Autobiographical Writing and Identity in EFL Education 9781135076115, 9780415814874

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Autobiographical Writing and Identity in EFL Education The book explores the pedagogical potential of autobiographical writing in English-as-a-foreign language, approaching the topic from an educational, longitudinal, dialogical, and social perspective to provide a valuable resource for language teachers and researchers. Shizhou Yang ( ) teaches English writing at Yunnan University of Nationalities in Kunming, China. He received his PhD in 2011 from La Trobe University in Australia. His current research interests include identity, literacies, autobiographical writing and the use of narrative approaches in minority education.

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95 The Resegregation of Schools Education and Race in the Twenty-First Century Edited by Jamel K. Donnor and Adrienne D. Dixson 96 Raising Literacy Achievement in High-Poverty Schools An Evidence-Based Approach Eithne Kennedy 97 Autobiographical Writing and Identity in EFL Education Shizhou Yang

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Autobiographical Writing and Identity in EFL Education Shizhou Yang

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First published 2014 by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2014 Taylor & Francis The right of Shizhou Yang to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

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Yang, Shizhou. Autobiographical writing education / Shizhou Yang.

and

identity

in

EFL

pages cm. — (Routledge Research in Education ; 97) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1 Autobiography—Authorship. 2. Biography as a literary form. 3. English language—Rhetoric—Study teaching—Foreign speakers. I. Title. PE1479.A88Y36 2013 808.06’692—dc23 2013002624 ISBN: 978-0-415-81487-4 (hbk) ISBN: 978-0-203-06670-6 (ebk)

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and

For Cathryn, my fun and faithful companion

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Contents List of Tables List of Figures List of Abbreviations Acknowledgements 1 Introduction to the Study 2

Understanding Autobiographical Writing and Identity

3 Research Autobiographical Writing and Identity 4 Abby: “A Butterfly Has No Soul” 5 Matt: “The Smile Became Special” 6 Beth: “A Wonderful Book” 7 Anne: “A Small Clean Warm Plastic” 8 Comparisons Across the Four Case Studies 9 Conclusion Appendix A: Bilingual Invitations for Ethnic Bai Students Appendix B: Mission Statement Appendix C: Life Experience Themes Appendix D: Nicholas’s Life River (T/D_1) Appendix E: A Sample of Written Comments Appendix F: Abby’s Reading History

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Appendix G: Abby’s Writing History Appendix H: Nicholas’s Chapter Titles (2T) Appendix I: “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) Appendix J: “God Made a Joke with Me” (1W_M) Appendix K: Written Response to Anne’s Writing Sample Appendix L: “Unleash Your Writing Voice” Appendix M: “My Father” (1W_W) Appendix N: 14th Meeting Handout Appendix O: “ Never to Be Healed)

” (A Wound

Appendix P: “My First Picture” Appendix Q: “I Am a Sinner” Appendix R: Written Comments on Hope’s Sample Notes on Data Notes Bibliography Index

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Tables 3.1

Group Composition

3.2

Writing Group Schedule

3.3

Summary of Information about Case Study Participants

4.1

Summary of Interviews

4.2

Abby’s Autobiographical Writing Samples and Interviews

5.1

Matt’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

6.1

Beth’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

7.1

Summary of Interviews

7.2

Anne’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

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Figures 3.1

A multi-storied diagram.

4.1

Abby’s tree pictures.

4.2

Abby’s two faces.

4.3

Abby’s first writing sample (1W_W).

4.4

Abby’s second face.

4.5

Abby’s special moments in the writing group.

5.1

“My Feeling about Autobiography” (2W_W).

5.2

Matt’s life river (3D/W_W).

5.3

“The Smile Became Special” (14W_W).

5.4

“‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W).

5.5

“Confidence.”

5.6

“My Life Road.”

6.1

Beth’s three images.

6.2

Beth’s bottle.

6.3

“My Feeling of

6.4

“Fall into Man-Made Lake” (13W_W and 14W_W).

7.1

Anne’s first tree.

7.2

Anne’s life river and chapter titles (3D/W_W).

7.3

“My First Time to See Father’s Tears.”

” (3W_W).

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7.4

“A Wound in My Soul” (14W _W).

7.5

Anne’s free writing.

7.6

Anne’s two trees.

8.1

Anne’s version 1 (“Study Abroad”).

8.2

Cathryn’s writing on studying abroad.

8.3

Anne’s second version on studying abroad (“A Wonderful Travel”).

8.4

Diagram of identity work in narrative terms.

9.1

Identity diagram.

A.1

Nicholas’s life river.

A.2

Abby’s reading history.

A.3

Abby’s writing history.

A.4

Nicholas’s chapter titles.

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Abbreviations CEE

College Entrance Examinations

EFL

English as a Foreign Language

ESL

English as a Second Language

GRE

Graduate Entrance Examinations

SLA

Second Language Acquisition

TEM-4;Test of English for English Majors, Band 4; 8 Band 8 TESOL

Teaching of English to Speakers of Other Languages

TOEFL Test of English as a Foreign Language

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Acknowledgements This book explores relationships between autobiographical writing and identity in EFL education. The work was made possible through the help and support from many wonderful people. First of all, I wish to thank each of the 19 student volunteers, especially Abby, Matt, Beth, and Anne. Their friendship and generous sharing as the members of the writing group enabled me to continue with my proposed research. They are the heroes in this thesis, as they are in real life. I will always be thankful for my three PhD thesis supervisors: Dr. Audrey Grant, Dr. Howard Nicholas, and Dr. Peta Heywood from La Trobe University in Australia. Audrey first saw the potential in my topic and encouraged me to pursue it by using interdisciplinary approaches. She helped me to see story as multiple, and literacy as much more than reading and writing. I thank her for her dedicated supervision throughout my candidature. I appreciate her generosity in letting me use her personal professional library, her guidance in writing joint conference papers, and her timely visit in China while I was running the writing group. I thank Audrey particularly for the genuine respect she has shown me as a person, learner, storyteller, and researcher, as shown through each supervision meeting, phone conversation, and email communication. I am indeed honoured to be her student. Howard has influenced my research since 2007 but especially during 2009–2011, after I became one of his formal students. He adeptly guided me through the field of Applied Linguistics, introduced me to scholars like Pavlenko and Edelsky, and challenged

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me through many thought-provoking and uplifting supervision meetings in his office, over Skype, and through his written comments on my drafts. I will always remember his thoroughness, attention to detail, sense of humour, and care. Peta’s qualities as an audience are rare. She always listened with eagerness, appreciation, and understanding. By introducing me to Romanyshyn’s work, she helped me to see myself as an instrument through which EFL autobiographical writing and identity tell their stories. I am blessed to have these three teachers as my supervisors. I thank my family, who gave me a home from which I start my multiple stories. They include my deceased mother, Wang Zhenfen, whom I remember as a loving, courageous, and generous figure; my father, Yang Qihua, a hardworking, honest, uncomplaining, courageous, and wise man, whose loving presence and unyielding faith since his conversion in 2006 will be remembered long after he is gone; my three elder siblings, Shicai, Shikuan, and Shihai, who have always trusted, supported, and protected me. I also thank my extended family: my godparents, Michael and Kitty Wilson, who have shown and surrounded me with godly love; my parents-in-law, Jerry and Julie Fine, two sisters-in-law, Sarah and Robin Fine, and their families, whose prayers, presence, encouraging words, and other support will always be appreciated. Many other individuals also helped me in significant ways. They are Dr. Robert Richardson, Dr. Mary Jane Curry, Professor Ma Yonghong, Dr. Lloyd Holliday, Dr. Bernie Neville, Professor Shirley Brice Heath, Jamin Pelkey, Dan and Cassy Silva, Barry and Catherine Brake, Jonathon and

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Erin Sciola, John and Catherine Manga, Darryl and Riitta Corp, Angelo and Marianne Di Giallonardo, Priyantha and Gayani Kiridena, Amila and Anoma Samarakoon, Dan and Katy Spak-man, Victor and Kendra Belfi, Brian and Ellen Mustain, Ron and Linda Wiltse, and many other encouraging friends from the Northern Connections, FWC, Christ Community Church, and the First Baptist Church. I thank my classmates and fellow students at La Trobe University, particularly Hui Min Lou, Hou Min, Trang Guyen, Iris Dumenden, and Dave Yoong, for their peer support through listening, questioning, sharing, and encouragement. I thank Professor Brian Street, Professor Andy Kirkpatrick, Dr. Jill San-guinetti, and two anonymous reviewers. Their comments on the whole or part of this book, in its earlier forms, encouraged me to pursue further the complex issues related to EFL autobiographical writing and identity. I also thank Professor Clare Kramsch for providing me with valuable references. My gratitude also goes to my friends and colleagues in China. They are Xi Chongxuan, Song Yuankang, Ma Fengming, Lim Cheng Gesk, Rod Lawrence, Li Shiqiang, Li Jiangxiu, Yang Hongyan, Wang Xiaohong, and Zhao Junhai, who helped me in one way or another. I thank Routledge Press for giving me this opportunity to publish my work. Particularly, I want to thank my editorial and production teams: Max Novick and Jennifer Morrow, Stacy Noto and Lauren M. Verity, and their

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colleagues such as Ryan Kenny, for their interest, timely communications, and professional advice. Financial support has been indispensable in this research. In this regard, I thank the Australian government and La Trobe University, who funded this research through the Endeavour Asia Award (2007), International Postgraduate Research Scholarship, and David Myers Scholarship. I thank Cathryn, my faithful friend and beloved wife, a great companion to have on this journey of learning, as in all others. I thank her for her unwavering love, trust, and encouragement. My sons, Micah and Kai, thank you! Playing with you or holding you each day helps me to imagine a time that I don’t remember much about, but was nonetheless loved. Even more so, you helped me to imagine and hope for new stories that stretch into the future. Last, thank You, Christ, the True Son of Heaven, who has authored and re-authored my life and stories with Your unfailing love. You have turned me from a countryside boy into a Kingdom child, from a ‘noisy gong’ to a musical note in the greatest love song of the universe. I’ve trusted You, and it is good.

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1 Introduction to the Study Autobiographical Writing Experiences In middle school and high school, I often wrote diaries and poems. They focused on my relationships with my parents. Most of the time, I wrote in Chinese because even though I had been learning English, my English was not good enough to express what I felt. Often I wrote to complain about my father, who, despite the fact that I studied hard and believed that I did a lot more housework than my peers—cooking, washing, cleaning, and feeding pigs—never seemed satisfied. To him, my food was either too salty or not salty enough. In my Chinese writing, Father was too talkative, constantly fault-finding, and did not care for his own family. Occasionally, I wrote about my mother, who stood for sickness, ignorance, and shame. Ever since Mother had been paralyzed in a tractor accident and had had to spend most of her time either lying in bed or sitting in a wheelchair, I had felt incomplete. To add to my embarrassment, Mother was ethnic Naxi, had little education, and spoke but a broken Chinese dialect. As a “good” son, I dutifully fed her, washed her feet, cut her fingernails. But I never cared to listen to her. I went to university in 1995 and majored in English. It was my first time to go to a city. I decided to use this opportunity to leave my family behind and seek a better future for myself. During my four years at university, I rarely visited home. Study was always my excuse.

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Coming from the countryside, studying at a university for ethnic minority students (synonymous with second-class status in China), with no relatives in positions of power, I had to study English hard in order to find a job in the city. Gradually, I became one of the top students in my class, who passed major domestic English exams such as TEM-4 and TEM-8, as well as TOEFL and GRE, two international English exams. Upon graduation, I was employed by my alma mater to teach English to English major students. One year later, I went to America to study for my master’s degree in English education. On reflection now, I know English played a significant role in shaping my life and taking me away from working in the cornfields or living in the remote countryside in southwest China. Somehow, studying English as my major changed my outlook profoundly. In year three, I began to read the English Bible in order to learn English really well. Never did I expect its impact on me. One day, I read that ‘If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal’ (1 Corinthians 13:1). These words pierced my heart, revealing my vanity in placing all my hopes in learning English. If God did exist, what really mattered to him was love, something I was unable to give even to my own family. I decided to learn how to love, as my Christian teachers and friends had shown me, genuinely and generously. In America, I lived with my two American teachers, Michael and Kitty Wilson, and went to church with them every week. A few months later, feeling that I knew

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enough about this unseen God, I asked Pastor Bob earnestly, “Am I qualified to be a Christian?” Somehow, I thought that becoming a Christian was like joining the Chinese Communist Party; you have to be good enough. Pastor Bob did not reply immediately. Instead, he asked me, “Are you a sinner?” “Yes, I am!” I answered, remembering how I had been with my own family. “Then, you are qualified to be a Christian!” I was baptised a few weeks later. After that, my family re-entered my writing. But this time, maybe because I had become a Christian, or I was writing in English, or I was writing from outside China, or I was more mature—or maybe because of all of these reasons and more, family took on different meanings. In a poem titled “TT: Tune of Tomb,” I wrote about Father as “a devoted husband.” Papa, 52 Sister, 19, Brothers, 18 and 15, me, 11, Mama, paralyzed. For thirteen years, known by a bed, a wheelchair, and an operation table; a devoted husband, an ever-caring daughter; and three wandering sons.

I wrote about Mother’s death, a traditional funeral that followed, and my family not telling me the news until one month later. Then in a still budding spring

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the Tune of Tomb crept through the cracks of our door. Thus pounded the resounding gongs. Thus plodded the heavy steps. Thus uplifted the long-awaiting box. Thus wound the goat trails. To me, the delayed news only increased the volume of the firecrackers— Did they scare evil spirits? Or did they numb feeble minds? All and all— but tribulations at the foot of Shanshen— the god of mountain.

I wrote about Grandpa, whom I had never seen but had heard much about. Although a man of many good deeds, noble character, and musical talents, he was killed by the government during the early 1950s. His “crime,” from which he was absolved in 1997, was the deaths of some villagers during a famine. As the village head, he was initially held responsible. Had his belly been trod by Grandpa’s brown horse? Or had Grandpa’s bamboo flute shamed his stone heart? He murdered Grandpa’s name with a cold bullet, leaving a report in the valley—“an evil landlord” whose offspring are “birds of the same feathers.”

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And now he is taking my mama away to Longquan1— the never satisfying dragon’s spring.

In the second half of my poem, titled “MW: Music of Water,” I related to my baptism and its impact on my life (“pressing his lifeline upon my palm”). For the first time in my life, I noticed the beauty of nature—grass, flowers, crickets, and cicadas. I also found a way to examine my tradition, as represented by “To the Son of Heaven”—an ancient melody dedicated to Chinese emperors—that I grew up hearing Father playing on his erhu. MW: Music of Water Crickets of azaleas look up at the plateful moon— no more pinching thumbs and index fingers; all but a quiet breeze first crossing dogwood petals, then tenderly touching the still green wings of a cicada. Mama, I know your pain— water filled my ears, water ran through my hair, water buried me, the same way Longquan buried you. I knew not to scream; my voice was dead— I was helpless;

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but a big hand lifted me out of the water, pressing his lifeline upon my palm. I thought of Papa. Bigger and stronger were his hands. They raised a hoe to dig a land. They drew a saw to make a bed. They shaped mud into an abode. They caressed my back when I yawned. But never were they opened to my eyes, until one day— I realized Papa was a fine musician who composed melodies with a horse-tail bow— never stop running and two stainless strings— love and honesty. He called his instrument Erhu and the music Chao Tianzi— To the Son of Heaven. In the water, everything was buried. But your hand lifted me up.

Writing about my family again in English, I discovered far more about them than who I had judged them to be. They were more than the people I had known and written

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about in Chinese in middle school and high school. They were more than the people I had tried to run away from at university. This experience taught me that through autobiographical writing (on this occasion in English), I might know my family anew and re-story my relationship with them. Some of the re-storying concerned my deceased mother. During her 13 years of immobility, she had asked me more than once to write down her stories. I never did. “She is just a farmer and a Naxi with hardly any education; how can she tell any interesting stories?” I had thought to myself. Mother died in the spring of 2001, carrying away her stories with her. Over the years after her death, I kept wondering why Mother wanted her stories written down, what her stories would tell about her as a person, and what effects they may have on me as her son. Although stories now told by others often put Mother in a different light, I still regret ever turning down her repeated requests to have her stories written down. In English education, I noticed similarly unwritten stories concerning English major students in China, especially those with ethnic minority backgrounds. Most ethnic minority students come from rural areas, where the teaching of English lags behind practices in the city. Some of them, like me, did not have much pride in their ethnic cultural heritage. But under the pressure of TEM-4 and TEM-8, these students mainly wrote argumentative essays in English at university. In my opinion, this was not a good way to learn English writing because it did not seem to build on students’

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knowledge of their own experiences. Based on the concept of ‘zone of proximal development’ (ZPD), which I had learned about in America, and based on my personal experience with writing both in Chinese and in English, I believed that they should start by writing about their own lives. So, in 2003, when I was assigned to teach writing at my university in China, I asked my English major students to write their “autobiographies” in English for a semester. My students’ English “autobiographies” showed me that they were not a homogeneous group, nor did they conform to stereotypes such as deficit and backward at worst or ‘ ’ (good at singing and dancing) at best. Instead, they were people with stories, albeit rarely written about. Three students especially influenced me in choosing EFL autobiographical writing and identity as my research topic. One student, a Han Chinese from northern China, started her autobiography by writing: “Thank you for giving me this opportunity to make such a big statement of myself!” Her stories featured travels around China with her parents. Another student, a Yi boy, filled many pages with his struggles as the son of a drinking and gambling father. The third student, a Naxi girl, complained that the stories she wrote with care were commented on only casually.2 These and others taught me that the opportunity to write their stories in English mattered to them. They prompted me to devote myself to exploring EFL autobiographical writing, hoping to understand both their stories and them. I entered this research with a minimal definition of “autobiographical writing,” i.e., writing about any

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aspects of one’s life experiences. It gave me a general direction to follow in data generation and analysis. However, as I wrote, discussed, and reflected on my case stories, I began to realise the inadequacy of this definition. Accordingly, in Chapter 8, I will re-conceptualise autobiographical writing based on this research. Four factors influenced my decision to start with ethnic Bai English major students. The first was the family. My wife and I started our PhD programs at the same time. Knowing that her fieldwork would involve extensive travelling around a Bai-concentrated area in China, I decided that my field site should be at a university near her data points, which I assumed would have many Bai students majoring in English. This arrangement allowed my wife and me to support each other throughout our fieldwork. The second was professional. To date, there are no in-depth studies of Chinese ethnic minority students learning to write in English. As such, researching EFL autobiographical writing by ethnic Bai English major students may fill part of the gap. The third was the Bai people’s Sinicised ethnicity. Although the Bai are the 14th most populous ethnic group in China, with a population of 1,850,000 (national census 2000), they were considered as ‘among the first of the larger minorities’ to lose their distinct ethnic identity in China (Mackerras, 1988, p. 80). Evidence includes their historical contact with the Han Chinese since the ninth century or earlier, their initial orthography

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using Chinese characters extensively, their preference to write in Chinese, and their religious practices that bear a close similarity to those of the Han Chinese—worship of nature, of ancestor, of deities from Buddhism, Taoism, and noble personages from the past. Social changes such as the adoption of the one-child policy and modernization, according to Mackerras (1988), will but aggravate the situation. This makes EFL autobiographical writing by ethnic Bai English major students an interesting site to observe the ways in which a threatened ethnic identity is relevant to EFL literacy education today. Last but not least, the combination of learning to write in English and belonging to a minority group in China has always interested me. Growing up as a member of a minority group in an impoverished rural area, similar to most ethnic minority groups, I am sympathetic to minority students who want to write well in English but are constrained by their previous literacy experiences and the current teaching practices they are exposed to, which focus on academic writing. Serving as a teacher of English at a university mainly for ethnic minority students, I want to find out where learning to write in English fits in these students’ uphill struggles to overcome social prejudice against them simply because of their ethnic background, or places of birth, or inability to speak standard Mandarin. I want to know what informed decisions I can make in my future teaching of English writing to bring about breakthrough-learning experiences for them. ‘ ’ (The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, a

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Chinese proverb), and I regard this research with four ethnic Bai students as such a humble start. Research Questions This research explores identity work by four ethnic Bai English major students, who actively engaged in EFL autobiographical writing in an extracurricular writing group that I led. The main question of this research is: How can an enhanced understanding of EFL autobiographical writing and identity work inform theories of L2 learner identity? More specifically, I ask: (1) How do EFL students invest in autobiographical writing in English in an extracurricular writing group? (2) To what extent do EFL student writers, who have not travelled abroad and who have limited English proficiency, engage in identity work through autobiographical writing in English? (3) What is the nature of the autobiographical writing in the writing group? (4) What happens to their writer identities as they engage in EFL autobiographical writing actively in the writing group? and (5) What roles does the writing group play in the four case study participants’ autobiographical writing and identity work? Question 3 and the main research question will be addressed in Chapter 9. Other questions will be addressed in Chapters 4–7, first case by case and then together in Chapter 8. The question of whether students’ engagement with autobiographical writing might have any impact on their writing of other genres, such as argumentative writing, although an interesting question to explore, falls outside the scope of this book.

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Potential Significance Previous studies have shown that extensive identity work was involved in English autobiographical writing by proficient L2 writers, such as immigrants who published their memoirs in North America. In comparison, little research is available concerning identity work of student writers from the English as a Foreign Language (EFL) context, who write autobiographically in English. This study attempts to fill part of this gap by focusing on four university English major students in China, who became actively involved in EFL autobiographical writing in an extracurricular writing group. This study draws together multiple disciplinary perspectives on identity: poststructuralist, dialogical, and narrative. Moreover, it takes up issues such as continuity, investment, and agency. Accordingly, the findings of this study may contribute to a more holistic understanding about L2 learner identity, particularly in relation to EFL autobiographical writing. Pedagogically, the findings of this study may be beneficial to teachers of English, who work with language learners with diverse linguistic and cultural backgrounds both in the ESL and EFL contexts. Fieldwork The fieldwork informing this research took place in a nine-month extracurricular writing group (March–December 2008) at Lakeview University (pseudonym), a state university in southwest China. The university was formed in 2001 by merging several existing colleges. The writing group members included 34

19 student volunteers and me as both the researcher and the group leader. All the student members were English major students from first-, second-, or third-year levels of the Foreign Languages College.3 Most of them were ethnic Bai and 17 were female. The group met weekly for 32 weeks to share with each other their writing samples, usually written before meetings, and discuss writing-related topics. Occasionally, foreign visitors participated in the group meetings. The group had an explicit orientation towards EFL autobiographical writing. During the first 16 weeks, the members were encouraged to write mainly autobiographically in English. During the second 16 weeks, although the group’s focus shifted to EFL argumentative writing, the members could continue writing autobiographically. The writing group members and activities generated a wide array of data for consideration in this book, e.g., EFL autobiographical writing samples, argumentative essays, drawings, poems, interviews, and meeting discussions. Theoretical Framework My theory of EFL autobiographical writing and identity mainly draws on postmodernist studies of L2 learners’ identities, sociocultural theories about learning, an ethnographic view of literacy, narrative theories, and a critical dialogical perspective (Bakhtin, 1981; J. Bruner, 1991b; Fair-clough, 2005; Hall, 1997; Heath, 1982a; Heath, Street & Mills, 2008; Holquist, 2002; Krǎmsch, 1999; Pavlenko, 2001a, 2003; Peirce, 1995; Street, 1993a; Vygotsky, 1978; White, 2007; White & Epston, 1990), all of which guard against essentialising L2

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learners. It entails three major aspects: an expanded view of L2 learner identity, two types of identities and a narrative sense of identity work. The expanded view of L2 learner identity allows us to consider identities in the making, with categories suggested by learners themselves, from three theoretical perspectives: ‘investment,’ narrative understanding, and ideological thinking. The two types of identities are English-writing-mediated identities and writer identities. They bring to the fore both L2 writers’ agentive roles and particular cultural tools in their identity work. A narrative sense of identity work builds on theories and practices used in family therapy, which see identity work as taking place socioculturally, i.e., with others and through cultural tools. It provides a sense of what identity work may be like for English L2 writers while reminding us of its sociocultural condition. Broad Methodological Approach In this study, I employ an emergent case study design (Patton, 2002; Stake, 2003). More specifically, I use narrative approaches (Bell, 2002; Chase, 2008; Clandinin & Connelly, 2000; Grant, 1997, 2001; Polkinghorne, 1995) assisted by ethnographic and case study methods (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008; Heath et al., 2008; Stake, 2003). Narrative approaches foreground the pivotal role played by narrative in identity making (e.g., Bell, 2002; J. Bruner, 1991b, 2004b; Clandinin & Connelly, 2000; White, 2007; White & Epston, 1990). Ethnographic methods situate EFL autobiographical writing as locally occurring ‘literacy events’ shaped by socially contextualizing ‘practices’ (e.g., Heath, 1983;

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Heath et al., 2008; Street, 1993a, 1994a, 2003). Case study methods facilitate learning from the local, the specific, and the particular (Stake, 2003; Yin, 2009). I then use a multi-storied approach to narrative analysis (Grant, 1997, 2001) to locate EFL autobiographical writing in four interpenetrating contexts. Structure of the Book Following this introduction to the study, in Chapter 2, I will present a literature review and develop a conceptual framework for relating autobiographical writing and identity in the EFL context. In Chapter 3, I explain the making of an emergent case study methodology. Chapters 4 to 7 contain the four case studies on the four individual writers actively engaged in EFL autobiographical writing, within a particular research inquiry that focused on identity work in the writing group. The case study titles come from words or works that are featured in the respective chapters. Hence: Chapter 4: Abby—“The Butterfly Has No Soul.” Chapter 5: Matt—“The Smile Became Special” Chapter 6: Beth—“A Wonderful Book” Chapter 7: Anne—“A Small Clean Warm Plastic” Chapter 8 contains three main sections: a re-conceptualisation of autobiographical writing, a comparison of contexts across the four case studies, and a review of the four writers’ identity work, both in terms of English-writing-mediated identities and writer identities. Chapter 9 concludes this book by connecting

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the major theoretical and pedagogical findings of this study, drawing implications for L2 literacy education, and suggesting future areas for research.

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2 Understanding Autobiographical Writing and Identity Writing Autobiographically and Identity Work in English as an L2 Looking back, I realize that the process of learning to write in English is in fact a process of creating and defining a new identity and balancing it with the old identity. The process of learning English composition would have been easier if I had realized this earlier and consciously sought to compare the two different identities required by the two writing systems from two different cultures. (Shen, 1989, p. 466) Literature has long shown this to be true: Autobiographical writing, entailing the important gesture of backward gaze, can be a powerful way to challenge fixed ideologies in people’s lives, pointing to alternative understandings or possibilities (Luke, 2008, 2010). Yet Shen’s testimony suggests other dimensions to consider: Can autobiographical writing in an additional language be used in a similar way? Can it challenge language learners’ sense of self as writers? What effects does it have on their language ideologies? What about their other social identities? In this chapter, I first argue for the need to research possible connections between EFL autobiographical writing and identity work. The use of English L2 autobiographic narratives as data in L2 research is reviewed, which reveals a gap of knowledge in the ‘Expanding Circle’ (Kachru, 1992, p. 3) or the EFL context about whether and how EFL student writers

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may use autobiographical writing in English to do identity work. As a point of entry, I define autobiographical writing as writing about any aspects of one’s own life. I then argue that a postmodern notion of identity needs to be further widened by (1) seeing identity as work; (2) foregrounding L2 learners’ agency in shaping their existing identities through the mediation of English writing; and (3) distinguishing two kinds of identities: English-writing-mediated identities and writer identity. I then draw on narrative practices to develop a narrative perspective on identity work. Last, I adopt a critical dialogical perspective on autobiographical writing and identity work. Autobiographical Writing in English as an L2 Since the late 1970s, under the influence of the ‘narrative turn,’ autobiographical narratives have entered many disciplines such as Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), L2 writing, Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research, and Applied Linguistics (Bell, 2002; Casanave, 2005; Pavlenko, 2007; Peirce, 1995). In Applied Linguistics, they have become increasingly popular in the past decade (see Pavlenko, 2007), contributing important knowledge about English L2 learners and their learning processes. According to Pavlenko (2007, pp. 164–165), using autobiographical narratives as data can deepen our understandings of learners of additional languages by: (1) revealing their private lives and ‘the insider’s view of the processes of language learning, attrition, and use’; (2) suggesting corresponding new research directions; and (3) contextualizing language learners historically.

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Published English L2 Memoirists One use of autobiographic narratives in SLA research can be illustrated by the excerpt from Shen (1989), quoted at the beginning of this chapter. In his autobiographical essay, Shen reflected on his experiences of learning to write in English, which was additional to his heritage language, Chinese. In essence, Shen argued from his experience that to write well in English as a non-first language or L2, a learner needs to reconfigure his or her identities to include ‘an English self’ (Shen, 1989, p. 461) or (at least as it might be shaped by cultures associated with English) ‘an individualized identity’ (Stapleton, 2002, p. 180). Drawing on published autobiographical essays such as Shen’s and/or autobiographies like that by Hoffman (1989), a number of researchers (X. Li, 2007; Pavlenko, 1998, 2001a; Steinman, 2005) have suggested that there is an intricate relationship between writing in English L2 or any other additional language and the writers’ identities. For instance, Pavlenko (2007, pp. 169–171) focuses on how English L2 learners ‘construct,’ ‘author,’ and ‘position’ their selves, as reflected in their autobiographical accounts published in English. Li (2007, p. 262) uses ‘soul in exile’ to capture the shared experiences of bilinguals, particularly immigrants and refugees, writing in English L2, claiming that: they (souls in exile) had to go through numerous struggles while trying to master the language and reconstruct a second self in their second language to achieve their goals in life, more specifically, to become a successful writer using the second language.

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The use of published L2 autobiographical works has introduced an important line of inquiry in L2 language and literacy education. If L2 writing is nothing but the acquisition of linguistic patterns, then, it can be taught and learned as skills, very much like riding a bicycle. If, however, L2 writing constitutes the writers’ reconfigurations of their identities through writing, then it should be taught and learned as complex social processes. However, published autobiographical accounts only tell some of the stories of English L2 learners. As Shen’s account is frequently mentioned in the literature (e.g., Hirvela & Belcher, 2001; Leki, 1991; Pavlenko, 2001a; Ramanathan & Atkinson, 1999), I will use it as an example. First of all, Shen is representative of a privileged class: memoirists who have published in English L2 in the Inner Circle. In Pavlenko’s (2001a, p. 339) words, they are ‘middle- and upper-middle class L2 users with unlimited access to linguistic resources.’ Like him, most English L2 memoirists, such as Hoffman, who was studied by Pavlenko (1998, 2001a, 2001b) and Steinman (2005), had resided in a traditional homeland of English such as America. Described in problematic (Nayar, 1997) but still widely-circulated terms (e.g., Leki, 2001; Leki, Cumming, & Silva, 2008), they are writers of English as a Second Language (ESL), who write ‘within the language of the community in which they live’ (O’Brien, 2004, p. 1). Alternatively, they may be described as L2 writers in ‘the Inner Circle,’ the ‘traditional bases of English’ (Kachru, 1992, p. 3). In such a context, L2 writers’ everyday activities are usually mediated through English. One of the potential

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consequences is the rationalization of the cultural values and ideologies underpinning the English language. As Shen’s (1989, p. 462) account may illustrate: The concept of a topic sentence, it seems to me, is symbolic of the values of a busy people in an industrialized society, rushing to get things done, hoping to attract and satisfy the busy reader very quickly. Thinking back, I realized that I did not fully understand the virtue of the concept until my life began to rush at the speed of everyone else’s in this country. Furthermore, being removed from their first language environments, L2 writers in the ‘Inner Circle’ may experience challenges to their established sense of self, whether as a successful writer in the L1 (Hirvela & Belcher, 2001) or a rich woman in one’s home country (Norton Peirce, 1993). In response, some of these writers, usually immigrants and refugees, may write memoirs in English L2 to ‘impose order on experience that was both disruptive and confusing’ (Pavlenko, 2001a, p. 324). Indeed, based on her analysis of 13 contemporary autobiographies and 15 autobiographical essays, written in English L2 by immigrants and published in America, Pavlenko (emphasis added2001a, p. 325) comments, ‘The metaphors of invention, imagination, and translation are among the most important in the memoirs in the corpus, where the protagonists are invariably concerned with repositioning and self-translation.’ In other words, writing in English L2 has become a strategy for some immigrants to reorganise their sense of self in their host cultures.

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In addition, the fact that Shen and most other English L2 learners published their autobiographical accounts in the USA has two implications. First, among other circumstances such as socio-political context, these writers were proficient enough in English to write about their experiences in English. In this sense, their autobiographical writing is similar to a growing body of literature by L2 teachers, who have reflected on their experiences of learning and teaching English L2 (e.g., Contreras & Gerardo, 2000; Lin, Wang, Akamatsu, & Riazi, 2002; Tsui, 2007; Xu & Liu, 2009; Zhao, 2006). Second, like all publications, published English L2 autobiographic accounts are crafted works. As Casanave (2005, p. 27) suggests, they are ‘cooked’ by the English L2 writers in the process of preparation: ‘Pieces are left out, retold in new ways, and adjusted to fit the requirements of an editor or publisher.’ Moreover, as H. Nicholas (personal communication, September 27, 2010) suggests, L2 published memoirs are not educationally oriented. For one thing, the writers did not write their L2 memoirs in order to learn L2. For another, they mainly dealt with individual experiences, with little consideration for group-mediations in their identity work. As such, L2 published memoirs have limited capacity to inform L2 learning in educational contexts. Finally, autobiographical accounts like Shen’s were shaped by their historical times and perspectives. Stapleton (2002, pp. 180–181) offers two insightful observations: that Shen was reflecting on China of the Maoist era (1950–1970); and that his representations of

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both the English and Chinese rhetoric were both too ‘static.’ Consequently, it is problematic for researchers to use Shen’s story ‘to support the argument that learning to write in English requires learners to project an individualized identity, or infuse their writing with voice, while stating or implying that doing so is an alien notion in some L2 cultures’ (Stapleton, 2002, p. 180). In my opinion, Stapleton’s critique is also applicable to the use of other published English L2 autobiographical accounts as data. They all contain the writers’ reflections on their particular eras and their idiosyncratic understandings about writing in different languages, but they do not, of themselves, frame pedagogical perspectives for the future. These features of published English L2 autobiographical works, as analy-sed in the preceding, do not negate the possibility that, for all these writers, learning English as L2 and/or writing in it have had significant consequences for their identities. Nor do they invalidate the importance of inquiring into possible links between writing in L2 and identity reconfigurations. Nevertheless, the majority of English L2 learners worldwide are not published writers. In the next two sections, I will examine major autobiographical-data-based studies with two less prominent groups of English L2 learners: recent immigrants in the Inner Circle—English-speaking countries, and university students in the Expanding Circle—countries such as China and Japan (Kachru, 1992, p. 3), who are usually known as EFL students. Recent Immigrants

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Parallel to studies of published L2 writers’ identities mentioned in the previous section, a number of studies have focused on the English L2 learning experiences of immigrants, who had recently arrived in an English-speaking country, particularly in North America (e.g., Menard-Warwick, 2004; Menard-Warwick, 2006; Norton, 2000; Peirce, 1995). Similar to the published L2 writers, the daily activities of recent immigrants were often mediated through English. But unlike the published writers, their language-learning experiences were usually elicited through interviews and diary studies—methods that were probably necessitated by their limited English proficiency. Studies focusing on recent immigrants have the capacity to offer critical insights into the complex language-learning processes of immigrant L2 learners. A case to consider is Norton’s one-year diary study (Peirce, 1995). Although not focused on autobiographical writing per se, Norton’s study is suggestive for the making of writer identities. Norton started off her study by questioning popular assumptions in Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research about ‘natural language learning,’ such as ‘the language used is free and normal’ (Spolsky, 1989, as cited in Norton Peirce, 1993, p. 3). She then investigated the language-learning experiences of five recent immigrant women in Canada—primarily through a diary study, i.e., asking the women to document their daily uses of English in their homes, workplaces, and communities and discussing their experiences with them during regular meetings (Peirce, 1995, p. 14). Norton’s findings threw new light on ‘natural language learning,’ revealing

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it to be much more complex than had been assumed. In a series of publications, Norton and others (Kanno & Norton, 2003; Norton, 2000, 2006, 2009) proposed poststructuralist ways of conceptualising identity and English L2 learning (Peirce, 1995, pp. 14–15). First, identity is ‘multiple, a site of struggle, and subject to change’ (Peirce, 1995, p. 9). In place of a traditional psychological view of identity as motivation, Norton argued for a social view of identity in relation to ‘imagined community’ and ‘investment.’ In gist, learning L2 amounts to ‘investing’ in acquiring a socially desirable identity, i.e., becoming a member of an imagined community one aspires to join through learning L2 (Kanno & Norton, 2003, p. 248). English L2 is thus assumed, following Bourdieu (2004), to be a tool to access certain ‘resources’ (Peirce, 1995, p. 17). Second, power relations between interlocutors shape the way learners use their opportunities to speak English in the ‘natural’ contexts. To illustrate, two examples of Norton’s (Peirce, 1995, p. 19) case studies are quoted in the following: Eva, who came to Canada for “economical advantages” and was eager to work with anglophones [sic], practice her English and get better jobs, was silenced when the customers in her workplace made comments about her accent. Mai, who came to Canada for her life in the future and depended on the wishes of management for her job security and financial independence, was most uncomfortable speaking to her boss.

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Third, language is essential to a learner’s social identity and social interactions. In Norton’s (Peirce, 1995, p. 13) words, it is: constitutive and constituted by a language learner’s social identity. It is through language that a person negotiates a sense of self within and across different sites at different points in time, and it is through language that a person gains access to—or is denied access to—powerful social networks that give learners the opportunity to speak. Norton’s study (Peirce, 1995, p. 9) is one of the studies in SLA that adopted a poststructuralist conception of identity. One contribution of studies like this is that they have broadened identity categories in L2 research to go beyond ‘dichotic oppositional categories such as native/ non-native, proficient/limited proficiency, assimilated, Western/Oriental in the interpretations of human motivations and desires’ (Ricento, 2005, p. 905). The other contribution is that they have highlighted the mutual shaping effects between L2 learning and identity. As Pavlenko (2001a, p. 319) summarised: First of all, L2 users’ linguistic, social, cultural, gender, racial, and ethnic identities mediate their access to linguistic resources and inter-actional opportunities available in the L2 (Pavlenko, 2000). Secondly, their agencies and investments in language learning and use are shaped by the range of identities available for them in L2.

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Similar to Norton (Peirce, 1995) and others (e.g., Block, 2007b; Park, 2009; Pavlenko, 2001a), I have adopted a poststructuralist or postmodern view of identity as the theoretical foundation for the present study of EFL autobiographical writing and identity. However, I have made one adaptation: integrating ‘continuity’ as a necessary dimension of identity (Bakhtin, 1981; Holquist, 1990; Menard-Warwick, 2005). Continuity of identity, i.e., a person maintaining the same position in different social domains, is important for L2 teaching practice. Several studies (Heath, 1993; Iddings & Katz, 2007; Kibler, 2010; McKay, 1993; McKay & Wong, 1996; Norton, 2009) have shown the pedagogical effectiveness of allowing L2 learners to continue their cherished identities, whether in relation to dance, drama, or their heritage languages. Norton’s (2001) own study has also shown the reverse to be true: If L2 teaching practice was not congruent with L2 learners’ social identities, resistance or non-participation may arise. The notion of ‘identity text’ offers a useful way to explain such contrasting learning outcomes. According to Cummins et al. (2005, p. 39), ‘identity texts’ are ‘positive statements that students make about themselves’ as expressed through writing, drawing, speech, performance, or a combination of any of these forms. Through identity texts, such as a dual language text that includes their home language, students are actively engaged in the learning process because, first of all, their languages and cultures become their resources rather than problems, and, secondly, they are free to express and continue investing in their identities in a new language.

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Continuity is also essential to holistic theories of L2 learner identity. This can be illustrated by critically reading an anecdote about Martina in Norton’s study. Martina was an immigrant woman who spoke from her social position as a mother to offset the power relationship between herself as an L2 learner and her young English L1 colleague. Asked by her colleague to clean the living room, she refused. Martina recorded in her diary, ‘And I said “No.” The girl is only 12 years old. She is younger than my son’ (Peirce, 1995, p. 23). Norton’s own interpretation is that Martina’s ‘social identity as a mother and primary caregiver in the home led her to challenge’ her young colleague’s request (Peirce, 1995, p. 21). This interpretation contradicts with Norton’s theoretical emphasis on identity as ‘constantly changing across time and space’ (Peirce, 1995, p. 18). As Price (1996, p. 332) points out: The problem here is that Martina somehow can insist on one identity (mother) over others, despite the way discourse might construct her (e.g., immigrant) at any given moment. Peirce seems obliged to appeal to an ongoing identity (mother) that seems in fact remarkably constant, reaching back even to the decision to migrate to Canada. Therefore, the issue of ‘continuity’ in Norton’s identity theory needs readdressing. There are many theories about how identity may continue (Eakin, 1999; Giddens, 1991; White & Epston, 1990). For instance, J. Bruner suggests that people’s senses of self may continue as a result of their

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commitment to certain beliefs and values (Bruner, 1991b, p. 76). To treat continuity of identity as an integral part of theories of L2 learner identity, one possible solution is integrating a dialogical view of language (Bakhtin, 1981) and a narrative view of identity (Menard-Warwick, 2005), to which I will return later. Adult EFL Student Writers We know little about adult EFL student writers’ autobiographical writing and identity work, short-term or long. On the one hand, SLA research on student writers’ identities seems to focus on academic writing, often with the assumption that identity is equivalent to voice (Alagozlu, 2007; Chen, 2001; Helms-Park & Stapleton, 2003; Hirvela & Belcher, 2001; Matsuda & Tardy, 2007; Menard-Warwick, 2007; Ramanathan & Atkinson, 1999; Stapleton, 2002; Stapleton & Helms-Park, 2008; Tang & John, 1999). On the other hand, most studies involving L2 students’ written autobiographical narratives tended to use these narratives as a tool to evaluate particular pedagogies, such as story grammar (Amer, 1992; Cheng, 2008; Ellis, Sheen, Murakami, & Takashima, 2008; Nilforooshan & Afghari, 2007) or as linguistic data to demonstrate certain textual features, e.g., the use of reference, typical to a particular group of L2 learners (Genc & Bada, 2006; Kaminura & Oi, 2001; Kang, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2009; Lee, 2003; Lingley, 2005). In addition, although a number of intercultural studies (Y. Gao, Cheng, Zhao, & Zhou, 2005; Gu, 2010; Krǎmsch, 1999; Lam, 2000; Z. Z. Li, et al., 2007; Peirce & Kamal, 2003; Shen, 1989; Tang & John, 1999) have

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revealed how English learners with a Chinese cultural background engaged in identity work when using English, it seems that no study has actually explored these learners’ identity work by drawing on EFL autobiographical writing as the primary data. Cross-Cultural Autobiographies and the Teaching and Learning of English by Li and her collaborators Bian, Gao, Y. H., Dai, Lu, Wang, L. Y. and Wang, C. J. (2007) is probably the only book with substantial discussions— even so, only three chapters out of 14—on EFL student learners’ identity issues related to learning English. Throughout their book, the authors suggest that language-learning autobiographies, as written by L2 published memoirists and linguists, may serve as rich reading materials to engage EFL language learners in meaningful dialogues and generate new learner positions. In the three chapters informed by EFL learners’ autobiographical writing, what falls short is its functional and short-term nature: a personal statement for overseas graduate schools or an autobiographical account assigned by the teacher/researcher. As such, the autobiographical writing is not itself produced for the purpose of learning an additional language, nor is it capable of revealing EFL learners’ evolving identity work over time. Nonetheless, evidence suggests that EFL autobiographical writing produced in educational contexts might involve significant identity work. A few studies (e.g., Brisk, 1998; Edelsky, 2003; Espinosa, 2009; Miller, 2004; Wu, 1994), situated in the ‘Inner Circle’ or the ESL context, found L2 students

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developing literacy while expanding their identities, e.g., taking up an identity as a memoirist, by writing autobiographical narratives in formal classes. These findings confirmed critical literacy theories (Giroux, 1987; Grant, 2001; Graves, 1983; Kamler, 2001; Moffett, 1981) in English L1 and multi-literacy contexts, as well as sociocultural theories of learning (Hall, 1997; Vygotsky, 1978), which emphasise the importance of starting with what the learners already know, including their sense of self. For instance, Takarczyk (1993, pp. 1–2), based on her study with three American students, suggests that autobiographical writing is a way for student writers to ‘envision different futures for themselves’ and of ‘representing particular identities of minorities.’ But EFL student writers are very different in their contexts of learning from English L1 students, published L2 memoirists, immigrants, and international students in the Inner Circle. Firstly, EFL student writers’ daily activities outside school and universities are mainly mediated through their first language(s) rather than English. Secondly, they may regard English writing ‘as peripheral or irrelevant to [their] educations, careers, or lives’ (Leki, 2001, p. 202). Most importantly, residing in a familiar environment, EFL student writers may not experience as acute a challenge to their established sense of self due to L2 learning as L2 learners who dwell in a foreign land. In such contexts, some scholars seem to suggest that EFL student writers do not engage in identity work when they write in English. In doing so, they have not only overlooked the continuity dimension of identity, but also neglected the multiple ways L2

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learners may construct and reconstruct their identities, with L2 as only one of the possible mediating tools. For instance, Block (2007b, p. 144) concluded in his book Second Language Identities that ‘in the FL (Foreign Language) setting, there is usually far too much first language-mediated baggage and interference for profound changes to occur in the individual’s conceptual system and his/her sense of self in the TL (Target Language).’ Block extends this point by arguing that for re-constitution of selves to take place, L2 learners need to go through ‘critical experiences,’ i.e., ‘periods of time during which prolonged contact with an L2 and a new and different cultural setting causes irreversible destabilization of the individual’s sense of self’ (emphasis added, Block, 2002, p. 4; Block, 2008). The present study challenges this kind of sweeping conclusion by focusing on EFL autobiographical writing and identity work in an autobiographically oriented extracurricular writing group in China. One main question entailing five specific questions are asked regarding possible relationship between autobiographical writing and identity in the particular EFL context (see “Research Questions” in Chapter 1 for details). As indicated earlier, as a point of entry, I am using a minimal definition of autobiographical writing to cover any writing that deals with any aspects of one’s own life experiences. This is because I do not want to set limits on the kind of ideas and activities that may be fostered at my research site. But later in the book I will look back and see what is significant about this kind of writing and how it can be better understood.

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To address my research questions, next I will argue for an expanded view of L2 learner identity, which emphasises learners’ agency in their own learning and identity-making processes. An Expanded View of L2 Learner Identity Identity as multiple, Agentive, and Made In arguing for an expanded view of L2 learner identity, I mainly draw on postmodernist studies of L2 learning, dialogical philosophy, ethnographic studies of literacy, and narrative theories. Three perspectives are integrated. The first perspective is of identity as multiple. Recent studies have shown that traditional dichotomous and static categories such as ‘native and non-native’ are insufficient (Block, 2007a; Krǎmsch & Lam, 1999; Nayar, 1997; Norton, 2006; Ricento, 2005; Thesen, 1997). Norton’s (2000; Peirce, 1995) study, for instance, demonstrates that immigrant women have multiple identities based on their immigrant status, ethnicity, gender, age, social class, and roles, which may intersect with their use of spoken English. However, how EFL student writers’ various social identities influence their use of autobiographical writing in English has not yet been documented. The second perspective locates learner agency as central. Agency here should not be taken as ‘free will’ or ‘resistance’ (Ahearn, 2001). Rather, it means L2 learners’ ‘socioculturally mediated capacity to act’ (Ahearn, 2001, p. 116), which is ‘constitutive of and constituted by social structure’ (Block, 2008, p. 143). Thesen (1997) argues that critical discourse theories

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(Fairclough, 1992; Gee, 1990) and a number of studies on L2 learners (e.g., McKay & Wong, 1996; Peirce, 1995) have failed to find out ‘what [the participants] say they are doing’ (Thesen, 1997, p. 504). As a result, learners’ agency in making ‘emergent identities’ is neglected (Thesen, 1997, p. 504). Following Thesen (1997), I take the position that agency should be foregrounded in studying L2 learners’ identities by attending closely to ‘identity categories and combinations of categories’ initiated by learners themselves. The centrality of L2 learners’ agency is also supported by the next argument about identity work. The third perspective sees identity as made or as identity work. That is, identities have to be actively worked out by individuals. This idea is included in various conceptions of identity as a process. For example, the personality psychologist Allport (1955, p. 35) sees people as grappling with a lifelong dilemma between two conflicting ways of ‘becoming’: ‘the tribal and the personal: the one that makes him into a mirror, the other that lights the lamp of individuality within.’ The cultural anthropologist Holland and others (2001, p. vii) assert, ‘Identities—if they are alive, if they are being lived—are unfinished and in progress.’ The cognitive psychologist J. Bruner (1991b, p. 71) notes that self is not just a set of ‘givens,’ which would render people as ‘simply mirrors of our culture.’ The sociologist Giddens (1991, p. 215) takes it one step further by suggesting that self-identity is ‘a reflexive achievement’ through story, ‘shaped, altered and reflexively sustained in relation to rapidly changing circumstances of social life, on a local and global scale.’ As Taniguchi (2010) comments on the relationship

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between her stories of two trips abroad and her evolving sense of self, ‘the act of narrating is considered an act of constructing identity.’ Therefore, I see it fit to borrow a definition of identity work from sociology and use it to refer to ‘the range of activities individuals engage in to create, present, and sustain personal identities that are congruent with and supportive of the self-concept’ (Snow & Anderson, 1987, p. 1348). But as my research mainly concerns autobiographical writing, I will primarily focus on the ways EFL student writers engage in identity work through language use. Identity as work entails at least three dimensions. The first dimension is identity making through ‘investment’ in L2 learning (McKay & Wong, 1996; Pavlenko, 2003; Peirce, 1995). Norton argues learners’ ‘investment’ in an L2 may point to their desired future identities (Kanno & Norton, 2003; Norton, 2000, 2006; Peirce, 1995), i.e., becoming the members of their ‘imagined communities,’ which refers to ‘groups of people, not immediately tangible and accessible, with whom we connect through the power of the imagination’ (Kanno & Norton, 2003, p. 241). ‘In essence, an imagined community assumes an imagined identity, and a learner’s investment in the target language must be understood within this context’ (Norton, 2006, p. 505). An example is: ‘when a young Japanese man studying fashion design in Tokyo starts to learn English, he may envision himself as one of the most successful fashion designers in New York’ (Kanno & Norton, 2003, pp. 241–242). With the English language being an important entry pass into that imagined community in New York, the young man’s

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investment in learning English can be equated to his investment in an imagined identity— a specific kind of fashion designer. Therefore, what is imagined and pursued are the symbolic values (Bourdieu, 2000, 2004) that L2 learners attach to the language. L2 learners invest in the language-related practices because they see, imaginatively, the potential dividends such investment may yield, which include ‘possibilities for an enhanced range of identity options in the future’ (Norton, 2006, p. 505). The second dimension of identity work involves narrative understandings of self. Narrative theorists assume that story is an indispensable cultural tool for people to generate a sense of continuity in their identities (Bruner, 1991b, 2004b; Eakin, 1999; Holquist, 2002; Sfard & Prusak, 2005; White, 2005). Following E. M. Bruner (1986, p. 14), White (2005, p. 10) suggests that ‘people’s stories of life and of personal identity’ consist of dual landscapes: ‘the landscape of action,’ i.e., sequentially plotted events and actions, and the ‘landscape of consciousness,’ which contains ‘identity conclusions’ or people’s understandings of themselves as informed by the contemporary culture. In a narrative sense, then, people have to work out who they are by interpreting their experiences reflectively, thus joining together discrete events and values in their lives through a storyline (Bamberg, De Fina, & Schiffrin, 2007, p. 5; Eakin, 1999; Giddens, 1991, p. 225; Holquist, 1990; Mackenzie, 2008; Menard-Warwick, 2005). Identity work through narrative writing has been found taking place among published English L2 memoirists (see X. Li, 2007; Pavlenko, 1998, 2001a), who wrote

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autobiographically to regain their established sense of self as well as to construct new identities, a process of ‘self-translation’ (Pavlenko, 1998). Whether or not similar identity work may take place for EFL student writers, whose English proficiency is much more limited, remains to be seen in the present study. The third dimension of identity work is ideological. It is implicated in dialogical relations between self and other in any language use (Bakhtin, 1986; Holquist, 1990, p. 26; Hull & Katz, 2006), particularly in relation to others’ words. People have to work out their ideological positions in the world by having dialogue with others’ words, both the preceding and the forthcoming (Bakhtin, 1986, p. 94). In this process, others’ words or discourses function as the basis of our ‘ideological becoming’ (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78). That is, our ‘ideological becoming,’ builds on others’ ideologies and is achieved through ‘struggle’: ‘an intense struggle within us for hegemony among various available verbal and ideological points of view, approaches, directions and values’ (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 246). More specifically: Another’s discourse performs here no longer as information, directions, rules, models and so forth—but strives rather to determine the very bases of our ideological interrelations with the world, the very basis of our behavior; it performs here as authoritative discourse, and an internally persuasive discourse. (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78) An authoritative discourse comes to us already with power attached to it from the past; in contrast, an

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internally persuasive discourse derives its power from being reasonable (Lightfoot, 2004, pp. 35–36). Put in another way, individuals enter the ‘space of authorship’ when they struggle with multiple discourses for their own ideological positions (Holland, et al., 2001, p. 169). Their words do not stand alone as meaningful, but have their meanings as ‘multi-voiced’ (Bakhtin, 1981; Holquist, 2002; Prior, 2001) or ‘cross-fertilised’ texts (H. Nicholas, personal communication, September 13, 2010). A minimal sense of ‘multi-voicedness’ is ‘double-voicing,’ which ‘involves instances in which the writer or speaker imposes her or his own meaning on the words of others, appealing, for instance, to ironic exaggeration to explicitly state something and implicitly deny it’ (Pavlenko, 2007, p. 179). English-Writing-Mediated Identity and Writer Identity Emphasising learners’ agency in their own identity work (and continuity as a dimension of identity), in this section I will draw on the existing literature to build an argument that two broad types of social identities can be distinguished. The first kind is English-writing-mediated identities, i.e., identity conclusions people make about themselves as people (or perhaps more specifically as categories of people such as immigrants, daughters, mothers, workers, etc.) through writing in English. The second is writer identity, i.e., identity conclusions EFL writers draw about themselves as writers in English. My argument, concerning the term English-writing-mediated identities, is that L2 autobiographical writing should be viewed as a unique space for

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identity work, different from identity work in spoken interactions mediated in L2, including elicited spoken narratives (e.g., Block, 2002; Menard-Warwick, 2007; Thesen, 1997). When discussing L2 learner identities, SLA scholars (Block, 2007b; Y. H. Gao, 2007, 2009) often do not differentiate English-writing-mediated identities from identities mediated by spoken English. However, studies that have drawn more extensively on written data (e.g., X. Li, 2007; Pavlenko, 2001a, 2003; Peirce, 1995; Steinman, 2005) suggest that this distinction is important. For instance, in Norton Peirce’s (1995) study, L2 writing, in the form of diaries, appeared to be a distinctive tool for the immigrant women to reposition themselves. In speech, these women had experienced deficit identity categories based on their immigration status, accent, limited English proficiency, and the like. In contrast, some of the women used their diaries to show how they preferred to be known, leading Norton to use alternative identity categories such as a ‘primary caregiver’ or ‘multicultural citizen’ (Peirce, 1995, pp. 21, 24). Similarly, Pavlenko (2001a, p. 326) found that published English L2 memoirists used L2 autobiographical narratives to: ‘regain control over the self, the world, and their own life story narrative... accomplish linguistic transitions... [find] uniquely safe spaces in which new identities can be invented and new voices “tried on.”‘Others have made bigger claims. For instance, in her study of published L2 memoirs, Li (2007, p. 260) suggests that ‘a soul in exile’ is a reality for all bilingual writers, even for all human beings, before they become ‘a global soul,’ which refers to identities drawing on both languages. In line with these early explorations, the term English-writing-mediated 62

identities may help foreground identity work that takes place distinctively in English L2 writing, which is the focus in the present study. Norton’s (2000, 1995) and Ivanič’s (1998) theories of identity have suggested an important direction to follow when researching L2 learners’ identities. That is, identity work may be integral to the processes of learning (to write in) English, especially as an additional language. Their theories have also suggested two useful general types of identities: as social roles and positionings (e.g., a mother, immigrant, worker) and as a writer. Accordingly, there may be two main types of identity work in relation to these two types of identities. My main question then is what kind of identity work, if any, would take place when student writers engage actively with EFL autobiographical writing. To answer this question, however, finer distinctions than those made in the preceding are needed. First of all, overemphasising the roles played by L2 learners’ social identities in their use of spoken English, Norton’s theory fails to acknowledge diaries written by immigrant women in Canada—a particular kind of L2 autobiographical writing, as a special site where identity work takes place. As such, those L2 diaries were treated as if they were faithful representations of the actual language-using experiences. Furthermore, although Ivanič’s three-dimensional view of writer identity is rather comprehensive, it does not pay enough attention to language learners’ self-understandings as writers. The closest Ivanič comes to addressing this notion of writer identity is ‘autobiographical self,’ i.e., a writer’s

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ever-evolving stock of past experiences in all their complexities. However, such a notion of ‘autobiographical self’ is too broad to be useful in the present exploration of possible identity work with one’s writer identity in relation to EFL autobiographic writing. As an alternative, I turned to narrative theories to fashion a different notion of writer identity that emphasises learners’ agency and the impact of their actual writing experiences. Thirdly, Ivanič’s framework was not initially developed for intercultural work, as in the present study. Her data were provided by students in Great Britain whose first language was English. As a result, even though Ivanič recognises the existence of multiple literacies and the impact of social interactions on writing, her three categories do not provide sufficient space to address issues faced by L2 learners who potentially have multiple language and literacy experiences besides writing in English. My definition of writer identity is an attempt to bridge Ivanič’s theory about English L1 literacy and Norton’s theory about English L2 learning. Firstly, it complements Ivanič’s (1998, p. 24) three-dimensional view of a writer’s identity: i.e., ‘autobiographical self,’ ‘discoursal self,’ and ‘self as author.’ As mentioned earlier, I define writer identity as an English L2 learner’s conclusions about him/herself as a writer in English in association with having had experience of writing in English. This notion of writer identity is similar to but more specific than ‘autobiographical self,’ which refers to a writer’s stock of past experiences and sense of self up to the moment of writing (Ivanič, 1998, p. 24). As studies of mature age multilingual writers (e.g., Hirvela

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& Belcher, 2001) have shown, one can be a confident writer in L1 but a struggling writer in L2. Therefore, it is necessary to find out how L2 writers, as agents, reflect on their previous writing experiences in English and generate their own identity conclusions as writers. The next dimension of a writer’s identity, discoursal self, is the impression of a writer conveys through the features in a text (Ivanič, 1998, pp. 26, 29, 39). Norton (2000, p. 148) describes it as ‘the on-going construction of identity implicated in each act of writing.’ The third dimension of a writer’s identity, self as author, is the representation of self as the creator of a text in relation to other texts (Ivanič, 1998, p. 24). As both Ivanič and Norton have argued, all these dimensions of writer identities should be understood in relation to ‘possibilities of selfhood’ (Ivanič, 1998, p. 27), i.e., ‘a larger, more abstract notion of writer identity which addresses the subject positions that are available to writers within particular communities, at particular points of time’ (Norton, 2000, p. 148). Secondly, my notion of writer identity builds on Norton’s relational notion of identity, i.e., ‘how a person understands his or her relationship to the world, how that relationship is constructed across time and space, and how the person understands possibilities for the future’ (emphasis added, Norton, 2000, p. 5). More specifically, it emphasises L2 learners as agents in making their writer identities in L2 through ‘investment’ in their ‘imagined communities’ (Peirce, 1995). As a two-year study of adolescent immigrant learners’ language learning experiences in California (McKay & Wong, 1996) has

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found, L2 learners’ investment in various areas of language learning, e.g., writing, speaking, and listening, may be shaped by their personal needs to maintain and develop certain social identities. Therefore, it is necessary to distinguish investment in L2 learning in general from investment in the domain of L2 literacy. As writer identity seems a useful pedagogical focus for literacy education, I will explicate it more. In researching EFL students’ writer identities in relation to their autobiographical writing in English, I draw extensively on ethnographic studies of literacy. The ethnographer Street (1984, 1994a, 2003) suggests an ‘ideological’ model of literacy. Street assumes that, first, literacy is not a value-free skill of coding and decoding but a socially embedded practice, and, second, that ‘the ways in which people address reading and writing are themselves rooted in conceptions of knowledge, identity, being’ (Street, 2003, p. 2). Accordingly, literacy is best approached as ‘multiple and highly contextualized’ (Graff, 1984, p. 54; Menard-Warwick, 2005, p. 263), that is, as ‘literacies’ (e.g., Collins, 1995; Graff, 1984; Street, 1984, 1994b, 1999, 2003) which are particular cases of reading or writing as informed and shaped by cultural ways of engaging in such activities (Barton, 1994, p. viii). The particulars are referred to as ‘literacy events,’ i.e., ‘any occasion in which a piece of writing is integral to the nature of the participants’ interaction and their interpretive process’ (Heath, 1982a, p. 93; Heath, Street, & Mills, 2008, p. 102). Reading stories to children at night and referring to recipes when cooking are examples of two different literacy events. Literacy

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events manifest and sustain literacy practices, which, according to Street, are a: broad concept, pitched at a higher level of abstraction and referring to both behaviour and conceptualisation related to the use of reading and/or writing... Literacy practices incorporate not only ‘literacy events’ but also ‘folk models’ of those events and the ideological preconceptions that underpin them. (as cited in Grant, 1993, p. 3; also in Street, 1993b, pp. 12–13) Therefore, if literacy practices are icebergs, literacy events are their tips. In a cross-cultural context, as in the present study, taking an ethnographic view of literacy has three critical implications. First, it problematises ‘assumptions about what is “natural”‘(Walton, 1993, p. 45) by inviting ‘close descriptions of the actual uses and conceptions of literacy in specific cultural contexts’ (Street, 1993a, p. 3), e.g., a particular extracurricular writing group in China. Such descriptions are the basis for real understandings about English L2 language learners, who communicate and construct their multiple identities through multiple languages, language varieties, genres, and modes of communication in diverse sociocultural contexts and domains (Farías, Obilinovic, & Orrego, 2007; Lam, 2000; Ouellette, 2008; Piller, 2001; Prior, 2005; Shipk, 2005; Yancey, 2004; Yi, 2007). Second, an ethnographic view of literacy problematises thin descriptions of EFL writers’ identities as ‘illiterate,’ ‘unable to read,’ or ‘unable to write’ in English, as if 67

these were the inherent nature of some learners. Instead, it invites thicker and more inclusive descriptions of EFL writers as users of English literacy in particular social domains. By doing so, the social origins of particular literate identities may be revealed. Take as an example Heath’s (1983) classic study of students from three American communities. By the time the townspeople’s children went to school, they had already learnt at home much of the literacy practices of the school, e.g., book reading, turn taking in conversations, using proper labels across contexts (Heath, 1983, p. 351). Roadville children, in contrast, were apprenticed at home to literacy practices quite different from those of the school, e.g., telling stories that are true to reality, without making changes to details such as sequence and wording (Heath, 1983, p. 165). Consequently, the townspeople’s children’s better performance and Roadville’s children’s not so good performance were not their inherited nature but were made with the aid of ‘common sense’ (Lea & Street, 1998; Street, 2003, p. 198), literacy events, and literacy practices in formal education. Third, an ethnographic view of literacy works hand in hand with an ethnographic sense of culture ‘as a verb’ (Ivanič, 1998; Heath et al., 2008; Street, 1993b). More specifically, culture is ‘the constant interaction of competing systems of values, beliefs, practices, norms, conventions and relations of power which have been shaped by the socio-political history of a nation or an institution in the interests of privileged members of it’ (Ivanič, 1998, p. 42). As such, culture is ‘unbounded, kaleidoscopic, and dynamic’ (Heath, et al., 2008, p. 7). This verb sense of culture fits well with the ‘dialectic of

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the local and the global,’ which characterizes the modern world (Giddens, 1991, p. 22). It repositions EFL autobiographical writing as a particular site of ‘glocal effects’ (Grant, 2005, 2007a; Ryan, 2006), through which EFL writers may explore and expand their identities by drawing on resources associated with both their first and additional languages (Belz, 2002; Higgins, 2009; Kibler, 2010; Lam, 2000; Lin, et al., 2002; Pavlenko, 2003; Piller, 2001). In the preceding discussion, I have attempted to delineate important features of an expanded view of L2 learner identity. To summarise, this view entails broadened identity categories, as well as new understandings of one’s own identity that build upon existing identities, through ideological thinking (particularly about others’ words), as well as reflection and investment in L2 writing. If, as argued, identity is work in progress, a natural question is how L2 learners move from one identity conclusion to another. Fascinating as they are, studies of published English L2 memoirists fell short of explaining how these memoirists’ identities shifted from ‘a soul in exile’ to ‘a global soul’ (X. Li, 2007) and from initial loss to later restoration (Pavlenko, 1998). To address this issue, I turn to narrative conceptions of identity work—the most promising approach to this dynamic that I have located. Distinguishing English-writing-mediated identities and writer identity takes us closer to explore possible links between EFL autobiographical writing and identity work. Next, I will turn to narrative theories, in an

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attempt to locate some of the dynamic characteristics of identity work. Narrative Perspectives on Life and Identity Work Life as Narrative, Multi-Storied Life and Narrative Therapy In turning to narrative practices, especially those used in family therapy, my ultimate goal is to develop a narrative sense of identity work applicable to L2 learners. Doing so is consistent with the overall orientation of the present study, which takes postmodernist and sociocultural approaches to language, learning, and identity (Lantolf, 1994; Pavlenko, 1998; Peirce, 1995)—similar to those of narrative therapists (Polkinghorne, 2004, p. 60; White, 2007). Besides this overlap in orientation, I assume a common ground exists between L2 learners and clients seeking therapeutic treatment in four regards. To begin with, they both face the dilemmas of all human beings: existing socially yet as unique beings (Holquist, 2002) and living by grappling with both ‘the tribal and the personal’ ways of ‘becoming’ (Allport, 1955). In addition, both populations are involved in interpretation and constructing. Like other people, they seek to make sense of their experiences (Connelly & Clandinin, 1990; Geertz, 1973; Grant, 1997, 2005) and construct their knowledge of the world and the self (Bruner, 1991a, 1991b; Eakin, 1999; Magoon, 1977) with the aid of language—a dialogically shaped (Bakhtin, 1981; Holquist, 2002) mediating tool (Vygotsky, 1978).

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Furthermore, story is an integral part of life for both populations as a feature of their human condition. As J. Bruner (2004a, p. 709) suggests, ‘Our precommitment about the nature of a life is that it is a story, some narrative however incoherently put together.’ More importantly, both populations have the potential to live ‘multi-storied’ lives (Grant, 1997, 2001, 2007a; White, 2005). As J. Bruner (2004a, p. 709) continues, ‘any story one may tell about anything is better understood by considering other possible ways in which it can be told.’ If this applies to educators such as Luke, who revisit or ‘look back’ and find alternative storylines for their ethnic identities (Luke, 2010), the same may also be true for EFL learners. Last, for both populations, learning occurs socioculturally. Learning, including learning an L2 and coming to know oneself in new ways, always involves movements from doing with others (intermental) to doing by oneself (intramental), and always through some kind of cultural tools such as conversation, drawing, and writing (Lave, 1996; Lave & Wenger, 1991; Vygotsky, 1978; Wenger, 1999). Viewing L2 learning as sociocultural has been empirically applied in a number of studies (Edelsky, 2003; Willett, 1995). That identity work is not a ‘solo’ activity is articulated in the following observation: Self seems also to be intersubjective or “distributed” in the same way that one’s “knowledge” is distributed beyond one’s head to include the friends and colleagues

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to whom one has access, the notes one has filed, the books one has on one’s shelves. (Bruner, 1991b, p. 76) Despite these similarities, clients seeking help from therapists have at least one major difference from EFL writers: Clients enter the therapeutic context with some kind of problem; however, this is not a precondition for L2 learners to engage in EFL writing. Accordingly, in the EFL educational context, a ‘multi-storied’ or ‘multi-voiced’ sense of self is a much broader concept than that in the therapeutic context, which always implies a liberating and empowering process. For EFL writers, the concept highlights deepened understandings about self and that which has shaped the self. Besides this needed adaptation, four stances that narrative therapists take about the connections between life, narrative, and identity in their particular contexts seem equally applicable to the present study. First, stories are meaningful tools in a number of ways. For one thing, stories are an essential tool that people use to interpret and ascribe meanings to their life events and experiences, which outlast the events and experiences themselves (White & Epston, 1990). For another, White and Epston, who co-founded narrative therapy in the early 1980s (Epston, 2010), argue that through new readings and writings of stories, new meanings are achieved—a process similar to the evolving understandings of life and relationships (White & Epston, 1990, p. 9). For still another, the two authors suggest that through stories, people may successfully join aspects of their experiences from their past, present and future into ‘a coherent account of themselves and the

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world around them,’ thus generating ‘a sense of continuity and meaning in their lives’ (White & Epston, 1990, p. 10). Second, the two authors posit that stories are only partial representations of life. Stories show only part of our lived experiences, those that are consistent with ‘the dominant evolving stories that we and others have about us’ (White & Epston, 1990, pp. 11–12). Consequently, our lived experiences that are at odds with these ‘dominant evolving stories’ are often left ‘unstoried,’ untold, and shapeless (White & Epston, 1990, pp. 11–12). Third, the two authors suggest that performed stories may re-constitute people’s lives and relationships. Drawing on Goffman’s (1959) work, they claim that ‘with every performance, persons are reauthoring their lives.1 The evolution of lives is akin to the process of reauthoring, the process of persons’ entering into stories, taking them over and making them their own’ (White & Epston, 1990, p. 13). Thus, it is important to examine whether a story is performed or not and for what audience. Most importantly, identities seem to be made through stories. As mentioned earlier, drawing on J. Bruner (1986), White (2005, p. 10) suggests that each story consists of two landscapes: ‘the landscape of action,’ i.e., sequentially plotted events and actions, and ‘landscape of consciousness,’ which contains ‘identity conclusions’ or people’s understandings of themselves as informed by the contemporary culture. These features of stories and story structures provide narrative therapists with a

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theoretical foundation for their practices, which works against essentialising people’s identities. So far as identity work is concerned, narrative therapy can be summed up as processes of clients moving from storying ‘a single-voiced sense of self’ to storying ‘a multi-voiced sense of self’ (White, 2005, p. 13) in a supportive narrative space. A narrative space ‘enables frames of intelligibility, intentional states and personal agency to be brought to bear in people’s meaning-making and conclusions about their lives and identities’ (Grant, 2005, p. 20). More specifically, ‘stories constitute this frame of intelligibility’ (White, 1995, p. 13), providing people with a cultural tool to make sense and share the meanings of their experiences. Intentional states are ‘nonstructuralist categories of identity—intentions and purposes, values and beliefs, hopes, dreams and visions, commitments to ways of living’ (Bruner, 1991a, p. 7; White, 2005, p. 11). One way the clients can experience a sense of personal agency is, with the assistance of therapists, they come to know that they and their problems are actually two entities (Gre-million, 2004, p. 188). Working in a narrative space, narrative therapists assume that the dominant stories of their clients’ lives, which usually imply ‘problem-saturated’ stories in therapeutic contexts, may curb the ‘performance of [the clients’] preferred stories’ (White & Epston, 1990, pp. 10, 14). As such, it is necessary for therapists to help clients to ‘co-author’ their alternative stories (Carr, 1998). According to Carr (1998, pp. 487–489), the process entails nine major practices: (1) taking the stance of a

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co-author; (2) ‘externalizing’ or separating problem from person; (3) helping clients to identify ‘unique outcomes’ or exceptions of their dominant stories; (4) generating detailed descriptions about these ‘unique outcomes’ by inviting the clients to explore their landscapes of action and landscapes of consciousness; (5) joining these ‘unique outcomes’ with similar events in the past and projecting their influences into the future to form an alternative storyline or plot; (6) involving ‘outside witnesses’ to be the supportive audience of the new story developed along the alternative storyline; (7) ‘re-membering,’ i.e., bringing clients back in touch with their significant (but absent) social others and those others’ perspectives of the clients (through imagination); (8) using documents to sustain the clients’ new story; (9) inviting clients to be co-authors of alternative stories in the lives of other people faced with similar predicaments. Put in another way, by working within a narrative space, narrative therapists take as the core issue ‘thin’ deficit-based identity conclusions and seek ‘thick’ agentive accounts of people’s identities (Gremillion, 2004; White, 2001, 2007; White & Epston, 1990). Similarly, EFL autobiographical writing and identity work in the present study should be examined in relation to the writing group context and how the group processes do or do not relate to the development of rich accounts of people’s identities. Narrative Sense of Identity Work In developing a narrative sense of identity work applicable to L2 learners, I am aware that two

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assumptions about clients seeking therapists’ help need to be relinquished. First, L2 learners usually do not have a problematic identity conclusion per se. Consequently, the therapeutic work to move clients from negative to positive identity conclusions does not apply to L2 learners. Second, the social space in which L2 learning takes place, e.g., the writing group in the present study, usually involves more participants, whose participation does not necessarily follow ‘maps of narrative practice,’ to borrow White’s book title. Therefore, it is more fitting to view an L2 social space as a multi-voiced space with dialogical participation from multiple social perspectives where the group facilitator does not occupy the same role or have the same guiding status as the therapist. Nevertheless, narrative therapists frequently mention ‘performance,’ ‘remembering,’ ‘reflecting,’ and ‘reauthoring’ or ‘re-authoring’ or ‘re-storying’ (e.g, Polkinghorne, 2004; White, 2004a, 2007; White & Epston, 1990) and occasionally ‘re-visions’ (e.g., Parry & Doan, 1994). These terms seem applicable beyond therapeutic contexts. Therefore, I will focus on defining and adapting them for the present study. Although not clearly defined and sometimes overlapping with each other, the general meanings of these terms can be understood in the contexts where they are used and with reference to their theoretical origins, e.g., postmodern anthropology (e.g., E. M. Bruner, 1986b; Geertz, 1973), sociology (e.g., Goffman, 1959), psychology (e.g., J. Bruner, 1986; Vygotsky, 1978), philosophy (e.g., Foucault, 1972), and cultural anthropology (Myerhoff, 1982). To begin with,

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performance has two key features. First, it always involves an audience. By Goffman’s (1959, p. 11) definition, performance refers to ‘all the activity of a given participant on a given occasion which serves to influence in any way any of the other participants’ (emphasis added). In a therapeutic context, the audience includes the therapist and sometimes ‘outsider witnesses’ (White, 2005, p. 15). Performance is thus a social activity. Second, each performed story is a new rendering of experience. As E. M. Bruner (1986a) stresses: It is in the performance of an expression that we re-experience, relive, re-create, re-tell, re-construct, and re-fashion our culture. The performance does not release a pre-existing meaning that lies dormant in the text.... Rather the performance itself is constitutive. (as cited in White & Epston, 1990, p. 12) Linking this to story as an organising and meaning-making device, White and Epston (1990, p. 12) argue that the performance of texts evolves alongside the meanings people bring into their lives and relationships. Applied to L2 learners, performing can be regarded as a ‘literacy event’ (Heath, 1982a; Heath, et al., 2008), during which L2 writers try on or experiment with images of themselves through writing in English—images that may be inconsistent with how they are usually known by people familiar with them. In performing, the writer appears as a certain kind of person before a particular audience. This occurs anytime an L2 learner reads a text to others. In this sense, it is similar to

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‘discoursal self’(Ivanič, 1998).2 Both are impressions through written texts, both are socially constructed, thus entailing the involvement of some kind of audience, and both have potential effects on the ways the writers are perceived. But I prefer ‘performing’ over ‘discoursal self.’ For one thing, performing has a wider intelligibility than ‘discoursal self.’ Most people, including EFL student writers, know about performing, but ‘discoursal self’ seems to belong only to the academic community. For another, at least from a narrative therapeutic point of view, performing has a greater impact on people’s lives than ‘discoursal self’ does. Indeed, White and Epston’s (1990, p. 13) claim, that ‘with every performance, persons are reauthoring their lives,’ is convincingly supported by numerous case stories (c.f., White, 2007). In contrast, ‘discoursal self’ seems confined to working on the linguistic presentation of oneself rather than potentially working on self itself. For instance, one promised outcome of knowing ‘discoursal self’ is developing a ‘critical language awareness’ in L2 learners (Ivanič & Camps, 2001, p. 31), thus helping them to avoid leaving their readers with unwanted impressions of themselves, which has an unclear relationship to actually working on self. Furthermore, writing as performance (Coffey, 2007; Fishman, Lunsford, MacGregor, & Otuteye, 2005; Landay, 2004) is socially shaped by power relations, which in turn demand a critical approach to literacy, particularly in relation to writing the personal (Brodkey, 1996; Giroux, 1987; Kamler, 2001; Pavlenko, 2003). As Hagood (2002, p. 249) wrote in her description of critical literacy, ‘relations between texts and readers are always understood as struggles for knowledge, power, representation, and material 78

resources.’ In this regard, it matters whether I positioned myself as a facilitator, as is encouraged by critical theorists and practitioners (Graves, 1983; Kamler, 2001), or as a teacher in the writing group, as is usually the case in traditional writing classrooms in China. Two modifications are needed. First, I will use ‘re-authoring’ to refer to a fundamental change in one’s position or stance towards one’s own experiences. Narrative therapists use both ‘reauthoring’ (e.g., White & Epston, 1990, p. 13) and ‘re-authoring’ (e.g., White, 1995) interchangeably. Small as it is, I argue that the hyphen matters. ‘Reauthoring’ can be seen as a form of repetition, simply meaning authoring or writing again. This contrasts with the ultimate goal of narrative therapy: helping people to ‘re-author’ their lives ‘according to alternative knowledges/stories and practices of self and relationship that have preferred outcomes’ (Epston, White, & Murray, 1992, p. 108). In addition, performing does not automatically guarantee re-authoring in a positive way; only performing alternative storylines, ones that may offer more hopes and futures for the wellbeing of the participants, herald positive re-authoring of their lives. Accordingly, the second modification is to change White and Epston’s (1990, p. 13, see above) original quote to, ‘with some performance, persons are re-authoring their lives.’ One practice that facilitates re-authoring is re-membering (Carey & Russell, 2003, pp. 35–36). The term re-membering was originally introduced by the cultural anthropologist Myerhoff (1982, p. 111) to refer

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to a ‘special type of recollection,’ i.e., ‘the reaggregation of members, the figures who belong to one’s life story, one’s own prior selves, as well as significant others who are part of the story.’ It gave rise to the narrative practice re-membering conversations, which are scaffolding conversations that allow the clients to develop a ‘multi-voiced’ sense of self (White, 2005, 2007). Underlying remembering practice is the assumption that identities are an ‘association of life,’ i.e., who we associate with and what knowledge of ourselves they contribute to us (White, 2007, p. 129). Accordingly, by re-membering others, i.e., shifting their memberships in one’s life (White, 2007, p. 129), people may achieve alternative social understandings about themselves. This practice is particularly useful in the therapeutic context because it challenges the clients’ dominant views of themselves—which are usually problematic and essentialising (White, 2007; White & Epston, 1990)—by suggesting counter perspectives. As Carey and Russell (2003, p. 36) summarise, ‘remembering questions evoke the views and perspectives of people who can contribute to the further development of the alternative story.... They link the newly co-authored story of identity to a sense of history and also to the stories of the lives of other people.’ I believe that the assumption that identities are an ‘association of life’ equally applies to L2 learners. As J. Bruner suggests, self is socially ‘distributed’ and ‘intersubjective’ (Bruner, 1991b, p. 76). Therefore, for the present study, I adapt re-membering to refer to the

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practice of writers shifting, through writing, the memberships of other people in their life experiences, and as a result, develop alternative identity conclusions about themselves. However, whether re-membering occurs in L2 learning remains a question. After all, the kind of purposeful recollection of people and the generation of self understandings in relation to these people, as guided by the therapist’s questions (e.g., White, 2007, pp. 130–131), seems less likely to occur in ordinary L2 learning contexts, especially where writing is the focus. Accordingly, emphasis may need to be given to reflection and re-visioning, which seem to show more explicitly that the writers are engaged in making their (alternative) identity conclusions in relation to their social others. In narrative therapy, reflection is a purposeful cognitive engagement. It can refer to a process of clients zigzagging cognitively between the ‘landscape of action’—especially the terrains of life previously excluded by the dominant storylines—and the ‘landscape of consciousness,’ sometimes yielding alternative and more hopeful concepts of self (White, 2004b, 2007; White & Epston, 1990, p. 61). It can also refer to generating identity conclusions using ‘intentional state categories’: To reiterate, the landscape of meaning3 is derived through reflection on events in the landscape of action to determine what those events might say about [the intentional states, i.e.,] the desires, preferences, qualities, characteristics, motives, purposes, wants, goals, values,

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beliefs, commitments, of various persons. (White, 1995, p. 31) Applied to L2 learners, I will use the verb form ‘reflecting’ to refer to either of the two activities: (1) learners generating new identity conclusions about themselves in relation to their past experiences; (2) learners revisiting the social identity conclusions they experienced elsewhere by writing about them in English, with or without considering whether such conclusions still fit them. These two uses of ‘reflecting’ with L2 learners have two major implications. First, the objects of ‘reflecting’ are often located in the past, even though the outcomes may have impact on both the present and the future. Second, the second use of ‘reflecting’ seems adequate to substitute for ‘remembering’ in its general sense. That is, re-membering entails conversational practices that assist people to give a different membership to their social others and in association, alternative knowledge of selves these social others may contribute (White, 2007, p. 129). After all, both terms describe activities that are rooted in a person’s past encounters with some social others and knowledge of self in relationships. In narrative therapy, re-visioning is associated with people discovering alternative storylines or ‘plot’ in their lives. The impact is as great as re-authoring: ‘The re-visioning of one’s life plot... changes the meaning assigned to past events and happenings and serves to re-vision one’s future’ (Polkinghorne, 2004, p. 60). But re-visioning is used only by a handful of narrative therapists (e.g., Parry & Doan, 1994, p. 43), who treat it 82

as a byproduct of ‘externalization’—a process that relocates a person’s problems (White, 1989, 2007) and preferences ‘in culture and history’ (Gremillion, 2004, p. 192). As a result of this relocation, the clients can exercise personal agency and critically review previously unquestioned meanings while integrating elements from their old stories (Polkinghorne, 2004, pp. 60, 64). Because re-authoring, which will be discussed next, has been widely accepted, I will reserve re-visioning for another purpose in this study, referring to L2 learners redesigning their imagined futures through writing in English. Re-visioning appears to me a particular kind of re-membering. It makes explicit that certain imagined identities are being given different memberships. Re-authoring is a frequently invoked term, often as ‘re-authoring conversations,’ in narrative practices (e.g., Epston, et al., 1992; Grant, 2005; White, 1995, 2004b). It operates on the metaphor of the text as an analogy of human lives (White & Epston, 1990, p. 9), which: ‘made it possible to conceive of the evolution of lives and relationships in terms of the reading and writing of texts, insofar as every new reading of a text is a new interpretation of it, and thus a different writing of it.’ In other words, re-authoring, occasionally known as re-visioning (e.g., Parry & Doan, 1994, p. 43), is the ultimate destination in narrative practices, with its object being both stories and lives. As Carr (1998) points out, ‘The narrative approach rests on the assumption that narratives are not representations of reflections of identities, lives, and problems. Rather narratives constitute identities, lives, and problems.’ Furthermore,

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re-authoring emphasises moving towards un-naturalistic or relational understandings of identities. ‘Re-authoring conversations usually exhibit a drift toward the generation of identity conclusions associated with intentional state understandings, irregardless of the starting conditions’ (White, 2007, p. 105). One adaptation is required. In narrative therapy, re-authoring is a series of movements resulting in the emergence of ‘unique outcomes,’ i.e., events and experiences excluded by the clients’ dominant storylines to the development of alternative storylines (Carr, 1998; Polkinghorne, 2004; White, 2005, 2007; White & Epston, 1990). As White (2007) sums up, unique outcomes ‘provide a starting point for re-authoring conversations’ and ‘provide a point of entry to the alternative storylines of people’s lives that, at the outset of these conversations, are barely visible.’ Used with L2 learners, I maintain re-authoring’s overall meaning of storying in a new and agentive sense. But given the focus of the present study, I reverse the emphasis from conversations to writing, although both may be involved in the re-authoring processes. Based on the preceding discussion, a narrative sense of identity work can be described as: performing, i.e., L2 writers putting on known or new images of themselves through writing in English; re-membering, i.e., L2 writers shifting, through writing, the memberships of other people in their life experiences, and as a result, developing alternative identity conclusions about themselves; reflecting, i.e., L2 writers generating new identity conclusions about themselves by writing in

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English about their past experiences or identity conclusions assigned by others; re-visioning, i.e., L2 writers imagining new future identities for themselves through writing in English; and re-authoring, i.e., L2 writers writing in English about their lives and identities along storylines that are more hopeful and agentive than their previous ones. EFL autobiographical writing involves issues not necessarily found among published L2 memoirists and recent immigrants. Therefore, to further my understandings of possible identity work that EFL student writers may engage in through their autobiographical writing, I have adopted a critical dialogical perspective, which includes three key elements: questioning EFL autobiographical writing, taking EFL autobiographical writing as a unique dialogical site, and searching for a third space. A Critical Dialogical Perspective Questioning EFL Autobiographical Writing From a constructivist point of view, life and narrative shape each other (Bruner, 2004a). On the one hand, autobiographical accounts are influenced by many factors, such as society, culture, memory, time, language options, accumulating life experiences, and accompanying evolvement of subjectivities, as well as personal agency in storying processes and the shaping effects of conversational partners (Bruner, 1991b; Connelly & Clandinin, 1990; Freeman, 1993, 2007; Heath, 1982b; Kang, 2004; Ko, Schallert, & Walters, 2003; Steinman, 2005; Wang, 2006; Wang &

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Brockmeier, 2002). On the other hand, narrative may act back upon life, giving order and ascribing meanings to it (White & Epston, 1990). Therefore, it is important not to take EFL autobiographical writing as factual representations of life but as constructions informed by life. Accordingly, one needs to scrutinise how EFL learners write in English, an additional language to them, to construct their lives and possibly their identities as well, in particular sociocultural contexts. In critically examining EFL autobiographical writing, four issues will be kept in mind. Evolving Life Course and Understandings Life is a dynamic and open process. First of all, life may stretch into several time frames. In terms of life span, life concerns the time between one’s birth and death. In terms of life course, life concerns long-term development of a social group or population. In terms of life cycle, life highlights relatively stable social orders, as is implied by the cyclic metaphor of time (see O’Rand & Krecker, 1990, pp. 258–259 for a detailed discussion of these terms). Second, from the point of view of dialogism, each individual’s life is an ongoing dialogue between self and other, to make sense of messages from others and to form answers (Holquist, 2002, pp. 14–39). In other words, not only does life grow in terms of passing time and accumulating new experiences; it also grows in terms of added meanings. To add yet another level of complexity, complete understandings of life takes some other to consummate, as no one is able to both live the end of his or her life and interpret it in retrospect

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(Holquist, 2002, p. 165). Thus life history, i.e., a researcher’s interpretation and presentation of a participant’s life as a whole through the use of multiple sources (Roberts, 2002, p. 3), becomes necessary to situate L2 learners in their complex social and cultural contexts (Kouritzin, 2000) so as to approximate some kind of holistic interpretations of life. All these factors suggest a need for longitudinal case studies as a way to understand EFL autobiographical writing and identity, the main subject of Chapter 3. Social Influences While showing individual differences, autobiographical accounts are susceptible to social shaping. This is well illustrated by J. Bruner (2004a) and his colleagues’ study of four self-narratives from the same family. In all their autobiographical accounts given in half an hour, all four members elaborated, with different orientations, on a dichotomy between home and society or inside and outside. Moreover, other studies show children’s ways of storying often bear much influence from their parents in degree and ways of elaboration (Heath, 1982b; Wang, 2006). Accordingly, it is necessary to be mindful of the participants in the telling or writing of any autobiographical account and the co-constructing roles played by these others. Cultural Shaping The roles culture plays in shaping autobiographical accounts are threefold. First, culture provides story types and narrative structures that transcend many generations of a society. It is against these story types and narrative

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structures that new stories are not only intelligible, but also tellable (Bruner, 1991a). Second, culture preconditions relationships between self and other in autobiographical accounts. While one should not dichotomise cultures, it is nonetheless necessary to recognise different storying practices in different cultures (Klapproth, 2004; Zierott, 2005). For instance, a study on autobiographical memory finds that group-oriented cultures such as the Chinese culture seem not to encourage children to tell stories that emphasise the self as much as individual-oriented cultures such as American culture (Wang & Brockmeier, 2002). Third, culture also shapes the way one uses languages. A culture’s influences on a language not only show in its idioms and historical allusions, but also on its word order and the ways sentences and paragraphs are put together (Kirkpatrick, 1997; Stolze, 2009). One of the most evident ways culture shapes language use is probably reflected through the different ways, associations, and comfort levels of using “I” in one’s texts (Kashima & Kashima, 1998). That explains partly why for some L2 writers like Shen, it amounted to a total ideological transformation when learning to write in English as an additional language. Accordingly, the study of EFL autobiographical writing needs to be sensitive to the dynamics of multiple cultures. Memory as Play-Doh Autobiographical writing inevitably draws on what people remember about their life experiences, also known as autobiographical memory (Robinson, 1986, p.

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19). Three features of autobiographical memory summarised by McAdams and Adler (McAdams & Adler, 2010) especially need attention. First, it is selective, never containing everything that a person goes through. Second, it is subjective, always influenced by the person’s present circumstances and visions of the future. Third, it is also shaped by the person’s implicit narrating needs for consistency and other cultural standards for good stories. In this sense, autobiographical memory, as reflected through EFL autobiographical writing, should not be taken as a complete picture of the writer’s past but as Play-Doh. All these factors mentioned in the preceding suggest that, if at all, EFL autobiographical writing offers but a partial opening into the complex and still evolving trajectories of learners’ lives and identities. Both personal agency and contextual shaping need to be considered in understanding textual constructions. Nonetheless, I argue that EFL autobiographical writing can be an important dialogical site, not only for the writers themselves, but also for professionals from both the Inner Circle and the Expanding Circle. EFL Autobiographical Writing as a Unique Dialogical Site Traditional modes of representing the EFL contexts have more or less built on the native versus native dichotomies, treating English L1 users as the default norm provider. Alternative modes emphasise the fact that English has been used by a greater number of people outside than inside traditional home bases of English. Therefore, English should be treated as a ‘glocal’

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language (Lin, et al., 2002; Piller, 2001). On the one hand, it serves some communication needs among local communities around the world. On the other hand, it functions as an international language or lingua franca, a language of choice when communication occurs across national boundaries. It is against the backdrop of English as a ‘glocal’ language that EFL autobiographical writing may serve as a unique dialogical site. First of all, EFL autobiographical writing invites English learners to engage in important dialogues with their past, present, and future. As You’s (2010) research on EFL writing by Chinese students shows, on the one hand, English learners may use EFL autobiographical writing to engage in their daily lives and realities, most of which are mediated by languages other than English and may be considered irrelevant to EFL literacy education. On the other hand, these learners may use EFL autobiographical writing to challenge an inherited Confucian worldview or an imposed outsider perspective: be it imperialism or Christianity. Therefore, EFL learners may stand at the forefront of bridging the local and global cultures. Moreover, other studies show that English as an international language provides an important cultural tool for language learners worldwide to construct their imagined identities in a global community (Norton, 2009; Peirce & Kamal, 2003). In other words, English plays an important role in shaping language learners’ mobility in terms of crossing both geographical and social boundaries in a modern world, the latter being the range of community memberships they can assert through the use of English. These dialogical relations

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suggest that EFL autobiographical writing may actually become a vantage point for language learners to occupy as meaning-seeking human beings. EFL autobiographical writing provides yet another vantage point for language learners worldwide to speak back. Traditionally, English as a language has flown from the Inner Circle to the Outer Circle, last to the Expanding Circle, making EFL learners peripheral participants as users of English in a global context (Kachru, 1992). As outcry against such a Eurocentric perspective and domination increases, EFL learners are gradually treated as legitimate users and owners of English as well. Some scholars suggest an alternative model that emphasises proficiency rather than geographical locations (Rajadurai, 2005). Yet more needs to be done to debunk idealised L1 English speakers, as Cook and others (Cook, 1999; Krǎmsch & Lam, 1999) attempt to do, and replace them with idealised L2 English speakers. If the meanings of any text depend on its historical links to other texts (Bakhtin, 1981), and if narrative stands for another mode of knowing, contrasting to the categorical mode featuring academic writing (Polkinghorne, 1988), then autobiographical writing may well challenge and expand the capacity of English to engage with and participate in the diverse and complex local and personal lives of English learners worldwide. Therefore, although EFL autobiographical writing cannot provide any clear-cut norms of English, it may nonetheless speak back to the Inner Circle with two distinct voices. One concerns the complex and diverse realities of the EFL learners. The

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other concerns the evolving faces and functions of English outside official prescriptions. More important, the use of English, a language of the other, may provide an important way of ‘self-othering.’ ‘Self-othering’ is a process of utilizing others’ identities in making one’s own (During, 1994, p. 47). So far as writing is concerned, it may involve both writing oneself from the stances of some other, that is, othering the self, or writing the other from the stances of the self, that is, selfing the other. Both critical discourse analysis theories (Fairclough, 2005) and a multi-storied approach (Grant, 1997) suggest all autobiographical texts are partial representations of reality. They are discursively constructed, speaking in the tongues of the multiple discourse communities of which the writer is a member. Or as Luke and others suggest, there are always gaps that leak into other ways of storying (Bamberg & Geogakopoulou, 2008; Luke, 2010). Once externalised in the form of a text, former ways of knowing and living may become open for critique and revision to bridge the distance between the textual realities and the lived realities, and in a supportive social context, individuals may be able to re-imagine possibilities for themselves (White, 2007). The use of English, a language which is distant from the majority of EFL learners’ life realities, makes autobiographical texts, at least theoretically, texts with many possible gaps. In this way, EFL autobiographical writing may open up a dynamic space for critically investigating power relations, ideologies, class, othering, and any other representations EFL learners opt to reveal through their texts.

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A few more words concerning EFL autobiographical writing and power relationships. Here, power refers to ‘the socially constructed relations among individuals, institutions, and communities through which symbolic and material resources in a society are produced, distributed, and validated’ (Norton Peirce, 1993, p. 8). Again, Norton’s (2000) study with five recent immigrant women to Canada may illustrate my point: two kinds of imbalanced power relations between language learners and their local others. One type has language learners in positions of limited power, mainly based on their non-native-speaker-of-English status. They were powerless because they did not speak English the same way(s) native speakers do. To be more fair, language is but one of the many cues that betray their foreignness and deny their access to valued resources. The other type does not negate English native speakers’ upper hand in English, yet it allows language learners to occupy positions of increased power. In Norton’s case, she adopted research practices beneficial to the participants: e.g., driving them home when needed, helping them to learn English in a homely environment, and being sympathetic with the immigrant women’s experiences. Their increased power thus lay in Norton’s willing relegation of her own to serve her research participants. Of equal importance is the primary way Norton generated her data on language use: participants’ diaries plus discussion sessions to clarify and elaborate particular aspects in their diary entries. In effect, such a method provided language learners at least two sources for increased power: re-positioning through writing and speaking—two of language learners’ multiple mediating tools—and sharing personal experiences in the presence 93

of a sympathetic white scholar and some others with similar language using experiences. A challenge in understanding EFL autobiographical writing and possible identity work through it is then explicating the ways language teachers and researchers use their power and the range of positioning options their practices provide for EFL learners. To sum up, EFL autobiographical writing has three unique features: it may engage EFL learners with multiple aspects of their lives; it may serve as a vantage point for them to speak back to the ‘Inner Circle’ based on their locally lived realities; and it may involve potential ‘self-othering’ through the use of English. These features suggest first of all, EFL learners live in and work on their identities in a very different world and possibly with different trajectories from those in the ‘Inner Circle.’ They also suggest EFL autobiographical writing may be used in powerful ways to help EFL learners expand their ‘ideological self’ or selves, beyond those already known in their first languages and those based on inherited or imposed ways of thinking, to search for deepened understandings of their identities. For this educational prospect, with due sensitivity to imbalanced power relations at research sites, it is now fitting to turn to ‘third space’ theories for further inspiration. Need for a Third Space Space is an important concept because all human activities need to be understood as situated activities (Holquist, 2002, p. 22). Yet in an educational context, space entails not only the chronological times and

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physical places, but also an extended ‘third’ space where the mixing of elements from diverse cultures, languages, modalities and the like yield new possibilities, both in textual practices and identity work (Gutiérrez, Baquedano-López, & Tejeda, 1999; Lam, 2000; Miano, 2004). There are many ways to name such a ‘third’ space: a ‘contact zone,’ a ‘zone of proximal development’ or ZPD, a ‘world 3,’ a ‘narrative space,’ and the like (Bereiter, 1994; Grant, 2005; Krǎmsch, 1999; Pratt, 1991; Vygotsky, 1978). Collectively, these ‘third space’ concepts have provided a powerful way to re-imagine traditional dichotomies such as native vs. non-native, global vs. local, offering hybridity as an alternative to richer understandings of EFL learners. For instance, one of the pioneer thinkers of ‘third space,’ Bhabha (1996), used the concept to refer to a dynamic open space where new identities, which transcend the dichotomy of colonizers and the colonized, may emerge. These new identities are hybrid identities which draw on multiple sources. As Rutherford (1990, p. 211) cites Bhabha, “the importance of hybridity is not to be able to trace two original moments from which the third emerges, rather hybridity to me is the ‘third space’ which enables other positions to emerge.” If such is the case, what Kachru (2005, p. 28) says about Asian Englishes, i.e., ‘linguistic and cultural hybridity is our identity and destiny,’ seems to suggest that EFL writers have a particular third space to enter. My understanding of the term ‘third space’ has also integrated elements from a psychological notion of

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‘potential space.’ According to Winnicott (1971), a potential space is the space between child and mother, as featured by trust, playfulness, and new learning possibilities. In educational contexts, a potential space has been extended to ‘a third area, an intermediate zone between self and other, the individual and the environment’ (Grant, 2005, p. 2). As such, a potential space provides an important social or interpersonal understanding of both learning and the constructing of new identities not explicit in Bhabha’s notion of third space. Moreover, a macro and dynamic view of culture associated with a potential space seems particularly relevant to the present research topic, which explores new possibilities both for EFL writing and identity work. That is, culture, as spoken of in a potential space, may include all forms of culture, whether local or distant, whether from the past or the future (Winnicott, 1971). A main benefit in the potential space is, then, having ‘creative/cultural experiences’ (Grant, 2005, p. 20) out of these diverse cultural possibilities and a new sense of self in relation to them. A notion of third space, as explained earlier, is particularly relevant to EFL education for three main reasons. First, it allows us to reconsider EFL learners. While the traditional term ‘non-native speakers of English’ positions EFL learners as forever deficit, a third space concept re-positions them as agents with unique contributions to make. As You’s (2010) book Writing in the Devil’s Tongue may illustrate, EFL learners’ language use bears strong influences from their particular social, cultural, and political milieus and

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China’s evolving relationship with the outside world, as well as the learners’ own creative appropriation of the language. Therefore, EFL writing may provide deep understandings about the complexities and dynamics of English as an international language. Furthermore, a third space perspective suggests two critical pedagogical challenges for EFL education. One challenge lies in taking measures to turn EFL learners’ cultural and linguistic backgrounds from ‘baggage and interference’ (Block, 2007b) into potential resources to draw upon, as through the lens of ‘multicompetence’ (Cook, 1992). In other words, EFL learners need to be re-positioned as having multiple languages to communicate in besides English, multiple semiotic tools to mean besides writing, and multiple modalities of representation besides pen and paper. The other challenge lies in building collaborative learning relationships with EFL learners. Pedagogically speaking, it should entail at least the following three dimensions: (1) trust, i.e., positioning learners as agents who are capable of learning and who can take control of their learning processes; (2) design, i.e., creating ZPDs among learners and teacher(s); and (3) co-authoring, i.e., purposefully supporting or scaffolding learners’ movements towards alternative understandings. Such collaborative learning relationships can be found in various narrative-oriented practices, both in therapy and education. They allow individuals to achieve richer understandings of self and other. More specifically, stereotypes of self and other become replaced by richer accounts of people (Pavlenko, 2003); previously held assumptions about a particular research topic become

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acknowledged and challenged (Grant, 2007b); problem-defined identities give way to more agentive stories of self (White & Epston, 1990). Such richer understandings are essential to capturing people’s narratively constructed lives and identities, which are both complex and evolving. Summary In this chapter, I started off by locating EFL autobiographical writing and identity in the current SLA literature. While the use of autobiographical narratives has brought about significant advances in the field, their usage remains limited to bilingual professionals’ published autobiographies, interview-elicited narrative accounts, and some classroom-based narratives. In the EFL context, narrative data tend to be used as an object of linguistic analysis along the lines of native versus non-native comparative studies and of particular teaching pedagogies. I have found no report that explores possible identity work of adult EFL students involved in autobiographical writing over time. Such serves as the background for the present research. As a point of entry, a minimal definition of autobiographical writing, i.e., writing about any aspects of one’s life experiences, was adopted. Then, I presented an expanded view of L2 learner identity, which may be summarised as a postmodern, sociocultural, and dialogical approach to language, learning, identity (cf. Pavlenko, 2001a, p. 318). I then developed a narrative sense of identity work by drawing on narrative therapy and by proposing five potential phases that EFL writers doing autobiographical writing

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may move through. Last, I developed a critical dialogical perspective through which autobiographical writing and identity work may be further explained with specific pedagogical considerations. Equipped with these understandings, in Chapter 3, I will map out a methodology, through which I approach my research questions.

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3 Research Autobiographical Writing and Identity “Methodology” is really [a] process constructed by highly situated understandings. (McIntyre, 1997, p. 9) A review of the literature in the previous chapter shows that there are some unanswered but important questions in the field of SLA regarding autobiographical writing and identity in the EFL context. This chapter paves the way to answering these questions by explicating the use of an emergent case study design as a methodology or ‘the approach to systematic inquiry’ (Mertens, 2005, p. 7). This choice is shaped by my evolving understandings about the research topic as well as the changing situations at the research site. It entails seven main aspects: emergent case study design, theoretical perspectives, background of the Bai people, fieldwork, data collection, data analysis, and conventions. Theoretical Perspectives Several theoretical perspectives informed the ‘construction’ (McIntyre, 1997) of the emergent case study design used in this study. They include understandings of the constructivist paradigm, socially oriented research in SLA, ethnography, and narrative inquiry. Constructivist researchers emphasise the ways individuals construct realities through their interpretations and representations (Patton, 2002, pp. 96–97). As an example, the same reality, say an

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elephant, may be multiply perceived and represented by the six blind men, as the ancient Indian fable has it. To understand such multiple realities, constructivist researchers need to form an interactive communication pattern with their research participants, using a range of qualitative methods to collect data for a holistic interpretation (Mertens, 2005, pp. 12–16). They need to attend to the role the knower plays ‘in shaping the known’ (Clinchy, 2003, p. 37) because ‘both knower and respondent cocreate understanding’ (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008, p. 32). There are two main approaches to SLA research, according to Larsen-Freeman (Larsen-Freeman, 2007). The first one, a cognitive approach, was influenced by Chomskyan linguistics in the late 1950s. It focuses on the development of language competence within a language learner, i.e., knowledge of grammar rules and structures. People adopting this approach often see native speakers of the language as competent and ‘idealised speakers’ of the language. The other is a social/sociocultural approach. Influenced by a Vygotskyan theory of learning, among others, this approach emphasises language use in particular social contexts and has seen a rise since the late 1990s (Block, 2007; Firth & Wagner, 1997; Hall, 1997; Larsen-Freeman, 2007; Prior, 2001). In my research, I adopt the social/sociocultural approach because, first of all, it rejects the narrow view of language learners as merely ‘Non-Native Speakers’ in relation to ‘Native Speakers,’ which often projects them as inferior or deficient (cf., Sridhar, 1994, p. 802). Secondly, as held by Bakhtin (1981), language has its

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life not as an abstracted system, but in its particular uses in response to and in anticipation of responses. Accordingly, a social/sociocultural approach is ideal for its close attention to contextualized uses of a language, as in the present study. Ethnography emphasises a dynamic view of culture and ways of conceptualising and generating data. Ethnographers promote the notion that ‘culture is a verb’ (Street, 1993a, p. 23). In other words, culture does rather than is; it creates and maintains domination and submission, as well as various boundaries between self and other (Street, 1993a, p. 33). Or, as Ivanič (1998, p. 42) explains, culture is ‘the constant interaction of competing systems of values, beliefs, practices, norms, conventions and relations of power which have been shaped by the socio-political history of a nation or an institution in the interests of privileged members of it.’ This view of culture relocates EFL autobiographical writing as a site of struggle, where the local competes with the global, and one domain and group contend with another. As explained in Chapter 2, ethnographic studies of literacy (e.g., Heath, 1982, 1983; Street, 1984, 1994) have reconceptualised literacy as literacies: i.e., multiple in form, language, modality, medium, and depending on particular domains. In understanding literacies, two terms are indispensable: literacy events (Heath, 1982), i.e., text-mediated interactions and interpretations, and literacy practices, i.e., literacy events and the cultural assumptions underlying them (Street, 1993b). This perspective encouraged me to be sensitive to the

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particular contexts in which EFL autobiographical writing samples were generated. Various ‘ethnographic tools’ (Green & Bloome, 1997, see Heath, Street, & Mills, 2008, p. 121) were also employed to generate EFL autobiographical writing and supporting data. These included writing samples, various artefacts, audio/video recordings of interviews, and discussions, observations, and reflections. The third main informing perspective is narrative inquiry, which gained increasing importance in my methodology. According to Connelly and Clandinin (1990), one premise of narrative inquiry is that human beings— teachers and learners alike, researchers and researched alike—are storytellers who live storied lives. Accordingly, narrative inquiry is a process in which the inquirer uses narrative both as ‘the phenomenon and the method’ (p. 2) to understand human experience and reconstruct ‘a person’s experience in relation to the other and to a social milieu’ (see Pinnegar & Daynes, 2007, pp. 4–5). In other words, stories, experiences, and interactions are central to narrative inquiry. Prior to my fieldwork in early 2008, narrative was to me a way of theorising identities and interpretation. I evoked narrative for two main purposes: (1) to introduce a ‘multi-storied approach to narrative analysis’ (Grant, 1997, 2001), which remains crucial in my methodology; (2) to frame the change and development of identities in narrative terms such as personal agency, intentional states, and identity conclusions (White, 2004, pp. 30–31). At the end of my fieldwork, when I had

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collected a wide range of EFL autobiographical writing samples, narrative began to take on more significance. First of all, the stories written, re-written, and read by my participants showed their evolving understandings of their past experiences, as well as their sense of self, all in relation to some social others. I began to accept a narrative view of identity, i.e., identities as narrative constructions and found more theoretical grounding in Maps of Narrative Practice (White, 2007) and Actual Minds, Possible Worlds (J. Bruner, 1986). Narrative inquiry was now becoming for me the most important way of understanding identities dialogically, e.g., involving both ‘action’ and ‘consciousness,’ both ‘fact’ and ‘fiction,’ both ‘change’ and ‘continuity” (Bruner, 1986; Eakin, 1999; Menard-Warwick, 2005). This evolving understanding further convinced me of the aptness of using a multi-storied approach (Grant, 1997, 2001) to narrative analysis, to be discussed in detail later in this chapter. Emergent Case Study Design A case study is the study of a particular, unique, and ‘bounded system’ ‘within a number of contexts—physical, economic, ethical, aesthetic, and so on’ (Stake, 2003, pp. 135–141). Using a case study approach—‘the study of the particularity and complexity of a single case’ (Stake, 1995, as cited in Patton, 2002, p. 297)—to explore learners’ English literacy and related identity issues is a path by now well-trodden in countries where English is either the mother tongue or second language (e.g., Grant, 1981; Ivanič, 1998; Lam, 2000; Ouellette, 2008). In applying it to studying EFL

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autobiographical writing and identity, I was especially drawn by the ‘holistic and context-sensitive’ (Patton, 2002, p. 447) understandings case studies seek to produce. Stake (2003) distinguishes two kinds of case studies: the intrinsic and the instrumental. The former studies a particular case out of the researcher’s interest in the case itself; the latter studies a case to illuminate a larger issue of which the case is a part or member (pp. 136–139). The present study is instrumental in that it uses EFL autobiographical writing written by ethnic Bai English major students to explore possible relationships between autobiographical writing and identity in EFL contexts. An emergent case study design was employed for this purpose. On the one hand, this design offers a general direction to follow by specifying ethnic Bai English major students at a Chinese university as the case. On the other hand, the design was flexible enough to allow adaptations to the changing situations in the research site (see Patton, 2002, p. 40; Yin, 2009, p. 62). The adaptations were made cautiously. In the present study, for instance, the case study participants were selected from an extracurricular writing group instead of a formal writing class as originally planned. As a result, the overall research design was improved because of the way in which relations between participants and me as the researcher were made more equal, diverse, and open. Methods Background of the Bai People

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The Bai people are one of the 55 officially recognised ethnic minority groups and the 14th most populous in China, with a population of 1,858,063 (national census 2000). Over 80% of the Bai people live in Yunnan, southwest China. The Bai language’s family affiliation, i.e., whether it belongs to the Tibeto-Burman language family, and if so, what its exact place is in the family, has remained controversial (cf., Deng & Wang, 2003; Zhao, 2009). Two reasons make the identity work of ethnic Bai university students particularly fascinating. Firstly, the Bai people have a highly sinicised culture. According to Mackerras (1988), the Bai people’s culture has been heavily influenced by that of the Han, the majority people group, which accounts for over 90% of the population in mainland China. For instance, the Bai people have had an extended historical contact with the Han Chinese since at least the ninth century; their religion bears a strong similarity to that of the Han Chinese—worship of nature, of ancestor, of deities from Buddhism, Taoism, and noble personages from the past (see Mackerras, 1988). In light of both social changes such as the adoption of the one-child policy and modernization, Mackerras feared that the Bai people might become one ‘among the first of the larger minorities’ to lose their distinct ethnic identity in China (p. 80). Against such a cultural backdrop, it is worthwhile to find out how ethnic Bai university students use EFL autobiographical writing as part of their ethnic identity work.

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Secondly, most Bai people lack literacy experiences in Bai. According to Billard and Billard (2007), the Roman-alphabet-based Bai script invented by the Chinese government in the 1950s has never been popularised. From 2004 to 2009, an experimental Bai-and-Chinese bilingual program was implemented in a rural Bai village. Reportedly, the program has made a positive impact on the local community, particularly on the pre-schoolers and their parents who went through the program (Billard & Billard, 2007, pp. 14–15). However, the Bai script itself remains far from being learned and used by the Bai people outside the village. In consequence, none of the participants in this study could write in Bai. Fieldwork This study took place in an autobiographically oriented extracurricular writing group, which met over nine months (March–December 2008). The members included 19 student volunteers—all English major students from the Foreign Languages College of Lakeview University in southwest China and me. During the first 16 weeks of the study (March–July), the student members were invited to write autobiographically in English. During the second 16 weeks, the members were asked to focus on argumentative writing; although on several occasions they were encouraged to turn their experiences into short poems too. At the weekly meetings, we shared each others’ writing samples and discussed writing-related topics. The student members were interviewed at different times during the study. Some members were observed in their regular

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semester-long writing classes in the second semester of the group’s existence (September–December). Gaining Entry into the Field I made my initial contact with Lakeview University through a family friend, who brought my proposal to the dean of the university’s Foreign Languages College. The main idea of my proposal was that I teach some writing classes for free and recruit ethnic Bai English major students from the classes as research participants. In early January 2008, after receiving a formal approval from the dean, I arrived at Lakeview University. Forming the Writing Group However, upon my arrival, the dean of the Foreign Languages College informed me that, due to an impending evaluation of undergraduate-level teaching performance by the Chinese State Ministry of Education, his university would not allow me, a teacher from a different university, to teach any writing classes. In response, I proposed forming an extracurricular writing group with ethnic Bai English major students from his department. The dean approved my proposal. Following receipt of a revised ethics approval (see the following), I approached students to participate in the writing activity. While the students were taking a break between classes, I briefly introduced my research and invited Bai students to participate in it. Each potential participant then received three written documents: plain information sheets, English-and-Chinese bilingual invitations (see Appendix A), and a consent form in Chinese. 109

The writing group was formed on March 14 at the first meeting with all the potential participants. Each member received a copy of the “Mission Statement” (see Appendix B), which I had written as the group’s founding document. It made explicit that my role was more of a researcher, group leader, and co-writer than that of a teacher. It also encouraged sharing of writing samples within the group, including drafts written by the researcher. The student members of the writing group included 19 English major volunteers, representing three year levels. Among them, 14 were Bai and 17 were female. One of the two males from year three was a Han Chinese named Peter; the other was Bai named Matt. Both came from the same class. Table 3.1 provides a summary of the student members’ basic information. Table 3.1 Group Composition

Forming the extracurricular writing group improved my overall research design in five ways. First, it ensured that the Bai students’ participation in this writing research was purely voluntary. Second, in the writing group, my role was not that of a teacher, who would evaluate the students’ learning outcomes, but a researcher and a supporting member. Third, the writing group arrangement spread the range of variations among ethnic 110

Bai English major participants. It gave me access to participants from year levels one to three, compared to only one grade. Fourth, with fewer members (19) than in a regular class (50 on average), the writing group allowed me to have more interactions with individual members and learn about them. Last but not least, the writing group allowed me to generate writing samples that were not test oriented. Reflecting back, the moment I walked into different classrooms to recruit group members became especially significant, as shown in the following poem. The forming of an extracurricular writing group I’m waiting, outside the classroom, my heart racing. The voice inside the classroom fluctuates, so does my breath. Hovering over English tests, the voice rules: demanding tributes of fear worry desperation utter silence, and less-to-become, 111

creating a white Narnia without Christmas. Finally, the bell rings, interjecting the voice with chats on steamed buns and giggles on newly learned secrets ... I pushed open the door inch by inch gesturing and walking toward where the voice used to be, suggesting a dinner party and a writing group removed from the voice.1 Writing Group Schedule (March–December 2008) and Language Issues

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The writing group lasted nine months and had 32 weekly meetings. On average, each meeting was attended by nine members (based on attendance records). Table 3.2 provides an overview of the writing group schedule, marked in blue, in conjunction with the university’s calendar, marked in yellow. Table 3.2 Writing Group Schedule

Most meetings were held on the Lakeview University campus in the same classroom, where the students attended the first meeting on March 14, 2008. Meetings marked with “*” were also attended by foreign visitors. They were: my wife Cathryn and her Malaysian friend Chingyee (1st meeting, 16th and 32nd meetings); Cathryn (13th meeting); Chingyee, Cathryn’s American friend Catherine and her husband, Barry (23rd meeting); and Cathryn, Chingyee, and my supervisor Audrey (32nd meeting). “Oral publication” refers to group members reading what they regarded as their best writing samples to the group and receiving comments from others. Oral publication sessions were held at my home, attended by visitors and accompanied by food.

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The writing group had its official last meeting on December 20. 2008. But four members—Abby, Mary, Cindy, and Hope—could not come for various reasons. So another meeting was held for them at a local restaurant on January 5, 2009. All group members could speak Mandarin Chinese very well. Some members could also speak the Bai language. Where they differed substantially was in their abilities to speak English at group meetings. The students’ English might include some Chinese words, have a strong accent, and contain what would usually be considered as grammar, spelling, or pronunciation mistakes. Nonetheless, the group members did not seem to have much difficulty following each others’ stories, explanations, comments, and questions in English. In cases of confusion, the members would often resort to speaking Mandarin Chinese to clarify their meanings. Ethics After receiving advice that my previously agreed project could not proceed and in accordance with my proposed alternative writing group arrangement, I submitted a new ethics application to the Faculty of Education Human Ethics Committee of La Trobe University to include additional data generation methods, such as audio and video recording of the writing group meetings. The application was approved in early March 2008. After receiving this approval, potential participants were given a detailed introduction in Chinese, which made clear that their participation was purely voluntary. Students who joined the writing group

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all gave written consent to participate in the writing research. Like Lieblich (see Clandinin & Murphy, 2007), I believe that following ethics approval procedures and causing ‘no harm’ to research participants is only one side of ethical concerns. Narrative researchers should also seek ‘positive’ forms of ethics (see Clandinin & Murphy, 2007) by bringing benefits to the participants. I did so in this study by creating ample opportunities for student members to practise their spoken English, by giving written feedback on their writing samples, showing sympathy to those grappling with difficult experiences, and, as a culturally accepted token of appreciation for their participation, treating the members to meals and giving them reference books. In addition, the following efforts were made during the fieldwork to return favours to my host institution, the Foreign Languages College of Lakeview University. First, I taught for a semester at the university—as requested by the dean—Integrated Reading: a course not related to my research. Second, I gave a free research presentation, together with my supervisor Audrey, to the college’s staff towards the end of the fieldwork. Case Study Participants When joining the writing group, all student members agreed to be case study participants and signed consent forms. But the actual case study participants for this study were not finalised until the middle or the end of the writing group, when it became clear who might make ‘information rich’ cases (Patton, 2002).

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The following three criteria were used to select actual case study participants from the 14 Bai members in the group. The case study participants should have: (1) produced a sufficient number of EFL autobiographical writing samples during the study; (2) attended at least 20 of the 32 weekly meetings; (3) demonstrated maximal variations in their prior literacy experiences. Criteria 1 and 2 both indicate the members’ active engagement with autobiographical writing in English. This was an inevitable bias in the judgment sample given the focus of this study on autobiographical writing and identity. Accordingly, a writer like Hope, who wrote extensively but almost exclusively argumentative essays, was not selected as a case study participant. Four case study participants were selected based on the criteria stated in the preceding. They are Anne, Beth, Matt, and Abby. Table 3.3 provides the basic information about these four case study participants. Table 3.3 Summary of Information about Case Study Participants Name

No. ofYear Level Agea Meetings Attended

Anne

24

One

20

Female

Beth

25

One

19

Female

Abby

27

Three

23

Female

Matt

26

Three

21

Gender

Male

a That is the participant’s age at the time of joining the writing research. The same applies to the year level. 116

These four members all produced a large number of autobiographical writing samples. Some of the samples included revisions. In terms of previous literacy experiences, these four members showed stark contrasts with each other. Anne and Beth were first-year students and two weeks into their second semester. Anne’s parents were “illiterate.” She had read little as a whole—in either Chinese or English—and felt it kept her from writing well. Moreover, Anne used to “just write for examinations” and “hate it.” Beth, in contrast, had read extensively in Chinese and had a relatively successful writing experience in Chinese. For instance, her analysis of issues was once commended by her pre-university classmates as “ ” (clear and precise). However, her writing in English was often “corrected all in red” by her university teachers. Abby and Matt were older students from the third year. Abby seemed to be an engaged learner of English before university (“ ” simply learning English like crazy). However, when joining the writing group, she said that English was “so boring!” and regretted choosing English as her major. What she remembered most about her previous writing experiences at university was making a format mistake in her letter, which was commented on by her teacher as “the worst kind of mistake!” Matt, in contrast, had always been “interested” in English and appeared to be successful in learning English at university. For instance, his English teacher at university had commended one of his writing assignments in front of the whole class as

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having the proper format and content for a national English exam. The four case study participants were purposefully chosen to represent a wide range of writers. Nonetheless, there were inevitable limitations. First, no members from year two were selected. The only second-year member was excluded as a case study participant because she attended only five meetings in total and wrote very little in English. Second, a gender balance was impossible to achieve among the 14 Bai members because Matt was the only Bai male student. Third, members who wrote mainly argumentative writings, e.g., Hope, were not chosen as case study participants because they did not provide sufficient autobiographical writing samples for the present study. A consequence of these limitations is that I have designed a study of those who chose to be active participants in the autobiographically oriented activities of the group. This consequence frames the study as a whole. Data Collection Informed by a literacies perspective, I collected a wide range of data from the writing group. They include: EFL narratives, argumentative essays, poems, letters, emails, short-text messages (STMs), drawings, and transcripts of life story interview, text-related interviews, and video/ audio recordings of meeting discussions, etc. Among these data, of central importance to this study, are students’ narratives, as will be explained in more detail in the next section. Narrative Data

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According to Chase (2008, p. 59), narrative data may take three main forms depending on the proportion of one’s life they cover. First is ‘a short topical story about a particular event and specific characters,’ which I call episodes or anecdotes. Second is ‘an extended story about a significant aspect of one’s life,’ which I call ‘life chapters,’ to borrow a term from McAdams (1995). Third is ‘a narrative of one’s entire life, from birth to the present,’ which I term ‘auto/biography.’ Narrative data collected from the writing group were variations of these three main forms. Each case study participant wrote, revised, and shared several episodes about people and events in their lives. The use of McAdams’s (1995) life story interview prompt (see Appendix C) encouraged the group members to tell their life stories—‘a fairly complete narrating of one’s entire experience of life as a whole, highlighting the most important aspects’ (see R. Atkinson, 2007, p. 232). During group activities, the members were also encouraged to use visual narratives with labels (e.g., life river drawings, see Appendix D for a sample) to represent the entirety of the life experiences or particular aspects of their lives, e.g., reading and writing history, experiences in the writing group. Visual narratives like these respect the fact that ‘many experiences cannot be spoken; others are communicated more easily with images’ (Salmon & Riessman, 2008, p. 83). This seems especially relevant to language learners, who may be restricted by their proficiency in English. Contextual Data

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Ethnographers often immerse themselves in the communities they study to observe and situate literacy within its specific cultural contexts and social domains (e.g., Dale, 2001; Heath, 1982). For a male researcher like me, who worked with predominantly female participants, such direct observations are close to impossible. For one thing, gender difference makes observations socially awkward. For another, I had no access to some spaces in which some members’ autobiographical writing took place, e.g., their dormitories and homes. Accordingly, I sought such contextual information by encouraging but not requiring the writing group members to use a format that contained time, i.e., when a piece of writing is written; place, i.e., where it is written; and context, i.e., events and emotions that situate the piece of writing. The use of this format was modelled through my written responses to the members’ writing samples (see Appendix E for a sample). Gradually, some members, including the two older case study participants, Abby and Matt, began to provide similar descriptions about their writing samples. Others were asked either during group discussion or interviews about the personal contexts in which particular samples was written. Special attention was given to these samples’ ‘intertextual’ relations, i.e., connections with readers and other shaping texts (e.g., Kristeva, in Chandler, 2003), and to their ‘interdiscursive’ relations, i.e., connections with text models or genres (Fairclough, 1992). My understanding is that in a contemporary world, as literacies studies may attest, a text can take many forms: speech or writing or drawing. So do inter-textual relations. Moreover, writing, if taken as a way to fulfil one’s addressability or 120

unique place to respond in some ongoing dialogue with the world (Holquist, 2002), seems too limited a view to only attend to other texts and discourses. For this reason, I prefer using ‘dialogical’ (Bakhtin, 1981) to describe extra-textual relations, the kind of context I seek to understand, which shape the becoming of any particular autobiographical writing text. In order to give myself some background knowledge about the Foreign Languages College of the Lakeview University, I also collected contextual data from other individuals from the department. These included non-participatory observations in two writing classes over a semester of 18 weeks, artefacts from the writing classes, documents of the Foreign Languages College, interviews with two of the college’s foreign writing teachers, two Integrated English teachers, and a leader. Although these data are not particularly featured in my book, they help me to understand the Foreign Languages College as a social context. Data Analysis Narrative Analysis A multi-storied approach to narrative analysis (Grant, 1997, 2001) was adopted for this study. In three main ways, this approach has great potential in leading to holistic interpretations. First, it assumes people as ‘interpretive beings, inescapably involved in making sense of their experiences’ (Grant, 1997, p. 35). This assumption is supported by dialogical philosophy (Holquist, 2002) as well as studies in many disciplines such as cognitive psychology (Bruner, 1986)

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and interpretive anthropology (Geertz, 1973). Bakhtin goes so far as to suggest that human existence always involves interpreting and responding to ‘potential messages’ from ‘the world’: ‘The world addresses us and we are alive and human to the degree that we are answerable.... give the world an answer.... [we] keep on forming responses as long as we are alive’ (Holquist, 1990, pp. 29–30, 47). If, as Bakhtin also suggests, each human being is endowed with a unique position in the world (Holquist, 1990, p. 24), then the meanings each individual makes and individual ways of according meanings can never be replaced by other meanings and ways of making sense. A multi-storied approach respects this uniqueness of the individual and takes it as a starting point. As Grant (emphasis added, 2001, p. 11) points out, when addressing the multiple contexts of vernacular literacy, ‘we need to start with where people are... who people are... their languages... ways of knowing... ways of experiencing and making sense … ways of learning’. Second, a multi-storied approach stresses the intimate relationship between life and narrative. According to J. Bruner (2004, p. 709), ‘our precommitment about the nature of a life is that it is a story, some narrative however incoherently put together.’ Furthermore, people use stories not only to make sense of their experiences, but also to work out their identities. As White (2005, p. 10) suggests: People’s stories of life and of personal identity can be considered to compose “landscapes of the mind” (following Jerome Bruner), which are constituted of “landscape of action” (composing events, linked in

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sequence, through time, and according to a theme/plot)’ and ‘landscape of consciousness [identity]’ (composing identity conclusions that are shaped by contemporary identity categories of culture). Accordingly, it is appropriate to use ‘the analogy of life-as-story,’ regarding ‘people as storytellers, constructing and reconstructing meanings, storying and restorying, authoring and reauthoring their life narratives’ (Grant, 1997, p. 39). Third, a multi-storied approach is committed to contextualized understandings of people and their stories. Grant (1997) recognises three unsatisfactory analytical practices in other forms of inquiry. First is a one-dimensional analysis, adding other perspectives only to create a pluralistic impression. Second is a macro-oriented approach, which neglects ‘evidence at the micro level’ or restricts the presence of evidence inconsistent to a pre-conceived theory. Third is a personal–social split approach, which only accepts personal or social interpretations as valid, representing ‘another debate over the subjective/ objective dichotomy’ (p. 31). In her proposed alternative, analysts may achieve more holistic interpretations by sequentially foregrounding four ‘interpenetrating’ contexts and their associated stories (Grant, 1997, pp. 33–34; 2001, p. 12). More specifically, a multi-storied approach, as illustrated in Figure 3.1 (A multi-storied diagram), encourages analysts to contextualize their interpretations by taking stances in four contexts.

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Figure 3.1 A multi-storied diagram. Copyright © 1997, 2001, 2007 by Audrey N. Grant. Adapted with permission. Grant (2001, p. 13) explains: The personal context places us in the stance of learner—seeing ourselves as learners. The social context places us in the stance of being analysts of the shaping forces in our work and lives. The global context2 places us in the context of being citizens of one world and working out ways of being active contributors. And the transformative context places us in the stance of taking 124

action (agency), restorying as change agents for sustainable futures. One outcome from taking these stances is telling by juxtaposing multiple and interrelated stories. Personal narratives are shown as interconnected with ‘socially available narratives,’ i.e. other stories individuals may have access to through their own social relations. These stories are further shown to be informed by and constrained by larger cultural narratives, i.e. ‘culturally preferred and institutionally legitimated narratives and ways of being’ (Grant, 1997, p. 38). Finally, by recognising the interconnections between these stories, ‘transformative’ or ‘transportive’ stories can also be told, which ‘foregrounds imagined possibilities, restor(y)ed alternatives and movement into new territories of life’ (Grant, 2007, p. 49). Alternative storylines or possibilities in the transformative context become ‘thickened in significance’ as they interact with the other three contexts (A. Grant, personal communication, May 31, 2010). As such, a multi-storied approach resonates with J. Bruner’s (2004, p. 709) suggestion that ‘any story one may tell about anything is better understood by considering other possible ways in which it can be told.’ Data Analysis Procedure and Techniques Guided by a multi-storied approach, my analysis dealt with three kinds of realities in autobiographical data, as categorised by Pavlenko (2007). These include recurrent themes (subject reality), interactions between text construction and environment (subject and life reality), and the textual construction of self (text reality).

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My data analysis included six main phases. The first phase (March– December 2008) was the identification of EFL autobiographical writing samples, particularly those who seemed to make for ‘information rich’ cases (Patton, 2002). In identifying EFL autobiographical writing samples, I looked for textual features such as the use of “I,” “my,” “mine,” and “me” (e.g., “My Home”) to determine whether a particular piece of writing met the minimal definition of ‘autobiographical writing,’ i.e., any writing about any aspect of one’s own life experiences. There is an inevitable cultural bias in relying on such textual features alone. For cultural, socio-political, and or ideological reasons, writers in oriental societies may be less comfortable with the frequent use of self-referent singular pronouns (Kashima & Kashima, 1998; Matlene, 1985; Morling & Lamoreaux, 2008; Na & Choi, 2009; Ramanathan & Atkinson, 1999; Shen, 1989) than those in Western societies, where individualism seems to be the norm (Atkinson, 2001). However, in the context of this particular writing group, the use of first-person referents is a valid indicator because it has been frequently modelled. For instance, some of my writing samples that I shared with the group members as an example (see Appendices P and Q) showed to the members that they could and were encouraged to write autobiographically by using “I,” “my,” “mine,” and “me.” In addition, I also used interview data, i.e., interview transcripts related to particular samples, to identify autobiographical writing samples. This additional measure revealed to me samples that appeared non-autobiographical textually but had an intricate relationship with the writers’ life experiences. 126

An example is “Confidence” by Matt, which makes no direct reference to himself but, as shown in an interview, was rooted in his intention to become confident. The result of such an analysis provided textual evidence to address my first research question concerning the case study participants’ investment in EFL autobiographical writing in the group. The second phase (March–December 2008) was the preliminary content analysis. During this phase, I mainly coded the four case study participants’ EFL autobiographical writing samples ‘according to emerging themes, trends, patterns, or conceptual categories’ (Pavlenko, 2007, p. 166). The purpose was to address the second question concerning identity work through EFL autobiographical writing. Following postmodernist theories of identity, language, and learning (see Chapter 2), I assumed that EFL student writers’ identities are relational, multiple, and evolving and that the writers play an agentive role in the changes and continuities of their own identities (Eakin, 1999; Menard-Warwick, 2005; Peirce, 1995; Thesen, 1997). I also assumed that EFL student writers’ identities are informed by culturally framed categories and descriptions (Bruner, 1986). Accordingly, while reading and making written comments on the group members’ writing samples, I attended closely to their descriptions of themselves (e.g., Beth: “I think I’m a homely girl, so far, I’m not great achievement”) and descriptions of those with whom they were closely related (e.g., Anne: “I... even felt her ugly and disgusting”). I also attended closely to different descriptions the group members gave to the same or similar experiences in different writing samples (e.g.,

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Anne: “But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it”). In identifying and selecting other relevant evidence, I was guided by my previous understandings of the key concepts such as voice, i.e., uniqueness in content, expression, and structure (Yang, 2007); discourse, i.e., communal norms (Gee, 1990, p. 143); and literacy events, i.e., text-mediated interactions and interpretations (Heath, et al., 2008, p. 102). I adopted two tools for the preliminary data analysis. The first tool was a reflective journal, which I kept throughout the writing group activities (March–December 2008). The second tool was the NVivo 8 software. Its “Annotation,” “Coding,” and “Memo” functions allowed me to code the digitalised EFL autobiographical writing samples. The third phase (February–December 2009) was the contextual analysis. Its main purpose was to address the questions concerning the four case study participants’ investment in EFL autobiographical writing, the roles played by the writing group in both their EFL autobiographical writing and identity work, and the nature of autobiographical writing in the writing group. The primary data informing this contextual analysis were the four case study participants’ interview transcripts, the selected transcripts of their video recordings from the group’s weekly meetings, and some of the case study participants’ own contextual descriptions. A multi-storied approach to narrative analysis (Grant, 1997, 2001) guided this analytical process. In understanding the personal context, I attended closely to what the members said they were doing through their writing samples. In understanding the social context, I paid attention to how social others, particularly those in

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the writing group, shaped the writing and revision of particular writing samples (e.g., the relationship between Anne’s title “God Has Tricked Me” and my title “When I Was Serious, God Is Romantic”). In understanding the global context, I attended closely to cultural elements that joined the local with the global (e.g., Abby’s interest in Western rock ‘n’ roll and literature and Beth’s dream to travel around the world). In understanding the transformative context, I attended closely to the interconnections between the personal, social, and global contexts and imagined possibilities rooted in these interconnections. The fourth phase, which overlapped with the second phase, was the linguistic analysis of the case study participants’ EFL autobiographical writing samples in the group. The purpose was to explore if there was any textual evidence to show that the four participants engaged in identity work in their English-writing-mediated identities, particularly in terms of their ‘ideological becoming’ processes (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78). To answer this question, I paid close attention to the linguistic features of particular texts (e.g., the use of personal pronoun, verbs, and modal verbs) and dialogical relations between these texts and other texts. The fifth phase was narrative analysis. The purpose was twofold: to answer the question about movements in the four case study participants’ writer identities and to holistically represent the four case study participants’ identities as entailing both ‘continuity and change’ (Menard-War-wick, 2005, p. 253). During this phase

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(April 2009–October 2010), I wrote individual case study chapters as stories in line with Polkinghorne’s (1995, p. 15) notion of narrative analysis, i.e., ‘the procedure through which the researcher organizes the data elements into a coherent developmental account.’ As such, my analytical focus shifted from the interpretation of discrete pieces of data to ‘the configuration of the data into a coherent whole’ (Polkinghorne, 1995, p. 15). One strategy I found helpful was starting each case study chapter with a storyline and organising most of my analysis chronologically. In drafting storylines for the case study chapters, especially in storying the four case study participants’ movements in their writer identities, I found their own drawings, labels, and explanations at the end of the writing group activities particularly useful as a reference. The sixth phase (July–October 2010) was the comparative analysis (see Clandinin & Murphy, 2007), whose purpose was to maximise understandings of identity work in terms of both writer identity and English-writing-mediated identities. During this phase, I first compared the four case studies for similarities and differences in contexts, using a multi-storied approach (Grant, 1997, 2001) as a guideline. More specifically, I compared the four case study participants’ personal contexts, social contexts, and global contexts. I then compared the extent to which the four case study participants engaged in identity work through EFL autobiographical writing in the group. That is, I examined the four case study participants’ identity work in narrative terms such as performing, reflecting

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(re-membering), re-visioning, and re-authoring, which are terms that I adapted from narrative therapy. The result of this comparative analysis will be presented in Chapter 8. Influenced by a sociocultural theory of learning (Kutuzova, 2010; Vygotsky, 1978), I adopted three strategies to ensure that I have produced the most plausible interpretations of my data. First, I shared my writing with others. My expanded audience mainly included the four case study participants; some classmates at La Trobe University, with whom I met weekly for a year; my three supervisors; my wife, Cathryn; Dr. Bernie Neville’s monthly research group; several conference audiences; and anonymous reviewers of an academic journal. Like scaffolds, these interactions helped me to see the real complexities of my data and their alternative interpretations and take positions based on evidence. Second, I tried to be open to critiques. Connelly and Clandinin (1990) encouraged narrative inquirers to take every critique seriously. I engaged in such a process especially during the sixth phase of my data analysis, the comparative analysis. Knowing that I was not an expert in narrative analysis or narrative therapy, I frequently consulted my supervisors regarding the use of narrative terms. I will use ‘personal communication,’ following APA style, to reference their significant contributions, as made through supervision meetings and email exchanges, to my analysis. Third, I rewrote my drafts frequently. This process helped me to build on my earlier drafts and interactions with others. In particular, it challenged me to be clear about my arguments and necessary evidence, which often resulted

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in re-analysis or expanded analysis of my data. Taking into consideration my interactions with others in one way or another, I regard my data analysis as a scaffolded learning process. This process was further facilitated by the conventions I adopted and adapted from other researchers. Conventions Transcription Transcription is inevitably a partial and interpretive practice that has impact on the research argument (Juzwik, 2006, p. 17; Mishler, 1986; Riessman, 2006). Nonetheless, a ‘faithful,’ i.e., verbatim, transcription of spoken discourses is a crucial first step towards holistic understanding (Grant, 1991). It can both facilitate quality analysis by the researcher and help others to make sense of the reconstructed data with minimised interference from the researcher’s values and assumptions. In this study, the following transcription practices suggested by Grant (1991) were used:3 • Use the same type size for both speakers. • Use I for myself and Name initials for my interviewees. • Represent speech verbatim. • Use (()) to mark transcriber descriptions. • Use () for what is untranscribable,—indecipherable or inaudible, and (?) for a guess. • Use [for overlapping speech when both speakers are speaking simultaneously. • Use underlying for emphasis.

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• Use... where beginning or continuation of talk is omitted. • Use upper case for words read from a text, e.g., ONCE UPON A TIME...

In addition, I will use ‘—’for utterances stopped halfway and ‘p’ for a long pause (Riessman, 2006, pp. 12–13) and transcribe interview data in the language in which the interview took place (Pavlenko, 2007, p. 173). Four steps were taken to ensure the accuracy of transcriptions. First, I transcribed only the verbal information in the original language. When unsure about a section, I noted its specific time in the recording to facilitate double-checking. Second, I thoroughly went through the participant’s transcription, while listening to the recording, and changed transcriptions that were inconsistent with the recording. Third, I ‘spot check[ed]’ (MacLean, Meyer, & Estable, 2004) by randomly selecting transcripts from the participants to ensure both accuracy of information and coherence in conventions. Fourth, when possible, I asked participants to check the transcriptions which involved them. Translation and Representation Interviews in this study took place in both English and Chinese. To be ‘faithful’ to the information contained in the original language, the following translation and representation practices were adopted and/or adapted from researchers already familiar with bilingual and multi-lingual interview data: • Where a few Chinese words are used and translation acceptable, include both the original words and my translation within the text. Place the original words within quotation marks

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and my translation within brackets within the same quote, e.g., “ ” (wind and rain; hardship) (see Menard-Warwick, 2006), ‘so that readers familiar with the original language would have an opportunity to see what the participants really said’ (Pavlenko, 2007, p. 173). • When bilingual data are used, juxtapose quotes in Chinese and translations in English to avoid unnecessary implications about language status (Davidson, 2009, p. 38). • Use ‘transliteration’—by keeping the original expression in text and giving explanation in the footnote—to represent expression which defies translation (Halai, 2007, p. 352).

Two steps were taken to ensure the quality of translation. First, I double-checked the accuracy of translated quotes by referring back to the original. Second, I attended closely to responses to the drafts with such translations from the participants, my supervisors, and other audience. Data Reference The following abbreviations were used to indicate the sources of data: 1W_W

1st writing sample for the writing group

5W_W

5th writing sample for the writing group

1E

1st email to the author

2I

2nd interview

32V

Video transcripts of 32nd meeting

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The numeral numbers indicate time sequence. Accordingly, 1W_W precedes 2W_W and 1 I precedes 2 I. A Multi-Vocal Way of Representation A dialogical notion of voice (e.g., Miano, 2004; Prior, 2001), which I define as dialogically shaped perspectives, as expressed through particular semiotic means, helps me to represent my research in a multi-vocal manner. More specifically, drawing on multiple sources of data, I seek to present in this book multiple voices arising in particular social interactions—both my own voices and those of my research participants, those mediated through both texts and drawings. This way of representation is my response to the postmodern uneasiness with voice, particularly regarding whose stories get told in research (Emihovich, 1995; Kadar, 1992; Mazzei & Jackson, 2009). Three main reasons influenced my choice. First, I believe that a ‘seeing surplus’ (Holquist, 2002) can be achieved through combining multiple perspectives, both the etic or those of the researchers and the emic or those of the participants (Todeva & Cenoz, 2009), both those expressed through conventional texts and those expressed through other means of representation such as images and videos (Hull & Katz, 2006; Radley, 2010). Moreover, from a dialogical perspective, not only do different people have different voices; even the same individual may have different voices at different times (e.g., Bernauer, 2012). Third, being explicit about my own background and being reflective on my own research practices are a requirement for contemporary

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qualitative research. Like other qualitative researchers, I am influenced by ‘the turn to self-critical reflexivity (that is, the practice of being explicit about how a researcher’s race, class, gender, and other identity markers have influenced the research)’ (Alvermann, 2000). Although such research practice does not change the fact that my book contains only selective accounts—as all books do—it at least brings the selecting process to light. At the same time, it also shows my commitment to my responsibility as an author: to bring bits and pieces of data together into a meaningful whole, or what Bakhtin describes as architectonics (Holquist, 2002, pp. 149–150). For these reasons, a multi-vocal way of representation may contribute to holistic understandings of complex and dynamic processes (Larsen-Freeman, 1997; Larsen-Freeman & Cameron, 2008), such as the cases of autobiographical writing in English as a foreign language and its related research. Summary In this chapter, I have argued for the use of an emergent case study design as the overall methodology to integrate three theoretical perspectives—a constructivist view of reality, ethnographic approaches to culture and literacy, and narrative conceptions of identity—in relation to the changing situations in the research site. The extracurricular writing group that was formed yielded a wide array of data, particularly autobiographical narratives. Informed consent was obtained from participants and ‘positive’ forms of ethics pursued. A multi-storied approach to narrative analysis has been employed for data interpretation. Conventions for

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transcription, translation, and data reference were then explicated. Last, a multi-vocal way of representation was presented. This chapter has set a stage for the following five chapters, which will first report four individual case studies respectively (Chapters 4–7) and then draw comparisons among them (Chapter 8).

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4 Abby “A Butterfly Has No Soul” January 5, 2009, four student members, who had missed the farewell meeting for the whole group in December, came to another meeting specially held for them in a local restaurant. As with the earlier group meeting, I invited each member to draw pictures to represent their writing group experiences. In response, Abby drew three “grey” trees in her picture (see Figure 4.1) to represent her experiences at the beginning, during, and at the end of the writing group activities (33V). On the right-hand side of her third “grey” tree was a butterfly.

Figure 4.1 Abby’s tree pictures.

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During the meeting after she had drawn her picture, Abby pointed at the third tree in her picture and explained: This [picture] refers to this last stage when I’m harvesting love. I used a butterfly to stand for it, because although butterflies are colourful and beautiful, it is said that “A butterfly has no soul.” So, I’m somewhat confused about it. ((laugh)) Inside me I feel empty.1 (33V) To clarify her meaning, Abby wrote to me later, “‘It’s empty inside me’ is not for love is no content to me, but I have got no idea when love coming. I was puzzled” (email on July 1, 2010). As such, the butterfly appeared to evoke for Abby the exploration of the relationship between self and other, as manifested in her then newly started romantic relationship.2 It was outward beauty without a clear inner correlate—a relationship through an outer to an undefined/unknown/unexplored inner. Prior to this occasion, there had been another similar combination that invoked the saying, “A butterfly has no soul.” In her first email to me in May 2008, about two months after she joined the writing group, I noticed that Abby joined “nosoul” with her male-sounding English name, one similar to Mark or John, which she had chosen for herself. When I asked her about this unusual combination, Abby explained, “Well, I liked butterfly very much last year [2007] and somebody who says (A butterfly has no soul.) and I use it unconsciously” (email reply on May 9, 20083). Abby’s reply seemed to suggest that it was

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due to her affection for both the butterfly and the “somebody who says ‘A butterfly has no soul’” that she mentioned “nosoul” in her email. The words of this unspecified “somebody” thus served as a literary model for Abby to give meaning to a creature that she liked. Moreover, by combining her English name with “nosoul” and using it in all her email communications with me since May 2008, Abby seemed to suggest that she was one with a soul-less butterfly. Considering the persistence of the butterfly image in Abby’s thinking, I regard it as a useful reference in understanding Abby’s identities in relation to her EFL autobiographical writing in the writing group. That is why I chose “A Butterfly Has No Soul” as the title for this chapter. Abby was a third-year student English major student when she joined the writing group. According to her, she used to be “an excellent student” and “learned English like crazy” (1 I). However, as an English major student at her university, she found it “so boring” to study English and considered changing her major (1 I). In the writing group, Abby ‘invested’ actively in autobiographical writing by writing about her family, school, and university experiences. In this process, she performed some of her social identities (e.g., as a humorous family member). Through engaging in autobiographical writing in English in the writing group, Abby appeared to have become a more engaged, hopeful, and agentive writer of English than she had been before joining the writing group. Previous Learning and Literacy Experiences

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During the writing group activities, I interviewed Abby seven times. Table 4.1 provides a summary of the interviews that are most relevant to this chapter. Table 4.1 Summary of Interviews

As can be seen in the table, the interviews were often in the presence of other group members, especially Hope, Abby’s “intimate friend here” at her university (4D/ W_W). Abby had been reading extensively since primary school (“My Reading History,” 13D/W_W, see Appendix F). Some of her favourite books included Pride and Prejudice (read at middle school), Gone with the Wind (read at high school), and Tuesdays with Morrie (read at university) (13D/W_W). As a writer in Chinese, Abby had had her days of success when she was “participating writing contests [in Chinese] every year and won the prize each year” (“My Writing History,” 14D/W_W, see Appendix G). Her success, however, had been accompanied by mixed comments. “From primary school to university, my teachers always said that my

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handwriting was ugly. They always said, ‘Good writing, poor, poor handwriting!’ I’m used to such blows” (3 I). According

to

Abby,

she

used to “ ” (learn English just like crazy) when she was in the middle school and her English “ ” (had always been excellent) through high school (4 I). In other words, she used to be an engaged learner, who wanted to achieve well. At university, however, she found it “so boring!” to study English as her major (1 I). Prior to joining the writing group, Abby’s writing in English had had a limited range and focus. While at university, apart from a few diary entries, she wrote “ ” (mainly because it’s an assignment from a teacher or taking a test) (4 I). Moreover, she found “the number of words” mattered more than grammar, as compared to middle school and high school, and it was “really hard” to write enough words (4 I). Clearly, the technical aspects of writing were taking priority over the content and meaning. Abby’s focus on form in English writing was at least partially shaped by the kind of English education she had been exposed to as an English major student at her university. Abby told a story about a writing experience that she remembered very clearly. Right after she entered university in 2005, her English teacher had asked the whole class to write a letter to their families in English. Abby wrote her letter to her mother, her first time to do so. She felt good about it overall. “It didn’t have any mistakes in organisation. It didn’t miss anything I 143

wanted to say,” she said. But she did make “the worst kind” of “mistake.” maybe because I hadn’t written for a long time, I made a mistake, the worst kind ((laugh)). I used the wrong format, putting the date at the end. Anyway, the teacher was real mad. At least, he was unhappy: “How can university students make such a mistake!” (4 I) Because she reported no engagement with the content of texts that she had written, Abby’s experience in English writing seems to have been responded to only at a very superficial level, as represented by her story about the reaction to dating her letter in the wrong place. On the same day (January 5, 2009) that Abby drew the picture of trees and after she had explained what the trees meant, Abby drew two faces (see Figure 4.2) to show the contrast between herself as a writer before and after joining the writing group.

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Figure 4.2 Abby’s two faces. The first face was grey, sad-looking, and incomplete. Abby explained, “Back then [before joining the writing group], I was very unqualified as a writer. What I wrote was monotonous, stiff, and very incomplete. So, I used grey”6 (33V). This partial face and its explanation gave a summary of Abby’s previous writer identity. I will return to some of Abby’s other pictures later. Autobiographical Writing Abby was one of the eight third-year students who volunteered to participate in the writing research group in mid-March, 2008.7 She attended 27 of the 32 extracurricular weekly group meetings, contributed actively to group discussions, and wrote a great number of autobiographical writing samples. Table 4.2 is an overview of Abby’s autobiographical writing samples in English for the writing group; they are chronologically arranged with the interviews included. The purpose of this overview is to demonstrate the extent to which Abby ‘invested’ in autobiographical writing as a group member. All writing samples, except Abby’s 50-word poem (24W_W), were initially composed during the first stage of the writing group (March–July 2008). Table 4.2 Abby’s Autobiographical Writing Samples and Interviews

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These samples showed Abby’s engagement with her home, school, and university experiences. My following analysis will start with the first sample (1W_W), which, as will be seen in the next section, contains hints of Abby’s general take on autobiographical writing. I will then focus on samples that inform Abby’s English-writing-mediated identities (e.g., as a family member) and writer identity. These include “My Home” (2W_W), “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), and “ ” (“When I Stood Mourning,” 10W_W), and samples explicitly dealing with Abby’s gendered identity (“The Days,” 14W_W & 15W_W; “The First Time to Be a Boy,” 23W_W, and her poem 24W_W).

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“I Will Write Down My Feelings and Thinkings” (1W_W) During the second group meeting, March 21, I gave the first writing task to the members. I asked them to write a “preface” to their “EFL autobiographies” in 20 minutes or, alternatively, they could write down their feelings about writing their “autobiographies” in English (second meeting plan). In response, Abby wrote about her plan for her own autobiography (see Figure 4.3).

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Figure 4.3 Abby’s first writing sample (1W _W).

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The first paragraph of this sample (1W_W) revealed one of Abby’s social identities as a reader/writer: someone “liking reading and always writing down [her] feelings.” Moreover, this identity seemed to have provided her with a way into autobiographical writing. As she wrote, although she had “never writ[ten] autobiography before,” she felt she could “choose it [her feelings?] to be one element of [her] autobiography.” In other words, Abby was planning to continue her reader/writer identity through her “autobiography.” Abby’s identity as a reader/writer surfaced again in the last paragraph, in which Abby took her stance on autobiographical writing by contrasting “Benjamin Frankle’s autobiography” with her own. Extract: Abby’s first writing sample (1W_W) I’ve read one part of Benjamin Frankle’s autobiography,8 and it writes himself from young, it also expresses the success of his life. But the most I interest in was his minds and thinkings. In my opinion, that’s the soul of a person. So in my autobiography. I’ll write down my feelings and thinkings. Whoever this Benjamin is, this paragraph illustrates an outcome of Abby’s ‘struggle’ with others’ words (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 246) in making her writer identity. On the one hand, Abby emphasised Benjamin’s “minds and thinkings” and compared them to “the soul of a person.” On the other hand, the planned scope of her own autobiography went beyond the mental or “thinking” alone, entailing also her “feelings” (“So in my autobiography. I’ll write down my feelings and 149

thinkings”). Given that Abby was used to “always writing down [her] feelings” (first paragraph, 1W_W), the addition of her “thinkings” or “soul” seemed to suggest that Abby took autobiographical writing in the group as an opportunity to expand her writer identity. Last but not least, Abby saw autobiographical writing as a way to explore her life experiences. As she wrote in the third and fourth paragraphs: “May be I can introduce myself or say something about my home and the school life, even the cute friends around me.... try my best to remember the interesting things happend to me [in my childhood]”). As shown by Abby’s collection of autobiographical writing samples (see Table 4.1), during the writing group activities, Abby fulfilled most of her initial plan. More importantly, in writing about her life, as is the case in “My Home” (2W_W), Abby expanded her existing identities. “My Home, Sweet Home.” (2W_W) Abby wrote “My Home” (2W_W) in late March, read it to me and two other members during an interview (1 I), and regarded it as one of her best writing samples (33V). Extract: My Home We’ve been seven years in this house, a big six-room normal residence, not counting the big basement. After my father have bought the tofo, we dreamed of living in a new and big house with three floors. But in fact we’re still living in this tousy house cause of bankruptcy. And I call it “Big shanty”

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The basement is filled with variety of machines, such as motors, pulverizers, mill machines, shreshing machines etc. And we live in the second floor, and there is a flight of twelve steps down to the front door. My father’s friends may drop in without ceremony, but I don’t know why so many people walk forward into our rooms as if they are all our intimate friends. Well, they save us the trouble of going down to the front door, thereby taking us from our work. I was rather afraid of the noise of the cars and the dust from the road nearby. But my father said we should not notice them later on, and he was certainly right. I always pay more attention to the color of the paddy which on the other side of road, turns to golden then to green. My father always do more on his business, and my mother likes nailing up here and there or mending pillow-case, or singing the song of Narcissus trebly. And it is also a great comfort to them to know that their children are happy and healthy. My home, sweet home. “My Home” (2W_W) left me with an impression that Abby “[had] a sense of humour” (my written comments, approx. March 27, 2008). In Ivanič’s (1998) terms, this impression was Abby’s ‘discoursal self.’ Abby was humorous in the way she responded to the self-imposed visits by her father’s friends, “Well, they save us the trouble of going down to the front door, thereby taking us from our work.” Abby agreed with this interpretation. When I asked her about the kind of impression she wanted to leave of herself through “My Home”

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(2W_W),

she

replied,

“

” (I think maybe just as you said, it was somewhat amusing and humorous, 3 I). Evidence suggests that Abby performed her humorous identity through “My Home” (2W_W). During Interview III, Abby regarded “My Home” (2W_W) as her best piece of writing because she “used another angle to look at [her] home... the ‘sweet’ angle” (3 I). Like a dominant storyline (White & Epston, 1990), this “sweet angle” excluded details of Abby’s life that were not “sweet.” For instance, Abby did not write about the tense relationship she had with her mother (“I miss her, but as soon as I get home, I quarrel with her, endlessly,” 3 I), nor did she mention other troubling issues in her family (“The main things around my family is just like divorce, pressure [?], crisis and other things,” 1 I). The result surprised Abby (“ [“My Home”], ” When I wrote the article [“My Home”] with such an attitude, I felt quite surprised, 3 I) and she felt that it would surprise her family too. Maybe they [my family] would think I was amusing, because at home I was not like that. I was very quiet with them. When others—guests— come to visit, I wouldn’t say anything. When I get home, I wouldn’t utter a sound either. Just like that. So [they] should find it quite unexpected too.9 (3 I)

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Therefore, through “My Home” (2W_W), Abby enacted an “amusing” identity of herself, which contrasts with her family’s usual view of her as “ ” (very quiet). In performing her “amusing” identity through “My Home” (2W_W), Abby followed a literary model provided by The Diary of a Nobody (Grossmith & Grossmith, 1962). As shown in the interviews below, Abby took a “humorous” perspective on her home, as the protagonist in The Diary of a Nobody did on his ‘Laurel Mansion.’ I

Abby, can you talk about your experience of writing My Home?

A

I often influenced by other things. I read the Diary of Nobody, this book. The book is so interesting, so I think maybe I could also write something interesting my home. Because I never plan to say something unhappy. (1 I)

... I never wrote about... my home. But that day, I had read The Diary of a Nobody. It’s about the male protagonist moving to a new place called “The Laurel Mansion” with his wife. It then talks about what his new home was like. That made me think of my home. So I wrote it that way. That book did not have much melancholy; it was quite humorous throughout—a kind of cheerful or joyful mood. So, I wrote that way.10 (3 I) Therefore, while reading The Diary of a Nobody, Abby aligned with the male protagonist’s humorous perspective. By writing “My Home” (2W_W) the way

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she did, Abby continued taking such a perspective and performed before the writing group a new identity of herself as a humorous family member. In the case of “My Home” (2W_W), Abby altered her existing identity as a family member by adopting an alternative way to relate to it. Consistent with the distinction between the outer appearance of the butterfly and its apparent inner emptiness, Abby’s autobiographical writing samples do not necessarily show how she really felt. In her EFL autobiographical writing, she appeared to be avoiding some negative aspects of her life by, for instance, glossing over her tense relationship with her mother. A similar example is “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), in which Abby performed against the background of her past self as “a decent sort of fellow.” “I Used to be a Decent Sort of Fellow” (4W_W) Abby wrote “Introduce Myself” (4W_W, April 4) about three weeks after she joined the writing group. Extract: It is said that I was 1.5 kilogram when I was born, which, much to my parents’ old friends’ surprise that the little thing has grown so strong and healthy. I didn’t care much for the girl’s accountments such as little skirt, riband and elastic. And I always played hoodles or climbed trees even fighted with boys. But I was taciturn, civil and learning-hard. I liked reciting on my way home. That’s certainly an incredible and great

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time. By-the-by, I didn’t often make jokes, so I felt disgraceful when fell over the stone or darsill. I seldom shouted out at the top of my voice and never fighted anyone’s quarrels. Blackguarded, I thought of a splendid I ought to have given them when they had gone. However, I’ll keep it for another occasion. Then, I forget it. But now, I become to be the one I detested before. I’ll sound off about the things infernal and slam the door. I’m angry, I do what at my will, even act in the uncalled manner. But I don’t mind my change, maybe it’s a different experience and fun. I like walking and love Rock ‘n’ roll, I consider it as my evangel and tranquillizer. I used to be a decent sort of fellow and now I’m the one I hope to be, It is not too bad. The first three paragraphs were about Abby’s descriptions of who she used to be. More specifically, in her first paragraph, Abby wrote about her unusual growth despite her low birth weight of “1.5 kilogram.” In her second paragraph, Abby described her atypical girlhood (e.g., “didn’t care much for the girl’s accountments such as little skirt, riband and elastic.... always played hoodles or climbed trees even fighted with boys”11). These details seemed to be examples of the “interesting things” in her childhood that she had wanted to write about (1W_W). In the third paragraph, Abby described her way of interacting with others, especially in handling quarrelsome situations (e.g., “never fighted anyone’s quarrels”).

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In the last two paragraphs, Abby reflected on her “change” (e.g., that she would now “sound off about things infernal and slam the door” and that the rock ‘n’ roll was her “evangel and tranquillizer”). Abby’s reflections resulted in two identity conclusions: one about her past self, “I used to be a decent sort of fellow,” and the other about her present self, “But now, I become to be the one I detested before.... It is not too bad.” Here, I agree with H. Nicholas’s (personal communication, October 11, 2010) interpretation: Given her interest in the writing of others, it could be that ‘a decent sort of fellow’ is a literary quote. It is definitely ‘dated’ and therefore has a literary feel. It is in ‘The diary of a nobody’ and in a range of other pieces of famous English literature. So it could be that this is an ‘older’ identity or one found in other material whereas the rock-related identity may be more ‘herself’—(?) from the inside (?). It could almost be a sense of moving from the ‘other-approved’ (decent sort of fellow) to a ‘self-approved’ (the one I detested before). Nevertheless, Abby’s ‘self-approved’ identity remained a site of struggle. Regarding her change, Abby sounded affirmative (“I don’t mind my change.... now I’m the one I hope to be”), as if being “angry” was her preferred way of being. Additional data show that the situation was not as simple as this. Behind Abby’s apparent acceptance of her change in “Introduce Myself” (4W_W) was an enduring struggle about “whether to keep myself or... melt into a group.” As she wrote in an email to me:

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I haven’t felt peace for many years. I don’t know when I started changing. I feel it is getting harder and harder to interact with people. Most of the time I did not want to or was unwilling to, now it is mainly because I have lost that capacity to. I don’t know whether to keep myself or... melt into a group. Always need something to keep me going.... I don’t think I’m a sinner, but I often feel guilty. No wonder Hope said I was lunatic.12 (Email on June 15, 2008) Two reasons suggest that Abby revealed more truth about her real feelings about her present self in her email than she did in “Introduce Myself” (4W_W). First of all, she wrote the email in Chinese, a language she was good at. For instance, she noted in “My Writing History” (14D/W_W) that at middle school, she had “enter[ed] [Chinese] writing contests every year and every year won prize.” In contrast, she felt that, “When writing in English [at university], I think in Chinese, and translate it into English” (1 I). Furthermore, the context in which Abby wrote her email also made it more reliable than her autobiographical sample (4W_W). Abby’s email, written three months after she joined the writing group, was her reply to my expression of sympathy for her mother’s illness (“From Hope I learned that your mother is sick in hospital, so you are there to take care of her. I just pray that she can feel better soon,” email on June 15, 2008). In contrast, she wrote her autobiographical sample “Introduce Myself” (4W_W) when she had known me and most of the group members for only about two weeks. Taking these factors into consideration, I think Abby was performing an identity that was an external presentation before the writing group through 157

“Introduce Myself” (4W_W), as she had done through “My Home” (2W_W). In “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), Abby seemed to suggest that the activities she engaged in now, e.g., listening to rock ‘n’ roll, made her less “decent” than before. Abby was a devoted fan of rock ‘n’ roll (“I consider it [rock] as my evangel and tranquillizer,” 4W_W). She first became interested in rock, particularly metal music,13 under the influence of Swcolt, a guitarist from her university (email to me on July 1, 2010). With this interest Abby started a new hobby: copying song lyrics. Abby explained in an earlier email, “I have to copy out so much of lycirs cause the metal music is very hard for me to listen clearly. And then I’m fond of doing it” (email to me on May 10, 2008). Abby’s special relationship with rock set her apart from many other girls. First, it distinguished her from Hope, her only “intimate friend” at her university (4D/W_W), who preferred popular music (1 I). It also set her apart from her university roommates. In her email to me on May 10, 2008, Abby wrote, “The musice [rock ‘n’ roll] I listening is very terrible for other girls... too extreme and frenzied ... always about death, doom, black, war etc.” As an example, she copied “Fade to Black” by Metallica at the end of her email. Part of the song goes: “I have lost the will to live.” In contrast, Abby wrote during a free writing activity at the fifth meeting, April 11, 2008: “I’m so sick of love songs. Especially the ones hear in my domisty-room [dormitory room]. Tired of the sweet voice and the exquisite lyric. It makes me to be crazy and harebrained” (“So Sick of Love Songs,” 6W). As we

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will see next, Abby’s special relationship with rock had implications for her English-writing-mediated identity as a mourner, as illustrated by Abby’s writing plan for her mourning experience. “My First Response was a Song” (11W_W) To remember the victims of “5.12 Massive Earthquake” in Wenchuan, China, which killed at least 69,000, public mourning gatherings were organised throughout the country. Abby attended the gathering at her university and wanted to write about this experience. I wrote all my recent articles for the case study the way I liked; I wrote whatever I thought of. I was not restricted to any title. So, when we were mourning that day [for the 5.12 Earthquake], I really just felt blank in my mind. Then I thought of writing this [“When I Was Mourning”]. (3 I) It was an unfinished draft. Abby chose the title “ ” (11W_W) and asked me to help her to decide which English translation to use (“I don’t know if I should use When I’m mourning or standing in silence tribute or neither is correct,” email to me on May 23, 2008).14 But somehow she could not finish it. “I only wrote the context, the first paragraph and last paragraph. But I couldn’t write one single word in the middle section. I got stuck, so I stopped.... Maybe I don’t yet know enough. I don’t know why. I just can’t organise it. So, I stopped writing it” (3 I). Nonetheless, Abby’s writing plan shows the kind of mourner that she had intended for her text. When I asked

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Abby to recall her original writing plan, she said (the italicized parts are my translation from Chinese): There seemed to be much more in my context [description]. It was about my plan to write on this topic. I had the title already. My first response [before I started writing] was a song ... named Death to Birth. That is ‘ ,’ maybe the theme song of the movie Last Days. It talks about the days before the lead singer of the Nirvana Band committed suicide. From the beginning, the song can make you smell death. The lyrics also tend to be like that—words like ‘death,’ ‘life’ keep popping up. At first I planned to copy the lyrics as the context. Then [I thought that] in the first paragraph, I would write about when I was supposed to be mourning—indeed, we said several times that we would go into mourning for three minutes—I just felt completely blank in my mind. I asked myself what I was doing. Having a blank mind is not mourning at all. I must think of something. Then I thought of things a teacher said about the [Wenchuan] Earthquake. For example, some victims were rescued, but because of outdated medical facilities, the medical staff just had to watch the victims die—watching them die, unable to do anything. Some people were over-excited, unable to sleep at night. They didn’t yet realise what had happened. Our teacher said, it took three months for him [them] to realise what he [they] had lost. Then they would be hit by extreme sorrow, or develop depression, even kill themselves. The teacher said they would need counseling. Another [teacher] said, during the Tangshan Earthquake [in 1976], a girl was caught so tightly that she couldn’t be rescued. Nothing could be done, so 160

people just had to watch her die. Then someone asked her what she wanted to say. She said, ‘Just comb my hair for me!’ These are about all the things I thought of ... Then in the last paragraph [...] it means when something 15’[jue-tou] and ‘show,’ I think we should becomes ‘ really mourn. What I said just now is the last sentence of the last paragraph: ‘Just please resting your heart in puri-, pure silence and praying for the, the vi-, victims.’ (3 I) Abby’s writing plan reveals three aspects of her identity work as a mourner. Firstly, autobiographical writing was a site where Abby continued working on her identity as a mourner. When going through the actual mourning process, Abby “just felt completely blank in [her] mind” and she concluded that “having a blank mind is not mourning at all.” In contrast, there was much for her to write about in “ ” (“When I Was Mourning,” 11W_W), e.g., a rock song, her teachers’ stories, and her own view about what should be really mourned for. The contrast between “having a blank mind” and having a lot to write about supports my argument in Chapter 2 that autobiographical writing is a unique space for identity work. Secondly, “ ” (“When I Was Mourning,” 11W_W) was a ‘multi-voiced’ text (Bakhtin, 1981; Holquist, 2002), through which Abby engaged in ‘ideological becoming’ (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78) as a mourner. Abby’s writing plan shows that she had been exposed to different ways of giving meaning to earthquake deaths. The rock band song “Death to Birth” 161

contained a message of resurrection not found in either Chinese or Bai cultures, which share religious beliefs in Buddhism and Taoism, as well as local deities (cf. Mackerras, 1988). In contrast, her two teachers’ stories, representing official narratives about earthquake victims, focused on post-shock scenarios and placed blame completely on “outdated medical facilities” for unsuccessful rescues. In addition, Abby also included her own view: “when something becomes ‘ ’ [jue-tou] and ‘show,’ I think we should really mourn.” A public mourning for “show” was thus mocked by Abby. Thirdly, Abby’s writing plan revealed a ‘struggle’ (Bakhtin, 1981) among the multiple voices, as well as the identities they represent. The rock song took its place in Abby’s context description, suggesting that although Abby’s identity as a rock fan continued into her writing by contributing a song, nonetheless, it was marginal to Abby during her writing process. In contrast, the main body of Abby’s text would include several accounts from her teachers, which foregrounded Abby’s identity as a student. In the last paragraph, Abby planned to write her own criticism against unauthentic mourning processes. Doing so suggests that she would juxtapose her identity as a critical thinker by contending with her teachers’ positioning. Therefore, Abby’s difficulty in linking her teachers’ stories with her criticism was essentially a difficulty in ‘orchestrating’ multiple social discourses (Bakhtin, 1981; Lam, 2000; Menard-Warwick, 2005) to author a new identity of herself as a critical mourner.

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Though unfinished, “ ” (“When I Was Mourning,” 11W_W) highlights the possibilities for Abby to continue working on some of her existing identities through EFL autobiographical writing. Such possibilities were at least partially actualised in Abby’s autobiographical writing about herself as a boy/girl. “Did Anyone Know that was a Girl?” (23W_W) Abby described her gendered but less conventional identity as a girl in four autobiographical samples. Each time, it was associated with different events and experiences. In “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), Abby already gave some hints about her differences from other girls. On the one hand, she “didn’t care much for the girl’s accountments such as little skirt, riband and elastic.” On the other hand, she “always played hoodles or climbed trees even fighted with boys.” Then, she used a term, “fellow,” which, according to P. Heywood (personal communication, June 22, 2010), usually refers to males, to sumvmarise her past self (“I used to be a decent sort of fellow”). These descriptions seemed to suggest that Abby identified at least in part as a boy. In “The Days” (15W_W), which was about her life at a one-teacher-with-three-grades primary school, Abby first wrote about a game she played with other girls (“I always played the role of ferocious wolf when other girls were little rabbits”). She then described an anecdote of her pretending to be her teacher Mr. King, who “was fond of playing mah-jongg and often played outside after class.”

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Extract: There was no bell in school and the sound of opening school gate meant that Mr. King had finished his mah-jongg game and it’s time to class. Sometimes, students stealthily opened the gate to make a noise, and pretent Mr. King’s back. One day I went to open the gate slinkingly to make a false alarm, but was knocked down by gate, while Mr. King was pushing outside. He was really back. As such, in “The Days” (15W_W), Abby continued to set herself apart from other girls through the contrast between herself as “a ferocious wolf” and other girls as “a little rabbits” and herself pretending to be an authority figure to play tricks on her schoolmates. A highlight is found in “The First Time to Be a Boy” (23W_W). The sample contains a description of Abby’s embarrassing “manlike name” and hair (“I have a manlike name and because of strong and short hair, I always be recognized to be a boy. Well, that’re embarrassed things indeed”). But according to her sample, Abby turned her “manlike” appearance into an advantage and became a courageous heroine. During a “ ” (singing song contest) at her middle school, her class was short of boys. So, Abby dressed herself as a boy and sang with the other boys “happily.” Extract: And I was suggested when practice to pretend to be a boy. People all laughted at me and I rejected. You may think I faded back, but I agreed in minutes. Then I was

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wearing black suit with red tie, standing with boys and singing happily. Well, if someone with good sight, he may see my little ear ring is shining in the light. Did anyone know that was a girl? What a mestory night. By “mestory,” Abby might have meant “mysterious,” emphasising her presence among the boys as a mystery (“Did anyone know that was a girl?”) or she might have meant “my-story,” suggesting that she was the protagonist of the night because of her heroic act (“You may think I faded back, but I agreed in minutes”). In either case, Abby seemed to imply that her “first time to be a boy” was a positive experience. Of particular interest is Abby’s 50-word poem about her meeting with a boy with the same name as hers. Abby read it at the farewell meeting and was responded to with happy laughter among the audience. Extract: I have met the boy hasing the same name with me this morning. And we never spoken to each other before. With grinning and gazing at each other we seemed to say something, but we didn’t and passed by.”Stupid”, I told to myself. I was going to say “Hello”! The boy shared Abby’s name in Chinese, yet they had never spoken to each other before. All they did was “grinning and gazing at each other,” as if they were going “to say something.” While the experience Abby wrote about may be factual, what the boy may have represented seems to me an externalised other—the “manlike” aspects of Abby, which were at times a source

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of pride, and at others, a point of tension. In light of this conflicting self-other relationship, Abby’s constant struggle with “whether to keep [her]self or... melt into a group” (email on June 15, 2008) may be read as a struggle in performing her gendered identity. Abby’s gendered identity, although manifested differently, lasted for a long time. First of all, these samples covered different periods of Abby’s life: “Introduce Myself” (4W_W) about her past in general; “The Days” (15W_W) about her childhood; “The First Time to Be a Boy” (23W_W) about her as a middle school student; and the poem (24W_W) about her university life. Secondly, Abby used “manlike” names in both Chinese and English. While her Chinese name was given by others (1 I), she chose for herself “a boy’s name,” something like Mark or John, as her English name (“What’s more, my Chinese name is also a boy’s name. Perhaps it’s the reson I using boy’s name as my English name,” email on May 18, 2008). Thirdly, Abby continued using a “boy’s name” even when alternative options were available. When my wife noticed Abby using a boy’s English name for herself, she suggested that I tell Abby to change it. However, Abby refused even though I had offered her a long list of girls’ names such as Grace and Melody. She wrote in the same email on May 18, “I have tried to find some meaningful or interesting name but failed. And now I don’t care much about my English name actually.” Fourthly, Abby’s “manlike” identity seemed to be an established identity in her online communication with her friends. For instance, in one of Abby’s blog entries, I noticed that her girl friends address her as “ ” (Brother) in their

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comments on what she had written. Therefore, Abby’s English-writing-mediated identity as a girl was very much like a butterfly; there was no one-to-one correspondence between the appearance and the inner reality. Comment Abby’s autobiographical writing in English goes beyond simply recording her family, school and university experiences. Multiple English-writing-mediated identities can be observed in her individual writing samples. In her first sample (1W_W), a written response to the invitation to write autobiographically, Abby revealed herself as a reader/writer, who valued both her “thinkings and feelings.” In “My Home” (2W_W), she performed as a “ ” (very amusing) identity of herself, which contrasted sharply with the “ ” (very quiet) image she had usually presented to her family. In “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), she performed an identity contrary to “a decent sort of fellow” and claimed that she did not mind her change. Through several samples (“The Days,” 15W_W; “Introduce Myself,” 4W_W; “My First Time to Be a Boy,” 23W_W and her untitled poem, 24W_W), Abby performed an enduring gendered identity of herself as a girl, who had “a manlike name ... strong and short hair,” removed from girls’ dress codes (e.g., “little skirt, riband and elastic”), enjoyed boys’ activities (e.g., “I always played hoodles or climbed trees even fighted with boys”), and in specific circumstances agreed to be a “boy” socially (“wearing black suit with red tie, standing with boys and singing happily”),

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linguistically (“I used to be a... fellow”), and also through her names. Similarly, Abby’s writing plan for “

”

(“When I Was Mourning,” 11W_W) was suggestive of Abby’s multiple social identities: her identities as a mourner (during the public mourning), whose mind was “completely blank”; as a student, who remembered her teachers’ stories about earthquake victims; as a fan of rock ‘n’ roll, who had planned to copy song lyrics as her writing context; and as another kind of mourner, who critiqued show-like mourning gatherings. Accordingly, as basic as it was, identity work was definitely involved in Abby’s EFL autobiographical writing in the writing group. It was the kind of ‘calculating and manipulating just how far they [language learners] want to go in pushing a particular identity for themselves’ (Leki, 2000, p. 105). On two occasions, Abby clearly performed her existing identities through her EFL autobiographical writing samples. They are “My Home” (2W_W) and “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), in which Abby presented images of herself that were contrary to how she had presented herself to others in other social domains. Three reasons may explain why Abby performed as she did. First, Abby was reluctant to engage with the unhappy aspects of her life through writing (“I never plan to say something unhappy,” 1 I). As a result, she was showing to the writing group mainly one side of her life experiences. Second, Abby was susceptible to what she read and relied heavily upon others’ models for writing 168

(“If I read a book and write within a period, the words I use or my style would all be very close to what I read. I feel empty when I don’t read something,”16 7 I). Consequently, what she showed about herself through autobiographical writing was usually the images that she had adopted from reading and was trying on herself. Put another way, others’ texts provide a way for Abby to experiment with different identities in her own autobiographical writing. Third, Abby’s expressed difficulties in relating to others mean that she had to be deliberate in revealing her identities through autobiographical writing. This was shown in her email to me on June 15, 2008, in which she wrote, “I feel it is getting harder and harder to interact with people ... I have lost that capacity to [interact with them].” The same kind of issue continued after she became a teacher of English at a middle school. “I never talked my true feeling with my workmates, but only C [Abby’s boyfriend]. Talking with one of them mean talking to the whole world” (email to me on July 1, 2010). Abby also performed her preferred gender identity through EFL autobiographical writing in the group. It was not a straight girl or boy identity but an identity consisting of both categories and their culturally typical defining features (e.g., playing marbles being a boys’ game). This gendered identity was enduring too, expressing itself through Abby’s English writing about her experiences from childhood to university. Other types of identity work were missing in Abby’s autobiographical writing in English. Abby rarely used reflection in her autobiographical writing in English to

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form her own identity conclusions (see Chapter 2). Two exceptions occurred in “Introduce Myself” (4W_W), in which Abby reflected on her past and present selves and concluded: “I used to be a decent sort of fellow” and “But now, I become to be the one I detested before.” Similarly, her EFL autobiographical writing showed no signs of re-visioning, i.e., imagining alternative options for her future. The lack of reflection and re-visioning for Abby was partly due to her approach to autobiographical writing. First of all, Abby rarely wrote complete narratives. An exception was “The First Time to Be a Boy” (23W_W). Often, she wrote about a series of discrete events, without giving it a clear unifying storyline (e.g., “My Home,” 2W_W, and “Introduce Myself,” 4W_W). In addition, Abby had a simplistic notion of narrative writing. She regarded narrative writing as easy “because I have memory and remember some events, I just need to know what words to use” (3 I). Accordingly, to Abby, “The number one benefit of doing the writing now is that [she] will look up unknown words if [she] run into them” (4 I). Furthermore, Abby rarely wrote about the same experiences more than once. Often, after my interviews with her or receiving my written comments, Abby would make slight revisions to her drafts by changing a few words or sentences. An example is “Introduce Myself,” in which she revised her description of rock from “my evangel and tranquillizer” (4W_W) to “my painkiller, comforter and gospel” (6W_W). As such, Abby did not explore opportunities to explore multiple meanings in her life experiences by critically reviewing what had shaped her life and her sense of self.

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In part, insufficient group scaffolding for Abby also contributed to her lack of reflection and re-visioning in her autobiographical writing. As a group member, Abby shared her autobiographical writing samples with the writing group three times. The first time was during Interview I, when I asked her to read aloud to me “My Home” (2W_W) in the presence of two other student members, Hope and Melody. The second time was at the eighth meeting, when six members participated in the group’s first “oral publication” at my home (8V). At the meeting, Abby read her sample “My Friend ‘F’” (12W_W). The third time was at the farewell meeting when Abby read her poem to four members, my wife, and me. On all these three occasions, group interactions over Abby’s texts were constrained by the fact that no hand-held copies were provided for the members. Moreover, I did not use any of my comments to purposefully guide Abby to reflect or revision through my comments, as narrative therapists would through their conversations (White, 2005). The saying “a butterfly has no soul” seems to capture Abby’s English-writing-mediated identities very well. On the surface, Abby wrote a lot about herself in her autobiographical writing. In reality, Abby did not freely reveal herself through EFL autobiographical samples. Instead, she only performed the identities that she wanted her readers to know. Abby’s autobiographical writing experiences in the writing group nonetheless repositioned her as a writer.

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This shift is best represented by the second face picture that Abby drew at the farewell meeting (see Figure 4.4).

Figure 4.4 Abby’s second face. Abby explained:

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Now, after studying for more than a year, I feel very happy. I know how to express myself. Just like choosing to keep long hair or something else, it’s my own gain. [...]And what I write is more complete. Compared to what’s on the left, it [the second picture] is filled with colours. I chose purple for it because purple is a very mysterious colour. It means I still have a lot to learn and explore. (33V) This quote offers important linguistic clues about the nature of Abby’s new writer identity. Compared to her description of the first face, there was an increased sense of personal agency. About her first face, Abby mainly described negative aspects of what she was like (“unqualified as a writer”) and what her writing was like (“monotonous, stiff, and very incomplete”). In contrast, Abby’s choice of verbs in describing her second face, e.g., “ ” (know), “ ” (chose), “ ” (learn), and “ ” (explore”), suggests a changed relationship between her and English learning. She was no longer “tired of English” or regarded English as “so boring!” (1 I); she had begun to take more control over it. This agentive writer identity was made through Abby’s ‘investment’ (Peirce, 1995) in autobiographical writing in the writing group. First of all, Abby mainly wrote what she was interested in. Consider the following dialogue:

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N (In the writing group usually you choose your own topics. How do it?) A

(There is lots of freedom, unlike writing essays [at university] restrictive. So I usually write what I’m interested in or just write w this way of writing compositions.) (4 I) As such, even though Abby also wrote other types of essays, they tended to have a strong autobiographical nature in their origins. For instance, Abby wrote “Family Morality Education” because she felt that her uncle had overindulged his son. She wrote “Lucky Numbers” because her younger sister liked number 4, which most Chinese people try to avoid because it sounds like “ ” (death) in Chinese. Furthermore, Abby wrote much more frequently than she had previously done. This increase in volume was shown by the collection of autobiographical writing samples she produced in the writing group, as well as by her words, “In the past two years, I hardly wrote any English except in tests. But recently, I wrote every week. Sometimes, I couldn’t write. I would still write something every two weeks,”17 (4 I). Such an engagement with writing seemed to be sustained by a sense of re-ignited hope and interest in learning English. As she said, “Doing the writing now.... I have more hope in learning English. It is not all boring. It still has something interesting for me to keep on learning”18 (4 I). 174

The performing of her English-writing-mediated identities and the movement she made in her writer identity need to be understood with reference to her EFL autobiographical writing in the social context of the writing group. First, Abby associated autobiographical writing with her life experiences. The invitation for Abby to write autobiographically was first responded to with multiple possibilities: family and school experiences, “even the cute friends around me,” and “thinkings and feelings” (1W_W). Such openness contrasted sharply with writing that “requires some fixed format”: I can’t write it [argumentative writing]. I feel that argu ... both expository and argumentative writing require some fixed format. For example, argumentative essays need to have a thesis statement and a topic sentence supported by evidence. I feel that I don’t have the experience to write argumentative essays, and can’t write them well. Besides, there is little that can be extended or thought of to support your opinion. (3 I) Secondly, the invitations for Abby to write autobiographically seemed congruent with her existing writer identity. Towards the end of the writing group activities, Abby said that she still could not write argumentative essays; her favourite genre of writing remained narratives (7 I). She explained, “I think I’m a very emotional writer, who writes emotional things”19 (7 I). In other words, autobiographical writing allowed her to continue what she had been used to doing, “always writing down my feelings” (1W_W). It became an outlet of her emotions. 175

Thirdly, Abby’s use of English in autobiographical writing needs to be understood in light of her general alignment with Western cultures. Consider the following dialogue: N

How do western cultures influence you?

A

I feel pretty envious.... Usually I like to watch Travelogue documenting ... travellers going to many countries, learning lots about customs, ways of life, also learning about things like architecture and arts. It is very good. And I am a little bit afraid of certain things in the Chinese tradition. I have some fear about religions such as Buddhism.... There used to be a store along the ((name omitted)) Street, in which was some very old stuff such as bracelets, jewellery, wooden fish, prayer beads, Buddha statues, etc. When we went inside, we felt it was so creepy, so horrifying! ((laughing)) And the old stuff felt kind of dark. And I feel Chinese customs such as funerals are also horrifying. Western funerals feel strange, making you solemn. Chinese funerals are weird and fearsome. (6 I)

Western cultures influenced Abby at least through two channels: the novels she read (e.g., The Diary of a Nobody) and the rock ‘n’ roll songs she listened to in English (e.g., “From Death to Life”) on the Internet. These pieces of evidence seem to suggest that although Abby has never travelled abroad, her identity work, particularly in terms of ‘ideological becoming,’ bears much influence from some geographically and culturally distant other. Consequently, through her 176

autobiographical writing in English, Abby could experiment with identities different from those prescribed by Chinese traditions. Fourthly, the writing group played a supportive role in Abby’s growth as a writer. This was clear in Abby’s explanation about the second grey tree in her picture (see Figure 4.1), which has scaffolding and is surrounded by several golden stars. Abby said: “And then in this past year I saw some hope and got some support—from some friends, and the writing group and you [the teacher] ... [as well as] the old friend who are not here”20 (33V). Abby did not specify the kinds of support she received from the group. My observation is that the writing group provided Abby with an appreciative audience, who heard her reading several of her samples without critiquing her handwriting or format, as had been the case with her previous literacy experiences (1 I & 4 I). These samples include “My Friend ‘F’” (12W_W, 8V, May 2, 2008); “Family Morality Education” (22V, October 8, 2008); “Thank You for Smoking” (28V, November 19, 2008); and Abby’s poem (24W_W, 33V, January 5, 2009). In addition, Abby was also supported by the dynamic interactions in the writing group. Indeed, as Abby said, her special moments in the writing group were “times of laughter” and “heated discussion” (see Figure 4.5).

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Figure 4.5 Abby’s special moments in the writing group. 1. Times of laughter, felt happy and joyful, with all sorrow and sadness dispelled. 2. Times of heated discussion, when all expressed what they felt—fun even when in utter disagreement.21 Abby’s EFL autobiographical writing samples in the writing group are extremely complex. Only through extra-textual means such as interviews and drawings was it possible to begin to understand the multiple identities her writing mediated and the movements she was making in her writer identity. Even then, we could know Abby’s identities only to the degree she allowed us to. Thus, I was both complimented and cautious when reading Abby’s comments on an earlier draft I sent to her. In her email reply,22 Abby wrote, “I admire you and your circumspection.... What you analyzed the identities of mine are thorough, better than myself doing.” On the one hand, I believe I was on the right track in recognising her multiple English-writing-mediated identities. On the other hand, I know Abby’s EFL autobiographical writing alone tells but partial stories about her identities. As she wrote in the same email, 178

“Sometimes I was well-behaved, and sometimes crazy and impenetrable.” Reflecting back on her first mention of “soul” in her writing samples, Abby continued, “Body is only body, but people’s minds and thinking are true treasures. I call them ‘soul.’ It’s the spirit, the core and the heart of a human. And it’s powerful.” “ ” (a butterfly has no soul), but Abby does, as was shown through her EFL autobiographical writing samples in the writing group. It was a spirit that engaged in expanding her existing identities, even through EFL autobiographical writing. One can only speculate whether or not girlishness—as suggested by the arrival of her long hair in her second picture and her recent dating experience—would continue to feature in Abby’s future autobiographical writing.

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5 Matt “The Smile Became Special” Matt was the only ethnic Bai male member in the writing group and one of the two older case study participants. Matt came from a family of mixed ethnicity, his father a Bai and his mother a Han. Matt had learned to speak Bai from his father (1 I). Matt described his level of Bai as “Perhaps like the degree I speak English! When Bai people speak Bai, I can understand 70 percent of what they say” (email on May 21, 2010). His EFL autobiographical writing samples mainly dealt with his past experiences. The dialogicality of these texts illustrates how Matt was forming his ideological self by interacting with others’ words. His English-writing-mediated identities included him as a child, a son, and a young man trying to understand love and also trying to gain confidence. Through his autobiographical writing samples, he performed these identities to the group, as well as reflected on and re-visioned some of them. At the end of the writing group, his writer identity seems to have made three movements: he had become a more confident, involved, and life-oriented writer in English. These movements are discussed in light of the multiple contexts in which Matt wrote autobiographically in English. Previous English-Writing Experiences During the nine months when Matt was a writing group member, I interviewed him five times. Matt chose to be

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interviewed in English so as to have more opportunities to practise his spoken English. Therefore, we spoke Chinese only occasionally, mainly to clarify our meanings. These interviews had different foci, as follows: 1I

Life experience themes (March 28).

2 I, 4 I

Literacy experiences in Chinese English (June 13; December 04).

3I

Process of writing “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (September 10, 2008).

5I

The meaning of Matt’s drawing “My Life Road” (January 5, 2009).

and

It was mainly through 2 I and 4 I that I learned about Matt as a writer in English prior to joining the writing group. Matt had had a lasting interest in English. It was first ignited by “a very good English teacher” in middle school (2 I). Matt continued that he “liked studying English very much” and became “the first one”—the top student with “the highest mark”—in “middle school grade one and two” (2 I). In high school, “my English was not so good, but my interesting [interest] was good. Until now [in university], I also I’m interested in English” (2 I). Matt’s emphasis on “interest” in learning English can be related to his motto, which is, “as Einstein says, Interesting [Interest] is the best teacher” (1 I).

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Matt remembered his first experience of learning English and writing in English as a 13-year-old: At that time, we just wrote small short writing, about fifty or thirty words. I still remember the first writing I wrote at the final exam at my middle school.... There are some events, for example, at six-thirty you get up, eight o’clock you go to school, five o’clock you leave school and go home, and when do you sleep, when do you watch TV. I think at that time it’s very easy writing, because the first time I studied English I think it’s, English was very interesting. (2 I) The nature of English being “very easy” seems to give Matt a sense of control over English writing. In describing his English writing at university, Matt said, “Until college, especially when I began to prepare for TEM-4, I began to write more and more writings, but most of them are argumentations” (2 I). TEM-4 is a nation-wide examination for English major students in China. Matt did not pass the exam the first time he took it in 2007. When he joined the writing group in March 2008, he was still preparing to take it again in April. “But I think in college my writing level has been largely increased,” Matt claimed (2 I). Asked to specify how, Matt replied: In using words, and sentences, I think. I learned more words, so I can use them. And I also memorised many good sentences. At the time of preparing for TEM-4, also Mrs. [name omitted] suggested us to memorise more articles, more writings as you can. So I followed

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her advice. And then I began to memorise more and more writings as I can.... because I memorised many writings, many good writings, especially for TEM-4, and I just follow that kind of constructure [structure]. For example, the first, the second, the last one. And the first I describe my topic sentence, and then I took some examples to describe this topic. And last I draw a conclusion. So I just use fifteen minutes to write that writing ... I think it’s good writing, because I used proper, I used good structure. (2 I) The preceding quote shows that Matt’s English writing at university was closely related to TEM-4. One indicator is Matt’s strategy of memorising “good sentences” and “good writings, especially for TEM-4.” The other indicator is Matt’s view of “good writing” in TEM-4: “I think it’s good writing, because I used proper, I used good structure.” Forms seemed to have dominated meanings and ideas in priority. In his second year in university, Matt became aware of cultural differences between writing in Chinese and writing in English. I remember once I wrote an essay. Our teacher gave me a comment in the feedback, saying “Don’t put it together like in Chinese; try to use the English way.” That provoked my thinking. Although I did not make many mistakes, my writing was not idiomatic. Being idiomatic is very important.1 (Italics indicate my translation from Chinese)

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I felt quite strange because I didn’t make any grammar mistakes. How come that I should “Write in the ways native speakers do!” Strange! It turned out that I piled together my meaning in Chinese using English words. I should pay special attention to this.2 (4 I) After that, Matt began to change his approach to English by imitating the ways native speakers use words in sentences. From then on, I began to often imitate and use English sentences. By imitation and paying more attention to [the cultural differences], and by memorising—I find I’m improving in these regards. ... For words, always I will look at the Chinese meaning, (I—uh huh) but for sentence, I will look at the examples, sentence examples. And I will imitate the style of the sentence to create another sentence. (4 I) Although most of Matt’s university writing was argumentative writing, starting from 2007, he “began to write diaries ... all in English.” Matt regarded it as “a good way to improve my English, especially my written English.” “I think when I have something to say, or something important in my mind, and I will write them down,” he said (4 I). However, at the time of joining the writing group in mid-March 2008, he had given up keeping his diary and found it hard to start again. “I’m busy, so I can’t, I don’t want to keep it” (4 I). Matt was busy partly because he was preparing for two major exams. One was the previously mentioned TEM-4 exam

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for English major students in China, which he had failed in 2007 and was to take again in April 2008. The other was the graduate entrance exam, which he was to take in January 2009. It was then curious that he still decided to join the writing group and took up the researcher’s invitations to write autobiographically. Matt joined the writing group when he was in his second semester as a third-year English major student. His primary reasons were threefold: to “practise both our spoken and writing English,” to “know more friends,” and to improve “my interpersonal skills,” as he wrote in “Why I Join the Study,” quoted in the following. Extract: For our English Majors, I think that it is very beneficial to join a study which can practise both our spoken English and writing [written] English. So after reading the instruction,3 I decided to join the study. Before I decided to join the study, a classmate of mine said, “There will be a free meal. If I were you, I would go to have a try.” What my classmates said is true. A free meal will be for us to join the study.4 However... the most important thing is that I can learn more through the study. In addition, in the course of the study, I will get to know more friends. Perhaps, at the same time of communicating with others, my interpersonal skills may be improved by degrees. (Matt, “Why I Join the Study,” 1W_W, March 14, 2008) These reasons serve as a background for understanding Matt’s investment in autobiographical writing.

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From March to December, Matt attended 25 of the 32 writing group weekly “discussions,” asking for leave only on account of sickness or similar situations (e.g., “Nicolas, i am sorry to tell you i won’t attend today’s writing discussion due to the bad stomachache. I feel very weak today,” STM on May 9). He accepted five interview requests, feeling proud of his use of English during the interviews (e.g., one of his special moments was “the first time I was interviewed by you ... I spoke a lot of English and try to speak just English and no Chinese” (32V). Autobiographical Writing As a group member, Matt produced 36 writing/drawing samples in total, most of which were explicitly autobiographical, i.e., focusing on his life experiences. Table 5.1 provides an overview of the autobiographical writing samples Matt wrote for the writing group. All titles were chosen by Matt. Table 5.1 Matt’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

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My analysis of Matt’s autobiographical writing in English will start with three samples (“My Feeling about Autobiography,” 2W_W; life river, 3D/W_W; and chapter titles, 4W_W) as they may provide a general background for Matt’s other autobiographical writing samples. I will then focus on Matt’s writing about “a miserable scar” (6W_W), his father’s “rare smile” (11W and 14W) and his experience of unrequited love (13W and 16W). I chose these samples for two main reasons. First, they are completed stories, some with revisions, and can exemplify what it was like for Matt to write autobiographically in the writing group. Second, they are rich in information about Matt as a son and a young man in love—two identities seemingly unrelated to Matt as a 188

learner writer in English but surely part of his identity. Last, I will analyse two additional samples (“Confidence,” 9W_W, and “View on Love,” 26W_W), which Matt wrote during the second stage (August–December), to illustrate the autobiographical nature of his writing in English even when his writing appeared on the basis of the textual features to be non-autobiographical. “My Feeling about Autobiography” (2W_W) At the second meeting, March 21, I asked the members to each give a preface to their “autobiographies” or just write down their feelings about writing “autobiographies” in English. I gave the members 20 minutes. In response, Matt wrote “My Feeling about Autobiography” (2W_W; see Figure 5.1).

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Figure 5.1 “My Feeling about Autobiography” (2W_W). In his first paragraph, Matt first described autobiography as “very common but interesting.” He then revealed his experience of reading “famous writers’ autobiographies translated into Chinese.” Matt found “it is very

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interesting” and thought to himself, “I feel that maybe someday I should also write some, for me or for others.” Matt’s desire to be an autobiographer thus became apparent. It had been one of his ‘imagined identities’ (Peirce, 1995) rooted in his past experience of reading others’ autobiographies. Interestingly, Matt regarded having good English as a prerequisite for writing his “autobiography.” “Undoubtedly,” he wrote, “one must first improve one’s English writing if he or she wants to write autobiography ... Therefore, I must first improve my English.” His preoccupation with the shaping of language formed a stark contrast with those of Abby and Beth, who both associated “autobiography” with a sense of freedom. It also contrasted with Anne, whose focus seemed to be “ ” (expressing her true feelings) through her stories. As will become clear in later discussion, partly influenced by his emphasis on improving his English, Matt tended to craft his autobiographical writing more than the other three case study participants. Life River (3D/W_W) and Chapter Titles (4W_W) Matt drew his life river on March 28, during the third meeting after I showed my own version (see Appendix D) to the writing group. Matt’s life river starts with “birth” and ends with “future,” with six bends of the river being labelled (see Figure 5.2).

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Figure 5.2 Matt’s life river (3D/W_W). Matt’s life river and its captions depicted a theme of change from ‘contamination to redemption’ (McAdams & Bowman, 2001), or from negative situations to a positive outcome. The negative situations—though mingled with positive alternatives such as “study hard”—included “accident,” years of smoking in

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secondary school, “badly ill” in high school, and times of “misery” at “college” [university]. The positive outcome was his “success,” which according to several sources, was located more or less in his life as a university student. For instance, Matt was one of the few students from the Foreign Languages College who had passed TEM-4 by the time they graduated; he was a student leader in his class, in charge of sports activities, a candidate to join the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and a student activist who performed in several English dramas in his department (based on public notices and several conversations with Matt and other members). After drawing their life rivers, the members were asked to draft some “attractive chapter titles” for their “autobiographies” (third meeting plan). In response, Matt wrote “(1) Injury of My Right Hand, (2) My Years of Living in Smoking, (3) Fighting against the Devil of Illness, (4) Ups and Downs in the course of studying” under the heading “Titles for My Autobiography” (4W_W). The four numbers correspond to those at the turns of his life river. At the time, Matt did not get to write tittles for his “accident” (1), “sorrow” (5), and “success” (6). Nonetheless, the drawing, captions, and titles Matt produced gave a sketch of his life as composed of an eventful past, ongoing success, and a still un-annotated future. They can serve as a point of departure to observe and understand Matt’s evolving identities in relation to his autobiographical writing in English. “Miserable Scars” (6W_W)

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In his life river drawing (3D/W_W) and “Titles for My Autobiography” (4W_W), Matt had already named an event in his past, calling it respectively “accident” and “Injury of My Right Hand.” At this stage, however, he mainly located himself in his ‘landscape of action’ (J. Bruner, 1986, p. 14). A few days later, on April 2, Matt took one step further by focusing on the same event but adding extra meanings to it. For instance, in place of the original title, “Injury of My Right Hand,” which mainly gives a description of his physical injury, he wrote, “Miserable Scars” (6W_W). This new title introduced a negative theme for the series of events that led to his injury, i.e., trying to see the “cute pigs” by climbing up the door of his family’s pigsty, “a bigger pig rushed to the door I was climbing,” falling on “hard cobblestones,” and the doctor being “uncareful” [careless]. Matt described these events in the last paragraph of his story. Extract: Desirously, I began climbing up the door until I saw the cute pigs. Suddenly, I found that a bigger pig rushed to the door I was climbing. Unsteadily, I couldn’t hold to catch the door and fell off. Paining and crying, I just lay down the floor which was made up of hard cobblestones. Later, I got to know the truth from my parents that I had broken my right arm. Then I had to suffer the incurable scars because of the doctor’s uncareful heal. In this episode, Matt not only wrote about his experience of an “accident,” but also his feelings about it, as expressed by words such as “terrible” and “miserable.” Therefore, he was uniting his ‘landscape of action’ with

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his ‘landscape of consciousness’ (J. Bruner, 1986, p. 14), specifying the position he was taking about an event in his life. By drawing his life river, labelling it (3D/W_W), drafting his chapter titles (4W_W), and writing “Miserable Scars” (6W_W) in English, Matt sequentially named a past event as “accident,” described it as “Injury of My Right Hand,” re-titled it as “Miserable Scars,” and turned it into a story. During this process, Matt increasingly specified and thickened the meanings of this past event and revealed his childhood identity as a victim. Importantly, while narrating his identity as a victim through his story “Miserable Scars” (6W_W), Matt’s other identities also began to emerge. One of these identities was Matt as a farmer’s son, which was implied in the following description: “Every day my parents fed pigs, I might follow parents’ steps, seeing them feeding all the pigs” (6W_W). About three weeks later, Matt wrote a sample (“Smile Full of Happiness,” 11W_W), which described this identity more thickly. “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W) The event in focus in this sample (11W_W) is Matt’s experience of seeing his father’s smile as a young child. This event was neither charted in Matt’s life river drawing (3D/W_W) nor mentioned in Matt’s chapter titles (4W_W). As such, writing about it suggests that Matt was exploring a territory of his life that he had not planned at the very beginning.

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Two reasons might explain why Matt started writing about his father. First, writing about his childhood in “Miserable Scars” (6W_W) opened up possibilities for Matt to write alternative stories such as “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W). After all, the two samples shared similar experiences. One was about Matt following his parents around to see them feeding pigs (6W_W); the other was about Matt following his father (“Following his steps, we reached the neighbor’s house,” 11W_W). One recounted an accident that occurred when Matt was five years old (“One day at my five years old, I met an accident outside a pigsty,” 6W_W). The other recounted his experience of seeing his smile when he was four (“At my four years old, this kind of happy smile on father’s face began to leave me deep impression,” 11W_W). Second, early during the autobiographical writing stage, an orientation seemed to have begun for the writing group to engage with their family experiences. On March 21, 2008, at the second meeting, Abby shared with me her sample “My Home” (2W_W, Ab.), which was consistent with her original writing plan (1W_W, Ab.). On the same day, Anne submitted her sample “My Father” (1W_W, An.) to me. Because each meeting often began with group sharing, i.e., members spending a few minutes reading each others’ composition books, Matt might have read these samples during one such meetings. In addition, on April 18, two weeks before Matt wrote “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), I read my sample “My First Picture” to the writing group, recounting my relationship with my mother (6V). Samples like these might have encouraged Matt to write about his father.

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Matt wrote about his father’s smile three times in the writing group. When he wrote about it for the first time in “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), he explicitly described his father’s smile and its significance to him. Extract: Sometimes I am extremely impressed with my father’s rare smile, which is full of visible happiness. Actually, my father is not a man of laughter and he usually makes me feel serious. Undoubtedly, my father’s smile fills with happiness when I find there is smile on his face. Two excerpts from Interview II show that Matt was engaged in identity work by writing “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W). Excerpt 1:

I

That’s a very interesting image that you remember of your father in a particular place smiling. Can you talk something more about it? What is important about it, or—

M

... I think the relationship I [have] with my father is not so good. So I sometimes, I’m always [blamed] by him ... So I think the relation with him is [has] various problems.

I

So what do you hope to do by writing down your father’s smile in your story?

M

In my heart, I, sometimes I feel very sorry for my father. I always don’t follow his suggestion. For example, she, he, when he wants me to do farm 197

work, I always ((laugh)) refuse. I don’t like farm work. So I always quarrel with him. For example, the season that harvests the rice or the grain, it’s a busy season. So, I must help them. But I feel I’m very tired of doing that work. I feel very sorry about that. I

So, what’s the relationship between your feeling sorry about your relationship with your Dad and your writing about his ‘smile full of happiness’? …

M

I think from this smile, I can, I can see my father’s heart. For example, it’s very kind. He is very kind, and he’s not so serious. Maybe I just misunderstand him. So, I can get something from this smile. (2 I, June 13)

According to this excerpt, Matt wrote about his father’s smile because “the relationship [Matt has] with [his] father is not so good.” Although writing about his father’s smile did not solve the problem, it made two contributions: to evoke, however implicitly, Matt’s regret for disobedience (e.g., “sometimes I feel very sorry for my father [for not following] his suggestion”) and to reposition his understanding about his father (e.g., “He is very kind, and he’s not so serious”). In this sense, by writing about his father’s smile, Matt was working out a new way to relate to his father. Excerpt 2 makes the connection between writing about his father’s smile and his identity work even more clear.

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Excerpt 2: I

Through this text [Smile Full of Happiness], what kind of impression would you like to leave for your reader about yourself?

M

The first should be the smile—this kind of smile. And I should suggest my love to the readers.

I

Your love?

M

Yeah.

I

What do you mean? Your love for what?

M

Love for my father.

Based on Excerpt 2, Matt wrote about his father’s smile partly to suggest to his readers his love for his father. Therefore, he was constructing a ‘discoursal self’ (Ivanič, 1998) as a loving son through writing about his father’s smile. “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W) is important also in revealing Matt as a writer in the writing group. Firstly, he wrote it in response to my invitation for the members to prepare their best writing sample so far to share with the group at the eighth meeting on May 2. Matt wrote it in the morning and read it to the group in the afternoon. Therefore, the writing group was Matt’s actual audience. However, the writing group being his audience did not immediately change his habitual way of relating to English writing. As Matt explained: When I writing [“Smile Full of Happiness”], actually I didn’t think for my readers. I just recalled my 199

memories.... But in our daily writing, for example our professor ((name omitted)) ... let us do—write some writings, we just tend to have an attitude—we must finish our task, not thinking for our readers. (2 I) In other words, Matt regarded himself as a student who had treated writing in English as a “task” to complete in its own right. Secondly, “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W) received written comments from me. In my response to Matt a week later, I first acknowledged that his writing “recounted an interesting childhood memory” and then challenged him to clarify some of his expressions: Here I’m curious as a reader: can your Dad’s smile reveal more about who you are or the relationship between you and your Dad? How did it happen that you saw your Dad picking up rice and counting money almost at the same time? Did he just sell the rice and the smile was a smile of a harvesting farmer? People do smile for different reasons. So as a reader I really want to know what made your Dad smile such an ‘innocent’ and ‘natural’ smile. My questions, particularly “can your Dad’s smile reveal more about who you are,” explicitly guided Matt in his identity work. Therefore, although I did not intend it when I asked Matt these questions, I was actually ‘co-authoring’ (Carr, 1998, p. 487) his identity work in relation to his father’s smile. Thirdly, “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W) was again featured in Interview II on June 13. Especially worth

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noting is a contrast between his views of his story before and after reading it aloud to me, even though there was only about five minutes in between. Before, Matt saw mainly the virtues of his text (e.g., “it’s a good part of my autobiography” and “the plot is good”).

M

Before writing, first, I think it’s a good part of my autobiography, so I decided to write it. Another, and also I feel the smile gave me rich impression, so I think I write it. Before writing, I believe I could write well. Because the impression is very very (I—clear) deep and clear. After writing, I feel it’s a successful writing of mine. I think I can describe this story clearly. Also some mistakes ((laugh)) in it. ...

M

Sometimes, maybe, I think the plot is good.

I

What kind of plot do you have?

M

I wrote this article as a narration. So I can handle the time sequence. I write it. I can handle the time, and have clear sequence. (2 I)

In this dialogue, Matt seemed to have treated “plot” and “time sequence” as the same matter, regarding his “plot” as good because “[he] can handle the time sequence.” However, Matt’s view about his writing changed dramatically in the following conversation. Matt had just finished reading his text aloud to me.

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I

Yeah, how did you feel when you were reading your text again?

M

Yeah ((laugh)), a little simple.

I

A little simple?

M

Yeah, a little easy.

I

You mean simple, in which aspects?

M

Simple in sentences, words and easy. I think the plot should be improved ... I think I will improve the plot—more touching or more attractive. …

I

How are you going to improve it?

M

Use more details to describe the smile on my father’s face, and my father’s action or activity. For example, when he got hand of rice and how does he look like at that time, and sometimes feeling. But I don’t know his feeling. I can use some details to describe it, or suggest [to] the readers.

I

Yeah, that’s good. What other changes are you thinking about, if you have?

M

Maybe the first paragraph ... I think the words and phrases are too easy, or sometimes not proper.

I

What words and phrases are too easy or not proper?

M

Yeah, for example, “full of.” If possible, I would use another suitable phrases, oh, phrase. (2 I)

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In this conversation, Matt laid out a revision plan to improve his text both locally (e.g., “use another suitable ... phrase” to replace “full of”) and as a whole (e.g., add details to his “plot” to make it “more touching or more attractive.” As will become clear in Matt’s revision (“The Smile Became Special,” 14W_W), such interactions via written comments and interviews supported him in making changes to his draft. “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W) June 28, Saturday was our 16th and also the last writing group meeting of the autobiographical writing stage. It was held at my rented Bai-style home as a celebration. As with the eighth meeting on May 2, the members were expected to select their best writing samples so far and get ready to read to the group. For ease of following the reading, I also asked the members to each make enough copies of their writing samples for others. A home-made meal was prepared for the occasion. Nine members came, and for the second time, my wife, Cathryn, and our Malaysian friend Chingyee joined in as guests. Matt, sitting on my left, started sharing his essay by saying, “I think, this article is the best one I write this semester.” I was especially intrigued when he said: My, this article, the previous title of this article is “Smile Full of Happiness.” After some considerations, then I changed it to this title “The Smile Became Special.” Because I think the previous title seem[s] too obvious about my theme. So I want to make my readers, make my readers become a little curious about my theme, so I changed it. Uh, because this title, also this thing is a very

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good story in my life ((laugh)), and it leaves me [a] deep impression that I wrote it. En, now, I just read for you. (16V) Note Matt’s purposeful change of his title to “make my readers become a little curious about my theme.” It shows, at least in this instance, Matt’s efforts to engage his readers with his English writing. Matt made this change probably because during the autobiographical writing stage, I had emphasised the importance of using a good title. I told the group that a title to a text was like a head to a body. Even though a head is small, it directs the whole body. Similarly, a title should catch and direct the readers’ attention (third, fourth, fifth, and sixth meeting plans). Matt attended all these meetings, and so he might have been influenced in some ways. Note also Matt’s re-evaluation of seeing his father’s “rare smile.” Previously, in the second interview about “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), Matt had described seeing his father’s smile as “a good part of my autobiography.” Now, he was referring to the same event in his introduction to “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W) as “a very good story in my life” as if Matt’s story and life had become more intertwined. Matt indicated the “modifications” he had made to his original text with italics and read to the group, “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W, see Figure 5.3).

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Figure 5.3 “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W). Matt read his essay to the writing group clearly and at an even speed. When coming to the last few words, “SMILE FULL OF HAPPINESS,” however, he sped up. Loud applause immediately followed.

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“OK, comments and questions from the crowd?” I asked. Again, silence, of about 15 seconds, before Anne took the lead. She seemed troubled by Matt’s description of his father as both “serious” and having a “smile full of happiness”:

A

I have a question: In the second paragraph, ((looking closely at her handout)) and you write [about] your father, “There is, there was a special smile appeared on your father’s face.” But at the last [sentence] of the paragraph, you said, your “father said—” ((looking up to Matt))

M

“My father said seriously.” You mean why I (design?) it like this?

A

said seriously. ((smiling and waiting for Matt’s response)) (16V)

Matt took Anne’s question to mean that he had “contradicted” himself in his description about his father. So, he explained, “[About the word] ‘seriously,’ first I think my father is always [a] serious man. Even though when he smiles. And I think it’s not contradicted.” More comments and questions followed in the next eight minutes. Cindy, Matt’s classmate since high school, wanted to know why Matt had chosen the new title and what the original had been. Anne suggested using “A Special Smile” as the title instead, because it “is more—((laugh)) is shorter” than “The Smile Became Special.” But Matt insisted on his own choice: “But I want to emphasise this kind of action. I use the verb ‘became.’ So I want to make it a sentence ‘The smile 206

became special.’ (I—uh huh) Because on that day, the smile became special” (16V). Matt’s explanation makes the meanings of his story more complex. As H. Nicholas (personal communication, approx. October 7, 2010) pointed out, it was unclear whether “the smile became special” for Matt in retrospect (i.e., “later,” when Matt was writing about the event) or during the event (i.e., “on that day,” as in Matt’s explanation to Anne). My wife, Cathryn, for instance, understood Matt’s conclusion as an act of “remembering back,” as expressed in the following comments: Cathryn: I think that especially when you added the last paragraph that talks about “BUT LATER, I BECAME CLEAR THAT IT WAS A SPECIAL SMILE,” so you are kind of remembering back. Your father didn’t smile a lot. But that day, it was, it was a special smile. Matt’s further explanation seems to suggest a “both/and” understanding of his father’s smile: Uh, my father also always smile, but that day, the smile was very special. Maybe has special meaning. (I & Cathryn—en) Just as I said, it became, means, smile full of happiness. (I & C—en) Because I use these words later. But I think when I was four years old, I can’t understand what it mean, but I just feel it was very curious, and I can’t understand. So I used this word later, [to mean] when I was a little, growing up a little. (I & C—uh huh) And I became clear. So, that’s it.

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In other words, Matt thought his father’s smile “was very special” when he saw it, but he was too young (being only “four years old”) to “understand what it mean[s].” It was not until “later” when Matt was “growing up a little” that he understood the “smile meaning” of the smile, i.e., a “smile full of happiness.” “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W) thus recorded Matt’s “later,” most probably before writing, understandings of his father’s smile. Afterwards, I expressed my appreciation of the dialogues Matt had added, which, in my opinion, “gives some livelihood to the event.” My wife liked the image Matt created of him always following his father’s steps as a four-year-old, and then saying it again, using different words, when he talked about going to the neighbour’s house with his father (i.e., “With his steps, we reached the neighbor’s house.”). “Good job, Matt!” I said, ready to ask Abby to share her writing. Matt finished by saying that he had changed his first paragraph because it had previously been “too obvious” (16V). There are two major changes in Matt’s revision. First, the beginning was more interesting and suspenseful than that in the previous version. As Matt explained, he used the new title “The Smile Became Special” to “emphasise this kind of action,” the action of becoming. In addition, “paragraph one (in “Smile Full of Happiness,” 11W_W) was also very obvious” (16V). It says: Extract: Sometimes I am extremely impressed with my father’s rare smile, which is full of visible happiness. Actually, my father is not a man of laughter and he usually makes

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me feel serious. Undoubtedly, my father’s smile fills with happiness when I find there is smile on his face. This paragraph betrayed Matt’s “theme” even from the start. The reader did not need to wait long to find out whose smile it was and what kind of smile it was. The first sentence told it all. In contrast, Matt added the following texts to the beginning of his essay: Extract: My father is not a man of laughter and he always makes me become serious. Although many times the seriousness [was] on father’s face, I know that father can smile, even sometimes so special and unforgettable. I still clearly remember the smile which became very special appeared on father’s face many years ago. It was a season when almost all peasants were busy with the rice reaping. I was just four years old and usually kept following with father’s feet, seeing he reaped the rice and something else. This addition not only situated Matt’s father’s smile explicitly in the context of his relationship with his father. By posing a problem (“My father is not a man of laughter and he always makes me become serious”), Matt created a sense of suspense about “the smile” which “appeared on father’s face many years ago.” The other major change was Matt’s inclusion of a dialogue between him and his father. Extract:

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“Is it good?” said I. “It depends. I am still not sure whether everything goes always like this!” said father seriously. The dialogue was an extension of Matt’s revision plan, which had emerged during an interview conversation. Matt wanted to make his “plot” “more touching or more attractive” by adding details (“Use more details to describe the smile on my father’s face, and my father’s action or activity,” 2 I). These two changes show that Matt was engaged in communicating to his audience—the writing group—in an interesting manner. Through “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), Matt intended to express his love for his father. In writing “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W), Matt’s focus shifted to crafting his story. He was not as interested in understanding his father’s smile as in making his story interesting to read. This emphasis on language was consistent with Matt’s initial response to my invitation for him to write autobiographically (“one must first improve one’s English writing if he or she wants to write autobiography ... Therefore, I must first improve my English,” 2W_W). Therefore, in making his revisions, Matt was engaged in performing a competent writer identity to the writing group. A similar example was found in the revisions Matt made to his draft on his experience of unrequited love. “I Like You and I Love You” (13W_W) ... curious ... simple story ... about experience ... maybe about couples, lovers (14V).

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The poor video recording on June 13, the 14th meeting, made it impossible for me to hear everything that Matt said. Nonetheless, the few words captured by the video still gave a glimpse to Matt’s response to the story we had just read “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You’” (Coffman, 2003, pp. 163–165). It was, as Matt expected, a love story between “lovers.” The main event was a Chinese university student calling his girlfriend to express his love for her, which was responded to favourably by her. As the section read by Matt says: I could feel my heart beating quickly along with the rhythm of her breath from the other side of the phone. A sweet voice was saying to me: “I love you too, David.” After we finished reading the essay, I challenged the group to write with their voices: Under the topic “first time to ...,” “Just write a title and a very short paragraph, OK, try to be as different from this article and from each other as possible.” To make sure everyone understood, I repeated myself in Chinese. After about six minutes (14V), Matt finished his draft titled “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (see Figure 5.4).

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Figure 5.4 “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W). During the second interview on June 13, Matt said that the story we shared had given him a “ (line of thought; plot).”

I:

M:

(My question is: what influences did the essay we shared group have on your essay [“‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’”].)

(It g of thought. Then I remembered the event. I wanted to write ab because it impressed me deeply.)

I believe the same “line of thought” also applies to Matt’s draft “I Like You and I Love You” (13W_W).

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Here, I equated “ (line of thought)” to “plot” because like a plot, it gave Matt a way to select relevant details for his story, to orient its development, and to create a sense of coherence (Kenyon & Randall, 1996, pp. 66–67). It is thus not surprising that Matt’s draft has a close resemblance to the essay “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” For instance, both writers wrote about their confession of love to their beloved. Second, both writers included a telephone conversation. In “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You,’” the words used were: “Hang up the phone and have a good rest,” I said. “No,” she replied in a tender voice, “you first.” There were also significant differences. For instance, whereas the other writer placed his phone conversation at the beginning, Matt presented the events leading to his own phone conversation chronologically: “Two years ago, I fell in love,” “After a month, I felt it was high time,” “At a night, after a long time of thinking, I decided to tell her my love.” In addition, Matt directly used the words he said to his adored one, “I like you and I love you,” as his title, without using “first time to” or putting them in quotation marks. Thus, in “I Like You and I Love You” (13W_W) Matt both shared with and distinguished himself from the other writer. “I Like You and I Love You” (13W_W) mainly contained Matt’s memories of a past youthful love experience.5 Nonetheless, it initiated Matt’s reflection on and re-evaluation of his previous understanding of love which became clearer in his revision “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” 213

“‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) Matt made a number of changes in “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W), which he wrote during the summer holiday two and half months after his draft (13W_W). The first change is with his title. By quoting “I love you” and “I like you” separately, Matt seemed to suggest that the two are justifiably distinct. Secondly, Matt added an eye-catching beginning, positioning and engaging his readers by the universal subject of love and the thorny issue of its expression. “Love is really an extreme wander [wonder] and completely exciting thing. How will you express love to a girl when you feel you cannot wait to tell her?” Thirdly, Matt added details and arranged them into separate paragraphs, making his story more suspenseful. For example, in ¶2, Matt wrote, “Most importantly, according to my stronger intuition, I felt she might like me. I thought it was high time to tell her everything.” In ¶3, he continued: Extract: “Tell her, directly, without any hesitation!” Most of my friends or classmates suggested. Actually, I had been being in hesitation for a total month. I should have told her everything earlier. However, the result that [it] might be good or bad had stopped me and even had frightened me. Matt kept building up the tension, not writing about his confession of love until ¶4. Even there, he kept his readers waiting with him: 214

Extract: “For all the month, obviously, like most believe, I like you and I love you. I want you to be my girlfriend!” With my heart beating quickly, all the words skipped out of my mouth. I didn’t know where my courage had come from. Silently, hopefully, I was waiting [for] her response. Only in the next two paragraphs did Matt reveal the result of his confession: Extract: “How, how can you say so?” She continued, “You know, it’s impossible, seriously! We’d better be friends. Why did you say you love me?” (¶5) Without saying anything, I rang off the so heavy [a] telephone. I gave up saying anything. An extremely painful feeling hit my heart again and again. (¶6) Matt ended his story by describing his reflections on and understandings of the event. As he wrote in the last two paragraphs: Extract: “I like you!” and “I love you”. Was I wrong? (¶7) “I was absolutely wrong.” I’d like to say today. If God gave me another chance, I would only say “I like you!” rather than “I love you!” (¶8)

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Like the revisions he had made to “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), Matt’s focus here in “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) was on how to craft his writing to make it interesting to his audience. Matt did so by using quotations marks, dialogues, and intriguing arrangement of the details. In the end, although his story became interesting to read, he did not reveal new understandings about himself or the girl he liked, nor did he resolve the differences between “like” and “love.” As such, through the revisions he made to “I Like You and I Love You” (13W_W), Matt again performed a competent writer identity before the writing group. Nevertheless, “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) showed traces of Matt’s ideology about love. When Matt said “I like you and I love you” for the first time, on the phone, as recorded in ¶4, the two statements were joined together in one utterance, with one intention, to gain love from his beloved. Matt expressed this intention explicitly by saying, “I want you to be my girl friend!” Like and love were conflated. The girl, however, segregated Matt’s utterance with her response, in the form of a question and indirect speech, “Why did you say you love me?” in ¶5, dropping out the part about “I like you!” Her intention was clear: to demarcate “love” and “like,” and consequently, to replace Matt’s suggestion, “I want you to be my girl friend!” with hers, “We’d better be friends.” Matt was positioned to rethink his original suggestion due to his interaction with the girl. In ¶7, when Matt repeated the two statements, they were already separated into two, “I like you!” and “I love you!” Matt had virtually accepted the boundaries set

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by the girl, even if unwillingly. The words he had said previously now became the object of reflection, “Was I wrong?” Then, in ¶8, Matt returned to the present, as someone who saw clearly what he should have done: Extract: If God gave me another chance,6 I would only say “I like you!” rather than “I love you!”7 “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) thus expressed multiple voices of Matt from his life experiences. They were the voice of himself prior to making the love confession (“she might like me,” “I thought it was high time to tell her everything”); the voice of his “friends or classmates” (“Tell her, directly, without any hesitation!”); the voice of himself saying nervously on the phone, “I like you and I love you!”; the voice of the girl (“We’d better be friends. Why did you say you love me?”); the voice of his reflective self in the past (“Was I wrong?” “I was absolutely wrong”); and the voice of his present self imagining a hypothetical future (“If God gave me another chance ...”). By reflecting on and taking position towards distinctions between “I like you” and “I love you,” Matt changed in his ways of relating to the other, as represented by the girl he confessed love to. “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) also contains voices from the story “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” that Matt read in the writing group (14V). One kind of voice concerned the overall organisation of his story. As mentioned earlier, from “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” Matt found a “ (line of 217

thought; plot)” (2 I, June 13). The “plot” offered him a way to select details for his story, orient its development, and make it coherent (Kenyon & Randall, 1996). Another kind of voice concerns words, expressions, and sentence structures that Matt encountered in “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” Matt made minor changes to some of them. For example, the original sentences in the text that was read to the group were: “Spontaneously, almost unconsciously, the words skipped out of my mouth” and “I could feel my heart beating quickly along with the rhythm of her breath from the other side of the phone.” In his own text, Matt wrote, “With my heart beating quickly, all the words skipped out of my mouth.” Another sentence in the text originally read aloud was: “Having talked continuously for three hours made my voice hoarse.” In his own text, Matt wrote, “I decided not to talk to her continuously.” But there were also instances where Matt used a sentence that was identical with one of the sentences from the original story (e.g., “I didn’t know where my courage had come from”). These voices from the other story served as a basis for Matt to “author” his own story at two broad levels. In organising his whole text, Matt adopted the other author’s “plot” in the ‘architectonics’ of ‘ordering parts into a whole’ (Holquist, 2002, p. 29). Despite similarities in both being love stories featuring the protagonists’ confession of love on the phone, Matt’s story differed from the original in that his was one of unrequited love. At local levels were the various words, expressions, and sentence structures that Matt adopted either with or without changes. They played supportive roles in carrying out Matt’s “plot” of telling his own love story.

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As such, they were filled with Matt’s ‘own semantic and expressive intention’ (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 77) and thus belonged to him. Therefore, even though Matt had not gone very far in explaining the differences between “like” and “love,” identity work was nonetheless involved in his autobiographical writing sample “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W). Through crafting in his revisions, Matt performed a competent writer identity, which was consistent with his top reason for joining the writing group (“For our English Majors, I think that it is very beneficial to join a study which can practise both our spoken English and writing [written] English,” 1W_W). Moreover, at least linguistically, Matt’s sample “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) also showed signs of him engaging in ‘ideological becoming’ (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78) in regard to love. As such, for Matt, as it was for Abby in Chapter 4, EFL autobiographical writing in the group was a site to continue working on their existing identities, i.e., identities that first emerged in other domains. Importantly, the same was found true in Matt’s samples “Confidence” (9W_W) and “View on Love” (26W_W), which, based on textual features alone, were not autobiographical at all. “Confidence” (9W_W) During the first interview on March 28, I heard the earliest mention of confidence in the writing group. When describing his turning point, Peter, who was interviewed with Matt, said that he had regained his confidence through an experience of teaching English to

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a group of middle school students. Peter said, “If, if someone is confident, he will do well—everything what he want to do.” Peter’s words might have influenced Matt’s choice to write about confidence. Two weeks later, during a five-minute free-writing session in the fifth meeting (April 18), Matt wrote two paragraphs under the title “Confidence” (9W_W, Figure 5.5). Later, Matt marked the first sentence as his “heart sentence”—the writing group’s way of talking about a thesis statement or the most important sentence in a passage.

Figure 5.5 “Confidence.” This unfinished draft contains three broad claims: (1) “Everyone... should be confident”; (2) Confidence is a “must” for success; (3) “Everyone will become nervous” the first time giving a speech. Matt’s choice of pronouns, e.g., “everyone,” and modal verbs (“should” and “must”) make his writing sound like absolute generalizable truths that apply to all. For four main reasons, however, Matt’s

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universal claims were actually self-directed, expressing Matt’s desire to be confident. First, as the conversation that follows shows, Matt’s present attitude towards confidence shows a close connection with his past description of himself, i.e., “I am not confident.” The event that he was referring to had happened two years before in a spoken English class with a Canadian teacher. I:

So what made you think of this topic [Confidence] at that time?

M:

... [Our spoken English teacher] let us make a dialogue about confidence. So we began to discuss and go to the stage and do this play group by group ... My topic is travelling. So I said like this, “I don’t like travelling because ((laugh)) I’m not confident, and I don’t like communicating or talking with other, people from other countries, especially people from English speaking countries. So I don’t like travelling.” (2 I, July 13)

Second, Matt’s present position towards confidence reveals a continuation of his own reflections. Matt said in the same interview: When I described my opinion, especially my sentence “I’m not confident,” I feel I am really not confident. I just, at that time, I’m a little— how to say?—I feel it’s not my words. How, I think, “How can I say so? You must be a confident man.” ((Laugh))

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This excerpt suggests three movements in Matt’s reflective understandings of confidence. The first movement is his recognition of the power of his words, even though they were spoken in a foreign language (“When I described ... ‘I’m not confident,’ I feel I am really not confident”). The second movement is Matt’s rejection of his own words (“I feel it’s not my words”). The third movement is Matt’s decision about what he preferred to be in the future (“You must be a confident man). Third, Matt’s claims in the interview about confidence are contextualized by his previous alignment with his classmate’s words, “Every time we should be confident.” It is unclear whether he was referring to Peter or someone else. Still in the second interview, Matt and I said: I:

That’s a long time, uh? Starting from you as a freshman, right?

M:

Yeah. I still remember my classmates, classmates of mine began to argue against my topic. So, at that time, I had no words. I kept silent. I think that student was reasonable. His words was very reasonable. Very per-, [persuasive]. …

I:

What kind of words? …

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M:

Seemed she [he?] said, “Every time we should be confident.” It was this sentence, these words.

It is clear that Matt was convinced by “very reasonable” words to adopt his classmate’s position that confidence is an absolute necessity. Given that they were spoken by a peer, his classmate’s words were functioning as an ‘innerly persuasive discourse’ (Bakhtin, 1994, p. 78) to re-fashion Matt’s ideology about confidence. The major difference lies in the expression. Matt wrote “everyone” instead of “every time,” as his classmate did. By doing so, Matt made a distinction between himself and his classmate. In Ivanič’s terms, he was making ‘self as author’ (Ivanič, 1998, p. 24). Last, as the following dialogue shows, Matt wrote his text “Confidence” (9W_W) in the writing group two days before he took TEM-4 “to encourage myself to pass this exam,” forming an English-writing-mediated identity.8 When asked how he came to the topic, Matt replied: You know TEM-4 (I—uh huh) is coming. Just the day after tomorrow ((April 20)). So, I want to encourage myself to pass this test. So, I want to become confidence. (I—so you want to become confident). Oh, confident. So, I chose this title. (Emphasis added, 6V) Ideologically then, Matt was actively constructing a confident self through his writing in English. In simplified terms, the process that led Matt to doing so can be described as: (1) saying “I am not confident” in front of his spoken English class; (2) reflecting on the

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effect of his words on himself, “When I described ... ‘I’m not confident,’ I feel I am really not confident”; (3) rejecting his own words, “I feel it’s not my words”; (4) seeking to become confident by telling himself that “You must be a confident man”; (5) being persuaded by his classmate’s words—“Every time we should be confident”—“very reasonable”; (6) aligning with his classmate’s words, writing that “Everyone of us should become confident” to “encourage myself to pass this test” and “to become confidence.” While the words Matt once spoke about himself in English constructed him as a diffident person, an identity which had had real effects on him, now the words he wrote about himself in English, even if disguised by general pronoun choices such as “everyone,” constructed him as a “confident man,” an identity conclusion that he took into his oncoming TEM-4 examination. “Confidence” (9W_W) was autobiographical mainly because of its function. Similarly, the next sample, “View on Love” (26W_W), is not autobiographical by appearance. Nevertheless, it turned out to have an autobiographical origin. “View on Love” (26W_W) Part of my plan for the 30th meeting on December 3 was for the writing group to appreciate 50-word poems written by members during the recent weeks. Matt’s poems (“View on Love,” 26W_W; “One More Minute,” 27W_W; and “Exams,” 25W_W) were three of the six poems included in the handout. He chose to share the first one, “View on Love.” The meeting was attended by 10 members and two guests—my wife, Cathryn, and our

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Malaysian friend Chingyee, who were attending the meeting for the third or second time. Matt began by reading his poem aloud (The description that follows is based on the video recording of the meeting, 30V). Extract: Once men fall in love, Men get mature; If women fall in love, women believe nothing is untrue. Love teaches men to be active. Women learn to say “I love you!” Within life of love, how to live. More support, more understanding too. There is nothing that can not forgive. When he finished the third line, “If women fall in love, women believe nothing is untrue,” the whole group roared with laughter. He read on. When he finished his poem, applause and more laughter followed. I invited the group for “Questions and comments, or whatever!” Twenty seconds passed in silence. So I asked, “Matt, can you tell a little bit about the writing of this poem, the background, where and when and how you thought of writing?” Everyone looked up at Matt, who, scratching his head, said: I wrote this poem almost, almost at eleven O’clock. I sit in the individual study room. It’s very silent and I can 225

write it in peace, and get many ideas. Why I want [to] write this poem? Because also, I fall in love. ((All laugh extendedly)). First, I fall in love, and I, so I had many words to say. I just want to write in it in a poem, a short poem.9 (30V) The questions that followed and Matt’s replies were often followed by laughter of good nature from the group. Chingyee said to Matt, “You seemed to engage the person—men are like ... woman are like ... Is it your observation or ...?” Matt replied, “Yes, sometimes observation, sometimes from psychology books, also about love, sometimes some articles about love.” I wanted to know if his view of what women are like included his girlfriend, who was Matt’s classmate but not a member of the writing group. Matt replied, “About my girlfriend, I’m not sure.” Everyone laughed. My wife asked Matt, “Did you read the poem to your girlfriend?” “No,” Matt answered, “but I gave [it to] her to read it. She just said, ‘it’s good!’” Other questions from the group and guests included: “Do you want to show difference between men and women in love, or difference?” “Could you think of one word or two words that describe that difference?” “Is it a revised version or draft?” “Who forgives?” The next day on December 4 I interviewed Matt (4 I) about his experience of sharing his poem “View on Love” with the writing group. Matt regarded it as a “good” experience. According to Matt, he was “praised by members” for his writing at the meeting, which gave him “more confidence to write English writing.”

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And an important thing: I sometimes am praised by members. So I have more face in the future. (I—Do you mean more faith— or what is it in Chinese?) Just more confidence. (I—More confidence.) Yeah. More confidence to write English writing. Although I cannot find any concrete examples of Matt being “praised by members,” there might be multiple possibilities. Matt might have felt “praised by members” because his writing aroused laughter of good nature and caught attention from the group, the majority of which were females. Whatever the form, the most important fact was that Matt felt “praised” by group members for his writing. It seemed to have repositioned him towards English writing. Comment Matt wrote about his life experiences in the writing group at two levels. First, through his labelled life river (3D/W_W) drawing and chapter titles (4W_W), he represented his life as a whole. The overall storyline was one of changing from the negative to the positive. Then, through his other autobiographical writing samples, which were episodic (e.g., “Miserable Scars” and “The Smile Became Special”), he represented particular aspects of his life. Data related to Matt’s autobiographical writing show that his English-writing-mediated identities include him as an autobiographer, a victim in an accident, a farmer’s son, a young man in love, and someone trying to gain confidence. With them, Matt engaged in different kinds of identity work. In writing “Smile Full of Happiness,”

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Matt performed his identity as a loving son. In “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W), he reflected on his former identity as a young man in love, accepting the boundary between “like” and “love.” In both samples, Matt also performed a competent-writer identity. In addition, in writing “Confidence,” Matt not only reflected on his former identity as a diffident man, but also re-visioned his preferred identity: a confident person. As a writing group member, Matt’s writer identity seems to have made three major movements. First, he became a more confident writer in English. In addition to Matt’s comments after he shared “View on Love” (26W_W) with the writing group, (i.e., “I sometimes am praised by members. So I have more.... confidence to write English writing,” 4 I), another example is Matt’s drawing “My Life Road” (see Figure 5.6).10

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Figure 5.6 “My Life Road.” Matt explained: [This picture represents] [m]y two stage of writing. At the beginning maybe I didn’t have this tunnel, so maybe I have to face more difficulties to get the last point of writing. So, when I began to practise writing and then it can represent a process of my writing. Also this tunnel refers to I hav[ing] improved my writing English, so I’m not afraid of these obstacles, meaning difficulties. (I—Like what kind of obstacles?) Like errors in writing, some bad habit in writing ((laugh)). Such as when I want to write a sentence, maybe I will take [spend] a long time to think. After a long time practice, I can improve it. (5 I) In other words, having “improved my writing English,” which was represented by “the tunnel,” Matt became confident when facing his usual “obstacles” such as “errors in writing.” Now, Matt was “not afraid of these obstacles” anymore. Second, Matt became a more involved writer in English. Recall that Matt said that he used to write with a “we-must-finish-our-task” attitude and “not thinking for our readers” (2 I). In contrast, in his writing associated with the writing group he wrote frequently—one sample one week by average—and revised several of his writing samples to make them more interesting to read. Two good examples are “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (16W_W) and “The Smile Became Special” (14W_W).

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Third, Matt became a more life-oriented writer in English. Prior to joining the writing group, Matt mainly wrote argumentative essays for TEM-4 (“when I began to prepare for TEM-4, I began to write more and more writings, but most of them are argumentations,” 2 I). After joining the writing group, his English writing engaged in many aspects of his life, such as family (e.g., “Smile Full of Happiness,” 11W_W); romantic relationship (e.g., “I Like You and I Love You,” 13W_W; “View on Love,” 26W_W); writing group experience (e.g., “A Special Diner,” 33W_W and 34W_W); and exams (e.g., “Exams,” 25W_W; “One More Minute,” 27W_W; “Confidence,” 9W_W). These samples show that Matt’s English writing had become increasingly intertwined with his life. Matt’s identity work, in relation to his autobiographical writing in English, did not occur in a vacuum, but in multiple contexts. In the personal context, three factors need to be taken into account. First, autobiographical writing was relevant to Matt’s ‘imagined identity’ as an autobiographer (“maybe someday I should also write some, for me or for others,” 2W_W), which invited his ‘investment’ (Peirce, 1995). Second, Matt’s autobiographical writing samples in English foregrounded life experiences, some from the distant past (e.g., “Miserable Scars,” 6W_W, and “Smile Full of Happiness,” 11W_W), some from Matt’s university life (e.g., “I Like You and I Love You,” 13W_W). In writing about these experiences, Matt was positioned as a capable writer. As Matt explained why he favoured narrative writing, “You just write memories or some stories. So I think it’s easy to write narrations” (2 I).

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Third, through autobiographical writing, Matt seemed to have found “the pleasure of writing” which “stimulate[d] [him] to write more articles,” as he wrote in an email about one and half years after the writing group was officially ended: Writing my autobiography [in English] first helps me improve my writing ability.11 In addition, by writing my autobiography I become aware of the pleasure of writing and stimulate me to write more articles.... I think that the greatest help is that I become aware of the pleasure of writing. I believe it’s very important to me. (Email on May 21, 2010) In the social context, three domains have shaped Matt’s autobiographical writing in English. First was his family. Recall the last paragraph in “Miserable Scars” (6W_W), in which Matt’s parents indirectly joined in the telling: “Later, I got to know the truth from my parents that I had broken my right arm. Then I had to suffer the incurable scars because of the doctor’s uncareful heal.” Matt was suggesting that he had learned about his broken arm and the reasons for his “incurable scars” from his parents. Second was Matt’s university class. Consider his classmates encouragement in “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” (“Tell her, directly, without any hesitation!” 16W_W). Consider also how Matt’s classmate’s words “Every time we should be confident” repositioned him (“his words were very reasonable”) and subsequently his position in his sample “Confidence” (“Everyone of us should become confident,” 9W_W). Third was the writing group. Two examples suffice for illustration. One was my 231

interactions with Matt during Interview II about “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W). As shown earlier, most of Matt’s revisions found in “The Smile Became Special” (16W_W) were made along the revision plan Matt had formed during Interview II. The other example is Matt’s samples about his unrequited love. “I Like You and I Love You” (13_W_W), for instance, was written in response both to the group reading a sample about a similar topic in “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” and my prompt for members to write about “the first time to ...” with “uniqueness” (13V). These examples show that various social others and their words not only shaped Matt’s positions in life circumstances, but also as a writer. In the broad global/cultural context, three aspects seem to have influenced Matt’s autobiographical writing in English the most. First is the dominance of examinations in his life and learning experiences. During the first stage (March–July), Matt wrote “Confidence” (9W_W) right before TEM-4 to encourage himself “to pass this test.” During the second stage (September–December), Matt was busy preparing for the graduate entrance examinations, which had a profound impact on his autobiographical writing samples from this period. For instance, he wrote “One More Minute,” a 50-word poem, one month before the examinations “just to encourage myself” (4 I, December 4). He wrote another 50-word poem “A Special Diner” “to relax a little while” because he was “tired” from preparing for the examinations (“I begin to feel a little tired after a long time focusing on the preparation of the entrance exam for postgraduate schools. Then I decide to relax for a little while by

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writing something,” Matt’s context description, December 10). These examples illustrate a central place of examinations in Matt’s life and learning experiences. The second aspect to foreground at the global/cultural level is Matt’s participation in different cultures, as revealed in Interview IV. Matt told me that he wanted to become a teacher of Chinese as a foreign language. Asked why, he replied, “Maybe I was impressed by something from the TV. They talked about our culture ... our language Chinese is very good.” Matt’s explanation shows his alignment with the Chinese culture, as portrayed through mass media. About the Bai culture, Matt said that he participated in Bai weddings “and sometimes superstitions” such as “pray for [to] the Guanyin” with his family.12 I felt a sense of his contempt for his own culture. About Western culture, Matt mentioned that he celebrated Christmas in his department. His descriptions show that it was a localised gift-sharing event rather than a religious occasion (“you should prepare an apple,13 and also prepare some gifts, in a sock, long sock ... but we just talk, but we don’t use that kind of long sock”). Third, the cultural/global context also featured in Matt’s autobiographical writing through the mediation of modern technologies such as mobile phone, computer, and the Internet. As the following dialogue shows, Matt found the word “invigilator” on his mobile phone, a word which appeared in his poem “Exams” (e.g., “I will be an invigilator in four years when I graduate from college”).

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I

How did you think of that word [invigilator]? Did you look it up or did you remember it from somewhere?

M

Looked up from my mobile phone. …

I

So you put in Chinese?

M

Yeah, put in Chinese, and translate into English.

I

What Chinese word did you put in?

M

(4 I)

Several of Matt’s writing samples for the writing group were composed on the computer and sent over to me via email (e.g., “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!,’” 16W_W, email on August 21). Asked what he would do if he encountered something he did not know while writing, Matt replied, “If I was writing in the computer ... maybe I will use Internet dictionary. It’s very convenient” (4 I). Matt’s active use of modern technology mirrors his view of the Internet as a modern necessity: “With the development of human society, Internet is becoming extremely important and useful in people’s daily life. Even sometimes, people all over the world cannot work without the Internet, for they are living in a system of Internet” (free writing during the 20th meeting, September 17, topic: “Internet”). Placed in a transformative context, Matt’s autobiographical writing in the writing group shows three important features. First of all, it involved my

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invitations for Matt to engage with his life and his responses to such invitations. Second, it was a social experience, entangled with Matt’s intention to practise his English and social skills, as well as the participation of and shaping roles by various social others such as the rest of the writing group. Third, it entailed Matt’s construction and reconstruction of his existing social identities, as well as investment into imagined identities such as an “autobiographer.” All these suggest that EFL autobiographical writing should not be taken merely as a skill, but as a social practice. This is an important understanding if autobiographical writing is used in EFL education in order to provide learners with rich learning experiences.

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6 Beth “A Wonderful Book” Beth was one of the two first-year case study participants. She had had starkly contrasting experiences of writing in two of her languages, Chinese and English. While her pre-university Chinese writing had received positive comments from her classmates (e.g., “ ,” analysis of issues is clear and precise, 3 I, June 13), her English writing at university was often “corrected all in red” for grammar mistakes (1 I, April 11). Beth had wanted to major in Chinese and study in another province, but her exam score had not been high enough, and instead she was assigned to major in English (1 I). She joined the writing group, hoping that by writing her autobiography in English, she could “continue [her] literature dream” (letter to me and my wife, date approx. March 14). Beth’s term “literature dream” seems to refer to her desire to develop as a writer in both Chinese and English. As an English major student, Beth continued literary activities in Chinese: e.g., reading Chinese novels and magazines and writing book reviews for her friends from the Chinese Department (2 I).1 In her autobiographical writing samples—using mainly English—Beth went beyond writing about her “literature dream” to exploring her multiple dreams and life experiences, especially exploring the tension that she felt between her desires for safety and adventure. In her samples, Beth performed and reflected on her English-writing-mediated identities

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as an individual who expressed her uniqueness while also striving for acceptance in a conformity-demanding world. Through EFL autobiographical writing, Beth added another writer identity of herself as “a literary girl” in English, someone who “always decorates [her] ... book and life” and has “a wonderful book” to share with her readers. That is, in addition to her perception of herself as a competent writer in Chinese, Beth developed new understandings of herself as a writer in English. Previous Literacy Experiences Beth had regarded herself as a good Chinese writer in her school class, saying that she was “ ” (pretty good compared to others in her class) (2 I). Three factors seem to have contributed to this view of herself. First, Beth used an elegant writing style when writing in Chinese, a style that is generally admired in China: “ ” (When writing Chinese essays, I personally tend to use relatively elegant expressions). Second, Beth’s Chinese writing had received positive feedback. Once, her essay entitled “ ” (“My Family’s TV”) became a “ ” (a model essay) in her class, and her analysis of issues was described by her classmates as “ ” (clear and precise). Third, Beth reported that her high school Chinese teacher had helped her to grow as a writer. Asked what she remembered most about her experiences of learning to write in Chinese, she said:

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My high school Chinese teacher was very talented; he was right for us. Sometimes he would write with the students; (at that time I would write better). Sometimes he would find CEE topics for us, not to write [but] discuss and think, just like what you [the researcher] do sometimes.2 In contrast, Beth seemed to have had frustrating experiences while learning to write in English. Her writing experiences can be characterized by a deficit orientation leading to a paralyzing focus on grammatical errors and an external locus of control leading to limited scope and restricted content. According to Beth, the feedback she had received on her writing concentrated on her grammar mistakes, rather than meaning: “I just felt that my grammar—especially every time I handed in my composition, my book would be corrected all in red. And yet I tried—I studied and studied [the grammar], but whenever I used it, I just couldn’t remember; I got it all wrong” (1 I).3 A similar kind of emphasis had been given to grammatical accuracy in her English classes before university: “In middle school, the teachers asked us to recite beautiful sentences and structures, emphasising spelling of words and grammar mistakes. High school was the same” (2 I).4 This deficit orientation led to paralysis in Beth’s private use of writing in English. Her diary writing was short-lived due to her fear of “making grammar mistakes in [her] writing” with no one to correct them for her. I wrote one or two passages in English. Then I felt I couldn’t continue anymore; there might be grammar mistakes in my writing. Since I wouldn’t give it to 239

anyone to read and have it corrected, I was afraid to get it wrong and get into a habit. So I quit. (4 I, October 23)5 Beth’s contrasting writing experiences in Chinese and English provide an important background. First, it may explain why Beth frequently used Chinese in her EFL autobiographical writing for the group. Second, it may also explain why in the writing group, where the focus was on meaning rather than accuracy, Beth wrote so much more in English than she had done previously. Before Beth joined the writing group, she only wrote the minimum to fulfil external requirements. She mainly wrote in English to complete assignments from her “ ” (mentor): “ ” (Before joining the writing group, I basically didn’t write anything except my mentor’s assignments and diary). Beth’s diary writing in English was rare: “ ” (Of diary writing, one out of ten is in English, 2 I). Thus, her English writing had a limited scope. The content of Beth’s English writing was also limited. For one thing, her mentor’s assignments to her were test-oriented: “ , ” (The mentor’s assignment: one composition from previous TEM-4 exams. Just write on those topics, including a big composition and a small one—a note, 2 I). For another, Beth perceived writing for tests a requirement to state the positive only. According to Beth, “

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” (The standard of test-oriented education is that you can only write about the positive aspects [of issues], 2 I), probably meaning she thought that making critical comments about any official position would lead to lower test scores. For instance, at one meeting, some members shared an experience of writing about lunar exploration during TEM-8. They said although they wanted to argue that it was better to spend money on basic infrastructure, they did not dare to write this opinion, for fear that it might affect their scores. Understandably, Beth implied that there was not much room for her own opinions in her previous English writing: “ ” (I used to only write the positive; now I have my own opinions, 2 I). Beth’s drawings and associated explanations and captions vividly reflected her previous writing experiences in English. During the 32nd and last group meeting, Beth drew three images (see Figure 6.1) to represent her writing experiences before, during, and after participation in the writing group.

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Figure 6.1 Beth’s three images. Her “before” image was a cup of water. In later analysis, I will return to Beth’s other two images: a little girl in a green circle and a rainbow. Beth said, “at the beginning, I’m like water, pure (pointing to and tapping near the cup), uh—didn’t know what to do and how to do.” The caption Beth added below her cup image says, “My words and sentences are plain, the structure of my article is (loose), but I want to write a good composition.” As will be seen in the following, by plain, Beth appears to mean something like “dull.” This interpretation was corroborated by Beth’s other picture, a bottle with a narrow neck, which she drew also at the 32nd meeting to represent herself as a writer before joining the writing group. She explained, “I draw a bottle.... At the beginning of writing, I know, I know a little.... But when I write somethings, I found it has some borings. So, it’s like a neck. So, [it’s] very narrow” (see Figure 6.2).

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Figure 6.2 Beth’s bottle. Through her cup and bottle images, Beth seemed to suggest three dimensions of herself as a writer in English at the time she joined the writing group. First, she felt a sense of helplessness due to her lack of knowledge about

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writing (e.g., “didn’t know what to do and how to do”). Second, she felt that her writing was inadequate (e.g., “words and sentences are plain,” “the structure of article is loose”). The image of pure water suggests that she saw her writing as colourless and dull. Third, she expressed a sense of unrealised personal agency (“I want to write a good composition”), implying that she wanted to develop further as a writer but did not feel that she was yet doing this. Beth was one of the eight first-year English major students who joined the writing group in mid-March 2008. Three reasons seemed to have influenced her decision to join, as revealed in Beth’s letter to me and my wife (1W_W) after the first group meeting on March 14. First, taking part in the writing research promised her a sense of belonging and pride: “In this group ... I could recognise a lot of schoolmates.... My senior high school of my mates are very admire me when I told them that I took a particular group. I’m so proud and happy.... a dream for me and my classmates.” One primary reason Beth felt a sense of pride was probably because her ethnicity was publicly affirmed in my invitation for her to join the writing group. This contrasts with the often negative social positioning of the Bai ethnicity in Beth’s department. For instance, at the first meeting on March 14, 2008, Beth’s classmate Amy told me one of her concerns. According to Amy, her teacher had said that the ethnic Bai students were not fit for learning English because they had a strong accent. In contrast, my invitations seemed to have given the Bai students a more positive position. As explained in more detail in Chapter 3, I invited ethnic Bai student to join the writing group

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during breaks between classes. Their teachers and classmates were all present. After I briefly introduced myself and my research in English, I asked the ethnic Bai students to raise their hands and presented them each a printed-out English and Chinese bilingual invitation to attend a special meeting. I also told them that at the meeting they could meet my American wife and we would treat them to a meal. My invitations were met with enthusiasm. Many students, including non-ethnic Bai students, seemed very interested. As I recorded in my field notes on March 11, 2008: By 10:30 a.m., I had already gone to three classes. It appeared to me that the Bai students were quite privileged. In Class Two of Grade 2006, some students asked ‘Why just the Bai students?’ or ‘Can’t the Han students also participate?’ One teacher [...] w/a long artistic hair style commented that all the other students were envious. Another teacher [...] said in Chinese jokingly to the class, ‘Don’t you regret that you’re not Bai?’ As such, my public invitations positioned the Bai ethnicity as a gateway to potential resources (Pavlenko, 2001a, p. 319) in the writing group rather than a problem to be avoided. Second, in the writing group, Beth saw a new hope for her “literature dream”: “I think written autobiography could continue my literature dream.” That is, Beth saw EFL autobiographical writing as a way to build on her existing Chinese writer identity. Before coming to university, Beth’s “literature dream” appeared to be

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focused on Chinese. Beth had not chosen English as her major; her preferred subject had been Chinese: “When I end my Entrance examine to university. my come forward is chinese. But I don’t know why reason my major became English” (spacing and spelling as in the original). Generally in China, high school graduates choose their majors after they take the College Entrance Examinations (CEE) without knowing their scores. Those who gain high enough scores can study the majors they choose at their selected universities; others usually have to either accept offers from different faculties or universities or prepare for the exams again by repeating the third-year studies in high school, frequently referred to as “ ” (taking remedial classes). In fact, taking remedial classes was what Beth wanted to do, but her family would not let her (1 I).6 Although an additional motive for Beth to want to take remedial classes was because she had “always wanted to go to another province,” the fact remains that she valued her “literature dream,” presumably in Chinese, and was willing to give up a year of her life for it. Joining the writing group provided her with an alternative. She had been a girl in love with words, especially Chinese. But because “fate” put her in the English department (6D/W_W), she was making the best of it and expanding her “literature dream,” her love of words, to include writing her “autobiography” in English in the writing group (1W_W). Third, Beth expressed a sense of freedom about writing her “autobiography” in English. “In my own autobiography, I could everything that I like.” This forms a sharp contrast with her previous writing in 246

English, whose topics and content were both restricted by standardized tests. Beth’s “literature dream” (1W_W), presumably originally linked to Chinese, sums up what she liked. It links her past as a “ ” (a pretty good) writer in Chinese (2 I), connects with her present as an English major student, and carries forward her expectations into her future (“I fill with the expectation to it ... a chance to continuing my dream,” 1W_W). Autobiographical Writing Beth produced more than 30 writing samples in English for the writing group, about half of which were autobiographical. Table 6.1 provides an overview of the autobiographical writing samples Beth wrote in English for the writing group. Beth chose the topics and/or titles for most of them. Table 6.1 Beth’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

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These autobiographical writing samples in English seem to converge on two main categories: Beth’s immediate life experiences (1W_W, 9W_W, 10W_2F, and 16W_W) and her imagined futures (4W_W, 11W_W, and 18W_W). The analysis that follows will focus on selected writing samples about these two categories to illustrate the interactions between Beth’s sense of self and writing autobiographically in English. Based on the analysis, I will demonstrate Beth’s performance and reflection on English-writing-mediated identities. “My Feeling of

(Autobiography)” (3W_W)

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During the second meeting on March 21, I asked the members to give a preface to their “autobiographies” or simply write about their feelings of writing their autobiographies. In response, Beth wrote “My Feeling of (Autobiography)” (see Figure 6.3), beginning with a draft in Chinese, located in the right upper-hand corner of the page.

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Figure 6.3 “My Feeling of

” (3W_W).

Beth’s draft in Chinese says something like (my translation):

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Extract: In my autobiography, I may write what I want to write or express. It can be my past, or dreams for my future, and something I don’t even know whether I should or can write about. I have a great expectation for it! In this Chinese draft, Beth expressed a similar sense of freedom about autobiographical writing that she had expressed in her letter (1W_W). Beth’s English writing has three paragraphs. In the first paragraph, Beth wrote: Extract: I think I’m a homely girl, so far, I’m not great achievement. My life is beginning, It likes flowers that not totally come out. In the eyes of others, I’m a out-going and curiousty girl like a child. but I know I’m not. I know There are so many unhappiness and dangerous at the society. However, I’m still believe happy and wonder. Sometimes, I eager to use my words to express my thoughts, feeling, but I can’t. I can’t how to speaking. In this paragraph, Beth shared her understandings about herself (e.g., “I’m a homely girl,” “In the eyes of others, I’m a out-going and curiousty girl like a child. but I know I’m not”), budding expectations for life (“My life is beginning.... flowers that not totally come out”), preferred futures (“I’m still believe happy and wonder”), and her desire to “express my thoughts, feeling” that were held back (“but I can’t. I can’t how to speaking”).

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In the second paragraph, Beth wrote about her “problem” and in relation to it, her views of herself: Extract: I have not enough guts to face and solve the problem In my dialy life, I am afraid of something, such as gossipe. I feel something always involved me. It makes me sad, lonely. I have little pride and strongly require other’s admit they love me so that I can love myself. How bad it is, but I can’t (overcome). Beth’s descriptions suggest that her “problem” seemed to be one of insecurity (“I feel something always involved me,” “strongly require other’s [to] admit they love me so that I can love myself”). According to Beth, it overpowered her (“I have not enough guts to face and solve the problem”) and she was helpless (“How bad it is, but I can’t overcome it”). In the third paragraph, Beth described several of her “dreams in life.” One was “travelling around the world, especially to French. Japen.” Another seemed to relate to her “literature dream” that she had written about earlier: Extract: I hope [that I can] have an own attic where I can stroe [store] my own bed and some interesting books.... At the same time, I can read a head [heap?] of beautiful article. Outside my attic, sunshine [end of the draft]

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Clearly, in “My Feeling of ” (3W_W), Beth’s focus was not on writing itself—in Chinese or English—but on her life: self-understandings, challenges, and dreams. A week later, during the third meeting, I asked the members to revise what they had written during the second meeting. In response, Beth added two paragraphs primarily to describe her travel dreams. About France, she wrote, “I think it is a beautiful and romatic place . French is famous for perfume. wine and flower . especially [Lavender of Provence].” Beth also wanted to travel within China: “Tibet and Lijiang is my ideal travelling destination in own country .most pure and clear place, especially Tibet . I like Lijiang’s [A-Meter-Length Sunshine].” Thus, in this revision, Beth extended her autobiographical writing in English to continue exploring her dreams. Therefore, Beth seemed to use EFL autobiographical writing to reflect on a tension in her life. As her sample “My Feeling of ” (3W_W) shows, on the one hand, she was home-bound, “a homely girl.” On the other hand, she wanted to experience the outside world, as represented by her various travel dreams. In life, her desire to “go to another province” was constrained by her family: “ ” (I always wanted to go to another province, but people like my mother wouldn’t let me. Because I had never boarded; I had always stayed at home) (1 I). In her EFL autobiographical 253

writing sample “My Feeling of ” (3W_W), her dreams about the outside world continued and took over her sense of inadequacy, which featured in the beginning of her sample. Beth’s EFL autobiographical writing was not only about her existing self-understandings and dreams. It also revealed her evolving sense of self in relation to her immediate life experiences. Interestingly, two examples come from Beth’s diary in English as a group member. In other words, having the writing group as her potential audience, Beth overcame her previous fear of making grammar mistakes in her English diary with no one to correct them for her (4 I). Diary Entry 1 (2W_W) In the writing group, Beth wrote and shared two diary entries with me. Her first diary entry, dated March 21, was about her being cheated by a stranger. On her way to the town, Beth had run into “a woman, about 30 years old with black skin and short body who block[ed] me.” The woman wanted to borrow Beth’s phone. Beth “refused” because she “suddenly remember[ed] [her] friend’s experience” of being cheated out of his phone. Instead, she gave the woman some money (“my all changes” [all of my change]) to make a call with an IP phone (“I still suggest I could pay for her cost in [using] IP”7). It was not until later that she realised that she had been cheated: Extract:

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I’m very happy to help a strange man [a stranger]. So I called my domitry mates [roommates]. But she told me I was cheated because ten minters ago, a woman used same way to cheat her money. After I described the appearance of the woman, my mates exclaim: a sam person. In this diary entry, Beth not only recounted a recent life experience, but also performed her social identity as a “pure girl.” As she wrote in the first two paragraphs of her diary: Extract: Today, I’m very angry because of I was cheated. When I became a university student, my parents always tell me: the society is complex and dark, you should learn to protect yourself. In the eyes of my parents, I’m a pure girl without enough social experience. In order to reduce worried of parents, I cautiously to living. Even though I’m so carefully, I still was cheated on this Sunday. This description corresponds to what she said about her cup image, “I’m like water, pure.” Beth was “pure” socially due to her lack of “enough social experience” so that she perceived herself as being gullible. Diary Entry 2 (5W_W) Beth’s second entry recounted her experience of having an oral English class with a Canadian teacher at university. Her teacher had asked the class to give a “free talk” at the “teaching-desk.” The topics were 255

decided by drawing lots, and Beth ended up with the topic of her dream job. Beth wrote in her diary, “In the class, I told my teacher and classmates, my ‘dream’ job is teacher so that I have regular income and peaceful life.” It was very possible that Beth talked about a teacher dream simply because such an idea was easy to express or socially acceptable in a Chinese classroom. Whatever the reason, through her “free talk,” Beth performed a teacher identity in front of her class. Beth continued in her diary, “In fact, I want a high income job to travel aroud [around] the world, I [am] eager to experience different life and culture. It is my big dream.” There are two English-writing-mediated identities in this diary entry: a teacher identity, expressed through Beth’s “dream” job, which she had spoken about in her oral English class, and a world traveller identity, as expressed through her “big dream.” They are English-writing-mediated identities because it was in her writing that Beth showed signs of refashioning these identities to draw different conclusions about them. For instance, Beth’s expression “In fact” introduced her reflection, basic as it was, on a teacher identity she had performed through speaking. As a result of this reflection, Beth downplayed the position of a teacher identity, which had taken a prominent place in her spoken English class, and concluded that being a teacher was not what she really wanted. In addition, following her expression “In fact,” Beth also introduced her imagined social identity as a traveller, suggesting that travelling around the world was what she really wanted to do. She named this imagined traveller identity as “my

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big dream,” which seemed to link with her travel dreams already mentioned in “My Feeling of ” (3W_W). In essence, the tension between Beth’s two dreams was a tension between home and outside. More specifically, it was a tension between social expectations and her personal preferences. On the one hand, becoming a teacher was her parents’ dream for her because it was “stable.” As Beth said about her future plan, “ Tina ” (My parents want me to be a teacher; because just as Tina ((Beth’s classmate)) said, it is very stable. But I think, how to say— becoming a teacher won’t be too bad, 1 I, April 11). On the other hand, Beth had “always wanted to go to another province” but was not allowed to.

I always wanted to go to another province, but people like my mother wouldn’t let me. Because I had never boarded; I had always stayed at home. From middle school to high school, my home was just over ten minutes away from school. Most of the time I just stayed at home. And I was not used to university life—having never lived at school—and when I came, I cried all day. I cried for almost a month. ((laugh)) (1 I) Beth’s unfulfilled desire to “go to another province” contrasts with her “stay-at-home” girl identity (“I had

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always stayed at home”). Although this desire to go outside had not yet been fulfilled, it manifested itself through Beth’s diary entry 2, in which she downplayed her imagined teacher identity and emphasised her traveller identity. Becoming a teacher meant a “very stable” job (1 I), in keeping with what others (e.g., Beth’s parents and classmate) expected and what she had been (a “stay-at-home” girl). In contrast, becoming a traveller seemed to imply adventure away from home, “to another province” and beyond. As such, Beth’s diary entry 2 became a site of struggle between her multiple identities. Beth resolved this struggle by re-evaluating her relationships with them and assigning them different priorities. Similarly, in writing about her immediate life experiences, which did not concern her imagined identities, Beth continued to wrestle with the tension between home and outside, social expectations and personal preferences. This was evident in the changes Beth made to her drafts on her experience of falling in water (13W_W, 14W_W, and 15W_W). In achieving narrative understandings of herself, Beth had to work out which ones of her multiple identities to foreground and which ones to place in the background. “Fall into Water” (15W_W) By writing about her experience of falling in water, Beth reflected on it and generated an identity conclusion of herself as a curious girl. One “sunny” afternoon when she was a first-year student, Beth took a walk with a classmate to a lake on her university campus. The lake had “a bridge ... and some wooden area.” Walking on the

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wooden area against her classmate’s advice, Beth “fell into water” because “one part of wooden area suddenly loose.” She became “very afraid” when she realised that her “feet can’t touch the bottom of lake.” So she started screaming. Fortunately, her classmate grabbed her hand and pulled her out. Soaking wet, Beth felt “cold and embarrassed” in front of “so many students walking around the lake.” On her way back to her dormitory, she felt others were looking at her as if she were a “strange animal.” “I really want dig a hole to hidden myself,” Beth wrote in “Fall into Water” (15W_W). Beth’s fall was partly due to an external condition (“one part of wooden area suddenly loose”) and partly, as Beth explained, due to her “curiousty” [curiosity]. “My classmate told me don’t went to wooden area, but I was very curiousty it. Old says: curiousty kill cat. That day, the curiousty nearly killed me.” The Western proverb “Curiosity kills the cat,” albeit inaccurately quoted, provided Beth with a cultural way of explaining her act and its consequences. In this sample, Beth reflected on her experience and concluded that she was a curious girl. This transition from ‘the landscape of action’ and ‘the landscape of consciousness’ (J. Bruner, 1986) appears to be smooth. But in fact, as will become clear in an earlier draft of Beth’s, in reflecting on her experience, she had to work out her relationship with multiple identity options. Before Beth shared the complete story (15W_W) with me on June 20, she had worked on it twice during the 14th meeting on June 13. The writing group had just read “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You!’” (Coffman, 2003, pp. 164–165)—a romantic story by a Chinese university student—and reviewed the idea of voice as uniqueness in content, expression, and 259

structure (14V). I then asked the members to write something on the topic “the first time to ...” in a way that would show their own uniqueness. Beth titled her draft “Fall into Man-Made Lake” (13W_W). She wrote the first half in black (13W_W), and during the time for revision, after an opportunity for sharing each others’ drafts, Beth added the additional parts in green (14W_W; see Figure 6.4).

Figure 6.4 “Fall into Man-Made Lake” (13W_W and 14W_W). This two-coloured draft shows Beth’s evolving understanding of herself in relation to her experience of falling in water. From the proverb she quoted inaccurately (“curiousty kill cat”), Beth seemed to suggest that she was curious. In her summary of that day’s event, she called herself “a naughty cat” (“That 260

day, the curiousty nearly kills me—a naughty cat”). Her reply to her classmate’s caution shows still another possibility, that she was being adventurous (“Oh, no! I must let you know you are too worried and never-oused, I’m not a children”). This third possibility is viable for two reasons. For one thing, Beth’s curiosity, which led her to fall into water, was linked to her embarrassment about falling in front of other students (15W_W). For another, Beth had written that she was “afraid of ... gossipe” and needed others’ approval to love herself (3W_W). Her tension between home and outside thus continued but with a slight variation: playing safe and being adventurous. In the end, Beth chose to foreground her curiosity (“I was very curiousty it ... curiosity kill cat. That day, the curiousty nearly killed me”). And that is the identity she shared with the writing group through her final draft “Fall into Water” (15W_W). As shown by Beth’s multiple drafts on her experience of falling in water, her EFL autobiographical writing was a site of struggle between multiple identity options that were available to her. Accordingly, Beth’s EFL autobiographical writing involved identity work because she had to actively work out which identity options to adopt and foreground. Yet identity work through EFL autobiographical writing is not a soloist activity. As is more clearly shown through Beth’s writing about her student teaching experience, certain identities, such as ‘discoursal self’ (Ivanič, 1998), are ‘co-authored’ (Carr, 1998, p. 487) by both the writer and the audience. “A Teacher of Forty Minutes” (16W_W and 17W_W)

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This story was about Beth’s experience of teaching English at a “shabby and small” primary school in the countryside. The experience was initially and briefly described in Beth’s two-paragraph draft: Extract: After a short rest, we arranged the class schedule. I was arranged English class for grade 1. It was my first time to stood teaching-desk as a teacher. For children too young, I was afraid they can’t accepted my teaching contents. So I changed my schedule. This is a successuful and happy experience. I hope I could have more chances to donated my knowledge to others. In this short narrative, Beth recounted an English teacher identity she had enacted: someone who planned the lesson (e.g., “I changed my schedule”) and transmitted knowledge (“donated my knowledge to others”). Beth’s subsequent revision (17W_W), containing a total of five paragraphs with added details about the teaching process, helped make this teacher identity more ‘experience-near-and-particular’ (White, 2007) than her first draft did. For instance, she added a description of her interactions with her students: Extract: The ringing bell, I begun class. “Have you anyone could lend me a book?” I asked. “Teacher, me, me, me!” They said. Suddenly one little boy rushed platform. “Teacher, used mine! He said. I was so frighted because their head teacher looking me out of the window. I soon received his book and said : thanks for your books,

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please return your seat now! The case ended with happy. Because I saw a delighted exprssion on his face. After that, we begun sang ABC songs. They are so passional and active. The forty minutes teaching quickly passed away. Beth thus performed a teacher identity in the classroom. Her audience included her students, who addressed her as “Teacher” and eagerly lent her their books (“Teacher, me, me, me!” they said). It also included the “head teacher,” who was “looking [at her] out of the window.” By writing about her teaching experience and sharing it with others in this second version, Beth also performed her teacher identity to an extended audience. At the 16th meeting on June 28, Beth read her third version, titled “A Forty Minutes’ Teacher” (19W_W), to the writing group. Nine members at the meeting, two guests (Cathryn and Chingyee), and I thus became the ‘outsider witnesses’ (White, 2007) to her teacher identity. According to Beth, in her writing she was “a successful teacher during the forty minutes.” As Beth said in response to my question in the following extract in the third interview after her sharing of the extended version of her story. I

What kinds of comment do you expect me to give to your essay [“A Forty Minutes’ Teacher”]?

B

First of all, you will feel those kids are very cute, and you may think that I was a successful teacher during the forty minutes.8

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Beth’s response was not about the kind of comments she expected from me on her writing. Instead, it was about her ‘discoursal self’ (Ivanič, 1998) as a teacher, i.e., the kind of impression about her as a teacher that she wanted to convey through her writing. Therefore, an English-writing-mediated teacher identity was clearly present in Beth’s autobiographical sample “A Forty Minutes’ Teacher.” I regard such an identity as ‘co-authored’ (Carr, 1998) because it only became clear during the process of an interview interaction. Writing autobiographically in English in the group had a profound impact on Beth’s identities. As will become clear in “A Wonderful Book” (18W_W), Beth’s experiences of EFL autobiographical writing provided her with a different ‘landscape of action’ (J. Bruner, 1986) to reflect on and generate new understandings of herself, particularly her sense of self as a writer. “A Wonderful Book” (18W_W) During the 15th meeting on June 20, one week before the writing group finished its autobiographical writing stage, I asked the members to write for 20 minutes about their “autobiographies” (“ ... ” use your autobiography as the topic ... and choose your own titles, 15V). Beth wrote “A Wonderful Book” in response. Extract: As we all known, book plays an important role in our history and life. These books are always wrritten by

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others. However, today I will show you wonderful book written by myself. I’m very proud of using English and little Chinese to write my own book. Of course, it is about myself. If you read carefully, you will find it is a really wonderful book. Perhaps, you can more understand me. Some years later, the book may become a famous book! Just a joke! There are so many things in my books, some were happy, some were sad. For it, I’m more willing to say it my own book, not Autobiography. Because I think I’m a literary girl and always decorate colorful and peomful for my book and life. I will write some beautiful things in it. For example, my provence dream, travelling to Lijiang, fall into man-made lake and so on. No wander it still have sad things such as my fail, was cheated and betrayed by my friend, the earthquake in Wenchuan. If you read my book, you can saw a girl who have both rose dream and [end of writing] Two features of this writing sample stand out most strikingly for me, with reference to Beth’s drawings and previous writing samples. First, in Beth’s statement, “I’m a literary girl and always decorate colorful and peomful for my book and life,” the “literary girl” takes over, with confidence, the cup image in Beth’s drawing, which seems to represent Beth as a writer at a loss as to how to go about her craft (“at the beginning, I’m like water, pure ... didn’t know what to do and how to do”). In contrast, Beth can now stand her ground/find her place to write her own “wonderful book.” Her previous “literature dream” (1W_W), in pursuit of which, at least 265

in part, she joined the writing group, was now being realised. Her “literature dream” had become more substantial and personal, as evidenced by events and dreams that she already had written about in the writing group (e.g., “Fall into Man-Made Lake,” “Provence Dream”) and events yet to be written about (e.g., “travelling to Lijiang,” being “cheated and betrayed by my friend,” and “the earthquake in Wenchuan”). Second is Beth’s description of the potential of her book. “If you read carefully, you will find it is a really wonderful book. Perhaps, you can more understand me.” Beth thus saw her book leading to greater shared understandings about her compared to how she was known prior to joining the writing group: someone who wanted to “take remedial classes,” whose writing in English was “corrected all in red,” and who joined in the writing group to “continue my literature dream” (1W_W). Therefore, Beth was using her English writing to convey her personally preferred identities to her audience just as she had done through “A Forty Minutes’ Teacher.” Moreover, Beth was now the owner of “a wonderful book written by myself,” “decorate[d] colorful and peomful for my book and life.” These different texts show a movement in Beth’s views of her writing in English. Previously, her writing had been compared to a cup of water image of her drawing, about which she explained: “at the beginning of my writing, I think I don’t know write what or how to write—very plain. (I: Plain like water?) Yeah.” (32V). Now, her writing could be compared to her “rainbow” image, which stands for beautiful dreams associated with her

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writing (e.g., “literature dream”) and life (e.g., “attic” dream, “provence dream,” and “big dream” as a world traveller), as well as hopes and alternative possibilities. As Beth explained about her rainbow image: “Now.... My life is like a rainbow— colourful and hopeful” (32V). Comment The samples analysed in the preceding show that Beth performed through her EFL autobiographical writing a wide arrange of social identities to her readers: as “a pure girl,” “a homely girl,” a traveller, “a successful teacher,” “a curiousty cat,” “a naughty girl,” and “a literary girl.” They are Beth’s English-writing-mediated identities. Beth’s data also show that, through EFL autobiographical writing, she engaged in two kinds of reflecting on her identity. One kind of reflection is reflecting on actual experience or ‘landscape of action’ and generating certain ‘identity conclusions’ (White, 2005). An example is in her text “Fall into Water” (15W_W), where she reflected on her experience of falling into water; Beth represented herself in her final draft as a girl of “curiousty.” The other kind of reflection is reflecting on her English-writing-mediated identities. In “My Feeling of ” (autobiography, 3W_W), for instance, she started with describing autobiographies as books by “great people” that are “full of [their] achievement.” She then continued, “I think I’m a hardy girl, so far, I’m not great achievement.” Again in the same sample, Beth wrote, “In the eyes of others, I’m a

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out-going and curiousty girl like a child. but I know I’m not.” By reflecting on these identity conclusions suggested by her “autobiography” as well as other people’s views of her, Beth put herself in a position to decide whether they fitted her. Reflecting thus played an important role in Beth’s understandings of herself in relation to her experiences and people she had been in contact with. There are also early signs of Beth re-visioning some of her English-writing-mediated identities. For instance, in her diary entry 2 (5W_W), Beth first reflected on a teacher identity she had performed before her class, and then she re-visioned her social identity by asserting that her real “big dream” was to travel around the world. Two major changes can be observed in Beth’s autobiographical writing in English, which have implications for her writer identity. The first is a change from one “literature dream” to many dreams and experiences in life. When Beth first responded to my invitation to join the extracurricular writing group, one reason was that she wanted to “continue [her] literature dream” (1W_W, approx. March 14). As Beth continued writing her “autobiography,” her other dreams also began to surface: e.g., “dream job” as a teacher and “big dream” as a world traveller (5W_W, March 27), which were gradually specified (4W_W, March 28; 18W_W, June 20). Experiences of being cheated (2W_W), falling into water (14W_W), and teaching English to children (16_W, 17W_W) were also featured in her autobiographical writing. These dreams and experiences revealed not only her existing social identities, as “a

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homely girl” and as “a pure girl,” for instance, but also her expanded sense of self. While her identity as a world traveller remained largely unrealised and associated with her imagined experiences, her identity as a teacher was joined with her actual teaching experience and new shared understandings. The second is a change from a “literature dream” to “a literary girl,” a change associated with Beth’s uses of both Chinese and English. Previously, Beth had wanted to major in Chinese at a key university (1 I, April 11). “Fate” had it (6D/W_W, March 28) that she had to major in English at a less prestigious university in her hometown. Yet seeing a possibility that “written autobiography [in English] could continue [her] literature dream” (1W_W), Beth joined the writing group. Therefore, Beth’s ‘investment’ (Peirce, 1995) in autobiographical writing in English was associated with her imagined identity as a writer, which probably began in Chinese. Through such a purposeful investment, Beth began to see herself as “a literary girl,” as shown in “A Wonderful Book” (18W_W). Granted, Beth did not become “a literary girl” simply because she claimed to be. Nonetheless, EFL autobiographical writing, as evidenced by the writing samples she mentioned, seems to have given her an ‘experience-near-and-particular’ (White, 2007) sense of self as a confident writer. Autobiographical writing, in English and/or Chinese, and the writing group all contributed to these two shifts. First, “autobiography” positioned Beth in relation to alternative possibilities and invited her investment. Prior

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to joining the writing group, Beth’s writing in English was test-oriented, usually in the form of argumentative essays, and restricted in what she could write. Consider the following extracts from the second interview: At university, before joining the writing group, I basically didn’t write anything except the mentor’s assignments and diary.... Before I was forced to write; now I write out of interest .... Before, I only wrote about positive aspects [of issues]; now I have my own opinions. The standard of test-orientation is that you can only write about the positive aspects [of issues].9 I’m not so good at argumentative writing; mainly because of [the need for] argument and evidence—Argumentative writing is also my least favourite kind of writing, but it seems most frequently used in examinations.10 In contrast, Beth associated “autobiography” with personally desirable futures (“written autobiography could continue my literature dream”), freedom to express herself (“In my own autobiography, I could everything that I like,” 1W_W), and her preferred way of writing (“ , ” I like writing narratives very much; it’s rather easy, 2 I). There was a two-way dynamic relationship between Beth’s imagined writer identity and her engagement with multiple dreams and experiences in her life. As a personally valued identity, her imagined writer identity invited her long-term investment. Once realised, i.e.,

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grounded in her actual experience of writing autobiographically in English in the writing group, this identity gave Beth a powerful position to stand and write from, as evident in “A Wonderful Book” (18W_W). Conversely, Beth’s investment in her imagined writer identity led her to explore and write about her other dreams and experiences. It was through engaging in and reflecting on such a writing process that Beth found room to move as a writer in English. Second, Beth’s sense of self as a writer was shaped by others in the writing group. Take “oral publication” as an example.11 The first time Beth did her “oral publication” in the writing group was at the eighth meeting,12 during which she read to the group the paragraphs about the travel dreams she had added to “My Feeling of ” (3W_W). At the 32nd and last meeting, Beth stated that this meeting was a special moment for her in the writing group. She explained: “we went to your home. When I found the junior and senior are very good at the oral and written English, I feel my words and sentences are plain. I feel worried, and I wan’to do a good job” (32V). This “oral publication” thus generated a sense of urgency in Beth. Another example is Beth’s response to my feedback. In describing the second image in her drawing, a girl in a green circle, Beth said: ... I feel puzzled sometimes. My teacher, writing teacher, when I write a article called Cohabitation is not good for young people, my teacher—when I write this article, my teacher give me a high scores. But you [the researcher] give me some suggestions, and find some mistakes ((Everyone laughs loud)). Another is, Life is

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like a what? I write a article, name is Life Like River. My teacher said ((smiling)) my article is bad, but you said it’s good. ((Everyone laughs again)) (32V) Beth’s puzzlement concerns two assignments from her writing class. It shows the social nature, or rather, the multi-voicedness, of writing autobiographically in English in the writing group. In other words, Beth was not writing alone, nor did her sense of self as a writer evolve in itself. Instead, both Beth’s autobiographical writing and writer identities involved the active participation of multiple others and perspectives. Third, Beth showed an evolving relationship with English in regard to autobiographical writing. At first, writing in English was associated with challenges and hopes. “Writting English is difficult for me. I think use Chinese more express my dreams.... I hope I can writting and speaking fluent English to express my feeling and dreams,” Beth wrote at the end of her travel dreams (3W_W). Towards the end of the autobiographical writing stage, a sense of pride in writing in English began to emerge (“I’m very proud of using English and little Chinese to write my own book”). Nonetheless, Chinese appeared to remain her most comfortable language. Three examples suffice for illustration. First, several of Beth’s autobiographical drafts started with or included Chinese words and sentences (e.g., “My Feeling of [Autobiography],” life river drawing, and chapter titles). Second, under the rainbow image in her drawing, Beth wrote that “Now I can ... even written poems. One Chinese poem and English poem.” Third, after the writing group, Beth replied in Chinese to a draft

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I

sent

to

her,

saying,

“

” (To be frank, although my major is English, I am more used to and prefer using Chinese! email on September 10, 2009). Therefore, even though writing autobiographically in English relocated her as “a literary girl,” it did not shift Beth’s language preference away from Chinese. Therefore, Chinese, Beth’s first additional language, remained a resource for her to draw upon during her English-writing processes. Viewed as a whole, Beth seemed to have integrated EFL autobiographical writing into her identity project, as represented by the tension between safety and adventure. “A Wonderful Book” was not finished. Neither was Beth’s identity work as mediated by EFL autobiographical writing. As she ended so abruptly due to time restraint, “If you read my book, you can saw a girl who have both rose dream and ...”

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7 Anne “A Small Clean Warm Plastic”1 “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” ... Afterwards, before our classmates’s parents came

class

was

over,

my

to pick them up, carrying lively little umbrellars and water shoots. I looked out of the windows and felt worried and disappointed. ... I walked out, my mother took out a clear piece of plastic quickly under her coat and gave me. I received it and ran into my seat without any words. I tucked it into my desk very angrily. After class, I didn’t go until I made sure everyone had left. It still rained heavily. I had to wear the plastic. I ran home as quickly as possible. Tears ran out of my eyes. …2 (May 9, 2008) The extract from Anne’s writing gives a glimpse into her childhood experiences of poverty and their impact on her. Anne was a first-year English major student from a poor Bai family in the countryside of southwest China. Prior to the study, the primary reason that she would write in English was “just for examinations.” Hoping to improve her “poor English” (letter to me on December 19, 2008), she accepted my invitation to join the autobiographically oriented extracurricular writing 275

group. As a member, she wrote, rewrote, and shared her stories, especially of poverty and family, with other group members. In this process, Anne re-authored her relationship with her mother by reinventing as creative art her painful childhood poverty experiences in which her mother had played a focal role; in the process, she became able to come to terms with/accept both her mother and her childhood self. Through autobiographical writing, she also became a more confident and expressive writer in English. Anne’s autobiographical writing as a whole thus demonstrates her dynamic self-othering processes. Previous Literacy Experiences During the writing group activities in 2008, I interviewed Anne 13 times, covering topics on her life and literacy experiences as well as processes of writing specific samples. Table 7.1 is a summary of the interviews that are most relevant to this chapter. Table 7.1 Summary of Interviews Code

Main Topics

Date

Main Language

Interview I (1Life experience April 28 I) themes3

English

Interview II (2Literacy I) experiences

May 30

Chinese

Interview IV (4 Beliefs I)

September 3

Chinese

” Interview V (5“ September 3 I) (Model Essay)

English

276

Interview (11 I)

XIMentor’s assignments

December 9

Chinese

Anne spoke Bai at home with her parents and Chinese or English at school (1 I). Both of Anne’s parents were “ ” (illiterate) farmers (2 I). Like other case study participants, Anne could not write the Bai script, nor had she had any opportunity to learn it. Anne was chosen as a case study participant for her ethnic Bai background, prior frustrating experiences with both Chinese and English literacy, and active participation in the writing group activities, i.e., attending 24 of the extracurricular group meetings, frequent involvement in group discussions, and producing a large number of English autobiographical narratives (more than 10). Compared to the other three case study participants, Anne had had a particularly restricted literacy background before she joined the writing group. Her writing, in both Chinese and English, had never been “praised” by others (5 I and 1 E). In fact, she frequently mentioned her failures in Chinese exams, both in middle school and high school. For instance, according to Anne, two of her most remembered experiences of writing were her failures in Chinese examinations.

I can’t even remember what I wrote about in my Chinese exam for my middle school graduation. But just because I did not write well for that graduation exam—and then

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my writing was off topic in the College Entrance Examination, my total scores held me back. (2 I) Interview II with Anne also revealed her negative experiences with her test-oriented learning history concerning English writing. She said that soon after she started learning English in middle school: all my writing in English was done for examinations. All the teachers... gave you a fixed format, such as you should, should, you’d better write in three parts: beginning, conclusion and middle.4 When asked to comment on what she remembered most about her English classes from middle school and high school, she said it was copying keys to tests, including model essays: “Often after each [English] test, the teacher would hand out the papers, and then ask us to copy them”). As an English major student, Anne regarded writing as important “because TEM-4 mainly depends on listening comprehension and writing.”5 Anne’s test-oriented learning history was most vividly shown by her drawing during the last writing group meeting. She described this drawing as a “small and weak” tree with “a few fruits” (32V, December 20) and said that it represented herself as a writer before joining the writing group (see Figure 7.1). She explained in her caption “most time I write just for examinations.”

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Figure 7.1 Anne’s first tree. Anne’s drawing and words give a glimpse into her ‘autobiographical self,’ which, according to Ivanič (1998, p. 24), is as stable as habitus. That is, “writ[ing] just for examinations” had been Anne’s habitual way of relating to English writing, which left her “knowing little about writing.” This was substantiated by Anne’s acknowledgement that up until university, she had never

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borrowed books from her school library nor was she in the habit of buying her own books (1 I). One impact of such an ‘autobiographical self’ seems to be writing without personal feelings. An example is Anne’s second sample “My Feeling about Writing” (2W_W) as a writing group member. During the second meeting on March 21, I asked the members to give a preface to their EFL “autobiographies.” Alternatively, they could describe their feelings about writing their “autobiographies” in English. In response, Anne wrote: Extract: Writing is one of a English major’s basic capacities., so it’s plays a important role for a English major. In my opinion, if we want to write well, we must notice some points. [1st ¶] ... we must have something to write ... (2nd ¶) ... we must make a outline ... (3rd ¶) ... we should notice[e] the structure of paragraph[h] and a sentence ... (4th ¶) ... we should have a good hand writing ... (5th ¶) In a word, writing needs your more attentions in daily life. if you want to write a outstanding compesition. Writing needs you gather many wonderful words, phrases, sentences, and so on. Writing is also a long jureny of study. (6th ¶)

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According to Anne, there is a set format to follow in writing, as exemplified by her frequent use of “should” (5) and “must” (3) (e.g., “we must have a outline”). In addition, Anne was emotionally removed from her writing. Despite her title “My Feeling about Writing,” Anne did not show her personal feelings in the 239-word essay. First personal singular forms were also scarce: “I” (0), “my” (2), “mine” (0), and “me” (0), compared to her frequent use of plural pronouns: “we” (19) and “our” (4). Clearly, Anne related to writing as a subject for all English major students (e.g., “Writing is one of a English major’s basic capacities”). Such a lack of personal involvement in her English writing at the beginning serves as a backdrop for her later autobiographical writing in the group. Autobiographical Writing Table 7.2 gives an overview of the autobiographical samples written by Anne in English while she was a writing group member. She read some of them to the writing group and revised some others. All titles were chosen by her. Table 7.2 Anne’s Autobiographical Writing Samples

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a This indicates Anne’s first writing sample for her “ ” (mentor). These writing samples showed Anne’s extensive and repeated engagement with her family and poverty experiences. My following analysis mainly focuses on 3D/W_W, 4W_W, 11W_W, 9W_W, and 14W_W. The reasons are twofold. First, these samples share a general theme of the poverty experiences that had filled Anne’s childhood, high school (1 I), and university life (4 I). As such, they may illustrate two important dimensions of Anne’s identities: her evolving understandings of her life and a sense of continuity (Giddens, 1991; Holquist, 2002; White & Epston, 1990, pp. 9–10). Second, rich contextual information is available about these samples. The ‘literacy events’ (Heath et al., 2008) around these samples, e.g., “oral publications” at group meetings, email correspondence, and interviews, allow me to probe both their dialogical relations (Bakhtin, 1981) and what

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Anne says she was doing (Thesen, 1997, p. 504) through these samples. “God has Tricked Me...” (3D/W_W) During the third meeting on March 28, 2008, I asked the writing group to draw a life river and “work out three to five titles for your autobiography chapters” (third meeting plan). Anne’s life river (see Figure 7.2) ran upward from left to right. It was drawn and labelled with a green pen.

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Figure 7.2 Anne’s life river and chapter titles (3D/ W_W). At the top of her paper, Anne wrote three autobiographical chapter titles, “A Unlucky Dog,” “My Ordinary Life,” and “A Strong and Large Power Is

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Driving Me” (see Figure 7.2). The first title, obviously a play on the expression “a lucky dog,” refers to her birth, which becomes apparent in the two lines Anne wrote below it: “On a windy and cold night, a poor dog came to the world....” The meanings of the other two titles are less obvious. However, two things are definite: Anne regarded her life as “ordinary” and that an unnamed “power is driving [her].” Of particular interest are the three God-related titles Anne drafted further below: God has tricked me. God is tricking me. God tricked me. (4W/D) Anne’s titles seemed related to her feelings of social inequality. For instance, when talking about “God Is Tricking Me,” Anne related to her experience of applying for study loans at university:

(4 I) Actually, these days many people in the university just pretend to be poor. Some apply for study loans even though their family conditions are good. As a result, those whose family conditions are really not good (for example myself) cannot get them (a study loan). (4 I)

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Three contextual details suggest that the three titles were intended for three chapters instead of alternative titles for one chapter. First, Anne did not cross out her original titles, but boxed them together. Second, Anne’s God-related titles had a dialogical relation (Bakhtin, 1981) with one of my “chapter titles,” i.e., “When I Am Serious, God Is Romantic” (see Appendix H),6 which I had shared with the group as an illustration. See the conversation below: N

What made you think of these expressions?

A

You seemed to have written a title related to God. And I saw it and thought that I could write about it.

N

Was it my When I Am Serious, God Is Romantic?

A

Oh, yeah, yeah. (1 I)

Third, Anne used three tenses instead of one, as was the case in my God-related title. These three details suggest that her three God-related titles were of similar significance to her original titles, e.g., “A Unlucky Dog.” In other words, they were a different set of “chapter titles” for her “autobiography.” This became even clearer when Anne explained about her writing plan for her God-related titles. N

What kind of content are you planning to write about?

A

I think in the first one, I use the present perfect tense and should talk about the impact my past experiences and difficulties had on me. The second 286

one is continuous tense and is about events in my life which involves God’s influence on me. The third one is past tense, just remembering some events from the past. (1 I) Anne’s “difficulties” seemed to be mainly financial, as shown by the saddest moment in her life: “Others in primary school all have good clothes to wear. I would feel very sad, because my family could not afford” (1 I). Similarly, her “turning point” was related to financial difficulties. In the second year of high school, Anne’s father fell ill. She wanted “to find a job” and cure her father’s disease. But her “headteacher” asked her to come back and helped her by having her tuition reduced to “ ” (one or two hundred kuai) or approximately $A16 to $A32 per semester. Later, Anne again thought of quitting school before graduation. This time, her teacher persuaded her by suggesting two equally nightmarish consequences of withdrawal: that she may be too poor to treat her parents if they became sick in the future and that she might marry poorly herself. He told me, “If you give up now, you won’t even have money to cure your parents when they get sick in the future.” He also said, “For someone like you, to give up now means an unhappy marriage in the future. To look for someone good will be very difficult.” So I felt, he had a very big impact on me. (1 I)

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Anne was convinced by her teacher’s arguments. She finished high school and became an English major student at her present university, leading a life supposedly matching her second chapter title, “God Is Tricking Me.” Covering her life from the past to the present, Anne’s three God-related chapter titles gave an overall storyline to her life. It will be a point of reference in understanding Anne’s movements in her English-writing-mediated identities, as exemplified by the first occasion for her to publicly share her writing, which is considered next. “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) Before she started “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W; see Appendix I) about the plastic sheet event, briefly cited at the beginning of this chapter, Anne wrote: Extract: At the age of eight, I was a carefree and invinsible girl. I was very boisterous ... and neve listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting, because she didn’t meet my needs. For examply, I had no lovely clothes, no toys, no candies and all. (¶2) According to the text, poverty experiences shaped Anne’s relationship with her mother and consequently her identity as a daughter.

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Anne’s representation of her mother can be read in reference to three social contexts: the writing group (and by extension the wider society that influenced members of the group), her family, and the Foreign Languages College of Lakeview University. At my invitation, Anne shared her story “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) with the writing group on May 23 at the 11th meeting (attended by eight student members, Attendance Record 1). Her description of her mother as “ugly” immediately led to a heated discussion. She had to give additional reasons for using such a taboo word about her mother: “Because she’s very short, small, I always think my mother [is] not like other mother.” Unconvinced, another group member, Peter, said laughingly, “But mother [is] still mother!” Another member, Mary, joined in, suggesting that Anne should change “ugly” to something like “not beautiful.” In one way or another, others suggested that Anne drop the word “ugly.” There were only two exceptions. Hope supported Anne’s choice, regarding it as normal for an eight-year-old to see her mother as “ugly.” Abby commented that “ugly” does not describe a person’s appearance, but character (11V). A week later, when I asked Anne how she felt about other members’ comments on her word choice, she maintained her position but added that “in [the] countryside most people... are not [as] pretty or beautiful than [as] the people in city. Because they are very, very tired” (2 I). These interactions show that whereas there were multiple ways of representing Anne’s mother, there seems to be a socioculturally preferred representation. In describing her mother as “ugly,” Anne ran contrary to

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this preferred representation. Meanwhile, these interactions also reveal Anne’s perspective, and possibly a social one as well, on country women farmers like her mother, who were “short, small,” and “very tired” (2 I). The second social context of Anne’s family was revealed at the beginning of her Chinese report “ ” (A wound never to be healed): Extract: During my childhood, Younger Sister and I often nagged Mother to tell us stories. But Mother was illiterate, unable to tell any exciting stories. So she told us about her childhood life. She said life used to be very hard. People often had to eat wild plants— now used to feed pigs only—and steamed buns made from rice chaff. The best food they could have was steamed corn buns. If anyone had any rice, washing and cooking it had to be totally in secret. Some people died of constipation after eating rice chaff. Some of them starved to death. Families had little clothing but many children. So, clothes were like treasure, worn first by the older children until they were outgrown and then handed down to the younger ones. She said although life was hard, people were diligent and capable rather than lazy. Mother said when she was young, she had to both study and do housework, such as washing clothes, cooking, farming and gathering firewood in the mountain. She was indeed “grabbing with both hands”!7

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Earlier ethnographic studies (e.g., Heath, 1982b; Heath, 1983) showed that children are socialised into their parents’ ways of using language and telling stories. In “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W), Anne foregrounded her poverty experiences as did her mother during her childhood. More importantly, like the writing group, Anne’s family also channelled to her sociocultural values of the wider society in China, e.g., values associated with loyalty to one’s own family. Note that Anne’s mother’s stories were followed by a description of herself as one of the people from the hard times, who “were diligent and capable and not lazy.” The housework her mother did, e.g., “washing clothes, cooking, farming and gathering firewood in the mountain,” exemplified her contributions to her family. Similar evidence was found in Anne’s life as well. She started doing housework early, “ ...... , , ” (I learned to do things like cooking and washing clothes when I was in the first grade, or not even the first grade, 1 I). When I asked her about her biggest challenges in learning English, her first response was, “ ” (I’m not afraid of working hard, 1 I). At university, she paid her tuition and board with support from her younger sister, a migrant worker in the capital city of her province, and applied for a study loan (4 I). She also worked in her university cafeteria for a while to finance her studies, but she saved most of her money for her parents. “

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” (Every time I go home I usually give them some money, leaving only a small amount for myself, 4 I). These and many examples show that in ways of using language and telling story, as well as valuing, Anne was as the proverb says, ‘Like mother, like daughter.’ The third social context is Anne’s university department, best understood through its policies and practices. When Anne joined the writing group, it was the second year her department had been running a “ ” or mentoring system. The basic idea was that each teacher from the Foreign Languages College should guide about five students in the department in how to study English. The mentors were supposed to meet their students regularly and ensure, among other policies, that by the time their students graduated, they would have written “50 passages” in English, which was one of the “ ” (Five by Fifty) requirements (based on a departmental public notice, October 17, 2008). Although mentoring was a major responsibility for the teachers, its practice seemed to have been compromised by many factors: the extent to which the teachers took it seriously and the pressure for them to engage in research and get published on top of the usual heavy teaching loads for all the English teachers from the Foreign Languages College. For instance, one young teacher, about 30 years old, complained during an interview that he had virtually become “a teaching machine” (interview on April 7, 2008). From Anne’s perspective, her mentor was a poor example of mentoring. Under this mentoring system, Anne wrote several passages, including “God Made a Joke with Me” (1W_M; see Appendix J), a thematic predecessor of “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” 292

(4W_W). But Anne said her mentor was “ ” (not so responsible), because “ ” (It’s all up to us as to how many compositions to write and what to do) (11 I). By the end of the writing group, Anne had written 10 passages for her mentor but had received no comments and assumed none of what she had written had been read (11 I). Among these three social contexts, the writing group played a significant role in shaping Anne’s writer identity by its “literacy events” (Heath et al., 2008). Anne’s essay “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) was a ‘performed story’ (cf. White & Epston, 1990), i.e., a story shared with an audience in the writing group. After I read it, I commented in an email to Anne (May 22, 2008; see Appendix K): “I admire your courage to tell the story”; it is “powerful,” “painfully beautiful,” showing the “demoralising power of poverty.” Anne’s email response (1E) two days later, on May 24, the day after she read her story to the writing group, was filled with joy for being “prised.”8 Extract: Niclos, First, I feel very happy after reading your letter. Because I never thought I would write a article prised by others. Thank you! I think I have so many things to do and improve. I hope we can cooperate happily. Best wishes to your wife and you.

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I take “prised” to mean “praised.” As Anne explained to me about this email during Interview II on May 30, she was “happy” because it was “the first time my, my composition is being praise, prized, praised” (2 I). Her explanation suggests that she was in the process of correcting herself. Writing and sharing “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) with the writing group was a landmark event for Anne. It was the first time that she had written about this poverty experience, the first time she had read her writing to a group of people, and the first experience of “being praise[d]” for her English composition. A week later, during Interview II, Anne regarded this story as her best. About five weeks later, Anne shared another best piece, “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W), with the writing group, which continued her reflections on her relationship with her mother. “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W) The focal event described in Anne’s next story took place when Anne was in high school. She did not know that her father had been hospitalized until her uncle called her on the phone. When asked by her uncle to speak to her mother on the phone, she wanted to refuse. “But too late, she got the phone.” Thus began Anne’s first time to hear her mother’s voice on the phone. Due to her mother’s hearing problem (“Both Dad and Mom have poor hearing and it’s hard to explain on the phone. Even at home when we talk we have to yell,” 1 I), the telephone call was a one-way conversation featuring her

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mother’s “penetrat[ing]” voice and Anne’s silence. However, as revealed in her story, the event proved crucial in the evolution of Anne’s relationship with her mother. Three major events contextualized Anne’s title. One was reading a text at the 14th meeting on June 13, “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You’” about a Chinese university student’s confession of love for his sweetheart on the phone.9 At the meeting, we first guessed the contents of the story based on the title, then took turns reading the story, and making comments on it (14V). Anne’s comments show that she was impressed by the story’s “title,” “organisation,” and use of “conversation,” which she regarded as an example of “voice” (14V). She said, “Here the writer used conversation ((looking up at me)) (I: uh huh, uh huh, conversation) ((looking at the handout again)) (I: uh huh) and I think, this is one of his voice in this article ((laughing))” (14V). Another event contextualizing Anne’s text was reading my essay “Unleash Your Writing Voice” (see Appendix L), which was intended to encourage the members to write with uniqueness. This was the second time I discussed the notion of voice as uniqueness with the group. To make sure that the members understood what I meant by “voice,” I first read my essay in English, then explained it in Chinese (14th meeting plan, 14V). In my essay, I used Anne’s “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) to illustrate using personal experiences as unique content. The unique content is part of the voice. Remember Anne’s story in which she recalls how she experienced 295

poverty as an eight-year-old.... Many, including me, have experienced poverty. But Anne’s account, revealing the imprints made on her by the storm, her classmates’ ‘lively little umbrellars and water shoots’,10 her mother’s appearance with two pieces of plastic, has breathed her personal voice—in terms of unique content—into her poverty story. Thus, a writer’s voice is heard where the writer notes specifics of events: both the happening and the personal interpretation. There was not a causal relationship between reading my essay on voice at a group meeting and Anne’s title “My First Time to Hear Her Voice on Phone.” Nonetheless, it seems fair to suggest that the group context encouraged Anne to keep drawing on her personal experiences, as she had done in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W). The third event was the group being invited to write with uniqueness. During the 14th meeting, after we had finished reading and commenting on “The First Time to Say, ‘I Love You,’” I asked the members to write “with uniqueness” on the topic “my first time to....” (14V). In response, Anne first wrote—in red—about seeing her father’s tears. After reading other members’ samples, she first used green ink to make some minor revisions to her original text and then wrote in green at the bottom what became the title of her full piece (see Figure 7.3), “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (6W_W).

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Figure 7.3 “My First Time to See Father’s Tears.” Two cues from this draft and other texts are important. First, Anne did not cross out the original title about seeing her father’s tears. Second, according to the text “My Father” (1W_W; see Appendix M), “the day when I saw my father’s tears for the first time” was “when I was in Grade Two in high school.” Hearing her mother’s voice for the first time on the phone had taken place one year earlier, when Anne “was a freshman in senior high school,” as the completed story will show. These cues suggest that Anne was actually re-starting a different story with a new title, which led to the writing and sharing of another touching story about her relationship with her mother. Two weeks passed. We were now approaching the end of the first stage, the 16th meeting on June 28. To celebrate, I encouraged the members “to orally publish a piece of writing you are most satisfied with” at the meeting (handout of 14th meeting; see Appendix N). In response, Anne finished “My First Time to Hear Her 297

Voice in Phone” [on the phone] and emailed it to me, asking for “help before I show it off.” Extract: This week I wrot a article, but I need your help before I show it off. I hope you can give me some advice. (2E, Anne’s email on June 25, 2008) I started my comments as a teacher/mentor by appreciating Anne’s story (“Such a turning point... is worth exploring and writing about,” email on June 25, 2008). I then responded from a reader’s perspective (e.g., “Your first paragraph successfully keeps my attention with you. But the second paragraph somewhat interrupts that flow. What if you continue with your uncle’s asking you to speak with your mother and your no-choice situation instead?”). I also made it “optional” for Anne to consult a handout on sentence structures and consult the usage of “image vs. imagine, hung.” Anne integrated some feedback, such as changing ‘image’ to ‘imagine’ and added why she kept silent: “because I knew no matter how hard I shouted, she never could hear my voice.” The meeting where the stories were to be shared orally was joined by nine members and two foreign guests—my American wife, Cathryn, and her Malaysian friend Chingyee. Both of them had met the group before and had become an important part of the group. At the first meeting on March 14, 2008, they talked in a friendly manner to the group members and helped me entertain the members with games and foods. Cathryn also attended the 13th meeting, wrote with the group on 298

the topic “Study Abroad,” and shared her sample with them (13V). The group and the guests sat in a circle in our well-lit living room in my temporary home. When it was Anne’s turn to read her story (9W_W), she gave a photocopy to each attendee and said with a smile, “First I will read this article and after I read it, maybe you have some questions.” Extract (place names in the text omitted): What her voice will be like? I constantly asked myself since I entered senior high school. In elementary school and middle school, I felt extremely disgusted for her voice. I never listened to her voice carefully. I didn’t image her voice until that day. When I was a freshman in senior high school, father suffered a serious illness. He needed a further check, so he had to go to [] with mother, and uncle would wait for them at []. One day when I was doing my homework in dormitory alone, all of a sudden, the phone rang. I was dreaded by the ring. I answered the phone, it was uncle. He told me mother and father had arrived at [], I was confused. So I asked why they went there. He told me the situation of father, I felt sad and anxious. He said if I wanted to talk to mother. I should have refused, for I knew she never picked up a phone, and I knew clearly she couldn’t hear my voice at all. But too late, she got the phone. “Anne, are you OK at school?” mother said, her voice was so loud that could penetrate my ear, but very clear.

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“Mom, I’m very well. Why do you go to []?” I said anxiously. “At school, you must take care of yourself, no hungry, no cold, and eat well. Do you understand that?” mother continuously said. “Mom, mom ......” I broke our crying. “Er ... and your father only need a physical check, not too serious. We will be back tomorrow, if possible, we can meet each other at the county. Do you have anything else to say?” mother said, never gave me a chance to say, her loud voice was still going on. I kept silent, because I knew no matter how hard I shouted, she never could hear my voice. “Since you have nothing to say, I will give the phone to your uncle” mother finally said. I said few words with uncle, totally controlling my feelings. Then I hung up the phone, could not help my tear at tall. In fact, her voice was so loud and clear, maybe beautiful. It was a pity that I didn’t find it before. But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it. It will be always around me no matter where I go. When Anne had finished reading her story, applause followed. Anne smiled again. Questions, answers, and comments continued for about seven minutes. Anne explained to my wife, Cathryn, about her mother’s hearing problem: “her ear not ... so good.” She told Matt

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that she had since learned to “cherish” her mother’s voice “because I think my mother is important—to me. And, and this time is my, is my, for the first time for my mother to pick the phone and also it was my first time to talk [to] her in [on the] phone.” Cathryn appreciated Anne’s expression in her story, “I really like that I LEARN TO TASTE HER VOICE AND CHERISH IT ... a very interesting image ... a very unique way of expressing that idea.” Lastly, Anne explained to Peter she “felt angry and anxious” because “they never ... let me know everything bad happened in my family.” These interactions at the meeting positioned Anne as the owner of yet another story (after “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” 4W_W), one which she shared via writing in English at the 14th meeting with fellow learners and some ‘outsider witnesses’ (White, 2007). She was in effect thickening the storyline (White, 2007) of accepting her mother. This storyline first emerged in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W): “I ... neve listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting ... I didn’t change my opinion until that day”). In “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W), her mother’s voice became the focus. Extract: In elementary school and middle school, I felt extremely disgusted for her voice. I never listened to her voice carefully. I didn’t image [really hear] her voice until that day. (¶1)

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In “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W), Anne’s position as a daughter was unclear. It was in answering another member, Matt’s, question that her position became clear.

M

... So you felt ((looking up and smiling at Anne)) very angry. Yes. At that time. ((Spoken in a falling tone.))

A

Why I felt angry?

M

Yeah, you have said, you, um

A

You mean why I felt angry at that time? ((speaking in a falling tone))

M

En, yes.

A

Because I also want to have a lovely umbrella like my classmates.

M

And now, what’s your feeling about that? (I: en)

A

Um, I feel grateful for [to] my mother ((laughing)). ((I nod my head.)) (11V)

Later in her revised conclusion to “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W), Anne showed clearly that she had accepted her mother. Extract: In fact, her voice was so loud and clear, maybe beautiful. It was a pity that I didn’t find it before. But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it. It wil always be around be no matter where I go.

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Here, Anne was storying a new self, an accepting daughter, more clearly than she had done in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W). So far, Anne’s autobiographical writing concerned a wound, one primarily associated with her relationship with her mother, as mediated by her experiences of poverty, and its process of healing at a family and relational level. “A Never Healed Wound” (11W, August 29), to be presented next, goes further, revealing how Anne’s previous poverty experiences became a lens through which she approached and understood new experiences. “A Never Healed Wound” (11W_W) The story recounted Anne’s recent experience of encountering a city girl from another province, who had taken a university-organised learning trip to the countryside in Anne’s hometown during the summer holiday (July– August). The city girl was “pretty,” “very kind and excellent.” Anne and she “soon became good friends and slept in one bed.” But a gap began to surface when the city girl revealed her childhood experiences. Extract: When she was a little child, her family traveled [to] so many places. She also told me how her parents taught her elder sister and her. ... an unspoken feeling occurred to me. I only felt how large the distance was, even though we were so near.

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... I saw the distance between us, and it was a never healed wound. But I also very clearly know it was not only the distance between us, but also the countryside and city’s. Anne’s story created a paradoxical image: two in one bed with an immense gap in between. What divided them were not only the different childhood stories, but also the different learning opportunities they each could access, simply because of where they had lived in China. Three aspects about this story are worth noting. Anne first mentioned the city girl in her introduction to a Chinese report “ ” (A Wound Never to Be Healed) (August 24; see Appendix O), which had won her an “Excellent Essay” award from her university. (Only three out of her class of 48 students won the award.) It was the first time Anne’s Chinese composition had been “praised” (5 I). Secondly, Anne re-wrote the story in English for the writing group. This may be related to several factors: that her encounter with the city girl had had a strong impact on her, that she was encouraged by the award and expected a similar affirmation from the writing group, that her previous experiences of sharing her English writing in the group had been positive, and that English was the written language of the group. Presumably, it would have been less likely for Anne to have done so for her “irresponsible” mentor, who did not seem to read her writing. Thirdly, Anne concluded her texts differently in Chinese and in English. In her Chinese report, after giving

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various

reasons,

Anne

concluded

sadly:

“

” (The big gap between countryside and city is a wound never to be healed). In contrast, she wrote in English with a greater sense of hope. Extract: On the way home, a dumb idea accidentally appeared to my mind: I wanted to change the situation of whole countryside. But now I’m not sure if it can come true. Maybe it is a daydream. I’m still looking forward to it any way. This comparison pointed to new possibilities associated with writing in an additional language (e.g., Krǎmsch & Lam, 1999; McKay, 1993; Pavlenko, 2001a; Steinman, 2005; You, 2008). In Anne’s case, re-writing the story, using a language different from the original, seems to have allowed her to outline an alternative future. In “A Never Healed Wound” (11W_W), Anne moved into a sociocultural context to understand the larger world of which she was a part. Anne’s engagement with this context not only showed the growing gap between countryside and city in China, but also imagined alternative possibilities, in which she would be an active agent. This, however, was not the end. In time, Anne would revisit her previous poverty experience and find alternative meanings, as is the case with “A Wound in My Soul” (14W_W). “A Wound in My Soul” (14W_W)

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During the second stage, our writing group was to focus on argumentative writing, but several times the members were encouraged to turn their experiences into 50-word poems as a way of learning to be concise.11 For the 32nd and the last meeting, to share with the group her best writing, Anne wrote an autobiographical poem about the same plastic sheet event recounted in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W). Eleven members and three foreign guests—Cathryn, Chingyee, and my Australian supervisor/advisor, Audrey—joined in the meeting. When it was Anne’s turn, she produced a small piece of lined paper, and, after a brief introduction, read her poem, “A Wound in My Soul” (14W_W; see Figure 7.4).

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Figure 7.4 “A Wound in My Soul” (14W _W). After finishing reading her poem, Anne translated it into Chinese. Applause followed. I was pleasantly surprised when Anne said, “This poem is also a gift to Nicholas” (32V). English writing was now serving an additional social function for Anne. This poem marked yet another journey Anne had travelled in making sense of her poverty experiences. The plastic sheet, described only as “clear” before, was now “small clean warm.” Her mother, who used to be represented as “ugly,” now, without being described as such, became anonymously represented in “she 307

gradually disappeared in the cold rain.” “I cried” revealed a shift of her feeling from mainly shame, as in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W), to “I was moved also I feel ashamed,” as she explained to Peter (32V). The multiple ‘potential meanings’ (Holquist, 2002; Robinson, 1999, pp. 200–201) of the plastic event were now grafted into alternative interpretations. Moreover, reading the line “A small figure gradually disappeared in the cold rain” (14W_W), I had a sense of Anne feeling loss for her mother. In the end, the event was the same, but the meaning lived by Anne now was not. It went deeper than the emotional hurt to the level of “a wound in my soul.” “Was I a Boy?” After the writing group was officially ended, Anne continued writing autobiographically in English. She shared her story “Was I a Boy?” with me in an email in March 2009. While this story again draws on her earlier experiences of poverty, it shows a different interpretation and representation of self. Extract: Was I a boy? one day one of my roomates bouget a new skirt. she liked it very much. she was standing ahead the mirror trying on her new skirt the moment i returned to our dorm. i blurted out instantly” it is a boy’s shirt.” “boy’s shirt,” oh, a boy’s shirt appears not to very strange for me. in fact, i was extremely familiar with it.

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to tell the truth, my childhood was went through by wearing boy’s clothes.(what an amazing girl!) we only had a little money to support four mouths. even sometimes, we merely had rice, no any vegetables. we just ate rice with chilli. so we could not afford any clothes. every member of my family wore some old clothes given by many kind-hearted people. i have an aunt. she has three chilren—two boys and one daughter. they are all older than me. therefore, it seemed thant i was destined to be the successor of their chothes. most time i wore my elder brother’s chothes, seldom my elder sister’s. so i can say it was the boy’s chothes that occupied my whole childhood. that day my roomate bought a “boy’s shirt,” an unusal childhood occured to me. a lovely girl with boy’s clothes was playing without any shyness, worry and shame. it is an interesting and unforgetable episode in my life. maybe i was ever a boy. This sample contains some apparent errors such as capitalizations, spacing and confusion between “skirt” and “shirt.” Nonetheless, it is a sample that links her present life with her past. In particular, it adds details to Anne’s poverty-stricken childhood (“no any vegetables,” “could not afford any clothes”). Perhaps more importantly, it situates Anne in the context of a caring community: “every member of my family wore some old clothes given by many kind-hearted people.” It also provides a positive self-evaluation by Anne (“What an amazing girl!” “a lovely girl with boy’s clothes was playing without any shyness, worry and shame.”). This image of self contrasts sharply with the previous

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self-understandings associated with shame, hurt, and estranged family relationships. Her playful comment “maybe I was ever a boy” reminds me of the recurrent theme of Abby, another member’s identity as a boy-like girl (see Chapter 4). Like her poem “A Wound in My Soul,” Anne’s story “Was I a Boy?” immediately suggested to me that Anne has constructed a Christian identity. This kind of interpretation, however, is not plausible. For one thing, Anne wrote the story in March 2009, one or two months before she became a Christian. Anne’s conversion was somewhere in early May 2009 (“tell you a news about myself, i join a christian party which teaches us the holy bible every week. i have deicded to accept christ and believe in him,” Anne’s email on May 2, 2009). Yet Anne had already shared the story with me in March 2009. As Anne clarified, “ ” (I wrote the composition before I knew Jesus. That night, I could not fall asleep. Then out of nowhere I remembered my Auntie, so I wrote the composition.) For another, people with worldviews other than Christianity may also accord positive meanings to difficult experiences in their lives. “ ” (The more you can suffer, the better you become than others) — this traditional Chinese saying, for instance, suggests that suffering makes a person stronger. Nonetheless, it seems fair to suggest that in a relational space formed between Anne and her Christian associates, she has found alternative positions to take regarding her childhood poverty experiences. For instance, in another email 310

where Anne revealed her conversion, she showed a happy state of mind: “I feel very happy and in this summer holiday our christians will have a camp with some foreigners. I am looking forward to it.” Her admiration for me (“I admire you very much.”), a public Christian, may have also encouraged her to adopt a different stance towards her own childhood. Whatever be the reason, the multiple possible meanings of Anne’s autobiographical writing in English, with ambiguity at times, do seem to suggest the rich capacity such kind of writing has in positioning her among her various readerships. Comment Anne’s autobiographical writing samples, as presented in the preceding, suggest an intricate relationship between what she wrote autobiographically and her ongoing identity work. First of all, several English-writing-mediated identities can be observed in her EFL autobiographical writing samples. They include her identities as a victim of financial difficulties (e.g., “God Has Tricked Me,” 1W_M), as a daughter of a poor mother (e.g., “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” 4W_W), and as a girl from the countryside (e.g., “A Never Healed Wound,” 11W_W). In a broad sense, Anne communicated her multiple social identities through her autobiographical writing to other group members. In communicating these identities, Anne performed them, painting what she was like in different social relations through her stories. An especially poignant example is her childhood identity as a daughter, as

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constructed through her early autobiographical writing samples such as “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood.” Anne used socially unfavourable words such as “ugly” to describe her mother in these samples. She also highlighted her own emotions, such as angry reactions towards having to wear a plastic sheet in a storm. In contrast, the other characters in her early autobiographical writing—her mother, her classmates, God, etc.—were not accorded feelings. Therefore, it is fitting to use Anne’s own words to say that she wanted her readers to see through “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” a daughter who was “ ” or who did not understand things (9 I). Textually speaking at least, she constructed a self-focused daughter who did not know her self apart from her material lack, and her mother, as a primary caregiver, was held responsible. These performed identities of Anne’s, in relation to her ‘illiterate,” farming, ethnic Bai parents in the countryside, accentuate her positions of limited power. Materially, she had little, not even “an umbrella” to shelter her in a storm. Educationally, she read, travelled, and learned little, especially in comparison to the city girl she met on a village trip. Ethnically, she was disfavourably positioned by the local cultural dynamics. Not being able to speak Mandarin well when she entered university made her feel “ashamed.” Not being able to pass Chinese written exams started in her “a fear for writing.” Not knowing “Chinese history and culture” made her feel “shameful,” as shown in the following free sample (see Figure 7.5) written during the eighth group meeting of the second stage on October 8, 2008.

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Figure 7.5 Anne’s free writing. Note that culture in this text is a singular noun, attributed to China as “a great nation.” Note also Anne’s positioning of herself as a minority in terms of limited cultural knowledge: “I am one of these dull people” who “don’t know their country’s history and culture.” Therefore, relating to the dominant Han culture as the other in the public education system in China, Anne occupied an identity position of deficiency and inferiority. In addition to performing the aforementioned identities, Anne also reflected on some of these identities through her multi-drafts over the same or related people and events. Her initial performed identities were based on singular conclusions she drew about self and or others. For example, as an early articulation of her life as a whole, Anne’s life river and three God-related titles portrayed God as a trickster and herself “a poor dog” and “a unlucky dog” (3D/W_W). In the same vein, her mother was “ugly and disgusting.” Importantly, within these texts, Anne cast little doubt regarding her representations. But gradually, alternative 313

storyline of others, particularly featuring her mother, began to emerge and grow. When it first appeared in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W), this alternative storyline was indistinct. That’s why group members such as Matt asked Anne how she felt about her mother now (11V). In her later text “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W), read at the 16th group meeting, Anne first expressed her discovery of possible new meanings about her mother’s voice: “In fact, her voice was so loud and clear, maybe beautiful. It was a pity that I didn’t find it before.” She then very clearly expressed her acceptance of her mother: “But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it.” Similarly, in “A Wound in My Soul” (14W_W), she no longer represented her mother as “ugly,” but as a caring and suffering figure. There was even an element of Anne being “moved” by her mother for bringing her a plastic sheet and Anne showing admiration for her mother’s character.12 As Anne explained about the “small clean warm plastic”: Extract: “Small”, because I was just a child. My mother certainly took a small piece of plastic to me.” Clean”, because my mother loved me, and she was a very careful woman( ) “Warm”, because the plastic was hidden under my mother’s coat. (Anne’s email on May 8, 2010. Spacing as in the original. The words in Chinese mean: My family was poor, but she had aspirations.)

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Anne’s changed representations of her mother deserve further comments. By textualising her mother’s voice and values, Anne’s autobiographical writing provides a counter-narrative to the master narrative about the ethnic Bai people and people in the countryside as inferior. More specifically, they mark Anne’s definite movement away from a deficit identity position as the daughter of an ‘ugly,’ ‘illiterate,’ ‘deaf’ Bai country mother to a more self-enabling identity position as the daughter of a loving, ‘careful,’ and aspiring mother. An obvious turn in Anne’s understanding of her childhood self is seen in her most recent sample “Was I a Boy?” While thickening her childhood experience of poverty by adding new examples, Anne primarily expressed a sense of her growing up in a caring community formed by her extended family members and a sense of her self as “an amazing girl” not restricted by her experiences of material lack. Based on these examples, it seems reasonable to suggest that through Anne’s frequent English-writing-mediated reflections on her childhood experiences, Anne has generated multiple identity conclusions about both self and other, some of which provide her with more self-enabling positions to take. Some of Anne’s other autobiographical writing suggests that she also used autobiographical writing in English to re-envision or imagine new possibilities for her self. Writing her report in Chinese, the language of the locally dominant cultural other, Anne expressed a sense of powerlessness, as shown through her title, “

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” (A Wound Never to Be Healed). Re-writing it in English, a language Anne perceived as having some special power, in contrast, Anne expressed a sense of hope for the future in which she would be a change agent: “I wanted to change the situation of whole countryside.” Maybe, writing in English, the language of a globally dominant cultural other offset the imbalanced power relation between Chinese and Bai, allowing her to experiment with new possibilities. Maybe, too, writing for an appreciative writing group allowed Anne to be more daring in imagining her future self. Or maybe Anne’s report writing in Chinese paved the way for her to adopt new imagined identity positions in her English autobiographical writing. At any rate, as far as her future is concerned, Anne embarked on new identity options as mediated by writing autobiographically in English as an additional language. Taken as a whole, Anne’s autobiographical writing clearly shows signs of re-authoring. One sign is Anne’s re-representations of her mother along a more self-enabling storyline. Another sign is Anne’s re-representation of herself as an agent to bridge the gap between the countryside and the city and as “an amazing girl” unrestrained by her material want. With implications for EFL education, by actively engaging in autobiographical writing in the writing group, Anne also re-authored herself as a writer and learner. At the last writing group meeting, during which she shared her poem, Anne drew another tree (see Figure 7.6, the tree on the right) to represent herself as a writer

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after joining the writing group. Compared to her first tree, it was “tall and strong,” with “so many fruits” (32V).

Figure 7.6 Anne’s two trees. Anne’s new writer identity conclusion, as shown by her “tree” images and captions, was based on her reflections on what she had learned and what she could do through autobiographical writing. More specifically, it entailed her increased knowledge (e.g., from “knowing little” to “know more about writing” such as “the importance of a title”13) and her new relationship with writing (e.g., from “I write just for examinations, I hate it” to “I can express my feelings freely in my biography”). A detail worth noting is that Anne consistently suggested that autobiographical writing in the group had had a great impact on her. Reflecting on the autobiographical stage, she wrote in “My Harvest” (7W_W, June 20): “The semester I find myself change a lot, because an 317

interesting activity adds my life some colour, and makes my bag full of knowledge and joys.” She then gave some examples to illustrate what she had learned in the group (e.g., “the ingredients of an autobiograph, the organization of an article, how to write a attractive title and so on”). Significantly, such knowledge remained with her at the end of the writing group, as shown by the two examples she listed next to her second tree picture: “the importance of a title” and “how to write the first paragraph, especially the first sentence.” By writing autobiographically in the group, Anne moved from giving a summary of restriction, deficit, and disengagement to showing a sense of knowledge, agency, and confidence when describing herself as a writer. Anne’s movements in her writer identity are social. Through writing autobiographically and sharing her samples with the writing group, she established her new writer identity within the group. As Beth’s following comments suggest, Anne had been viewed by “the others like us,” probably referring to other group members, as a particular kind of writer: someone who “tends to write about relationships and family,” produces “thought-provoking” writing, and “is very good at her grammar.” B

Anne

I

(Yeah?)

B I

(I think Anne’s writing is pretty good.)

(En.) (Why?) 318

, , , B

I B

I

(First of all, the materi chose for her writing is different from ours. She tends to write relationships and family. For others like us, we tend to write ab emotions rather than these things. I think what she wrote thought-provoking to us.) (Yeah?)

(En, I think her writing is really good, and she is very good at her gr too.) (Very good, she should be very hear this.) (5 I, Bt., October 23)

Moreover, Anne’s shifts in her writer identity are transformative. Anne’s participation in EFL autobiographical writing in the writing group seems to have had ripple effects on her as a Chinese writer as well. As mentioned earlier, in August 2008, Anne wrote a report in Chinese titled “ ” (A Wound Never to Be Healed), which won her—as one among three of the 48 students from her class—an “Excellent Essay” award from her university. According to Anne, up until then—from primary school to university—her Chinese writing had “never been praised” (5 I). Although her teacher sometimes “picked

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some good composition to read us,” this had never happened to Anne’s writing (5 I). Thus, winning the award was a breakthrough for Anne as a writer in Chinese. Three details about Anne’s report are worth noting. Anne wrote the article a few weeks after the autobiographical writing stage. By then, she had read to the group several autobiographical samples, including “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) and “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (6W_W), and had been “prised [praised] by others” for her English writing for the first time. In addition, Anne’s report had obvious autobiographical elements. She first talked about the famine stories her mother had told her and her sister during their childhood (see extract that follows). She then connected these stories with her recent encounter with a city girl during her trip to the countryside. Extract:

Mother told me and Younger Sister a lot about their lives in the past. It was in her “stories” like these that we grew up. After this village trip, I suddenly had an unnamed feeling—because during the trip, I met a teammate who grew up in the city. After living with her for a few short days, I saw a gap between the two of us, and the gap was not only between us. I believe it is also 320

the gap between city and countryside, and it is a wound never to be healed. Furthermore, the report used a metaphor “ ” (wound), which was implicated or appeared in many of Anne’s autobiographical samples in English. In “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W), the wound was implicit and interpersonal, as in her description, “I... sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting.” In “A Never Healed Wound” (11W_W), the “wound” was both interpersonal (“the distance between us [the city girl and me] ... was a never healed wound”) and concerning the larger national community, in the sense reflected in Grant’s (1997, 2001) category of ‘global context.’ It referred to the growing disparity between the countryside and the city in China (“I also very clearly know it [the wound] was ... also the countryside and city’s”), similar to the “wound” expressed in her Chinese report. In Anne’s 50-word poem (14W_W), the “wound” went deeper as “a wound in my soul,” suggesting a deeply felt wound associated with the plastic sheet event she had written about before. Based on these three details and her drawings, it seems reasonable to suggest that through the experiences of writing autobiographically in the group, Anne found something significant about her personal experiences. It offered her a powerful way to stand as a knower (“I gradually know more”) and as a writer (“I can express my feelings freely in my biography”). It also offered her a powerful way to relate to the larger world (countryside and city); to make sense of her experiences (e.g., meeting a city girl and the plastic sheet event); to

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re-story them from multiple dimensions of contexts (personal, social, national); and to continue being herself, at least metaphorically (e.g., by using “wound”), across genres (narrative, report, and poem) and languages (English and Chinese). The shift in Anne’s identity as a learner may be observed by comparing her later autobiographical writing samples language features against those of her first sample, “My Feeling about Writing” for the group (see “Previous Literacy Experiences” in this chapter for details). First, about half of Anne’s clauses in these autobiographical samples take “I” as the subject, 63% in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” instead of “we” referring to English major students as a group. It suggests that in her autobiographical writing, Anne positioned herself explicitly as a heroine and character in active interactions with diverse others. The second feature is Anne’s frequent use of emotionally charged words and expressions in her autobiographical writing (e.g., “I cried, so did the God.”). It adds flesh to her narratively constructed selves as a daughter. The third feature is her frequent use of words such as “maybe” in her autobiographical writing in contrast to the absolute “must” and “should.” Recall Anne’s reflection on her mother’s voice on the phone: “In fact, her voice was so loud and clear, maybe beautiful.” Recall also Anne’s expressed desire to change the countryside: “I wanted to change the situation of whole countryside. But now I’m not sure if it can come true. Maybe it is a daydream. I’m still looking forward to it anyway.” Together, Anne’s three different ways of languaging in English show a much more personally involved yet tentative way of

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self-positioning. It is as if through writing her life stories in English, Anne has moved to the more unstable and unpredictable terrains of her life: terrains filled with alternative meanings and different future possibilities. It is impossible to tease out exactly to what extent autobiographical writing, English, and the writing group each contributed to these shifts in Anne’s English-writing-mediated identities and writer identity. After all, these features were intertwined in the kind of writing Anne engaged in and should be understood as such. Nonetheless, evidence suggests that they all made distinctive contributions to the shifts Anne made. Firstly, autobiographical writing repositioned Anne as a knower, both of her own poverty experiences and particular ways of narrating. As a significant part of her autobiographical memories, these experiences were “carved in my mind and soul” (4W_W). As narratives, their structuring was modelled, at least in part, by the poverty stories she grew up hearing her mother telling. Yet this sense of herself as a knower did not stop at autobiographical writing. Instead, it seems to have continued on, assisting her to transition from autobiographical writing to argumentative writing during the second stage. For instance, according to Anne, one major difficulty in argumentative writing was finding “powerful evidence,” which could include “famous people’s story ... their biography, and their saying, and maybe some true things happened in reality, in daily life” (5 I). She further explained that “some views and the examples in the autobiography can be used in the argumentative writing ... to support a writer’s opinion” (18V). That is probably why Anne would start her award-winning report in

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Chinese, “ poverty stories.

,” with her mother’s

Secondly, writing in English positioned Anne as a confident and capable writer. Anne’s past experience of writing in Chinese was primarily one of failure and fear. “All the time I just (could not finish?) my compositions in tests. So I developed a fear for writing” (2 I). Furthermore, not having a rich vocabulary in Chinese, a must-have according to Anne, also restricted her as a Chinese writer (2 I). Even with her award-winning Chinese report, Anne said, “I think it’s not good. Because I can’t use some beautiful words to express my feelings” (5 I). That language choice mattered to Anne as a writer was most clear in her statement, “You can write a lot in English using a few simple words, because—which is impossible in Chinese” (2 I).14 Anne made this comment in the context of describing her frustrating experiences of writing in Chinese (2 I). She gave two examples about writing diaries in English and Chinese in high school and at university. When [I was] writing an English diary every day in high school, there were no difficult words to understand. There were hardly any new words. Just use some simple words to keep an account of what happened. [But] I couldn’t do it in Chinese. Sometimes I felt the words were still very difficult. (2 I)15

(Do you still write your dia

I:

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A:

(I:

) (I:

)

Um, not any more, because our mentor told us not to write diaries in English, but to try to write dairies in Chinese. So I stopped writing in Chinese.... Now I can’t understand why [I should stop writing in English. So] I start using English to write [again]; I can’t write in Chinese. (2 I) In other words, it was not English per se, but Anne’s perception of Chinese and English, as shaped by her previous experiences of writing in these two languages, that made English writing more accessible for her. Anne’s aforementioned autobiographical writing samples in the writing group may illustrate how much she could say something substantial with “a few simple words.” Anne did not use complicated vocabulary in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) or “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W) or “A Wound in My Soul” (11W_W). Nonetheless, these stories were powerful to read. For instance, one international reader commented on a collection of 50-word poems written by the group members, ‘I find “A Wound in My Soul” extremely powerful and moving.’ Thirdly, the writing group repositioned Anne as a writer with a real responsive audience. As shown earlier, as a title, “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W) was born in the context of her reading others’

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texts, followed by the members’ attempts to write differently from each other. When Anne completed her story, she intended to “show it off” at a group meeting (2E). It was in the writing group that Anne was “praised” for her writing in English for the first time in her life (1E). Even her controversial description of her mother as “ugly” (4W_W) was responded to with empathy. As one member, Abby, commented at the meeting, “I have the same experience and same feeling [about my parents] but now when I recall, I feel regret” (11V). Autobiographical writing, English, and a supportive writing group by no means exhaust possible contributors to Anne’s shifts mentioned in the preceding. Nevertheless, together, these three dimensions of genre, language, and social context form a stark contrast with Anne’s previous test-related experiences of writing in Chinese and English and her ongoing but unsatisfying experiences of doing English writing for her mentor. Put in a re-stor(y)ing/transformative context (Grant, 2001), or a third space, Anne’s stories invite literacy educators to consider new possibilities in EFL education. I offer four general ideas drawing on sociocultural theories of learning, introduced in Chapter 2. First, writing tasks need to speak to EFL learners’ heart desires. If learners have a desire like Anne does, always wanting to write down their stories, inviting them to write autobiographically may contribute to active and sustained writing processes with multiple revisions. Accordingly, it may be worthwhile considering providing autobiographical writing as an elective course in adult EFL programs for interested learners.

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Second, scaffold learners’ writing processes. This entails designing a conducive learning environment similar to the writing group, in which struggling writers are re-positioned as knowers and capable learners. This further entails timely support to help EFL learners move beyond what they know about writing. Suppose their demonstrated level of competence is naming an event significant to them; their potential levels may be developing the event into a story or several stories, alongside learning English-writing conventions. Suppose their demonstrated level of competence is writing an important life story in one language; their potential levels may be writing the same story in other languages as well, thus creating bilingual or multilingual ‘identity texts’ (Cummins et al., 2005). Such texts may not only provide insights into how EFL learners use different languages to position themselves; they may also serve as stepping-stones for EFL to reposition their own languages as potential resources to draw upon in making multi-competent (Cook, 1992) writer identities rather than as ‘baggage and interference’ to jettison (Block, 2007b). Such texts may further provide opportunities for EFL learners to re-examine their own or others’ dichotomist representations of self and other, including their first and additional languages, through critical lenses such as language learning trajectories and critical discourse theories. That is why I was so delighted when Anne, in an interview, unlike other ethnic Bai members in the group, expressed a strong desire for writing her life stories in Bai, a script that she had yet to learn.

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Third, be supportive in learners’ identity work. Writing autobiographically, if sustained, may involve writers’ development of ‘multi-voiced’ (White, 2005, p. 13) or “multi-storied” understandings of self and other, some of which may enable the learners to stand as agentive beings. With the participation of supportive others, the learners may learn about multiple meanings of their experiences and to see themselves as people and writers through the eyes of others, such as their immediate audience of writing peers. In Anne’s case, she re-authored her identity from a writer “just for examinations” to a writer of multiple stories, with multiple meanings of poverty, her mother, and herself. What Anne has written about in English autobiographically is far beyond “merely a small clean warm plastic.” It reveals her multiple social identities and their evolving processes. It also suggests a potential space in which EFL learners may stand as agentive writers and learners, and in which dichotomous thinking of the world gives way to deepened understandings about self and other.

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8 Comparisons Across the Four Case Studies The individual case studies (Chapters 4–7) have revealed traces of identity work in the four student writers’ EFL autobiographical writing in the writing group. This chapter seeks to deepen this understanding by comparing the four case studies. It contains three sections. The first section begins by suggesting autobiographical writing in this educational context as a social practice, which will be revisited at the end of the chapter after presenting additional evidence from the four case studies. The second analyses the three contexts, particularly the writing group as a social context, in which the EFL autobiographical writing took place. The third develops in two parts: presenting four identifiable phases of English-writing-mediated identity work and discussing the shifts of writer identities in different ways in relation to autobiographical writing in the writing group. Re-Conceptualising Autobiographical Educational Contexts

Writing

in

A minimal definition of autobiographical writing, i.e., any writing about any aspects of a writer’s life experiences, such as was introduced in Chapter 2 as a point of entry, falls short of capturing its actual complexities. Data show that in at least six ways, the writing group arrangement shaped the members’ autobiographical writing. Accordingly, I re-conceptualise the kind of educationally based autobiographical writing practised in this particular

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writing group in this study as a specific kind of social practice. First, the writing group provided an active, responsive, and intertwined audience for the members’ writing of their life experiences. Most of the time, the audience was only other members of the group. Occasionally, as in the case of the last group meeting, the audience also included other visitors. More importantly, as part of establishing a mutually supportive, interactive frame for the group, I set up the meetings in such a way that the members were often invited to read their writing samples to the group and other members and other visitors were encouraged to make comments, often with each attendee having a copy of the writing samples at hand. This kind of ‘literacy event’ (Heath, 1982a; Heath et al., 2008) seemed to have given some members incentives to not only write autobiographically, but also to engage with others and revise what they wrote based on others’ comments. For instance, for the “oral publication” at the 16th meeting, Anne, Beth, and Matt all shared their revised samples: “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (An.), “A Forty Minutes’ Teacher” (Bt.), and “The Smile Became Special” (Mt.). Anne emailed her draft to me, asking for advice for revision before she would “show it off” to the group (An. 2 E). Matt’s revisions were mainly based on his own plan that was formed during Interview II with me. In addition, my text-related responses seemed to have added more complexities to his composing process. As Matt reflected: Extract:

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Matt’s reflections on his autobiographical writing process On the process of writing autobiography ... there were many things to think about, such as your writing style, your emotion in the writing, etc. I had to “answer” many questions in the writing: why do you want to write this passage? what is the context for writing? which part of the writing is the best you feel? (31W) Except for the question about style, these were questions I often asked the members during interviews and meetings. It appears that Matt had integrated such considerations into his writing process. Second, the autobiographical orientation of the writing group foregrounded the members’ life experiences, as reflected by my multiple invitations for the members to write autobiographically. My first invitation was a long-term overarching one. My written introduction to my research made clear to the potential participants that, if they joined the voluntary group, they were expected to work on their “EFL autobiographical projects” with the writing group during the first semester. Within this overall context, I made several more specific invitations: e.g., asking the members to design “three to five attractive titles” for their “autobiography chapters” (3V) or to turn their stories into a 50-word poem (e.g., 31V). I also consider the three “oral publications” as implicit invitations for the members to write autobiographically. Using the “oral publication” at the 16th meeting as an example, I made the announcement about it during the 14th meeting, framing the activity as an end-of-the-semester or 332

end-of-the-autobiographical-writing-stage “celebration” (14V). The “celebration” was to be held at my home, with complimentary food, and to be joined by my wife, Cathryn, and her Malaysian friend Chingyee. For the occasion, I asked the members to prepare to share a piece of writing that they were most satisfied with (see Appendix N). We negotiated the best time for the meeting. To make sure that they understood what I meant, I gave them each a handout with the details of the 16th meeting. The night before the 16th meeting, I sent an email to the members with similar instructions to remind them, adding a map to my home and an extra explanation: “Do come also even if you don’t think you have any ‘best’ writing yet. Sometimes even hearing others’ writing or talking about writing is beneficial for us writers” (email on June 24, 2008). The other two “oral publications” were organised in a similar fashion (7th and 31st meeting plans). Third, I scaffolded the group members’ writing about their life experiences by modelling. During the writing group activities, I shared a number of my writing samples on my own life experiences with the members. Some samples dealt with my life as a whole. They include “My Life River,” “My Chapter Titles,” and “Guided Autobiography”—the third one drawing on the guidelines provided by McAdams. Some samples dealt with significant events in my life. They include “My First Picture” (see Appendix P), “I Am a Sinner?” (see Appendix Q), “Love Kills,” and “My Favourite Poem.” Some other samples featured my experiences of learning English, e.g., “Find a Friend in English,” “Learning to

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Write in English and Trying to Become,” and “The Joy of Learning English.” These samples, most of which went through multiple revisions, performed at least three social functions. First of all, they demonstrated to the student members that it was legitimate for them to write about their personal experiences and dreams in the group context. Furthermore, they illustrated the use of first-person singular pronouns such as “I,” which was one of the linguistic features I used in this study to locate autobiographical writing samples (see Chapter 3). Moreover, by sharing my samples and revising processes with the student members, I positioned myself as a learner writer like them, a practice informed by critical pedagogy (Graves, 1983; Kesselman-Turkel & Peterson, 1981) that challenged the traditional teacher-centred relationships in a Chinese EFL educational context. Fourth, the group members’ writing about their life experiences engaged the audience at a meaningful level. Two samples suffice for illustration. The first sample is Anne’s “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone.” After Anne read it to the group, another member, Peter, asked her why she felt “angry and anxious” when she learned that her mother had gone to the county seat. My wife first asked why Anne wrote, “no matter how hard I shouted, she never could hear my voice.” She then expressed appreciation for Anne’s expression, “But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it.” The second sample “My University Life,” by Hope, in which she recounted her experience of running into a wrong dormitory during her early days at university, as illustrated by the following extract.

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Extract: In the early days in campus I did well. I relaxed. But later on, I made a mistake at one night. After class, I hurried to my dorm floor and the stairs were so long. I climbed step by step quickly and marched in the room at last. But what I saw three strange girls. They looked at me and said: “Yes? “I ... En.... Is [] in?” I asked. I felt a cold sweat broke out on my head of course [] was not in and I think you know what happened then. My dorm room is on the below floor. Hope read her sample at the 13th meeting. As soon as she finished reading the paragraph quoted in the preceding, the group laughed happily (13V). Cathryn, who was visiting at the meeting, commented how funny Hope’s description was. In interactions like these, the focus was not on the technical aspects of writing, as it had been for the four case study participants in their prior literacy experiences, but on the meanings the writers tried to communicate. Fifth, the group members’ writing about their life experiences was a site of struggle over contesting social perspectives manifested through group interactions over various writing samples. Taking as an example “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” in which Anne wrote about her mother, “I ... even felt her ugly and disgusting.” As shown in Chapter 7, Anne’s representation of her mother led to a heated discussion among the group members (11V). Peter and Mary commented that it was not appropriate for Anne to describe her mother as “ugly.” Hope commented that it 335

was fine for Anne to feel the way she did because she was just a child. Abby suggested that ugly described a person’s character rather than appearance. My written comments were that it took Anne “courage to tell the story,” and that the story was “powerful,” “painfully beautiful,” showing the “demoralising power of poverty.” In response to these comments from the group, Anne showed still another social perspective in an interview, i.e., that “in [the] countryside most people ... are not [as] pretty or beautiful than [as] the people in city. Because they are very, very tired” (2 I). Anne’s later samples, e.g., “A Never Healed Wound” (11W_W), in which she reflected on the growing gap between the countryside and the city in China, were thus grounded in these prior interactions within the group, a multi-voiced (Bakhtin, 1981; Holquist, 2002; Prior, 2001) or multi-perspectival social space. Besides other writing group members and visitors, many social others in the four writers’ previous experiences also spoke through their autobiographical samples. Anne’s titles “God Has Tricked Me,” “God Tricked Me,” and “God Is Tricking Me” were shaped by her interactions with people around her, probably her fellow villagers, who would complain at times of life difficulties: “Truly the Old Heavenly Master grows no eyes” (9 I, An.). Similarly, Abby’s unfinished draft “When I Was Mourning” featured both her teachers’ stories about earthquake victims in China and “From Life to Death,” a rock ‘n’ roll song. In the same vein, Matt’s claim “Everyone of us should become confident” echoed his classmate’s words in an English class, “Every time we should be confident.” The same kind of social

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influence was found in Beth’s diary entry about her experience of being cheated, which reported her parents’ view of her as “a pure girl without enough social experience.” These examples show that autobiographical writing in this particular writing group was not exclusively self-sustained but ‘multi-voiced’ (Bakhtin, 1981; Prior, 2001), shaped by the members’ ‘autobiographical selves,’ i.e., their previous encounters with others in all their complexities (Ivanič, 1998), and informed by multiple social sources. Last but not least, as volunteers, the members shared equal rights and responsibilities as participating members. As a group leader, I positioned myself mainly as a facilitator of group activities by writing with the members, sharing my samples with them, giving them meaning-focused feedback (see Appendix K for an example), and inviting them to share their writing samples with the group. Even foreign visitors were positioned as learner writers when they wrote, revised, and shared their writing samples with the group on topics such as “study abroad” and “my fear when writing” (13V and 23V). To summarise, autobiographical writing in this study was socially situated. It occurred in a particular social context, an extracurricular writing group, which served as an audience for the four case study participants, but also sometimes as direct or indirect co-authors. The arrangement entailed my invitations for them to write autobiographically and my scaffolding practices through modelling. For the group as a whole, including me, it also entailed meaningful interactions within the group,

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contesting social perspectives within and beyond the writing group, and an equal relationship among the group members. Accordingly, in the remainder of this chapter and in Chapter 9, what I mean by autobiographical writing is a social practice, through which the writers make personal and social understandings of their life experiences by writing with an egalitarian group. This definition will be further refined at the end of this chapter by including potential identity work involved in autobiographical writing. Comparison of Contexts Identity work, as conceptualised in Chapter 2, entails ‘investment,’ narrative understanding, and ideological positioning (Bakhtin, 1994; Peirce, 1995; White, 2007). As such, it should be understood in its particular contexts. Following a multi-storied approach (Grant, 1997, 2001), I will consider four interpenetrating contexts, i.e., the personal, the social, the broad cultural/ global, and the transformative, across the four case studies. The Personal Context The personal context foregrounds the selected EFL writers’ individual histories. Like Ivanič’s (1998) notion of ‘autobiographical self’ introduced in Chapter 2, the personal context contains writers’ sense of self, and more specifically, their individual dispositions and interests, etc., as shaped by their past experiences. There are a number of similarities among the four EFL writers. They had all spoken two languages before learning English in middle school and majored in 338

English at the same university. All had written in English, an additional language, primarily in tests; favoured narrative writing; been active participants in the writing group activities; and made movements in their writer identities. The four writers also showed four significant differences. First, they had different major reasons for joining the writing group. Anne wanted to “improve [her] poor English.” Beth thought “written autobiography could continue [her] literature dream.” Matt regarded the writing group as a place to “practise both our spoken and writing English,” to “know more friends,” and to improve his “interpersonal skills.” In contrast, Abby was desperate; the writing group seemed her last chance before she gave up studying English. Second, the four writers had rather different literacy backgrounds. Anne and Beth were in the second semester as first-year students when they joined the writing group. Anne’s parents were “illiterate” farmers. She had not been in the habit of borrowing books from her school library or buying her own books; “had a fear for writing” (in Chinese]) due to frequent failures in Chinese writing tests; felt restrained by her small vocabulary in Chinese; had always wanted to write down her own stories; wrote mainly for examinations and hated it; regarded it as easier to do narrative than argumentative writing (“just to write as if keeping a record”); regarded it as easier to write in English than in Chinese (“You can write a lot in English using a few simple words ... which is impossible in Chinese.”); and had written for an “irresponsible” mentor, who,

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according to Anne, had not read or commented on her writing assignments. In comparison, Beth had had a more positive reading and writing experience in Chinese. She had read many classics, especially tragedies; had once been praised by her classmates for her analysis in a Chinese essay (“analysis of issues is clear and precise”); had had a “literature dream” in Chinese; had not chosen English as her major; wrote English mainly for her mentor and in her diary; and believed that “the standard of test-oriented education is that you can only write about the positive aspects [of issues].” In contrast, the next two case study participants, Matt and Abby, were in their second semester as third-year students when they joined the writing group. I knew little about Matt’s pre-university experiences as a reader and writer except that his writing in Chinese had occasionally been selected by his teachers as a model for other students. At university, Matt had learned various strategies for writing in English, such as paying attention to cultural differences, memorising model essays, and imitating example sentences from the dictionary. Abby had started reading when young; had read many classics, especially Western novels; had won Chinese writing contests almost every year at school; and had received mixed comments for her Chinese writing (“Good writing, poor, poor handwriting!”). At university, she wrote in English mainly for examinations and her teachers’ assignments; had received a comment on her first English letter indicating that it contained “The worst kind of mistake!”; and regretted choosing English as her major.

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Third, the four writers approached EFL autobiographical writing differently. Anne foregrounded her experiences of poverty and relationships with her parents. Beth featured her “dreams,” university experiences, and associated understandings of self. Matt centred on his selected experiences as a child, a son, a young man in love, and a test-taker. Abby emphasised her “feelings and thinkings,” albeit modelled by what she read and listened to, in relation to her home, school, and university experiences. Fourth, the four writers had different understandings of themselves as learners. Matt used “Interesting [Interest] is the best teacher” (1 I, Mt.) to motivate himself. Anne foregrounded her perseverance with “But I stick to it,” her way of responding to challenges in the learning process (e.g., 7W_W, An.). Abby seemed to struggle to stay on track (“with my study, I’m constantly distracted, 3 I, Ab.). Beth appeared spontaneous, “ ” (I do whatever comes to my mind, 1 I, Bt.). As the major component of the personal context, the four writers’ unique histories provided a foundation upon which their identity work took place. However, both revealing the known and working on the new took place in a specific social context and took different shapes for the different writers. The Social Context Three social domains in particular, i.e., home, the English department, and the writing group, contextualized the four writers’ EFL autobiographical writing. First, the participants’ homes were marked by a common lack of support in English. None of the four 341

participants could share their autobiographical writing in English with their family members, who knew little (e.g., Abby’s brother and sister) or nothing at all of English (e.g., Anne’s parents). Second, the Foreign Languages College of Lakeview University influenced the four writers’ writing through its priorities, policies, and practices. Writing was not an important component in the departmental curriculum. It was one of the shortest courses offered by the department: two periods (or 80 minutes) weekly for 18 weeks, half of the instruction time compared to Listening and one-twelfth of the time for Integrated Reading. The focus of the writing course depended on the individual writing teachers. Based on personal interactions with Anne and Beth’s writing teacher, as well as non-participant observations in classes (from September to December 2008), their writing class focused on exposition, with assigned topics such as “Why Was the Olympics Successful?” One important departmental policy was the “ ” (mentor system). Started in 2006, this policy required that the mentors should, among other responsibilities, ensure that their students wrote “50 passages of 250–300 words (description, narration, exposition and argumentative)” in English before graduation (based on departmental advertisement, September 2008, my translation from Chinese). This policy influenced both Anne and Beth, who entered the department in 2007, but it did not have any impact on Abby and Matt, who had entered the department in 2005. In practice, the mentors differed greatly. Anne said that her mentor was “not so responsible,” leaving it up to her as to what to write and how to write. In response, Anne wrote passages such as 342

“God Made a Joke with Me,” but, according to her, none had been read or commented on by her mentor. Beth’s mentor, on the other hand, would assign topics from previous TEM-4 examinations (e.g., “Will the Phone Kill Letter Writing?”) for her to practise. Nevertheless, three of the four case study participants reported that they had engaged in autobiographical writing in their department, even though only occasionally and with various restrictions. Beth kept her diary in English for a short while and quitted for fear that, because no one would read and correct her grammar mistakes, she would form a bad habit. Abby’s first letter to her mother, due to her wrong formatting, was commented by her teacher as making “The worst kind of mistake!” Anne’s autobiographical sample “God Made a Joke with Me,” as mentioned earlier, had not been read or commented on by her mentor. In addition, her diary writing in English was discouraged by one of her teachers for unknown reasons: “ ...... ” (Our mentor told us not to keep our diaries in English, but should try to write diaries in Chinese. So I began to write in Chinese ... [but] I couldn’t write in Chinese, 2 I, An.). To sum up, in writing autobiographically in English, the four writers had minimal support from their families and varying supports from their department. This situation makes the writing group, which has been described in detail at the beginning of this chapter, a particularly important social context. To avoid repetition, I will only

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discuss three additional features of the group that were not mentioned in my earlier description. The Writing Group First, the four case study participants perceived the writing group as a unique social space for learning and actively participated in its activites. Anne regarded the group as a place to learn English, especially from the older students. Besides the potential opportunities to practise English, Matt also linked the group with opportunities to improve his social skills and make friends. Beth regarded the group’s focus on autobiographical writing as an opportunity for her to “continue [her] literature dream.” Abby was on the brink of giving up English but seemed attracted by the freedom and dynamics in the writing group (“There is much freedom.... So I usually write what I’m interested in or just write whatever. I like this way of writing compositions.” Special moment 2: “Times of heated discussion, when all expressed what they felt—fun even when in utter disagreement”). Even though only Beth’s “literature dream” amounted to an ‘imagined identity’ (Peirce, 1995), all four case study participants invested a huge amount of time in the writing group activities. For instance, they spent more time attending the 90-minute-or-longer weekly group meetings for 32 weeks (a minimum of 48 hours in total) than they spent in their formal writing classes, which met for only 80 minutes a week for 18 weeks (24 hours in total). Anne, who had the lowest attendance among the four case study participants, for instance, spent at least 36 hours attending the group meetings.1

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Second, of particular importance were the evolving relationships among the group members. Between the members and me, there seemed to have developed a trusting and friendly relationship. As Anne recalled in her letter to me in December 2008 when explaining her reasons for joining the writing group, “I believed in you.” This was accompanied by her poem, “A Wound in My Soul,” her parting “gift” for me after we had known each other for nine months. Another member, Peter, regarded me as his “friend”: “I think you and I talked as a common friends” (description of his special moment in the writing group, December 20). In written and spoken communications, most members addressed me by my English name, which was uncommon between Chinese teachers and their students. Among the members, who came from five classes and three year levels, the relationships began when we had our first meeting in mid-March 2008 and a dinner party afterwards. At first, most members only knew others from the same year level. Gradually, they began to become friends with members from other year levels as well. Two seniors, Abby and Hope, for instance, reported in December that Anne, a freshman, had called them to borrow reference books. Abby also expressed her liking for Anne, who, according to her, “ ” (had a strong personality) (7 I). At the beginning of the second stage, another member, Amy, brought a huge selection of mushrooms to cook for the writing group and three pairs of Bai-style shoes as her gifts for me, my wife, Cathryn, and Cathryn’s Malaysian friend Chingyee, who had attended group meetings several times. Instances like these gave glimpses into the group relationships.

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Therefore, the writing group appeared to be a context where the members could feel comfortable sharing what they wrote and hearing what others had to say about their writing. Third, a few features about the writing group in comparison to the members’ regular classes may be worth mentioning. On average, the members’ classes had 50 students, all from the same year level, with only a few Bai students. The classes were often delivered through lectures, with the teacher standing at the front desk, facing all the seated students. In the writing classes that I observed, the main writing the students did were a few expositional essays. The textbook was A Handbook of Writing (Ding, Wu, Zhong & Guo, 1994). The writing teacher graded her students’ writing samples and marked their grammar mistakes directly in their writing samples. At the end of the semester, the students were required to take an examination, which included three sections: “Error Correction,” “Letter Writing,” and “Essay Writing” (based on a test paper, January 11, 2009). In contrast, the writing group had 19 student members—most of whom were ethnic Bai—and came from three year levels. On average, nine members attended each meeting. They usually sat in a circle with me in a classroom to share their writing samples and have discussions. Once, the meeting was held in a garden on the university campus; on three occasions, it was held in my home; four times, it had foreigners as visiting guests; and five times, it was accompanied by sharing a meal or dessert. The four case study participants each wrote about 10 autobiographical samples. No regular textbooks or examinations were

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involved in the writing group. I supported the group members by giving meaning-focused written feedback in a separate piece of paper, which was occasionally followed by my suggestions for the members to use alternative ways of expressing their ideas by means of different words, expressions, structures, etc. (see, for example, Appendix E). Most importantly, participation in the writing group was voluntary. In combination with these other aspects mentioned, these three additional features seem to suggest that the writing group provided a supportive ‘narrative space’ (Grant, 2005, p. 20), in which the members could use stories to interpret their experiences, foregrounding their personal desires and agency if they so chose. The Cultural/Global Context In the broad cultural or global context (Grant, 1997, 2001), the four student writers were all (potential) contributors to a shared world. They all studied English, a global language, and had stated to me that they intended sooner or later to teach English in their local or neighbouring communities. Anne wanted to and did become a teacher of English in her rural hometown after graduation. Beth was not sure about her future, but she seemed to favour becoming a teacher rather than a tour guide, one of the two possible career tracks after graduation from her department. After graduation, Matt and Abby both became English teachers in their home province, one in a middle school, the other in a primary school.

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The four writers also took from the world in very different ways. Anne read little. Her understandings of the world were largely bound to her lived poverty experiences, in relation to people around her. At university, she had toyed with the idea of becoming a Buddhist (3 I, An.) but became a Christian instead (Anne’s email to me on June 6, 2009), about six months after the writing group activities. Beth read extensively about Chinese classics and developed a “literature dream,” presumably in Chinese. Matt took Einstein’s words “Interest is the best teacher” as his motto and applied it to most of what he was engaged in, e.g., English, autobiographical writing and Teaching Chinese as a Foreign Language. Abby read extensively, especially Western literature; she became a fan of rock ‘n’ roll at university and copied many English song lyrics. The books she read and the music she listened to both played significant roles in her autobiographical writing in English. The four writers differed in their use of modern technologies in their processes of autobiographical writing in English. Matt and Abby frequently used the computer and the Internet, both in interactions with me and with their peers. Anne and Beth, in contrast, rarely used these modern conveniences. The reasons were twofold: different socioeconomic backgrounds and knowledge of these modern technologies. Both Matt and Abby had personal computers in their dormitories. They were older and had taken a computer course at university. In contrast, neither Anne nor Beth had personal computers. Anne had to apply for a study loan and worked in her university cafeteria to finance her

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studies. Thus, she was unlikely to have money for a personal computer. Although Beth was not as financially challenged as Anne, she dressed plainly throughout my fieldwork, which I took to imply that she was not well-off. Their lesser extensive use of computers and the Internet may also have been related to their relative lack of computer knowledge. Neither of them had taken a computer course before their second year at university. The personal, social, and the broad cultural/global contexts intersected with each other, giving a general background to the identities the four writers revealed through their EFL autobiographical writing. I will leave until later the fourth, the transformative context, in relation to re-authoring, the most complex phase of identity work identified in this study. Identity Work in Relation to Autobiographical Writing In Chapter 2, I defined identity as a series of ‘identity conclusions.’ Identity work was further defined as an ideological, reflective, and prospective process of people understanding and making conclusions about their positions in relation to the world. In doing identity work ideologically, people take positions in the world, particularly in relation to others’ words. In doing identity work reflectively, narratives situate people in their personal, historical, social, and cultural contexts, rendering their changes and continuities as meaningful and coherent. In doing identity work prospectively, people mainly ‘invest’ in the ‘imagined identities’ that matter to them. Identity work in this study is interpreted in relation to a narrative sense of progression, as informed by narrative therapy literature, and through the

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lenses of spatial terms such as movement and stance. Moreover, as I argued in Chapter 2, identity work in this context concerns two main kinds of social identities: English-writing-mediated identities and writer identity. In the remainder of this chapter, I will answer my research question about the extent to which the four case study participants used autobiographical writing to do identity work. Data from this study show that the four student writers engaged in four phases of identity work through autobiographical writing. Phases of Identity Work in English-Writing-Mediated Identities Certain things become clearer if we look comparatively at the four case studies, in particular at four phases of identity work, i.e., performing, reflecting, re-visioning, and re-authoring, and the extent to which they operate as and how they start laying foundations for identity work. These four phases were identified in the data from this study but described by using terms adapted from literature on narrative therapy (see Chapter 2). As such, some caution needs to be exercised. First, the terms describing the four phrases, particularly ‘reflecting’ and ‘re-visioning,’ are used differently from the ways narrative therapists use them. Second, the four phases were first identified in individual case studies and then crystallised through comparisons. Whether or not these phases of identity work are typical of other EFL writers in the writing group and other contexts awaits further exploration. Third, these four phases of identity work did not take place in isolation from each other, but with dynamic interactions. Nonetheless, as I showed in my

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analyses in Chapters 4–7, it is possible to determine the main type of identity work involved within the boundary of one or several pieces of EFL autobiographical writing, by reference to other domains (e.g., speech or writing in another language or genre) where the writers’ social identities are expressed. As will be discussed in the following, all four phases contribute to EFL writers’ identity work in significant ways. Performing Performing is a process of writers trying on or experimenting with images of themselves through writing in English—images that may or may not be consistent with how these writers are usually known by people familiar with them. In performing, the writers present themselves as certain kind of people, regardless of how they are otherwise perceived. According to Ivanič (1998), all writing involves a performing element, i.e., the construction of a ‘discoursal self’ on the page. In the writing group, I identified what identities the members were performing by asking them, “What kind of impression of yourself do you want to leave with your readers through this writing sample?” Accordingly, I found that all four case study participants performed through their autobiographical writing samples. For instance, Abby was an “amusing” person in “My Home”; Beth was “a successful teacher” in “A Forty Minutes’ Teacher”; Matt was a loving son towards his father in “Smile Full of Happiness”; and in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” Anne was a daughter who did not understand her parents and looked down upon them.

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However, the four writers performed their identities with different scripts and prompts. Abby read habitually, was “susceptible to the influences of what [she] read,” and often performed with others’ styles, as was the case of “My Home.” Her performed identities were thus personal experiences dressed in literary models provided by others. Matt, who regarded good English as a prerequisite for anyone who “wants to write autobiography,” seemed to have performed a competent writer identity by carefully crafting his writing, as with his revised story, “‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’” Beth, who pursued her “literature dream” through autobiographical writing, performed as “a literary girl” by summarising what she often did: “always decorat[ing] colorful and peomful for my book and life.” Anne, who felt that good writing should “ ” (express one’s true feelings), performed her immature daughter identity by describing explicitly how she, as a child, had felt about her mother (e.g., “I ... even felt her ugly and disgusting”). Although performing is the least elaborated phase the four student writers engaged in, it plays two important roles in their identity work. First, through performing, the four writers were unified, however temporarily, with particular images of themselves. The involvement of the writing group as an audience meant that such unifications were not private properties, but social identities through which these writers became known by their audience. In other words, performing may have enhanced and expanded the writers’ existing social identities. Second, performing prepared the groundwork for the next phase of identity work, i.e., reflecting on, to 352

take place. Similar to ‘externalization’ in narrative practices (White, 2007), performing introduces a different way of relating, which in this case, is not a ‘problem,’ but an identity. It brings onstage identities that may have remained unknown and allows the audience to comment on them and the performer to reflect on them. Reflecting A narrative therapy view of ‘reflecting’ is an invitation for clients to zigzag cognitively between their ‘landscape of action’—especially the terrains of life previously left unexplored by the dominant storylines—and their ‘landscape of consciousness,’ potentially yielding some alternative and more hopeful concepts of self (White, 2007; White & Epston, 1990). I use ‘reflecting’ more broadly than White and his collaborators. In this particular autobiographically oriented writing group, it refers to (1) the processes of the four student writers putting on paper in English identity conclusions they made about themselves while recounting their past experiences, or (2) reconsidering social identity conclusions they experienced elsewhere and the degree to which such conclusions fit them in the shifting moments of the present. As such, the objects of ‘reflecting’ often originate in the past, even though the outcomes may have impact on both the present and the future. The four student writers used reflecting to varying extents in their autobiographical writing in English. It played a central role in most of Beth’s EFL autobiographical writing samples. Usually, it was

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expressed through statements that contrasted her self-understandings in relation to others (e.g., “I think I’m a hardy girl, so far, I’m not great achievement”) or others’ view of her (“In the eyes of my parents, I’m a pure girl without enough social experience”). In contrast to Beth, Abby’s EFL autobiographical writing samples rarely showed signs of reflection. An exception was “Introduce Myself,” in which Abby first described her “change” (e.g., “sound off about things infernal and slam the door”) and then linguistically endorsed it, “But I don’t mind my change.... I used to be a decent sort of fellow and now I’m the one I hope to be, It is not too bad.” This appeared to be a matter of language: In her English writing, Abby tended to be more certain than she was in her writing in Chinese, in which she seemed to be more explicit about her struggles (e.g., “ ...... “[I don’t know whether to keep myself or ... melt into a group]). Reflecting was similarly rare for Matt. It was found in his love story, in which he reflected on the words he had said to a girl he liked, “I like you and I love you.” Towards the end of his story, Matt wrote, “‘I like you!’ and ‘I love you!’ Was I wrong?” (¶7). The words he had said to the girl previously now became the object of his reflection. He continued, “I was absolutely wrong. I’d like to say today. If God gave me another chance, I would only say ‘I like you!’ rather than ‘I love you!’” (¶8). Matt’s reflection gave him a way of identifying a new position to take in relation to the girl.

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Some reflections in the group were scaffolded processes. For instance, I directed Matt to think about his identity as a son through my question, “Can your Dad’s smile reveal more about who you are or the relationship between you and your Dad?” In my written feedback, I encouraged Anne to probe further about the meanings of her experience of seeing her father’s tears for the first time. Extract: Your writing on your father seems to be filled with an overtone of your love for your father. His getting sick seems an important event in shaping your understanding of him, but I’m not sure. Can you develop it further? To me, seeing a father shedding tears is quite unusual, emotional and revealing. (My written comments on March 27, 2008) These examples show that within the writing group context, I ‘co-authored’ (Carr, 1998, p. 487) some of the case study participants’ reflections. Among the four student writers, Anne was the only one who repeatedly reflected on her experiences (of poverty). These reflections were associated with different identity conclusions. In her early sample “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood,” her reflection showed her as a daughter estranged from her mother due to unmet needs: “At the age of eight, I was a carefree and invinsible girl. I was very boisterous ... and neve[r] listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting, because she didn’t meet my needs.” In “A Never Healed 355

Wound,” written in the middle of the writing group, Anne’s reflection featured her as a country girl: “I saw the distance between us, and it was a never healed wound. But I also very clearly know it was not only the distance between us, but also the countryside and city’s.” In “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone,” Anne’s reflection resulted in her acknowledging a role as an accepting daughter, “But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it.” As discussed in Chapter 7, Anne’s reoccurring reflections and shifting conclusions were grounded in group interactions mediated by her own writing samples. I see three major impacts of reflecting on the four case study participants’ identity work. First, as a purposeful engagement in one’s life, especially aspects that have been left unexplored by the already performed identities, reflecting may generate alternative identity conclusions. This was particularly evident in the case studies with Beth and Anne, who reflected on identities that others ascribed to them or identities that they had performed previously. Second, reflecting lifts up performed identities to a higher level of identity work. While performing, a writer may be as reliant on others’ literary models as Abby, but in reflecting, a writer is taking on the challenging task of personalising performed identities. It is a process of making self-identities (Giddens, 1991). Third, reflecting may open up future possibilities. Through reflecting, a writer prepares ground work for re-visioning to take place. Thus, Beth’s rejection of a once performed teacher “dream” laid down a foundation for her dream as a world traveller to enter

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the scene. Reflecting is, therefore, a central link between performing and re-visioning. Re-Visioning A narrative view of ‘re-visioning’ is a by-product of ‘externalization’—a process that separates the client from the problem (Parry & Doan, 1994; White, 1989, 2007). I take ‘re-visioning’ to mean that through interactions with others, the four student writers discover and project different images of themselves in their writing samples from those they had projected in earlier communications. This phenomenon was a shared feature in the EFL autobiographical writing samples among the four participants. For Beth and Matt, re-visioning occurred as a continuation of reflecting on performing that had taken place in a different context. The process is similar to that of the immigrant women in Norton’s (2000; Peirce, 1995) study. In Beth’s diary entry 2 (5W_W), she reflected on her “dream” job—teaching, which she had told her class about. She then shared a different vision for her future: “In fact, I want a high income job to travel aroud [around] the world.... It is my big dream.” Such a future suggests a different future self and it entails a different investment. Similarly, Matt wrote “Confidence,” which began with a broad claim, “Everyone of us should become confident,” to encourage himself. As discussed in Chapter 5, this re-visioning of himself as a confident man was rooted in both his interactions with his classmates in an oral English class and his reflecting on the words he had said about himself (“I don’t like travelling. Because I’m not confident....”).

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In a way, re-visioning was facilitated by group interactions. Consider Anne’s two versions of “Study Abroad.” In version 1 (see Figure 8.1), studying abroad did not seem to concern Anne personally, even though her expression “fly out the big mountain” at the top of her paper seems to suggest such a wish. However, it was left out of the main text. As shown by her use of nouns and pronouns (e.g., “we,” “most people,” “they,” “studying abroad,” “a popular tide”), Anne approached studying abroad mainly as a social phenomenon.

Figure 8.1 Anne’s version 1 (“Study Abroad”). After the members completed their first drafts, I told them to exchange and read each others’ drafts. Cathryn was visiting at the meeting and sat next to Anne (13V). She underlined Anne’s expression “popular tide” and wrote a comment with a green pen, “good image.” Anne also read Cathryn’s draft, which was a personalised story (see Figure 8.2).

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Figure 8.2 Cathryn’s writing on studying abroad. After the exchange, I asked the members to re-write and try to write differently from each other. Interestingly, Anne’s version 2 (see Figure 8.3) became much more personalised, like that of Cathryn’s, by using first-person singular pronouns. In addition, Anne introduced to the group a new image of herself as “a dreamer,” an identity by which she had been known among “all of [her] classmates.”

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Figure 8.3 Anne’s second version on studying abroad (“A Wonderful Travel”). Through her second version, Anne projected a different image of herself from that she had shown through her first version (“Study Abroad”). First of all, the title of her second version, “A Wonderful Travel,” explicitly expressed Anne’s personal and favourable stance towards study abroad. In addition, in her second version, Anne related to a future in relation to study abroad and her existing identity as a “dreamer.” Moreover, in her second version, Anne seemed to suggest that “dreaming” has a life-enriching capacity (e.g., “we can go anywhere ... make our lives more wonderful and colourful”). Re-visioning thus occurred for Anne partly because it had entered into a ‘dialogical’ relation (Bakhtin, 1981) with Cathryn’s draft, which provided her with an alternative future identity option. For Anne and Abby, re-visioning seemed to be language-specific. English offered Anne a way to re-vision the future. Recall her Chinese report “ ” (“A Wound Never to Be Healed”), Anne drew a sad conclusion: “

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” (The big gap between countryside and city is a wound never to be healed). In contrast, she wrote in English about the same experience but with a much more hopeful ending. Extract: On the way home, a dumb idea accidentally appeared to my mind: I wanted to change the situation of whole countryside. But now I’m not sure if it can come true. Maybe it is a daydream. I’m still looking forward to it any way. (“A Never Healed Wound,” 11W_W) Re-visioning happened differently for Abby, who seemed resolute in her writing in English but less so in her writing in Chinese. For instance, she wrote in “Introduce Myself”: “I don’t mind my change.... now I’m the one I hope to be.” But in a Chinese email, she wrote, “ (My hope for myself is to grow as healthy, upward, and bright as a sunflower).” Thus, how EFL writers use autobiographical writing to envision their futures in different languages appears to be individualised processes. Based on the four case studies, re-visioning contributes to identity work in two major ways. It links two student writers with different futures, Beth mainly with travelling, and Anne mainly with improving the situation in the countryside. As such, it not only declares the status quo as unsatisfactory; it also suggests directions to follow by revealing the writer’s ‘imagined identities’ and potential ‘investment’ (Peirce, 1995).

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Re-Authoring Re-authoring (White, 1995, 2004b), the process of finding and thickening alternative storylines, has a transformative nature as expressed in the multi-storied approach (Grant, 1997, 2001). Being transformative requires some articulation of the personal and social, as well as culturally patterned and dominant, ways of writing stories about people’s lives. This articulation allows alternative possibilities to emerge and develop. Similarly, re-authoring requires the prior work of the other three phases, which progress from performing and reflecting through to re-visioning. Re-authoring of English-writing-mediated identities was identified only in Anne’s case study. It is best reflected in Anne’s multiple drafts relating to her childhood poverty experiences, as represented by the plastic sheet event. In an early writing sample, the plastic sheet was associated with Anne’s personal hurt and shame and her estrangement from her mother. Extract: At the age of eight, I ... neve listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting, because she didn’t meet my needs. For examply, I had no lovely clothes, no toys, no candies and all. [....] I walked out, my mother took out a clear piece of plastic quickly under her coat and gave me. I received it and ran into my seat without any words. I tucked it into my desk very angrily. After class, I didn’t go until I

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made sure everyone had left. It still rained heavily. I had to wear the plastic. I ran home as quickly as possible. Tears ran out of my eyes. In contrast, during interactions around her 50-word poem “A Wound in My Soul,” Anne said that she felt both “moved” and “ashamed” by her mother for bringing the plastic sheet to her (see discussion following “A Wound in my Soul” in chapter 7). Her poem artistically expressed a deeply felt “wound”: “I ran into rain, cried / so did the God / A small figure gradually disappeared in the cold rain / How could I forget it easily? / The Wound in my soul.” However, her mother was not represented as “ugly” and “disgusting” as in “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood.” Alongside her changed representation of her mother, a shift in Anne’s identity as a daughter was also taking place. She was beginning to accept her mother. This shift was taken further in “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone,” in which Anne began to appreciate her mother’s “loud” voice: “But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it.” The absence of ‘re-authoring’ in the other three writers’ autobiographical writing is worth considering. It does not seem to be a matter of year level because Anne was two years behind Abby and Matt in her year level. Nor does it seem to be a matter of age; Anne was younger than Abby and Matt as well (see Chapter 3). However, it is possible that even before Anne joined the writing group, she was already more advanced in doing identity work, having probably thought much about her experiences of poverty. After all, these experiences overlapped with her saddest moments in life: “Others in

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primary school all have good clothes to wear. I would feel very sad, because my family could not afford” (1 I). Aside from Anne’s possibly more advanced identity work prior to joining the writing group, her ways of engaging with her past experiences seemed also to have played an important role. Unlike Abby, who seemed reluctant to engage in the “unhappy” aspects of her life, and unlike Beth and Matt, who reflected on diverse aspects of their life experiences, Anne wrestled with hers by repeatedly writing about her poverty experiences, across languages, i.e., English and Chinese, in different genres, i.e., narrative, report, and poem. This kind of engagement allowed her to go deeper than the other three participants in her reflective understandings about her past experiences and sense of self. In addition, by writing for the group and reading her samples to them, Anne had ample opportunities to perform, reflect on, and re-vision her English-writing-mediated identities, which may have prepared needed groundwork for re-authoring to take place, i.e., discovering an alternative storyline and thickening it. A remaining question is whether re-membering occurred in the four case study participants’ EFL autobiographical writing in the group. Data suggest that it did, not as a phase of its own, but as a specific kind of reflection. In essence, re-membering is about changing the memberships of others in one’s life and their contributions to one’s sense of self. In other words, re-membering is about achieving a social view of self. Consider Abby’s story, in which she pretended to be a boy in a singing contest at the suggestion of her middle

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school classmates. Abby’s story acknowledged the influence that her classmates had on her middle school self, a performed identity as “a boy,” who did not “fade back” from a challenging request (“The First Time to Be a Boy,” 23W_W, Ab.). Consider Matt’s story “Smile Full of Happiness” (11W_W), in which he wrote about his father’s “rare” smile. By writing this story, Matt re-membered his father as someone who was “very kind [and] not so serious” as he had thought. He also re-membered himself as a repentant son (“sometimes I feel very sorry for my father”), who wanted to show his father his love. Recall Beth’s diary entry 2 (5W_W, Bt.), in which she reflected on her imagined identities. On the one hand, she downgraded her imagined teacher identity, which she had performed in front of her class. On the other hand, while writing for her classmates as a potential audience, she introduced and upgraded her membership of an imagined traveller identity by writing, “In fact, I want a high income job to travel [around] the world.... It is my big dream.” Recall also Anne’s draft “A Wonderful Travel” quoted in this chapter (see Figure 8.3), in which she evoked her classmates’ description of her as a “dreamer.” It was rooted in Anne looking back and recruiting her classmates’ view of her to identify a different identity, as facilitated by her experience of reading Cathryn’s draft. In all these examples, remembering did not occur as a phase of its own, but as a specific kind of reflection, in which the writers foregrounded their sense of self in relation to the specific people they had interacted with previously. Data from the present study do not suggest a sequence from re-visioning to re-authoring. After performing and

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reflecting, Matt, Beth, and Anne all engaged in re-visioning their identities through EFL autobiographical writing. In contrast, Anne seemed to be the only case study participant to have engaged in re-authoring work. Therefore, I suggest that re-visioning and re-authoring are alternative third phases. However, I maintain re-authoring as a more complex and significant phase of identity work than re-visioning. First of all, re-authoring implies a thorough-going process of storying one’s whole life experiences and associated identities (past, present, and future). Secondly, re-authoring is rooted in contextualized understandings of self, both that shaped by oneself and that shaped by other contexts. In contrast, re-visioning, in the sense I have adapted for the present study, works only on the future aspect of one’s life and associated identities. To summarise, the four case study participants’ identity work in narrative terms appears to be a series of movements where each later movement builds on an earlier movement. The second phase, i.e., reflecting, which entails re-membering, builds on the first phase, i.e., performing. These two phases of identity work in turn may prepare the third phases of identity work, i.e., re-visioning and re-authoring. However, it remains unclear whether there is a sequence from re-visioning to re-authoring. Accordingly, I use Figure 8.4 to represent the four phases of identity work identified in this study.

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Figure 8.4 Diagram of identity work in narrative terms. One way of looking at the phases of identity work the four writers engaged in is using the metaphor of hiking in a mountain. This occurred to me when I hiked with a friend to a ridge named the High and Windy Place in North Carolina. Hiking resembles doing identity work in many ways. It requires the hiker’s active participation; the hiker is always in a particular place in relation to the mountain, which may yield different views and understandings; the hiker can always take stances whether to continue on the same path or detour or stop or turn back; hiking with others is different from hiking alone; and before reaching the summit, the hiker usually has to hike the lower sections of the mountain, e.g., its base and its foothills. The four phases of identity work show similar features. When performing, one does preliminary but important identity work. 367

Through performing, the four student writers seemed to embody certain identities they valued privately and made them public. When reflecting, one engages in major challenges in one’s life. Through reflecting, the four student writers seemed to make sense of their experiences in terms of their identities or take issue with their performed identities, seeking alternative identity options for themselves. When re-membering, one acknowledges others’ contributions to one’s sense of self. Through re-membering, the four student writers appeared to share socially contextualized identities. When re-visioning, one imagines different futures for oneself. Through re-visioning, the four student writers imagined alternative possibilities for their futures, with the potential for investment in such possibilities. When re-authoring, one reaches the summit of the mountain, where because the air is thin the climber may be breathing hard, but the view is rewarding. Through re-authoring, which only Anne seemed to have reached, she came to a new grand view that enabled her to re-story her personal, social, and cultural stories and associated identities. My role in the four case study participants’ identity work was like that of a hiking companion. For all of the four case study participants, I served as an appreciative audience who was interested in their stories. But I did not give them the same amount of scaffolding in their identity work. For Abby and Beth, I hardly used any of my scaffolding questions. For Matt, there was some scaffolding. For instance, when interviewing him about “Smile Full of Happiness,” I asked him, “So, what’s the relationship between your feeling sorry about your

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relationship with your Dad and your writing about his ‘smile full of happiness?’” (2 I, June 13). I probably gave Anne the most support in her identity work. For instance, I encouraged Anne to reflect on the meanings of her seeing her father’s tears for the first time, because I regarded such an event as “quite unusual, emotional and revealing” of her father (my written comments on March 27, 2008). In response to Anne’s writing about her mother as “ugly and disgusting” (4W_W, “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood”), I asked her two questions: “First, did you feel differently about your mother after the rain-and-plastic event? Secondly, how do you feel about your mother now?” (my written comments on May 22, 2008). These questions were very likely to have encouraged Anne to take a different stance about her mother in “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone” (9W_W) and “A Wound in my Soul” (14W_W). In reflection, I think my extra support in Anne’s identity work was probably due to our similar family backgrounds: both of us came from the countryside, and both of us had sick parent(s). My sympathy with Anne—as she wrote, “You are always sympathetic with me”—would probably have been a catalyst in her continuous explorations of her poverty experiences and their multiple meanings through EFL autobiographical writing. A comparison across the four case studies shows that English-writing-mediated identities were not the only identities that experienced movement through EFL autobiographical writing. The four writers’ writer identities also had some major shifts.

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Shifts in Writer Identities Through EFL autobiographical writing, all four writers’ writer identities shifted, especially in terms of how they related to their writing processes. Abby moved from being “very unqualified as a writer,” producing “monotonous, stiff, and very incomplete” writing, as represented by a partial sad-looking grey face, to a “very happy” writer with a sense of agency and whose writing was “more complete” and “filled with colours,” as represented by a whole smiling purple face. Beth moved from feeling helpless, inadequate, and constrained as a writer, as represented by a cup of water, to a “hopeful” writer, who could use “beautiful words or sentence,” as represented by a rainbow. Matt became a more confident writer. He used a “tunnel” through mountains to represent his increased confidence, as shown in his drawing “My Life Road” (see Figure 5.6)—explaining that having “improved [his] writing English,” he was able to overcome his usual “obstacles” such as “errors in writing.” Anne moved from being a writer restricted by writing for examinations (“knowing little about writing, because most time I just wrote for examinations, I hate it”) to a writer with more knowledge (“knowing more about writing,” such as “the importance of a title”) and a sense of control (“I can express my feelings freely in my biography”). In other words, these four writers began to show signs of taking control of their writing processes. From this perspective, they have all improved as writers. Such improvement was also substantiated by the four members’ frequent engagement with writing and revisions, and Anne’s successful transition from autobiographical writing to argumentative writing.

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Obviously, these movements cannot be attributed to EFL autobiographical writing in the group alone. Other possible contributors also need to be acknowledged. First of all, the writing group members not only wrote autobiographically, but also engaged in other types of writing. For instance, during the autobiographical writing stage (March–July 2008), Abby wrote a book review, “The Mole Sisters”; an opinion piece, “Music and the Movement of Sound”; and an expository essay, “The Main Difference between My College Life and Middle School Life.” Secondly, the members not only wrote in English for the writing group, but also wrote in their regular English classes. During the argumentative writing stage (August–December 2008), Beth and Anne wrote several essays in their English composition class. For this class, Anne wrote a memo report, an essay titled “Saving Money or Spending Tomorrow’s Money,” and a letter to “Aunt Agony” (record on December 2, 2008). Meanwhile, Matt and Abby started writing their undergraduate theses. Thirdly, not all members responded to autobiographical writing in English positively. Abby’s friend Hope, for instance, hardly wrote any autobiographical essays in the group. All these factors suggest identity work with one’s writer identity is a complex process. Nonetheless, the data of this study suggest that through inviting their active ‘investment’ (Peirce, 1995), autobiographical writing played an important role in the shifts the four case study participants made in their writer identities. For Abby, autobiographical writing reignited her hope and interest in learning English: “Now I have more hope in learning

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English. It is not all boring. It still has something interesting for me to keep on learning.... I like this kind of composition” (4 I). According to her, she also wrote more frequently than before: “In the past two years, I haven’t written much in English except in exams. But lately, I have been writing something every week or sometimes every two weeks” (4 I). For Matt, autobiographical writing in the group helped him “become aware of the pleasure of writing,” which “stimulate[d] [him] to write more articles.” As he reflected a year and a half after the writing group activities. Extract: Writing my autobiography [in English] first helps me improve my writing ability. In addition, by writing my autobiography I become aware of the pleasure of writing and stimulate me to write more articles.... I think that the greatest help is that I become aware of the pleasure of writing. I believe it’s very important to me. (Matt’s email on May 21, 2010) For Beth, who had associated autobiographical writing with an opportunity to “continue [her] literature dream” and a sense freedom (“In my own autobiography, I could everything that I like”), writing about her life experiences and dreams provided a basis for her claim that she was “a literary girl” with “a wonderful book” to share with her readers. For Anne, who had had a desire to “write down all [her] experiences from the past” in English (2 I, An.), autobiographical writing allowed her to explore her family and childhood experiences of

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poverty. Moreover, she experienced what it was like to be “praised” by others for her writing, in both English and Chinese. Reflecting on the autobiographical stage, Anne wrote in “My Harvest”: “The semester I find myself change a lot, because an interesting activity adds my life some colour, and makes my bag full of knowledge and joys.” Significantly, what Anne learned during the autobiographical writing stage (“My Harvest”: “Such as the ingredients of an autobiograph, the organization of an article, how to write a attractive title and so on”) remained a substantial part at the end of the writing group (“knowing more about writing,” such as “the importance of a title”; “I can express my feelings freely in my biography”). To sum up, as a social practice, autobiographical writing in this particular writing group played a significant role in shifting all four case study participants’ sense of self as writers. Previously, their writer identities were featured by their passive engagement with their writing processes, as well as a lack of agency as writers. In comparison, at the end of the autobiographically oriented writing group activities, the four student writers all reached more confident and agentive conclusions about themselves as writers. Comment In this chapter, I have argued that autobiographical writing as practised in this particular writing group be viewed as a specific kind of social practice. My first evidence concerned the group arrangement. For all the group members, writing autobiographically was not a soloist activity. Instead, it was a process shaped by the

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writing group arrangement, which provided the members with an interactive audience and involved my writing invitations and scaffolding practices. In addition, for the group as a whole, including me, it entailed meaningful engagement, contesting social perspectives both within and beyond the writing group and an equal relationship among the group members. I have then examined the multiple contexts, in which EFL autobiographical writing of this study took place, giving particular attention to the writing group as a social context. This contextual analysis has shown that the four case study participants’ autobiographical writing in particular was not exclusively self-sufficient, but bore influences of their personal experiences and desires, social supports and constraints, cultural resources and limitations. Last, four phases of identity work in English-writing-mediated identities, i.e., performing, reflecting, re-visioning, and re-authoring, have been identified and their contributions to identity work discussed. Re-membering has been identified as a specific kind of reflecting. Through EFL autobiographical writing, the four student writers’ writer identities also shifted. Therefore, identity work was not incidental, but integral, to the four student writers’ autobiographical writing in the group. Based on these findings, I suggest that for the four case study participants, autobiographical writing in this particular educational context be viewed as a social practice, through which the writers may make personal and social understandings of their life experiences and

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engage in various phases of identity work by writing with an egalitarian group. Through active participation in autobiographical writing, the four case study participants have also reached more agentive conclusions about themselves as writers. These findings have implications for the potential use of autobiographical writing in EFL contexts in particular and L2 literacy education in general. They will be re-evoked in Chapter 9.

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9 Conclusion The book has nine chapters. Chapter 1 revealed the autobiographical origin of this research topic. In Chapter 2 I argued for the need to study autobiographical writing and identity of EFL student writers and to adopt an expanded view of L2 learner identity. In addition, the chapter also argued for the need to distinguish two types of identities, i.e., English-writing-mediated identities and writer identities, and to develop a narrative sense of identity work. Chapter 3 argued for the use of an emergent case study design. In response to changes in the research site, an autobiographically oriented extracurricular writing group was set up, which gave me access to a wide range of autobiographical writing samples from the members. Chapters 4–7 told individual case stories about four group members: Abby, Matt, Beth, and Anne. Chapter 8 foregrounded contexts and identity work by comparing the four case studies. This research yielded two major findings, which are rooted in individual case studies but crystallised through comparisons. First, it is possible for EFL student writers to engage in identity work through autobiographical writing in English in an extracurricular writing group. Four phases of identity work were identified: performing, reflecting, re-visioning, and re-authoring. Second, autobiographical writing in this educational context is a best viewed as a social practice. This chapter mainly focuses on addressing the research questions, particularly the main question: How can an

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enhanced understanding of EFL autobiographical writing and identity work inform theories of L2 learner identity? In the first section, I theorise L2 learner identity by drawing on findings from this study. Two types of identity are considered: writer identity and writing-mediated identity. Further, I reflect on the six dimensions of identity through which these writers’ engagement with these two types of identity have been traced. These dimensions are: multiplicity, change, continuity, learner agency, phases of identity work, and ‘investment’ in EFL autobiographical writing. In the second section, I summarise educational autobiographical writing as a social practice. In the third section, I consider three implications of viewing autobiographical writing as a social practice. In the fourth section, I reflect on the research process. In the fifth section, I make suggestions about further applied research. Theorising L2 Learner Identity Two Senses of Multiplicity: Categories and Conclusions The data of this study support a poststructuralist view of identity as multiple (e.g., Peirce, 1995). That is, each L2 learner has multiple social identities, which mediate their interactions with others through the L2 (Pavlenko, 2001, p. 319). Through EFL autobiographical writing, all four case study participants reported a range of existing English-writing-mediated identities (e.g., Matt as a son, a young man in love, a test-taker, etc.; see Chapter 5). A multi-storied approach to narrative analysis (Grant, 1997, 2001) helped me to contextualize the

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autobiographical samples that revealed the four student writers’ multiple identities. This study also contributes another way of understanding identity as multiple. That is, there is a potential for each L2 learner to use autobiographical writing in English to generate multiple alternative identity conclusions about themselves both in terms of English-writing-mediated identities and writer identities. Among the four case study participants, this potential was most strongly realised in Anne (see Chapter 7), who drew sharply contrasting identity conclusions about herself as a writer and as a daughter. Through engaging actively in autobiographical writing in English in the writing group, Anne moved from being a writer restricted by writing for examinations (“knowing little about writing, because most time I just write for examinations, I hate it”) to a writer with more knowledge (“knowing more about writing” such as “the importance of a title”) and a sense of control (“I can express my feelings freely in my biography”). She also moved from an “ ” (immature; not understanding) daughter, who despised her mother (“I ... even felt her ugly and disgusting”) to an accepting and appreciating daughter (“But now I learn to taste her voice and cherish it”). Although the other three case study participants realised this potential to a lesser extent than did Anne, the potential for them to produce multiple identity conclusions remains. I suggest that in at least three ways these two senses of multiplicity may inform theories of L2 learner identity. First, they may expand our categories of L2 learners’ identities. Previous studies have pointed out the

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insufficiency of using ‘native/non-native’ and other similar dichotomous categories, as well as class, gender, and ethnicity, to capture the complexities of L2 learners’ identities (Ricento, 2005). The data from this study suggest that identities that mattered to the four case study participants show individual differences in theme (e.g., Anne as a daughter and Beth as a traveller). These identities are different from those that were wrestled with and foregrounded by immigrants and published L2 memoirists in previous studies (Pavlenko, 1998, 2001; Peirce, 1995), e.g., as a rich immigrant, as a mother of several children, as an international student in an American university. This difference calls for theories of L2 learner identity to remain open to identity categories suggested by L2 learners themselves while attending to their emergent identities (Thesen, 1997) that refuse narrow categorisation. .

Second, theories of L2 learner identity need to take a more holistic view of L2 learners’ prior experiences and cultures. Previously, some scholars have suggested that in the foreign language context, L2 learners’ identity work is restricted by their ‘first-language-mediated baggage and interference’ (Block, 2007, p. 144). Moreover, they have argued for a limit on the potential for identity work in this context by arguing that for re-constitution of selves to take place, L2 learners need to go through ‘critical experiences,’ i.e., ‘periods of time during which prolonged contact with an L2 and a new and different cultural setting causes irreversible destabilization of the individual’s sense of self’ (emphasis added, Block, 2002, p. 4). The data from this study show otherwise. Even though the four case study

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participants have never lived away from their local languages and cultures, i.e., those of ethnic Bai and Han Chinese, by studying overseas, for instance, their sense of self was nonetheless re-constituted in different autobiographical writing samples. Such re-constitution may range from performing a humorous daughter identity, as Abby did through “My Home,” to re-authoring a daughter identity, as did Anne through her multiple samples on the theme of her poverty experiences. Abby did her identity work by drawing on world literature (e.g., The Diary of a Nobody); Anne did her identity work by storying her Bai-and-Chinese-mediated poverty experiences in English, an additional language which she regarded as having the capacity to allow her to “write a lot ... using a few simple words.” In a similar vein, Matt and Beth’s autobiographical writing involved ‘writing life 1 in language 2’ (Steinman, 2005, p. 65), involving advanced identity work such as reflecting and re-visioning. As such, the four case study participants’ multiple English-writing-mediated identities challenge L2 literacy professionals to review L2 learners’ first-language-mediated experiences as potential resources for them to draw upon while they engage in their identity work instead of as ‘baggage and interference’ to abandon (cf. Block, 2007). In addition, they also suggest that a static view of culture that focuses on a physical place, as in the term ‘a new and different cultural setting’ (Block, 2007) needs to be complemented by a dynamic ‘verb’ sense of culture (Ivanič, 1998; Heath et al., 2008; Street, 1993b) that highlights the interactions between the local and the

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global (Giddens, 1991, p. 22; Grant, 2005; Lin, Wang, Akamatsu, & Riazi, 2002; Piller, 2001). Third, theories of L2 learner identity need to consider writer identity, i.e., conclusions L2 learners draw about themselves as writers in English, as a significant component of L2 learners’ social identities. It can complement the previous understanding about writer identities as consisting of three dimensions: autobiographical self, discoursal self, and self as author (Ivanič, 1998). Unlike self as author, which emphasises a writer’s positioning in relation to other authors and texts, writer identity as used in this study emphasises writers’ understandings of themselves as writers in relation to their actual experiences with and investment in writing. As such, it complements Ivanič’s framework in three ways. First of all, paying attention to writer identity, as defined in narrative terms earlier, acknowledges the possibilities for L2 learners to develop a sense of self as writers in English as an additional language, which may be different from their existing sense of self as writers in their first languages. Furthermore, by approaching writer identity from a narrative perspective, we also acknowledge the agentive role played by L2 learners in making their writer identities in relation to their experience with and investment in writing in English. Moreover, the four case studies show that autobiographical writing experiences in this particular writing group seem conducive to the making of alternative writer identities. To summarise, EFL autobiographical writing by the four case study participants suggests two senses of identity as

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multiple, i.e., multiple in categories and multiple in conclusions. These two senses of multiplicity challenge theories of L2 learner identity to not only remain open to identity categories introduced by L2 learners themselves, but also to re-evaluate conditions for identity work in a ‘glocal’ world (Grant, 2007). In addition, writer identity itself becomes an open site for construction, which may be enriched by autobiographical writing experiences in a supportive writing group context. Accordingly, L2 learners should be viewed as both complex (McKay & Wong, 1996) and evolving social beings, whose identities can be ‘multi-storied’ and ‘multi-voiced,’ especially when scaffolding is provided (Grant, 1997; White, 2005). Change and Continuity Poststructuralist theorists usually view L2 learner identity as constantly changing (e.g., Peirce, 1995). However, some scholars have also argued that a sense of continuity, even if taken as a ‘fiction’ (Eakin, 1999), is indispensable to a holistic understanding of L2 learners’ identities (Menard-Warwick, 2005; Price, 1996). The data from this study offer two alternative ways of perceiving identity as a dialogical notion, which entails both change and continuity (Hermans, 2001, p. 248; Holquist, 2002). First, this perspective calls for a view of L2 learner identity in terms of both historical facts and shifting interpretations. In this study, the four case study participants each had a unique stock of situated experiences with social others, whether at home, school, university, or a larger community. While growing with

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the passage of time, as expressed by the term ‘autobiographical self’ (Ivanič, 1998), such experiences may contain certain relatively enduring facts: e.g., Abby’s gendered experiences with “a manlike [Chinese] name and ... strong and short hair” and Anne’s experiences of poverty (“I had no lovely clothes, no toys, no candies and all”). However, as shown in Chapters 4–7, where the case study participants wrote multiple samples about the same experience, the meanings they accorded to such facts of their lives were often different. Therefore, L2 learners’ identities may continue in terms of historical facts that they enlist when storying their life experiences. Meanwhile, their identities may also change as a result of alternative meanings (White & Epston, 1990). Second, this perspective calls for a view of identity in terms of personal experiences and metaphors. This was most clearly shown in Anne’s case study, where she used the metaphor of “ ” (wound) frequently in her autobiographical samples across languages, genres, and contexts (see Chapter 7). Although filled with different meanings, the metaphor offered Anne a relatively constant and personalised way of interpreting and making intelligible both her past and recent experiences of poverty even when they were manifested differently. Change and continuity apply to the two types of identities distinguished in this study. The first kind is English-writing-mediated identities, i.e., identity conclusions people make about themselves as people (or perhaps more specifically as categories of people such as immigrants, daughters, mothers, workers, etc.) through

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writing in English. The second is writer identity, i.e., identity conclusions EFL writers draw about themselves as writers in English. To avoid confusion, I use an identity diagram (see Figure 9.1) to represent relationships between different types of identities. Taking identity as a dialogical notion means that, like two sides of the same coin, change and continuity have meanings only in relation to each other (Holquist, 2002). There are multiple ways of rendering this dialogical principle. Two examples are viewing identity in terms of historical facts and shifting interpretations or in terms of personal experiences and metaphors, both being broad perspectives outside the identity box.

Figure 9.1 Identity diagram. Recognising identity as both changing and continuing is important in L2 language and literacy education. Some educators, especially those concerned with EFL learners, tend to focus on the change of identity among L2 learners as a result of learning L2 (Block, 2002, 2007). However, as H. Nicholas (personal communication, September 27, 2010) suggests, identity

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being a multi-dimensional phenomenon makes it less likely that writers will deal with only one of its dimensions. Moreover, the four case study participants’ active engagement with EFL autobiographical writing confirms insights from previous studies (Heath, 1993; Iddings & Katz, 2007; Kibler, 2010; McKay & Wong, 1996; Norton, 2009) that ‘when language and literacy development become congruent with learner [existing] identities, learning is enhanced’ (Menard-Warwick, 2005, p. 254). Otherwise, resistance might arise (Menard-Warwick, 2005, p. 254; Norton, 2001). That would have been the result if I had forced Hope, a group member who mainly wrote argumentative essays in line with her sense of self as an argumentatively oriented writer,1 to write autobiographically. Therefore, in order to assist practice more efficiently, theories of L2 learner identity should take the continuity of identity seriously while simultaneously holding on to identity as changing. Following that, in EFL education, change or mobility of identity, whether in terms of identity categories or conclusions, may be sought less through the means of physical removals from one’s homeland and culture to another, as is implied in Block’s notion of ‘critical experiences.’ Instead, it can be relocated in a third space constructed among language teachers and learners. Learner Agency In addition to taking a dialogical view of identity, theories of L2 learner identity may benefit by foregrounding the role of personal agency in L2-learning-related identity work (Hull & Katz, 2006; Menard-Warwick, 2005; Peirce, 1995; Thesen, 1997).

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Data from this study illustrate how agency, i.e., ‘socio-culturally mediated capacities to act’ (Ahearn, 2001, p. 116), was integral to the case studies’ identity work in the writing group. I make this argument by first focusing on the mediating role played by the writing group in shifting the four case study participants’ agency as writers. Prior to joining the writing group, the four case study participants’ agency as writers was restricted by a test-oriented education system (e.g., Beth: “Before, I only wrote about positive aspects [of issues].... The standard of test-orientation is that you can only write about the positive aspects [of issues],” 2 I, Bt.). But as a sociocultural context, the writing group scaffolded their exercise of personal agency. It gave permission for the members to take control of their own writing through voluntary participation, my periodic invitations for the members to write autobiographically, the option for them to select their own topics, my written comments on their writing samples, and group interactions over the members’ writing samples. Moreover, the writing group was set up in such a way as to be supportive (e.g., focusing on the meanings) rather than restrictive (e.g., focusing on grammar and accuracy) in group interactions. It was within such a sociocultural context that the four case study participants’ agency emerged. As Abby expressed, “There is much freedom.... So I usually write what I’m interested in or just write whatever. I like this way of writing compositions” (see Chapter 4). Consider Hope as another example. Based on available evidence, her agency as a writer was not thwarted by the

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fact that the writing group was autobiographically oriented. Rather, it was expressed differently: e.g., by attending as many writing group meetings and participating in group discussions as actively as did Abby and producing a huge number of argumentative essays (e.g., “The Advantage of Moon Exploration”). In the group, she continued engaging with argumentative writing that she preferred and received similarly meaning-focused comments on her writing (see Appendix R) as did other members’ on their autobiographical samples. In the end, despite her continuous preference for argumentative writing, Hope wrote a few short autobiographical writing samples during group meetings. She also wrote her first complete narrative for the writing group, titled “My University Life,” a story about her experience of running into a wrong dormitory on her first day at university. Hope read it at a group meeting and created much enjoyment and laughter (13V). It would have been less likely for Hope to make this shift had she not had the support of the writing group. From a sociocultural perspective, learner agency is also pivotal in English-writing-mediated identities. The four case study participants’ agency was mediated by a wide range of cultural tools (Vygotsky, 1978), e.g., EFL autobiographical writing, drawings, conversations and emails, etc. Similar to the immigrant women in Norton’s study, who used diaries to reposition themselves as people of multiple identities (Peirce, 1995), the four case study participants in this study used the aforementioned cultural tools to introduce their own identity categories (e.g., daughter, teacher, “a pure girl,” “dreamer”) and

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identity conclusions (e.g., Beth as “a literary girl” in English, who “always decorates [her] ... book and life” and has “a wonderful book” to share with her readers; see Chapter 6). In other words, another way the four case study participants expressed their agency was through their acts of using EFL autobiographical writing and other cultural tools to shape their audience’s perceptions of them. To recapitulate, a focus on learner agency in this study foregrounded EFL autobiographical writing and associated identity work as socioculturally mediated. If theories of L2 learner identity want to go beyond imposing ready-made identity categories to L2 learners in diverse sociocultural contexts, such a sense of agency appears promising. Moreover, as argued in Chapter 2, identity work through narrative understanding also requires L2 learners to play an agentive role in defining their own identities. Two Types of Identity In this book, I distinguished two main types of social identities that L2 learners may have: writer identity and English-writing-mediated identities. The two have overlaps as well as a major difference. On the one hand, both types of identities are mediated by writing and may mediate the writers’ social interactions with others. On the other hand, their objects of learning are different. Writer identities are conclusions that writers draw about themselves in relation to their actual experience of writing in English. In other words, it is learning about oneself as a writer on the basis of one’s writing

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experience. Being reflected upon is one’s writing experience. In comparison, English-writing-mediated identities concern a range of social identities that are of central importance to the creation of specific texts, e.g., as sons and daughters, and conclusions that language learners fashion and refashion through the act of writing in English. It is learning about oneself in diverse social relationships by means of writing. Being reflected upon are social identities other than as a writer. The distinction appears to be promising for future research within a postmodern framework. Firstly, a narrative view of writer identity, as used in this book, allows a more critical look at the ‘co-authoring’ role played by a researcher than that provided by Ivanič. Secondly, the term English-writing-mediated identities highlights the fact that English L2 learners may engage in diverse identity work through different languages, language varieties, genres, and modes of communication. As a literacies perspective on writing gathers more momentum (Farías, Obilinovic, & Orrego, 2007; Ouellette, 2008; Prior, 2005; Shipk, 2005; Yancey, 2004; Yi, 2007), English writing will retain its proper place as one of the potential cultural tools through which English L2 language learners communicate and construct their multiple identities. In terms of its application, the distinction between the two main types of L2 learner identities calls for context-sensitive approaches to both language research and teaching. As the conventional wisdom of using Native Speakers of English as a criterion becomes increasingly challenged by ethnographically oriented

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scholars (Cook, 1992, 1999; Krǎmsch & Lam, 1999; Leung, Harris, & Rampton, 1997; Pavlenko, 2003), there is also a tendency to explore more critically the Native Speaker mindset permeating the present pedagogical applications of ‘Communicative Competence’ model in language education. More specifically, language teaching materials and guidelines intended to cultivate learners’ communicative competence may well be informed by ‘idealized typifications of what native speakers may say and do in specified contexts’ (Leung, et al., 1997, pp. 126–127). As an alternative, such materials and guidelines may be redesigned by drawing on research on actual writing and identity work in genuine EFL contexts. As Leung (2005, 136–137) points out, we should not only see language use as a context-specific and changing phenomenon; we should also see learners as carrying with them from outside the language classroom a myriad of roles, social positions, expectations, power relations, cultural values, and practices into communications with others. The distinction between writer identity and English-writing-mediated identities may, therefore, serve as a practical step in attending to both the local contexts and the complex identity work EFL writers may engage in. Nonetheless, distinguishing English-writing-mediated identities from writer identities is but a beginning to understanding English literacy with its multitude of variations and complexities. For instance, this book mainly focused on English-writing-mediated identities that took place through student writers’ active participation in autobiographical writing, English being

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an additional language in the Expanding Circle. In a similar context, whether and to what extent identity work takes place through other genres of writing in English as an additional language, e.g., academic writing, remains to be found out. Understanding Identity Work in Narrative Terms Previous research has shown significant identity work occurring in L2 writing by published L2 memoirists in North America (e.g., Li, X., 2007; Pavlenko, 2001) but did not specify how these writers shifted from one kind of identity conclusion to another. Moreover, it was unclear to what extent EFL student writers, who had never travelled to an English-speaking country and whose English proficiency may be limited, may engage in identity work through autobiographical writing in English. Furthermore, EFL contexts are assumed to be an unproductive ground for identity work to take place in English as L2 (Block, 2007). In this regard, the data from this study have contributed three major understandings. First of all, despite their differences in year levels and prior literacy experiences, and despite the fact that none of the four case study participants in this particular writing group had studied abroad, all of them engaged in identity work through EFL autobiographical writing (see Chapters 4–8). As such, this study highlights an important role played by narratives (Bruner, 1991; Eakin, 1999; Holquist, 2002), particularly written narratives, in self-making. Accordingly, educational autobiographical writing in English as an L2, i.e., autobiographical writing whose primary function is L2

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learning, needs to be recognised as a unique space for student writers’ identity work. Furthermore, using terms adapted from narrative therapy literature (e.g., White, 2007), this study identified four phases of identity work engaged in by the four case study participants in their writer identities and English-writing-mediated identities. These phases include: performing, reflecting, re-visioning, and re-authoring. Performing refers to processes of writers trying on or experimenting with images of themselves through writing in English—images that may or may not be consistent with how these writers are usually known by people familiar with them. Reflecting refers to the processes of writers (1) drawing identity conclusions about themselves while writing about their past experiences in English, or (2) reconsidering social identity conclusions they experienced elsewhere, from the shifting moments of the present, the degree to which such conclusions fit them. A specific kind of reflecting is re-membering, which foregrounds the writers’ sense of self in association with their previous encounters with others. Re-visioning refers to the processes of writers discovering and projecting different future images of themselves in their English-writing samples as shaped by their particular social interactions with others. Re-authoring refers to the processes of finding and thickening alternative storylines to reconfigure the meanings of one’s life experiences as well as sense of self. These phases may add to theories of L2 learner identity a more dynamic view of identity. Of particular interest is re-authoring, which, following a multi-storied

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approach (Grant, 1997, 2001), seems to occur by virtue of a writer connecting her personal experience with larger contexts and alternative ways of storying. In addition, this study also highlights the sociocultural nature of identity work. As shown in the individual case studies, as well as the comparison across them, the four case study participants’ identity work was ‘co-authored’ (Carr, 1998) by a multitude of people: other group members, visitors, people they had encountered before they joined the writing group, authors whose texts were read in the group, etc. From a sociocultural perspective, the writing group functioned in a similar way as does a ‘narrative space’ in family therapy (Grant, 2005). Accordingly, theories of L2 learner identity may need to make more apparent the co-authoring roles played by learner peers, L2 teachers, and researchers in L2 learners’ identity work. Re-Visiting ‘Investment’ In Chapter 2, I argued that an ‘investment’ view of identity (Peirce, 1995) provided a poststructuralist way of interpreting L2 learners’ identity work in a social context. According to this view, learning an L2 amounts to ‘investing’ in a desired social identity learners aspire to develop through the mediating role of the language, i.e., becoming members of a particular ‘imagined community’ (Kanno & Norton, 2003, p. 248). However, L2 learners’ investment in L2 writing, particularly autobiographical writing, is less understood. The data in my study have contributed to my understandings about the four case study participants’

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‘investment’ in EFL autobiographical writing in the following ways. First, multiple factors influence their investments. The major ones identified in this study, which was situated in a particular writing group, are: ‘imagined identities’ (e.g., Beth’s “literature dream”); “pleasure” in writing; use of autobiographical writing to “encourage” or “relax” oneself (e.g., Matt); a sense of freedom (Beth and Abby); use of English as the working language (e.g., Anne’s idea that “You can write a lot in English using a few simple word s ... which is impossible in Chinese”); and periodic invitations for “oral publications” in the writing group (e.g., Anne’s sample, “My First Time to Hear Her Voice in Phone”). These factors suggest that investments in EFL autobiographical writing are a complex phenomenon, which takes more than ‘imagined identities’ alone to explain. Second, investment can be imposed or voluntary. Prior to joining the writing group, the four student writers mainly wrote in prescribed tasks such as assignments and writing in examinations, which are usually argumentative essays. Such limited investment in English writing was expected of them by their teachers and department but not welcomed by them. One outcome seemed to be negative relationships with English writing (e.g., Matt: “We just tend to have an attitude—we must finish our task, not thinking for our readers”; Anne: “knowing little about writing, because most time I just wrote for examinations, I hate it”). Such negative relationships were evident even in private domains, as illustrated by Beth’s short-lived attempts to keep a diary in English. In contrast, voluntary

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investments, as was the case with the four case study participants in this study, may lead to active and frequent engagement with EFL autobiographical writing in the writing group, on the one hand, and positive forms of writer identity, on the other. As shown in Chapters 4–7, the four student writers wrote frequently, at least once each fortnight for Abby. They wrote and re-wrote about the same or similar experiences, particularly in Anne’s case. They also wrote in various places: the dormitory, the university library, the classroom, and the home, as Matt’s contextual information shows. In addition, they all integrated their life experiences into their writing samples. Such investments resulted in writer identities with increased agency (e.g., Anne: “I know more ... I can express myself freely in my biography”) and confidence (e.g., Beth: “I am a literacy girl” with “a wonderful book”). Third, an investment view of identity work can be expanded to include a view of mobility amongst identity options in the third space. Investment, so far as its theory and current studies go, mainly concerns the making of some identities in the distant future, passing over learners’ identity work at more micro and moment-by-moment levels. Moreover, the (potential) roles of language learners’ first language(s) and culture(s) have not yet received sufficient attention (yet consider Cummins’s study on the ‘identity text’ as an exception). Not surprisingly, the investment theory provides little understanding about the dynamics between EFL learners’ established cultural identities, such as the four case study participants’ ethnic Bai identities and Chinese identities, and new identities

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mediated by learning English as an additional language. In the same vein, it offers limited understanding about EFL learners’ further identity work once they actualise their imagined identities. Such a research focus and its consequent limitations are unhelpful if the teaching of English language should continue in the EFL world as a thriving enterprise without becoming a tool of cultural domination. Alternatively, one may give special attention to the design of a third space and EFL learners’ mobility/immobility within it. This should, on the one hand, demystify English as an inherently powerful language and, on the other hand, return EFL educators to their unique positions in serving EFL learners in moving from one imagined identity to another, from one identity position to another, from one identity category to another, from one identity conclusion to another, with the hope of gradually moving to hybrid and multi-voiced identities. Based on these three understandings, I suggest that EFL learners’ investment in autobiographical writing be explained through critical experiences and concerns. The former is an adaptation from Block’s concept of ‘critical experiences,’ which defines ‘critical’ totally in terms of physical, geographical, and cultural relocation into the Inner Circle, as in the case of immigrants to Canada. Unlike Block though, I define ‘critical experiences’ as any experiences that EFL language learners struggle with, value, and seek to understand in their particular social and cultural contexts. The latter refers to a wide range of possible reasons behind EFL learners’ voluntary investment in autobiographical writing, e.g., developing social skills, which may even

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appear only remotely related to autobiographical writing. I regard such critical experiences and concerns as a necessary first step for the design of any third space in the EFL context. The four case study participants’ complex ways of investing in autobiographical writing point to the need for theories of L2 learner identity to seriously consider EFL autobiographical writing as a special, even if potential, component of L2 literacy education. More specifically, it seems time to integrate a practice view of educational autobiographical writing, as that operated in the writing group. Educational Autobiographical Writing as a Social Practice Although useful as a point of entry, a minimal definition of autobiographical writing, i.e., any writing about any aspects of one’s life experiences, was found inadequate to capture the actual complexities involved in autobiographical writing as practised in the writing group. In the writing group, autobiographical writing turned out to be highly social and ‘multi-voiced’ (Bakhtin, 1981) or rich in inter-textual relations. It involved an interactive audience and entailed my invitations for the members to write autobiographically and my scaffolding practices. In addition, for the group as a whole, including me, it entailed meaningful engagement, contesting social perspectives both within and beyond the writing group, and an equal relationship among the group members. Moreover, identity work was found to be an integral part of autobiographical writing for the four case study participants, who actively

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engaged in writing about their life experiences as members of an egalitarian group. Viewing autobiographical writing in the writing group as a social practice may offer a critical stance or starting point for theorists of L2 learner identity to take up. As L2 researchers begin to use autobiographical narratives to inform them of the L2 learners’ identities (e.g., Block, 2008; Coffey & Street, 2008; Pavlenko, 2007), the need also grows to recognise the social nature of autobiographical writing in educational settings. As Coffey (2007) suggests, language learners may use narratives to perform various social identities in relation to language learning. If this applies to other domains where autobiographical writing samples are used as data, then L2 learners’ identities are to be constantly regarded as identity work with the participation of others. This will in turn complicate our roles as L2 language or literacy teachers and researchers. We will probably need to, as narrative therapists do, take up the position of ‘co-authors’ and be critically reflexive of the ways our own practices shape our participants’ identity work (Carr, 1998). Furthermore, viewing autobiographical writing as a social practice also points to the need to recruit additional data-generating methods, e.g., life story interviews, text-related interviews and drawings, in order to gain a holistic understanding of identity work as dynamic processes. From a Critical Discourse Analysis perspective, written texts provide only hints of identity work (Fairclough, 1992; Ivanič, 1998). Indeed, ‘there are many exciting possibilities in the study of identity and

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L2 learning’ (Ricento, 2005, p. 906), and viewing autobiographical writing as a social practice seems to offer a way to imagine and re-imagine such possibilities. Implications for Practice As introduced in Chapter 1, this research was rooted in my own autobiographical writing experiences and in my experience of teaching my students to write autobiographically in English several years ago. Therefore, it seems appropriate to reflect at the close of this book on how this research process and the findings presented in the preceding have ‘wounded’ (Romanyshyn, 2007) me as an EFL literacy teacher, and also to imagine my future practice. I begin this process with three pieces of advice for my former self before he had ventured into asking his students to write autobiographically with a blind passion. First, learn about L2 learners’ literacy histories and literacy-mediated aspirations in life. L2 learners bring with them diverse literacy experiences and ideals, which may influence how they respond to invitations to write autobiographically in English. Such knowledge is helpful in designing writing activities that allow students to continue their valued identities without marginalising students like Hope, who preferred argumentative writing. In this regard, I found asking the group members to draw and label their reading histories and writing histories particularly informative and it helpful to demonstrate how to do it with your own literacy experiences (see Appendices F and G for samples). The basic idea is: On a blank piece of

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paper, draw a reading history like a river, then label it in terms of languages used, periods concerned, and books read, including critical reading events or people and preferred types of reading materials. On another piece of paper, ask the students to do the same with their writing histories, labelling with critical events or people as well as their preferred types of writing. For instance, Abby’s labelled drawing “My Reading History” told me much about her intimate relationship with world literature. Second, cultivate voluntary investment. However potentially powerful EFL autobiographical writing can be, imposing it on adult students makes it less welcoming. Recall Abby, who asserted that she disliked any kind of assigned writing tasks. Recall also Hope, who was a prolific argumentative writer in the group. They both invested voluntarily in English writing, although with a focus on different genres. Cultivating EFL students’ voluntary investment in English writing requires sensitivity to both students’ needs and preferences. Given the fact that regular writing classes in China and other “Expanding Circle” countries usually have many more students than the writing group, it is unlikely that writing teachers will be able to put as much energy into their classes as I did in the writing group to cultivate voluntary investment. For example, it is not feasible for teachers to write detailed written comments on every piece of writing sample collected from a regular writing class every week. Nevertheless, practical ways can be adapted to cultivate voluntary investment in regular classes. First, decide on a minimal requirement for passing the course. Second, adopt a practice-focused criterion that emphasises writing in its particular social

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context. Third, use part of the class time for student-writing-mediated interactions, e.g., revision and oral publication. Fourth, maximise the use of written comments by sharing comments with the whole class, which can be easily done by setting up a class email account. These four measures seem hopeful as ways of reducing students’ worries about writing examinations and turn their attention to engaging in writing practice on a regular basis. Third, scaffold students’ learning processes. EFL autobiographical writing is not as easy as often assumed simply because students already (presumably) know the content for writing. As a social practice, it involves learning in multiple dimensions: of language, of experiences, of deepened understandings of self and other, to say the least, often with the participation of teachers, peers, and other people in the students’ lives. Moreover, some identity work involved in EFL autobiographical writing, e.g., reflecting on unpleasant experiences, may be threatening to some students, as it was in Abby’s case. Accordingly, for EFL autobiographical writing to be a productive learning tool, multi-dimensional scaffolding is needed. In this regard, some elements from the writing group may be useful: • Create a safe sharing space by respecting students as writers and focusing on meanings they try to communicate. • Design ‘literacy events’ (e.g., Heath, Street, & Mills, 2008) in which students’ writing samples become the

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centre of interactions and allow students to choose what to share and what not to. • Give students both emotional and technical support. Autobiographical writing sometimes may cause stress or emotional turmoil for student writers, as in Abby’s case. I supported Abby by writing to her that such a reaction was normal and by cultivating a non-judgmental attitude and relaxing atmosphere within the group. But I wish I had warned my student participants, as early as when inviting them to write autobiographically, that they might encounter negative emotions. In times like this, they may consider writing about some positive experiences to balance up, a technique I learned from Kutuzova (2010). • And whenever possible, write with students (Graves, 1983). During some meetings, I would write with the members for a few minutes. Usually, I asked the members to write freely, without worrying about grammar or spelling. When finished, everyone, including myself, would share what they had written with each other. Such was the occasion on which Anne responded to my chapter titles (e.g., “When I Am Serious, God Is Romantic”) with her own (e.g., “God Made a Joke with Me”). By writing with the members, I positioned myself as a learner writer, who engaged in writing practices. This is important because it seems to me a way of exercising a positive form of power (Street, 1996), taming it to serve my students’ learning processes. This may, as was experienced in my own research process, help to create more dynamic interactions among the teacher and the students.

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No longer regarding EFL autobiographical writing as a panacea, I remain fascinated by the fact that Anne, who had had a severely restricted literacy background, prospered as a writer by actively engaging in writing her stories in English within a supportive group. I am also challenged by the ever-expanding self–other networks that actually shape my case study participants’ autobiographical writing in English and associated identity work. Now, as I teach English composition at my university in China, I find myself coming back to where I first started, the concept of ZPD, and ‘know it again for the first time.’ If the struggling writers are interested in their own stories, start by inviting them to write autobiographically. If English is perceived as having some special power, as in Anne’s case (“You can write a lot in English using a few simple words,” 2 I), let them write in English. In all that I do, I want to first position my students, who have diverse language and literacy experiences, as knowers and capable learners (Giroux, 1987). Next, in a constant search for a third space through my teaching practice, I want to support my students’ movements in taking more critical stances towards that which had shaped them (Kamler, 2001). These lessons I have learned from my research, but the research process in a postmodern era calls for continual critical reflection. So, before suggesting any further research directions, I will turn reflective eyes on my own research process, considering the roles played by the ethnic Bai identity and the group, my shaping effects on the case study participants’ identity work, my own identity work, a general observation of the impact of the program on the other

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participants, and the use of a multi-vocal way of representation. Reflections on the Research Process Reflections on the Bai Ethnic Identity To begin with, being Bai matters in this study for three reasons. First, as one element of the students’ identities, it has shaped the students’ previous language and literacy experiences. For example, for Anne, being ethnic Bai at a Chinese school was initially associated with not being able to speak good Mandarin and having Chinese vocabulary too limited for her to write well in Chinese. Although the other three case study participants did not experience as acute a challenge as Anne did in Chinese schools, they too learned Chinese as an additional language. In this regard, the four case study participants were different from Han students, whose home language and culture are reflected and transmitted in school. Second, being Bai mattered because it mediated the case study participants’ interactions with others in different social domains. In the regular university English classes, the Bai students were often treated as the other whose pronunciation was regarded as problematic. Several students, Amy and Beth, for instance, reported at the time of joining the writing group that their teachers had said that Bai people were not suitable for learning English due to their strong accent. In contrast, in the writing group, being Bai was treated as a potential resource. Being ethnic Bai not only meant that one could join the extracurricular writing group; it also meant that one could communicate with other group members in multiple languages: Bai, Chinese, and

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English. Third, although not necessarily foregrounded in the EFL autobiographical writing analysed in this book, Bai-ness remained an area open for construction. For instance, during an interview over dinner, Anne mentioned that she was interested in learning the Bai script and writing down her stories for future generations. During a group meeting, another group member, Amy, told the group about her exciting experiences of learning about the Bai people’s history, places of interest, and cultural practices. Taking these factors into consideration, it appears that the Bai university students had not lost their ethnic Bai identities, as some may have feared (Mackerras, 1988). Rather, they gave evidence of wishing to continue experiencing and working on their ethnic Bai identities, something supported by being in social interactions with others who have an interest in this aspect of identity. Reflections on Creating Identity Texts It would have been interesting to find out the impact of giving the student members opportunities to first write in Bai, then in English with others’ assistance, thus creating Bai-and-English bilingual ‘identity texts’ (Cummins et al., 2005). Unfortunately, although the alphabet-based Bai script has had some success compared to the old script (Wang, 2004), none of the student members could write it. In fact, for the four case study participants, the Bai script seemed to have little value in comparison to the dominant Chinese and English languages. For instance, when I asked whether they would learn the Bai script if given the opportunity, only two student members, Anne and Abby, showed any interest. Anne

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even hoped that she could write her stories with the Bai script for future generations. In contrast, Beth strongly rejected the idea of having a Bai script, arguing that “ ” (There was never any [Bai script] before. Why should there be one now?). Accordingly, in continuing ethnic Bai identity, the four case study participants may go through very individualized processes. Data from the four case study participants’ suggest that a broadened view of ‘identity texts’ may be usefully employed in future L2 literacy teaching and research. First of all, an identity text may be extended to include any text about any particular event, experience, or concern of great value or importance to the writer. As an example, even though Anne wrote directly in English, instead of first in a language more familiar to her, her writing samples on the theme of poverty concerned a vital part of her experience that shaped who she was. Therefore, writing samples like these should be also regarded as a variant of identity texts despite the lack of use of the writer’s first language. In addition, when engaging students in producing Chinese-and-English bilingual identity texts, we should be sensitive to the writers’ diverse literacy experiences in and relationships with Chinese. For Abby, Beth, and Matt, who had all had positive experiences of writing in Chinese, inviting them to first write in Chinese might have enhanced their sense of self as writers. In contrast, for Anne, who had had numerous experiences of failure in Chinese writing, inviting her to write in Chinese might have intimidated and restricted her. Therefore, in creating an ‘identity text,’ what seems to really serve as a springboard or 407

stepping-stone is not necessarily the use of one’s home language, but the use of languages one feels most at home with, even though these languages may not have been a language of early literacy. Reflections on My Presence in the Group Members’ Identity Work As emphasised throughout the book, the four case study participants’ identity work through EFL autobiographical writing needs to be understood in its specific sociocultural context. Therefore, it is necessary to acknowledge my presence in and shaping effects on the group members’ identity work. My role in the writing group was multi-dimensional. As a group leader, before each meeting, I prepared topics for discussion and handouts to share and made arrangements for group members to appreciate each others’ writing samples. As a teacher/facilitator, I demonstrated the kinds of writing and writing-mediated interactions I wanted to encourage in the writing group, i.e., writing based on one’s personal experiences and interactions focusing on the content and meaning rather than spelling and grammar. I did so mainly by sharing my own writing samples with the group and providing meaning-focused comments on and written feedback to the members’ writing samples. As a researcher, I also carefully and systematically filed the members’ writing samples, and through interviews I questioned my various assumptions about EFL writing and EFL writers. One critical aspect to consider is a naturally imbalanced relationship between my participants and me, as shaped by unequal shares of power and knowledge. My status as

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a staff member in a provincial university’s English department, a PhD student, studying at a university in a developed (and English-speaking) country, married to an American, having a car, living in a big house—these all showed to the students that I had some desirable ‘cultural capital’ (Bourdieu, 2004). As Anne wrote in her letter to me, “Every time I arrived at your home, I admired you so much, for you have got a successful career, a good wife. I am eager to have such a life.” Fortunately, my privileged position did not seem to have become a barrier in my interactions with the student members. For instance, most members addressed me directly as “Nicholas,” a practice not common between Chinese teachers and their students. Peter regarded me as his “friend.” In her aforementioned letter, Anne described me as “always very kind.” Several factors might have helped me to use my power and knowledge in positive ways, which contributed to the making of an egalitarian group. Firstly, during group meetings we always sat in a circle. Like the students, I was without a teacher’s desk. Secondly, just as student members shared their lives with me through English writing, so I often shared mine with them. Thirdly, I invited the student members to write instead of imposing writing on them. Fourthly, I positioned myself as a learner writer in the group just like the students. I did so mainly by submitting my writing samples for the members’ critical comments, engaging in revising my drafts afterwards, and inviting the students to observe my writing processes. Last but not least, being a Christian, I was restrained from judging the students and constantly reminded to accept the student members as

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they were and be compassionate. I was also restrained from putting too much value on English, an international language as it is. That probably helped student members like Anne and Amy, who were struggling with difficult life experiences, to participate in the EFL autobiographical writing processes. My Own Identity Work While I cannot comment on the identity work of the other group members, I can provide a general observation on my own. Identity work similar to that identified in the case studies can be found in my own EFL autobiographical writing, such as the poem I presented at the beginning of this book. Through autobiographical writing, I performed an identity as one of the “three wandering sons.” I also reflected on my past experiences and identities, in relation to my parents, on the one hand, and in relation to my native culture, on the other. By doing so, I re-authored the identities of my parents, especially that of my father, and developed a new relationship with him. Towards the end of my poem, I also re-visioned his identity by hoping that he would use his music to pay tribute to the True Son of Heaven, instead of what Chinese traditions prescribe. In these ways, my identity work was especially similar to Anne’s despite our differences in gender, ethnicity, life experiences, and levels of English. My identity work was also shown through my struggles in self-positioning in my choice of topics and participants. For instance, challenged by my supervisors to make clear my own positions, I once experimented with these two titles: “1) Autobiographical writing and

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autobiographical self: Searching for an EFL writing pedagogy of hope 2) Autobiographical writing and autobiographical self: Stories of an EFL writing researcher and four ethnic Bai English majors” (email to supervisors, August 21, 2009). Audrey, one of my supervisors, responded: Extract: I think you’ve firmly answered some questions that we’ve raised in earlier discussion. For example in the second suggested subtitle—You and your autobiographical self are very much in this thesis. That’s still tricky of course—you as the PhD researcher, the teller fashioning / refashioning your research stories; you as writing teacher and assessor; you as a fellow EFL writer writing autobiographically in the workshops (also minority nationality background); you as writing teacher and assessor; and you as a case study participant generating data. (Emphasis added, Audrey’s email on August 24, 2009) Not wanting to be trapped in the “tricky” situation of juggling multiple identities in my research, particularly in its final presentation, I finally decided on a general plan to use my own language learning experiences and shifted language ideology as a “personal context of my research” (“Maybe in Chapter 1, where I give a personal context of my research, I can tell about myself as a learner writer of English and my changed ideology of language that I bring into my research,” email to Audrey, August 27, 2009). Group Members’ Growth as English Writers 411

In at least three regards, the four case study participants have improved as English writers. Firstly, they have improved in terms of taking more control over their writing processes than they previously did when engaging in test-oriented writing practices. Previously, their relationship with English writing was predominantly negative and restrictive. Through EFL autobiographical writing, they have used English writing as a powerful way of engaging in their identity work. Secondly, they have improved, to varying degrees, in terms of applying different writing techniques. Thirdly, they have improved in terms of engaging in writing not as a once-and-for-all event, but as a process of writing and rewriting. Among the four case study participants, Anne improved most as a writer, in terms of coming to alternative and empowering identity conclusions about herself as a writer. This has been illustrated by her successful transition from autobiographical writing to argumentative writing, from narrative writing to poem writing, and from writing in English to writing in Chinese (see Chapter 7). However, none of the other three case study participants showed such dramatic changes. In addition, it was a pity that I did not get to further research the case study participants’ writing in terms of fluency, which may be pursued in future research. As for the other 15 group members, an impression is that, even though they did not produce as many autobiographical samples as did the case study participants, to some extent, they all changed as writers

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in relation to their participation in the autobiographically oriented writing group. If these 15 members were divided into two main subgroups, an example from each subgroup suffices for illustration. In the first subgroup were seven members who frequently attended group meetings but for various reasons did not produce much autobiographical writing. They include Hope, Mary, Becky, Peter, Cindy, Joy, and Amy. As mentioned earlier, Hope made a breakthrough in autobiographical writing, producing her first complete narrative in English for the writing group even though she had thought that she could not write narratives. In the second subgroup were seven members who attended only a few meetings, mainly during the autobiographical writing stage. They include Melody, Karen, Emily, and Nancy,2 who often absented themselves from group meetings, and Jane, Kelly, and Zoe, who joined the writing group around the end of autobiographical writing stage. Kelly reflected at the last group meeting that in the writing group she learned to think and make her writing different from others’ writing. Another member, Tina, withdrew from the group at the end of the autobiographical writing stage, saying that she was too busy with her schoolwork. I do not have particular evidence about her progress. A Multi-Vocal Way of Representation Committing myself to a multi-vocal way of representation proved to be a difficult process filled with constant struggles with my self-positioning, particularly concerning what place I should give to my own experiences as an autobiographical writer and learner of English as an additional language. In the end, I decided

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to use my personal experiences as a point of entry and the impact of the research process on my own practice as part of the conclusion. My positioning follows four main considerations. First of all, as Bakhtin alerts, to hear the voice of another, i.e., any understanding of another’s ideologies and consciousness, necessarily entails the refractions through one’s own. Furthermore, between the researcher and the researched exists an unequal power relation, which definitely has an impact on what voices get represented and how they are represented in the written text (Mazzei & Jackson, 2009, p. 2). In addition, as a researcher, I myself am constrained by the research topic and process itself, making it impossible to include all perspectives in my book. Last but not least, my research aimed to produce situated understandings rather than generalizable knowledge. Thus, it was reasonable that its very application to practice should start with my own embodied and value-laden participation in a particular EFL context. Accordingly, the best I could do as a researcher was first lay bare my own voices, particularly those which I consider might have ‘refractioned’ or shaped the voices of my participants. I then tried to capture my use of power through the eyes of my participants and through reflection as an attempt to contextualize the multiple voices included in this book. Whether I have succeeded in doing it is up to my readers to decide. Future Applied Research The writing group arrangement produced a rich data pool, enabling the connections between EFL autobiographical writing and identity work to be

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explored. A large amount of argumentative writing data was also produced by the writing group and the same four student writers but has not been explored in the present study. In future research I would like to expand this work by focusing on argumentative writing. Tentatively, I expect following four lines of inquiry: 1) What difference, if any, is there between the ways the four case study participants approached EFL autobiographical writing and EFL argumentative writing in the writing group? 2) What evidence is there, if any, to suggest that the four case study participants became better argumentative writers (in terms of fluency, for instance) following their active participation in EFL autobiographical writing? 3) What evidence is there, if any, to suggest that identity work is involved in the four writers’ EFL argumentative writing? 4) What evidence, if any, is there to suggest that the four student writers’ argumentative writing in the writing group entails similar identity work as in their autobiographical writing? As an extension to the present study, further SLA writing research may also consider three additional practice-oriented categories that focus on the use of autobiographical writing by L2 learners in different parts of the world. One is situated in various kinds of writing groups. The other is situated in regular classrooms, which integrate certain writing group elements. The third is identity work as mediated by autobiographical writing 415

in non-English languages such as Chinese. Such research does not resolve major challenges such as oversized classes and marginal status of writing particularly in the EFL context (Leki, 2001; You, 2004). Nonetheless, applied research of this kind seems particularly beneficial to SLA as ‘a theory of practice’ (Hall, 1997) and to L2 learners, whose identities cannot be told by any single story. The four case study participants have all used EFL autobiographical writing in powerful ways to express, continue, and re-configure their multiple identities. May such also be the case for other L2 learners as more SLA scholars adopt an expanded view of L2 learner identity and a practice view of educational autobiographical writing.

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Appendix A Bilingual Invitations for Ethnic Bai Students (Originally inserted in invitation cards) Dear Bai student: You are invited to attend a meeting with me on Friday, March 14, 3:40 p.m. at Room J2A-108. At the meeting I will explain any questions you may have regarding joining the study. My American wife and I will invite you to dinner after the meeting. Look forward to seeing you there. Yang Shizhou/Nicholas

3:

40,

J2A-108

/Nicholas

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Appendix B Mission Statement A Mission Statement for the Bai English Majors Writing Group at [...] University Drafted by Nicholas Yang (Researcher member) March 14, 2008 This writing group is formed by Bai English major volunteers at [...] University who, from March 2008 to January 2009, will meet and work regularly on various activities related to English writing. Broadly speaking, the writing group serves two purposes. For the researcher who is also a member, it serves as a site to learn about its members’ EFL writing practices, especially in regard to EFL autobiographical writing and argumentative writing. For all its members, the writing group also serves as a community in which they learn with and from each other how to write better in English. The researcher’s role in the group is more of a facilitator than of a teacher or lecturer. He initiates activities, and responds to activities initiated by other members, in hope to create an environment personally or professionally perceived as conducive to the group members’ development as successful EFL writers. These activities include the researcher writing together with other group members and subjecting his writing, especially the drafts, to their critical reading. Other members’ role in the group is more that of a co-writer and co-researcher rather than that of a student in lectured classes. The only difference is that these members engage in writing and

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research activities from different backgrounds and angles to find out how they can become successful writers in English. Therefore, the responsibility remains with the researcher member to truthfully observe and the other members to truthfully tell how helpful these activities actually are to their development as EFL writers. [...] University

2008

3 14 [...] 2008

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3

University 2009 1

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Appendix C Life Experience Themes Adapted from McAdams (1995) RESPONDENT CODE: INTERVIEW DATE: VENUE: FORM: Focus-group or individual EVENTS: the happiest moment in your life the saddest moment in your life a turning point for you your earliest memory something you will always remember what event influences you greatly PEOPLE your family structure someone significant to you what makes this person special to you what does this person say about you FUTURE PLAN what kind of person do you want to become in your life

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PROBLEM what are some challenges for you BELIEFS AND VALUES your motto what you think about life

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Appendix D Nicholas’s Life River (T/D_1)

Figure A.1 Nicholas’s life river.

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Appendix E A Sample of Written Comments Time: 6:25–6:33 p.m., 7: 17–7:31 p.m., Thursday, June 5, 2008 Place: Home office Context: I have been writing whole day at my desk. All the preparations for tomorrow’s meeting are done. Now I hope to respond to writing samples I received last week. Maybe I can finish before dinner and won’t have to work too late tonight. Abby, Your article titled Music and the Movement of Sound is quite interesting. After reading it, I understood at least partly why I was in love of music. It’s the ‘beat,’ the ‘movement’ which accord very much with movements that fills my life. I wonder what inspires you to write on this topic. Did you do any research on the topic before or during writing? Did you actually ask others ‘Why do you listen to music?’ and record their responses or did you conceive both the replies yourself? What seems to me still bare is the lack of any particular pieces of music in the text. Wouldn’t your experience with rock music or pieces of music you are familiar with provide a good illustration for your theory? You used dash ‘—’well in your last paragraph.

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Third paragraph into your text, I found two sentences which can work better if slightly revised. 1. Whatever you listen to, opera or popular music, they are important to listen and both of them can stir a listener and evoke a response in him. (Divide into two sentences. Avoid shift of pronouns from ‘you’ to ‘him.’) 2. All music, whether it is the pulsation of primitive tribal drums or the complex coordination of voices, has the same feature: it is based on the power of sound to stir our senses and feelings. See you tomorrow. Best regards, Nicholas Time spent: 22 minutes

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Appendix F Abby’s Reading History

Figure A.2 Abby’s reading history.

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Appendix G Abby’s Writing History

Figure A.3 Abby’s writing history.

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Appendix H Nicholas’s Chapter Titles (2T)

Figure A.4 Nicholas’s chapter titles.

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Appendix I “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” (4W_W) [Context: Anne submitted “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” after the ninth week meeting, May 9, 2008. Two weeks later on May 23, Anne read it to the writing group.] An unforgettable event in childhood A lot of unforgettable things in my childhood always unvoluntarily turn up in my mind, especially the on [one] happened in Grade Two. At the age of eight, I was a carefree and invinsible girl. I was very boisterous and neve listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt her ugly and disgusting, because she didn’t meet my needs. For examply, I had no lovely clothes, no toys, no candies and all. But to my surprise, I was always in her mind, she cared me so much. One afternoon, I was having my maths class. Suddenly, the clouds gathered and became dark. In a few minuites [sic], it rained heavily. Afterwards, before our class was over, my classmates’s parents came to pick them up, carrying lively little umbrellars and water shoots [boots]. I looked out of the windows and felt worried and disappointed. [If] No one took me an umbrella, I would be struck in classroom. I could not focus on the text. Our class was going over. At this time, I saw a wonder, mother came hurrily, she wore a piece of plastic, and no one umbrella in her hand, Meanwhile, my teacher also [saw] my mother, he gave me permission to meet her. I 437

walked out, my mother took out a clear piece of plastic quickly under her coat and gave me. I received it and ran into my seat without any words. I tucked it into my desk very angrily. After class, I didn’t go until I made sure everyone had left. It still rained heavily. I had to wear the plastic. I ran home as quickly as possible. Tears ran out of my eyes. Now, I recall the event again. It seems that the event just happened yesterday. It shocks me deeply. I never forget it forever, never forget mother’s figure, because it has been carved in my mind and soul.

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Appendix J “God Made a Joke with Me” (1W_M) Context: Written on April 26, “God Made a Joke with Me” was one of Anne’s three essays for her mentor. It dealt with the same childhood event as 4W_W. Anne submitted it to me sometime after she had read “An Unforgettable Event in Childhood” to the writing group.] God made a joke with me A man should not always recall his past. [Anne then wrote ‘x’ at the end to indicate that her first paragraph starts with the next.] Nothing is absolutely fair. Most people jearn they can be treated fairly by God. So do I, I often complain many unfairs in life, because God likes to make joke with me. A lot of unforgettable things in my childhood always unvoluntarily turn up in my mind, especially the one happened in Grade Two. At the age of eight, I was a carefree and invinsible girl. I was very boisterous and neve listened carefully to my mother, sometimes even felt she ugly and disgusting, because she didn’t meet my need. For example, I had no lovely clothes, no toys, no candies and all. I didn’t change my opinion until that day. One afternoon, I was having my maths class. Suddenly, the clouds gathered and became dark. In a few minuites [minutes], it rained heavily. After-wards, before our class was over, my classmates’s parents came to pick them up, carrying lively little umbrellars and water

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shoots [boots]. I looked out of the windows and felt worried and disappointed. [If] No one took me an umbrella, I would be struck in classroom. I could not focus on the text. Our class was going over. At this time, I saw a wonder, mother came hurrily, she wore a piece of plastic, and no one umbrella in her hand, Meanwhile, my teacher also saw my mother, [and] he gave me permission to meet her. I walked out, my mother took out a clear piece of plastic quickly under her coat and gave me. I received [it] fast and ran into my seat. I tucked it into my desk very angrily. After class, I didn’t go untill I made sure everyone had left. It still rained heavily. I had to wear the plastic. I ran home as fast as possible. Tears ran out of my eyes. God made a big joke with me. I believe he must be laughing me when I ran wearing the plastic in rains. When I was young, he didn’t take mercy on me. It’s unfair. Now I know a truth that when I am weak, God will make me much weaker, but if I am strong enough, I can defeat him.

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Appendix K Written Response to Anne’s Writing Sample Response to your An Unforgettable Event in Childhood From: Shizhou Yang ([email protected]) Sent:Thursday, May 22, 2008 9:56:00 PM To: [email protected] Please see below. Time: 4: 52 p.m., Thursday, May 22, 2008 Place: Home office Context: I’m reading and writing to some Beethoven music in the background. Anne, You wrote a powerful story in An Unforgettable Event in Childhood. When reading it, I felt as if I were there to see the rain, to feel your feelings (anxiety, joy and embarrassment) and to walk the lone walk home. I admire your courage to tell the story. Although your language is simple, you told the story quite painfully beautiful. Your story touches on a serious topic: the demoralising power of poverty. It’s interesting to hear Christ say that blessed are those who are poor in spirit. Sometimes, we may all fail to see a person’s true worth because we don’t look at the inside, but rather at the outside. So, as a reader I’m interested in two things.

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First, did you feel differently about your mother after the rain-and-plastic event? Secondly, how do you feel about your mother now? Hope to see you again tomorrow. Best wishes, Nicholas Time spent: 26 minutes

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Appendix L “Unleash Your Writing Voice” Unleash Your Writing Voice by Nicholas Yang [I gave a copy of this sample to each member as a handout at the 14th meeting on June 13, 2008, and explained it to them in both English and Chinese.] Time: 10:10 a.m., Thursday, June 13, 2008 12:10; 12: 30–1:16 p.m.; 3:18–5:05 p.m.; total time spent: 273 minutes Place: Home office Overall design: Voice definition and significance A mini-project: • What are the multiple voices over a writing group activity? • How do they feel about an interpretation of their voices? • Voicing in personal narratives. Purpose: • To review and reinforce voice and its working in argumentation. • To invite members to reflect on the practice of voice. • To explore voice in personal narratives. 446

Audience: Writing group members Some possible questions from the members: What is voice? What is it in Chinese? What’s important about it? How to write with a voice? Last Friday, we discussed voice, such as what voice is and what is important about voice. Does anyone have any questions about voice now? Whenever I think of voice, I like to compare God the Creator and human being the writer. The Bible says, ‘the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being’ (emphasis added, Genesis 2:7). Likewise, a writer forms a story from the dust of the language, e.g. words, phrases and punctuation marks, and breathed into the story the breath of life—his or her voice—and the story becomes alive. God’s breath contains God’s life in it. Similarly, writers’ voices contain their lives. Living beings communicate with their Creator and other fellow living beings. In the same vein, living stories listen to and talk with their creator and other fellow living stories. God the Creator formed the man, turned him into a living being, and saw ‘it was very good’ (Genesis 1:31). So it is for us writers who create stories. When we have written our stories and given living breaths or voices to them, we also see them ‘very good.’ Hence, it is fitting for Graves (1983) to suggest voice as what drives writers to write their stories, to keep writing them and to present them alive.

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What exactly is voice then? Unlike Graves (1983) who calls it ‘the imprint ( ) of ourselves on our writing’ (p. 227), I’d rather call voice the writer’s out-print ( ) in the story. Turn your palms ( ) towards you. Look at your fingertips. What do you see? Fingerprints. We all have fingerprints, but mine differ from yours in their turning and whirling. Fingerprints are given and imprinted on our fingertips. Likewise, the different lives we are given to live bring us unique ( ) imprints of God and the world—the content or the stuff we can out-print into our life stories. The unique content is part of the voice. Remember Anne’s story in which she recalls how she experienced poverty as an eight-year-old. In part, it’s Anne’s anxiously expecting her family to bring her a ‘lively little’ umbrella, being embarrassed to receive only a plastic covering and going home alone in the rain so as not to be seen by others. Many, including me, have experienced poverty. But Anne’s account, our-printing the imprints made on her by the storm, her classmates’ ‘lively little umbrellars and water shoots,’2 her mother’s appearance with two plastics, has breathed her personal voice—in terms of unique content—to her poverty story. Thus, a writer’s voice is heard where the writer notes specifics of events: both the happening and the personal interpretation. Voice, however, does not come in unique content alone, but also in unique expressions and structures. You may be wondering how. Don’t we all share the same list of words and expressions? Don’t we all tell stories alike: either for or against time flow? Yes and no. Yes, because

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to make ourselves understood, we need to use shared conventions or ways of writing, whether in words, expressions or organisation. No, because to distinguish one writer from another, we need to infuse our unique meanings and intentions into these shared conventions. Remember my story I Am a Sinner in which I used the word ‘qualified’ four times. This word has a shared meaning such as a Webster dictionary may contain: ‘having met conditions or requirements set.’ Yet in my story the word carries on unique significance at its each appearance. ‘Qualified’ in my question ‘Am I qualified to be a Christian?’ is inflated with my pride as a ‘good’ and successful Chinese young man. ‘Qualified’ in two of my repeated statements ‘I was qualified’ reflects my personal understanding of joining the Communist Party and getting the teaching job at my university. ‘Qualified’ in my pastor’s response ‘Then, you are qualified to be a Christian!’ bears out a biblical ( ) truth and my identification ( ) with it. It’s a truth about salvation ( ) through grace and faith rather than works (Ephesians 2:8–9). This example tells how even more effective it can be when we start and continue our stories using expressions different from those used by others. Take the topic of going abroad as an example. Those who were here last Friday might remember the American writer Michael Krigline’s complaint against the overused expressions—‘nowadays,’ ‘hot topic’ and ‘every coin has two sides’ and the like—at the beginning of his Chinese students’ writing. So we challenged ourselves to write on the same topic but write differently. The result

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is encouraging; almost all of us start with something new.

Hope:

With the development of our society, more and more people are egar3 to study abroad. [first draft]

Peter:

Recently, I have had a dream—studying abroad. [first draft]

Cathryn:

I wanted to study abroad ever since the summer of my eleventh birthday. [first draft]

Abby:

My friend is going to Japanese for further study. [first draft]

Joy:

I dreamt of studying abroad since I was in high school. [second draft]

Beth:

At morden4 times, studying aboard has become a population* for a person who want experience different life. [first draft]

Nancy:

It’s very fashion have education in abroad. [second draft]

Anne:

With the development of the society, we are in a quickly-developing period. [first draft]

Nicholas:

Studying in America and in Australia are quite different experiences for me. [first draft]

[The members wrote their second drafts after reading each others’ first drafts.]

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Although these statements may contain a few errors, they are nevertheless rich in voice. In them, we begin putting into practice Krigline’s suggestion: ‘If all of your classmates are using some expression, find a different way to say it.’ In a sense, our challenge continues beyond writing on studying abroad, using different expressions to start. Our challenge also lies in using unique ways to organise our stories. Recall the story My Wonderful Lousy Poem. Like many stories, it mainly follows an easy time flow: first, second, then, in the end. However, the writer Budd Schulberg mingles the time flow with two unique currents. One is the continuing suspense to know why his poem is both wonderful and lousy (sounds like a bad word). The other is an increasing suspense for the readers to find out how his father will respond to his first poem. These two—time flow and unique suspense—join force into a strong river which carries the readers through the many unique events experienced by the writer: writing his first poem at eight or nine, being praised highly by Mother, feeling happy and expecting more lavish praises from Father, Father coming back delayed, Father reading the poem, Father speaking harshly of the poem, feeling sad, understanding the whole experience anew as a mature writer. Needless to say, the story will read much plainer if the unique suspense is removed. Now I’m tempted to finish writing about voice by translating it into Chinese. Others have done it—calling it ‘ ’ (sheng-yin) just as in speaking—confusing me profoundly, and I believe it will also confuse any other Chinese writer who wants to write with a voice. Here I

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humbly

present

mine:

a

writing

voice is [unique content, expression, and structure], which I believe does voice more justice. A further challenge remains for us all: to translate voice into practice. In my lingering meditation, I heard a distant voice from two American professional writers and writing teachers. It says good writing—besides doing five other things5—‘says something new’ (Kesselman-Turkel & Peterson, 1981, p. 25). Notes cast aside now but kept for future use: Hereby, I/ Yet I know to translate voice into Chinese is still easier than/Like two rivers, the time flow and suspense join It is the expectation of his unique events, some of which are listed below: What flows with time here Being such, it seems appropriate to /weaves into the time flow his personal /t and and my of saving through grave instead /also bends the flow according to his events/This is then interesting / We can also out-print in terms of/may also come /together with unique That is, at any given moment, our unique life experiences and aspirations give us unique positions to read God and the world differently from each other. /Thus it can be said that each writer has different imprints from God and the world. To write a story alive is to transfer that unique imprint—such as content, expression and structure—into the story. / the world imprints itself on each living. /All living beings breathe in the same breath of life from God/writers’ voice give life to their dead texts, /Yes, according to

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Graves (1893), voice is vital to successful writing. A writer’s voice prompts, sustains and enlivens both the writing process and the written text.

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Appendix M “My Father” (1W_W) [Anne submitted “My Father” at the second week meeting, March 21, 2008. She originally wrote it for her mentor.] My Father As for this topic, I intended to write long ago, but I really didn’t know what to start, because there are too much to say, until today. The faster time flies, the more preciously I consider the past. I want to stop time walking, and live in the past forever. Only in this way, my father could be young again. My father is always handsome in my eyes. He has medium height, his eyes are big and eyebrows are dense and dark. He was not too fat and not too thin, but now he is extremely thin, just like a stick. However, to my joy, he always gives you a big smile, with laugh wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, no matter what happen or when. When I was a child, although he didn’t show much love on me, he usually carried me on his shoulders on the way home at night, and I would sleep with dad’s temperature on his shoulders (back) [sic]. Frankly, dad never hit me, communications almost never happened between us. But I was not angry at it. I did understand him untill that time. At that time, I was in Grade Two in high school. I came back home for my summer holiday. I was frighten that

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father had been ill for a long time, but they didn’t tell me. Father hardly moved one step, I was deeply shocked. Seeing him weak, I just wanted to cry out, but I couldn’t. One day I took father some food for lunch, but he didn’t want to eat no matter how I persuaded. After a while, tears ran down on his cheek, while he was unable to () [left blank] his tears. I took some soft issues and helped him. His eyes were filled with hopelessness. I turned my face away, cried. Fortunately, father is getting better and better. I’ll never forget the day when I saw my father’s tears for the first time. It’s that day that father walked up to my world. He is one of the most important parts in my life. I’m trying to know more about him. Even though you can’t hear me, father, I still want to shout “I love you so much.”

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Appendix N 14th Meeting Handout Last Writing Group Meeting [Autobiographical Writing Stage]

This

Semester

Our last writing group meeting this semester: • Orally publishing the piece you are most satisfied with. • Practice reading it. • Revising it if needed. • Write a paragraph or so to tell the importance of this article. • Can be ones already shared with the group before or can be a new essay. • Make 15 copies. • To be presented at the last writing group meeting this semester. • Time: • Date: • Venue: at my home. • Food and entertainment will be provided.

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Appendix O “

”

(A Wound Never to Be Healed)

2008.8.24

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Appendix P “My First Picture” [The text was shared with the group at the sixth meeting on April 18, 2008. Five student members attended the meeting. They were: Cindy, Matt, Hope, Abby, and Becky.] Time: 7:30 p.m., Thursday, April 17, 2008 Place: At my desk in my home office Context: I just had dinner and came back from a short errand. I was trying to decide what we should discuss tomorrow and thought it might be helpful for the writing group members to see more of my writing samples. So I decided to write an article about my first picture. Outline: • Its value in general. • Why the value. • How did it come about. • Showing myself demanding, persistent.

as

a

little

kid—childish,

• Showing my connection with my mother. • Portray myself as one who cherishes family relationships. My First Picture Nicholas Yang

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How I wish I could find my first ever picture! After moving my home a few times, I could no longer find the picture in my albums. I tried many times to persuade myself that the picture would jump out by itself one day just like most of my lost and found, but I’m afraid that I might have lost it forever, much to my own regret. To others, the picture is simple, black and white; to me, it’s both special and precious. It holds my memories of myself in my early childhood and my mother in her good health and a bond between us two. I went to school when I was six years and three months old, about one year short of the school age. Mother sent me to her friend Madam Wei’s class to pang-ting or listen at the side so that I could be taken care of by Madam Wei. However, much to my disappointment, the school turned out to be a difficult place: no playing of clay, nor hunting of crickets, but repeatedly reading after the teacher things I could not understand. Worst of all, I was constantly bullied by bigger kids. So when I discovered that a photographer was at school, I was overjoyed. ‘Mother, please take me to get a picture! Someone is taking pictures!’ I said to Mother, full of longing. I cannot remember what Mother was doing at that moment, nor can I remember how [what] else I said to her. But Mother did take me to the school, which was only a five-minute walk from my home. The photographer was still there. He asked me to stand straight, look into the camera, and then on went the flash—my first ever picture was taken.

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I was wearing a blue jacket and pants made by Mother. Both were so long that I had to roll up my sleeves and pant legs. My black shoes were made by Mother too, with a V-shaped opening at the top. Though not long enough to cover my eyes, my hair had a considerable length and was zigzagging at my forehead. I put my hands in my pants’ pockets and deliberately put on a very serious look on my face. Next to where I stood were a few power poles of cement lying on the ground. At the far back was my one-storey classroom. Above its windows was a slogan in red which was probably written during the Great Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). It says, ‘The Maoist Thought Wins at Every Battle!’ For years and years, I cherished the picture. The serious look on my face seemed to express my will to persevere through a difficult school, though not without tears. The clothes and shoes I was wearing often remind me of Mother’s love. I also remember that it was a time when Mother was still healthy and able to work in the field, sell snacks near the school, or visit me at school when I was bullied. Every time I tried to recall what Mother did before she was paralysed and died, the memory of taking my first picture always haunted me. The picture has literally become a bond between me and Mother, who lived her life as an illiterate farmer but sent me to school and comforted me in my tear-filled days. I wish I could somehow find the picture. (567 words) P.S.

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I finished writing at 9:07 p.m. The article took me 98 minutes to complete. I found for some time I was not able to break through using ‘it’ to begin sentences. But I am glad that I succeeded in the end to use other sentence initiating devices. Below are some sentences or sentence-like constructions I tried to use in the text at first, but decided to throw them out either because they don’t seem to relate to my title very well or because they have a tendency to shift the focus of my text. Upon reflection, I feel I’m successful in my communicative goals except in telling me as a demanding kid. This was left out partly because I was not in a strict sense demanding.

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Appendix Q “I Am a Sinner” Time: 8:12 p.m., Wednesday, June 4, 2008 (I first stopped at 9:06 p.m., spent 48 minutes; resumed 6:41–7:13 a.m., 7:35–7:46 a.m., 8:22–9:39 a.m., Thursday, June 5, 2008.) Time spent altogether: 158 minutes Place: home office Context: I have been writing a paper about voice. Now I give myself 15 minutes to re-write my conversion story. Softly playing on my computer is a Mozart’s collection. But as the writing went on and off, this context also changed. For example, I resumed writing this morning first by myself in the home office, then with my wife and another friend doing their own work in the office. I Am a Sinner by Nicholas Yang ‘Am I qualified to be a Christian?’ After a Sunday service, I asked Pastor Bob earnestly. He looked into my eyes, as if trying to find out the background from which I used such an unfitting word. That background, of course, he didn’t know, nor did I ever tell him. It was a background of accomplishments and pride.

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I was one of three students out of about 150 high school graduates from my hometown who scored high enough to go to college in 1995. I passed almost all high-level English tests available in China: TOEFL, GRE and grade 4 and 8 of Tests of English for English Majors (TEM-4 and -8). I spoke fluent English. I was a model student—once at the provincial level— and a model Communist Youth League Member throughout my four years in college. I won many awards, most noteworthy of which was the Norwegian King Harold V Scholarship I received in 1998. I worked harder than anyone else in my class. I was often the first one to get up and the last one to get to bed in my dormitory. I spent my weekends reading the 800–some-page long Oxford English Pocket Dictionary or listening to VOA and BBC. I spent none except two college vacations at home with my family. Even then I kept studying most of the time. One time my aunt gladly found out from an alumna that I was looked upon as a ‘flag’ at the English Department. Being a student leader in charge of the class PE, I knew the importance of getting public support. I organised successful poker and chess games. I closed one eye when the ladies—there were many of them in my class—did not appear at the roll call in the morning exercise. I often treated my classmates with delicacies from my hometown: walnuts, chestnuts, pumpkin seeds and the like. I was also a passionate cheerleader. So, in my last year of college, I joined the Communist Party with ease. My application was short: only two or three pages long. But it didn’t matter. I was qualified.

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My outstanding performance as a student and student leader made me distinct. If I can’t join the party, who else can? So, right after I graduated, my alma mater—Yunnan Nationalities University—took me to teach English majors while serving as the departmental tuan-lao-zong or Youth League leader. I only had my bachelor’s degree then. But it didn’t matter either. I was one of the four who passed TEM-8 in my class. On top of that, I was the only boy of the four; and I was handsome and hardworking. I was qualified for my job. Pastor Bob didn’t reply at once. There was a pause, an unbearably long pause. The congregation had now left the church building, leaving me alone with Pastor Bob. I became uneasy. I could feel sweat in my palm, just like that time when my primary school principal stood me in the basketball court for gambling on glass pebbles. Doubts began to rise in my heart. What if the pastor says I’m not good enough to be a Christian? I knew too well that I was not as loving as Mother Teresa who went to India to serve ‘the poorest of the poor.’ I was not even as good as my godparents who gave me free boarding while I attended Mercer University. And despite my humble way of speaking, I was proud inside for my accomplishments. I was but a hypocrite. My doubts grew stronger and stronger when Pastor Bob finally broke the silence. Yet he didn’t answer my question. ‘Are you a sinner?’ He asked plainly.

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I was taken aback. I too needed a background to fully understand Pastor Bob’s question. It was a background I was to absorb deeply into in the years to come. In that background, each man has gone astray like lost sheep, each going his own way (Isaiah 53:6), whether it’s being unloving, unforgiving or ungrateful. Nevertheless, God loves each of us while we are still sinners (Romans 5:8; John 3:16). What God wants of us is this: recognising our sin and repent (Luke 13:1–9; 1 John 1:8–10). Of course, I didn’t have this background yet. Strangely, words seemed to come out of my mouth of their own will. ‘Yes, I am!’ I said firmly, startling even myself. ‘Then, you are qualified to be a Christian!’ Pastor Bob replied with a content smile. He also put extra stress on the word ‘qualified.’ Many sermons had I heard Pastor Bob preach. Several private conversations had I with him. However, nothing impressed me as much as this dialogue. Eight years later, I still find myself often recalling with fondness this brief yet long dialogue. It stood in my journey of faith my initial seeking as a successful Chinese. As he promises, ‘Seek and you will find’ (Matthew 7:7). Through my proud yet honest seeking, I found him: a humble and humorous God who saves me with his own blood. (838 words)

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Appendix R Written Comments on Hope’s Sample Time: 8:30 a.m., Friday, April 25, 2008 Place: Home office Context: Commenting on your writing was the first thing today. Hope, I’m responding to your two articles one by one. Your article Money and Happiness begins well, with a good head, strong shoulders and a vigorous heart, speaking in terms of our body metaphors. Your later development on what constitutes or leads to happiness also answers a question I had as a reader. The statement—‘Money is not the only answer to all problems’—however, raises some other questions in me the answers to which could not be found in the text. I’m wondering, to add more uniqueness to your text, if you could explore further what makes you happy. You can focus on one event, such as the knowing of a new friend, and give details on when, where, how and the significance of this event to your life. The second text is quite interesting to read. I feel you were trying to give your reader an explanation about occasions where lies should be told. I wonder where you read or heard about the study about teachers saying confident words to the ordinary group of students. Did you have any personal experience of being ‘lied’ in such a way? Also in the case of lying to a dying patient, are 473

there any personal stories to draw upon? I could definitely get your point. But I was also hoping that there could be more ‘flesh’ to the ideas you presented. Best regards, Nicholas

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Notes on Data 1. Transcription Conventions sentence stopped halfway [ ]

explanation added by author

...

material deleted in quotation

( )

untranscribable utterances

(?)

transcribed with doubt

(( ))

description added by author p long pause

CAP

reading out material

Great!

emphasis

italics

my translation from Chinese

2. Names Case study participants: Anne

An.

Abby

Ab.

Beth

Bt.

Matt

Mt.

(These abbreviations will be used particularly in Chapters 7, 8, and 9.) Researcher: Nicholas

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Visitors: Cathryn

American, Nicholas’s wife

Chingyee

Malaysian Chinese, Cathryn’s friend

Barry

American, Cathryn’s friend

Catherine

American, Barry’s wife

Audrey

Australian, Nicholas’s supervisor

3. Data Quoted from Participants Data quoted from the participants are copied from the original writing samples verbatim. No attempts are made to correct grammar, spelling, punctuation, or spacing. Whenever possible, writing samples are dated according to the time of writing, either based on reliable sources such as the participants’ contextual description or interviews. An “approx.” is used whenever a writing sample was not dated by the writer and the best available date is the time when the writer submitted the writing sample to me. Data sources are abbreviated in the following format: Ordinal Number, Type of Data, Audience (if applicable). The following list gives examples of the abbreviations used: 1W_W

first writing sample for the writing group

5W_W

fifth writing sample for the writing group

3I

third interview

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32V

video transcription of the 32nd group meeting

1W_M

first writing sample, written for a “ (mentor)

1E

first email

1T

first reference text in the writing group

10W_2F

10th writing sample, free writing during a group meeting

”

4. Confidentiality All names and places have been changed to protect the identities of the case study participants. Other first names are used with permission.

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Notes Notes to Chapter 1 1. Literally, it means “Dragon’s Spring,” a place where the dead gather according to Chinese tradition. 2. The situation was beyond help as, besides other teaching and administrative duties, I had more than 130 students in my writing course, divided into three classes. 3. ‘College’ in this book refers to a department or faculty of a university, in accordance with my host institution’s own English translation. Notes to Chapter 2 1. In later discussion, I will make a case about the use and disuse of a hyphen. 2. Like White and Epston (1990), Ivanič draws on Goffman’s theory of performance in defining ‘discoursal self.’ 3. Narrative therapists’ alternate term for ‘landscape of consciousness’ and ‘landscape of identity’ Notes to Chapter 3 1. This poem was first written and read in an experimental writing workshop by Y. Lincoln’s workshop at the Fifth International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry at the University of Illinois, May 20–23, 2009. It was my response to her invitation for attendees to each write a poem about ‘emotional residues from [their] research.’

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2. Grant’s original term is ‘sociocultural/global context.’ To avoid confusion with ‘sociocultural’ in a Vygotskyan sense (see Chapter 2), I use ‘global context’ instead. 3. Grant (1991, passim; personal communication, July 16, 2008). Notes to Chapter 4 1.

2. An art graduate from Abby’s university started dating her during the last stage of the writing group activities (33V). 3. Unless otherwise indicated, all dates were from 2008. 4. See Appendix C for an outline. 5. Potentially, Abby and Hope could have chosen English, Mandarin, dialect Chinese (by which I mean a local version of Chinese), or Bai. During the last two interviews, they chose dialect Chinese, a very interesting choice, according to Howard, because presumably Mandarin Chinese was the language in which Abby and Hope had become familiar with thesis writing, literacy, and cultures. It was unlikely that they could use Bai to discuss thesis writing, for instance. 6.

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7. That is, in her second semester as a third-year student. 8. By “Benjamin Frankle,” Abby probably referred to Benjamin Franklin, whose autobiography was mentioned by Matt, another member from Abby’s grade. Or given that Abby is a music fan (1 I), she might have been referring to Benjamin Frankel (1906–1973), an accomplished violinist and musician. However, in an email on July 1, 2010, Abby replied, “It must be Benjamin Franklin. Sorry for my wrong spelling. I cannot distinctly remember the parts of his autobiography I’ve read.” 9. ” (3 I). 10.

11. In her email to me on July 1, 2010, Abby wrote that what she meant by “hoodle” was “ ” or “a glass bead.” More accurately, it is called playing marbles. 12.

Hope

......”

13. At times, Abby listed rock ‘n’ roll and metal music as two types of music (e.g., “Swcolt, whom I learned much Rock ‘n’ Roll and metal music from...” 4D/W_W). 480

14. “ When I’m mourning When I’m standing in silence tribute ” 15. According to an online Chinese dictionary, “ ” has two meanings: “ ” (bemusing words and behaviours) and “ ” (dialect, referring to tricks) (Retrieved June 24, 2010, from http://xh.5156edu.com/html5/290126.html). 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. Abby wrote these on January 5, 2009, after she had drawn trees to represent her writing group experiences and two faces to contrast herself as a writer before and after joining the writing group. 22. All three quotes that follow are taken from Abby’s email on July 1, 2010. Notes to Chapter 5

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1.

2. 3. Matt

was

referring

to

‘

EFL

(An Introduction to ‘Learning to Write English through EFL Autobiography: Case Studies of Bai English Majors in China’), an introduction I wrote in Chinese and gave each potential student participant a copy at the time of inviting them to join the writing group. 4. Howard Nicholas pointed out that Matt probably meant “a free meal will be enough for us to join the study.” The offer of a free meal was made in my invitation to the Bai students in five classes. 5. According to Matt, this piece of writing was based on his real experience. As he explained to some members at the 32nd meeting, “ [“I like you!” and “I love you”] ” (Mine [“‘I Like You!’ and ‘I Love You!’”] is also about a personal experience.” 6. There is some confusion between Matt’s written and spoken expressions of God. When asked about his mention of God here, Matt said, “All of a sudden I got this sentence, and I use ‘Gods.’ Maybe I mean, ‘if I have another chance.’ But it’s impossible, so I use ‘Gods’ express the impossibility” (3 I). Despite the change from

482

“God” in his writing to “Gods” in his explanation, it was clear that Matt was being rhetorical rather than religious. 7. At the 32nd meeting, when members were commenting on Anne’s poem “A Wound in My Soul” during the break, Matt told Amy that his story “ ” (was also based on my personal experience). Asked about the result, he said laughingly, “She refused” (32V). 8. This was Matt’s second and also the last chance to take the TEM-4. In 2007, Matt had taken the TEM-4 but failed with a score of 58, two points short of the passing score (2 I). In 2008, he passed narrowly with a score of 62 (based on departmental public notices), making him the only Bai member from his year level to pass the exam. 9. It was the second time that Matt suggested a connection between his writing in English and his experience of falling in love. In an email to me on June 16, for instance, Matt wrote, “I am falling love with a girl who is a classmate of mine. Curiously, I feel I have strong passion to want to say more and also write more. Perhaps I will have many articles appeared.” 10. Matt drew “My Life Road” in response to my request that he use one or more images to represent himself as a writer before and after joining the writing group. Before this, Matt had drawn a picture of winding roads, flowers, and snow to represent his writing group experiences. Both pictures were made during the 32nd and last meeting on December 20, 2008.

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11. This was clear as Matt wrote in reply to my questions, “ ” (In what ways did autobiographical writing in English in the writing group help you? What is the biggest help? Email on May 19, 2010.) 12. Guanyin is Chinese name for Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara, Amida, or female Buddha. The worship of Guanyin, started by Han Chinese, has been integrated in Bai cultural practices for centuries (cf. Mackerras, 1988). 13. I did not ask Matt why the gift was of an apple, as I already learned about it from experience and from his high school classmate Cindy, also a writing group member. “Apple” in Chinese is “ (ping—guo),” its first character homophonic with the first character in “ (ping-an),” which means “peace” or “safety” in Chinese, both highly valued among Chinese people. The association between apple and peace or safety created business opportunities for some. According to Cindy, one of her high school classmates even made a small fortune by selling wrapped-up apples near her school and “treated my whole class to a meal” afterwards. Notes to Chapter 6 1. “

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2. 3.

4. “ 5. “

6. (After taking the CEE, at first, I did not want to come here; I wanted to go back to take remedial classes. But my mother said: Since I already came, since I already got in the university—just tell me to come. I think this is a big pity. I still want to take remedial classes very much, but I was not allowed to.” (1 I) 7. A kind of phone service via the Internet which offers cheaper rates, especially international calls, than the conventional landline or mobile phones do. Such services can be found in specialised phone stands or convenience stores in towns and cities in China. 8. I 9.

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10. “ 11. By this I mean the members reading their most satisfactory pieces of writing to the whole group. 12. The meeting was held at my home and attended by five members from the third year, two guests—Abby’s classmate and Tina’s niece. Beth and Tina were the only year-one students at the meeting. Notes to Chapter 7 1. An earlier form of this chapter was published under the title of “A small clean warm plastic”: Understanding EFL autobiographical writing and identity, Asian EFL Journal, 14(3), September 2012 Quarterly Edition. Included with permission from Asian EFL Journal. 2. Spelling, grammar, case, punctuation, and spacing as in the original. To retain the flavour of the original, the same applies to other excerpts from Anne’s writing samples. 3. See Appendix C. 4. Italicized texts indicate my translations from Chinese. 5. TEM-4 stands for Test of English for English majors, Band 4, taken by Chinese English major students in their second year. Each student has a maximum of two opportunities to take the test. 6. Through my title “When I Am Serious, God Is Romantic,” I intended to write a love story about me and 486

my wife, Cathryn, from America. I first met Cathryn in 1999 when she studied Chinese at my university, where I had just become a teacher of English. We were casual acquaintances only. Then both of us went to study in America without knowing what the other one was doing. After losing contact for nearly four years, in 2004, in the city where we first met, at a local church, where I sang with the choir for the first time, there she was in the congregation. We were both surprised to see each other, even more to learn about each others’ lives in the past few years. For it was during those years that I became a Christian and she had completed her graduate studies and decided to return to China. Cathryn and I started seeing each other more often. After a series of miracle-like events, we started dating in autumn 2004 and got married in 2006. So, in my story, God is a loving Father, who plays the role of a matchmaker. 7. This is an allusion to a Chinese government policy, with one hand managing “ ” (material civililisation) and the other dealing with “ ” (spiritual civilisation). 8. A. Grant (personal communication, 2010) suggested Anne might have meant “prized” here, meaning “valued, treasured by.” 9. The story was not written by any writing group member. It was a sample included in A Peking University Coursebook on English Exposition Writing (Coffman, 2003).

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10. The two words ‘umbrellars’ and ‘shoots’ are kept as original. They should be ‘umbrellas’ and ‘boots’ instead. 11. The idea occurred to me when I attended a presentation by Hassall (2007) on Extremely Short Stories Competition (ESSC). Similar references can be found at http://50words.org; Hassall (2006); and Hassall et al. (2007). 12. “I was moved also I feel ashamed because my mother didn’t take me a lovely umbrella or rainboot, just plastic,” Anne said to Peter after she read her poem (32V). 13. It is interesting that what Anne described here was mainly what she learned during the autobiographical writing stage, even though several months had passed. 14. ” Here, Cathryn reminded me that Hemingway wrote mainly with one-syllable words. 15.

Notes to Chapter 8 1. This is because meetings held at my home, with complimentary meals, often lasted several hours. Notes to Chapter 9

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1. During an interview on December 11, 2008, Hope reported that since middle school, she had been writing only argumentative essays and no narratives. All the books at her home, according to her, were about argumentative writing. Argumentative writing was her favourite genre. If ever she came across narratives in a composition book, she would simply skip them. 2. Both Melody and Nancy were busy students. Melody was a student leader, who aspired to become either an interpreter or an international tour guide. Nancy was dating and had a part-time job. Notes to the Appendix 1 The two words ‘umbrellars’ and ‘shoots’ are kept as original. They should be ‘umbrellas’ and ‘boots’ instead. 2 This should be spelt as ‘eager.’ 3 It should be spelt as ‘modern’; note its similarity with ‘modem.’ 4 Although they words—‘aboard’ and meaning and usage.

look alike, these two ‘abroad’—differ greatly in

5 These five other things are: elicits one main intellectual response from read ers; grabs the readers’ attention and holds it; is sensory; builds on ideas already understood by readers; makes every abstract idea so concrete that readers can picture it.

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Index 50-word poem. See autobiographical writing A Abby: ‘A butterfly has no soul’ explained, 63–64; and cultural alignment, 86; and gendered identity, 78–81; and increased agency, 84; and music, 76; and The Diary of a Nobody, 73; as “an excellent student”, 64; as a humorous family member, 72–74; as a mourner, 77; as a reader/writer, 71; autobiographical writing, 67–81; identity work in two languages, 75; identity work through autobiographical writing, 81–87; lack of reflecting and re-visioning, 82–84; male-sounding English name, 63; performed social identities, 81; Previous learning and literacy experiences, 65–67; shifts in writer identity, 84–85; ‘soul’ explained, 87 adult EFL student writers, 16–18 agency. See identity Ahearn, L. M., 19, 206 Alagozlu, N., 16 Allport, G. W., 19, 26 Alvermann, D. E., 62 Amer, A. A., 17 Anderson, L., 19 Anne: “praised” in the writing group, 156; and “wound”, 171; and Chinese culture, 166–167; and continuity, 171; as “an amazing girl”, 164; as a daughter despising her 526

mother, 153; as a girl from the countryside, 161–162; as an accepting daughter, 161; autobiographical writing, 149–165; identity work through autobiographical writing, 165–175; perceptions of writing in English and Chinese, 173; performed social identities, 166; previous literacy experiences, 145–148; re-authoring, 168, 175; reflections, 166–168; re-visioning, 168; shifts in writer identity, 169; use of pronouns, 148, 172; writing in two of her languages, 162 Atkinson, D., 12, 56 Atkinson, R., 52 autobiographical writing: “Guided Autobiography”, 178; a minimal definition, 18; an early exploration in education, 5; and an expanded view of identity texts, 217; and backward gaze, 10; and Christianity, 165; and culture ‘as a verb’, 25; and diary study, 14; and freedom, 85, 127; and invitations, 177; and memory, 36; and modern techonologies, 186; and social interaction, 101–103; and third space, 39–40; as a repositioning tool, 22; as a site of struggle, 136, 138; as a social practice, 121, 212–213, 200; as a unique dialogical site, 36–39; as a unique space for identity work, 22; as a way to relax, 120; as a window into partial realities, 34–36; as multi-voiced, 78, 112; chapter titles, 178, 237; critical applications, 215; need for scaffolding, 214–215; personal statement, 17; poem, 2–4, 48, 80, 116, 163; published L2 memoires, 11–13; teacher’s assignment, 17; use in ESL classrooms, 17 B

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Bai: and Chinese, 45; beliefs, 45; presence in the writing group, 47; script, 46, 217 Bakhtin, M., 8, 15–16, 21, 26, 37, 43, 53–54, 58, 62, 71, 78, 112, 114, 149, 152, 179, 180, 193, 212, 221 Bamberg, M., 20, 37 Barton, D., 24 Belcher, D., 12, 16, 23 Bell, J. S., 8, 11 Belz, J. A., 25 Bereiter, C., 39 Bernauer, J. A., 62 Beth: and English grammar, 123; and two of her languages, 144; as “a homely girl”, 131; as “a literary girl”, 140–141; as a “pure girl”, 134; as a Chinese writer, 122–123; as a curious girl, 136–137; as a teacher, 138–139; autobiographical writing, 127–141; diary writing, 123–124, 134–136; early English writer identity, 126; identity work through autobiographical writing, 141–144; imagined identities as a teacher and as a traveller, 135–136; investment in autobiographical writing, 127; ‘literature dream’, 122, 127, 133, 140–143, 181, 183–185, 188–199, 210; multiple identity options, 138; performed social identities, 141; previous literacy experiences, 122–126; reasons for joining the writing group, 126–127; reflections, 141–142; re-visioning, 142; shifts in writer identity, 142; travel dream, 133 Bhabha, H., 39–40

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Bible, 1 Billard, B., 46 Block, D., 15, 18–19, 22, 40, 43, 174, 203, 205–206, 209, 212–213 Bloome, D., 43 Bourdieu, P., 14, 20 Bowman, P. J., 96 Brisk, M. E., 17 Brockmeier, J., 34–35 Brodkey, L., 30 Bruner, E. M., 20, 28–29 Bruner, J., 8, 16, 19, 26–27, 29, 31, 34–35, 44, 54, 56, 98, 137, 140 C Carey, S., 31 Carr, A., 28, 33, 102, 138–139, 210, 213 Casanave, C. P., 11, 13 case study, 44–45 Chandler, D., 53 Chase, S. E., 8, 52 Chen, H. L., 16 Cheng, F. W., 17

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Choi, I., 56 Clandinin, D. J., 8, 26, 34, 43, 50, 59 Clinchy, B. M., 42 Coffey, S., 30, 213 Coffman, D. M., 137 Collins, J., 24 Connelly, F. M., 8, 26, 34, 43, 59 contexts: the cultural/global context, 185–186; the personal context, 182; the social context, 182–185; the transformative context, 56, 174, 193–197; theory, 56 continuity: through facts and metaphors, 204–205; through identity texts, 15–16 Contreras, E., 13 conversion, 2 Cook, V., 37, 40, 174, 208 critical experiences, 18 ‘critical language awareness’, 30 culture: a macro and dynamic view of, 40; as ‘baggage and interference’, 18; ‘as a verb’, 25, 43; as potential resources, 203; Buddhism, 6, 78, 86, 185, 267; Christianity, 37, 165; western, 86 Cummins, J., 15, 211, 217 D Dale, I. M. B., 53 530

Davidson, C., 61 Daynes, J. G., 44 De Fina, A., 20 Deng, X. H., 45 Denzin, N. K., 8, 42 dialogism: a multi-vocal way of representation, 61–62, 221; and human existence, 34; and ‘ideological becoming’, 21; and language, 43; and ‘orchestrating’, 78; and voicing, 61–62; architectonics, 62, 112; self-othering, 37; voice defined for represenation, 61 Ding, W. D., 154 discourse: as multi-voiced, 21; types of, 21 Doan, R. E., 29, 32–33, 190 drawings: as mediating tools, 52, 87, 124, 140, 171, 207 During, S., 37 E Eakin, P. J., 16, 20, 26, 44, 57, 204, 209 Edelsky, C., 17 Ellis, R., 17 English: and mobility, 37; as a ‘glocal’ language, 36; as a tool, 14; Asian Englishes, 39; perceived power of, 173, 210, 215 English as a Foreign Language (EFL), 7; and China, 40; and identity work, 203; need for thick descriptions, 25

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English as a Second Language (ESL), 7, 12, 17 Epston, D., 8, 16, 27–34, 40, 72, 149, 155, 188, 205, 265 ethnicity: Bai background, 6, 45–46; Chinese ethnic minority students, 5; Naxi, 1, 4; positionings of Bai, 126; relevance of Bai ethnicity, 216 ethnography: and contextual data, 53; and language teaching and research, 208; and literacy studies, 18, 24–25; research methods, 8; view of literacy, 8 extracurricular writing group: as a social context, 58, 85, 120, 153–154, 155–156, 183–185; as an audience, 30, 80, 86, 101, 107, 111, 134, 138–139, 141, 155, 174–176, 178, 180, 197, 200, 212; comparison with regular classes, 184–185; feedback, 50, 143, 158, 185, 189, 218; foreign visitors, 49; investment, 184; language use, 49–50; members, 47; oral publication, 49; relationships, 184; schedule, 49 F Fairclough, N., 19, 37, 53, 213 Farías, M., 25 Firth, A., 43 Fishman, J., 30 Foucault, M., 29 G Gao, Y., 17 Gao, Y. H., 17, 22

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Gee, J. P., 19, 57 Geertz, C., 26 Gerardo, A., 13 Giddens, A., 16, 19–20, 25, 149, 190, 203 Giroux, H. A., 17, 30, 215 Goffman, E., 27 Grant, A. N., 8, 17, 24–26, 28, 33, 37, 39–40, 44, 54–56, 58–60, 171, 174, 180, 185, 193, 202–204, 210, 265, 269 Graves, D. H., 17, 30 Green, J., 43 Gremillion, H., 32 Gu, M. M., 17 Gutiérrez, K. D., 39 H Hagood, M. C., 30 Halai, N., 61 Hall, J. K., 8, 17, 43, 222 Harris, R., 208 Hassall, P. J., 269n 11 Heath, S. B., 8, 15, 24–25, 30, 34–35, 43, 53, 57, 149, 154–155, 177, 203, 206, 215 Helms-Park, R., 16

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Hermans, H. J. M., 204 Higgins, C., 25 Hirvela, A., 12, 16, 23 Hoffman, E., 11 Holland, D., 19, 21 Holquist, M., 8, 15, 20–21, 26, 34–35, 39, 53, 54, 62, 78, 112, 149, 179, 204–205, 209 Hull, G. A., 21, 62, 206 I Iddings, A. C. D., 15 identity: a poststructuralist view of, 14; a relational view of, 23, 27; ‘an English self’, 11; an expanded view of, 18–26; and a ‘multi-storied’ or ‘multi-voiced’ sense of self, 27, 175; and agency, 19; and categories, 8, 15, 19, 21–23, 25, 28, 32, 54, 57, 202–204, 206–207; and investment, 7, 14, 20, 24–25, 57–58, 84, 91, 119, 121, 142–143, 180, 191, 193, 197–198, 201, 204, 210–212, 214; and literacy, 24; and motivation, 14; and multicompetence, 40; and power, 16; as ‘association of life’, 31; as entailing both change and continuity, 204–206; as made, 19; as multiple, 19, 202; continuity as important, 15–16; dichotomies, 15; emergent identities, 19; English-writing-mediated identities as important, 22; essentialised, 8, 28, 31; ‘soul in exile’, 11; two types of, 207–209 identity conclusion: defined, 20 identity texts: defined, 15 534

identity work: a narrative view of, 26–34; agency as central to, 206–207; and argumentative writing, 221–222; and contexts, 180–186; and English learning, 17; and ideology, 21, 86; and performance, 27–28; and scaffolding, 197; defined, 19; English-writing-mediated, 8, 10, 21–22, 26, 58, 67, 85–88, 122, 135, 141, 172, 186, 193, 195, 202, 205, 207–209; in a ‘glocal world’, 204; in narrative terms, 209–210; of immigrants, 12, 13–16; of published L2 autobiographers, 11; phases of, 187–197; the researcher’s, 219 imagined communities: defined, 20 imagined identity: as a writer, 142; as an autobiographer, 119, 121 investment: cultivate voluntary investment, 214; imposed vs voluntary, 211; multiple factors for, 210–211 Ivanic, R., 22–23, 25, 30, 43–44, 72, 101, 115, 138–139, 148, 180, 187, 203–204, 208, 213, 265 J Jackson, A. Y., 62, 221 Juzwik, M. M., 60 K Kachru concentric circles: Expanding Circle, 10; the Expanding Circle, 13, 36, 209; the Inner Circle, 12–13, 17, 37, 212 Kachru, B. B., 10, 12–13, 37, 39 Kadar, M., 62

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Kamal, F., 17, 37 Kaminura, T., 17 Kamler, B., 17, 30, 215 Kang, J. Y., 17, 34 Kanno, Y., 20, 210 Kashima, E. S., 35, 56 Katz, L., 15 Katz, M.-L., 21 Kenyon, G. M., 109, 112 Kesselman-Turkel, J., 248 Kibler, A., 15, 25 Kirkpatrick, A., 35 Klapproth, D. M., 35 Klapproth, D. M., 35 Kouritzin, S. G., 35 Kramsch, C., 8, 17, 19, 37, 39, 162 Kutuzova, D., 215 L Lakeview University, 7, 46, 49–50, 53; mentoring system, 155; regular writing class, 53, 182 Lam, W. S. E., 17, 19, 25, 37, 39, 78, 162, 208

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language: and identity, 15; as a mediating tool, 26; use and dialogical relations, 21 Lantolf, J. P., 26 Landay, E., 30 Larson-Freeman, D., 42, 62 Lave, J., 27 Lea, M. R., 25 learning: and co-authoring, 28; and modelling, 178, 180; as sociocultural, 26–27 Leki, I., 12, 18, 81, 222 Leung, C., 208 Li, X., 11, 20, 22, 26 Li, Z. Z., 17 life: life river, 52, 95–99, 117, 144, 149, 151, 166, 229; life story interview, 52; metaphors, 34–35 Lightfoot, C., 21 Lin, A., 13, 36 Lincoln, Y., 42 Lincoln, Y. S., 42, 265 literacy: and contexts, 43; and ‘literacies’, 24; and literacy practices, 24; literacy evens, 24 Liu, Y., 13 Luke, A., 10, 26, 37–38, 258

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Lunsford, A., 30 M Mackenzie, C., 20 Mackerras, C., 5, 6, 45, 78, 216, 267 MacLean, L. M., 60 Magoon, A. J., 26 Matlene, C., 56 Matsuda, P. K., 16 Matt: and “the pleasure of writing”, 119; and examinations, 120; and multiple contexts, 119–121; and plot, 102–103; and technologies, 120–121; as a confident writer, 118; as a loving son, 101; as a victim, 99; as a young lover, 107–112; as an autobiographer, 95; autobiographical writing, 91–117; being “praised’ in the writing group, 117; change in writing practice, 118; constructing a confident self identity, 115; identity work through autobiographical writing, 117–121; performed social identities, 117; performing a competent writer identity, 107; previous English writing experiences, 88–90; reasons for joining the writing group, 91; shifts in writer identity, 117–119; view of “good writing”, 90 Mazzei, L. A., 62, 221 McAdams, D. P., 36, 52, 96, 178, 227 McIntyre, J., 42 McKay, S. L., 15, 19–20, 24, 162, 204, 206

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Menard-Warwick, J., 14–16, 20, 22, 24, 44, 57, 61, 78, 204, 206 Mertens, D. M., 42 Miano, A. A., 61 Miller, J., 17 Mishler, E. G., 60 Morling, B., 56 Murphy, M. S., 50, 59 Myerhoff, B., 29, 31 N Na, J., 56 narrative: analysis, 58; and culture, 35; and dual landscapes, 32; and life, 27–28; and life story interview, 52; and reauthoring, 27; and therapy, 28–29; as a cultural tool, 28; as data, 11; as evaluative tool, 17; dual landscapes, 20; importance in identity work, 20; inquiry, 43–44; mode of knowing, 37; practices, 28–29; shaped by culture, 35; space, 28–29, 39, 185; textual features of, 17; visual, 52–53 narrative terms, 29–34; co-authoring, 102, 213; defined, 33; identity conclusions, 44; intentional states, 44; outsider witnesses, 29, 139, 160; performing, 29–30, 187–188; personal agency, 44; plot, 28, 32, 54, 102, 107, 108–112; re-authoring, 33, 193–197; re-authoring and reauthoring, 31; reflecting, 32, 82, 188–190; re-membering, 31; re-visioning, 32–33, 59, 82–83, 142, 187, 191, 193, 190–193, 195–197, 200, 203, 209; 539

storyline, 20, 28, 58, 72, 82, 117, 153, 160, 167–168, 195; ‘unique outcomes’, 28, 33 Nayar, P. B., 12 Nicholas, H., 21 Nilforooshan, N., 17 Norton, B., 12, 14–16, 19–20, 22–23, 24, 37, 38, 190, 206–207, 280 O O’Brien, T., 12 O’Rand, A. M., 34 Ouellette, M. A., 25, 208 P Parry, A., 29, 32–33, 190 Patton, M. Q., 8, 42, 44–45, 50, 56 Pavlenko, A., 8, 11–12, 15, 20–22, 25–26, 30, 40–41, 56–57, 60–61, 126, 162, 202, 208, 213 Peirce, B. N., 8, 11–12, 14–17, 19–20, 22, 24, 26, 37–38, 57, 84, 95, 119, 142, 180, 184, 190, 193, 198, 202, 204, 206–207, 210 Piller, I., 25, 36, 203 Pinnegar, S., 44 Polkinghorne, D. E., 8, 26, 29, 32–33, 58 power: and ‘cultural capital’, 218; and research practices, 38; defined, 38; 540

positive forms of, 55, 215, 218; shapes language use, 14 Pratt, M. L., 39 Prior, P., 21, 25, 43, 61, 65, 179–180, 208 Prusak, A., 20 R Radley, A., 62 Rajadurai, J., 37 Ramanathan, V., 12, 16, 56 Randall, W. L., 109, 112 research: a multi-storied approach to narrative analysis, 54–56; a multi-vocal way of representation, 61–62, 221; and ‘ethnographic tools’, 43; case study participants, 50–52; conventions, 61; data analysis, 54–59; data collection, 52–53; ethics, 50; fieldwork, 7–8, 46–50; literacy experiences and ideals, 213–214; questions, 6; the extracurricular writing group, 46–50 Ricento, T., 15, 19, 202, 213 Riessman, C. K., 53 Roberts, B., 35 Robinson, J. A., 164 Russell, M., 31 Rutherford, J., 39 Ryan, S., 25 S 541

Salmon, P., 53 Schiffrin, D., 20 Second Language Acquisition (SLA): as ‘a theory of practice’, 222; a social/sociocultural approach to, 43; cognitive approach to, 42–43 Sfard, A., 20 Shen, F., 10–13, 17, 35, 56 Shipk, J., 25, 208 SLA. See second language acquisition Snow, D. A., 19 spatial terms: mobility/immobility, 212; movement, 56; stance, 71; third space, 39–40 Sridhar, S. N., 43 Stake, R. E., 8, 44 standardised tests: TEM-4, 1, 4, 89–90, 97, 115, 119–120, 124, 147, 183, 257; TEM-8, 1, 4, 124, 258 Stapleton, P., 11, 13, 16 Steinman, L., 11–12, 22, 34, 162 Street, B. V., 8, 24–25, 43, 203, 213, 215 T Takarczyk, M.M., 17 Tang, R., 16 Taniguchi, S., 19

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Tardy, C. M., 16 Thesen, L., 19, 22, 57, 149, 203, 206 third space: and critical experiences and concerns, 212; and hybridity, 39; and potential space, 39, 40, 175; contact zone, 39; mobility/immobility within, 211–212; need for a, 39–40 Tsui, A. B. M., 13 V voice: a pedagogical definition, 157 Vygotsky, L. S., 8, 17, 26, 27, 29, 39, 59, 207 W Wagner, J., 43 Walton, C., 24 Wang, Q., 13, 17, 34–35, 45, 203, 217 Wenger, E., 27 White, M., 8, 16, 20, 26–34, 38, 40, 44, 54, 72, 84, 139, 141–142, 149, 155, 160, 175, 188, 190, 193, 204–205, 209, 265 Winnicott, D. W., 39, 40 Wong, S. C., 15, 19–20, 24, 204, 206 writer identity: and ‘autobiographical self’, 23; and ‘possibilities of selfhood’, 23; and ‘self as author’, 23; as narrative understanding, 203–204; defined, 21; shifts in, 198–199

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X Xu, Y., 13 Y Yancey, K. B., 25, 208 Yi, Y., 25 You, X., 36, 40, 222 Z Zhao, H. Q., 13 Zierott, N., 35 ZPD, 5, 39–40, 215

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