The Omnipresent Classroom during Summer Study Abroad: American Students in Conversation with Their French Hosts

Study abroad is often promoted as one of the best opportunities to use foreign language skills outside the classroom. Yet, relatively little is known about the language that students produce when speaking in noninstructional settings. Relying on conversation analysis and ethnographic techniques, this qualitative study investigates both speech and speaker perceptions through tape–recorded conversations between summer study abroad students and their French hosts, as well as through interviews and observations. Findings indicate that natives and nonnatives alike relied heavily on classroom roles and discourse structures to manage their interactions, calling into question the assumption that language use with a native–speaking host family liberates students from classroom limitations. The inappropriateness of transferring didactic discourse patterns to out–of–class interactions also raises issues for consideration about the nature of in–class instructional practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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