Plenary Talk
FROM COMMONSENSE TO UNCOMMONSENSE KNOWLEDGE: HOW LANGUAGE MAKES MEANING IN UNIVERSITY STUDY AND THE IMPLICATIONS FOR TEACHERS AND STUDENTS IN DIVERSE INSTRUCTIONAL, DISCIPLINARY AND SOCIOCULTURAL CONTEXTS
1 2 Caroline Coffin , Jim Donohue
1
The Open University, UK. Queen Mary, University of London, UK
2
From childhood to adulthood, as students move through different educational contexts they are constantly learning new things through language and constantly learning to use language in new ways. In other words, they are learning language, learning through language, and learning about language (Halliday, 2004/1980). To date, however, disciplinary and language/writing specialists (and the higher education institutions within which they work) have yet to exploit the full potential of this major insight into the relationship between language and learning. In this presentation, we will argue that the changing environment of higher education makes it all the more important that universities do so. We are now in an era where there is growth in English medium education, expansion in local multilingual communities, and a multiplication of modes and media of communication. In the UK, widening participation agendas and the academicization of areas such as nursing and the caring professions are additional factors in creating a highly differentiated student body with diverse linguistic backgrounds and linguistic repertoires on which to draw in navigating the increasing demands of a complex curriculum .
It is against this background that we will discuss our applied linguistic research and targeted educational and writing interventions in order to develop what we are calling a Language as Social Semiotic (LASS) approach to teaching and learning in higher education (Coffin and Donohue, 2014). Our aim is to bring together, build on and take forward different (though related) lines of research. These can be summarised as i) the linguistic analysis of disciplinary meaning making, ii) research into students’ predispositions towards meaning making – their ‘semantic orientations’ (Hasan 2011) and iii) research into the way in which language mediates meanings to the mind in teaching and learning interactions. In this latter process, referred to as ‘semiotic mediation’ (Hasan, 2011, Vygotsky, 1978), we are particularly interested in the value of what can be referred to as ‘metasemiotic mediation’.
The meanings which are made in academic contexts, seen from a social semiotic perspective, can be referred to as ‘uncommonsense’ understandings of phenomena, in contrast with the commonsense understandings which are developed through more spontaneous engagements with the world (Halliday, 1998). Our paper presents the background to our collaborations with colleagues in understanding the role of written language in this movement from commonsense to uncommonsense knowledge.
References
Coffin, C and Donohue, J (2014) A language as social semioticbased approach to teaching and learning in Higher Education (Language Learning Monograph Series) . Chichester, West Sussex; Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Halliday, M.A.K. (2004/1980). Three aspects of children's language development: Learning language, learning through language, learning about language. In J.J. Webster (Ed.), The language of early childhood (pp. 308326). New York: Continuum.
Halliday, M. A. K. (1998). Things and relations. Regrammaticising experience as Technical knowledge. In J. R. Martin & R. Veel (eds), Reading science. Critical and functional perspectives on discourses of science (pp. 187235). London and New York: Routledge.
Hasan, R. (2011). Language and education: Learning and teaching in society . London: Equinox.
Vygotsky, L.S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.