Research Brief: Multilingual Genre Knowledge Development in A College Writing Course

Wei Xu, The University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, USA

Statement of the Problem

Genre, conceptualized as a social action in rhetorical genre studies, (Miller, 1984), is oftentimes mistakenly perceived as a formulaic template of writing. In genre-based pedagogy, genre is referred to as the result of typified discoursal practices that we conduct in response to recurrent situations in our life (Tardy et al., 2023). Genre is not a single text but a category. It is also not static but dynamic and fluid. For example, a CV, as a genre, may consist of different components when used to apply for a job in higher education compared to an industry job application. In the United States, a CV should not include a photo and the applicant’s age; however, these elements are required in a CV used in China.

For multilingual writers, learning to write across genres also requires learning to write across languages, as they may be familiar with genres in their home language but not in English. Notably, there is theoretical support for instruction facilitating the process of learning new genres across languages (Tardy et al., 2020). Gentil (2021) proposes that multicompetence is a fruitful term to conceptualize multilingual writers’ knowledge systems. The original definition of multicompetence is “compound state of a mind with two grammars” (Cook, 1991, p.112). In studies of multilingual writing, a multicompetent writer presents the flexibility to employ different linguistic resources to make meaning, respond to ever-evolving multilingual communicative demands, and negotiate their writing in multiple languages with different groups of target audiences (Gentil, 2021).

Yet, a survey of literature indicates a paucity of empirical studies that examine how writers recontextualize their genre knowledge across languages – that is, how writers adapt what they know about a genre in one language and use it when writing in another language. While various pedagogical activities have been suggested to help students adapt genre knowledge across languages (e.g., Tardy et al., 2020), there is still a lack of empirical evidence in classroom settings for this process.

Data Collection and Analysis

To bridge the gap, the present study aims to illuminate how writing instruction can facilitate multilingual writers’ learning to write across genres and languages through multiple data sources. This study situates the research setting in a first-year writing (FYW) course for English as an additional language (EAL) students at a Southwestern university in the US. It investigates how multilingual writers in a FYW course develop their genre knowledge and recontextualize that knowledge across languages in the process of writing across genres and languages. Key learning outcomes of the course under study include developing students’ rhetorical awareness and enhancing their understanding of how the purpose, audience, and rhetorical context of texts are related to genre conventions. The focal assignment in this study is called a Bilingual Genre Redesign. In this activity, students analyze the features of a public genre in two languages and then re-write their academic literature review in this public genre, preparing a version of it in two languages. It provides students with an opportunity to experience the flexibility of writing across genres and languages, heightening their rhetorical sensitivity through recontextualization. The teaching of this assignment typically lasts for three to four weeks.

The course was taught by an instructor who is the researcher’s colleague. Data were collected by means of 1) pre- and post-mind maps of students’ understanding of the chosen public genre, 2) screen recordings to understand cognitive processes during the Bilingual Genre Redesign, and 3) semi-structured interviews with focal students. Supplementary data include students’ written works and their explanation texts of the changes they made in the process of redesign. The explanation texts were necessary to comprehend the changes made by participants who do not share a similar native language (i.e., Mandarin) with the researcher. Table 1 introduces the participants recruited in my pilot study and what data sources they contributed.

Table 1

Collected Pilot Data

Pre- and post-instruction mind maps generated by students underwent a comparative analysis to reveal how students’ self-perceived genre knowledge of their selected genre developed before and after performing the Bilingual Genre Redesign. The screen recordings of students working on the task were analyzed complemented with semi-structured interviews. In the interviews, focal segments were displayed to the students to prompt their narrative retrospection of why they make certain decisions in writing. I then conducted the full transcriptions of the interviews and thematically coded them in an inductive manner (Braun & Clarke, 2012).

Preliminary Findings

The pilot study generated initial findings in terms of the resources students drew on and how they perceived the assignment. Findings suggest that students frequently referred back to the features listed in the genre analysis worksheet. They also utilized online dictionaries and translators to produce non-academic synonyms for the academic vocabulary in their literature review. The analysis of mind maps indicates an expanded understanding of their chosen genre and how to go about analyzing a genre. Regarding the perceived affordances and challenges, key affordances include that genre serves as a pedagogically engaging concept in this Bilingual Genre Redesign assignment. In addition, through drawing on both multimodal and multilingual resources, students perceived this assignment as fun and helpful for their multilingual genre knowledge development. A primary challenge perceived by both the instructor and the students lies in the assessment of the Bilingual Genre Redesign. Their concern revolved around the need for a systematic evaluation plan, primarily because the instructor might not comprehend texts written in languages other than their own. However, it was anticipated that the accompanying explanatory texts would assist the instructor in grasping the students’ thought processes regarding recontextualization. This study provides empirical evidence in terms of the language dependence of certain domains of genre knowledge. For example, students’ genre awareness has been found to be applied across writing in different languages and therefore is language independent, whereas their rhetorical knowledge is language dependent (i.e., being different depending on which language the student writes in).

Proposed Solutions

Based on the preliminary findings of this study, I propose that EAL writing courses introduce multilingualism as resources for multilingual writers to become rhetorically flexible and equipped with expanded multilingual genre knowledge. Students can be guided to conduct a genre analysis by reading genre samples written in more than one language and analyzing their genre conventions along with the sociocultural contexts in which the authors are situated. As multilingual students, their access to different linguistic communities can serve as desirable learning materials to facilitate students’ genre knowledge development. In addition, with multimodal genres gaining prominence in various writing contexts nowadays, multilingual writing instructors may also consider incorporating assignments that lead students to recontextualize print-based academic genres into open multimodal genres, which may yield fruitful learning outcomes to prepare students for future writing scenarios they may encounter (e.g., Cimasko & Shin, 2017).

Significance to the Field of SLW and Multilingual Writers

The findings of this study provide an answer to the question posed by Tardy et al. (2020), which has remained unclear until now: “How might writers’ multilingual resources contribute to their genre-specific knowledge and genre awareness” (p. 293). Building upon the current theory, this study also reveals how multilingual writers’ language resources could contribute to developing certain aspects of their genre knowledge and offer pedagogical implications for writing instructors who employ genre-based pedagogy in multilingual classrooms. In addition, Gentil (2021) proposes that a multicompetent writer presents the flexibility to employ different linguistic resources to make meaning, respond to ever-evolving multilingual communicative demands, and negotiate their writing in multiple languages with different groups of target audiences. With triangulated data sources, this study reveals the intricate relationship between multilingual writers’ genre knowledge development and multicompetence.

Final Reflections

How can multilingual writers capitalize on their linguistic resources to develop their multilingual genre knowledge, which may contribute to their multicompetence, or vice versa? What might be the relationship between the multilingual writers’ L1 and L2 genre knowledge? These are the questions that merit further exploration. How to scaffold EAL students to employ their multilingual knowledge to enhance their writing competence is a question that applies to varying pedagogical settings, such as K-12 and English for Specific Purposes (ESP) writing courses. Further explorations can focus on various tasks designed for multilingual writers that tap into their unique sociocultural and linguistic knowledge to enhance their multilingual genre knowledge development.

References

Braun, V., & Clarke, V. (2012). Thematic analysis. American Psychological Association.

Cimasko, T., & Shin, D. S. (2017). Multimodal resemiotization and authorial agency in an L2 writing classroom. Written Communication, 34(4), 387-413.

Cook, V. (1991). The poverty-of-the-stimulus argument and multicompetence. Second Language Research, 7(2), 103–117. https://doi.org/10.1177/026765839100700203

Gentil, G. (2021). Multicompetence and L2 Writing. In R. M. Manchón & C. Polio, The Routledge Handbook of Second Language Acquisition and Writing (1st ed., pp. 109–122). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429199691-14

Miller, C. R. (1984). Genre as social action. Quarterly journal of speech, 70(2), 151-167.

Tardy, C. M., Sommer-Farias, B., & Gevers, J. (2020). Teaching and researching genre knowledge: Toward an enhanced theoretical framework. Written Communication, 37(3), 287-321. https://doi.org/10.1177/0741088320916554

Tardy, C., Caplan, N. A., & Johns, A. (2023). Genre Explained: Frequently Asked Questions and Answers about Genre-Based Instruction. University of Michigan Press.

Wei Xu is a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching (SLAT) at the University of Arizona. She works as a graduate teaching associate and graduate assistant director for the Writing Program. Her research interests include genre studies, second language writing, and multimodal composition.