Identity and Communication in a Lingua Franca

Identity and how it might affect L2 developments is one of the main discussions in SLA studies (e.g. Norton, 1995; 2000; 2013). Each year, many students go to universities abroad to enhance their life and educational experiences. Some of these students study at universities where English is the language of instruction, but it is not the main language of the host society. International students enrolled in such universities may face many challenges in their identity construction. On one hand, identity is highly influenced by the language (Mackinnon Heise, 2010); and on the other hand, these students may have challenges in their day to day communications with the host society. Because Identity plays a major role on the post-secondary students’ social and academic success (Rahimian, 2014b; 2015a); in this study we wanted to explore the underlying identity challenges of these students. Eleven Iranian international students enrolled at different universities in Malaysia were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. Different theoretical backgrounds informed the research including Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT) (Giles, 1973; Giles, Coupland, Coupland, 1991; West Turner, 2010), and second language identity development (e.g. Norton Peirce, 1995; Norton 2013) with respect to social identity theory (Mackinnon Heise, 2010). The results revealed that the participants’ identity development vary depending on many factors including contexts of accommodation and perceived intentions of the accommodators. Each emerging theme is discussed and explained in detail.