“Survival of the fittest”: Language attitudes in a German classroom

This case study describes the language attitudes of seven high school senior students in a suburban U.S. American German foreign language (FL) classroom and how they might impact one Latina student’s language use and identity construction. Ethnographic methods (classroom observations, interviews, collection of documents) were used to answer the following research questions: (a) What language attitudes do the students of one German FL classroom express? (b) How might these language attitudes shape one Spanish speaking Latina student’s language use and identity construction? Findings suggest that most of the students’ language attitudes were characterized by stereotypes, xenophobia and populist ideologies. Additionally, the focal student “Karla” positioned herself as a compliant and hard-working student who strives for academic success and social assimilation. She has banned her first language (L1) Spanish almost completely from the school context and sacrificed her Mexican identity in order to assimilate to her peers. Only in the German FL classroom she has found ways to activate her L1 by using positive transfer of vocabulary and language structures. Implications for teachers and teacher educators are discussed, e.g. the importance of addressing social issues and language attitudes from critical perspectives in FL classrooms.