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This book explores the role of identity in adolescent foreign language learning to provide evidence that an identity-focused approach can make a difference to achievement in education. It uses both in-depth exploratory interviews with language learners and a cross-sectional survey to provide a unique glimpse into the identity dynamics that learners need to manage in their interaction with contradictory relational contexts (e.g. teacher vs. classmates; parents vs. friends), and that appear to impair their perceived competence and declared achievement in language learning. Furthermore, this work presents a new model of identity which incorporates several educational psychology theories (e.g. self-discrepancy, self-presentation, impression management), developmental theories of adolescence and principles of foreign language teaching and learning. This book gives rise to potentially policy-changing insights and will be of importance to those interested in the relationship between self, identity and language teaching and learning.

A critical reality of contemporary education in a globalised world is the growing cultural, racial and linguistic diversity in schools and the issues involved in educating increasing numbers of students who are still learning the dominant language. This poses extraordinary challenges for second and foreign language teachers in many countries, where such students must engage with the mainstream curriculum in a new language. What do these increasingly plurilingual and multicultural classrooms look like? And how do language teachers address the challenges of such diverse classrooms? This book brings together a group of well-recognised language education scholars who present their research in a range of international settings. They focus on the key areas of pedagogy, language policy and curriculum and exemplify new research directions in the field.