REFRAMING IDENTITIES IN THE MOVE: A TALE OF EMPOWERMENT, AGENCY AND AUTONOMY

Abstract

ABSTRACT Transnational movements raised by globalization to a status of normality, let alone to absolute necessity, have reshaped the world and social practices (VERTOVEC, 2007; WEI & HUA, 2013). As a social practice, language dimension acquires a renewed importance in the way people use and consume languages functioning as an agent in the exercise of social and political power. Language ideologies, whether individual or socioculturally constructed, may be a source of empowerment or, conversely, disempowerment, forging asymmetries in the way people consume languages. Thus, the pursuit of autonomy in language learning with the combination of its technical, psychological, sociocultural and political dimensions constitutes a space for (inter)personal emancipation and social transformation. Our theoretical framework emphasizes the collective aspects of learner autonomy, based on the sociocultural autonomy concept (OXFORD, 2003). Drawing on Bakhtin's (1929/2006;1981) and Vygotsky's (1991) contributions used as groundwork for research in learner autonomy and in consonance with ideas of fluid and hybrid identities (HALL, 1992; BAUMAN, 2005; MOITA LOPES, 2006), this paper discusses agency, empowerment and identity through sociocultural autonomy development in multicultural environments. This chapter, then, is an attempt to show issues of empowerment, autonomy and agency being processed across real-life social language practices. Its findings and results come from two research projects conducted by the authors in two different contexts but related to the same research interest. Both projects aimed to analyze language learning autonomy, agency and empowerment in the continuous process of learners (re)constructing their identities, while learning a second language. Data generation was based on interviews with two speakers of Brazilian Portuguese and learners of English as an additional language, while taking part in exchange programs for international mobility - one of them in the U.S and another one in Australia. Results show that both participants seem to reframe their multiple identities, so that they can adapt and readapt themselves to the new communities of practice (COP), in which they have emerged. Factors like agency, empowerment and sociocultural autonomy seem to be essential and decisive in this process of reframing identities.