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Abstract
This study investigates U.S. undergraduate students’ perceptions of international teaching assistants’ levels of accentedness, comprehensibility, and teaching ability and the impact of a virtual language partner program upon those perceptions. The virtual language partner program was formed under the most ideal conditions, which provided U.S. students and international teaching assistants a space to learn from and with each other while also investigating if these interactions impacted U.S. undergraduate students’ perceptions of international teaching assistants upon completion of the language partner program. This study draws on three primary theories and perspectives: Max Weber’s verstehen, Allport’s Contact Theory, and Blumer’s theory of Symbolic Interactionism. This mixed method’s study uses multiple types of data: pre- and post-semester rating results of international teaching assistants teaching in a classroom setting completed by U.S. undergraduate students, international teaching assistants’ and U.S. undergraduates’ recorded conversations over Zoom throughout the duration of a semester, and international teaching assistant and U.S. undergraduate Vlogs, which highlight their individual experiences and insights into the effectiveness of the language partner program.