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The project “The informalisation of English language learning through the media: language input, learning outcomes and sociolinguistic attitudes from an Italian perspective” (2022-2025) probes Italian university students’ undetected and more private processes which are shaping English L2 informal learning and use.

                                                               

Owing to contemporary globalisation, multilingualism and media saturation, the availability of English in traditional and new media has increased at an unprecedented rate. No longer limited to institutional spaces, learning English as L2 naturally emerges from the user's involvement with mass media, web technologies and social interactions through behaviours not primarily aimed at language learning. At the same time, language attitudes towards English are changing because of growing informalisation of L2 learning and use. The project studies the degree, type and modality of media exposure, while engaging with the outcomes of informal language learning and learner-users’ beliefs and orientations to English as a native language, foreign language, second language and lingua franca.