| This study is an exploration of the English language learning experiences of four Malaysians who were students in the U.S. at the time of the research. They represent the three main ethnic groups in Malaysia, namely the Malays, Chinese, and Indians. The objectives of this study were to explore the ways in which the factors surrounding students' homes, schools, and social realms impacted the construction and reconstruction of their identities as learners and users of the English language. It also looked at how these attributes further shaped their notions of their ethnic, national, and global identities. This study was undertaken with the notion that students' voices are sometimes ignored and unheard, and that hearing them often leads to valuable pedagogical awareness. I conducted this study of lived experiences using Clandinin and Connelly's qualitative narrative inquiry methodology (2000) and phenomenological interviews to obtain data. I gathered students' lived experiences using the three-dimensional inquiry spaces of temporality, sociality, and place and looking at narrative as both the method and the phenomena under investigation. I analyzed, interpreted, and retold these personal narratives in relation to their social significance. The findings from this study suggest how a gradual flexibility in the construction of students' identities as English language learners bears upon their current conceptualizations of their ethnic, national, and global identities. |
