This paper reports on a study conducted with university student-learners of Spanish and French. The inquiry explored student-learners’ self-perceived autonomy and approaches to the study of both languages. Although student-learners perceived themselves as autonomous, autonomy varied from one language to the other as a result of differences in academic cultures.
Autonomy in foreign/second language (L2) learning has raised a great deal of interest in L2 education in the last four decades. However, most of the literature available is in English and reports mostly on research conducted with learners of English. Other languages and their learners seem underrepresented in the mainstream literature. The literature available in Spanish on learners of L2 Spanish is not as vast as that of English. This paper reports on a study conducted with university student-learners of Spanish in the English-speaking Caribbean, specifically Trinidad and Tobago. The inquiry explores the self-perceived autonomy of a group of students of Spanish and French. The comparative nature of the study seeks to analyse if there are variations in the way students describe how they go about studying both languages and their constructed identities as learners of both languages. However, the main concentration of the study is on Spanish. This phenomenological study (Smith, Flowers, & Larkin, 2009) explores the lived experiences of six students who pursue a double major BA degree in Spanish and French. Participants were conveniently selected as their Spanish instructors identified in them qualities and attitudes of seemingly autonomous student-learners who take an active role in their L2 learning. Participants’ descriptions and self-assessment served to illustrate their autonomy as L2 learners, yet their autonomy varied in Spanish and in French. Academic culture emerged as a key notion to begin to understand the variation in approaches. The difference in the academic cultures and learning practices in Spanish and French surfaced as a factor that might have influenced the participants’ self-perceived autonomy and how they approached studying and practising each of the languages in the context of the inquiry. Reference Smith, J., Flowers, P., & Larkin, M. (2009). Interpretative phenomenological analysis: Theory, methods and research. London, UK: Sage Publications.
