Making Literacy through Technology in Appropriating Languages to Context: An Iranian Experience

The process of learning another language is appropriating the language as one‟s own to mediate the thoughts and the world to the user. This paper addresses this concept through lived experiences of a teacher teaching at the tertiary level in Iran by making literacy alive within the dialogic process of learning and teaching with participants who are the university students of Alzahra University and another staff member who is one of the authors. The research narrative highlights the complementation of using another language utterance when using the English that is appropriated within the Iranian and Muslim context. This is observed within the vignettes of practice using visual media and Web2 tools like Edmodo in dialogic exchanges and course instruction. The authenticity of language use among the students is observable in their discussion of various topics as they appropriate the English for their own despite the linguistic errors which could be noted. This suggests that there is a need to further study the possibilities of making literacy in English for speakers of other languages who have different cultural and religious practices, especially for teachers of language.