Abstract

A still-widespread perspective on “academic language” is that the most important dimension of language used for academic purposes is the extent to which its linguistic features contrast with “everyday language” used outside of school. But focusing on the unique linguistic features of written academic texts ignores the important role that other, more “everyday” forms of language plays in doing academic work and overlooks the intellectual work that students—especially those from linguistically marginalized backgrounds—are capable of doing using their existing linguistic resources. In this article, we (a language and literacy specialist collaborating with a history education expert) suggest that an alternative is to shift the focus away from what makes academic texts different from everyday language toward the nature of the “language of ideas” used to engage in disciplinary work, including (a) how the content, ideas, and practices at the heart of a discipline can be expressed in a variety of ways, (b) the participant structures and communicative tasks students are called upon to navigate to do academic work, and (c) the linguistic resources students bring to the table to engage in disciplinary learning opportunities—no matter how far from “academic” that language may initially sound.

摘要

关于“学术语言”的一个仍然广泛的观点是，用于学术目的的语言最重要的维度是其语言特征与校外使用的“日常语言”的对比程度。但是专注于书面学术文本的独特语言特征忽略了其他更“日常”的语言形式在学术工作中发挥的重要作用，并忽视了学生——尤其是那些来自语言边缘化背景的学生——能够使用的智力工作他们现有的语言资源。在本文中，