Spatial repertoire, translingual creativity, and identity in Chinese speakers’ online intercultural experience

ABSTRACT

This paper uncovers L1 Chinese speakers' online intercultural communication where they deploy English as a lingua franca and other spatial repertoires to co-construct translanguaging practices with their interlocutors and present three-fold identities - translingual, L1 Chinese, and legitimate users of English, leading to the argument that non-native English speakers and spatial repertoires play agentive roles in shaping English in the trends of globalisation and digitalisation.

本文揭示中文母语者在线上跨文化交流中以英语为通用语，调用空间资料，与对话者共构跨语实践，展现跨语者、中文者及合理使用英语者三重身份；从而指出非母语英语者和空间资料正能动地塑造全球化数字化趋势下的英语。

KEYWORDS:

• Spatial repertoire
• translingual creativity
• identity
• online intercultural communication
• translanguaging space

Acknowledgment

I want to thank Yang-Yu Wang for her assistance with the data collection and two anonymous reviewers for their help with this paper. I would also like to thank the participants for their invaluable contribution to this study. All and any errors are the responsibility of mine.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ying Wang

Ying Wang is Lecturer in Applied Linguistics and Global Englishes at Languages, Cultures and Linguistics, University of Southampton. She has published articles in the research areas of Global Englishes, language ideologies, identities, and language policy, with the focus on Chinese speakers and the Chinese context. She has published a monograph Language ideologies in the Chinese context: orientations to English as a lingua franca with De Gruyter Mouton. She has reviewed articles for journals such as World Englishes and Applied Linguistics.