The concept of safe spaces is used to define spaces where individuals are comfortable taking risks (Holley & Steiner, 2005; Redmond, 2010). Previous studies in critical language education in Europe and in the United States have shown that participating in such safe spaces – those in which students feel comfortable enough to make mistakes, to share their personal experiences and to question their teachers and peers – can facilitate legitimating experiences for them in their second language (Ashtari, 2023; Pazos, 2023). Such experiences may then lead to lower foreign language anxiety (Dryden & al., 2021; Galmiche, 2014; Horwitz & al., 1986). To date, research lacks on linguistic safe spaces in the context of French as a second language education in Canada. Our goal, then, is to show how a French immersion program, the Groupe-pont, offered at a French-language university in New Brunswick, Canada, can provide a linguistic safe space. We conducted ten semi-directed interviews with five Anglophone participants in this program. Using thematic analysis (Paillé & Mucchielli, 2021) we investigated five Groupe-pont students’ descriptions of the program’s empowering practices for their practice of French on campus. The participants consider the Groupe-pont a community which provides legitimating experiences in French, including opportunities to ask questions about their second language in spaces where they do not “sound stupid” in front of “real” Francophones. We conclude by suggesting practices, such as peer mentoring, that can be implemented in other language programs to reduce foreign language anxiety and to promote linguistic risk-taking (Rhéaume & al., 2021).

Authors:
Shayna-Eve Hébert, Université de Moncton, Canada

About the Presenter(s)
Ms Shayna-Eve Hébert is a University Doctoral Student at Université de Moncton in Canada

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