Confirmation of candidature : Peter Foley

This research project seeks to further understand the contribution that exposure to audio-visual media in a second language can make towards comprehension and production in second language proficiency. Globally, this project comes at a time where proficiency in a second language is often a prerequisite to employment, career advancement and to gaining residency in a foreign country. It also comes at a time when many nations are trying to accommodate and assimilate refugees who speak other languages. This project provides insight into the feasibility of mobile or displaced people directing their own language learning without the expense of course materials, schools or travel abroad. This project contributes to multiple research areas including: first and second language learning theories and methods, the effects of delayed second language oral practice, the contributions of AV media to language learning and the methodological lenses of phenomenology, autoethnography and self-experimentation. 
This research project has been designed as a classical experiment, with the researcher as the test subject. Since language learning is a mental phenomenon, the researcher will utilise phenomenology to observe language learning processes as they appear to consciousness. Furthermore, through the methodological lens of autoethnography, the researcher will give a first person account of the experience of learning an unknown second language from AV media.