Although the potential of translanguaging within ESL/EFL classroom contexts to promote students' linguistic learning has been well-documented, most studies have focused on ESL/EFL teachers (whose L1 is not English) and their students' ideologies and experiences, with little attention paid to the experiences and perspectives of native English teachers (NETs) working in the Global South and postcolonial areas. This study examined 11 native English teachers' engagement with translanguaging in Hong Kong TESOL classrooms. Data were gathered through in-depth semi-structured individual interviews and video recordings of classroom interactions. A recursive qualitative analysis elicited a taxonomy of NET teachers' engagement with translanguaging, comprising resistant, ambivalent, and reductionistic approaches. The findings also demonstrate that ambivalent engagement with translanguaging turned out to be adopted the most among the NET participants. The findings call for examining two new translanguaging forms through NET teachers who have worked under a linguistically policed discourse, i.e., the underground and disguised translanguaging, and multimodal translanguaging without involving students' L1. The findings indicate that multimodality can be used as a bridge to create a translanguaging space, and that creating a translanguaging space through multimodality appears to be more politically neutral for NET teachers. Copyright © 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston.

In this chapter, the author, educated and trained in the UK, shares his experience of teaching first language Chinese students in Hong Kong. There is little doubt that there are many talented students in Hong Kong, who are industrious and are driven towards their work. However, at the same time, students from local Hong Kong schools may also appear as quiet and introverted compared with their Western counterparts, and they tend to keep themselves to themselves. Although not unique to Hong Kong, it is not uncommon for a teacher to meet with total silence when raising a question or inviting comments in Hong Kong classrooms. However, this does not necessarily mean students are mentally disengaged but, rather, just being reluctant to speak out. Hence, the question is, why do Hong Kong students appear to be shy? Silence may not be golden in a classroom environment nowadays, where enquiry-based learning is becoming more accepted in Hong Kong international schools. Whereas, Hong Kong students from local schools are still being bounded by traditional Chinese classroom culture, in which the teacher would do most of the talking, while the students maintain their attentive nature and intensive learning required of them. This is further exacerbated by the lack of confidence some students have in their use of English. Foreign teachers wishing to teach in Hong Kong need to adapt their Western teaching model and have an appreciation of the differences of language structure and cultural backgrounds. Copyright © 2017 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.