should be remembered that bilingualism is not a static but a very dynamic category and individual bilingual profiles might shift as personal or social circumstances change. E.g., an individual might lose oral skills in a previously learned language as they start using another one more frequently instead, etc.
Originally, I was looking at interviewing bilinguals with a high (self-reported) level in the four language skills (listening, reading, writing, speaking). All of the fellow Fulbrighters I have interviewed obviously fit this description as all Fulbright candidates are expected to take the TOEFL test and get a certain overall score (depending on the requirements specified by particular host universities in the U.S.). There have also been a few English teachers from different countries whose occupation alone equalled them to the level of a confident language user.
Throughout the course of this project I realized I had to adopt a more liberal approach to who qualifies as bilingual if I wanted to get more varied perspectives on individual language learning histories. I was able to interview a few first-generation Americans who spoke their heritage languages with a varying degree of fluency, immigrants to the U.S. as well as Americans who self-reported different levels of proficiency in other languages. I felt these people’s insights would be valuable for this project as well. Everyone who participated had had prior experience of learning a foreign language and showed a great interest in the topic of bilingualism. Every participant’s interview was included into this project and I am sure each one contributed to it in its own unique way.
Part 1.2. HOW WAS MY DATA COLLECTED?
Interview questions
– Introduce yourself (your name, country of origin, what you are studying in the U.S.)
– When did you start learning English?
– What kind of difficulties did you have at different stages of learning? What did you find easy/difficult?
– Did you have a chance to use English outside the classroom?
– What was the main focus of your language instruction?
– What is your general opinion of the language instruction in your country?
– What are the attitudes to language instruction in your country?
– Would you agree that one might feel like a different person while speaking other languages and switching between them?
– How are you planning to use English in your future life?
– What tips would you give to anyone trying to learn another language?
Interviews as a research method
As I said, one of the reasons why I chose to conduct this interview project was my love for journalism where being able to talk to your interviewees effectively and reporting facts in the manner fit for a specific target audience and publication is key. Being exposed to various types of journalism (particularly political) facilitated my learning in my senior years at university to such an extent that I was secretly dreaming of pursuing a career in this domain. This never happened, but every once in a while I would pick up books on journalism.
In the attempt to become a better interviewer for a couple of projects I had in mind, I started reading one by a journalist Dean Nelson called Talk to Me: How to Ask Better Questions, Get Better Answers, and Interview Anyone Like a Pro (Nelson, 2019). One phrase he used stuck in my mind, «Asking good questions keeps us from living in our own echo chambers». What the author means is that in investigating other people’s perspectives on some issues we revisit and reevaluate our own. Nelson goes on to say that one doesn’t even have to be a professional journalist to interview others as asking questions is essentially what we do almost on a daily basis. If we are trained to formulate our questions correctly, that would be able to «draw out personalities and understandings».
Actually, interviews («qualitative interviewing», Rubin and Rubin, 2005) are a popular qualitative research tool in social sciences, including applied linguistics. This is especially the case for studies «that aim to investigate participants» identities, experiences, beliefs and orientations’ (Talmy, 2010). In the late 1960s and early 1970s narratives became an object and «a legitimate means» of doing research in history, education, anthropology, etc. (Briggs, 1986). Interviews were thought of as an effective way of eliciting different types of narratives to be investigated. This process is referred to as narrative inquiry. Of special interest have been so-called «personal speakers experiences» which draw on stories about «real, imagined, or possible events» (Pavlenko, 2007). Linguistic autobiographies as a subtype of such narratives have been one of the most common tools to study bilingualism. Different groups of bilinguals have been studied over the decades and there are a lot of papers presenting an overview of such research (e.g., Mann, 2010).
Among a huge number of studies, there were two books that I found truly inspirational for my own research into bilingualism. The first one was by a British linguist David Block called «Multilingual Identities in a Global City: London Stories» (Block, 2006). What I loved a lot about this book that despite being rigidly structured and presenting an extensive literature review on bilingualism and second language identities in particular, it had some storytelling elements as well following different individuals (immigrants, students, teachers, etc.) as they were living through their own unique linguistic experiences with London as a platform for their adventures (with obvious ups and downs). The author was able to provide the context for all the interviews and grouped them either according to the participants’ country of origin or occupation. To me, this research appeared to be an engaging attempt to humanize bilinguals while still examining their life stories through a research lens.
Another book that fascinated me was by Alastair Pennycook and Emi Otsuji titled «Metrolingualism. Language in the City» (Alastair, Otsuji, 2015). Metrolingualism «describes the ways in which people of different and mixed backgrounds use, play with and negotiate identities through language» with the focus being «not on language systems but on languages as emergent from contexts of interaction». Sydney, the city where the research is undertaken, acts as a backdrop for new language identities transformed by «global and local practices». The authors draws a lot of attention to their diverse participants’ everyday experiences making these individuals seem like actors on the vibrant multicultural Sydney stage where multilingual street signs also serve as an essential element of the action.
Besides being a linguist and a language teacher, I am a keen traveler as well. So, I instantly fell in love with the idea of analyzing bilingualism as it is incorporated into a city’s texture as well as its soundscape and landscape. As I knew I would be living very close to NYC, I couldn’t help thinking about using its multiculturalism as a platform for my own explorations of language practices there. For sure, I would not be the first person to have attempted that, so in order to make my work more original, I wanted to incorporate my future home state, New Jersey, and my host university town into the picture. As I was hoping to be able to travel to other places across in the U.S., that would make sense to include them into my narrative as well.
Even before starting this project I had an idea to make it into something not purely scientific. I agree that autobiographic narratives «are interesting and thus have aesthetic value and can engage the readers. They are accessible and thus can appeal to larger audiences» (Pavlenko, 2007). So, the purpose of my interview project was to collect linguistic
