Students' Use of Languaging in Rewriting Events from The Things They Carried

Abstract

This article describes high school students' responses to events in the novel, The Things They Carried, leading to their collaborative rewriting to create their own narrative versions of these events. It draws on "enactivist" theory of languaging, an approach to language that focuses on its use as social actions to enact and build relationships with others (Cowley, 2011;Linell, 2009). The focus is on "in-between" meanings constituted by "shared intentionality" (Di Paolo & De Jaegher, 2012) in readers' transactions with authors' portrayals of events in texts as well as in responding to uses of languaging in characters' interactions. Analysis of four students' rewriting events from the novel indicated that they drew on their responses to the novel to portray tensions in their characters' interactions as well as their ownexperiences of coping with these tensions. Students also benefitted from collaboratively creating their narratives through sharing their different perspectives on events in the texts, suggesting the value of using collaborative rewriting activities to enhance students' literary responses and awareness of how languaging functions to enact relationships.

Critical Perspectives on Linguistic Fixity and Fluidity

“…Languaging as a concept refers to the practice of using language to make meaning, and while the basic understandings of the concept within the two research strands are certainly compatible, the focal interests and the purposes of employing it differ. Languaging as it is used within educational research emphasises language use as a key mediational tool for meaning-making and learning in general (e.g., Beach 2017 ;Bloome & Beauchemin 2016 ). Within socio-and critical contact linguistics, the primary interest has been the ontological theorisation of the concept of language itself and the development of more precise descriptive terms for language use in linguistically diverse contexts (e.g., ).…”

Expanding Meaningfulness in Literacy Research: Possibilities of a Relational Perspective

“…Continuing with adolescent’s relational activity with and within text, Beach (2017a, 2017b) as well as Fjallstrom and Kokkola (2015) used the rewriting of fictional narratives to reposition readers concretely within texts, through voicing characters. These descriptive studies differ somewhat from Fecho (2013) and Wissman (2009, 2011) in that the purpose of composing was comprehension rather than relating to, and understanding, self and others.…”

Making sense of events in literature and life through collaboration

“…For example, Richard acquired narratives written by students in an 11 th -grade American literature class as they rewrote events from the novel The Things They Carried (O’Brien, 1990) (Beach, 2017a, 2017b). Students were assigned by their teacher to portray their own versions of these events based on translating O’Brien’s and characters’ languaging into their own languaging.…”

“…Teachers can also facilitate collaborative sensemaking through having students work in pairs to rewrite events in texts to create their own versions of these events (Beach, 2017a, 2017b). For example, teachers could have students entertain the possibility that Sunny in A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning (Snicket, 2007) is able to talk in certain events, and grapple with the significant consequences of her communication abilities on her relationships with others.…”

“…In this conceptual article, we continue to define sensemaking; explore ways in which English teachers can adopt alternative methods for helping their students make sense of not only of unfolding events in literature but also events in their own lives; and explore the implications of fostering sensemaking in one’s literacy classroom. To do so, we draw on examples of classroom discussions observed by Michelle (Falter, 2016) and written narratives acquired by Richard (Beach, 2017a, 2017b) as university researchers, and interactions experienced by Jennifer (Whitley, 2016) as a middle-school teacher. We want to highlight how a dialogical approach to pedagogy encourages, acknowledges and, in combination with sensemaking, enhances student engagement and understanding.…”