Attitude as discourse element in a multicultural professional medium1
Attitude as discourse element in a multicultural professional medium1

Summary/Abstract: The present paper discusses a research in the area of language teaching focusing on cultural identities, attitudes which are embodied in discourses, where a discourse according to Merry “is not individual and idiosyncratic but part of a shared cultural world” (1990:110). Kramsch, Cain, and Murphy-Lejeune (1996) outlined historical reasons for discourse-based “culture as language and language as culture” pedagogy; therefore we need to search for those factors which could be responsible for the language learners’ attitudes towards learning languages other than their mother tongue. The mixture of cultural identities and attitudes as well as discourses is created as bilingual language learners’ second language meets their third language. Foucault reflects upon discourse as “systems of thoughts composed of ideas, attitudes, courses of action, beliefs and practices that systematically construct the subjects and the worlds of which they speak.” Discourse therefore is controlled by attitudes. In our case attitude is an assessing reaction of the language learner towards the process of learning a second or third language. In order to approach the issue of attitude and its possible role in (cultural) discourses we need to have a look on some factors involved: the relationship between formal (academic) and informal (non-academic) settings of second language learning, second language proficiency, variety and frequency of using the second language and anxiety. The paper presents the most important conclusions of a research based on 107 questionnaires, filled by students of the Babes-Bolyai University.

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