Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Back

Looking Back 報告
Space, Place and Autonomy in Language Learning: Joe Falout and Alison Stewart
discuss the symposium at AILA 2014

去る8月にオーストラリアのブリスベンで行われたAILA学会で、Joe FaloutとAlison StewartがTerry LambとGarold Murray両氏の司会によるシンポジウム（The Space, Place and Autonomy in Language Learning）に参加しました。そしてそのシンポジウムでは、日本の大学の語学学習センターからロシアのEmirati大学の片隅や浴場など、様々なコンテクストでの語学学習者の経験に関する６つの発表が行われました。シンポジウム
では、空間と場所に関し、例えば空間と場所がどのように学習者に影響を与え学習者が解釈するか、またどのように空間を概念化し、政策とデザインに関する判断をする際に生かしていけるのか、さらに学習者オートノミーの理解にどのようなヒントを与えるかなど、様々な議論について光を当てていました。

At the AILA conference that took place in Brisbane, Australia this August,Joe Falout and Alison Stewart attended the Space, Place and Autonomy
in Language Learning symposium convened by Terry Lamb and Garold
Murray. The symposium consisted of six presentations by researchers on
the experiences of language learners in contexts ranging from Japanese
university language study centres to hidden corners in an Emirati
university building to a Russian bathhouse. The aim of the symposium
was to shed light on a series of questions on space and place: how it
affects learners and the uses they make of it, how we can conceptualize
space and how we can use our understanding of it to make decisions
regarding policy and design, what light this might shed on our understandings of (learner)
autonomy.
Alison: Joe, I remember that we were both bowled away by this symposium, and decided there
and then to continue and deepen our conversation about it in a written dialogue that we could
share with members of the Learner Development SIG. To recapture the excitement and inspiration

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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backof the event, shall we start by reviewing the presentations and recounting what it was that
attracted us to them?
Joe: Sure, I’ll start with the first presentation of the symposium: Cynthia White’s “Emotion in theconstruction of space, place and autonomous learning opportunities.” She drew on somefascinating case studies, including one of learners of Russian in a study abroad program in St.
Petersburg, and another of learners in New Zealand and Germany interacting together in atelecollaboration project. Cynthia investigated how specific settings can contribute to invoking
emotions in learners, and how the memories of those experiences add to the construction ofidentity. During encounters with others in which the L2 was used, these students reportedly
experienced a range of powerful emotions. Such emotions help shape important aspects ofpeople’s learning and identity formation, and thus merit more attention in language learning
research.
Although the focus of this symposium was on space, the themes of time and motion
struck me as something integral to all the presentations. These aspects were particularly
highlighted in Cynthia’s presentation. For example, one learner of Russian in St. Petersburg was
asked by a Russian woman for directions in the subway. While walking together, the learner tried
to start up a conversation. But the woman responded strangely, and they ended up walking
silently in the same direction, but now separated some distance from each other. Trying tounderstand what had gone wrong, the learner said she wanted to stop time, like pausing a scene
in a movie, and try to get inside the other person’s mind to figure out what went wrong with theconversation. She was wondering if she had made some cultural faux pas, or pragmatic error, or if
it was her accent that caused some misunderstanding. These kinds of emotions and confusion may
be happening in language classrooms, influencing how learners see themselves as users of the L2for better or worse, and I wonder how teachers might recognize such moments and address them.
Alison: Cynthia’s presentation resonated strongly with me too. At a personal level, her examples
brought back my own memories of learning languages. The memories of occasions and theemotions I felt at the time are still clear, almost visceral: for example, the confusion andfrustration I felt at my failure to explain to my Russian roommate that her boyfriend had called
round and then gone again, but subsequent delight when I realized that I finally understood how
verbs of motion work in that language. As a teacher of English and student of Japanese, I need to
be aware that the emotional impact of language in authentic contexts of use is more powerfulthan in attempts to describe those contexts.
Whilst Cynthia’s study highlighted the interconnectedness of context and emotion andtheir role in learning and identity formation, the other side of the coin is that learners can imbue
the meaning of spaces around them with their own identities, in other words, they canappropriate space for their own purposes and needs, not necessarily in the ways imagined by thedesigners of those spaces or by their teachers. Gergana Alzeer’s “Spatio-learning experiences of
Emirati female students in a single gender context” featured a series of stunning photographs ofNewsletter of the JALT Learner Development SIG <ld-sig.org/>

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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backblack-clad young women appropriating spaces in a hyper-modern university building, sitting on
floors, under the stairs, and in a tiny empty alcove intended for a water fountain. Alzeer’s
ethnographic study of the learners and the places they inhabit culminates in a complex map,
representing the ways in which these modern desert women engaged with the “hot” and “cold”
places in their environment.
Joe: A surprising thing about their sitting in odd places was that plenty of chairs and desks stood
empty nearby. Yet they choose the floor for what appeared to be serious individual studying. I
wondered whether the original space makers, the architects, would be angrily astonished or
gleefully delighted that the facilities were being appropriated and used for purposes not initiallyintended. My guess is that most architects, as artists of public space, would embrace the newuses that people make of such spaces, and allow this ambiguity and potential for multifarious uses
to inform their future design.
Alison: What struck me most about these images was the clash or mismatch of identities in thesesurroundings. It was startling to see the way these women chose to ignore the chairs and sit on
the floor, but it was also startling to see them carrying fashionable handbags while wearing theconservative burka. In a way, you could say these women are rebels—subverting expected
identities that are created or assumed in the context. In the classroom, it's assumed that theywould sit on chairs; wearing burka, it's assumed that they wouldn't be interested in western
designer accessories.
Joe: Yes, Alison, this is important because it shows that learners relate to the spaces they enterby conforming to or by resisting identities that are assumed of them in that space. Anotherpresentation concerned with how public spaces are used was “Social learning spaces and ‘theInvisible Fence” by Garold Murray, Naomi Fujishima, and Mariko Uzuka. They used the concept of“communities of practice” to investigate membership of and access to spaces in a Social Language
Learning Space (SLLS) at a large Japanese university. In particular, one concern of the SLLS was
about making newcomers feel invited and included, which can be difficult as spaces ofparticipation can be created via the exclusion of others. Various ways were used to help
newcomer students gain access, such as old-timers inviting passers-by inside the SLLS, decorating
the entryways with posters bearing information about the activities inside, and providing
newcomers with roles for participation.
This makes me realize that spaces can exist even where there are no actual walls or linesof demarcation. The example in this presentation was an open door to the SLLS: the spaces insideand outside the SLLS are open to each other, and merge to form a single space. Similarly, inside
the SLLS, subspaces may not actually have walls that keep people out, but when others are using
the area, some students may feel they are not allowed in. It’s another case of the mutuallyconstitutive influence of spaces on the behaviours and identities of the people who inhabit them.
This reminds me of another study in which office location became a determining factor for
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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backstudents taking doctoral exams. Those with offices more central in relation to the other offices on
campus were physically able to consult more with each other and, through sharing their beliefs
about ways of coping with the stress and studying for the exams, eventually fared better thanthose with offices on the periphery (Mechanic, 1978).
Alison: Interesting! So it's not only a matter of spaces having insides and outsides, but also ofcentres and peripheries! It’s very complicated, isn’t it? I think one of the most interesting aspectsof all in this presentation, as with all the presentations in this symposium, is the way it brought
out new dimensions of what constitutes context. Physical space is one dimension, but atmosphereis also part of context. Or is it? Is atmosphere created or at least influenced by the physicalproperties of a place, or is it something that arises from the interactions and relationships
between the people inhabiting it? These are some of the key questions that occurred to me fromlistening to Garold, Naomi and Mariko’s presentation, and also from another presentation ofresearch set in Japan by Katherine Thornton.
Joe: That’s right, Alison. Katherine’s presentation dealt with space and place in a self-accesscentre in Japan. Combining questionnaires with student and staff observations over threesemesters, she explored how students thought, felt, and behaved in various areas and rooms (i.e.,
subspaces) within a newly built self-access centre. The purpose of the study was to use thefindings to promote meaningful uses of the various subspaces in the center. One of the changes
made was the name of the overall space, the centre, from something sounding like a largeorganization to a friendly community café, E-CO (meaning English Café at Otemon). The main
finding was that students were inclined to use spaces that were most convenient for socialising,such as sitting in a cozy corner with small sofas or standing around the counter chatting. Students
spent less time in quiet study but they increased their social use of English over Japanese, andthe Japanese that they did use became more oriented toward learning socially rather than justsocializing (i.e., they were talking about learning). Spaces created collaboratively for learning
within a relaxed social environment increased students’ willingness to communicate in English.
Notably, the students’ own preferences for using space were included in the decision-making for
improving the design of the facility.
Alison: While the previous two studies looked at how students do or don’t appropriate
institutional space for their own learning purposes, the last two presentations dealt with thelearning that students do outside of the classroom. In Lindsay Miller and Christoph Hafner’s
presentation, “Creating spaces for autonomous learning in an EST course”, the locus of learning
was shifted to outside the institution, a Hong Kong university, as more traditional writing
assignments were replaced with corpus quizzes, a group project to make a scientific video
documentary, and an individual written report. A study of the students, using questionnaires andfocus groups, as well as project artifacts and out-of-class communication, pinpointed where andhow the students interacted about their video project. Whereas class time was devoted toNewsletter of the JALT Learner Development SIG <ld-sig.org/>

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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backpreparation and support in creating and filming the documentary, the students took ownership of
the project and spent a remarkable number of hours practicing and honing the quality of their
final video.
Joe: Lindsay and Christoph’s presentation also reminds me that out-of-class learning is wheremost learning actually occurs, as language learning requires a lot of time, more than what canusually be offered within the time constraints of a class and curriculum. Therefore, it’s important
for their own developing autonomy as life-long learners that students recognize this and maketime for learning English outside of the classroom and the class schedule.
Alison: I agree, Joe, and I would say that the huge increase in time spent on the project was
undoubtedly the key here. A similar point comes through in the final presentation “Publicpedagogy through mobile learning: Autonomy and acquisition” by Hayo Reinders. Hayo reported
on a refreshingly traditional experiment to test the effect of listening to audio books using mobile
phones on Korean students’ acquisition of the passive voice. The study divided a cohort ofstudents into three groups: over the course of one week, one group listened to audio books withpauses inserted, a second listening to audio books with the speed slowed down, and a control
group listened to the audio books played at normal speed. Predictably, the first group performed
slightly better than the second, which performed slightly better than the third, and all threegroup performed better in the post-test grammar check than in the pre-test check. Statistically,
however, the results were not significant. Nevertheless, the students enjoyed the activity, and itis this enjoyment that will make it more likely that they will continue the activity and get tospend the additional hours listening which should eventually enhance their learning. These final
two presentations weren’t so much about space and place in the way that the first four were;instead they focused on the learners, the spaces that they move in and out of, and theopportunities that they have or make for autonomous learning.
Joe: What I learned from these two last presentations was how much attention and interest canbe enhanced when learners have the freedom to choose the time and place for their learning. I
wonder if the Hong Kong students working on the video project were even aware of how muchtime they spent doing it. That state of becoming enraptured in the process itself, of losing oneself
to the activity, is a state of “flow” (Csikszentmihalyi,1990).
Alison: This is really interesting! When you are completely absorbed in something, time and place
seem to fall away—only the activity itself remains. Flow is complete freedom of action andthought; space, or the awareness of it, is actually a constraint on freedom. What do you think?
Joe: Yes, that’s right Alison! In this sense, space can be binding. I suppose that in other senses
space can bring liberation. For the group project from Hong Kong, some students enjoyed working
individually from within their own rooms, a private space, while collaborating together online, a
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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backpublic space. Alternatively, by sitting in the alcove of a public hallway, as seen in the Emirati
university, a student positions herself in a restricted space to attain privacy. So what we see hereis that people’s uses of space are important for how they see themselves, and how they wish tointeract with or avoid others.
Alison: I would agree with you: space can bring liberation, but how does that work? I think what I
want to say is that space usually is a constraint. As Lefebvre (2009) writes, “Space is political andideological” (p. 171). What I take this to mean is that space, whether in the physical sense of abuilding, a street, a park, or a forest, or in the symbolic sense of social space (e.g., Bourdieu,
1990), is created and appropriated by people with particular purposes in mind. The opposite ofspace would be the void or entropy, that is, space with no meaning and no purpose. So space isnecessary, because it gives things meaning. It also provides us with affordances (van Lier, 2001;
Menezes, 2011), that is, opportunities for learning, provided we have the autonomy to seize thoseopportunities. In its original sense, an affordance is something in our environment that pushes us
to change or adjust our behaviour (Gibson, 1992). I think this is the sense in which we can think ofspace and place in learner autonomy. When we are habituated to something, we forget about
space and place, but when we're new to something, such as a new language, space and placemaybe matter more.
Joe: That’s a good observation. We don’t usually notice much about the spaces and places withwhich we are most familiar. This was also the subject of a plenary at the AILA conference by Elena
Shohamy. Public spaces and their influence on human interaction can be constructed by the
linguistic landscape, particularly the texts, symbols, and pictures seen in outdoor or open
locations, such as on signs, mass-produced and replicated by industrial processes, such as thedesign of commodities, and in print, video, and internet media. Linguistic landscapes represent
and help create individual and cultural identities, power relationships, and transgressions(Shohamy & Gorter, 2009).
One of the exciting things suggested to me from this symposium was the notion thatlearners can actively participate in the creation of their private and public spaces for learning. At
any moment, students have choices and can create opportunities to collaborate with others,
distribute their knowledge, and situate themselves within physical, psychological, social, andtemporal spaces. Natural fluctuations and fluidity, and contextual co-constructing dynamics, canshape these spaces. For me, this means that teachers and students can choose to act
autonomously, that human autonomy articulates and becomes articulated by language use within
and beyond spaces and places, some of which we are very familiar with, and some we are noteven aware of.
Alison, what new understandings came to you from this symposium?
Alison: I’m not sure it’s a new understanding so much as a clarification that space is a vital anddynamic way of looking at power relations in social contexts. The “social turn” (Block, 2003) has
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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Backbeen recognized as a major advance in applied linguistics for more than a decade. I would like tohope that a “spatial turn” (a term which, I realize, has been in force for well over two decades inother fields) will be our next new horizon. As I mentioned before, there are already pioneers in
our field, such as the late Leo van Lier and Vera Menezes, who have broken new ground in their
explorations of affordances. Gergana’s use of Lefebvre in her study was really fascinating as an
example of how postmodern spatial theories can underpin research into learner autonomy. But
the symposium as a whole, convened by Garold Murray and Terry Lamb, must be commended as ashowcase of cutting-edge research.
As a final word, I note that the Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine has this year gone
to John O’Keefe, Edvard Moser and May-Britt Moser for their research into “place cells”. Thesebrain cells not only help us map our way around the world, “but in humans at least they form partof the spatiotemporal scaffold in our brains that supports our autobiographical memory” (BBC,October 6th, 2014). What clearer indication can there be than this, of the importance of space andplace in human lives? What greater precedence can there be of the need to research it in our own
field of applied linguistics?
References
Block, D. (2003). The social turn in applied linguistics. Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh University Press.
Bourdieu, P. (1990). The logic of practice. (Trans. R. Nice). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. New York: Harper
Collins.
Gallagher, J. (2014). Nobel Prize for the brain’s GPS discovery. BBC, October 6th, 2014<http://www.bbc.com/news/health-29504761> Gibson, J. J. (1979). The ecological approach tovisual perception. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.
Lefebvre, H. (2009). State, space, world: Selected essays. (Ed. N. Brenner & S. Elden).
Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Mechanic, D. (1978). Students under stress: A study in the social psychology of adaptation.
Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.
Menezes, V. (2011). Affordances for language learning beyond the classroom. In P. Benson & H.
Reinders (Eds.), Beyond the language classroom. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan
Shohamy, E., & Gorter, D. (Eds.) (2009). Linguistic landscape: Expanding the scenery. New York:
Routledge.
van Lier, L. (2000). From input to affordance: Social-interactive learning from an ecologicalperspective. In J. Lantolf (Ed.), Sociocultural theory and second language
learning. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

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Learning Learning 『学習の学習』 21 (2): Looking Back
Recently released books andarticles on Learner Development
The following list is an extract of one that was compiled by one of cofounders of the LDSIG, Richard Smith,and reprinted here with his permission.
If you are interested in seeing the original list that goes back to 1977 please click here.
If you are interested in doing -- and, with mentoring, feel competent to do -- a PhD in the area of 'History of
the language learner autonomy movement' please get into contact with him at<R.C.Smith@warwick.ac.uk>.
Morrison, B.R. & Navarro, D. (2014). The Autonomy Approach: Language Learning in the Classroom and
Beyond. Peaslake: Delta Publishing. Further information.
Murray, G., ed. (2014). Social Dimensions of Autonomy. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Further
information.
Barfield, A. and Delgado Alvarado, N., eds. (2013). Autonomy in Language Learning: Stories of Practices.
Canterbury, England: IATEFL Learner Autonomy SIG. Further information.
Benson, P. and Cooker, L., eds. (2013). The Applied Linguistic Individual: Sociocultural Approaches to
Identity, Agency and Autonomy. Sheffield: Equinox.
Crabbe, D., Elgort, I. and Gu, P., eds. (2013). Innovation in Language Learning and Teaching (7/3). Special
issue: Autonomy in a Networked World. Table of contents.
Hobbs, M. and Dofs, K., eds. (2013). ILAC Selections: 5th Independent Learning Association Conference.
Christchurch, New Zealand: Independent Learning Association. Online: http://
www.independentlearning.org/uploads/100836/files/ILA_2012_Proceedings.pdf
Huang, J. and Benson, P., eds. (2013). Chinese Journal of Applied Linguistics (36/1). Special issue for the
16th World Congress of Applied Linguistics: Autonomy in Foreign and Second Language Education. Tableof contents
Ludwig, C. and Mynard, J., eds. (2013). Autonomy in Language Learning: Advising in Action. Canberbury,
England: IATEFL Learner Autonomy SIG. Further information.
Menegale, M., ed. (2013). Autonomy in Language Learning: Getting Learners Actively Involved.
Canterbury, England: IATEFL Learner Autonomy SIG. Further information.
If you have read any of the above books and would like to submit a review, please send it on to<learninglearningjaltldsig@gmail.com>

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