A functional analysis of translanguaging practices in engineering and literature courses in an English medium higher education context in Turkey

This thesis aims to explore and elucidate translanguaging practices in various academic courses taught at engineering and literature departments in Turkey. The key objectives of the study are to identify to what extent translanguaging is used in English literature and food engineering classes, what translanguaging practices are adopted during the delivery of content, determine the functions of translanguaging in these contexts and discuss the attitudes of students/lecturers towards the use of translanguaging in content-based courses. The required data was collected during the spring semester of 2018-2019 academic year at the departments of Food Engineering (Food Sciences (FS) programme) and Western Languages and Literatures (English Language and Literature (ELL) programme) of Gaziantep University (GAUN), a public university in southeast Turkey. It was obtained through audio recordings, a Likert-type questionnaire, face-to-face interviews and class observations. While the audio recordings provided the main part of the data, the other tools were used to complement the information gathered from the audio data. As the primary data source, a total of 14 (7 hours each) lesson hours (277 minutes in ELL, 278 minutes in FS classrooms) were audio-recorded, transcribed and studied to answer the research questions. Conversation analytic approach (CA) was adopted as a methodological framework to interpret translanguaging practices in the audio-recorded data. As a secondary source, the questionnaire results were handled, categorised and analysed in the SPSS (Version 21.0) software. A series of semi-structured interviews with students and lecturers were also used as complementary data, which comprised a total of 30 student (15 from each department) and 12 lecturer (six from each department) interviews. The questionnaires and interview questions assisted in crosschecking the data and thus ensuring the reliability and validity of the study. A final data collection tool was the non-participant observations in both departments, for which the classrooms were visited and observed for 44 lesson hours (21 hours in ELL, 23 hours in FS classrooms) These helped identify the patterns of translanguaging practices used by the lecturers and students as well as their attitudes towards these practices. The study concludes that translanguaging practices are ubiquitous in the academic setting. The lecturers from both departments use these practices to deliver the lesson content. The use of key terminology consistently in L2, the discussion of L2 resource in L1, reiteration, the use of addressee words in L2 and the adoption of L2 for non-existent words in L1 have been identified as common practices. These serve various pedagogical functions such as apprenticing students into the related science community, preventing misunderstanding, clarifying and negotiating meaning, discussing challenging topics and building rapport with students. However, the study reveals that there are some practices and functions peculiar to each academic field. The students studying English literature use language both as a means and an end. Yet, the engineering students use it chiefly as a means to master the course content introduced in L2 field-specific textbooks. The majority of classroom interaction leads ELL students and lecturers to use translanguaging practices for functions such as commenting, agreeing, disagreeing and persuading. However, FS students mostly consider L2 as a challenge and L1 as a panacea to the problems they experience in the face of academic tasks and responsibilities. Concerning the lecturer and student attitudes, the results show that FS lecturers hold a maximal position towards translanguaging practices in the class by prioritising English particularly for better job prospects. Nevertheless, the lecturers stress that it is vital for students to develop their content knowledge and linguistic skills. On the other hand, both ELL lecturers and students hold an optimal position regarding translanguaging. The lecturers claim it to be a context-sensitive practice, so some courses might require more frequent use of L1 during the delivery of the specific content. Accordingly, this study carries implications for different stakeholders in academia and encourages them to reconsider how translanguaging practices could be integrated into current curricula as an effective and essential learning and teaching tool in the content-based courses that are delivered in L2 at universities in Turkey and other countries.