ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the various forms of presence that learners perceive and produce during screen-mediated exchanges in foreign language classes. It analyses videoconferencing sessions, which to date have received far less attention than asynchronous Culture exchanges. The effects of presence depend on multiple variables that can be grouped around three poles: the relationship between the user and the tool, the relationship between speakers, and the educational context. The chapter describes the screen as a mediator of human interaction, as described by Jewitt Carey and Teal Triggs, with examples illustrating users' perceptions of the screen as paradoxically both opaque and transparent. It focuses on educational exchanges via desktop videoconferencing (DVC) for collegiate learners of French and analyses various forms of presence that they experience, create, and manipulate. When learners participate in DVC, the educational context in which they operate brings together face-to-face and screen-mediated communication, generating complex forms of interpersonal presence.
