Exploring Two East Asian ESL Students’ Linguistic and Cultural Needs: From the Emic Perspective

Exploring Two East Asian ESL Students’ Linguistic and Cultural Needs: From the Emic Perspective

East Asian international students’ inactive attitudes in the ESL classroom have been a concern for educators in the U.S. college setting. To understand their needs behind their classroom attitudes, this qualitative study explores two East Asian international students’ linguistic and cultural experience when they were ESL students in the U.S, by looking into their varied academic and social contexts in connection with their language use. Two sets of interviews with a 10-year interval were conducted to track their life paths and identify any changes in their perceptions of their language use in various contexts. I, the researcher, also position myself as a participant to maximize the scope of the emic, or the insider’s view. Findings show that, making efforts to pick up L2, participants adjusted to the diverse ESL contexts by balancing out L1 and L2 use through the interconnectedness with their L1 communities. As a way to accommodate East Asian ESL students’ linguistic and cultural needs institutionally, a culturally relevant ESL curriculum is proposed as a viable approach. (169 words)