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Programme: accepted abstracts

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Abstract ID: 908

Part of Session 153: Working in the City (Other abstracts in this session)

Language mentoring and employment ideology: Internationally educated professionals in Canadian Cities

Authors: Kerekes, Julie Anne
Submitted by: Kerekes, Julie Anne (OISE/University of Toronto, Canada)

            The success rate of qualified internationally educated professionals (IEPs) seeking employment in Canada is significantly lower than that of their Canadian-born counterparts (Boyd & Schellenberg, 2007).  This discrepancy can be attributed, in small part, to the fact that some IEPs have weak English language skills; this problem is being addressed by newly initiated immigrant support programs, such as Enhanced Language Training offered by settlement agencies and Occupation-Specific Language Training offered by colleges.  Many other IEPs who fail to find adequate employment opportunities speak fluent English, however; their failure has more to do with miscommunication based on subtle, ideological and sociolinguistic nuances in communicative styles than with second language ability.  IEPro, the Internationally Educated Professionals Project, seeks to uncover areas of miscommunication that can be improved in order to benefit job seekers.

            With a theoretical grounding in sociolinguistic literature on language and identity (Buckingham, 2008), gatekeeping encounters and co-membership (Kerekes, 2006), this study, which is a part of IEPro, compares the cases of two internationally educated engineers (IEEs) seeking employment in Toronto.  They participated in 10 to 14 mentoring sessions designed by City Center for Newcomers[1], to help them to improve their employment prospects. Two of the IEPro researchers volunteered as mentors for these IEEs, and recorded the mentoring sessions (approximately 30 hours of recorded data) for the purpose of subsequent analysis.  The mentoring sessions included sociolinguistic interviews, English language tutoring, and lessons in employment-seeking strategies, including creating effective résumés, practicing job interview skills, and professional networking.  

            While both of the participants had learned English as a Foreign Language and immigrated to Toronto to seek better professional opportunities, their outlooks and outcomes in Canada were strikingly different across the following emergent themes:  their developing theories about Canadians and Canadian culture; their perceptions and reports of others’ perceptions regarding their work prospects; and the relationship between their language use, the discursive construction of their mentoring sessions, and their employment trajectories. Transcripts of the data also provided rich sources of language-learning data, enabling the researchers to analyze retention and application of language concepts addressed, sometimes repeatedly, over the course of the mentoring sessions.  These included features of English grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, and pragmatics.  This presentation considers the roles of not only language ability and professional background in job seekers’ experiences, but also how IEPs’ individual attitudes, circumstances, and their adaptation to Canadian life have influenced their varied employment trajectories.  Pedagogical implications as well as implications for employment policies and practices are considered.

 

References

 

Boyd, M, and Schellenberg, G. (2007). Re-accreditation and the Occupations of Immigrant Doctors and Engineers. Canadian Social Trends. Ottawa: Statistics Canada. http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/11-008-XIE/2007004/pdf/11-008-XIE200700410312.pdf. accessed 18 February 2008.

 

Buckingham, David. (2008). “Introducing Identity." Youth, Identity, and Digital Media. Edited by David Buckingham. The John D and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, p. 1–24.

 

Kerekes, J. A. (2006).  Winning an interviewer’s trust in a gatekeeping encounter.  Language in Society, 35 (1), 27-57.

[1]  This is a pseudonym for an immigrant settlement organization.