Acquisition of Academic Literacy through CMC: Non-native Graduate Students in Applied Linguistics

Acquiring discipline specific academic literacy is a major challenge facing non-native English speaking students. Computer-mediated communication (CMC) offers new possibilities for scaffolding where students interact and negotiate meaning and thus represents a new pathway to academic literacy development. Yet limited research is conducted in this regard. This book examines how CMC influenced non-native students? acquisition of academic literacy in applied linguistics classes. CMC was built naturally into the classes where students kept online discussions on key concepts and assignments and participated in online peer review activities. Data gathered from multiple sources were analyzed using different methods and allowed data triangulation. The results indicated CMC facilitated both process and product of academic writing, yet cautions need to be taken for effective application of CMC. The analysis should help shed some light on the role of CMC on the acquisition of academic literacy and should be especially useful to professionals in the field of TESL/TEFL and Applied Linguistics, or anyone else who is interested in facilitating acquisition of academic literacy through CMC.