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April 7, 2012

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Quantum seppuku: Becoming a Japanese vampire

In order to become a vampire, you must die. Except you don’t simply expire—you’re undead, the living dead. To choose to become a vampire is to choose this undeath. You, unlike Schrödinger’s Cat, commit quantum suicide, dying without dying, attaining subjective immortality.

What has this to do with language? According to the narrative collective-assimilation hypothesis (Gabriel & Young, 2011) and other research, when you read a text narrative about a collective, including groups of fantastical beings such as vampires, your empathy is increased in specific and general ways, and you self-identify with the characters, psychologically becoming a member of their collective, taking on their traits; this identification creates a sense of belonging which increases positive mood and life satisfaction.

To connect this to language learning, when you empathize and identify with a sociopolitical group while learning its language, you develop a more permeable language identity, or language ego, which aids acquisition and causes factors such as your accent to become closer to that of the target group’s language (Ibrahim, et al., 2008). You can even evaluate the relationship between two language users by examining how well their language styles match (Ireland & Pennebaker, 2010).

Studies have also found that having a national identity can aid or impede language learning, depending on how it’s oriented towards zealous patriotism or intercultural empathy, internationalism: how postitively or negatively one’s national identity views the other language’s nationality (Rivers, 2011). Too positive can be just as bad as too negative, imposing a sense of inferiority and resistance (Liu, P., 2010). Proposed solutions to this include providing a learning environment for the language identity that places a positive focus on the individual, acknowledging their L1 skills and usage as they become multilingual, while evading ideology and essentialism (Liu, P., 2010; Rivers, 2010).

The unfortunate flipside to the lighter accent phenomenon is the stigma associated with having a heavier accent. Those with heavier accents are often seen prejudicially as outsiders, associated with particular stereotypical traits (Niedt, 2011), and viewed as less trustworthy (Lev-Ari & Keysar, 2010), with the content and structure of their language judged to be poor and lacking credibility in proportion to the difficulty of listener understanding, regardless of how otherwise well-formed or intelligent it may be. However, being made aware of accent variations, taught to perceive and understand them, and simple education on the difference between communicative competence and accents can mitigate this prejudice of treating the native language user as the norm against which the foreign multilingual is compared (Gluszek, 2011).

As linguists studying language with a global emphasis will tell you, in most of the world multilingualism has become the norm (Bordin & Pinheiro, 2012; Zareva, 2010), not the deviant exception, and learning to appreciate variations of languages such as English is essential in the global era, where, for example, monolingual English speakers can be left bewildered, or bewilder others, at international meetings—even as speakers from diverse multiple countries are able to understand one another, each of them speaking variants of English, based on core, pragmatic aspects of the language that allow them to communicate their concerns effectively (Crystal, 2003). Examining the expressivity and effectiveness of a language variant in itself is optimal, rather than simply labeling it as deficient by comparison to a native version which itself allows for much variation (such as the affirmation of students’ rights to use African American Vernacular English, etc.).

As part of the dominant scientific understanding of the emergent co-evolution of language with the brain and culture, these functional aspects aren’t in any single module in the brain or ‘out there’ in particular geographical locations, they are found through constantly changing usage constrained by written and spoken media and general cognitive domains (Christiansen & Chater, 2008; Christiansen, et al., 2011; Deacon, 2010; Levinson & Evans, 2009; Levinson & Evans, 2010; Lupyan & Dale, 2010).

Technology and the great availability of Japanese-language media has rendered geography unnecessary for the savvy learner, allowing for imagined and virtual communities and telecocoons in a rich information ecology. Which is useful, since vampires can’t cross running water, though technological tools such as ships and bridges help resolve the issue.

These multilingual concerns have prompted second language experts (Combs, 2006; Cook, 1999; Mahboob, 2005; Matsuda, 2003; Paik, 2010; Torikai, 2011) to rethink the ideals used, from the native speaker model in classrooms, including assuming natives are the best teachers, or treating American English or British English used by monolingual residents as the linguistic and cultural templates, or using nativelikeness as the primary goal of acquisition (Birdsong, 2005), where differences between the L1 and L2 are treated as deficiencies in an L2 learner’s abilities (Liu, Y. T., 2006).

The L2 user is always learning and fluctuating in identity (Nogami, 2011) and skills to some extent, as is the native speaker. The lexicon in particular, L1 or L2, never stops developing (Zareva, 2010). It’s been proposed by the above researchers to think of the learner as an L2 user, to indicate that just as the literature doesn’t treat natives as ‘learners’ all their lives, it’s possible to think of the multicompetent L2 user as successful in their own right, rather than classifying them as failed natives. Multicompetence is simply a perspective for thinking of the bilingual mind that encompasses the languages and their interactions, as well as their interactions with the mind as a whole.

As emphasized by the above researchers, it is well known that for early and late stage bilinguals, the L1 and L2 reciprocally affect one another in a variety of ways, from phonology to grammatical judgments to vocabulary, including attrition of the first language. Metalinguistic awareness itself is increased by learning a second language. Thus, it is argued, disentangling from a monolingual standard and its departures the artefacts of this relationship, the effects of being and becoming bilingual, is a problematic, highly speculative task which renders the conventional criteria questionable. The goal of second language acquisition (L2A) should be a steady-state of ultimate attainment, a neutral term indicating the outcome of ‘complete’—asymptotic, not absolute—proficiency (Birdsong & Paik, 2008), not an end-state of strictly being native-like.

Nativelikeness still has its limited, conditional uses in research as a heuristic tool or control, such as the many analyses showing L2 users can become comprehensively indistinguishable from natives on performance tests (Birdsong & Paik, 2008; Bogaerts, et al., 2003; Liu, Y. T., 2006; Marinova-Todd, 2003), or using event-related potentials or ERP in neurolinguistic research (Kotz, 2009) which compares activations correlated with native users, joining other research which debunks the antiquated idea of the critical period (Ferman & Karni, 2010; Steinhauer, et al., 2009), revealing that adults can learn statistically, such as through distributional cues like children (St. Clair, et al., 2010), with plastic, flexible brains. The decline in language learning ability associated with AoA, or age-of-acquisition, becomes a dynamic, systemic issue rather than a hardwired biological one. Other findings from ERP research seem to indicate humans use a ‘good enough’ approach to language comprehension, rather than creating detailed and complete representations of input (Ferreira & Patson, 2007).

For example, it was recently found (Ullman, et al., 2012) that with both explicit and implicit learning of an artificial grammar, at delayed retention they achieved native-like neural processes when measured by ERP correlated with proficiency and nativelikeness. The researchers stress in other work, as part of a consensus, that explicit and implicit grammar exist on an interactive continuum, with explicit instruction more effective at drawing attention to form in form-focused instruction, relying on more declarative processes, which is what multilingual adults need to use to account for systemic and mental differences from monolingual children. Important to note is that at the end of training, before the delay proceduralized (a proven concept which debunks old but still popular beliefs that separate learning and acquisition) the explicit learning (which has mostly been shown superior to implicit), it had not achieved native-like neural activation despite actual language performance being studied at a stage when inseparable from those who learned implicitly (reflecting its declarative emphasis and efficiency; this recalls desirable difficulty, where in spaced retrieval, results are worse at first, then vastly superior at retention). That is to say, like previous research, this shows that even among L2 users rather than a monolingual group and an L2 group, you can be measurably equivalent to another group with distinct neurological differences (Clahsen & Felser, 2006).

For more on a synthesis of explicit and implicit grammar learning using the most proven methods for optimal study, see this post. To reiterate some definitions: explicit means you learn forms with awareness, implicit without (and when examples aren’t controlled for similarity, it’s hard to argue implicit ever fully exists), with deductive learning meaning you go from general to particular, from rules to examples, and inductive going from particular to general, from examples to rules. Setting aside extreme isolated, research-oriented (and thus inaccurate to the real world) polarized templates of classroom vs. immersion, the savvy L2 self-student must curate and design their own regimen of meaningful structured target material such as used in the aforementioned study, testing themselves with verifiable answers and explicit corrective feedback (Ellis, et al., 2006; Nguyen, et al., 2012; Rassaei, et al., 2012), ensuring a balance of strands from form-focused instruction (FFI), fluency development, input, and output.

To further elaborate upon the above and the Assassin’s Creed grammar post: As part of the deliberate, language-focused/form-focused strand, shown to be more efficient than incidental, purely meaning-focused acquisition, the key for self-studying grammar with spaced retrieval systems (SRS) is to assemble examples for grammar points and study them initially (overview, and when studying cards in the first phase here) deductively and explicitly, using explanations so that you can understand and select example sentences; actual spaced retrieval occurs inductively, presenting yourself with the sentence and parsing the relevant sections, the aim of the process is proceduralizing, internalizing rather than declaratively memorizing rules—using formatting to draw attention to form is optional, but highly recommended due to the dominant consensus in research on explicit FFI and ensuring efficiency in parsing the target areas of the sentences in a surgical way. As noted above, corrective feedback should be explicit (metalinguistic statements explaining the answer, translations for comparison).

Other research looking at the same neural processes (P600 in particular) over the years (Kotz, et al., 2008; Rossi, et al., 2006) shows that high L2 proficiency (learned explicitly and/or implicitly) is often correlated with them, yet sometimes it isn’t, depending on other factors such as how similar the languages are, age of acquisition, learning strategy, and the type of language feature being studied (Bond, et al., 2011; Tanner, et al., 2009; Van Hell & Tokowicz, 2010). In other words, such activations aren’t instrinsically linked to being nativelike. Focusing only on the high L2 proficiency correlation and setting aside other variables, this means that your goal, if it is to achieve such neural patterns, isn’t to become nativelike, or like a monolingual, but to become a skilled L2 user.

Despite its uses in research, the idea of ‘native’ and ‘native-like’ as a rigid, overriding point of focus for learning is misleading and unhelpful.

Thinking of source materials such as manga and films as ‘native’ are useful and motivating only insofar as the labels equate with authentic texts as defined in research—a real message using real language produced and received by real users (Gilmore, 2007). Such materials provide rich resources to be scaffolded and managed according to one’s level and aims, promoting motivation and aware intake. Meaningful language produced by communities of skilled users as part of a larger matrix of expert media materials. But these materials do not always describe or contain representations of the varied ways actual, skilled L2 users do and must learn and use language as a product of being bilingual, culturally diverse people, in relevant contexts. Authenticity is relative: learning tasks using authentic materials may not be authentic, if, for example, the learner is faced with normatively homogeneous templates with the goal of learning socioculturally heterogeneous usage which may be the actual norm (Arnold, 1991; Ketabi & Shomoossi, 2007).

While a very large percentage of L2 learners become highly proficient users, a smaller percentage becomes native-like depending on whether compared at the individual or group level (Birdsong & Paik, 2008); nativelikeness, that abused and misused standard (Birdsong, 2005), a product of a past when universal grammar, specialized brain modules for learning languages, bell bottoms, tie-dye, kanji reform, quantum mysticism, and critical periods were in vogue.

Far from being a deficiency, these percentages are markers of multilingual, sociocultural variables and effects, including goals and living situations. Sadly instead, the monolingual model and its regional and social variations are often treated as intrinsically superior, with the bumbling, ignorant, unskilled foreign writer/speaker the anti-role model; instead of being based on actual communicative competence, the typical thought is that it’s fine to have a heavy accent or different dialect, as long as it doesn’t mark you as foreign and thus non-native (Cook, 1999). What’s actually important with these ‘native’ materials in terms of acceptibility is how they correlate with media and people who use the language to communicate effectively, in particular who or what you will interact with, depending on your goals. Descriptive content analyses, qualitative and quantitative, help achieve the development of resources and dynamic standards from the pedagogical, applied and corpus linguistics standpoints. This applies even with materials that idealize the native model, as there is considerable stylistic and register variation within any given country, depending on the discourse community and genre (academic paper, blog, news article, manga or anime, literary novel, etc.).

Like Superman, who has been shown to reduce motivation in psychological studies (Nelson & Norton, 2005), being so perfect he serves only to underscore one’s own failings, the infallible native is quite literally an impossible role model for teachers and students. As researchers have stated, it’s merely a historic fact to be a native user, not an ideal state. You will never become a native, as bilinguals are fundamentally different from monolinguals. You learn a second language with a brain that’s already learned a language, and these languages interact, creating more idiosyncratic and diverse processes. You have accumulated experiences and a developed brain that’s better with metacognitive skills and working memory processes than when you were a child learning mostly procedurally. Despite the brain’s plasticity, there are systemic and cognitive differences that separate the bilingual from the monolingual. Not merely for language, but generalized to enhanced cognitive skills related to working memory (WM) and flexibility of executive control (Barac & Bialystok, 2012), including task-switching and problem-solving abilities. It even improves long-term episodic and semantic memory and helps prevent impairment in old age (Gollan, et al., 2009; Nilsson, et al., 2003; Nilsson, et al., 2008). Interestingly, working memory seems to use explicit knowledge best (though it can use both explicit and implicit) in declarative, attentional control processes during L2 reading (Erçetin & Alptekin, 2012).

Japan apparently has no native folklore for the vampire. Here, the ‘Japanese’ in ‘Japanese Vampire’ refers to the target language of your hybrid self, Japanese as an Additional Language (JAL), not to a racial or national identity. The Word is your sustenance, for the Word became flesh, the life of the flesh is in the blood, and the blood is the life. Spiritus quidem promptus est, caro autem infirma. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Long live the new flesh.

There has been considerable theorization on what occurs regarding identity when an adult learns an additional language, including as a foreign language (learning Japanese in the UK). The notion of identity slippage (Armour, 2009) encompasses the idea that learning to make meaning using an L2, through the structure of the language (e.g. lexicosemantics), the norms in the materials, codeswitching, and the situations usage occurs in, a new, acculturated, etic L2 identity emerges (this verb signifying its never fully formed, continually constituted nature) and interacts with the original, enculturated, emic language identity, the resulting identity slip then benefiting from emic grounding (Haugh, 2007). The term slippage stems from literature on cyberspace and protean identity (Armour, 2000; Turkle, 1995).

Recently in language acquisition research, the concept of an L2 motivational self system (Dornyei & Ushioda, 2009) has risen, modeled on earlier psychological research on motivation and possible selves. The above concept of identity slippage and reconceptualization of how to negotiate the self-directed and extrinsically enforced choices for its customization parallels the L2 motivational self system in interesting ways.

The key with this idea is the ideal L2 self, the self we want to become, who has ultimate attainment of the L2. This idea subsumes previous notions of integrativeness and instrumentality, where positive feelings towards the L2 community and the desire for pragmatic benefits motivate learning. Your disposition towards L2 users is tied to how attractive you find the ideal L2 self. The more positive that disposition, the more attractive the related possible self becomes. Many researchers (Erling, 2004; Irie, 2003; Lamb, 2004; McClelland, 2000; Yashima, 2000) suggest that integration with the global community and language variants rather than assimilation with native users is the most useful aim (Dornyei, et al., 2006).

Discrepancies between your actual self and your future self guide motivate you towards bringing them together. This self guide is composed of the ideal and ought-to selves. This is a different kind of idealization we’re dealing with now, one that isn’t essentialized into monolingual nativity. The ideal self is the focus of your personal aims and aspirations, it’s promotional. The ought-to self is the self that’s externally imposed by social pressures, it’s preventional. You want to promote the aspirational qualities, and prevent the failure to meet responsibilities. In addition to integrativeness, the ideal self connects to instrumentality through the personal desire for success; instrumentality also relates to the ought-to self, through the sense of duty and failure avoidance.

In order to use the ideal L2 self to motivate self-regulatory actions to achieve mastery of the L2, you need to maintain a vivid image of the L2 self in various situations, it needs to be plausible and attainable to give you a sense of control, which as we’ve seen, excludes the native model—this also recalls ideas of affective learning, as well as studies which show students perform better when they’re made aware that intelligence is not fixed (Blackwell, et al., 2007), and the ideal and ought-to selves must be in harmony—if your ideal self is enthusiastic and successful in classes, and the ought-to self is a disaffected underachiever around friends’ peer pressure, they’re in disharmony and this will cause problems. You need a malleable bicultural identity (Mok & Morris, 2012), local and global. You must also maintain the image dynamically in your working memory so it can act to consistently prime your actions, which are shaped by goal-focused strategies, using perceived control from attainable actions to make hopes into realistic expectations, with awareness of the ideal L2 self offset by a balanced dose of the feared self (who would fail to meet expectations and obligations).

Achieving these aspects, according to the concept proposed and shown to be effective in research, including Japanese learners of English (Ryan, 2008), needs from the learner a mindfulness of the motivational significance of ideal possible selves, imagery training (athletes make regular use of this), and constant reality checks on whether goals are plausible and being substantiated. To maintain motivation and achieve success, keeping the vision alive is important, through constant tasks, exposure to role models (such as successful L2 users), cultural activities, reminders of the ideal self in an constantly engaging framework. This includes a goal-setting component, with individualized study plans and strategies, continually reviewing your task completion, celebrating the attainment of goals, creating new ones, and reexamining hopes and fears. The dreaded self needs to be regularly activated as well, with thoughts on the limitations that arise from failing to achieve language goals, and reminders of obligations and duties. Careful, though, it needs to be in balance, just as with ‘wrathful practice’ in certain strains of Buddhism, as attempting to use the destructive energies of negative emotions such as hatred to achieve enlightened clarity can result in consuming negativity and arrogance.

Speaking of which: vampires, or vetala or rolang in Sanskrit and Tibetan, apparently have a scripturally documented affinity for Buddhism and have even attained Buddhahood, due to their liminal nature which subverts duality, and the interpersonal practice of karma mudra. Perhaps this inspired the famous 9th century Buddhist master Linji to say: If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him! It may also explain why there seems to be a trend in Japan of cosmetic dental surgery to give one fangs (八重歯).

Your ideal L2 self shouldn’t be an idealized native language user. There is no ideal Japanese national or Japanese human being. Discarding this nonexistent, essentialist figment in favour of a dynamic hybrid will allow you to more flexibly set goals and tailor your learning strategies, and will increase your motivation towards additive, incremental assessments of interim achievements with a firm basis in reality. Become the multilingual undead and achieve linguistic enlightenment. Commit quantum seppuku and become a Japanese vampire.

References