A systemic functional perspective on native and non-native English speaking students' online discussion in a mixed-mode graduate seminar

In North America, computer-mediated communication is increasingly used as a means of communication for university courses generally involving both native English speaking (NES) and non-native English speaking (NNES) students. How do they participate in online interaction? How does their academic discourse develop during online interactions? Can a functional linguistic approach illuminate aspects of these questions overlooked by a more traditional linguistic approach? Adopting the systemic functional linguistics perspective, this exploratory qualitative study addresses these issues by examining the perspectives and experiences of fourteen graduate students (5 NNES focal participants and 9 NES students) participating in online discussion in a mixed-mode graduate seminar at a Canadian university.; Collected from a three-week summer course, the data for analysis mainly consisted of observations of face-to-face classroom discussions and online discussions, questionnaires, interviews, and online protocols. This study explored online discussion at multiple levels: the social practice level, the discourse level, and the sentence/clause level.; At the social practice level, the findings illustrated that online discussion, as a new social practice to the participants, was a very complex endeavor in a larger sociocultural context. The online participants brought to the online forum a wide range of backgrounds and experiences as well as varied voices and perspectives on this instructional innovation. At the discourse level, the study illustrated ongoing construction of online discourse and its complexities, dilemmas and negotiations. The results showed that the construction of an online register was a sociocultural linguistic process which involves education, culture, agency, and identity. Turning to the sentence/clause level, the findings illustrated an analysis of functional recasts in students' online interactions and addressed issues of advanced language development.; As the first systemic functional inquiry on online discussion by NES and NNES graduate students at multiple levels, this study points to the need for research in this area that follows a systemic functional perspective.