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Shifting Paradigms of Language and 
Identities:  My Personal Journey of English 

Learning, Teaching and Researching 

By Huan Wang 
hwang45@student.gsu.edu 

Department of Middle and Secondary Education 
Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia 

A person’s identities are constantly changing in response to varied contexts 
where one is playing the role as an English learner, an English instructor, and a 
language researcher. With English being her non-native language, the author has 
experienced numerous challenges while being a learner attempting to explore 
her language identities, an English instructor trying to implement effective 
language teaching pedagogies, and a language investigator intending to conduct 
rigorous research to benefit next generations of English language learners. This 
article depicts the academic journey of an English language learner and how she 
has transformed from an English learner to an English instructor, and then a 
researcher and language variationist. The author also addresses how her 
language paradigms and identities have shifted during her years of experience.  

Keywords:  English language learner, identities, language paradigms, language 
varieties, language variationists 

 

                                                            Introduction 

My perspectives about language have been constantly changing through many 

years of learning, teaching and researching.  Chambers (2013) argues that 

“Language cannot exist without societies; language is quintessentially social”      

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mailto:hwang45@student.gsu.edu


(p. 1).  Due to the social aspects of language, English teaching, learning and 

researching are inevitably impacted by the social and political dynamics of the 

local context. Given this, my English learning and teaching experience in my home 

country where English is taught as a foreign language is very different from my 

experience of learning, studying English at a university in the United States where 

English is utilized as the primary language of teaching and communicating. In this 

paper, I share my previous experience of learning and teaching English in China, 

my home country, and my current experience of studying and doing research in 

English as my second language in the U.S. I will also address how my language 

paradigms and identities have shifted during these years of experience.   

Being an English Language Learner 

I started learning English in my middle school at the age of 14 before China’s 

Department of Education enacted the Full-time Compulsory Education Standard 

English Curriculum (Experimental Version) with coastal cities and a few developed 

areas offering English as one of the elementary school courses from first grade 

(Wang, 2012). Grammar translation method was one of the dominant English 

teaching methods back then. We learned English grammatical rules and practiced 

to translate phrases and sentences from Chinese to English. I had a difficult time 

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learning English at the beginning and would have quitted if it was not tested or 

the assessment result had not the power to decide whether or not I could go to a 

reputable high school. Honestly, I did not enjoy learning English for the first year 

but found the reward one year later because I received high grades and was 

labeled as “successful English language learner”. This label brought me priority 

and prestige, and boosted my confidence in the study of other content areas. I am 

aware of the political and power dynamics of English and its impact on my middle 

and high school life today since I have been putting on multiple lenses to perceive 

English and its social, cultural and political impact on various contexts. 

  In college, the power dynamics between English and me have shifted. I 

used to be a slave of English since it controlled my life and I had to spend so much 

time and energy to master it. However, in my college, I was eager to learn English 

since I was aware that successfully learning English would make a difference to 

my life. I believe that was an important reason I chose English as my major. Later I 

found what it brought to me was what we called opportunity – something 

excluded me from others but in a good way. I was selected as the only candidate 

to represent my university to compete in a provincial English speaking contest. 

Before I went to the contest, I had the opportunity to stay with foreign faculty 

and was given full-time intensive training by two excellent native English speakers 

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for two weeks. I was treated so special that it made me uneasy and even stressful. 

Even though I did not win the opportunity to proceed to the national competition, 

this experience brought me enough recognition and prestige in my department 

and even in the whole university.   

Being an English Instructor 

Three years later, my role transitioned from being an English learner to an 

English teacher who obtained the power of teaching the language. Therefore, I 

had to treat English differently. When I was preparing each lesson, I was precise in 

grammar and spelling because my identity of being an English language teacher 

pushed me to be accurate about the information I delivered to my students. At 

that time, every English teacher was required to teach “Standard English”. My 

understanding of “Standard” was “Standard” grammar and “Standard” 

pronunciation since these areas were constantly tested by the university as well 

as by the Board of Higher Education. I thought I would never achieve this political 

expectation because I could stick to the grammar book but I could not force my 

students to speak English the same way to make their English “Standard”.   

  As a teacher, I care about speaking because I believe that an important 

reason of learning a language is to freely talk to people who speak the language. 

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Although speaking naturally occurs to native speakers of the language, it is a 

challenge to speakers who are learning English as a second or foreign language. 

For this reason, I encouraged my students to participate in classroom discussions 

as well as in after-school English Corner where English was practiced orally. I was 

tolerable about students’ different pronunciations, intonations and dialect-

intermingled Englishes (some students speak their local Chinese dialects and this 

affects their English pronunciation). I would only correct them when their 

pronunciation and word stress caused misunderstanding. The philosophy 

underpinning my language paradigm was that I intended to allow “linguistic and 

social differences in communication” (Florio-Ruane & Morrell, 2011, p. 88) among 

students of diverse linguistic and social backgrounds (students from different 

areas bring their local culture and speak a distinctive local dialect). Jim Cummins 

(1981) asserts that “if the teacher consistently uses the standard form while 

accepting student utterances” in the non-standard, then “students will gradually 

shift to using the standard in the school context” (p. 35). The “Standard” Dr. 

Cummins mentions here sounds political and brings me questions such as “Whose 

Standard is it?” “What is the purpose of making one dialect Standard and others 

non-Standard?” “Shouldn’t variety of dialects be valued and treated equally?” As 

a non-native speaker of English, even after many years of learning, being 

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immersed in the English speaking environment and even being recognized in the 

English speaking contest, still, my English has an accent. Do I speak Standard 

English? Does that make a difference to my life and career if I do not?     

  In the second year of my teaching, I was nominated to be the coach of the 

University English Speech Team. My role shifted again from only teaching to the 

dual role of both teaching and coaching. There was more pressure and obligation; 

however, I felt I had more control over English to win honor for my students as 

well as for myself. During the intensive training two weeks before students 

participated in the competition, accurate pronunciation and fluent speaking were 

my norms of coaching. Even though it was hard to achieve the “Standard”, I 

guided my students toward this direction because from my experience of being a 

contestant, I was clear about what was expected: judges prefer fluent English 

either 100% British accent or 100% American accent with professional 

performance. Finally, we achieved success. Two of my students won the 

provincial English speaking contest and one was selected to compete in the 

national contest. When my students and I were awarded and had our photos 

taken by the media, I felt for the first time that I was the master of English and I 

had conquered it.  

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Being an English Researcher and Language Variationist 

Many years have passed; my language paradigms have shifted both 

consciously and unconsciously. After I became a doctoral student in the language 

and literacy program in a U.S. university, I realized that people speak English very 

differently and I sometimes had problems understanding different varieties of 

English. Gradually, I could understand much better than the time I first came. This 

is partly due to the language insights and knowledge I have gained from my 

language classes and partly because my attitude towards the varieties of English 

has changed. Now I call myself a language variationist because I am holding 

tightly to the perspective that there are varieties of languages and each variety 

should be equally perceived and treated because each language has a value and 

serves as a communication tool for a certain group of people. 

Even though the debate about “Standard English” is no longer a prominent 

topic in the current era, the “Standard” to me is like an invisible person who still 

holds the power and controls the society. This person is smart that he/she does 

not say anything such as “Your English is not standard but mine is”; instead, 

he/she only judges, fails or marginalizes people who do not speak like him or her. 

Thomas (1999) claims that “The development of a standard form of a language is 

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tied up with the development of a national and cultural identity” (p. 155). To 

apply it to English, which English or English varieties people speak could represent 

the national and cultural identities of people from a particular society. However, it 

is almost impossible to have one single English or English variety that identifies 

every person in a country or society because each individual uses English 

differently; their purposes of using it vary, and “how they perceive themselves, 

and what identity they want to project” (Wareing, 1999, p. 10) are different as 

well. In this regard, it seems that the identity of language is actually the identity of 

the people who speak that language. Wareing (1999) claims that “Who speaks 

which language (or which variety of a particular language) and the attitudes of 

people towards that language (or language variety), are further issues inherently 

connected to the concepts of power and society” (p. 10). In other words, some 

speakers are powerful enough to empower their language or language varieties; 

however, some speakers are not in a powerful position to authorize a prestigious 

identity to their language.  

As a critical language and literacy teacher, teacher educator, and 

researcher, I constantly remind myself to be neutral when perceiving language 

and its varieties since the attitude to certain languages is closely related to 

attitudes towards people who speak that language. In this sense, there is no 

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problem with the language because some languages have been passed from 

previous generations and are still alive even though they are only used by a small 

population. However, there is a problem of those who judge people by the way 

they speak their languages. Often times, their judgments are biased. Some 

language varieties may be difficult to be understood; however, if we have enough 

patience and make adequate efforts, we can do so successfully. This reminds me 

of the experience in the second year of my college, we requested that our oral 

English teacher from Australia to be replaced by another teacher from the United 

States. Unexpectedly, we had problems with the new teacher’s accent again. It 

was until one year later that I realized it took time to get used to people’s accents 

since everyone spoke differently even though they were all native English 

speakers. We as non-native speakers, should not only learn how to speak one 

language variety, but more importantly, taking English as an example, need to 

learn the differences among multiple English varieties and be prepared to 

understand and communicate with speakers of these different English varieties. 

Final Words 

As a language researcher of English, I perceive language as a system—a 

system of sounds, grammar and meaning (Wareing, 1999). When language is 

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used, variations occur since there is “scope for creativity and invention” (Wareing, 

1999, p. 10). While I am teaching English, one of my focuses is on how to 

encourage free language expression without judgment. We need to work on 

providing the space “where Standard English could be acquired while at the same 

time respecting and reinforcing the children’s pride in their own variety” (Van Lier 

& Corson, 1997, p. 237). In addition, we need to be aware that language is not 

isolated from the society; it is interdependent to the social, political and cultural 

aspects of the world. Moreover, judging people by the way they speak is 

dangerous since often times our judgments are biased due to the language 

concept we receive from the popular culture and media. Finally, a language 

researcher of English needs to be free from bias when exploring and studying the 

varieties of English in the language world.  

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References 

Chambers, J. K. (2013). Studying language variation: An informal epistemology. 

In J.K. Chambers, & P. Trudgill, (2nd ed.). The handbook of language  

variation and change (pp.   1-15). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. 

Cummins, J. (1981). The role of primary language development in promoting  

educational success for language minority students. In California State 

Department of Education (Ed.), Schooling and language minority students: 

A theoretical framework (pp. 3-49).   Los Angeles: Evaluation, Dissemination 

and Assessment Center California State University.  

Florio-Ruane, S., & Morrell, E. (2011).  Discourse analysis.  In N. Duke, &  

M. Mallate,  Literacy research methodologies (2nd ed.), (pp. 87-103). New 

York: Gilford Press. 

Thomas, L. (1999). The standard English debate. In L. Thomas, and S. Wareing,  

Language, society and power: An introduction, (pp.151 – 171). London: 

Routledge. 

Van Lier, L. & Corson, D. (Eds.). (1997). Encyclopedia of language and education,  

Volume 6:   Knowledge about language. Dordrecht: Netherlands. 

Wang, Q. M. (2012). China’s primary English teaching research and analysis in the 

past decade. English Teachers, 2, 63-67. 

Wareing, S. (1999). What is language and what does it do? In L. Thomas, &  

S. Wareing,  Language, society and power: An introduction, (pp.1 – 15). 

London: Routledge. 

 

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