An Exploratory Study Of Bakhtin’s Dialogic Theory In Foreign Language Classrooms

As the new century unfolds, the theoretical research of foreign language teaching and learning has received much attention in China. Though the research has yielded a lot of outstanding results, most of the studies focus on the learners’individual factors, such as learning strategies, motivation, automatic learning, etc. Few studies have explored localized foreign language educational theories in China. Foreign language classrooms are the most important, if not the only site for the Chinese students’L2learning, so it is absolutely necessary to explore suitable or local-sensitive theory(ies) of foreign language classrooms in order to upgrade foreign language education in China. In other words, classroom discourse theory construction is in accordance with the Chinese foreign language educational realities. Theory is the starting point of most studies. As long as specific research questions in the foreign language classroom are raised to the reflection on the theoretical level, the educators and researchers will have a more comprehensive understanding and practice of the foreign language classroom. Therefore, the foreign language classroom theory plays a vital role in the foreign language educational theory and practice.The shift of research focus in Western philosophy from epistemology to language philosophy calls for dialogic education. Bakhtin’s dialogism becomes one of the hottest dialogue theories in the research circle. As one of the representatives in the dialogic turn of SLA, his theory is paid great attention by the second language acquisition researchers. Based upon a critical review of current literature of L2theoretical and empirical studies, the present study aims to address the following aspects in order to construct a foreign language dialogic classroom theory from a socio-cognitive perspective:1. The status quo of the L2classroom research both theoretical and empirical, existing problems and solutions;2. The theoretical foundation and empirical evidence of the foreign language dialogic classroom theory construction;3. The constituent elements in the constructed foreign language dialogic classroom theory and their relationships;4. The relevant methodology orientation and the foreign language dialogic classroom theory.The present study, first of all, reviewed current literature of classroom dialogic research with a focus on the multi-dimensional definitions of "dialogue" and the various studies in which dialogue is applied metaphorically in classroom. Based on the review, the study points out that the existing studies are contradictary in terms of the definitions of "dialogue" at both the theoretical and the empirical level. Besides, these studies haven’t distinguished "dialogue" from "dialogicality" and their arguments lack of systematicity theoretically. In order to solve these problems, the study provides a systematic research procedure and stages for the theory construction of foreign language dialogic classrooms. In order to provide the theoretical foundation and empirical evidence for the theoretical construction in question, the thesis summarizes the studies of Bakhtin’s theory in SLA and provides the theoretical and empirical foundations for the theory construction. Based upon these, the present study interprets Bakhtin’s and Vygotsky’s three core concepts ’language, culture and self’, and shows that the two thinkers’ philosophical understandings or explanations of the three fundamental theoretical concepts are strikingly similar. Thus the thesis highlights its implications for the theoretical basis of the foreign language classroom theory construction.According to the systematic research procedure mentioned earlier, the thesis summarizes the domestic and international research of classroom discourse with implications for the present study. Based on these implications and the theoretical foundations discussed earlier, the thesis move to introduce the socio-cognitive perspective of the foreign language dialogic classroom theory, and then interprets the constituent elements and their relationships. After that, the author puts forward five major concepts, four simplified propostions, multi-variables and one hypothesis. Some additional explanations are provided after the theory construction for readers’ further understanding. The present study also recommends and discusses the research methodology which is believed to be compatible to the constructed theory. The thesis demonstrates that the qualitative research, complemented by the quantitative research paradigm would be more compatible to the dialogic classroom theory, and proposes five principles for the adoption of the methodology; these are Hierarchy Principle, Multi-variable Principle, Openness Principle, Difference Principle and Two-Dimensional Prinicple. Besides, the author holds the view that critical discourse analysis, especially, Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis can be used for research of the classroom practice and the interview can enable the researcher listen to the students’ and the teachers’ voices and find out the hidden factors affecting a certain kind of the classroom practice.The present study is about theory construction of the foreign language classroom in China, and it is exploratory in nature. However, it is hoped that it can contribute to theoretical studies of foreign language dialogic classrooms, and it can expand the discussion and better understanding of Bakhtin’s dialogic theory in relation to classroom discourse in China. It is also hoped that it can have implications for classroom teachers to upgrade their foreign language classroom pedagogical practices.