Social aspects of interlanguage

Second Language Acquisition by Rod Ellis (1997)

New Words
Convergence: The process by which speakers make their speech similar to their interlocutors’ speech. L2 acquisition can viewed as ‘long-term convergence’ towards native-speaker norms.
Divergence: The process by which speakers make their speech different from their interlocutors’ speech. Frequent divergence can be considered to impede L2 acqiosition.
Investment: Learners’ commitment to learning an L2, which is viewed as related to the social identities they construct for themselves as learners.

Three socio-cultural models of L2 acquisition
1 Interlanguage as a stylistic continuum
-stylistic continuum (Elaine Tarone)...Why learner language is variable, from a careful style to a vernacular style
-accomodation theory (Howard Gile)...How a learner’s social group influences the course of L2 acquisition
2 The acculturation model (John Schumann)
-Pidginization takes place when learners are unable or unwilling to adapt to a new culture because of the social distance and psychological distance from L2 group
3 Social identity and investment (Bonny Peirce)
-Learners have complex social identities. Investment is required in order to establish an identity