Percepción y actitudes lingüísticas de los docentes de ELE/L2 en España y Australia hacia la variación intradialectal del español

Abstract

The main objective of this doctoral research is to fill the gap in the availability of studies dealing with the issue of language attitudes of L2 Spanish teachers towards diatopic variation in Spanish by using solid empirical data, given its powerful influence on teaching practice. Besides, we intend to establish how they understand such variation as well as specific theoretical concepts related to it, as there are many who claim a lack of academic training of L2 Spanish teachers. Additionally, we are also determined to unveil the dialectal maps existing in teachers’ mental scheme. Finally, we analyse the potential influence of three variables on teachers’ attitudes: L1 of the informant, the variety of Spanish spoken by the teacher and the language setting where the language is taught. We worked with a heterogeneous group of 58 teachers: 20 in Spain (all native speakers) and 38 in Australia. In the Australian context, mirroring the distribution of the population, we have divided the sample according to the following profiles: 12 teachers from Spain, 15 from Hispanic America and 11 non-native speakers. The methodological approach is eclectic since it combines direct (mental maps, questionnaires and interviews) and indirect methods (verbal guise) generally used in the fields of Perceptual Dialectology, Social Psychology and Sociolinguistics, and it also brings together empirical and ethnographic research methods. This combination has enabled us to gather both qualitative and quantitative data that have been statistically analysed with SPSS. This analysis has been used as a triangulation strategy to provide greater internal validity to our research, given the subjectivity of attitudes. The findings show that, in principle, L2 Spanish teachers do not show negative attitudes towards any of the dialectal varieties studied. However, in the status dimension, it is statistically proven that there is a social hierarchy where the notion of prestige or status perceived by teachers work as a salient factor in the study. Regarding the linguistic knowledge, even though in general it is quite objective, the persistence of certain stereotypes deeply rooted in teachers’ mind as a result of the ideology of the standard language and the popular theory of language has been revealed. Finally, out of the three variables, the variety of Spanish spoken by the teacher and the language setting reveal a greater statistical significance, particularly the latter.