Putting Images into Second Language: Do They Survive in the Written Drafts?

Much has already been learned about what goes on in the minds of second language writers as they compose, yet, oddly enough, until recently little in the L2 research literature has addressed writing and mental imagery together. However, images and imaging (visual thinking) play a crucial role in perception (the basis of mental imagery), in turn, affecting language, thinking, and writing. Many theorists of mental imagery also agree that more than just language accounts for how we think and that imagery is at least as crucial as language. All of these demands, to be sure, are compounded for EFL students, which is why I investigate EFL students' writing process, focusing on the use of mental imagery and its relationship to the writing. First I speculate upon some ways that imagery influences EFL students' composing processes and products. Next, I want to explore how and whether the images in a writer's mind can be shaped effectively into a linear piece of written English in one's writing. I studied two university undergraduate EFL students, L and J. They had fairly advanced levels of English proficiency and exhibited high level of writing ability, as measured by TOEFL iBT Test. Each student wrote two comparison and contrast essays: one written under specified time limitations and the other written without the pressure of time. In order to investigate whether the amount of time in itself causes differences within an individual in imagery ability, the students were placed under strict time constraints for Topic 1. But for Topic 2, they were encouraged to take as much time as necessary to complete this essay. Immediately after completing their essays, I conducted face-to-face retrospective interviews with students to prompt them for information about the role of imagery as they write. Both L and J have spent more time on their second (untimed) essays. Without time constraint, they produced longer texts on untimed essay (149 vs. 170; 186 vs 284 words). However, despite a relatively long period of time spent writing an essay, these students neither described their images nor detailed them in their essays. Although their mental imagery generated an explosion of ideas for their writings, most visual thinking must merely be a means toward an end-pictures that writers spent in purchasing the right words or ideas.