Ph.D. Student
School of Education
August 1, 2008
Living and Studying in Taiwan and the U.S. Nurtured Yen-Lin Chou’s Interest in Computer-mediated Communication
Originally from Taiwan, Yen-Lin Chou obtained her B.A. degree in Business Administration at National Taipei University. She then completed her Master’s program in Teaching English as a Second Language at USC (University of Southern California). She currently is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Education at UC Irvine with Language, Literacy, and Technology as her specialization. Prior to entering the Ph.D. program, she taught English in Taiwan.
Yen-Lin has worked with UC Irvine Assistant Professor Dr. Rebecca W. Black on a first year project at UCI. Based on Yen-Lin’s cultural background, her first year project concentrates on investigating how Chinese immigrant students engage in participatory websites (e.g., Facebook). Particularly, her project explores how the use of Facebook influences college-level generation 1.5 Chinese immigrant students’ semiotic production and identity construction. As part of her research, Yen-Lin is studying the relationship between Facebook, the most popular networking site among youth, and immigrant students’ online literacies, social interactions, and cultural identity representations . In the future, she hopes to explore more about how computer-mediated communication (CMC) influences immigrant students’ semiotic production and how educators can integrate CMC into teaching.
Aside from studying, Yen-Lin also works as a GSR (Graduate Student Researcher) in the Department of Education at UCI during the summer. She is working on a project with Dr. Rebecca W. Black on how online communities affect young people’s civic engagement. Yen-Lin particularly appreciates that she has gained valuable experience in researching while studying and working at UCI.
Yen-Lin’s long-term goal is to enhance the practice of language education and integrate technology into teaching. She intends to contribute her expertise to the United States and her home country, Taiwan.