Dongping Zheng is Associate Professor in the Department of Second Language Studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. Her research interests include (trans) languaging, ecolinguistics, virtual world/reality, and mobile-assisted place-based language learning. Her interdisciplinary research effort has been on creating distributed language learning environments to contextualize being and becoming with ecological niches. 

 

 

 

Michaela Nuesser is a PhD student at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa’s Second Language Studies Department. She received her Master of Education in German and English from RWTH Aachen University in Germany and a Master of Arts in German from the University of Alabama, both in 2019. Her interests are Ecolinguistics, Cognitive Linguistics, and Virtual Reality use in Language Teaching.

 

 

 

 

Jin Dong is a PhD student in the Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. She received her Master degree in Second Language Acquisition from Beijing Language and Culture University. Her research interests include (trans)languaging, Ecolinguistics, virtual world/reality, and game-assisted language learning.

 

 

 

Naiyi Xie Fincham is Assistant Faculty Specialist at the Center for Language & Technology (CLT) at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. Prior to joining the CLT as an Assistant Faculty, Naiyi worked as a full-time faculty for the Language Flagship Technology Innovation Center (Tech Center) from within the CLT. Naiyi has an extensive background in designing, developing, implementing, and evaluating online world language courses for learners with various academic levels and learning needs. Her research interests lie at the intersection of Second Language Studies, Technology-Enhanced Language Learning, and instructional technologies and design. Specifically, her work focuses on task-based language teaching in online and blended environments, and the affordances of technology-enhanced learning environments that support language learners’ metacognitive development.

Peiqi Huang is an MA student in the Department of Second Language Studies at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. She received her MA degree in Linguistics and Applied Linguistics in Ocean University of China in 2005. She has taught English as a foreign language in Ocean University of China for 15 years. Her interests include (trans)languaging, ecolinguistics, language education, second language acquisition and sociolinguistics.