The pragmatics of L2 gestures in beginners’ classes of Italian
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1558/isla.21106Keywords:
L2 gestures, pragmatics, multimodality, Italian as L2, Canada, ItalyAbstract
This article examines the responses that two groups of beginners of Italian in Canada (n=30) and in Italy (n=30) contributed to a multimodal exercise, where six culturally-based Italian gestures were presented alone and in combination with mini-dialogues. The main goal of this study was to encourage Italian L2 pedagogy to become more oriented towards the teaching of the pragmatics of body movements occurring during interactions. This work advocates that it is important to promote awareness of the pragmatic roles of the body from the early stages of language development to better prepare L2 learners in the recognition of the nonverbal contents communicated in a target language. One of the main results of this study suggests that combining target gestures with speech is a necessary pedagogical approach to enable the understanding of the semantics and the pragmatics of multimodal messages in L2 communication.
References
Abner, N. K., Cooperrider K. and Goldin-Meadow, S. (2015) Gesture for linguists: a handy primer. Language and Linguistics Compass 9(11): 437–51. https://doi.org/10.1111/lnc3.12168
Allen, L. Q. (1995) The effects of emblematic gestures on the development and access of mental representations of French expressions. The Modern Language Journal 79(4): 521–29.
Asher, J. J. (1969) The total physical response approach to second language learning. The Modern Language Journal 53(1): 3–17.
Bardovi-Harlig, K. (2001) Evaluating the empirical evidence: grounds for instruction in pragmatics? In K. R. Rose and G. Kasper (eds) Pragmatics in Language Teaching 13–32. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bardovi-Harlig, K. (2013) Developing L2 pragmatics. Language Learning 63(1): 68–86.
Bassetti, B. and Cook, V. (2011) Language and Bilingual Cognition. Oxford: Psychology Press.
Bavelas, J. and Chovil, N. (2018) Some pragmatic functions of conversational facial gestures. Gesture 17(1): 98–127.
Billot-Vasquez, K., Zhongwen, L., Yukari, H. and Kelly, S. D. (2020) Emblem gestures improve perception and evaluation of non-native speech. Frontiers of Psychology 11: 574418.
Cenoz, J. and Gorter, D. (2011) A holistic approach to multilingual education: an introduction. The Modern Language Journal 95(3): 339–43.
Cook, V. (1992) Evidence for multicompetence. Language Learning 42: 557–91.
Cooperrider, K. (2014) Body-directed gestures: pointing to the self and beyond. Journal of Pragmatics 71: 1–16.
Davitti, E. and Pasquandrea, S. (2017) Embodied participation: what multimodal analysis can tell us about interpreter-mediated encounters in pedagogical settings. Journal of Pragmatics 107: 105–28.
Diadori, P. (1990) Senza Parole. 100 Gesti degli Italiani. Roma: Bonacci Ed.
Ekman, P. and Friesen, W. (1969) The repertoire of nonverbal behaviour: categories, origins, usage and coding. Semiotica 1: 49–98.
Gauci, P., Ghia, E. and Caruana, S. (2017) The pragmatics competence of teacher-students of Italian L2. In I. Kecskés and S. Assimakopoulos (eds) Current Issues in Intercultural Pragmatics 324–45. Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Glaser, K. (2020) Assessing the L2 pragmatic awareness of non-native EFL teacher candidates: is spotting a problem enough? Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 16(1): 33–65.
Goldin-Meadow, S. and Alibali, M. W. (2013) Gesture’s role in speaking, learning, and creating language. Annual Review of Psychology 64: 257–83.
Goldin-Meadow, S. (2003) Hearing Gesture: How our Hands Help us Think. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Grosjean, F. (1985) The bilingual as a competent but specific speaker-hearer. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 6: 467–77.
Gullberg, M. (2006) Some reasons for studying gesture and second language acquisition. IRAL International Review of Applied Linguistics Language Teaching 44: 103–24.
Gullberg, M. (2013) Bilingualism and Gesture. In T. K. Bhatia and W. C. Ritchie (eds) The Handbook of Bilingualism and Multilingualism 417–37. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.
Gullberg, M. (2014) Gestures and second language acquisition. In C. Müller, S. Ladewig, A. Cienki, E. Fricke, D. McNeill and S. Tessendorf (eds) Body – Language – Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction 1868–75. Berlin and Boston: Mouton de Gruyter.
Hilliard, A. (2020) The effects of teaching methods for raising ESL students’ awareness of gesture. Language Awareness 29: 1–20.
Holler, J. and Beattie, G. (2003) How iconic gestures and speech interact in the interpretation of meaning: are both aspects really integral to the process? Semiotica 146 (1/4): 81–116.
Hymes, D. H. (1972) On communicative competence. In J.B. Pride and J. Holmes (eds) Sociolinguistics. Selected Readings 269–93. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Inceoglu, S. (2015) Teacher gesture and lexical focus on form in foreign language classroom. Canadian Modern Language Review 71(2): 130–54.
Iizuka, T., Nakatsukasa, K. and Braver, A. (2020) The efficacy of gesture on second language pronunciation: an exploratory study of handclapping as a classroom instructional tool. Language Learning 70(4): 1054–90.
Kendon, A. (2004) Gesture: Visible Action as Utterance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kendon, A. (2017) Pragmatic functions of gestures. Some observations on the history of their study and their nature. Gesture 16(2): 157–75.
Kimura, D. and Kazik, N. (2017) Learning in-progress: on the role of gesture in micro-genetic development of L2 grammar. Gesture 16(1): 127–51.
Kita, S. (2009) Cross-cultural variation of speech-accompanying gesture: a review. Language and Cognitive Processes 24(2): 145–67.
Ladewig, S. H. (2011) Putting the cyclic gesture on a cognitive basis. CogniTextes, 6.
Ladewig, S. H. (2014) Recurrent gestures. In C. Müller, S. Ladewig, A. Cienki, E. Fricke, D. McNeill and J. Bressem (eds) Body – Language – Communication: An International Handbook on Multimodality in Human Interaction 1558–74. Berlin and Boston: Mouton de Gruyter.
Lantolf, J. (2000) Sociocultural Theory and Second Language Learning. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lantolf, J. (2010) Minding your hands: the function of gesture in L2 learning. In R. Batston (ed.) Sociocognitive Perspectives on Language Use and Language Learning 131–50. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lazaraton, A. (2004) Gesture and speech in the vocabulary explanations of one ESL teacher: a microanalytic inquiry. Language Learning 54(1): 79–117.
Leech, G. N. (1983) Principles of Pragmatics. London and New York: Longman.
Macedonia, M. (2014) Bringing back the body into the mind: gestures enhance word learning in foreign language. Frontiers in Psychology 5: 1467.
Macedonia, M. and Knösche, T. R. (2011) Body in mind: how gestures empower foreign language learning. Mind, Brain, and Education 5(4): 196–211.
Matsumoto, Y. and Dobs, A. M. (2017) Pedagogical gestures as interactional resources for teaching and learning tense and aspect in ESL grammar classroom. Language Learning 67(1): 7–42.
McCafferty, S. G. (1998) Nonverbal expression and L2 private speech. Applied Linguistics 19(1): 73–96.
McCafferty, S. G. and Stam, G. (eds) (2008) Gesture: Second Language Acquisition and Classroom Research. London: Routledge.
McNeill, D. (1992) Hand and Mind: What Gestures Reveal about Thought. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
McNeill, D. (ed.) (2000) Language and Gesture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
McNeill, D. (2005) Gesture and Thought. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Morris, D., Collett, P., Marsh, P. and O’Shaughnessy, M. (1979) Gestures, Their Origins and Distribution. NY: Stein and Day.
Muller, C. (2017) How recurrent gestures mean: conventionalized contexts-of-use and embodied motivation. Gesture 16(2): 277–304.
Nardotto-Peltier, I. and McCafferty, S. G. (2010) Gesture and identity in the teaching and learning of Italian. Mind, Culture, and Activity 17(4): 331–49.
Nathan, M. J., Yeo, A., Boncoddo, R., Hostetter, A. B. and Alibali, M. W. (2019) Teachers attitudes about gesture for learning and instruction. Gesture 18(1): 31–56.
Nuzzo, E. and Santoro, E. (2017) Apprendimento, insegnamento e uso di competenze pragmatiche in italiano L2/LS: la ricerca a partire dagli anni Duemila. EuroAmerican Journal of Applied Linguistics and Languages Special Issue 4 (2): 1–27.
Rosborough, A. (2014) Gesture, meaning-making, and embodiment: second language learning in an elementary classroom. Journal of Pedagogy 5(2): 227–50.
Salvato, G. (2011) The interpretation of emblematic gestures in L2 users of Italian. In V. Cook and B. Bassetti (eds) Language and Bilingual Cognition 385–405. Hove, UK: Psychology Press.
Salvato, G. (2015) Looking Beyond Words. Gestures in the Pedagogy of Second Languages in Multilingual Canada. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Salvato, G. (2020a) Awareness of the role of the body in the pedagogy of Italian in Canada and in Italy. Language Awareness 29(1): 78–95.
Salvato, G. (2020b) Promoting multimodal practices in multilingual classes of Italian in Canada and in Italy. Translation and Translanguaging in Multilingual Contexts 6(3): 282–311.
Schmidt, R. (1993) Consciousness, learning and interlanguage pragmatics. In G. Kasper and S. Blum-Kulka (eds) Interlanguage Pragmatics 43–57. NY: Oxford University Press.
Schmidt, R. (2001) Attention. In P. Robinson (ed.) Cognition and Second Language Instruction 3–32. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sime, D. (2006) What do learners make of teachers’ gestures in the language classroom? International Review of Applied Linguistics 44: 209–28.
Sime, D. (2008) Because of her gesture, it’s very easy to understand: learners’ perceptions of teachers’ gestures in the foreign language class. In S. G. McCafferty and G. Stam (eds) Gesture: Second Language Acquisition and Classroom Research 259–80. London: Routledge.
Smotrova, T. (2017) Making pronunciation visible: gesture in teaching pronunciation.TESOL 51(1): 59–89.
Smotrova, T. and Lantolf, J. P. (2013) The function of gesture in lexically focused L2 instructional conversations. The Modern Language Journal 97(2): 397–416.
Taguchi, N. (2011) Teaching pragmatics: trends and issues. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 31: 289–310.
Taguchi, N. (2015) Instructed pragmatics at a glance: where instructional studies were, are, and should be going. Language Teaching 48(1): 1–50.
Tellier, M. (2008) The effect of gestures on second language memorization by young children. Gesture 8(2): 219–35.
Tellier, M. (2013) Je gestualise, donc j’enseigne. La place du geste pédagogique en classe de langue. Québec Français 170: 62–3.
Tellier, M. (2016) Prendre son cours à bras le corps. De l’articulation des modalités kinésiques avec la parole. Recherches en Didactique des Langues et des Cultures 13(1): 1–23.
van Compernolle, R. A. and Williams, L. (2011) Thinking with your hands: speech and gesture activity during an L2 awareness raising task. Language Awareness 20(3): 203–19.
Wang, W. and Loewen, S. (2016) Nonverbal behavior and corrective feedback in nine ESL university-level classrooms. Language Teaching Research 20(4): 459–78.
Wehling, E. (2017) Discourse management gestures. Gesture 16(2): 245–76.
