| Research on classroom interaction (classroom discourse) has predominantly been information-processing or cognitive in orientation, such as the representative model of Initiation—Response—Follow-up sequence (Sinclair and Coulthard,1975; Mehan,1979). Meanwhile a growing body of research acknowledges that the dimension of sociocultural or contextual factors also deserve careful consideration. Within the line of inquiry with an emphasis on sociocultural or contextual factors, research on the constitution of student identities in relation to development of talk in class has great potential to provide a new or wider perspective on the inherent problem of EFL classroom interaction. Informed by positioning theory of identity, this paper aims to explore the feasibility of positioning students based on cultural and regional identities as well as its effect on EFL classroom interaction in China.Based on the ethnography of communication (EC), which can be used to study the use of language related to social and cultural values, three second-year classes randomly chosen from a college were observed for an academic year. Interactions between a teacher and students were audio-recorded and semi-structured interviews were also conducted. Specifically this paper focused on and discursively analyzed three events of the teacher's positionings of his students from their somewhat different sociocultural backgrounds. The first extract was chosen in that a pair of students with far different English proficiency was involved in the discussion. The second one was concerned with a poor student who never voluntarily engaged in classroom activities. Then it was followed by the extract three on a student who was underachieving in the subject of English.It has been found in all three events that (1) unlike their counterparts in ESL contexts, the three EFL college students embraced the teacher's social positioning to assume cultural and regional identities in classes. (2) The three underachievers in their L2 learning all made voluntary and substantial contributions to in-class discussions. The first extract illustrates that in the presence of a top desk-mate, a student who had a poor command of English overcame the language barrier and engaged in the discussion related to regional positioning. The second one describes how a poor L2 student made an endeavor to challenge his English teacher's authority based on the cultural positioning. Then it is followed by Extract three in which a group of students were first guided to speak on a topic generally but then a student himself chose to refer to his ethnic background specifically. Furthermore it has been revealed by the COLT observation scheme (Allen, Fr?hlich, and Spada, 1984) that classroom interaction also tends to be intensified.It is argued that unlike in the ESL context, regional or cultural positioning of EFL students in the classroom is indeed possible. EFL students do not undergo L2 socialization and then their displays of their cultural or regional identities will not place them outside the mainstream of society. Besides, in the EFL contexts as vast and diverse as China, in addition to the usual situated identities (Zimmerman, 1998) in class: teacher and student, teachers can encourage students to position themselves reflexively (Davies and Harrém,1990) to assume cultural and regional identities, which can turn into the resources for students in classroom interaction and then can help to increase in-class participation. Furthermore, in the act of positioning, teachers should facilitate their students'longer exchanges with timely yet appropriate help.To sum up, this study offers a snapshot of how a teacher successfully linked students'regional or cultural identities to language learning in practice. The pedagogic practice and its implications call for much more attention in that much work has tended to downplay the potential of social identities in the field of second language acquisition research in China.
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