ABSTRACT
This chapter involves an examination of the power structures and identity constructs that get named, produced, and reproduced when English is acquired and when local languages are acquired in juxtaposition to English. It focuses on a larger study involving ninth-grade English-language learners in three secular state-run schools in Jerusalem, such as monolingual majority school, monolingual minority school, and bilingual minority-majority school. The chapter explains markers of identity construction articulated by English learners, including some of the meanings learners ascribed to issues related to language, power, and identity. The markers participants ascribed to English increasingly bear resemblance to constructs associated with English as an international language (EIL). The English also marked political alliances, in particular those associated with the United States. When connected to the United States, English and its speakers became allies with Israel and the Israeli enterprise. The construction of new, other, or additional identity markers constitutes an outcome of language learning.
