Construction of L1/L2 use in informal social networks: A study of learners of Japanese in Australia

• The participants who studied Japanese at an Australian university expanded their social networks with Japanese speakers during their first year of university.
• The same learners sometimes had difficulty constructing interactions in Japanese in these networks.
• This difficulty can be attributed to various factors, including the learners’ history as an L2 learner/user and some norms in the community where they were situated.
• The construction of L2 interactions also appears to be mediated by certain other factors, such as accommodated goals of interaction and specific discourse strategies.

This study examines opportunities for intermediate students of Japanese at an Australian university to use the language in their informal social networks. Through interviews as well as analysis of the students’ natural interactions, the study focuses on the major factors affecting the construction of these opportunities.The findings reveal that the students expanded their social networks with Japanese speakers during their first year of university. More importantly, the study indicates that the same students sometimes had difficulty constructing interactions in Japanese in these networks. This difficulty can be attributed to various factors, including the learners’ history as an L2 learner/user and some norms in the community where the learners were situated. However, the analysis of L1/L2 selection and its negotiation in their interactions demonstrates that the construction of L2 interactions also appears to be mediated by certain other factors, such as accommodated goals of interaction and specific discourse strategies.