Similarities and Differences in Two Adult Learners’ Communicative Repertoires in Arabic as an Additional Language: A Study of Sociolinguistic and Contextual Alignment in the Saudi Hijazi Context

Abstract

Framed by the principal research question, “How do L2 learners of Arabic develop their communicative repertoire?”, this thesis investigated how two adult learners of Arabic as an additional language developed their communicative repertoires within the complex sociolinguistic environment of Arabic-speaking contexts, with a specific focus on the Hijazi Arabic context of Jeddah city in the Western territory of Saudi Arabia. I conceptualise second language learning as a socially embedded process, in which sociocultural and contextual features shape each communicative act, I used the Multiplicity framework of the communicative repertoire (Nicholas & Starks, 2014; 2019). Intersections between its four dimensions of Modes, Mediations, Varieties and Purposes offer a new way of understanding the flexibility of SLA processes. I examined the communicative resources learners noticed and selected during interactions and how they aligned and deployed these resources across varied sociocultural contexts.

The two case studies based on individual interviews and focus-group discussions, all in Arabic, revealed communicative repertoire development as a dynamic and individually-mediated process shaped by learners’ sociocultural awareness, access to interaction and recognition of sociolinguistic variation. Where one participant conformed to previous studies of adding dialectical varieties to the standard target language, the other actively resisted a standard orientation and, from the outset of her additional language acquisition, engaged actively with multiple varieties, including the standard language. The first case study was shaped by limited early opportunities for social negotiation and reduced exposure to varied Arabic-speaking contexts, delaying the recognition of sociolinguistic variation until later experiences in Jeddah. The second case study was distinguished by early, sustained and multimodal engagement with multiple Arabic varieties, facilitated by social friendships, digital interactions and lived experiences across diverse social settings. The findings have implications for SLA theorising and the pedagogy of multidialectal teaching and socially-anchored Arabic language learning.