#interactionist

Identity interactionism: theoretical perspective in which identity derives social processes from human interaction; interactional identity narrative.

The Interaction Hypothesis is the theory I agree with most. I do believe that a person needs to have their academic setting to learn language rules and how to interpret different phrases, but I also do not think that a person learns a language best through the interactionist process. The interactionist perspective gives different methods of learning or acquiring a language. I like that in these subtopics they all engage in different types of retention levels and through aspects of interactions. In the Modified Interaction theory, having interactions with a native-speaker of the language helps in adjusting to the level of the L2 learner. I believe that with the combination of Modified Interaction and Negotiation for Meaning an L2 learner can quickly advance in their comfort levels as well as in the L2 progression sequences. With the help of other language speakers who can assist the L2 learner with the following process: 1) Comprehension Check. 2) Clarification requests. 3) Self-Repetition or Paraphrase; the L2 learner can get on the spot gratification as well as ask as many questions and receive answers that will help with their L2 progression. 

When I travel to Europe and attempt to learn languages such as Czechoslovakian, Russian, French, etc. I tend to only remember phrases or conversations that I had a person of the native-tongue to help me interpret and process the language and information at hand. I do not recall any portions of the language that I heard outside of these scenarios. Social settings helped me retain the language for interaction and survival purposes.   

When reading the first part of this chapter, I really enjoyed learning about the different stages in which babies acquire language.  I have a 4 year old nephew and before reading this I didn’t put much thought into how he was learning language.  It’s interesting to read the examples and remember incidents that occurred in real life.  The most frequent one is asking “Why?”  Maybe a reason why children acquire language so quickly and effectively is because of their immense curiosity. They are new to this world and therefore want to learn more about it.  Although there is probably some physical growth element to why children learn so well, I think as we get older we lose some of our child-like curiosity and our information absorption slows as we become unconcerned, uninterested, or just distracted by other things in life. 

The next part of the chapter explained the three main theoretical positions that explain language development.  I think all three perspectives work together to explain language acquisition.  We need the behaviourist perspective because imitation is important when learning anything, especially language.  The innatist perspective, because I believe to survive as humans, communication and interaction with others is necessary, making us predisposed to language.  And finally, the interactionist/development perspectives, where exposure and interaction with people and objects, gives children the necessary understanding of language.  I don’t think language development can be achieved through only one of these perspectives but all of them together.