Conference Review

The 2012 JALT National Conference inHamamatsu City, Japan

Josh Brunotte
Nanzan University - Seto Campus
The 38th annual JALT National Conference, entitled “Making a Difference”, washeld in Hamamatsu City, Shizuoka Prefecture Japan in October 2012. Taking
place in the ACT City building complex near Hamamatsu Station, the setting
was pleasant and conducive to the event, featuring a spacious wooden concert
hall utilized for larger sessions and ceremonies. The weather was cool and sunnyfor most of the conference weekend, which seemed to help put the 1600-plus
attendees and presenters at ease. With swarms of volunteers guiding participants
and a registration process that was smooth and relatively painless, my first
impressions were of a well-organized conference that would likely not disappoint.
The conference featured four main plenary speakers for Saturday and
Sunday from a variety of backgrounds and fields of study. After the organizers’
self-proclaimed “world’s fastest opening ceremony”, the first speaker Jeannette
Littlemore (University of Birmingham) addressed the crowd with a discussionof figurative language use in non-native speaker (NNS) output. She framed thismostly within an academic writing context. After enumerating the ways in which
figurative language helps to manage and enrich communication, she encouraged
the audience to help language learners (LLs) expand their understanding and use of
these features. She noted, however, that the use of figurative language is not always
possible for lower proficiency LLs still mastering the basics of their second language.
The Saturday afternoon plenary speaker was John Eyles (Eyles and Associates,Ltd.), who illuminated the potential that technology holds for language
instruction. Eyles began by describing the difficulties of pre-Internet lesson
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preparation and accessing source material during that era, and went on to discuss
his own efforts at creating Web sites that provide English lesson materials toinstructors before many such sites existed. Although it’s difficult to argue with
the idea that technology can be useful to teachers, a business associate of Eyles
claimed (via a pre-recorded video) that software will soon allow automatic
grading of writing assignments, an idea I found overly ambitious in regard to thepart technology can play in the classroom.
On Sunday morning, we were presented with arguably the most impactfulof the plenary speakers, Suresh Canagarajah of Pennsylvania State University.
Canagarajah gave an impassioned and personal account of his struggles as a young
English instructor in Sri Lanka. He began by describing a personal crisis set off
by a class demonstration he attempted for a group of Western visitors, and thesubsequent criticism he received regarding his methodology. He marked this as
the start to his life-long journey to expand his understanding of second-language
acquisition and its intersect with culture, and his eventual realization that allteaching methods must be adapted for a local population. Canagarajah argued
persuasively that instructional approaches and frameworks developed in one
context are at least somewhat particular to that setting and cannot be applied as isto just any classroom around the world. He ended by suggesting that we attempt
to “stay in the margins” of current thought in our disciplines and constantly
question orthodoxy. Personally, I found this speech to be quite captivating, as
it touched on personal themes that were applicable to the audience, such as
occasional questioning of our own methods as educators and the desire to searchout best practices. I would encourage JALT to continue seeking out speakers of
this caliber for our national conferences that provide practical advice based on
personal experience in the classroom.
The last of the plenary speakers was Newcastle University professor Alan Firth,researcher in the areas of conversational analysis and English as a Lingua Franca(ELF). Drier and more subdued in tone than the day’s earlier plenary speaker,
Firth discussed his research into NNS conversations using the now-defunct
Skype-casting technology. Both written and audio samples of these language
events were presented with Firth’s analysis. The speaker argued for the need to63

Brunotterelinquish “ownership” of English in light of the sheer number of non-native
English speakers around the globe (reminiscent of the work of Braj Kachru andothers on the subject). Despite this important message, the presentation didn’t
seem to connect with many attendees who may have hoped for more practicaltakeaways (or a discussion of technology that is still currently available, as Skype
has done away with Skype-casting as a feature). Regardless, it is always fortunate
to have an opportunity to hear from a researcher of this caliber.
Beyond the plenary speakers, JALT National provided an incredible wealthof short- and long-paper sessions, poster presentations, forums, workshops, andfeatured-speaker presentations for their attendees. Faced with this wealth of choices,
I tried to attend sessions that seemed applicable to the university context or weregeneral enough to fit the teaching situations most tertiary educators encounter.
Notable among presentations discussing motivation and its impact on
Japanese college students’ learning, Ryo Nitta (Nagoya Gakuin University) andMitsuka Suzuki (Soka University) reported in separate presentations on studies
involving the influence of the “ideal L2 self ” and classroom learning outcomes.
Nitta’s presentation was titled “Dynamic interaction of the motivational system”,
while Suzuki’s was titled “Ideal L2 selves at different motivational levels”. As
may be expected in studies on motivation, both researchers described perceived
limitations in their instruments. Suzuki offered practical advice for instructors
on this subject, encouraging us to help increase students’ interest in the targetlanguage population and provide opportunities for meaningful output in theL2, which may in turn help increase their motivation to learn. Although the25-minute format of these short-paper sessions compressed the available timefor exploring their data, I would encourage more researchers to investigate andpresent on motivation at these conference in light of the incredible importanceit has for our profession.
Also notable was Maggie Lieb’s (Meiji University) presentation “Makinga difference by fostering cultural fluency”, in which she described her newlydesigned course on language and culture and her efforts toward promoting thisoft-overlooked type of fluency. Lieb argued that we are at a unique historicalmoment in terms of global communication, and that this incredible access64

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to other cultures has the potential to help reduce students’ prejudices andmisunderstandings of foreign nationals. Lieb even provided practical advice tooffer our students in this effort, such as learning to behave flexibly and be tolerantof ambiguity when encountering other cultures. I would argue that instruction
like this into “cultural fluency” can be of equal importance as language instruction
itself to our students, and thus I applaud Lieb’s efforts toward designing a courseof such potential importance.
An intriguing session was held by Takahiro Yokoyama (Central QueenslandUniversity) entitled “History of native-speakerism in Japan”, in which research
was presented on Japan’s history of preferring native English-speaking teachers
for their classrooms. Yokoyama explored how far back the history of this practice
goes, what the qualifications are for these teachers, and whether there was evidenceof preferential treatment between NNS and native-speaking (NS) teachers (andwithin NS instructor populations as well). Yokoyama argued that a prevailingassumption exists in Japan that native speakers always make the best educators,
despite the fact that many of these people have no teaching qualifications
to speak of (Yokoyama used the requirements for the JET Programme as oneexample). Through the course of his research, however, he could not findevidence that Japanese-national and native English speaking teachers vied forthe same positions, or that perhaps the difference in qualifications necessaryfor these two groups removed the perception that NS educators were preferred.
Of significance to our profession, Yokoyama did find evidence for a US-born
instructor preference among the native-speaker teachers selected in Japan, and an
overarching desire that “American English” be taught. In light of the fact that ourstudents will encounter a wide variety of English speakers (both NS and NNS),
my takeaway was that we similarly need to provide students with this same kindof variety in the classroom, helping to buck this perceived linguistic prejudice.
Overall, the rich variety of presentations provided by JALT National at thisconference left me simultaneously satisfied and hungry for more. Although thespread-out nature of the venue did require some hustling between the different
sessions, I was pleased by the overall organization, quality of material, andhelpfulness of the volunteers and staff at the conference. The lack of traffic and65

Brunottecongestion in downtown Hamamatsu City, coupled with the beautiful weather,allowed for an experience conducive to professional development and simply
having a great time. Thanks to JALT National for hosting this event and all of
their efforts toward its success.

Author’s bio

Josh Brunotte is a graduate of the University of Texas, San Antonio (MA-TESL)
and has taught ESL/EFL for over seven years in both Japan and the US. He is new
to the JALT community and recently became the Membership Chair for the CUE
SIG. He is currently teaching courses at Nanzan University (Seto Campus), Nagoya
Junior College, and Ohkagakuen University. joshbrunotte@gmail.com

Received: November 10, 2012
Accepted: January 6, 2013
Editor’s Note: In this issue, we welcome the conference
review written by Josh Brunotte. He is a recipientof the Member Support Conference Grant andconsequently applied his grant to a conference trip.
Here, he shares some of his experiences attending theevent.
One of the primary aims of the CUE SIG is to support and recognize the distinctive
work of our members through a variety of awards and grants. For outstanding
articles in the OnCUE Journal or excellent conference presentations we offer themember or attendee nominated Reader’s Choice and Best of CUE Awards. CUE
also supports our members’ interests in professional development through the New
Member Conference Grant, Member Support Conference Grant, and Member
Research Grant, which aim to help members with little or no institutional funding.
To find more information about CUE awards and grants and learn how to apply,
please see our Web site. http://jaltcue.org/content/cue-grants-and-awards-2014
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