Creating opportunities and spaces for social interactions in online contexts: Academic discourse socialization of L2 international graduate students

Abstract

Addressing potential research paucity on L2 international graduate students’ academic discourse socialization in online contexts, this study investigated students in graduate programs in the United States. The study focused on how graduate students perceive the impacts of online learning on their academic discourse socialization experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic. Adopting a qualitative approach, four participants’ perceptions were investigated through semi-structured interviews. The findings reveal that while digital tools, including Zoom, created some spaces for academic discourse socialization for L2 international graduate students during the pandemic, the tools also disrupted their learning in some areas. Importantly, the lack of informal social interactions in online contexts affected graduate students’ learning and participation in their communities of practice. This study suggests that in addition to in-class Zoom interactions, informal interactions are important for L2 international graduate students’ academic discourse socialization in online contexts. Pedagogical implications on incorporating Zoom and other digital tools to facilitate academic discourse socialization in online contexts are provided.