Teaching on Xiaohongshu: Analysing the Translanguaging Practice and Identity Construction of Non-Native English Teaching Vloggers

To cater to the growing need of accessible and flexible informal digital learning of English (IDLE) in China, an increasing number of non-native English teachers are taking on the role of vloggers to post short-form English teaching vlogs on online platforms (Zhang & Jiang, 2024). Unlike traditional classroom settings, these online environments allow teachers’ translanguaging practices to mobilize multilingual and multimodal resources (Li & García, 2022), challenging conventional notions of expertise and authority in education (Li, 2018). While teacher vloggers and their content enjoy considerable popularity, existing research exhibits notable gaps: there has been insufficient attention to non-native English teachers’ translanguaging practices as “designers” of video (Ho & Feng, 2022), nor to their own identity construction processes. Thus, there is a need to investigate how these teachers leverage translanguaging practices and construct their identities through vlogs beyond the traditional classroom. This study investigates how two non-native English teachers construct their identities through translanguaging practices in English teaching vlogs. Focusing on Xiaohongshu, a popular Chinese social platform, this study uses multimodal discourse analysis for the vlogs and qualitative content analysis for the comments. The findings present that the vloggers use various modes such as bilingual subtitles, emojis, real-world scenes, movie clips, gestures, music, and sound effects to mobilize multiple linguistic and semiotic resources. A range of identities were constructed through vloggers translanguaging practices such as language literacy expert, multicultural communicator, and learning partner. The findings also show that viewers generally comment positively on multimodal resources and identify the multiple identities of the vlogger. Based on the results, this study identifies the impact of translanguaging practices and identity construction in an online educational setting and explores the pedagogical implications of English teaching vlogs.