(Co)constructing use, belonging and legitimacy. A study of English language ownership in Italy

Abstract

The conviction that the ownership of English is shared among its users worldwide has long been held by linguists whose work has ushered in new paradigms in the ways of conceptualizing and researching language. Yet, research that explores how English users understand and construct ownership is lacking in many contexts. The present article aims to fill this gap by investigating the nature of language ownership among English learners in Naples, Italy. Drawing on the framework for language ownership delineated in Seilhamer (2015), questionnaire data and interview moments with four case study participants are analyzed to explore how high school students construct relationships with English and understandings of ownership in terms of prevalent usage, affective belonging, and legitimate knowledge. The findings unveil the dynamic ways in which understandings of language ownership, which is agentively (co)constructed and negotiated, are capable of continuously shifting in different settings and with different interlocutors.