Constructing Identities In Academic Advising Interaction: An Adaptationist Account

The present study, by adopting an adaptationist approach, probes into the expert advice-givers'identity construction in their academic advising interaction. Based on 395 advising sequences extracted from five PhD dissertation proposal presentation meetings in a Chinese context, this study provides a detailed analysis of the advice-givers'identity construction from four dimensions:(1) identity construction as a means of satisfying communicative needs; (2) identity construction as a process of making choices; (3) identity construction as a dynamic process; (4) identity construction as an adaptation to contextual correlates. The analysis yields the following findings:Firstly, expert advice-givers (i.e., the committee members of a PhD dissertation proposal presentation meeting) tend to construct two categories of identity:their default identity of an expert and deviational (or variational) identities. The default identities are the expected ones in certain communities of practice, while deviational identities are less expected or not expected at all in a specific institutional interaction. Moreover, the default expert identity is often dynamically modified to be more specific by making salient different aspects of an expert, thus constructing the identity of a knowledgeable expert, an authoritative expert, a modest expert and an amiable expert. The deviational identities mainly include the identities of a teacher, a researcher, a virtual advice-receiver and a layperson. All of these identities are constructed through making various linguistic choices, which can be summarized as linguistic forms, discourse contents and discourse styles.Secondly, the dynamics of the advice-givers' identity construction, unfolded in the temporal dimension of the advice-giving activity, can be displayed in two ways. One is the identity modification, which means that advice-givers may dynamically modify their default expert identity through the making of various linguistic choices. The other is the identity shift, which means that advice-givers may make a shift from the construction of one identity to another. The identity shifts can be further divided into three categories:(1) the shift of identities may happen with a clear sequential order in an advising sequence; (2) advice-givers may alternately construct the identities of an expert and a virtual advice-receiver as well as the identities of an expert and a collegial researcher in the sequence of advising performance; (3) advice-givers may construct two identities with the construction of one embedded within the construction of another.Thirdly, the variability of identities and the dynamics of expert advice-givers' identity construction in academic advising interaction are motivated by their communicative needs. These needs could be divided into two types:one is the primary communicative need of effectively performing advising acts, while the other is the secondary communicative need of building rapport. To satisfy these needs, identity construction needs to adapt to various contextual correlates in the social world, the mental world and the physical world of academic advising interaction. One identity may be constructed to adapt to more than one contextual correlate, but only one of them is usually made salient for the current need. Moreover, identity construction and contextual correlates are interadaptable through the making of linguistic choices, to satisfy communicative needs.This study, by providing a detailed description and interpretation of identity construction in academic advising interaction, has the following implications.From a theoretical perspective, this study could promote the understanding of identity and its construction, particularly the characteristics and motivations of deviational identity construction and identity modification and shift. It could also contribute to the understanding of the interrelationship between advising and identity construction. Moreover, the present study provides evidence that the Face Theory, the Politeness Principle, the notion of Community of Practice and some theories related to identity construction can be integrated into the Linguistic Adaptation Theory, serving as specific modules in analyzing discursive identity construction.Pedagogically, the findings of this study could help advice-givers to strategically construct possible identities to perform advising acts effectively and to create and maintain a harmonious communicative environment. The identities constructed by the experts and the linguistic choices for their construction could also benefit the PhD students in their own identity construction in the future in communities of practice similar to this one.Methodologically, the discourse-analytic method adopted in this study could be used to examine identity construction in other institutional interactions by focusing on linguistic forms, discourse contents and discourse styles. The method used to identify and extract advising acts could also provide a referential model for the study of advising in institutional interactions and in interlanguage and cross-cultural pragmatics.