ABSTRACT
Contemporary understandings of multilingualism and second language learning have led to a new paradigm (The Douglas Fir Group 2016) that presents a major challenge to current language teaching practice. The shift in orientation from communicative to intercultural and symbolic competence has reframed and expanded the goals of language teaching and learning (Leung and Scarino 2016) . The revised goals include developing learners’ meta-understandings of language and culture, helping them to make sense of the experience of intercultural communication, and nurturing their abilities as bi-(multi-)lingual language learners and communicators.
An intercultural orientation invites language teachers to reconsider their conceptual understandings and pedagogical stance towards all aspects of classroom practice. It involves rethinking the role of language teacher to that of mediator, and developing teachers’ self-awareness of how they can mediate possibilities of being by modeling their own identities as multilingual and intercultural actors. This orientation requires engaging with aspects such as subjectivity, affect, values, and ideology, which for many teachers is unfamiliar and uncomfortable territory.
This chapter traces key developments in classroom focused research and considers the consequent issues and questions. The discussion outlines implications and recommendations for research and practice, concluding that there is mutual benefit in a dialogic and reciprocal approach, itself reflecting an intercultural orientation.
