Social context and resources for language learning

System 34 (2006) 352–370

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SYSTEM

Social context and resources for language learning

David Palfreyman *

Zayed University, P.O. Box 19282, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Received 20 December 2003; received in revised form 21 April 2006; accepted 18 May 2006

Abstract

Until recently, research in applied linguistics has tended to treat learners in relative isolation fromtheir context, and to study primarily classroom and other educational contexts. This paper in con-trast focuses on the contexts which frame learning, and in particular the resources which these con-texts provide. A model is outlined which includes both material and social resources for languagelearning, and the interactions between them. This model is then applied to the learning resourcesused by a group of female university students in the United Arab Emirates. Students were foundto make use of various opportunities in their life outside the university, to practise English and toclarify problems in using the language. Social networks were found to influence the accessibilityand use of these resources, with gender and perceived expertise in English affecting students’ useof resources. In addition, students were found to act as sources of English expertise for other mem-bers of their family, in ways that contribute to their social identity within the family.� 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Language learning; Resources; Social context; Social networks

1. Introduction

In the discourse of language education, ‘‘resource-based’’ learning usually refers tolearners’ ‘‘independent interaction with learning materials’’ (Benson, 2001: 111) such asbooks or videos. However, in this paper I aim to relate the concept of language learningresources to ‘‘ecological’’ (Tudor, 2003) issues of social context and mediation in languagelearning (Palfreyman, 2003), through a study of a particular group of language learners,

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D. Palfreyman / System 34 (2006) 352–370 353

namely female university students in a fast-changing Gulf Arab community in the UnitedArab Emirates (UAE). What kind of environment does the UAE (as experienced by thesestudents) provide for supporting language learning, and what does these learners’ experi-ence suggest for the study and support of language learning more generally?

Until recently, conceptualization of language learning in Applied Linguistics and ELThad tended to portray ‘the learner’ as a relatively decontextualized, cognitive being (Hol-liday, 1994; Norton and Toohey, 2003; Palfreyman, 2003). A significant body of literaturehas developed concerning individual learners and the strategies which they use to learnboth inside and outside the classroom (Oxford, 1990; O’Malley and Chamot, 1990; Wen-den, 1991; Dickinson, 1992; Oxford and Ehrman, 1995). However, less attention has beenpaid to the contexts of which the learners in question are a part; and in particularstrategies related to the social context (e.g. Oxford (1990)’s ‘social strategies’) have beendiscussed less in later work (e.g. Chamot and O’Malley, 1996) than the more individual-centred categories of ‘cognitive’ and ‘metacognitive’ strategies.

Given this individualistic concept of the learner, the role of context in the literature onsecond language learning tends to be that of a ‘container’ (Lave, 1993): it is seen as a merebackdrop for a pre-existing individual learner, and is referred to only in so far as it is nec-essary to explain variation in individual performance. In contrast, a ‘situated learning’approach (e.g. Lave and Wenger, 1991) treats context and learner as shaping each other,in all aspects of learning.

Much of the literature on language learning has tended to focus, for practical reasons,on the context of the classroom, or on controlled experimental tasks (Pica and Doughty,1988; Foster and Skehan, 1996). Findings from the latter in particular are difficult to gen-eralize to learning in other settings (Garner, 1990; McDermott, 1993), suggesting the needfor a more ecological perspective (Tudor, 2003).

More recently, researchers have begun to compare how individuals learn in a range offormal and informal contexts, among which the classroom may play a minor role (e.g.Ryan, 1997; Norton, 2000; Skilton-Sylvester, 2002). Although the learners in the presentstudy are university students, the study focuses on contexts outside the university, illumi-nating a wider ecology of language learning, made up of ‘communities of practice’ (Laveand Wenger, 1991) in which individuals participate by learning and using language.Indeed, work in systems thinking (e.g. Roberts and Kleiner, 1999) suggests that learningmay need to be seen as a process occurring not simply in an individual, but throughoutthe interconnected parts of a class, a family or another social grouping.

The literature in the field of Second Language Acquisition has in recent years providedconcepts and data relating to the development of individual learner identity (e.g. Norton,2000; Pavlenko and Blackledge, 2004), to the sociocultural aspects of small-group activi-ties (e.g. Lantolf, 2000), and to the global networks of discourse which frame local inter-actions (Pennycook, 1994; Rampton, 1995; Canagarajah, 1999; Block and Cameron,2002). Between the individual and global levels, shaping both the flow of discourses andthe detail of dyadic or small-group interactions, lies a kind of social infrastructure: a net-work of everyday material and social resources which shapes the language learning pro-cesses and careers of individuals. In this paper I am concerned, like Norton (2000), withissues of access to language learning resources within a community, and I will draw onconcepts from the anthropology of education as well as Second Language Learning(SLA) in surveying and analyzing a language learning context to which relatively littleattention has been paid hitherto.

354 D. Palfreyman / System 34 (2006) 352–370

The notion of a community is of key importance in considering how social context con-tributes to learner development, especially in the UAE context. Bransford et al. (2000) esti-mate that 79% of school pupils’ waking time is spent interacting in the home andcommunity, compared with 21% at school, and they call for educators to capitalize onthe educational potential of the community. Heath (1983) carried out a seminal studyof two contrasting working class communities to investigate the practices which sur-rounded the learning of reading, examining how children were socialized into a commu-nity of language practice through everyday interaction with texts and family members.

Within SLA research, social parameters play an increasingly important role in re-con-ceptualising established constructs such as motivation (Lamb, 2004), and learner auton-omy (Palfreyman, 2003). The individual can be seen as actively taking up a particularstance with respect to material and social resources, and learner autonomy as a developingawareness of these resources and of one’s own use of them (Wertsch et al., 1993).

The Gulf Arab community studied here is particularly interesting because it contrasts insignificant ways with contexts discussed in the majority of second language learning liter-ature. The UAE has strong Islamic and tribal traditions, but in recent years has also seendramatic social changes, in which female university students are very much involved. Thelearners who took part in this study live in a country where the target language (English) iswidely used, but they are not powerless immigrants attempting to interact with an English-speaking majority (cf. Norton, 2000; Skilton-Sylvester, 2002). They have considerable sta-tus and material wealth, and speak a locally prestigious first language; but their lives arealso shaped by traditional gender roles.

This paper will use questionnaire and interview data to survey how social contextframes these students’ use of material and social resources for language learning. I will dis-cuss how their learning of English is shaped, supported and given meaning through theirdifferent social roles as members of their community.

2. Resources for language learning

Before I expand on the model of resources used here, it is worth contrasting the term‘resources’ with other terms sometimes used to analyze the context of learning. Contextis often depicted as setting constraints on learning: for example, a particular contextmay be seen as impoverished or as not conducive to learning (e.g. Ho and Crookall,1995; Jones, 1995). Another perspective views context more ambivalently, as offeringlearners capital of various kinds. Bourdieu (1986) speaks of ‘cultural capital’, highlightingthe benefits gained by certain sections of society who have access to particular skills orunderstanding, in contrast to the negative effects on those who do not. Putnam (2000)among others uses the term ‘social capital’ in a more benign sense, referring to ‘‘connec-tions among individuals – social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthi-ness that arise from them’’ (p. 19).

I have chosen to use the term resources here because I wish to focus on positive featuresof learning and context, which may help educators in facilitating learning outside the class-room. However, in practice resources and constraints are two sides of the same coin, beingmanifestations of rules which structure society (Giddens, 1984). I will discuss learning interms of resources afforded by the learning context (Darrah, 1990; Lave and Wenger,1991; Haddon, 1992; Henning, 1998), with the proviso that constraints are manifestedin the ways that resources are accessed and used by people.


One basic distinction is between the physical sense of ‘resources’ – suggested by termssuch as ‘resource centre’ – and a broader, more abstract sense. Van Lier (2001) viewsresources for learning as existing ‘‘in the tangible form of budgets, materials, equipment,and the like, but also in the form, less palpable though perhaps more important, of author-ity and power’’ (p. 93). Note that the distinction is more complex than this sentence sug-gests: a budget, for example, is less tangible than a textbook, although it clearly hastangible effects, just as authority and power do. Tudor (2001) also distinguishes two kindsof contextual factors relevant to classroom learning. The first he calls ‘pragmatic’ factors:these include physical resources such as classroom equipment, as well as structural factors,such as examination systems. The second kind of factor he calls ‘mental’ factors, and theseconsist of ‘‘attitudes, beliefs and behavioural expectations which participants bring withthem to the classroom’’ (p. 19). Tudor emphasizes that these two kinds of factor interactconstantly with each other: for example, Holliday (1994) analyzes patterns in Egyptianuniversity classes in terms of interaction between traditional cultural norms, and prag-matic constraints such as overcrowding in modern urban classrooms. In this paper I willfocus on ‘pragmatic’ resources, but within the context of the interpretations and customsof those involved.

In discussing contextual resources for language learning, I will view language learningitself as including two kinds of process: understanding and practice (Rutherford, 1987;Johnson, 1996). Understanding language involves developing an awareness (at a moreor less conscious level) of how language works – an awareness of how semantic, linguisticand social systems interact in the way language is used. The second aspect of learning rel-evant to this discussion is practice: applying internalized awareness of language to partic-ipating (receptively and/or productively) in communicative events. I will discusscontextual resources in terms of how they facilitate one or both of these processes.

2.1. Material resources

In the literature on language education, ‘‘resources’’ most often refers to materialresources (e.g. Benson, 2001), which may include authentic materials, teaching materials,equipment or, in a broader sense, funds. Some material resources, such as dictionaries orgrammar books, hold the potential to help students understand how the language works;others, such as novels or television channels in the target language, offer opportunities forpractice of skills. Material resources are often thought of as objective ‘things’, but in prac-tice they are open to interpretation. The literature in anthropology and, more recently, sci-ence and technology studies has demonstrated the complexity of the social practicesassociated with materials and equipment: rather than uses of technology being ‘read off’from technological objects, these resources are now more often seen as offering potential,or ‘affordances’, which are taken up and deployed in different ways by people within asocial context (Murdock et al., 1992). In language learning, available textbooks or com-puter software may be used in various ways – or not used at all – depending on how theyfit into a particular social context.

Lave (1988) makes a theoretical distinction between two aspects of social context. Whatshe calls the arena for a given social event, or collection of events, constitutes the ‘objec-tive’ social context, to be described in physical, economic, sociological or political terms;setting, on the other hand, is used to refer to the context as experienced by a participant orset of participants with reference to a social context. In language learning, material


resources (whether inside or outside a ‘resource centre’) constitute part of the arena forlearning, but a particular learner or teacher will interpret and use these resources differ-ently in different situations, just as a language learning task may be interpreted in differentterms by different participants (Hutchinson and Klepac, 1982; Roebuck, 2000).

If we view a material resource such as television or a book as ‘hardware’, then it cansupport language learning only in so far as it is a carrier for ‘software’, such as a targetlanguage television channel or information about the language. This ‘hardware’ and ‘soft-ware’ together offer an arena for learning; however, this is not sufficient to support learn-ing. An individual learner must for example be able to access the television channels or theinformation in the book; and she must be ready to use them for learning purposes. Indi-vidual learning strategies depend on resources being available, accessible and meaningfulto the learner, and these in turn involve social factors. Does the learner have the right totake the book home, for example? Does she (or significant others) see watching English TVprogrammes as a valid learning activity? The different perspectives, purposes and identitiesof those involved will shape the social activities for which the material resource itself ismerely a kernel. Institutional resource centres aim to make these issues as unproblematicas possible, so that learners can engage directly with meaningful and useful learning activ-ities; but in the world beyond the institution these issues play a larger role (Pollard andFiler, 1999; Aoki, 1999).

2.2. Social resources

Brookfield (1980) showed how people learning outside a formal educational setting didnot operate simply as individuals, but drew crucially on networks of other people whoacted as models for the learner, or as sources of support and feedback. This illustratesthe importance of social resources for learning, as analyzed in relation to language learn-ing by Norton (2000) and others. As with material resources, social resources can bedescribed in terms of arena and setting. A learner is surrounded by people (teacher, otherlearners, friends, family members and so on) who may be more or less knowledgeable orsupportive. As with material resources, however, access to and use of these resources maybe more or less problematic: for example Shamim (1996) describes how pupils compete forthe teacher’s attention in a classroom setting. More broadly, if a language learner has onlyinfrequent contact with a knowledgeable person, or if their interactions focus on mattersother than learning, then the setting may not realize the potential of the resources available(Haddon, 1992).

A key concept in understanding the ecology of social resources is that of a social net-work: a system of relationships between individuals which channels, and is constituted by,social interaction. Social network theory deals with the sharing and distribution of ‘‘tan-gibles such as goods and services, or intangibles, such as influence or social support,. . .sharing information (news or data), discussing work, giving emotional support, or provid-ing companionship’’ (Garton et al., 1997). These resources are an essential part of long-term learning: Garton et al. describe how specific relations between an individual andhis/her acquaintances may vary in their content (e.g. their topic and focus), their direction

(e.g. helping or being helped) and their strength (in terms of frequency of contact, or ofquantity/quality of content). Such relations may accumulate over time to form strongor weak ties between individuals, which may be more or less multiplex (combining variousdifferent kinds of relation, such as modelling language use, facilitating access to resources,


or supporting and encouraging the learner). In relation to individual learning behaviour,Borgatti and Cross (2003) show how people ask colleagues for information based on (a)their knowledge of the other person’s expertise, (b) how positively they view the other per-son’s skills, and (c) ease of access to the other person.

Garton et al. also describe more global properties of networks. A social network as awhole may be described in terms of its range – that is, the number of individuals and tieswithin it, and the variety among these. Informal roles may also be identified in a network:for example, language skills may give an individual learner a key position in her social net-work as a ‘language broker’, which may increase her prestige and push her to use anddevelop her language skills (Norton Pierce, 1995; Skilton-Sylvester, 2002). Conversely,she may have a marginal role which distances her from language practice opportunities,or which renders these opportunities unsupportive for language learning (Norton,2000). Educators working within the framework of multicultural education (e.g. Mollet al., 1992; Velez-Ibanez and Greenberg, 1992) have attempted to increase teachers’and students’ awareness of the ‘‘funds of knowledge’’ present in the home and community,with the aim of linking school and home learning; however, this work has had little influ-ence in the field of SLA research.

The first aim of this study is to examine the informal social and material resourceswhich are available, accessible and meaningful for a particular group of learners in theDubai context, and with which the learners interact. These resources include books andEnglish media, as well as the informal social networks which the learners use to under-stand and practice English. The study also investigates the converse aspect of these socialnetworks: the extent to which learners’ developing skills in English represent a potentiallearning resource for others with whom they regularly interact, and hence contribute tothe learners’ changing identity in their community.

3. The UAE context

The population involved in the present study comprises female university students atZayed University in Dubai, the commercial capital of the UAE. They are aged 18–21,and from the local Gulf Arab community; most of them live in Dubai emirate, but a sig-nificant number commute from the nearby emirates of Sharjah, Ajman and Um AlQuwain, which are smaller and more conservative. Significantly in terms of socialresources for learning, the majority of them live in families of five or more siblings.

Until about 40 years ago, UAE society was based on patterns largely unchanged forcenturies. There was a relatively low level of formal education and technology; genderroles were very tightly defined; and extended family ties shaped the lives of most peoplefrom an early age. These patterns still influence UAE society, but since the sudden growthof its oil industry in the 1960s the country has seen dramatic changes in education, tech-nology, and social norms. One significant result of these changes is the linguistic mix of themodern UAE: approximately 19% of the country’s population are local Arabs, with therest being imported labour in all sections of the economy. Of the latter, approximately20% are Arabic-speakers from other countries; 50% originate from the Indian subconti-nent and often use English as a second or first language; while less than 8% are from Wes-tern/English-speaking countries (CIA, 2006, citing figures from 1982). English, Arabic andHindi are all used in commerce, entertainment and other domains (Babrakzai, 2002). TheUAE is therefore a linguistically interesting context, especially with respect to the concept


of the ‘native speaker’: while English has a major role in the country’s economy and soci-ety as a whole, for some citizens it is a first language, for some a second language and forothers a foreign language.

The role of women in Gulf countries has traditionally been restricted largely to familylife (c.f. Wikan, 1991); and their access to languages other than Arabic has been limited.Since the growth of educational provision in the UAE, however, women have tended tostudy in higher education in greater numbers than men. Nowadays (particularly inDubai – a cosmopolitan commercial centre since long before the oil boom) womenare seen as a resource for national employment and development, and it is increasinglycommon for women to work. At the same time however there are strong family pres-sures which sequester women and encourage them to devote their energies to marriageand parenting.

Zayed University (ZU) was established by the UAE government in 1998 as a universityfor female citizens of the UAE, with the mission of preparing students for meaningful andsuccessful 21st century lives; promoting economic and social advancement; and promotingeducational excellence and leadership in the UAE. Access to information technology isseen as a key theme in this mission: all students have a laptop, and network access is avail-able throughout the campus. Students whose mothers often did not receive primary edu-cation now study university courses in Business, Information Systems andCommunication through the medium of English; and although often physically restrictedto the home for much of their time outside the university, they are able to connect to theinternet and browse or chat with a great degree of freedom.

At first sight, these young women’s environment appears to be relatively rich in materialresources for learning English, but socially restricted by local traditions of keeping womenwithin the family home, or at least away from contact with males outside the family; how-ever, the context is more complex than this. For example, the physical segregation ofwomen from public contexts may appear to curtail opportunities for communication inEnglish, but Johannsen (1996) found that a similar sample of UAE students reportedspeaking English on occasion in the home and with service workers outside.

Media such as internet messaging and mobile telephony provide a further dimensionfor communication (Walters et al., 2003): internet messaging, for example, is a technol-ogy (material resource) which offers a potential social resource for language learning – ina sense the anonymity of online communication compared with face-to-face contactfunctions like the traditional face veil, increasing women’s confidence that society willsanction their venturing into more public arenas. This potentially creates a disparitybetween face-to-face and electronically mediated opportunities for students to use thetarget language to interact and negotiate meaning and identity – although this needsto be investigated empirically: findings by Lenhart et al. (2001) and Rodgers and Gaunt-lett (2002) suggest that teenagers in the UK and the US tend to use internet messagingfor keeping in touch with everyday acquaintances more often than for initiating contactwith strangers.

Bearing in mind that one aim of the university is to empower UAE women by develop-ing skills for leadership, another point of interest is the extent to which these students takeon the role of language broker in their life outside the university. Darrah (1990, p. 42),claims that skills can act as ‘‘symbolic resources that partially constitute individuals anda social system’’: if students’ English skills are valued by significant others, this has impli-cations for their future role in UAE society.


4. Questions and method

The questions which this research attempted to explore are the following:

� What is the range of resources available to these students in learning and using Englishoutside the university?� Which of these resources do students typically draw on?� To what extent do students act as English resources for others?

The aim of the study was to gain an overview of these issues in the community inwhich the students live; in order to gather data on these questions, a sample of 131 stu-dents was asked to respond to an anonymous online survey. This sample included stu-dents from all levels of study (from foundation to final year) and from a range ofspecializations (including Business, Education and Information Systems). Following thissurvey, an interview study was initiated with individual students to gain more qualita-tive, individual data, and some data from this latter stage will be included for illustrationbelow.

The items in the questionnaire included questions on the resources available outside theuniversity for language learning, and on their patterns of use of these resources. The ques-tionnaire begins by trying to establish the kind of social environment within which thelearner lives, before going on to questions explicitly related to language learning practices.The content of the questionnaire is provided in the left-hand column of the table in theAppendix.

The items in the first section of the questionnaire (questions 1–3) establish some basicinformation about the respondent, including their level and specialization of study. Fol-lowing this is a series of questions (4–8) which build up a profile of the student’s familyand others with whom she has regular contact. These questions elicit the members ofthe student’s family, then factors relating to the education and other experiences of peoplein the family which seem likely to bear on a knowledge of English. Then a direct question(9) is asked about each family member’s perceived expertise in English with respect to therespondent’s own.

Following this are some questions (10–13) about the student’s level of contact with fam-ily and friends. First the respondent estimates roughly how much of her time she spendswith each category of family member, then how often she communicates with friends inperson or by phone, and finally how often she uses internet messenger (IM).

The questions outlined above build up a picture of the kind of social network withinwhich each student operates outside the university. This information provides a referencepoint for the questions which follow (14–20), relating explicitly to opportunities andresources for language learning. In questions 14–16, the student is asked about her useof English (in reading, in writing, in speaking and in listening) first at home, and then out-side the home. She is then asked to rate how useful she finds various material resources forimproving her English.

The final section of the questionnaire (17–20) focuses on how the student and her dailycontacts provide help for each other with English. These questions ask about who the stu-dent would ask for help with a problem in English at home (as well as who she would notask), and how often she receives help in this way; the final question asks about who thestudent gives help to at home, and how often.


The majority of the questionnaire items were closed response questions; open responseswere coded according to their content – for example the open question about who the stu-dent would ask for help was coded according to the person or persons mentioned – andthus converted into quantitative data. This data was then analyzed using Microsoft Excelto assess the frequency of particular responses, and SPSS for a factor analysis, to explorecorrelations among responses to all items in the questionnaire.

The quantitative data from the questionnaire provided an overview of a large sample ofstudents; but in order to gain more in-depth individual data, I followed this up with inter-views with a smaller sample. The interview stage which followed the survey involved inter-views between myself and five pairs of students in the English Readiness Program. I chosestudents from the Readiness program because these were most accessible to me, and Iselected five students representing different levels in the program and different levels ofmaternal education (a factor which emerged as significant in the survey data – see below).I asked each student to bring a friend to participate with them in the interview, partly tohelp the student feel more at ease with a male teacher (some students are not accustomedto interacting one-to-one with a male), and also to broaden the range of data and to stim-ulate discussion of ideas, in the way that a focus group does (Cohen et al., 2001). The inter-view was based around questions similar to those in the survey, but I took the opportunityto explore students’ responses to questions; the data cited below is from the questionnaireunless indicated as interview data.

5. Findings

5.1. Opportunities for English practice

At home, more than 70% of respondents say that they use English at least ‘‘a few timesa week’’ in each skill area. Reading and writing are used more frequently than listeningand speaking: 44% of respondents say they read something in English at home everyday, and 47% report writing in English at home, compared with 38% for speaking and40% for listening. This is partly linked to university work done at home, e.g.:

I write my homework.I read story from the university.

However, English is also read and written at home for more personal purposes, e.g.:

through the internet by reading the newspapers and writing [. . .] emails.I write some letters to my friends in English.

Listening opportunities at home are often related to watching English language films orlistening to songs in English. As for speaking, although Arabic is the main language ofcommunication within the home, as Johannsen (1996) notes there is also a significantamount of communication in English. This is partly with people who are perceived asnot having sufficient command of Arabic, e.g.:

with the foreign servant.when I call restaurants to make orders.

However, English is also used sometimes at home with Arabic speakers, notably toexclude others (such as parents) who are not familiar with English, e.g.:


When I want to tell my old sister or friends secret.

In the following example the student is drawn into (discussions of) interactions whichher sister has with English speakers through her work:

When I deal with my sister because she working with Indian people so she try tospeak with them to understand if she want anything also because she doesn’t wellin English so she try.

Outside the home, speaking (49% ‘‘every day’’) and listening (42%) are cited more thanreading (31%) and writing (22%). English use outside the home occurs mainly in publiccontexts where English is prevalent:

If I went shopping in any center and I couldn’t find what I want I would ask the per-son who work there about what I want and most of them are from Philippines orIndian so in this case I would talk in EnglishIn hospital, restaurant.

One student gives specific examples of typical utterances in these situations, illustratingthe functionally oriented, structurally reduced variety of language discussed by Johannsen(1996):

How much this please? Do you give me some rice please ? Can you tell where I canfind this shop?

Examples of reading outside the home are in similar settings to those of oral commu-nication, e.g.:

I read advertizement and shope signs.

It should be noted that the few examples cited of writing outside the home are linkedexclusively to university activities (e.g. ‘‘writing the projects & assignments in English’’),suggesting that these respondents had misinterpreted the question, which explicitly states‘‘outside home or university’’.

The examples above illustrate the ways in which opportunities for practice arelinked to particular settings, which constitute particular combinations of materialand social resources: the physical context of the shopping centre, for example, isassociated with certain social identities (e.g. the Arab customer, the Philippinoassistant).

Johannsen’s (1996) study had identified learners who often speak English in such con-texts, and from this sample it appears that speaking correlates with level of use of otherskills: the second most significant factor identified by factor analysis included use of Eng-lish outside home and university, in all four skills.

The survey data thus gives the impression of a variety of English-medium activities tak-ing place in social settings inside and outside the home, and the interview data reinforcesthis. The correlation between the use of different skills is also supported by the interviewdata, with some of the informants reporting frequent reading, speaking, listening and writ-ing, and others seeming to be less frequently engaged in English use.

All of this use of English provides opportunities to practise the language; I will nowexamine the views which students express regarding the usefulness of particular materialand social resources for improving their English.


5.2. Rating of resources

When asked to rate the usefulness of specific resources, students tend to rate mosthighly resources which are associated with entertainment and/or information technology:films, talking, electronic Arabic–English dictionary, reading stories, reading magazinesand looking at websites. The third most significant factor in the factor analysis was a pref-erence or otherwise for entertainment/communicatively oriented resources: films, chat,internet messaging and talking. This is reminiscent of Willing’s (1988) ‘communicative’learning orientation.

More specific mentions of websites include:

I like look for new movies in Internet.I use websites that are written in English and are mostly scientific.

Traditional media (grammar books and paper dictionary), on the other hand, are ratedas less useful. Opinion is divided as to the benefit of online chat and internet messaging,with comments including the following:

The Messenger help me to write more and chat with people from American or other.It help me because they try to correct my mistake during my writing to them.I thing its bad way to learn English because they didn’t talk right English. only chatlanguage.

Students also suggested social resources of the kind described in the next section:

ask my friends about the meaning of some wordsmaking new friends from different cultures.

As in the survey data, the interview data shows a great interest in online resources inEnglish – not restricted, as suggested by Peel’s (2004) data, to university-related material.The interviewees include students who look for health information online and one whoresearches information about pets, as well as another who, during a two-week trip to Ger-many for medical treatment, had used online communication regularly to keep up with herEnglish course at the university.

5.3. Students’ social networks

The responses to question 4 confirm that the students live in relatively large families,with many students having both older and younger brothers and sisters. The figures whichfollow are adjusted with respect to each student’s response to question 4: for example indetermining what proportion of students say their father has completed higher education,only those students who have a father in their household are counted.

There is a striking difference between the educational level of students’ parents and thatof their siblings. 35% of fathers and 31% of mothers have completed primary education,with only 8% of fathers and 4% of mothers completing higher education. Among siblings,on the other hand, rates are higher: 72% of older sisters have completed higher education,although the percentage for older brothers is lower (53%), reflecting the tendency men-tioned earlier for males to start working rather than continuing to study. On the otherhand, 18% of older brothers (compared with 11% of older sisters, 7% of fathers and 8%of mothers) have lived abroad, most likely for study purposes. In terms of contact with


the world of work, fathers and older brothers were the most likely to be working (81% and89%, respectively), with older sisters being the next highest (59%).

The topography of English knowledge within the family (at least as perceived by thesefemale students) reflects those of education and work experience outlined above. Olderbrothers are most often cited (by 66% of respondents) as knowing English better thanthe respondent – probably as a result of combined education and work experience. Oldersisters rank second in frequency (59%), while fathers are cited by 17% of respondents; thissuggests that educational level is more relevant to proficiency in English than is work expe-rience. Mothers, conversely, are cited least often in answers to this question (5%), as alsoin the preceding questions about education and work. Although younger siblings are notoften cited for this question, 11% of respondents do see them as knowing better Englishthan themselves – this could reflect changes in the UAE education system whereby Englishteaching now begins in Grade 2, rather than in Grade 4 as it did when these students wereat primary school.

The findings above suggest that older siblings and sometimes others in the family arepotential sources of help with English learning; but how much contact is there betweenthese and the students? In general, students spend more time with female family membersthan with male ones: for mothers, older sisters and younger sisters, ‘‘a lot of time everyday’’ was the most common response (63% of respondents gave this response for theirmother, for example). For fathers the most common response was ‘‘a little time everyday’’ (64%); ties with older brothers seemed to be the weakest in terms of frequency, with‘‘once or twice a week’’ being the most frequent response (55%). Contact with youngerbrothers was reported as more frequent than this, the most common response being ‘‘a lit-tle time every day’’ (57%); this probably reflects a responsibility for looking after youngersiblings.

Face-to-face contact with friends outside the university appears to be much less thanthat with family members. 85% of respondents report meeting friends once a week or less,although 79% report talking to friends on the phone at least ‘‘a few times a week’’. It ismore difficult to generalize about contact with friends through internet messaging: stu-dents were divided over the whole range of responses, from ‘‘every day’’ (38%) to ‘‘rarely’’(18%); with the most frequent response being ‘‘a few times a week’’ (33%).

Putting together the factors of perceived expertise in English and strength of ties asmeasured by frequency of contact, and bearing in mind Borgatti and Cross’s (2003) find-ings about peer help, one would expect parents and younger siblings to be a limited sourceof help with English, owing to their lack of knowledge of English. Older brothers alsoseem poor candidates, in this case because despite their perceived proficiency in English,contact between them and students is infrequent. Older sisters, on the other hand, appearto be both relatively proficient in English, and also in frequent contact with students, andso constitute an available source of expert help.

5.4. Receiving help with English at home

In broad terms, students’ responses to the questions about help with English are com-patible with the factors described above, and friends and sisters were the most citedsources of help. 36% of those who responded said that they would first ask their friendsfor help (often specifying that they would do this by phone), 31% mentioned friends astheir second resort for help, and another 4% specifically mentioned contacting friends


online as a second source. It would be interesting to know whether these online friends arepeople that the student knows face to face, or people that they know only online. Sisterswere cited as first source by 35% and as second source by 8% (note that this open questiondid not require the respondents to distinguish between older and younger sisters).

Although ties between students and their brothers seemed to be weak in terms of fre-quency of contact (see above), brothers were nevertheless cited fairly often as a source ofhelp: 22% of respondents cited them as a first source, with a further 9% mentioning themas a second possibility, which puts them in next position after friends and sisters. Leastcited as sources of help were parents, and where students gave a reason for this, it wasrelated to parents’ lack of proficiency in English. Indeed, mothers in particular were thegroup which students most often said they would not ask for help (59% of those whoresponded gave this reply). However, there were exceptions to parents’ outsider rolein students’ language learning: 7% of respondents said they would ask their father abouta problem with English (either as first choice or second), and 3% their mother (includingone student whose mother’s first language is English, making her the first choice forhelp).

Since this was an open question, students could mention sources of help other thanimmediate family members and friends. Indeed, 6% of respondents said that they wouldfirst try to solve the problem using their own personal resources, e.g.:

Always I depend on my self. I speak another languages which help me a lot.

A further 15% gave a similar response for their second source of help, often specifyingmaterial resources such as a dictionary or the internet, which they could use to look for theanswer. For 18% of those who responded, waiting until the next day and asking their tea-cher was their second preference; while other sources of help cited included aunt, brother-or sister-in-law, husband, housemaid and neighbour.

Maternal education and travel experience seems to be related to the student taking amore academic approach to self-help. The most significant factor revealed by the factoranalysis includes the mother’s university study, level of English and experience of livingabroad, as well as a preference for written sources of help at home (internet, a textbookor a dictionary). A small number of students showed most or all of these traits, while inmost cases they were absent.

While the survey data gives an overall picture of helping relationships, the interviewdata reveals the range and types of help which a student may receive from family members.One interviewee mentioned her father, who regularly buys and brings home English booksfor her (because she is less free to go shopping for these by herself); another described howher brother pushes her to use more complex vocabulary, thus both contributing to learn-ing and (in her view) making her tasks more difficult.

5.5. Offering help with English at home

It appears that students less often seek help with English from others at home, than theyoffer help to other family members: 72% of respondents said that they consulted others athome ‘‘sometimes’’ or ‘‘often’’, but 92% of them gave a similar response regarding helpingothers. It thus seems that, at least as far as students themselves perceive the situation, theyhave somewhat of an ‘‘English broker’’ role in the family. The kinds of help offered tofamily members are summarized by one respondent as follows:


1. in their homework 2. when they go to somewhere and the people in this place aretalking in English 3. reading for them some letters 4. translate in general somethingin TV

This shows how helping others with English arises in daily work and leisure activities.Recipients of help tend to be those with less knowledge of English than the student, e.g.:

I help my young sister and my young brother by teaching and do there homework inEnglish.my father . . . in reading the letters for himMy mother and younger brothers and sometimes some of my relatives such as myauntie.my friends when they ask me to double check their projectsI help father in his work sometimes. Mother in writing and reading letters that comefrom her country India. Sisters in their studies and the older one in writing poemsand emotional paragraphs for her friends.

This last example shows again the non-functional purposes for which English is used.Again, the interview data gives more depth to this aspect of social resources. For exam-

ple, interviews revealed that students may share material resources such as school bookswith siblings in order to help them. This involves the learner remembering and retrievingrelevant pages of textbooks and offering and/or explaining them to siblings. Such use ofeducational materials seems to occur only with siblings, around academic tasks; with par-ents help tends to be with work, shopping or medical activities, and mediated verballyrather than through written materials.

6. Conclusion

It appears from this study that learners make use of a rich variety of material and socialresources to practice English and to attempt to clarify their understanding of the language.The level of English use is fairly high, and in addition to public situations where the com-petence of interlocutors requires it, English is also used in more private domains, on- andoffline, for purposes of entertainment, self-expression or exclusion.

While students live in a very affluent society, and in theory have access to a wide range ofmaterial resources for language learning, they tend to favour entertaining and/or electronicresources; a preference for more traditional written sources is associated with a few studentswhose mothers are more highly educated. In terms of social resources, in the Emirati familyperceived expertise and accessibility are key factors in networks of help, just as Borgatti andCross (2003) found for organizational contexts. However, perceived expertise seems to bemore important, since the students take advantage of the relatively weak ties with theirolder brothers to seek help with English. In the case of sisters, however, proficiency in Eng-lish and overall patterns of contact together lead to greater use of this social resource.

English proficiency in social context does not consist simply of a set of neutral skills,but is linked to aspects of students’ identity, particularly in terms of gender roles.Increased English proficiency can contribute to students’ prestige and role-fulfilment asdaughters helping their parents. Within and beyond the home, students act as English bro-kers for their family, which may in turn strengthen their status in the family and in theircommunity.


In helping learners to use authentic resources more effectively, Ryan (1997) recom-mends a three-stage sequence: consciousness-raising, presentation and practice of tech-niques, and discussion of underlying theory. The findings of this study suggest thatlearning and teaching of English might benefit from the following:

� Through discussion and comparison, raising awareness of the range of material andsocial resources for learning which are available to students, of their own preferencesin the use of these resources, and of the roles/identities which students see forthemselves.� Promoting dialogue between existing learning practices and more institutionalized ways

of approaching learning, with the aim of creating a locally relevant and informedapproach to using ‘‘funds of knowledge’’ (Moll et al., 1992).

Future investigation of this topic will include case studies of particular language learn-ers and the ways in which they orient to learning resources (cf. Pollard and Filer, 1999, in aUK primary school). While such a study would, like the present one, focus necessarily onspecific learners and contexts, the concepts developed through such research, together withmore detailed information about the context, could be of relevance in understanding otherlanguage learning situations.

Appendix. Questionnaire and results overview

Question [possible responses] Most (least) frequent response: %
of students
1. How many years have you been studying atZU?

One: 48%

2. What are you studying now?
Readiness: 47% [Readiness/Arts and Sciences/Business/Communications and Media/Education/Family Science/Information Systems].3. Where do you live? Dubai: 54% [Ajman/Dubai/Fujeirah/Ras Al Khaimah/Sharjah/Umm Al Quwain]4. Who are the people in your family? various responses [Questions 4–9: Father/mother/olderbrother(s)/older sister(s)/younger brother(s)/younger sister(s)/other: __________ ]5. In your family, who has studied at primaryor high school?
younger sister(s): 81%(mother: 31%)

6. Who has studied at university?
older sister: 72%(mother: 4%)
7. Who has lived in another country?
older brother: 18%(younger brother: 1%)
8. Who has a job?
older brother: 89%(mother: 5%)


Appendix (continued)

Question [possible responses]
Most (least) frequent response: %of students
9. Who knows English better than you?
older brother: 66%(mother: 5%)
10. How much of your time do you usuallyspend with the people in your family? Choosean answer for each person.

responses for ‘‘a lot of time everyday’’

[A lot of time every day/A little time everyday/Once or twice a week/Other: _____]

mother: 63%(older brother(s): 30%)

11. How often do you talk to friends on thephone?

A few times a week: 41%

[Every day/a few times a week/once a week/rarely].

(Once a week: 14%)

12. How often do you meet friends outside theuniversity?

Rarely: 60%


(Every day: 2%)

13. How often do you use MSN Messenger,ICQ or Yahoo Messenger?

Every day: 38%


(Rarely: 18%)

14. How often do you use English at home?Choose an answer for each activity: speaking,listening, reading, writing.

Speaking – a few times a week:38%

[Every day/a few times a week /once a week/rarely]

Listening – a few times a week:40%

Please give a few examples of how you useEnglish at home____________________________

Reading – every day: 44%Writing – every day: 47%

15. How often do you use English outsidehome or university (e.g. in shops, restaurants,offices, . . .)? Choose an answer for eachactivity: speaking, listening, reading, writing

Speaking – every day: 49%

[Every day/a few times a week /once a week/rarely]

Listening – every day: 42%

Please give a few examples:____________________________________

Reading – a few times a week:31%

Writing – a few times a week:22%

16. How useful is each of the following forlearning English?: the Arabic–Englishdictionary in your laptop, a paper English–English dictionary, a grammar book, readingstories, reading magazines or newspapers,

responses of ‘‘very useful’’ –talking to other people; laptop

dictionary: 69%

(continued on next page)


Appendix (continued)

Question [possible responses]
Most (least) frequent response: %of students
watching films, chatting on the internet, usingweb pages on the internet, talking to otherpeople, other: __________.
[Very useful/Useful/A bit useful/Not useful. (paper English–English
dictionary: 37%)
17. If you have a problem or question about Friends: 36% (Mother: 3%) English when you are *at home*, who do youask first (e.g. someone in your family, a friend,someone else. . .)? Who would you ask second?18. Who do you NOT ask, and why not?__________
Mother: 59%

19. How often do other people help you withEnglish at home?

Sometimes: 58%, followed byRarely: 17%

[Often/Sometimes/Rarely/Never].(Who helps you most, and How? __________)20. How often do you help other people(family or friends) with English?

Sometimes: 56%, followed byOften: 36%

[Often/Sometimes/Rarely/Never].(Who do you help, and How? __________)

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Social context and resources for language learning