“I’m Tired. You Clean and Cook.” Shifting Gender Identities and Second Language Socialization

437TESOL QUARTERLY Vol 38 No 3 Autumn 2004

ldquoIrsquom Tired You Clean and CookrdquoShifting Gender Identities andSecond Language SocializationDARYL GORDONTemple UniversityPhiladelphia Pennsylvania United States

Drawing on a multisite ethnographic study that spans educationaldomestic and workplace contexts in the United States and Laos thisarticle investigates the interplay between gender identity shifts andsecond language socialization documenting the process by whichworking-class Lao women and men redefine gender identities in theUnited States Lao women in the United States experience increasedopportunities for enacting their gender identities through expandedleadership roles and wage labor but Lao men experience a narrowingof opportunities because they have lost access to traditional sources ofpower Language learning both influences and is influenced by thesechanging identities The author considers the impact of gender identityshifts on access to second language resources with particular focus onworkplace and domestic language events as venues for second languagesocialization and discusses implications for ethnographic research ongendered second language socialization This study highlights the needfor ESL practitioners to investigate and address the complexity of theeveryday language events in which adult ESL learners are engaged andraises questions regarding how adult ESL classrooms can becomespaces for discussing interpreting and responding to gendered lives ina new land and a new language

Shifts in gendered cultural practices within the Lao-American commu-nity were a familiar topic in the ESL class I taught at the Lao

Assistance Center In a discussion about the gendered division ofhousehold tasks a female student remarked that in the United Stateswhen a Lao wife returns from a long day at the factory she might tell herhusband ldquoIrsquom tired You clean and cookrdquo She perceived this commentas customary in the United States but unthinkable within a Lao culturalcontext The tone of this conversation was light and humorous withlaughter from both male and female students The deeply divisive nature

438 TESOL QUARTERLY

of these changes in gendered cultural practice would become apparentto me later however when a male student described how he experiencedthem His wife now went out at night and had begun openly dating anAmerican-born coworker Although she told him that she was onlyfollowing the ldquoAmerican wayrdquo he mourned the loss of the relationshipthat he and his wife had in Laos and he was frustrated and bewilderedabout the conduct of Lao women in the United States He told me ldquoShesays shersquos independent Shersquos American now She can do what she wantsI say I donrsquot like thatrdquo

Sociological research on migration and gender (Foner 1998 1999Haddad amp Lam 1994 Zhou amp Nordquist 1994) has documentedsimilarly dramatic gender identity shifts within many immigrant andrefugee communities Pessarrsquos (1984) research with Dominican womenin the United States illustrates that the shift to wage labor has resulted inwomenrsquos greater autonomy and equality within the household (p 44)Kibriarsquos (1990) study demonstrates the effects of migration on genderidentity and power in Vietnamese-American communities revealing howthe relative economic resources of men and women have shifted in thefamily Because women in these communities earn money through wagelabor and menrsquos jobs are less stable and lower paid in the United Statesthan they were in Vietnam men cannot support the family with theirwages alone as they had in Vietnam Ui (1991) calls attention to theCambodian menrsquos loss of traditional gender roles in the United Statesdemonstrating that although many tasks traditionally performed bywomen such as housework and childcare have endured in a new settingCambodian men have lost many of the traditional status markers In theUnited States they own no land experience high rates of unemploy-ment and have no traditional leadership office to aspire to

Though one might expect such changes in gender identity to pro-foundly affect womenrsquos access to second language resources research inTESOL and sociolinguistics has paid little attention to this connectionIn fact many studies have underscored the limitations that womenencounter when accessing second language resources and they haveneglected the sociocultural changes that could expand immigrantwomenrsquos opportunities for second language socialization Rockhill (1993)offers a case in point In that study she documents how acquiringEnglish literacy becomes ldquocaught up in the power dynamic between menand womenrdquo (p 156) and threatens gendered cultural practices in aLatino immigrant community Rockhill shows that when women attemptto enter literacy classes men respond with violence and she exploreshow Latinarsquos ldquoconfinement to the domestic sphererdquo (p 166) limits theiropportunities to learn English Although Rockhill calls attention to thesocial context of acquiring literacy in English and highlights the chal-lenges faced by immigrant women the Latinas in her study seem to

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 439

experience none of the emancipation discussed in other accounts ofimmigrant women Tran and Nguyen (1994) conducted similar researchwithin the Southeast Asian refugee community and they echo Rockhillrsquosfinding that women often have few opportunities to learn English Theyshow that women are less invested in acquiring English because theirwork is centered in the home while men consider English necessary fortheir primary role as economic providers

Though they carefully document the social context of immigrantwomenrsquos second language literacy Rockhill (1993) and Tran and Nguyen(1994) neglect the dramatic changes in gender identity that the socio-logical research highlights Additionally these studies portray immigrantwomen inaccurately as oppressed and confined to the domestic sphereThis notion that immigrant women are oppressed became apparent tome when I mentioned my research topic to ESL teachers who re-sponded with stories of controlling husbands or boyfriends forcefullypreventing women from studying English Male violence and control dosometimes limit womenrsquos access to educational and linguistic resourcesand such distressing cases deserve both activist and scholarly attentionTESOL professionals should not assume however that these casesreflect the experience of all women hoping to acquire English Such anassumption erases immigrant womenrsquos agency by failing to acknowledgetheir role in changing modifying and choosing to accept traditionalgender identities in different contexts and by ignoring simultaneousshifts experienced by immigrant men (Bhachu 1993) Husbands oftenundergo dramatic identity shifts as their wives enter the wage labor forceor receive welfare benefits that change the balance of power in thefamily In addition to erasing immigrant womenrsquos agency the ESLteachersrsquo assumptions promote the inaccurate belief that immigrantwomen need English language skills only for domestic settings

The study reported here investigated the interplay between genderidentity shifts and second language socialization showing how Laowomen and men redefine and restructure gender identities in theUnited States and how language learning both influences and is influ-enced by these changing identities Watson-Gegeo (1988) suggests thatethnographic work in ESL has redefined language learning as languagesocialization rather than language acquisition This perspective impliesthat language is learned through social interaction and refocuses theresearcherrsquos attention not only on how discrete language skills areacquired but also on how the larger framework of identity and contextenables or limits access to second language resources

My analytical framework is founded on poststructuralist theory whichconceptualizes identity as multiply constructed contradictory and fluidand posits a mutually constitutive relationship between language andidentity (Hall 1996) This theoretical frame acknowledges that gender is

440 TESOL QUARTERLY

constructed along with other identity categories such as class race andlinguistic and cultural background (Eckert amp McConnell-Ginet 1992) Itherefore employ the term gender identity rather than the more staticgender role because it conveys the dynamic potential for identity to shiftaccording to context (Davies amp Harre 1990) This ethnographic study ofgender identity demonstrates that some Lao women have gained greatereconomic independence and decision-making power within the familythrough their access to wage labor and their knowledge of Americancultural attitudes laws and public benefits that allow them to leaveabusive or unsatisfactory marriages English language gives these womenaccess to information about American culture and available resources

METHODOLOGY

I entered the Lao community in 1994 when I conducted a family-school discussion group in Philadelphiarsquos Southeast Asian communityPha1 one of the two Lao women profiled in this article participated inthat discussion group After I assisted Pha with an English language taskshe invited me to her home and over baskets of steaming kau niau (stickyrice) and tam mak hung (green papaya salad) she told me stories abouther homeland and her dreams and disappointments in the UnitedStates Pha also introduced me to other Lao families which made me amore familiar presence in the Lao-American community My own femalegender identity also became a salient issue Because Lao culture frownson unrelated men and women socializing together my initial contactsthrough Pha were Lao women When I later taught classes at the LaoTemple and a Lao cultural organization my new identity as a teachermade it more acceptable for me to approach Lao men and talk withthem about their experiences in the United States

Formal data collection took place between 1997 and 2000 in an urbanworking-class Lao-American community and in Laos Ethnographic datacollection took place in five distinct phases During the first phase(November 1997ndashMay 1998) I observed and interviewed participants atthe Lao Temple a religious and cultural center in the Lao-Americancommunity During the second phase ( June 1998ndashAugust 1998) Iintensively studied Lao language and literacy at the Southeast AsianSummer Studies Institute Phase 3 (September 1998ndashMay 1999) involvedpractitioner research in an ESLcitizenship class for Lao adults Midwaythrough this course I selected five principal participants Identifying the

1 Names of persons and organizations are pseudonyms All quoted material is used withpermission of research participants

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 441

principal participants began Phase 4 (December 1998ndashSeptember 1999)during which I conducted focused participant observations and inter-views in the participantsrsquo homes workplaces and religious institutionsOver the next year the fifth phase (October 1999ndashOctober 2000) Iconducted research in Laos which allowed me to visit the families of twoof the principal participants and to learn more about the culturaldifferences between Laos and the United States I conducted audiotapedinterviews with research participants in English or with the assistance ofa bilingual Lao-English translator which I translated and transcribedmyself

These data collection methods provided a broad and wide-rangingdata corpus that enabled me to triangulate data sources The data corpuscontained 35 interview transcripts (15 from the initial interviews withLao community members and 20 interviews with principal participants)field notes from participant observation in the Lao Temple the ESLcitizenship class research in Laos and in the principal participantsrsquohomes workplaces and gathering places documents from the ESLcitizenship class including class lists lesson plans student informationsheets student writings needs assessments student progress notes andlanguage use sheets documents from the research sites includingTemple newsletters and mailings pamphlets and memos from theIndochinese Assistance Association and the Lao Assistance Center andletters received by principal participants from the welfare office utilitycompanies childrenrsquos schools and other institutions

I began the data analysis by searching the data corpus to identifyemergent themes and generate empirical assertions and analyticalcategories (Erickson 1986) Data were manually coded using coloredlabels A written record was kept for each analytic category noting thedates of field notes or interview transcripts along with a brief descriptionor comment on the event

BACKGROUND ON LAO MIGRATION

Lao refugees were among the nearly one million Southeast Asiansfrom Vietnam Cambodia and Laos who sought refuge in the UnitedStates after the Vietnam War ended in 1975 Because of its strategicborder with Vietnam Laos was bombed relentlessly by the United Statesbetween 1964 and 1973 The United States dropped a staggering2092900 tons of bombs on Laos during this period approximately two-thirds of a ton for every man woman and child in Laos (Tollefson 1989p 25) Bombing effectively destroyed village life in Laos The people fledtheir villages and the farms that had provided their livelihoods to seekrefuge in caves or the jungle (Evans 1998 Stuart-Fox 1997 Takaki

442 TESOL QUARTERLY

1989) During this period approximately 25 of the population becamerefugees within Laos (Savada 1994)

When the Pathet Lao took power after the war many Laotians left thecountry By the end of the refugee exodus in the 1990s approximately305000 Laotians more than 10 of the population had emigrated(Guttal 1993 p 3) The refugee exodus has three main waves The firstand second waves comprised highly educated elites from urban areaswho had often worked closely with the US military Third-wave refugeesthe focus of this study were the largest group These individuals camefrom rural areas they had little money and almost no formal education(Kelly 1986) Though all refugees experienced the trauma of leavingtheir homeland third-wave refugees experienced the greatest hardshipsbecause they were the least familiar with Western culture and their livesas subsistence farmers did not prepare them to live in the urban areaswhere they relocated Third-wave immigrants to the United Statescomprised several ethnic groups including the Hmong from thehighlands and the Lowland Lao the largest population in Laos Thisstudy focuses on the Lowland Lao whom I refer to as Lao

Third-wave refugees spent many years in Thai refugee camps beforeentering the United States The participants in this study spent between2 and 5 years in refugee camps Although both menrsquos and womenrsquosnormal lives were disrupted in the refugee camps menrsquos roles shiftedmost dramatically Womenrsquos traditional domestic labor continued in thecamps because children needed care food needed cooking and clothesneeded washing Lao men however who had been subsistence farmersor soldiers lacked any access to the traditional gender identities that hadprovided the framework for their lives (Hitchcox 1993)

When they entered the United States Lao refugees attempted toadjust to an urban landscape that differed radically from the ruralvillages and rice farms in Laos To complicate matters Lao refugeesentering Philadelphia encountered a grim labor market During the1970s Philadelphia had lost 119 of its jobs The manufacturing sectorwas hit hardest losing 75 of jobs between 1955 and 1975 Like manynortheastern cities Philadelphia lost most of its industry after WorldWar II and with the loss of industry went stable unionized jobs Laorefugees entering the city in the 1980s found employment mainly inmetalworking woodworking and garment production nonunion jobsthat pay piecework rates and provide no worker benefits (Goode 1994)

The tenuous nature of employment for most Lao refugees is reflectedby their income levels The median income for Lao households in 1990was $19671 well below both the national average and the average forimmigrant groups At that time more than 40 of Lao households fellbelow the poverty line and 44 of Lao households received publicassistance (Portes amp Rumbaut 1990)

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 443

PARTICIPANTS

This article focuses on two principal participants Pha and VisethWhen Pha entered the United States in 1986 she was 20 years old with ahusband and three young children Pha had received 6 years of formaleducation in her northern Lao village During the course of thisresearch Pha received public assistance Viseth was 21 when she enteredthe United States in 1982 and had received 2 years of formal educationin Laos She married a Lao man during her first year in the United Statesand later had two children Viseth worked full-time at Empire Foam afactory that is profiled later in this article

Both women were vibrant and active participants in the ESL class thatI taught at the Lao Assistance Center Pha who had greater Englishproficiency than her husband took responsibility for English interac-tions on behalf of their household Though Pha did not work outside thehome her interactions with social institutions related to care for herchildren and the household provided her with many opportunities toacquire natural English Viseth could speak and understand very littleEnglish and we communicated mostly in Lao Her husband tookresponsibility for tasks requiring English use because he was moreproficient Although Viseth worked full-time she worked alongsideother Lao immigrants and had few opportunities to acquire English

Several researchers (eg Goldstein 2001 Holmes 1993 amp Rockhill1993) have examined the workplace as a venue for acquiring Englishnaturalistically and have found that participating in the workforceaffords immigrant men more opportunities to acquire English than itdoes immigrant women In the working-class Lao-American communitythat I studied however neither men nor women reported a significantneed for English in their agricultural and nonunion factory jobs wheretheir coworkers are primarily other Southeast Asian refugees Domestictasks related to household maintenance and childrearing tasks morefrequently performed by women often required more contact withnative-English speakers and greater proficiency in spoken and writtenEnglish To discover the gendered opportunities for language socializa-tion I interviewed Lao women and men in Philadelphia and found thatthey experienced radically shifting gender identities when they arrived inthe United States I also observed how they used language in theworkplace and in the home These data show that gendered opportuni-ties for language socialization in this working-class Lao community differin fundamental ways from such opportunities in other immigrantgroups demonstrating the importance of closely examining secondlanguage use in specific communities of practice

444 TESOL QUARTERLY

SHIFTING GENDER IDENTITIES IN MIGRATION

Both men and women in this urban Lao community agreed thatgender identities have shifted dramatically As Lao women have acquiredEnglish and access to wage work they have gained greater economicindependence and authority in the family However although womenperceived their access to American gendered cultural practices asenabling them to enact less restrictive gender identities Lao menexperienced these same changes as a loss of authority Lao womenrsquosgrowing English proficiency further erodes male authority because itfacilitates womenrsquos interactions outside of the Lao community

In the following interview excerpt Pha talks about how material andcultural resources in the United States make Lao women ldquostrongerrdquo

D How do women change so much [in the United States] It doesnrsquotmake sense to me

Pha Um because in here is have police have friends have uh communi-ties help them about make the make the woman stronger

D Huh thatrsquos interestingPha But in Laos nothing to help them about make them stronger Only

tell her patient and patient you is a woman you is a mother You haveto patient You cannot do anything except patient But in here husband work donrsquot give me money I can work too The companieswant me to work too right

(Interview 42195)2

Here Pha clarifies how access to material resources affects womenrsquos livesand their ability to refuse the positioning of traditional gender identitiesShe mentions the importance of police referring to her previouscomment that Lao women learn that they can call the police if they arebeing beaten by their husbands or boyfriends a resource not available towomen in Laos She also stresses the importance of friends communi-ties and paid work that support women and ldquomake them strongerrdquoenabling them to make new choices about how they realize theiridentities as women in the United States

Pha also describes how Lao women have actively changed Laogendered cultural practices in the United States using their awareness ofAmerican law and their ability to leave a husband and support them-selves In the following quotation she describes that although Lao menin the United States wanted to continue the Lao practice of polygamy ortaking a ldquosecond wiferdquo Lao women introduced changes

2 Interviews were conducted in English When an interviewee experienced difficulty explain-ing a concept in English I occasionally translated into Lao for clarification or sought the aid ofa translator often an intervieweersquos friend or family member

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 445

Pha In heres um Laos Laos people is uh man right Man is uh theywant to do the same thing but the woman whorsquos live here long about2 3 years they know about Americansrsquo law And if husbands go outhave girlfriend or have second wife something like that and the wifersquosat home they know about husband do like that They impatient theygo out too They have boyfriend too If husband say get divorcedthey donrsquot care They get divorced

(Interview 42195)

Lao women in the United States resist the traditional practice ofpolygamy not only through their awareness of American laws but alsothrough US culturersquos less restrictive gender identities Pha suggests thatwomen might resist polygamy by having an extramarital affair or gettinga divorce options not easily available to women in Laos because of thetraditional economic and cultural constraints Although many Laowomen appreciated the expanded gender identities available to them inthe United States they expressed concern about the increasing divorcerates within their community

When Lao men addressed gender shifts in the United States they alsoattributed womenrsquos greater independence to womenrsquos wage labor andtheir access to American laws and cultural attitudes but Lao menexperienced this shift as a loss of authority within their families andcommunity In this interview with Nongsay and Sampeth two Lao menwho attended the Lao Temple they discuss how Lao families andespecially Lao women change after they have emigrated to the UnitedStates Nongsay begins by stating his perception of gender identities inLaos Women come second to men and wives should listen to theirhusbands However as these men explain and as they themselves haveexperienced Lao women in the United States begin to question theseidentities

Nongsay Girls gotta be second man be number one Whatever man saygirl gotta do Girl over there [in Laos] listen like a wife

Sampeth Thatrsquos why when they come here they say ldquoWhyrdquoNongsay ldquoWhy why I have to listen to husbandrdquo Whatever husband say

wife gotta listen and doSampeth Most of Lao people want their wife to stay homeNongsay Yeah like wife always raise the kids and cookSampeth But when they come here they complain a lotNongsay They come here they be like a bossSampeth Equality supposed to be like thatNongsay No they want to be on the top thatrsquos whySampeth [laughing] Women want to be topNongsay Yeah(Interview 53198)

446 TESOL QUARTERLY

As Nongsay and Sampeth discuss the changes that occur as Lao men andwomen transition to new identities they both emphasize menrsquos ability tocontrol womenrsquos actions in Laos and womenrsquos acceptance of that control(ldquogirl over there listenrdquo) Lao women in the United States resist thiscontrol and not only wish to be equal to men but want ldquoto be toprdquo or totake the position of control from men

English represents both the language of the United States and themedium for accessing US resources and institutions English is thelanguage Lao women might use to contact the police about an incidentof domestic violence or to learn about American laws The role thatEnglish plays in the gender identity shifts experienced in Lao familiesand the perception of English use by Lao men and women are importantto explore Womenrsquos acquisition of English is a complex process becauseit can erode menrsquos sense of their own authority and change genderidentities within the family

MAKING A LIVING

The workplace and domestic spheres in the United States offer Laowomen opportunities for second language socialization Lao womenrsquostransition to wage labor in the United States has rendered their contribu-tions to the family economy more visible and changed family decision-making practices Although womenrsquos labor in Laos was similarly essentialto the family economy their work planting rice seedlings hulling riceand tending kitchen gardens was traditionally considered part of thefamily income In the United States however Lao women receive incomeseparately from the family in the form of a paycheck or welfare benefitWomenrsquos access to wages either through welfare benefits or wage workchanges the gender roles within the Lao family as Pharsquos earlier com-ments demonstrate She describes how a womanrsquos access to materialresources influences the degree to which she can assert her influencewithin a marriage Women can leave an abusive marriage and resist thepractice of polygamy because they can support themselves independently

Though Lao women have traditionally engaged in domestic labor Laowomen in the United States often negotiate with social institutions onthe familyrsquos behalf as these data show and this advocacy represents anew context for these women In Laos especially in the rural areas menwould negotiate for the family with village and provincial authoritiesAlthough the workplace has been heralded as a key site for secondlanguage acquisition these data demonstrate that Lao women negotiat-ing domestic events must use more complex English more frequentlythan they do in the workplace

Most working-class Lao men and women compete for a fairly small

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 447

pool of jobs almost exclusively unskilled labor in warehouses factoriesand agriculture The blue-collar jobs available to this studyrsquos participantsdid not require workers to speak or write English Employers structuredthe jobs to obviate the need for English language skills thereby enablingthem to employ low-paid immigrant workers Employers of Lao refugeesnoted in interviews that they valued job traits such as dependabilityregular attendance punctuality and ability to perform a repetitive taskwith continued attention Lao men and women often worked alongsideother Southeast Asian refugees and Spanish-speaking immigrants and anumber of participants reported that they had learned Khmer Vietnam-ese or Spanish on the job to communicate with other workers Acquiringthese languages clearly indicates that they had limited contact withnative speakers of English and that they did not see learning English asa useful or acknowledged job skill For blue-collar Lao workers Englishproficiency was extraneous to their unskilled jobs but lack of it was abarrier to gaining better-paid employment

EMPIRE FOAM

Empire Foam a factory where Viseth a principal participant in myresearch worked for 4 years illustrates how superfluous English profi-ciency was in doing factory work Empire employs approximately 100workers about half are Spanish speakers from Puerto Rico and theDominican Republic and half are Lao workers but the workforce alsoincludes a few immigrant workers from other countries and a few native-English speakers The factory has capitalized on the workersrsquo nativelanguages by creating separate work environments for Spanish and Laospeakers Spanish speakers work on the upper floor and Lao speakerswork on the lower floor Each floor has a bilingual supervisor who alsoacts as a translator for the office staff exclusively US-born native-Englishspeakers and the factory line workers

Approximately 70 of the workers are women and 30 are men Menusually operate the forklifts and large machines that cut or punch outsponges or they do heavy lifting and transporting Although a fewwomen workers operate smaller machines most work separating newlycut sponges from a large piece of foam and packing them into boxesEmployees who operate machines are paid a higher wage and those whooperate larger more complicated machines received the highest wagesworkers who do heavy labor are also paid more than those who dopacking Because men generally operate the machines they are paidhigher wages women who almost without exception packed the boxesare shunted into lower paying jobs Factory supervisors clearly conceptu-alize the jobs as gendered

448 TESOL QUARTERLY

In the factory Spanish-speaking and Lao-speaking employees work ondifferent floors an arrangement that actively encourages and supportsnative language use The largest number of workers (exclusively women)separate individual sponges from the long pieces of foam They work atvery long tables Six to eight women stand facing each other across thetable This physical layout encourages social interaction When I partici-pated in one womenrsquos work group they spoke exclusively in Lao chattingabout family and events in the neighborhood and at the Lao Temple

When I interviewed Bill the floor supervisor he echoed my ownobservations that workers spoke only in their native languages Hedescribed the English proficiency of Lao workers as ldquoabout 10 to 20have good Englishrdquo (this group includes mostly second generationimmigrants) ldquo10 to 20 have okay English and the rest [their] Englishis pretty poorrdquo Workers who do not share the same language maycommunicate using gestures (eg gesturing or pointing to a box) orlimited English vocabulary focused on work needs (eg saying the oneword box) Bill also mentioned that a few Lao women had learned somevocabulary words in Spanish because they frequently interacted withSpanish speakers To communicate with a monolingual English-speakingsupervisor Lao speakers can easily find a bilingual translator When oneLao worker needed to communicate with her supervisor but was unableto express herself in English her son who also worked at Empiretranslated her message

From the employerrsquos perspective the work did not require Englishlanguage proficiency Although supervisors may have criticized workersfor their lack of English proficiency management did not see it as animportant issue Management seemed to conceptualize language diver-sity as a problem to be solved and once they found the right organization(eg native-speaking work groups) they did not consider it an impedi-ment to work

Work at this factory also required minimal English literacy skills Forthe groups of women filling boxes one woman in each six to eightperson crew must count the sponges record the number on the box andwrite her initials Because only one woman within a crew is responsiblefor this task a woman who cannot perform it can easily avoid it Thoughworkers do not need English literacy to work in the factory they do needit to access information on safety or workersrsquo rights information Safetysigns in Spanish and English were posted throughout the factory butthere were no signs in Lao Workersrsquo rights information in Spanish andEnglish was posted on a bulletin board but it was not translated for Laoworkers English is perhaps most useful for advocating for oneself in thefactory Viseth told me that she used her English skills to request a liftingbelt a wide leather belt that supports the back when doing heavy lifting

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 449

when she began having back pain from lifting large pieces of foam Shecommunicated her request to her employer who issued her a lifting belt

Empire Foam comprises a number of separate worlds one for native-English-speaking workers in the office one for bilingual or monolingualimmigrants one for Puerto Ricans and one for Lao one for women andone for men Neither male nor female immigrant workers at Empire hadaccess to naturalistic English acquisition and they had few opportunitiesfor advancement or promotion Female workers were particularly disad-vantaged because they earned the lowest salaries

Holmes (1993) Rockhill (1987 1993) and other researchers haveindicated that immigrant men have more opportunities to acquire asecond language through their everyday interactions in the workplacewhile immigrant women have fewer opportunities because they moreoften work in the home Goldstein (1995 2001) demonstrated thatPortuguese men entering Canada with some proficiency in English moreeasily obtained relatively high-paying jobs working with other Englishspeakers which helped them to acquire English naturally Portuguesewomen had fewer opportunities to acquire English naturally becausethey worked primarily with other monolingual Portuguese speakers Formembers of the working-class Lao community employed at EmpireFoam however access to English language socialization in the workplacewas limited for both female and male workers Instead domestic languageevents defined as interactions with social institutions connected to carefor children and the home emerged as the most frequent opportunityfor second language socialization

DOMESTIC LANGUAGE EVENTS

Pha took responsibility for English domestic language events onbehalf of her family including interacting with school personnel dealingwith bills and negotiating with the English-speaking landlord BecausePha did not work outside the home and took responsibility for childcareshe had more opportunities to speak English than her husband whoworked full-time at a clam processing plant with other Southeast Asianrefugees

Throughout the years that I knew Pha she most frequently usedEnglish in interactions involving her sonsrsquo welfare I accompanied her toa number of her sonrsquos court hearings and visits to her son at the youthdetention center where he was placed after having been convicted of acrime Pharsquos interactions in these situations required her to understandmany different varieties and registers of English For example going tocourt required her to talk with a lawyer to understand the intricacies of

450 TESOL QUARTERLY

her sonrsquos case to understand questions from the judge about the boyrsquoscharacter and attendance at school and to understand the frequentcourt delays in his case Communicating with the guards and visitors atthe youth detention center most of whom were African American andmany of whom spoke African-American Vernacular English requiredPha to understand a very different register

Pha and the other women were also more willing than men to ask anative-English speaker for help another important factor that contrib-uted to womenrsquos greater access to acquiring natural language Duringthis study Pha asked me to help her complete a task that was beyond herlevel of English proficiency Asking for help can threaten face so for aLao woman to request help may be more culturally appropriate than fora Lao man Guumlnthnerrsquos (1992) study of Chinese studentsrsquo Germanacquisition substantiates this notion Her study demonstrated that womenwere far more likely than men to ask native speakers for help on alanguage task to save face the men attempted to cope with theselanguage problems themselves For a Lao man to ask for help withlanguage in a domestic matter would suggest that he cannot handlefamily affairs independently Moreover those most readily available tohelp him such as ESL teachers or social workers would likely be womenand that would only increase the requestrsquos threat to face making himeven less likely to ask for assistance

Two domestic language events demonstrated Pharsquos responsibility forEnglish language interactions on behalf of her family The first is sellingthe family car which required Pha to receive phone calls and negotiatewith native-English speakers When Pharsquos husband decided to sell his carand posted an ad in the paper Pha who knows little about cars andcannot drive assumed the responsibility for receiving the many phonecalls in response to the ad because she was home during the day whileher husband worked To prepare for these calls she studied thevocabulary about cars that she might use by looking up the words in apicture dictionary

Although Pha had studied the vocabulary she had difficulty with theidioms and phrases necessary to communicate effectively and sell the carAfter class one evening she asked me whether she could use the phraseldquoWhat do you bidrdquo which I had used in class the previous week to beginnegotiating the price with a potential buyer When I explained that thisphrase would imply that the car did not have a set price she asked for alist of common phrases used in negotiation As we made a list includingldquoWhat are you asking for the carrdquo ldquoThe price is negotiablerdquo ldquoThe priceis not firmrdquo ldquoIrsquom willing to take a little off the pricerdquo I realized thedifficulty of this exchange and the extent to which it challenged herEnglish ability Pha had taken on this task not because of her Englishproficiency but because she did not work outside the home and was at

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 451

home during the day caring for her child Although she might havepreferred that her son or husband handle these calls their workobligations precluded them from doing so Hence Pharsquos presence athome did not limit her second language socialization but in factincreased it because she was the only person available during the day toperform English communication tasks

The second incident involved her efforts to retain the family apart-ment after the landlord declared bankruptcy In October 1998 Pha toldme that she had received a notice from her landlordrsquos lawyer that she didnot fully understand The letter notified her that her landlord haddeclared bankruptcy Because the family had a month-to-month leasethe landlordrsquos bankruptcy meant that they might have to move out withonly a monthrsquos notice Pha was worried about having to move becausethe rent was very inexpensive and her husband had done many repairs toimprove the apartment She had talked with the other tenants in herbuilding all Cambodian and Lao families who indicated that they wereplanning to vacate their apartments immediately Anticipating the needto move quickly Pha had spent many days searching for anotherapartment but found them all too expensive She asked me to contactthe landlordrsquos lawyer to inquire whether she and the other tenants couldstay in the apartment The following excerpt from my field notesdescribes the information I gathered in these calls

I called the lawyer and Community Legal Services to inquire about her rightsin this situation Then I called to tell Pha of my conversation with CommunityLegal Services and to tell her that I had found out that she may not need tomove at all and if she does she could petition the court for more time Italked with the landlordrsquos lawyer and found that a trustee had been appointedand he would soon be making an inspection of the house in order to assessthe propertyrsquos value After this assessment he would decide a course ofaction keep with present landlord sell it or abandon the property When Itold him that I was calling on behalf of a Lao family who didnrsquot speak Englishwell he said he understood that was true of all families in house and thatperhaps if they spoke more English they could have negotiated a longer leasewhich would have provided them with more protection in this situation(Gordon field notes 102798)

When I called Pha to tell her about these developments our conversa-tion demonstrated the complexity of the language necessary to conveythis information The situation required an understanding of complexsentences hypotheticals and specific vocabulary For example Pha haddifficulty understanding such complex sentences as ldquoThe person atCommunity Legal Services said you may not have to move and if you doyou could petition the court to stay longerrdquo and ldquoThe lawyer told me thatthe trustee will inspect the property and decide whether the landlord will

452 TESOL QUARTERLY

keep it the trustee will keep it or it will be abandonedrdquo The lawyerrsquoscomment that the families might have been able to negotiate a longerlease had they been able to speak English though perhaps accurateignores the complex demands of this language situation the time andeffort necessary for successful second language acquisition and the factthat a lease is an unfamiliar notion in rural Lao culture This incidentdemonstrates Pharsquos responsibility for dealing with this English languagetask as a result of her greater English proficiency her having the time todevote to this task and her willingness to ask for help from a native-English speaker This situation also indicates how the familyrsquos well-beingdepends on at least one family memberrsquos ability to communicate inEnglish or to obtain help from someone who can

The incidents involving selling the car and dealing with the bankruptlandlord demonstrate that some domestic tasks require English use andthat these tasks increased Pharsquos opportunity for second language social-ization These data contradict researchersrsquo assertions that womenrsquospresence in the home limits their ability to acquire English (Goldstein2001 Holmes 1993 Rockhill 1993) Pharsquos responsibility for tasks relatedto the domestic sphere required her to use much more complex Englishthan Visethrsquos interactions did at Empire Foam Though increasedopportunity for second language socialization may not directly lead togreater second language proficiency examination of interview excerptscollected during 2 years of interviewing and closely observing the twowomen indicate that Pharsquos language developed both syntactically andpragmatically while Visethrsquos language demonstrated little change Piercersquos(1995) work with immigrant women in Canada underscores the impor-tance of considering both the language learnerrsquos exposure to the targetlanguage and his or her investment in using these opportunities tocommunicate using the target language The findings reported in thisarticle suggest the need for further study into how shifts in genderidentity influence second language socialization especially for working-class immigrants and refugees groups that have received little attentionin the field of language and gender

CONCLUSION

The findings in this study have implications for research on genderedsecond language socialization within and outside ESL classrooms and ongendered topics and issues in ESL text and curriculum choices Secondlanguage acquisition research does not typically examine languageacquisition as a social phenomenon influenced by menrsquos and womenrsquosdifferent positions vis-agrave-vis social economic and political changes

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 453

Ethnography can augment research on learning a second language byproviding holistic and detailed descriptions of the gendered socialcontext

Closely exploring gendered language use in the home and theworkplace provided complementary data for each context Findingsshowed that domestic language events required more complex patternsof English use than the workplace did Investigating the home contextyielded insight into how English proficiency and English use altered thegender roles within families and how men and women perceived thesechanges Because identity is multiply constructed and fluid ethnographersand ESL practitioners need to investigate multiple contexts to gain aricher picture of second language socialization

Although this study focused on women the research also demon-strated that Lao refugee menrsquos gender identities shift dramaticallyduring migration Identity theorists have begun to investigate masculinityitself as a constructed identity category rather than as an accepted normagainst which to analyze femininity However few studies have exploredthe connections between masculine identity and language use andfurther research is needed in this area particularly concerning men ofdiverse ethnic backgrounds and socioeconomic levels (Pujolar i Cos1997 Teutsch-Dwyer 2001)

This study suggests that both researchers and ESL practitionersshould explore multiple language needs purposes contexts and topicsamong participants and language learners ESL textbooks do not com-monly cover the contexts in which this studyrsquos participants often re-quired English such as the legal system On the other hand ESLtextbooks commonly cover contexts in which the participants more oftencommunicated in their first language such as the workplace Thisdisconnect between language learnersrsquo actual goals and the goals thattextbook authors ascribe to them indicates that learnersrsquo goals need tobe assessed locally because these goals may differ between communitieswith differing socioeconomic backgrounds and bilingual support Thisstudyrsquos principal participants used English primarily to negotiate withinsocial institutions Pharsquos experience using English to negotiate a newapartment and guide her son through the court system indicate howcrucial these interactions are to a familyrsquos well-being The complexity ofthese interactions suggests that these agencies need to provide bilingualsupport The prevalence of these interactions indicates that ESL textsneed to address not only the interactionsrsquo language-learning aspect butalso to provide guidance for immigrants negotiating these complicatedand often confusing systems ESL textbooks (Wallerstein amp Auerbach1987 Weinstein-Shr 1992) and frameworks for curriculum development(Auerbach 1992 1995 Nash Cason Rhum McGrail amp Gomez-Sanford

454 TESOL QUARTERLY

1992 Weinstein 1999) which focus on participatory activities andproblem-posing methods are a resource for ESL practitioners who wishto center classroom activities on the lives of their learners

In addition to addressing the real language needs and purposes ofimmigrants the findings regarding the dramatic changes occurringwithin immigrant families and communities present a challenge to ESLteachers and administrators How can ESL classes become venues whereimmigrants and refugees can consider the shifts in gendered culturalpractices that they experience in their families and communitiesNorton (1997) discusses the tendency of many ESL teachers to perceivelearnersrsquo ethnic identity as predominant while ignoring the new culturalmilieursquos influence on their identity She writes ldquoWhereas immigrantlearnersrsquo experiences in their native country may be a significant part oftheir identity these experiences are constantly being mediated by theirexperiences in the new country across multiple sites in the homeworkplace and communityrdquo (p 413) As this study shows although Laotraditional gendered cultural practices are an important part of Laowomenrsquos identities so too are these womenrsquos active negotiation andcreation of identities through their experiences during migration and intheir workplaces homes and religious institutions in the United StatesMany ESL texts consider the experiences of new immigrants and maydiscuss reactions to new foods and new settings Yet ESL materials andclassroom practices often fail to address the deeply felt cultural adjust-ments that long-term immigrants experience ESL learners who attendclasses for many years after having come to the United States are oftenexperiencing cultural change on a very different level than those who arenewly arrived

This article has closely examined the interplay between secondlanguage socialization and shifts in gender identity within a specificcommunity of practice a group of working-class Lao refugee womenPrevious research in language and gender has demonstrated the impor-tance of investigating the local construction of gender identities ratherthan generalizing across communities and contexts Although one mustuse caution in extending the results of this research to other immigrantor refugee communities this study raises questions and possibilities forfuture research in other communities and ESL classrooms How do shiftsin gender identities create new opportunities for women and men toaccess second language resources How does second language socializa-tion affect the formation of gender identity How can ESL practitionersinvestigate cultural notions of masculinity and femininity in their class-rooms How can ESL learners document the process of shifting genderidentities that affects their families and communities I trust that futurestudies will investigate specific local forms of gender offering insightinto how second language socialization influences gender identities and

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 455

ideologies thereby contributing to ldquothe undoing of a single unified taleof language and genderrdquo(Bucholtz 1999 p viii)

THE AUTHOR

Daryl Gordon has worked with adult ESL learners since 1988 teaching in LaosMexico and the United States She is assistant director of Project SHINE at TempleUniversityrsquos Center for Intergenerational Learning and an adjunct professor inTemple Universityrsquos TESOL program She completed her doctoral work in educa-tional linguistics at the University of Pennsylvania

REFERENCES

Auerbach E (1992) Making meaning making change Participatory curriculum develop-ment for adult ESL literacy McHenry IL Delta Systems

Auerbach E (1995) From deficit to strength Changing perspectives on familyliteracy In G Weinstein-Shr amp E Quintero (Eds) Immigrant learners and theirfamilies (pp 63ndash76) Washington DC Center for Applied Linguistics

Auerbach E amp Wallerstein N (1987) ESL for action Problem posing at work ReadingMA Addison-Wesley

Bhachu P (1993) Identities constructed and reconstructed Representations ofAsian women in Britain In G Buijs (Ed) Migrant women Crossing boundaries andchanging identities (pp 99ndash117) Oxford England Berg

Bucholtz M (1999) Introduction In M Bucholtz A C Liang amp C A Sutton(Eds) Reinventing identities The gendered self in discourse New York OxfordUniversity Press

Davies B amp Harre R (1990) Positioning The discursive production of selvesJournal for the Theory of Social Behavior 20 43ndash63

Eckert P amp McConnell-Ginet S (1992) Think practically and look locallyLanguage and gender as community-based practice Annual Review of Anthropology21 461ndash490

Erickson F (1986) Qualitative methods in research on teaching In M C Wittrock(Ed) Handbook of research in teaching (3rd ed pp 77ndash195) New York Macmillan

Evans G (1998) The Politics of ritual and remembrance Lao since 1975 Chiang MaiThailand Silkworm Books

Foner N (1997) The immigrant family cultural legacies and cultural changesInternational Migration Review 31(4) 961ndash975

Foner N (1998) Benefits and burdens Immigrant women and work in New YorkCity Gender Issues 16(4) 5ndash40

Foner N (1999) Immigrant women and work in New York City then and nowJournal of American Ethnic History 18(3) 95ndash113

Goldstein T (1995) ldquoNobody is talking badrdquo Creating community and claimingpower on the production lines In M Bucholtz amp K Hall (Eds) Gender articulatedArrangements of language and the socially constructed self (pp 375ndash400) New YorkRoutledge

Goldstein T (1997) Two languages at work Bilingual life on the production floor NewYork Mouton de Gruyter

Goldstein T (2001) Researching womenrsquos language practices in multilingualworkplaces In A Pavlenko A Blackledge I Piller amp M Teutsch-Dwyer (Eds)Multilingualism second language learning and gender (pp 77ndash102) New YorkMouton de Gruyter

456 TESOL QUARTERLY

Goode J (1994) Polishing the rustbelt Immigrants enter a restructuring Philadel-phia In L Lamphere A Stepick amp G Grenier (Eds) Newcomers in the workplaceImmigrants and the restructuring of the US economy (pp 199ndash230) PhiladelphiaTemple University Press

Guumlnthner S (1992) The construction of gendered discourse in Chinese-Germaninteractions Discourse and Society 3 167ndash191

Haddad T amp Lam L (1994) The impact of migration on the sexual division offamily work A study of Italian immigrant couples Journal of Comparative FamilyStudies 25(2) 167ndash186

Hall S (1996) Who needs lsquoidentityrsquo In S Hall amp P du Gay (Eds) Questions ofcultural identity (pp 1ndash17) London Sage

Hitchcox L (1993) Vietnamese refugees in Hong Kong Behaviour and control InG Buijs (Ed) Migrant women Crossing boundaries and changing identities OxfordEngland Berg

Holmes J (1993) Immigrant women and language maintenance in AustraliaInternational Journal of Applied Linguistics 3(2) 159ndash179

Kelly G (1986) Southeast Asians in the United States In H Kim (Ed) Dictionary ofAsian-American history (pp 39ndash49) New York Greenwood

Kibria N (1990) Power patriarchy and gender conflict in the Vietnameseimmigrant community Gender amp Society 4(1) 9ndash24

Lave J amp Wenger E (1991) Situated learning Legitimate peripheral participationCambridge England Cambridge University Press

Nash A Cason A Rhum M McGrail L amp Gomez-Sanford R (1992) Talkingshop A curriculum sourcebook for participatory adult ESL McHenry IL Delta Systems

Norton B (1997) Language identity and the ownership of English TESOLQuarterly 31 409ndash429

Pavlenko A (2001) ldquoHow am I to become a woman in an American veinrdquoTransformations of gender performance in second language learning In A Pav-lenko A Blackledge I Piller M Teutsch-Dwyer (Eds) Multilingualism secondlanguage learning and gender (pp 133ndash174) New York Mouton de Gruyter

Pessar P (1984) The linkage between the household and workplace of Dominicanwomen in the US International Migration Review 18(4) 1188ndash1211

Pierce B N (1995) Social identity investment and language learning TESOLQuarterly 29 9ndash31

Portes A amp Rumbaut R (1990) Immigrant America A portrait Berkeley Universityof California Press

Pujolar i Cos J (1997) Masculinities in a multilingual setting In S Johnson amp U HMeinhof (Eds) Language and masculinity (pp 86ndash106) Cambridge MA Blackwell

Rockhill K (1987) Literacy as threatdesire Longing to be somebody In J Gaskellamp A McLauren (Eds) Women and education A Canadian perspective (pp 315ndash331)Calgary Canada Detselig

Rockhill K (1993) Gender language and the politics of literacy In B Street (Ed)Cross-cultural approaches to literacy (pp 156ndash175) Cambridge England CambridgeUniversity Press

Savada A M (1994) Laos A country study In Library of Congress Federal ResearchDivision Country Studies On-Line Available from httplcweb2locgovfrdcscshomehtml

Stuart-Fox M (1997) A history of Laos New York Cambridge University PressTakaki R (1989) Strangers from a different shore A history of Asian-Americans New York

PenguinTeutsch-Dwyer M (2001) (Re)constructing masculinity in a new linguistic reality In

A Pavlenko A Blackledge I Piller M Teutsch-Dwyer (Eds) Multilingualismsecond language learning and gender (pp 175ndash198) New York Mouton de Gruyter

GENDER IDENTITIES AND SECOND LANGUAGE SOCIALIZATION 457

Tollefson J (1989) Alien winds The reeducation of Americarsquos Indochinese refugees NewYork Praeger

Tran T amp Nguyen T (1994) Gender and satisfaction with the host society amongIndochinese refugees International Migration Review 28(2) 323ndash337

Ui S (1991) ldquoUnlikely heroesrdquo The evolution of female leadership in a Cambodianethnic enclave In M Buraway (Ed) Ethnography unbound Power and resistance inthe modern metropolis (pp 161ndash177) Berkeley University of California Press

Watson-Gegeo K (1988) Ethnography in ESL Defining the essentials TESOLQuarterly 22 575ndash592

Weinstein G (Ed) (1999) Learnersrsquo lives as curriculum Six journeys to immigrantliteracy McHenry IL Delta Systems

Weinstein-Shr G (1992) Stories to tell our children Boston Heinle amp HeinleZhou M amp Norquist R (1994) Work and its place in the lives of immigrant women

Garment workers in New York Cityrsquos Chinatown Applied Behavioral Science Review2 187ndash211