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Laura Callahan, The City College of the City University of New York
SUMMARY
This is the paperback edition of a book first published in 2007. It contains
seven chapters, references, and an index. Notes are placed at the end of the
chapter in which they appear.
Chapter 1: Introduction.
Here the author situates identity as it is to be examined in this book,
beginning with a brief acknowledgement of popular perspectives on the concept.
With respect to second language learning (hereafter SLL), he quotes Norton
(1995: 12), who states that ''SLA theorists have not developed a comprehensive
theory of social identity that integrates the language learner and the language
learning context'' (p.1); Block notes that much work in identity has been done
since the 1990s. He next provides a brief overview of its theoretical trajectory
in various social sciences disciplines, from which the field of applied
linguistics has borrowed as identity has grown in interest for SLL researchers.
Block maintains that ''[t]he rise of identity in SLL has [...] been a question of
catching up with developments in other social sciences'' (p. 2). He provides
several references of work on the history of identity, from the Western European
enlightenment to the postmodern age. Finally, he summarizes the content of the
remaining chapters, and also anticipates questions readers might raise about
this volume's scope.
Chapter 2: Identity in the social sciences today.
Block examines the poststructuralist view of identity, with a comprehensive
overview of significant work from the past 20 years, as well as its foundations
from earlier decades. Concepts elucidated include subjectivity, discursive
construction and discourse; performativity and presentation of self;
positioning; ambivalence and hybridity; communities of practice; and power and
recognition. He then contemplates the seven most common angles from which
identity has been examined: race and ethnicity (considered in combination here
to reflect their frequent, if erroneous, conflation), national identity, migrant
identity, gender identity, social class identity, and language identity. He
cites authors who have objected to an over-reliance on the construct of
individual agency (e.g. May 2001), and ultimately demonstrates that the
progression from essentialist to poststructuralist and social constructivist
views can be seen as a building onto rather than a full scale replacement of one
school by another.