A Small Lens on Timescales and Multimodality in Classroom Language Learning Emotions

Empirical work exploring additional language (L+) learning emotions has both proliferated and expanded its focus over the past 15 years. The current article explores one possibility for responding to the challenge of capturing and describing emotions in order to furnish a more contextualized, multidimensional picture of emotions in L+ learning: the small-lens approach. From the perspective of the author as a practitioner-researcher, this article draws on data from an L+ discussion activity. Via the activity, the practitioner-researcher identified an emotional outcome of interest and examined the historical buildup to this phenomenon. A narrative of the research process applied aims to illustrate the ways in which multimodal analysis and interrogation of psychological timescales might illuminate intersections between the social and individual. Rather than delineating a complete description of the research, the article strives to intimate possibilities and stimulate more nuanced, situated, and dynamic empirical work into the emergence of emotions in instructed L+ learning. While not the primary focus, some of the teleological (functional) aspects of emotions and emotional expression are also unearthed.