• English Language & Literature Teaching
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.97-121
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• 2011

This study aims to examine how motivational constructs are interrelated with social, context-specific factors and, as a result, contribute to L2 writing achievement within the framework of self-determination theory. The data consisted of 67 Korean college students' questionnaire responses, final scores in an on-offline blended writing course, and qualitative interviews with 5 students. In the descriptive and the correlation analyses, the participants' extrinsic motivation was found higher than intrinsic motivation, with low amotivation. Among social factors, immersion environment, foreign instructor, and peer comparison marked high scores, whereas Korean instructor and online material gained low scores. Those contextual factors were interrelated with each other, such that the immersion factor correlated significantly with Korean instructor and peer comparison. Extrinsic and intrinsic motivational subscales engendered strong correlations with the high-scored social factors, i.e., immersion, foreign instructor, and peer comparison, which were also closely interrelated with L2 writing achievement. The findings illuminate intricate workings of motivation in its effects on L2 achievement and corroborate the roles of contextual factors. The effect of motivational subscales on achievement may be valid through interplay with some social factors. The dynamics of motivation is discussed for pedagogical applications.

• Journal of English Language & Literature
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.329-356
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• 2010

Coleridge's fame as a poet rests on the achievement of the mystery poems, "The Anceint Mariner," "Kubla Khan," and "Christabel." Coleridge's achievement in "Christabel" goes far beyond what previous critics have imagined. Coleridge is one of a handful of great writers who are included as representatives of androgyny. Throughout his life, Coleridge was accustomed to point out feminine qualities within himself. "Christabel" exemplifies the kind of writing contemporary feminist theories call l'écriture féminine. L'écriture féminine is not necessarily the creation of women but may rather be the works of those who refuse to identify with the father and the laws of paternal discourse. "Christabel" becomes Coleridge's most daring symbolic story. "Christabel" appears in its full significance as a vehicle for some profound insights into the dynamics of relationships between men and women, fathers and daughters. Through her deformity, Geraldine is actually the casualty of her father's hatred of women, and is the embodiment of all its anti-virtual aspects. The poem shows no bitterness against women, only compassion and remorse. Coleridge is sympathetically presenting Christabel's suffering as a woman at the hands of an overmastering man. Also, "Christabel" demonstrates woman power as well. In fact, the one person whose tales have any real effect within this narrative is the ambiguous Geraldine. Geraldine excels at story-telling, at making words act for her. Perhaps, despite the appearance of the surface, in which men hold all the cards, it is in fact women, or the feminine, so necessary to procreation and creativity, who hold sway here. This apparent dominion of the feminine derives at least partly from Coleridge's use of the conventions of that feminine genre, the Gothic romance. L'écriture féminine is a concept defined by its divergence from a dominant cultural norm. One may speculate that the fragmentary state of "Christabel" and "Kubla Khan" is in fact congruent with this mode of writing. If these poems imply a theoretical écriture féminine, they are by definition "incomplete," for completeness is a standard of patriarchal language and culture. More perplexing even than the other "mystery poems," "Christabel" is the true fragment of the three.