United States college students learning Spanish as a second language in a language and culture immersion program abroad: An ethnographic approach.

摘要

The field of second language acquisition (SLA) has been one of the fastest growing branches of social sciences in the last forty years. Research in this field has been based, to a great extent, on statistical analysis of groups.;SLA researchers have also examined individual variations in language learning such as learning styles, learning strategies, personality characteristics, and learners beliefs about learning. More recently, research on second/foreign language learning has included the contexts of language learning and has explored the interactions between individual learners and the socio-cultural environment.;This investigation is a qualitative study of three U.S. college students learning Spanish in a language and culture immersion program in Merida, Venezuela, during the spring of 1995. The study focuses on the relationship between the linguistic and cultural dimensions of second language learning in a partial immersion program abroad. I describe the nature and the dynamic of the second language learning process and assess the assumption that culture does influence language learning. The findings of this study suggest that the most salient patterns of thought and behavior that characterized the spring 1995 second language learning experience in Merida, Venezuela are the following: risk-taking behaviors, development of a sense of community, awareness of and response to caretaker speech, awareness of change in the affective, cultural, and linguistic domains, and reflective thinking.;The study describes and examines what happens when three North American college students are put in situations where the target language (L;This study contributes to the better understanding of the second/foreign language learning process by articulating the complex interweaving and interactions that frame a second/foreign language learning experience abroad.