is not enough. They may position themselves as a versatile person in the future, mastering multiple foreign languages and other professional knowledge and skills. As a result, they will balance their investment among the English courses and other courses. Setting Under the complicated situation, the learning setting seems to provide a favorable schema for English-majors in GW. Ever since its founding, GW has been a cradle for graduates with excellent English skills. GW developed from an institute of foreign languages and has been a leader in the field of language teaching and learning nationwide. With a history of 50 years, it has become an important base to cultivate foreign language talents for South China, and it is renowned for its graduates with excellent language skills. English language and literature has been appraised as a national key discipline by the state, so GW has always been laying stress on English teaching and learning. The English Faculty is the oldest faculty to bring up English-majors in GW. Studying hard is a tradition for English-majors in GW, especially in the English Faculty compared with those in other universities and other faculties. Students in the English Faculty have passed on a hard-working learning culture over years. This traditional discourse creates a

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favorable atmosphere for students in GW, especially in the English Faculty to keep up their agency in English learning. Self Interviews have shown that schemas affecting English-majors’ agency at the “self” layer include those visual and cultural “learner factors”. These factors will affect how much learners will devote themselves into English learning, and in what ways they are going to learn English. Learning conception and culture has been shaped over years in the learner’s education history. Early from primary and secondary education, the learner has formed conceptions about “study”, including why to study and how to study, under the influence of schooling and family education. These conceptions normally will continue into tertiary education. Besides, self-concept is also an influential schema. How the learner think about his or her English competence and performance will become an enablement or constraint for the learning process. A second factor is interest. Engagement with hobbies such as sports, music and arts will inevitably distract students’ time and energy, which otherwise can be spent on English learning. On the contrary, English-related interest can boost students’ agency in learning English. For example, Blair told me that she likes doing translation very much. She spent a lot of free time doing extra-curricular translation and frequently gave her work to her teacher for revision. Obviously the agency for doing this kind of exercises comes from her interest in translation. A third factor is motivation. Motivation, be it instrumental or integrative, is the driving force for English learning. Many English-majors want to work in the international companies with foreigners. Some plan to study abroad for higher degrees. Vivian wants to be a business woman. She desires to achieve success in everything and receive praise. She likes projecting herself by winning prizes of all sorts of contests, so she went for the dancing contest, the English drama contest, etc. We can see Vivian’s desires motivate her English learning on one hand, and hinder it on the other. Finally there are learners’ concerns. When Vivian was asked why she thought she “should” participate in the drama contest, she explained “because this is what I am supposed to do. If I don’t, people will say ‘hey, you are majoring in English. Why don’t you go for this?’” This kind of concerns of other’s expectations or opinions is another factor for Vivian to join in English-related activities. • Resources Situation Resources have an actual or material existence. They include the material and financial investment in English learning and teaching by the state. The national English tests also serve resources at this layer. TEM-4 (Test for English-majors band 4) and TEM-8 (Test for English-majors band 8) are two important proficiency tests for second- and fourth-year English-majors nationwide. The certificate of TEM8 represents the highest level of English skills in mainland China, and it used to be a prerequisite for English-majors to acquire the BA degree in GW. The senior

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participants mentioned in their interviews that many employers recruiting Englishmajors today still require the TEM-8 certificate together with the degree certificate. Therefore the certificates are still powerful driving force for English-majors. Setting Human beings are prone to being influenced by others. For English-majors, these “significant others” include family members, teachers and peers. They can serve as a source of power or an obstruction in the process of English learning. Parents’ conception about English learning and other abilities’ development has a direct impact on the agency of English learners, either positively or negatively. Parents have different expectations and requests for their children because of their conceptions. They may expect their children to be so skilled in English that they won’t have any difficulties in communicating with foreigners, reading English books, watching English movies, understanding English news broadcast. They may expect their children to study or work abroad after graduation. They may expect their children to master not only English, but also other knowledge and skills. They may ask their children to take a second major, or even to transfer to other majors. Family education also varies because of parents’ conceptions. Vivian told us, her parents entered her name for all sorts of activities and contests since she was a child. They always encouraged her to assert herself and improve herself through these opportunities. It is because of this tradition of family education that Vivian has actively engaged herself in numerous activities and contests in university, including the English drama contest that she mentioned in her narrative. And this is also the reason why she said “I myself like participating in activities like this.” In addition, family background has an indirect but important bearing on English learner agency. This background refers to the economic conditions, social status, and personal connections of the family. A strong and a weak family background are both possible to cause a learner to act passively in English learning. Under the former, the learner may feel lack of the need to study hard, since everything will be arranged by parents properly. Knowing that they are going to work for the family business or in a well-arranged job position, some students may slacken off since they don’t have the pressure from job hunting. Under the latter, students may think they will never be competitive no matter how hard they study since good jobs now are only available for those whose family has social power or personal connections. Teachers’ guidance and encouragement have a strong effect on students’ agency. Both the students and teachers in the interviews emphasized the important role of teachers’ feedback on students’ performance. Teachers found that students act more agentive when they give favorable comments to students’ performance in the class. However, for the jobs that they have labored to complete, simple and general acknowledgement and remarks are far from enough. Leslie said that she lost enthusiasm in writing compositions because the teacher always only marked “good” without more specific comments on her paper. According to Tony, the higher requirements the teachers have, the more agentive the students are. A student would feel more and more willing to spend efforts on the assignment when he spend more and more efforts

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on it. What’s more, the reputation of the professors or supervisors may also have a push to student’s learning agency. There is also the influence from peers. Top students are normally regarded as examples and competitors by others in the class. One will be spurred on by the desire to excel in the group and by the fear of lagging behind. When doing pair work or team work, one’s agency will be promoted if his or her partner(s) work hard and perform well. The attitudes and acts of peers in the class or out of the class create a favorable or sometimes non-favorable setting for English learning. Moreover, peers’ experience is also influential. Blair’s cousin was recently admitted to a postgraduate program in a well-known university in the US owing to her outstanding English proficiency. Blair felt greatly impelled by this and started to work harder on English. Tony told us a different story. He just learnt from the internet that a college graduate started a company and his company has achieved great success, but before that he was a “poor” student in college, doing badly at the major courses. Thus Tony began to doubt: “Do I really need to work hard on my major?” Apart from human recourses, there are non-human recourses at the setting layer. One of them is courses. Usually students have higher agency for the courses they choose voluntarily than for the compulsory courses being arranged for them. “But there are too many compulsory courses,” said Leslie, “We don’t have much free time for optional courses, so our learning passion has vanished.” Actually, no matter how many optional courses they take, students have to go through a four-year period before they can graduate from the university with a bachelor’s degree, as GW is currently running a 4-year set-course system rather than a credit system. Students are provided 3–5 compulsory courses every semester in the four years (except the last semester in which they don’t have any causes but have to finish writing their dissertation). This means students have to follow the prescribed order of the compulsory courses and there’s no way to shorten the length in university. And there’s influence from nonEnglish courses. Sometimes these courses may consume much time and energy of the learners and therefore affect their investment in English learning. Sometimes things are just opposite. Erica said, “The course of Website Designing is very difficult. And there’s no sense of achievement at all. After taking this course, I want to spend more of my time on English.” Other non-human recourses include English learning activities and facilities available. The more activities and the better facilities, the more favorable conditions and environment for English learning, the more encouraged and agentive the learners are. What’s more, an effective evaluation system of students’ academic performance is also helpful. If the test scores cannot differentiate the students’ efforts, their agency will definitely decrease. Furthermore, opportunities of internship may bring doubleedged effect. They may facilitate English learning process (if it is related to English) on one hand, and they may become one of the many distractions that hinder students’ English learning on the other hand. Self Resources at the “self ” level include those material and actual “learner factors”, such as learning objectives and habits. It is evident that students with clear and concrete

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Table 6.3 Structural factors mediating English-majors’ agency Structural factors Schemas

Resources

Situation

• English still as the most popular international language • English at a decreasing status in mainland China

• Governmental investment in English learning and teaching • National tests for English-majors

Setting

• Tradition and orientation of the faculty and university

• Family members, teachers and peers • Courses • Learning activities and facilities, evaluation system • Opportunities of internship

Self

• Personal learning conception and culture • Self-concept • Interest, motivation and concerns

• Personal learning objectives and habits • Individual capacity

learning objectives and good learning habits will have better control of their actions, while those with no purpose or bad habits will be less active in their learning. Learners’ capacity to control the learning process is also important. Leslie once said that she felt like being kidnapped in her studies. Although she knew she must study English hard and she really wanted to spend more efforts, there were too many distractions in her life that prevented her from doing so. A student with capacity to steer learning process can maintain the balance between English learning and other activities and grasp the initiative all the time. Table 6.3 has summarized the multifarious structural factors discussed above.

6.2.3 Online Learning Experience After we have examined the structural factors mediating English-majors’ agency, I would like to devote a section here to address learner agency in interactive online classes, because online instruction has become more and more common globally in recent years while the shift between offline class and online class is a significant transition at the setting layer in structure. With rapid innovations of cyber and mobile technology, online instruction has become an important direction for higher education development. Since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic at the end of 2019, all levels of education have been shifted from offline to online on a large scale in China, including English classes at college. In these open and virtual classrooms without supervision, what changes might have taken place to learner agency? How agentive are the students in interactive online classes as constructed in their telling of learning stories? What are the structural factors in interactive online classes and how do they affect learner agency?

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Transitivity analyses to the online-learning stories collected with the third group of participants have manifested a generally low level of agency. Qualitative analyses further revealed that learner agency has been largely suppressed by the network setting. Situated in leisurely and unconstrained home environment and faced with the emotionless and chilly computer screen, students who used to be active in class tend to become silent. I feel a bit shamed to answer questions online, so I am unwilling to turn on the mic and express my ideas. (Ida, 2020-03-05) I seldom take the initiative to ask teachers questions in online class. I think it will intrude teachers’ pace of instruction, causing unnecessary troubles to the class. (Yvonne, 2020-0408) We have less enthusiasm in group discussions online, probably because there is no supervision from the teachers. Even when the topic for discussion is very interesting and I can’t wait to share my ideas with other students immediately, as it takes quite a while for every member to join in the meeting, my interest gets lost during the waiting. (Brian, 2020-05-09) Almost each time for group discussion, there is one or two students who get disconnected now and then, or whose environment is very noisy. We have to end the voice call and switch to sending voice messages in the group. Thus the efficiency of our discussion is rather low. (Agnes, 2020-06-11)

Online-learning stories alike are full of setbacks, helplessness and frustrations. Moving from offline to online, the setting of the English class has gone through dramatic changes, showing the following three salient features. The first one is network interruptions. Because of occasional low speed and weak connection of the internet, teacher-student and student–student communications are likely to be suspended or delayed at these occasions. As a consequence, the pace of the class will be interrupted, and students’ learning enthusiasm will be depressed. Furthermore, students attend classes with computer or cellphone, in which messages from various active applications keep popping up and distract students’ attention. Some courses require using multiple applications and opening documents at the same time, and this may cause troubles for the students as they need to keep numerous windows open and shifted now and then. What’s worse, long-time staring at the screen strains the eyes and the lack of verbal or non-verbal communications also exhaust the students and make them drowsy and less attentive to the class. The second feature is home disturbances. During the quarantine of COVID-19, students attended the classes mostly at home, where there were miscellaneous interferences caused by family members, visitors and noises from the neighborhood every now and then. Students found it difficult to focus on the class all the time. Meanwhile, in order not to disturb the class by any possible sound from home, students usually kept the microphones off. The consequence was that they didn’t bother to turn them on when they were supposed to speak in the class, or even if they did, their speeches were always delayed for a while. Moreover, some students said that they were so accustomed to studying in the classroom since the beginning of their schooling that they could not identify home as a venue for study. They were used to being at ease at home and having drinks and snacks around. They might even lie on couch or bed

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during the classes and were thus hard to enter the intensive learning state. Some other students said they could not study in peace at home, as they needed to look after the kitchen, or younger brothers and sisters during the classes. The third feature is individual learning. Online classes are normally taken in an individual instead of a collective manner, which means they lack in the “classroom atmosphere”, i.e., “the feeling that having classmates sitting around you and attending the class together and discussing with you.” According to some students, the atmosphere of learning on one’s own and learning with others are distinct, and this is also the reason why students prefer going to library to review the lessons before examinations. The environment for collective study enhances learning efficiency. On the contrary, learning online individually has no supervision from teachers or the “nudges” from fellow learners, nor their instant helps of any kind. With the changes of learning environment, class activities also undergo corresponding transformations, and have presented the following two problems. One problem is the sense of distance. As every individual student and teacher is in different locations and has to communicate with each other across the cyber space, it is impossible to achieve the directness and fluency as by face-to-face contact. Some students reported that they had a “sense of distance” and a “sense of self-protection” online, so they were reluctant to turn on the microphone to speak out in the class. The physical distance among class members also causes inconvenience for teachers to organize many class activities. For example, role-play is a commonly practiced activity in English class, in which students attempt to fulfill specific tasks by playing certain roles from real life. But some role-plays would become unreal when they are carried out online. As Ethan said, “We used to have a lot of role-plays in the communicative class. They were really fun. When the roles are played online, such as tourists and guide in a scenic spot, we feel it difficult to transfer ourselves to the sightseeing situation as we are not together at all! We just don’t have interest in such role-plays that appear so fake.” This problem with class activities naturally leads to the other one—lack of variety. As mentioned above, it is difficult for class members to communicate in online class as smoothly and directly as in offline class. Some class activities such as group discussions do not work very well online and some other activities such as role-plays fail to transfer to online class successfully. As a consequence, these types of activities have to be abandoned or at least reduced. Many students reported that as there are less role-plays, games or discussions in class, teacher’s lecturing has become the main or the only mode of teaching. English learning in the class has become dull and monotonous, and hence leaner agency has been adversely affected. To sum up, the setting of interactive online classes contains considerable constraints for learner agency due to network interruptions, home disturbances and individual learning. Correspondingly class activities tend to become distanced and monotonous. Situated in this unaccustomed and uncomfortable setting, most students would like to position themselves in negative psychographic or behavioral identities such as “maladaptive”, “passive”, “marginalized”, or even “unvalued” learners. It is thus not surprising that learner agency in English classes online during the COVID-19 quarantine has been largely thwarted.

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6.3 Discussion: Identity Transformation and Agency Navigation It has been adequately illustrated from the previous two sections that whether within a discourse or across different discourses, agency keeps fluctuating in learners’ narration of their English learning stories. Agency navigation in the narratives is a concomitant consequence of identity transformation, which is mediated by structural factors in different aspects and at different layers of the context. Let’s first review Vivian’s case in Excerpt 13. Vivian kept switching among multiple identities in her story and thus navigated her agency in the discourse. With the identity of a voluntary participator of the Drama contest (“I took part in the drama contest on June 6”), she began her story with a high level of agency. Then she showed certain degree of obligation by attributing her participation to her identity of being an English-major, a student in the English Faculty (“as I am a student from the English Faculty”). In no time she converted her identity to an enthusiastic participator of activities (“I myself like participating in these activities”) to show her earnest interest in the drama contest. In her following account of the rehearsals, she assumed the identity of an actress (“I was just an actress”), to be more exact, a minor role (“(I) participated in it as a minor role”), and an obligatory participator (“but each rehearsal had to be attended”). Thereby she constructed a low level of agency, but quickly she turned the agency up by her imagined identity of being a leading actress (“originally what I interviewed for is a leading role”), which was what she desired at the beginning. Then she returned to reality and resumed her identity of being a sophomore (“so the leading actors and actresses are generally the juniors”) and a minor role(“then the director finally assigned me to a minor role”), placing herself in a controlled position. She also placed herself in an engaged position (“since I was quite busy at that time”, “it did take up much time”), but quickly she turned herself into a beneficiary (“I have gained a lot”). After that, she kept agency at a low level by identifying other people as influential (“the core members of the crew have influenced me deeply, especially the director”), powerful (“he is an enterprising person”) and competent (“they are awesome”), and positioning herself as an admirer (“(I) really envy (them)”, “(I) really admire them”). Near the end of her account, Vivian expressed contentment and happiness with the imagined identity of a proficient English user (“if I am able to reach their level”, “(if I) am able to master English”, “and take it as a tool that I am able to use skillfully”). Finally, she ended the story at a high level of agency with the identity of an English lover (“I like English better and better”). From a voluntary participator of the drama contest at the beginning to an English lover in the end, Vivian changed her identities time and again, and navigated her agency up and down throughout the story. If we place a particular story back into the learner’s learning trajectory, it is not difficult to realize that any story, as a short-term navigation of agency and identities, is only a dot in the long-term transformation of agency and identities. As illustrated in Harper’s and other participants’ cases, most English-majors experience identity variations over four years in university, and accordingly agency fluctuate across their

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narrations of English learning stories. Among many other identities, the students must go through the transformation from “freshman”, “sophomore”, “junior” to “senior”. They may waver between “marginal participators” and “central players” at different stages of the university. They may vary their self-definitions such as “poor learners”, “diligent learners”, “inefficient learners”, or “competent learners” for different courses or at different periods. They may alternate among all sorts of social identities brought about by their extracurricular activities and social connections. They may also affiliate themselves to different imagined communities at different points of time, so they will assume various imagined identities now and then. As a result, these identity variations cause the learners to switch constantly between the roles of “Actor” and “Goal”, or “Agent” and “Medium” in their accounts of their English learning experiences, bringing about agency fluctuations across the narratives.

6.4 Summary In this chapter we have addressed the research questions Q2, Q3 and Q4 by examining agency navigation both at intra-discoursal and cross-discoursal levels. For research question Q2, we have identified the logico-semantic (LS) relations that achieve upward-turning, downward-turning and maintenance of agency levels between adjacent clauses in a narrative discourse. In the expansion system, LS relations tend to be in complementary distribution. In other words, the narrators deploy varied LS relations for turning up/down and for maintaining the agency level. The LS relations to turn up/down agency level are focused on ‘extending’ and ‘enhancing’, and limited to a few sub-types. The ‘adversative’ relation indicates a turnaround in the course of narration; the ‘subtractive’ relation indicates exception; the ‘replacive’ relation implies negation; the ‘later’ relation suggests change with passage of time; the ‘concessive’ relation suggests contrary expectation. All these relations denote a kind of transition, which drive agency into a different level logically. The LS relations for maintaining the agency level are more abundant than, and almost complementary to those for agency turns. The three sub-types of ‘elaborating’ are all found. The ‘exposition’ relation gives explanation in another way; the ‘exemplification’ illustrates with an example; the ‘clarification’ relation explains in more specific way. All these three ‘elaborating’ are development of the previous clause in the same direction, hence at the same agency level. Under ‘extending’, there are the ‘additive’ and ‘alternation’ relations. The former indicates “both… and” or “neither… nor”, while the latter “either…or”. These relations place two elements in juxtaposition, which are of the same attribute and at the same agency level. Temporal relations like ‘later’ and ‘same time’ are also used in agency maintenance. The relation ‘later’ is also found for agency turns, suggesting that changes would or would not take place as time goes by. The level of agency may alter or retain after a period of time. The relation ‘same time’ are reserved for simultaneous events, which are

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usually concordant and hence at the same agency level. All types of ‘cause’ relations, namely ‘reason’, ‘result’ and ‘purpose’, are also found. They signify causal links between successive clauses, so the clauses are usually connected logically and hence carry the same level of agency. The last type or relation is ‘positive condition’, which is concerned with an imaginary situation. In this kind of “if…then” assumption, events are also normally logical and coherent. Therefore, the two clauses also stay at the same agency level. In the projection system, all the three types of projections, i.e. idea, locution and fact, are all found in different navigations of agency levels. A characteristic of the LS relation of projection is that the nexus often starts with a neutral level of agency, and ends with any level of agency. This is because many of the mental Process verbs (such as “feel”, “think”, “find” and “know”), the verbal Process verbs (such as “speak” and “say”) and relational Process verbs (“be” and “have”) are neutral in terms of agency, but projected ideas, locutions and facts often carry high or low levels of agency. In some occasions, the mental or verbal clause may also carry a certain degree of agency due to the circumstantial elements like the adverbials, or even the verb itself. In this case, the projected clause is usually consistent with the projecting clause in terms of agency level, as what is thought or said is normally in accordance with how it is thought or said. To answer research question Q3, we have found a number of identities in which Chinese English-majors keep positioning and repositioning themselves and thereby mediate agency level during the narration of their English learning experience. These identities include actual ones and imagined ones. The actual identities involve demographic identities (e.g. gender, age-group, etc.), social identities (e.g. college students, English-majors, senior or junior students, event- or work-related identities, etc.), psychographic identities (e.g. optimist or pessimist, competent or poor learner, winners or losers, etc.), and behavioral identities (e.g. diligent or efficient learner, active leader or passive follower, participator or on-looker, etc.). The imagined identities involve academic identities (e.g. postgraduate, overseas student, certificateholder, etc.), professional identities (e.g. teacher, translator, businessman, government official, etc.), and socio-cultural identities (e.g. immigrant, multilingual, social elite, etc.). Concordant or conflicting identities may co-exist within an individual learner in a particular situation, and keep changing across different situations. It is through identity transformations that the learners navigate their agency dilemma across narrative discourses. For research question Q4, we have excavated structural factors that mediate agency and identity construction and navigation by Chinese English-majors. At the situation layer, there are two dominating yet mutually competing social discourses as influential schemas: English still as the most popular international language and English at a decreasing status in mainland China. Meanwhile, the governmental investment in English learning and teaching and the national tests set for English-majors constitute powerful resources. At the setting layer, GW is famous for cultivating students with excellent English skills, and the English Faculty is the oldest faculty to bring up English-majors in GW. These traditional discourses have provided favorable schema for the learners. Taking pride in their identities of college students in GW

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and English-majors in the English Faculty, they have gathered their momentum in English learning. Family members, teachers and peers are significant in their influence on the learners and constitute important human resources, while non-human resources include English as well as non-English courses, learning environment, learning activities and facilities, evaluation system, opportunities of internship, etc.. At the self layer, there are many important factors too, including personal learning conception and culture, interest, motivation and concerns as schemas, and personal learning objectives, habits and capacity as recourses. These factors make a distinction between passive vs. active students and efficient vs. inefficient learners, bringing positive or negative consequences to learner agency. It is the result of the interactions among these multi-layered structural factors that the Chinese English-majors construct different identities and navigate among different levels of agency in the narration of their learning stories.

References Gao, X. (2013). Reflexive and reflective thinking: A crucial link between agency and autonomy. Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching, 7(3), 226–237. Sewell, W. (1992). A theory of structure: Duality, agency, and transformation. American Journal of Sociology, 98, 1–29. Thompson, G. (2008). Introducing functional grammar. Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press.

Chapter 7

Conclusion

Now I am in a position to bring this research into a conclusion. First, I revisit the research questions and the findings to them. Based on these findings, I draw a reflection on the relationships between agency, identity and English learning, and give the conclusions of my research. After that, I set forth the contributions that this research has made. I also extrapolate from my findings the possible implications for discourse analysis as well as for English language teaching in China. Finally I point out the limitations of the study and suggest the possible directions for future research.

7.1 Research Findings This research covers a linguistic approach to understand and observe language learner agency. It is an attempt to make connections between agency in discourse analyses and agency in applied linguistics by examining how learner agency is manifested in oral autobiographic narratives and influenced by contextual factors. There are two research objectives—to obtain a “thick” discursive description of agency making and its dynamics in story-telling, and to achieve an in-depth understanding to the agency issues of Chinese English-majors. The research objectives have been developed into four specific research questions. Research question Q1 is concerned with agency construction at clausal level. The study has investigated how different levels of agency are constructed out of various transitivity patterns, i.e., how an individual clause is configured with what Process and what Participant roles. Based on the selected data, eleven patterns have been found to construct a high level of agency, and sixteen patterns to construct a low level of agency. In addition, the study has summarized four ways to achieve a mixed level of agency. It is via different transitivity patterns that the learners construct different levels of agency in individual clauses in the narration of their learning stories.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7_7

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Research question Q2 and Q3 are about agency navigation at discoursal level, with the former at intra-discoursal sub-level and the latter at cross-discoursal sublevel. Within a narrative discourse, the focus of analysis is on how the narrators employ various LS relations between adjacent clauses to achieve up-turn, down-turn and maintenance of agency levels in their story-telling. It has been found that the LS relations for maintaining the agency level are more abundant than and almost complementary to those for agency turns in the expansion system. In dealing with narrative discourses across situations, the analysis is focused on how the narrators position and reposition themselves in different identities, which result in agency fluctuations in their narratives across time and place. The analyses and discussions have revealed both actual identities (including demographic, social, psychographic and behavioral) and imagined identities (including academic, professional and sociocultural) that the English-majors may perform when telling their English learning stories. Research question Q4 is related with structural mediation at contextual level. Miscellaneous structural factors have been found in different aspects (schemas and resources) and at different layers (situation, setting and self) that jointly mediate the English-majors’ identity positioning. Under the combined influence of these factors, the English-majors sometimes position themselves in high profiles and sometimes in low profiles, thus causing agency fluctuations in their learning stories.

7.2 Reflections: Agency, Identity and English Learning Before drawing the book into its conclusion, I would like to take a review on the key concepts in the research, and draw some reflections on their relationships. First, the relationship between agency, identity and structure (which includes self , setting and situation). Their relationship resembles an onion-skin structure, in the core of which rests human agency of the English learners (see Fig. 7.1). In this research agency is defined as a sense of control over the world. It is part of personal identity, which refers to how the learners understand themselves and Fig. 7.1 Relation between agency, identity and structure

Situation Settingaa Self Identities Agency

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their relationship with the social world. Learner agency, being at the center, is both empowered and constrained by the structure (also referred to as “context”, “structural factors”, “contextual factors” or “structural context” in this book), which includes both schema and resources factors at three outer layers: self , setting and situation. Self involves all individual factors of the learner. Identity, being a sense of self , is actually a “self ” factor. From Fig. 7.1, we can see that agency is part of identity, while identity is part of self . Self is located in setting, and setting is embedded in situation. Agency is manipulated by identity, while identity is shaped by layers of contextual factors, including other “self ” factors as well as setting and situation factors. It should be noted that the plural form “identities” is more appropriate here, as the multiple and un-unitary nature of the learners’ identity has been unfolded in this study. Learner agency is dynamic and fluctuating with the change of its structure. Both schemas and recourses at the layers of situation, setting and self are always on the change, including learner’s identities. Through identity positioning and repositioning, the structure offers both momentum and constraints to learner agency. That’s why a learner may sometimes be motivated and active, and sometimes unmotivated and inactive; why in one place a learner may be confident and extroverted, whereas in another place anxious and introverted; and why a leaner can sometimes speak and other times remains silent. Second, the dialectic relationship between identities and English learning experience. All sorts of identities and self-identifications fade in and out throughout the university life of the Chinese English-majors. These identities are more or less impactful in increasing or reducing the learners’ investment in their English learning, while their English learning experience will in turn reinforce or undermine their identities. For the participants in the study, the most prominent and constant identities are college student and English-major. The identity of college student means being independent, autonomous, and taking scholastic pursuit. This identity distances the learners from their families psychologically, and affiliates them to the community of university. As members of this community of practice (Lave & Wenger, 1991), they participate in various activities on campus. The identity of English-major further distinguishes them from other college students, and makes them to invest in English learning in their own ways, such as reading English originals, watching English TV programs or movies, taking part in English competitions, making English-speaking friends, and taking English-related part-time jobs. This all-round involvement in the community and engagement with English further reinforce their identities as college student and English-major. All the way along the process of English learning, the English-majors are constantly organizing and reorganizing a sense of who they are and how they relate to the social world. Their success in claiming more powerful identities is important to their success as good English learners. Third, the relationship between imagined community and investment in English. Norton (2010) argues that for many language learners, the community is one of the imaginations—a desired community that offers possibilities for a wider range of identity options in the future. When the learners invest in English, they expect that this investment will increase the value of their “cultural capital” (Bourdieu, 1986). Cultural capital is a person’s education (knowledge and intellectual skills)

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that provides advantage in achieving a higher social status in society. An extension of interest in identity and investment concerns the imagined communities that the learners aspire to when they learn this influential global language. For most English learners in China, English is not only associated with the target language culture, but also with an imagined community of “Chinese elites”, as it provides access to this imagined community. With English knowledge and skills, the learners may continue their study either at home or abroad to obtain stronger academic identities. They may enter the global market and compete with international talents to claim more powerful professional identities. They may have more options and opportunities in work and life to achieve a higher social statues and better-off living conditions. In essence, an imagined community assumes an imagined identity, and learners’ investment in English is to a great extent also an investment in their desired identities in the future. Fourth, the relationship between English learning and context. In an era of globalization and digitalization, and specifically in the rapidly changing economic and social context of China, English learning entails complex and often contradictory identity positionings. English-majors are situated in particular and local contexts and offered with varied subject positions that they may accept or reject by exercising their agency. They are also offered with both possibilities and constraints to learn and use English as in the virtual classroom online, engaging their identities in complex and often contradictory ways. Their agency level is bound up not only in what they think and do individually but also in those possibilities both the macroand micro-contexts offer them. When the context is safe and supportive, they are more agentive to learn. It has been well demonstrated in this research that many structural factors help the English-majors on the drive to learn English, meanwhile negotiating their identities and investments. Without opportunities to practice the target language, progress in language learning is compromised.

7.3 Concluding Remarks Previous chapters and the above reflections give me enough confidence to draw the following conclusions. First of all, agency is not a fixed entity that English-majors possess, but negotiated dynamically by the learners through their learning process and constructed discursively in the narration of their English learning experience. The discursive construction of agency is realized by the transitivity patterns of individual clauses and the dynamic navigation of agency is achieved by LS relations within narratives. With different clausal configurations, the narrators construct different levels of agency by presenting themselves as “doing things” or “being engaged” in events in their narratives. With diverse LS relations, the narrators navigate the agency dilemma among different levels of agency throughout the discourse. Secondly, agency construction and navigation by English-majors is the result of their identity positioning and repositioning within a complex and everchanging context. During the English learning process, English-majors constantly

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construct and negotiate their relationship with the world, so their identities are multiple, contradictory and changing over time. With positive or strong identities, learners tend to appear more active, initiative, confident and hopeful. On the contrary, with negative or weak identities, learners tend to appear more passive, reluctant, helpless and frustrated in English learning. Agency navigation is a concomitant consequence of identity transformation, which is mediated by structural factors in the context. The complex and ever-changing context for English learning in contemporary China are simultaneously empowering and constraining the agency of the English-majors, hence influencing their English learning trajectories. Thirdly, English-majors’ identities are significantly correlated with their investment in English and their English learning process. Their identities will cause increase or reduction on their investment in English learning, while their English learning experience will in turn reinforce or undermine their identities. Some identities may impel the learners to devote themselves to English learning, and their endeavor and achievement will further strengthen these identities or make them to aspire for more powerful identities. Some other identities may cause the learners to withdraw their time and energy from English learning and engage themselves in alternative actions. The consequent passive and unfruitful English learning experience will lead to identity deconstruction and reconstruction of new identities. The learners’ identities include actual ones and imagined ones, so the investment in English should be understood not only in terms of investment in the real world but also in terms of investment in imagined communities.

7.4 Contributions and Implications The current study has, to some degree, filled the research gaps in existing literature. It has made theoretical and methodological contributions to linguistics and applied linguistics and also has important pedagogical implications for language education.

7.4.1 Theoretical Contributions The study has made two important theoretical contributions. One is the establishment of a comprehensive theoretical framework for agency research. The framework has three distinctive features. First, it is integrative. Fusing relevant ideas and concepts from three fundamental theories—the theory of identity dilemma from the field of cultural psychology, identity theory of language learning from the field of second language acquisition, and SFL from linguistics, the framework is built on the common idea that agency is discursively constructed and that agency-making is mediated in socio-cultural context, and provides a solid foundation for this research in terms of “what is agency”, “how agency works” and “what makes agency”. Second, the framework is dynamic. The process of agency construction is

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described as starting from a psychological act of agency positioning, to a linguistic act of selecting a transitivity pattern, and then to a pragmatic act of agency construction. This process repeats itself as the narrator utters one clause after another during a narrative discourse, with various types of LS relations linking the clauses. These LS relations constitute the dynamic process of intra-discoursal agency navigation. Furthermore, with the narrators’ identities transforming across time and space, their agency level also varies from discourse to discourse, causing cross-discoursal agency navigation. Third, the framework is operable. Conforming to the standpoint of SFL, the framework breaks a narrative discourse down to the clausal level, and takes individual clause as the unit of analysis. It contends that agency construction is realized by the transitivity pattern of the clause, and agency navigation is realized by LS relations between clauses. Moreover, the framework also specifies that agency construction and navigation is mediated by narrators’ identities in particular micro- and macrocontexts. Therefore it can be inferred from the framework that transitivity patterns, LS relations, identities and contextual factors are all the targets of investigation for the purpose of the current research. The other theoretical contribution is the proposal of an explicit working definition for agency. The concept of agency has been ambiguous and controversial for a long time. A clear and analytical definition is always desired. In this research agency is conceptualized as a dynamic sense of control over the world. It is an identity dilemma, in which the individual constantly constructs and negotiates a relationship with the world. It is discursively constructed and navigated, and mediated by contextual structures. Highly compatible with the theoretical framework established, this definition emphasizes three features of agency: dynamic, discursively constructed, and contextually mediated. Based on the theoretical framework, agency is further operationalized as the transitivity pattern of individual clause in narrative discourses. This working definition, together with the theoretical framework, has made the concept of agency, once abstract and vague in previous literature, more specific and operable in the study. The theoretical framework and the working definition proposed in the current research corroborate the connection of agency study and discourse analysis, thereby making contribution to the constructivist theories of identity and agency as well as to linguistic theory of SFL. In recent literature on identity in social sciences and second language education, the nature of identity is often described as multiple, changing, contradictory, elusive, and fragmentary. Identity can be transformational and transformative; it is constructed, maintained, and negotiated to a significant extent through language and discourse in particular historical, socio-cultural and political contexts (e.g. Norton, 1995, 2000; Varghese et al., 2005). The current research has well illustrated that as one of its dimensions, agency shares all these features of identity. The linguistic theory of SFL just comes in handy when analyzing these features of human agency. Thus it is implied by this research that theories from different fields and different perspectives can complement each other, and join hands to serve common research goals.

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7.4.2 Methodological Contributions The methodological contributions of the current study include four aspects. To begin with, the study is among the first to examine agency of second language learners through fine linguistic analysis of narrative discourse. The existing agency studies of second language learners are mostly from a pedagogical or sociopsychological perspective. Agency studies of language learners by Chinese scholars are mainly quantitative research with the help of experimental statistics and focused on classroom context. On the other hand, research methods adopted by international scholars usually come from ethnography, including observation, field work, interviews, etc. Their analysis to the interview data is focused on the themes or the contents of the discourse by means of observing the words used. Poynton (1993, p. 6) suggests that a focus on lexis is undoubtedly necessary and useful in understanding how language is used in the negotiation of meaning, but it is limited. Much of what is involved in the linguistic construction of representations goes beyond the level of word into the level of the clause and ultimately linguistic forms of text. The current study blazes a new trail by probing into the learners’ narrative discourse at the level of individual clauses and analyzing intensively from the perspective of SFL, so that we can examine agency issues of second language learners in a more subtle and meticulous way. Second, the study opens a new path to examine the dynamics of agency navigation in individual narrative discourse. It is generally assumed that within a particular period of time, agency is relatively fixed in one person; agency might change, but it is a long-term process; only longitudinal studies can investigate the fluctuations of agency over time in individuals. This study, however, views agency as instantaneous. It is discursively constructed by the transitivity pattern of individual clause, so it may vary from clause to clause. This means that the agency level of a person may turn up or down instantly and fluctuate within one discourse, and this has been proved to be absolutely true in this study through clause-by-clause data analyses and interpretations. The study also examines the LS relations between the clauses to find out how agency wavers among different levels and this has never been done in previous literature. Third, the study is among the few that apply SFL analyses to oral narratives of Chinese language. Existing literature has shown that SFL is rarely applied to spontaneous oral talk, though it is much more widely applied to written texts or prepared speech on various research topics. This is also true with Chinese language, as SFL analyses have been mostly found on written discourses such as novels, news reports, advertising texts, ancient poems and lyrics of songs. (No SFL analyses have been found on oral narrative discourses of Chinese so far. This study has been another successful illustration that SFL is applicable for any type of discourse and probably any type of human language. Fourth, this study offers a general transitivity pattern of a discourse with descriptive statistics. Most of the existing literature only presents SFL analyses to selected individual sentences or utterances which are considered as typical or representative.

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This study conducts transitivity analyses and agency interpretations to a narrative discourse from clause to clause, so it can not only reveal the ups and downs of agency level, but also unfold the transitivity features of the discourse. It can provide information such as whether the discourse is material, mental or relational in principle, whether the material clauses are operative or receptive in general, how frequently the narrator has positioned himself/herself as the Actor or Agent in contrast to as the Goal or Medium, etc. This descriptive information is extremely helpful in examining and contrasting individual features of agency making in narrative discourses. In summary, the research provides an innovative perspective and method to study agency of the second language learners. It implies that agency in second language learning can be studied through SFL analysis to oral narrative discourse. In fact, agency issues in other fields can be also approached using the same methodology. In more specific terms, transitivity analysis and LS analysis can be applied to agency research on narratives of various topics by people from different social groups, not just of language learning by English-majors. They can be applied to stories told by, for example, prisoners, migrant workers, school dropouts, gays and lesbians, drug addicts, etc., so that a better understanding of discursive practices of human agency will be achieved.

7.4.3 Pedagogical Implications The current study has illustrated with empirical evidence that agency is not always constant in a second language learner. It is constructed and negotiated dynamically by the learner, and mediated by structural factors. These findings may have significant implications for language education. As learner agency is always in the change, it should be treated from a dynamic and process view. A low level of agency manifested in a particular period or in a certain context may not necessarily persist in later periods or extend to other contexts. Provided with the right exterior contextual conditions, learners are well on the course for higher levels of agency. As agency is largely mediated by external structures, learners are not wholly to blame for the low agency that they have shown in the learning process. Teachers are not the only people who will influence learner agency, and classroom is not the only site for learners to exercise their agency. Solicitude needs to be shown for larger social context. As EFL researchers, we should try to provide the Chinese learners of English with a more supportive local context. For example, the faculty may develop English courses which are more catered to the needs of China’s current situation. Teachers may adjust their teaching modes and styles to arouse the enthusiasm of the learners, and provide personalized guidance and assistance according to the needs of individual learners. Evaluation system may be improved so as to reflect learners’ investment in English more effectively. Class activities should take care of students with different abilities and at different proficiency levels. More opportunities of internship should be provided to students so that they have more possibilities to practice English.

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During the period of online instruction where the network setting seems in many ways unfavorable for leaner agency, teachers should give full considerations to all possible resources and constraints online, making best use of the advantages and bypassing the disadvantages of online class. First of all, they should compare and choose the most suitable software or application as the teaching platform for their courses, which can retain the brick-and-mortar class environment and functions as far as possible. In addition, teachers should actively adjust their teaching methods and transform the class activities according to the features of the courses. While communicative, performative and competitive tasks are reduced, autonomous, investigative and innovative tasks can be increased. Teachers can also explore various resources from the cyber space.to design new class activities for cultivating learner agency. In a nutshell, teachers should try every possible means to provide a supportive and constructive setting for students to learn English, help them to replace powerless and negative identities with powerful and positive ones, so as to facilitate their learning process.

7.5 Limitations and Suggestions for Further Research The research has the following limitations, which need to be pointed out for caution in interpreting the research findings and considerations in conducting further research. The first limitation concerns subjectivity of data analyses and interpretation. SFL analyses have been argued to be subjective, and the judgment of the analyst has always been part of how the theory is applied (Mann & Thompson, 1988). This means transitivity analyses may not always produce unified results. Decisions on whether a Process is mental or relational, whether a Participant is the Agent or Medium are sometimes controversial. The determination of agency level is also intuitive and subjective, even if the researcher’s decisions are checked and approved by the narrators themselves. There are no objective and clear benchmarks in either the researcher or the narrators themselves that can measure up to a “high” or “low” level of agency. Therefore, further research is suggested to invite more SFL-trained analysts for reliability check. Their results of analyses can be cross-checked with the researcher’s. Hence the final results of analyses will be more reliable. Furthermore, future researchers are suggested to come up with relatively objective standards for categorizing clauses into different levels of agency. In this way, more concordant interpretations of agency level can be achieved. The second limitation pertains to roughness and rigidness of data interpretation. In this research the agency level is broadly divided into only three categories: high, neutral and low. However, agency is a continuum, in which there are endless intermediate forms between two poles. In other words, it is a matter of degree. Between the two extremes of “high” and “low” there exist varying degrees, such as “very high/low”, “fairly high/low”, “slightly high/low”, etc. This difference of degrees, however, has been ignored in the current study. Besides, there are clauses that are neither “high” nor “low” in terms of human agency. There are also clauses that are

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both “high” and “low”, mixing high and low features of agency at the same time. In this study I have combined both of these types of clauses into a “neutral” level of agency. It might be over-simplified and far-fetched to assign each clause with a level of agency. Further research needs to take care of this problem, probably by setting up more levels of agency according to the research goals and questions, so that the discursive patterns for constructing different levels of agency will be more refined. The third limitation is related to completeness of the research findings. As the English learning stories collected and finally selected are limited, the transitivity patterns extracted from the stories are also limited. Although I have tried to solve this problem by selecting stories and analyze clauses as many as possible until no more new patterns can be found, it is still difficult or even impossible to exhaust all the transitivity patterns, as they can be incredibly diverse or even unlimited. What this research can do at its best is to sort out the frequent patterns that occur in the collected data. As for the contextual factors, I also believe that there must be other factors that have been overlooked in my investigation due to the limit of the depth of interview and to the comprehensiveness of the interview data. Further surveys and investigations need to be done with more informants from different backgrounds and in different research sites. Finally, a word of caution needs to be heeded as to truthfulness, though it is not exactly a limitation. What the analysis reveals is the agency levels discursively constructed by the learners in their narratives, which may not truthfully represent the genuine agency levels deep inside the learners. It is very likely that a learner tells his/her story in a particular way purposefully in order to construct an active or passive image in front of others. In these cases, it is impossible to explore his/her real psychological world just based on what s/he says and how s/he says it. What I discuss about discursive choices as the result of identity/agency positioning is on the basis of spontaneous and unconscious expressions without intentional hiding or distorting the truth.

References Bourdieu, P. (1986). The forms of capital (English version) in J.G. Richardson (Ed.), Handbook for theory and research for the sociology of education (pp. 241–258). Greenwood Press. Gao, X. (2010a). Strategic language learning: The roles of agency and context. Multilingual Matters. Gao, X. (2010b). Autonomous language learning against all odds. System, 38, 580–590. Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge University Press. Mann, W. & Thompson, S. (1988). Rhetorical structure theory: Toward a functional theory of text organization. Text & Talk, 8, 243–281. Norton, B. (1995). Social identity, investment, and language learning. TESOL Quarterly, 29(1), 9–31. Norton, B. (2000). Identity and language learning: Gender, ethnicity and educational change. Pearson Education. Norton, B. (2010). Language and identity. In N. Hornberger & S. Mckay (Eds). Social linguistics and language education (pp. 349–369). Multilingual Matters.

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Poynton, C. (1993). Grammar, language and the social: Poststructuralism and systemic functional linguistics. Social Semiotics, 3, 1–21. Varghese, M., Morgan, B., Johnston, B., & Johnson, K. A. (2005). Theorizing language teacher identity: Three perspectives and beyond. Journal of Language, Identity, and Education, 4(1), 21–44.

Appendices

Appendix A Notational conventions in SFL (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) 1. A clause is bracketed by single slashes / /. An Arabic numeral in / / indicates clause number, e.g. /1/, /2/. 2. A clause-complex is bracketed by double slashes // //. A capital English letter in // // indicates clause-complex number, e.g. //A//, //B//. In tables or diagrams, the brackets may be omitted when there is no enough space. 3. A downranked clause is bracketed by double square brackets [[ ]]; an interrupting clause is bracketed by double angle brackets . 4. Simultaneous choices are shown by a curly bracket {, whereas single choice is shown by a straight connector [. 5. Logico-semantic relation is shown in single quotes ‘’, e.g. ‘result’, ‘alternation’.

Appendix B System networks in Systemic Functional Grammar (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014) See Figs. B1, B2, B3, and Tables B1 and B2.

Appendix C See Tables C1, C2 and C3.

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7

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Appendices

transformative material

creative cognitive desiderative

mental

emotive

Process

perceptive

Type

identifying

relational

attributive behavioral verbal extential Fig. B1 Process types in transitive model middle clause

AGENCY

operative effective

VOICE

receptive

AGENTIVITY

non-agentive agentive

Fig. B2 System network of agency in voice system

Locution

Fig. B3 System network of projection

Linguistic Projection

experience

Idea

Facts (non-linguistic experience)

– Behavior

– Phenomenon

Receiver Verbiage

Attribute/Value

(Beneficiary)

Attributor/Assigner

–

–

–

Range

Beneficiary

Agent

Medium

Recipient; Client

Sayer [eff.]

Existent

Scope

Phenomenon

Carrier/Token

–

Sayer [mid.]; Target [eff.]

Initiator or Actor [eff.]

Senser

Behaver

Existential

Actor [mid.]; Actor or Goal [eff.]

Relational

Participant

Verbal

Ergative model Mental

Process

Behavioral

Transitive model

Material

Process

Table B1 Process and participant in transitivity system

Appendices 141

142

Appendices

Table B2 Logico-semantic system of expansion Category Elaborating

Extending

Exposition

Principal markers

P i.e. Q

In other words

Exemplification

P e.g. Q

For example

Clarification

P viz. Q

To be precise

P and Q

Both…and, neither…nor

Addition

Additive Adversative

P and conversely Q

But

Variation

Replacive

not P but Q

Instead

Subtractive

P but not all P

Except

P or Q

(Either…) or

Same time

P meanwhile Q

When, meanwhile

Later

P subsequently Q

After

Alternation Enhancing

Meanings

Temporal

Earlier Spatial

P previously Q

Before

P there Q

And there

P is by means of Q

By means of

Manner

Means Comparison

P is like Q

As if

Cause

Reason

Result P because Q

Because

Purpose

Because intention P so action Q

In order that

Condition

Result

Because P so result Q So that

Positive

If P then Q

If, as long as

Negative

If not P then Q

Unless

Concessive

If P then contrary to expectation Q

Even if, although

Table C1 Transitivity analysis of Excerpt 1 Clause

Transitive analysis Process type

Ergative analysis

Participant role

Agency analysis

/1/我很喜欢打乒乓 mental: 球嘛 emotive I like playing table tennis

I = Senser = Agent playing table tennis = Range = Scope

effective: operative

/2/当时我记得 at that time I remember

I = Senser

effective: operative

mental: cognitive

/3/七教一楼有间乒 existential 乓球室 on the first floor of Building No. 7 there was a table tennis room

= Medium

table tennis room = = Medium Existent

middle

(continued)

Appendices

143

Table C1 (continued) Clause

Transitive analysis Process type

Ergative analysis

Agency analysis

Participant role

/4/是留学生专用的 relational: 球桌 identifying (it) was a table only for overseas students

(it) = Token a table for overseas students = Value

= Medium = Range

middle

/5/后来我就经常去 material: 那里打 transformative later I often went there to play (table tennis)

I = Actor

= Agent

effective: operative

/6/因为我打得比一 material: 般外国人要好 transformative I played better than ordinary foreigners

I = Actor

= Agent

effective: operative

/7/所以他们跟我关 relational: 系比较好 attributive so their relation with me was quite good

their relation with me = Carrier quite good = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/8/所以我觉得 so I feel

mental: cognitive

I = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/9/我在那段时间, 是非常愿意 I, at that period of time, was very willing (to learn English)

mental: desiderative

I = Senser very willing (to learn English) = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/10/是非常乐意去 学英语 (I) was very delighted to learn English

mental: emotive

(I) = Senser very delighted to learn English = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/11/并且也非常享 受 and (I) enjoyed it very much

mental: emotive

(I) = Senser enjoy it = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/12/虽然很多那些 verbal 黑人啊还有那些印 度人啊, 讲的英语 although the English that many black people and Indians spoke

many black people = Agent and Indians = = Range Sayer English = Verbiage

middle

(continued)

144

Appendices

Table C1 (continued) Ergative analysis

Agency analysis

(the English that many black people and Indians spoke) = Carrier very different from the English in our Listening class = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

relational: attributive

(their) accents = Carrier very strong = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/15/有时候还要叫 他们说两次 sometimes (I) needed to ask them to repeat

verbal

(I) = Sayer them = Receiver

= Medium = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/16/但是我发现 but I found

mental: perceptive

I = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/17/跟他们讲英语 的时候 when (I) spoke English with them

verbal

(I) = Sayer = Agent English = Verbiage = Range them = Receiver = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/18/他们是很照顾 我们的 they were very considerate for us

relational: attributive

they = Carrier very considerate = Attribute

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/19/他们说的 what they spoke

verbal

they = Sayer

= Agent

effective: operative

/20/一般都是很简 单的英语 (what they spoke) was usually very simple English

relational: identifying

(what they spoke) = Medium = Token = Range very simple English = Value

middle

/21/用词也是 so were their vocabulary

relational: identifying

their vocabulary = Token so = Value

middle

Clause

Transitive analysis Process type

Participant role

/13/跟我们听力课 上的英语很不一 样, (the English that many black people and Indians spoke) was very different from the English in our Listening class

relational: identifying

/14/口音很重 (their) accents were very strong

/22/不会用很晦涩 verbal 的词 (they) would not use very obscure words

= Medium = Range

they = Sayer = Agent very obscure words = Range = Verbiage

effective: operative

(continued)

Appendices

145

Table C1 (continued) Ergative analysis

Agency analysis

I = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

we = Actor vocabulary = Scope

= Agent = Range

effective: operative

/25/早就已经支撑 material: 我们去表达一些日 transformative 常用语了 (the vocabulary we had learned) had already supported us to express some daily usage

(the vocabulary we had learned) = Actor us = Scope

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/26/所以在那段时 间, 我跟他们讲的 时侯 so in that period of time, when I talked with them

verbal

I = Sayer them = Receiver

= Medium = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/27/我就觉得 I felt

mental: cognitive

I = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/28/自己学的英语 the English I had learned

material: creative

I = Actor English = Scope

= Agent = Range

effective: operative

/29/是真正可以用 到的 (the English I had learned) could be really used

material: transformative

(the English I had learned) = Scope

= Range

effective: receptive: non-agentive

/30/然后有时候, 我 material: 还会教他们打一下 transformative 乒乓球啊 then sometimes, I also taught them to play table tennis

I = Actor them = Recipient

= Agent = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/31/就会去查一下 material: (I) would check (the transformative dictionary)

I = Actor = Agent Dictionary = Scope = Range

Clause

Transitive analysis Process type

Participant role

/23/所以那时候我 就发现 so at that time I found

mental: perceptive

/24/可能我们学的 词汇 perhaps the vocabulary we had learned

material: creative

effective: operative (continued)

146

Appendices

Table C1 (continued) Clause

Transitive analysis Process type

Ergative analysis

Agency analysis

= Range

effective: receptive: non-agentive

Participant role

/32/这个动作用英 verbal 语怎么讲啊 how an action was described in English

an action = Scope

/33/所以那段时间, 应该是[[我学英 语]]最愉快的、最 有成就感 so that period of time should be the most pleasant and most rewarding

relational: attributive

that period of time = Medium = Carrier = Range the most pleasant and most rewarding = Attribute

effective: operative

/34/ [[我学英语]] (when) I learn English

material: creative

I = Actor English = Scope

= Agent = Range

effective: operative

/35/就只有那段时 间 (and it) was only in that period

relational: identifying

(it) = Token in that period = Value

= Medium = Range

middle

/36/就是大二第一 学期末吧 (that) was near the end of the first semester of the second year

relational: identifying

(that) = Token = Medium near the end of the = Range first semester of the second year = Value

middle

/37/后来就没有去 material: 了 transformative afterwards (I) didn’t go there

(I) = Actor

= Medium

effective: operative

/38/热情慢慢消退 (my) enthusiasm slowly vanished

(my) enthusiasm slowly vanished = Phenomenon

= Range

effective: operative

/39/但是那段时间, material: 还是认识很多那些 transformative 外国人 but in that period, (I) got to know many foreigners

(I) = Actor many foreigners = Scope

= Scope

effective: operative

/40/然后跟两三个 relational: 留学生还是挺好的 attributive 吧 and (I) was quite close with two or three overseas students

(I) = Carrier = Medium quite close with = Range two or three overseas students = Attribute

mental: emotive

effective: operative

(continued)

Appendices

147

Table C1 (continued) Clause /41/他们有什么事 情 (when) they had something (to be done)

Transitive analysis Process type

Participant role

relational: attributive

they = Carrier had something (to be done) = Attribute

Ergative analysis

Agency analysis

= Medium = Range

middle

/42/都喜欢找我 mental: (they) liked to resort emotive to me

they = Senser = Medium liked to come to me = Range = Phenomenon

/43/当然他们主要 relational: 目的是 identifying of course their main purpose was

their main purpose = Token

/44/想我教他们汉 语 expecting me to teach them Chinese

expecting me to = Range teach them Chinese = Phenomenon

effective: operative

/45/但是呢, 比如说 mental: 他们要出去买点东 desiderative 西 however, for example, (when) they needed to shop out

they = Senser needed to shop out = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/46/他们想去那个 mental: 中国移动营业厅去 desiderative 办理一点手续啊 (or when) they wanted to go to China Mobile Service Hall to get something done

they = Senser wanted to go to China Mobile Service Hall to get something done = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/47/他们会叫上我 they would ask me along

verbal

they = Sayer me = Receiver

= Agent = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/48/叫我帮忙做中 verbal 间人沟通一下 (they) would ask me to help to communicate as interpreter

(they) = Sayer me = Receiver

= Agent = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/49/有时候跟他们 material: 去吃一下晚餐啊 transformative sometimes (I) dined out with them

(I) = Actor

= Medium

effective: operative

mental: desiderative

= Medium

effective: operative middle

(continued)

148

Appendices

Table C1 (continued) Process type

Participant role

Agency analysis

/50/我还去过他们 宿舍去玩 and I also went to their dorm for fun

material: transformative

(I) = Actor = Medium their dorm = Scope = Range

effective: operative

/51/所以我觉得 so I think

mental: cognitive

I = Senser

effective: operative

/52/真正的英语交 流, 就没有想象中 那么难 real English communication is not as difficult as in imagination

relational: attributive

real English = Medium communication = = Range Carrier not as difficult as in imagination = Attribute

middle

/53/而且我觉得 and I think

mental: cognitive

I = Senser

effective: operative

Clause

Transitive analysis

Ergative analysis

= Medium

= Medium

/54/在外国人面前 relational: 讲英语比在都是中 attributive 国人面前要容易很 多 to speak English in front of foreigners is much easier than in front ot Chinese

to speak English = Medium before foreigners = = Range Carrier much easier than before Chinese = Token

middle

/55/不会有任何压 力 (you) don’t have any pressure

relational: attributive

(you) = Carrier not have any pressure = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/56/因为你讲得懂 的话 because if you can be understood

relational: attributive

you = Carrier can be understood = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/57/他们会觉得 they would think

mental: perceptive

they = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/58/你很厉害 you are awesome

relational: attributive

you = Carrier awesome = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/59/如果我跟他们 说 if I said to them

verbal

I = Sayer them = Receiver

= Agent = Beneficiary

effective: operative

/60/我讲得不是很 好啊 I don’t speak (English) well

verbal

I = Sayer (English) = Verbiage

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

(continued)

Appendices

149

Table C1 (continued) Clause /61/他们就会说 they would say

Transitive analysis

Agency analysis

they = Sayer

= Agent

effective: operative

you = Sayer that = Verbiage

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

you = Sayer

= Medium

effective: operative

I = Sayer them = Receiver

= Medium = Beneficiary

effective: operative

Participant role

verbal

/62/唉, 你怎么那么 verbal 说话呀 hey, how could you say that /63/你讲的比很多 人都好啊 you speak better than many people

Ergative analysis

Process type

verbal

/64/很多学生我跟 verbal 他们讲根本都讲不 了 many students, I am unable to speak with them /65/大家都沟通不 了啊 we can’t communicate

verbal

we = Sayer

= Medium

effective: operative

/66/然后那时候我 就觉得很有趣 then at that time I felt interesting

mental: perceptive

I = Senser interesting = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

this period of time = Carrier relatively short = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/67/对, 但就是这个 relational: 时间比较短暂 attributive yes, but this period of time is relatively short

150

Appendices

Table C2 Transitivity analysis of Excerpt 7 Clause

Transitive Analysis

Ergative Analysis Agency Analysis

Process type

Participants

existential

I = Actor = Medium university = Scope = Range

effective: operative

mental: /2/还没有完全从 每天题海战术的 cognitive 高三生活里回过 神来 I hadn’t completely recovered from the life with excessive assignments in the third year in senior high school

I = Senser not recovered = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/3/突然之间回到 mental: 像初中那样[[一切 cognitive 靠自觉]]的生活 suddenly (I) came back to the life [[that everything depends on selfconsciousness]] as in junior high school

(I) = Senser came back to the life as in junior high school = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/4/一切靠自觉 mental: cognitive [[that everything depends on self-consciousness]]

everything depends = Range on self-consciousness = Phenomenon

effective: operative

/5/真心觉得 (I) sincerely felt

mental: perceptive

(I) = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/6/无从适应 (I) could not accommodate (to the university life)

material: (I) = Actor transformative

= Medium

effective: operative

/7/浑浑噩噩中 while I was muddling along

mental: cognitive

I = Senser muddling along = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/8/每天看着周围 的同学 I observed my classmates around every day

behavioral

I = Behaver my classmates = Behavior

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/1/刚踏入大学的 时候 when (I) first entered university

(continued)

Appendices

151

Table C2 (continued) Clause

Transitive Analysis Process type

/9/几点准备起床 what time they got up

material: they = Actor transformative

= Agent

effective: operative

= Agent

effective: operative

= Medium

effective: operative

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

(I) = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/10/收拾上课 material: (they) = Actor (they) got ready for transformative class /11/每节课前都得 问 (I) had to ask before every class

verbal

(I) = Sayer

/12/在哪个课室上 material: (we) = Actor 课 transformative class = Scope in which classroom (we) had class mental: /13/也不知道 and (I) didn’t know cognitive either

Ergative Analysis Agency Analysis

Participants

/14/什么时候该拿 课本出来 when (I) should take the textbook out

mental: cognitive

(I) = Senser when to take the textbook out = Phenomenon

= Medium = Medium

effective: operative

/15/翻一翻 (I should) turn (the pages)

mental: cognitive

(I) = Senser turn the pages = Phenomenon

= Medium = Medium

effective: operative

mental: /16/瞅两眼 (I should) skim (the cognitive textbook)

(I) = Senser skim the textbook = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/17/因为高中学的 because what (I) learned in senior high school

(I) = Actor

= Medium

effective: operative

material: creative

relational: /18/是理科 identifying (what I learned in senior high school) were science subjects

(what I learned in = Medium senior high school) = Range = Token science subjects = Value

middle

/19/大学学的 material: but what (I) learned creative in university

(I) = Actor

effective: operative

= Medium

(continued)

152

Appendices

Table C2 (continued) Clause

Transitive Analysis

Ergative Analysis Agency Analysis

Process type

Participants

/20/却是文科专业 (what I learned in university) are arts subjects

relational: identifying

(what I learned in university) = Token arts subjects = Value

= Medium = Range

middle

/21/所以很多时候 没有感受到理科 生的存在感 so very often (I) didn’t felt the existence of a science student

mental: perceptive

(I) = Senser the existence of a science student = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/22/有时候上课周 existential 围发言声此起彼 伏 sometimes in the class (my classmates’) voices arose and subsided around me

(my classmates’) voices = Existent

= Medium

middle

/23/觉得 (I) felt

mental: perceptive

(I) = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative

/24/自己比米粒还 渺小 I was smaller than a grain

relational: attributive

(I) = Carrier smaller than a grain = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/25/这个时期 [[受 relational: 环境和周围人作 attributive 用]]还是很大的 in this period (it) was tremendously [that I was affected by the environment and the people around]]

[that I was affected = Medium by the environment = Range and the people around] = Carrier tremendously = Attribute

middle

/26/[[受环境和周 material: 围人作用]] transformative [that I was affected by the environment and the people around]]

(I) = Goal the environment and the people around = Actor

= Medium = Agent

effective: receptive: agentive

mental: /27/一方面觉得 on the one hand (I) perceptive felt

(I) = Senser

= Medium

effective: operative (continued)

Appendices

153

Table C2 (continued) Clause

Transitive Analysis

Ergative Analysis Agency Analysis

Process type

Participants

/28/大学没有想象 中的那么自由 university (life) was not as free as in imagination

relational: attributive

university (life) = Carrier not as free as in imagination = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/29/就算是不喜欢 的课 even the class (I) didn’t like

mental: emotive

(I) = Senser the class = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

chance for skipping = Existent

= Medium

middle

/31/因为要点名 material: (the teacher) = because (the transformative Actor teacher) would call the roll

= Agent

effective: operative

/32/也找不到逃课 的理由 (I) also couldn’t find an excuse for skipping class

existential

an excuse for skipping class = Existent

= Medium

middle

/33/看周围那么优 秀的同学 (I) saw many excellent students around

behavioral

(I) = Behavior many excellent students = Behavior

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/34/另一方面自己 不知道怎么做 on the other hand I didn’t know what to do

mental: cognitive

I = Senser not know what to do = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/35/时间安排上有 沉重的无力感 (I) had a strong sense of helplessness in time arrangement

mental: perceptive

I = Senser strong sense of helplessness = Phenomenon

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/30/也没有逃课的 existential 机会 there was no chance for skipping

(continued)

154

Appendices

Table C2 (continued) Clause

Transitive Analysis Process type

/36/而且这种无力 mental: 感在考试前夕会 perceptive 明显加重 and this sense of helplessness would aggravate before exams

Ergative Analysis Agency Analysis

Participants this sense of = Range helplessness would aggravate = Phenomenon

effective: operative

/37/可能是因为 probably (it) was because

relational: attributive

(it) = Carrier because = Attribute

= Medium = Range

middle

/38/懒散惯了 (I) was used to being lazy

relational: attributive

(i) = Carrier used to being lazy = Attribute

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/39/突然要我什么 东西都来个规划 suddenly (when it) forced me to plan for everything

mental: (it) = Actor transformative me = Goal

= Agent = Medium

effective: operative

/40/就不知所措 (I) didn’t know what to do

mental: cognitive

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/41/无从下手了 (and I) found nowhere to start

material: (I) = Actor transformative

= Medium

effective: operative

/42/所以只能看看 周围人 so (I) could only observe people around

behavioral

= Medium = Range

effective: operative

/43/然后各种邯郸 学步 and then (I) followed suit everywhere

material: (I) = Actor transformative

= Medium

effective: operative

I = Senser not know what to do = Phenomenon

I = Behaver people around = Behavior

Appendices

155

Table C3 Logico-semantic analysis of Excerpt 13 ClauseComplex

Clause

//A//

/1/ 我最近参加了6月6日 N/A 的戏剧大赛 I took part in the drama contest on June 6

H

/2/

expansion: elaborating: clarification

N

/3/ 戏剧大赛, , 是英文学院的传统赛事 the drama contest is a traditional event in the English Faculty

projection: idea

N

/4/ 我觉得 I think

N/A

N

/5/ 作为英文学院的同学嘛, as (I am) a student from the English Faculty

projection: idea

N

/6/ 也应该…… (I) should …

expansion: enhancing: cause: result

L

//B//

LS Relation between Clauses

Agency level

/7/ 我本身都比较喜欢参加这些 expansion: extending: variation: H replacive 活动 I myself like participating in these activities /8/ 所以说我也报名参加了 therefore I entered my name for (the contest) //C//

//D//

expansion: enhancing: cause: result

H

/9/ 在这次大赛当中, 虽 N/A 然我只是一名演员 during this contest, although I was just an actress

N

/10/ 群众演员的身份参加到其中 expansion: enhancing: manner: and (I) participated in it as a minor means role

N

/11/ 但是每一场, 每一场的排练都必须去参加 but each, each rehearsal had to be attended

expansion: extending: addition: adversative

L

/12/ 当初的话, 我面试的 originally, what I interviewed for

N/A

N

/13/是一个主演 (what I interviewed for) is a leading role

projection: fact

H

(continued)

156

Appendices

Table C3 (continued) ClauseComplex

//E//

//F//

Clause

LS Relation between Clauses

Agency level

/14/ 但是因为毕 竟是针对大三同学的赛事 but after all (it) is a contest for third-year students

expansion: extending: addition: adversative

N

/15/ 所以说他们的主演基本上都 expansion: enhancing: cause: result 是大三的 so the leading actors and actresses are generally the juniors

N

/16/ 然后那个导演最终把我安排 expansion: enhancing: temporal: later 到一个群众演员的角色 then the director finally assigned me to a minor role

L

/17/ 当初我也有其他事 at that time I also have another engagement

N/A

H

/18/ 然后我想 so I thought

expansion: enhancing: cause: result

N

/19/ 既然不能演主要的角色 as I was unable to play a leading role

projection: idea

L

/20/ 其实去演群众演员 expansion: enhancing: cause: being arranged to play a minor role result

L

/21/也没有什么关系 (being arranged to play a minor role) had not much bearing in fact

projection: fact

N

/22/ 只要不要占我太多时间 as long as it wouldn’t take up too much of my time

expansion: enhancing: condition: negative

L

/23/ 因为那段时间我也比较忙 since I was quite busy at that time

expansion: enhancing: cause: reason

N

N/A /24/ 但是, 真正进去之后 however, after (I) really got in (the contest)

H

/25/ 我觉得 I felt

expansion: enhancing: temporal: later

N

/26/ 它确实会占用很多时间 it did take up much time

projection: idea

L

/27/ 这不是重点 this is not the point

expansion: extending: addition: adversative

N

/28/ 重点是 the point is

expansion: elaborating: clarification

N (continued)

Appendices

157

Table C3 (continued) ClauseComplex

//G//

//H//

//I//

//J//

//K//

Clause

LS Relation between Clauses

Agency level

/29/ 我收获了很多 I have gained a lot

projection: fact

H

N/A /30/ 他们剧组 的核心成员对我的影响很深 the core members of the crew have influenced me deeply, especially the director

L

/31/ 特别是那个导演 especially the director (has influenced me deeply)

expansion: elaborating: exemplification

L

/32/ 他是一个很有魄力的人 he is an enterprising person

expansion: elaborating: clarification

L

/33/ 剧本是 the script is

N/A

N

/34/ 编剧根据沙翁的经典剧 本改编 the adapters adapted(the script) from the classic Shakespeare’s play

projection: fact

N

/35/ 我通看了一遍剧本 I read through the script

N/A

N

/36/ 真的是很羡慕 (I) really envy (them)

expansion: enhancing: temporal: later

L

/37/ 真的是很钦佩他们 (I) really admire them

expansion: extending: addition: additive

L

/38/ 能够把英语真的是当作自己 expansion: enhancing: cause: reason 的一种工具 (they) are able to take English as a tool of their own

L

/39/ 觉得 (I) think

N/A

N

/40/ 她们很厉害 they are awesome

projection: idea

L

/41/ 觉得 (I) think

expansion: extending: addition: additive

N

/42/ 我能达到她们的高度 if I am able to reach their level

projection: idea

H

/43/ 就很满足了 (I) would be content

expansion: enhancing: condition: positive

H

/44/ 我进去之后 after I got in (the contest)

N/A

H (continued)

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Appendices

Table C3 (continued) ClauseComplex

//L//

//M//

Clause

LS Relation between Clauses

Agency level

/45/ 很大的改变就是 a great change in me is

expansion: enhancing: temporal: later

N

/46/ 在我看来 as I view it

projection: fact

N

/47/ 英语不是学习上的负担 English leaning is not a burden

projection: idea

H

/48/ 能把英语学好 (if I) am able to master English

N/A

H

/49/ 当作[[我自己能够游刃有余 使用的]]一种工具 and take it as a tool [[that I am able to use skillfully]]

expansion: elaborating: exposition

H

/50/ [[我自己能够游刃有余使用的]] [[that I am able to use skillfully]]

expansion: elaborating: clarification

H

/51/ 对于我来说是一件幸福的事 expansion: enhancing: condition: positive (it) is happiness for me

H

/52/ 我越来越喜欢英语了 I like English better and better

H

N/A

References

Davidson, D. (1963). Actions, reasons, and causes, reprinted in Davidson (1980), 3–20. Davidson, D. (1980). Essays on actions and events. Clarendon Press. Halliday, M. (1975). Learning how to mean. Edward Arnold. King, B. (2014). Inverting virginity, abstinence, and conquest: Sexual agency and subjectivity in classroom conversation. Sexualities, 17, 310–328. Lytra, V. (2011). Negotiating language, culture and pupil agency in complementary school classrooms. Linguistics and Education, 22(1), 23–36. Murphey, T., & Carpenter, C. (2008). The seeds of agency in language learning histories. In P. Kalaja, V. Menezes, & A. M. F. Barcelos (Eds.), Narratives of learning and teaching EFL (pp. 17–34). Palgrave Macmillan. Norton, B., & Gao, Y. (2008). Identity, investment, and Chinese learners of English. Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, 18(1), 109–120.

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023 Q. Lin, Agency Construction and Navigation in English Learning Stories, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-1406-7

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