Week 12

The world is undoubtedly being influenced by globalization, whether it be in a positive or negative way, as was explained in Chapter 1 and 2 by Mc-Kay and Bokohrst-Heng. It is making it much easier for information to be shared and for more cultural and linguistic exchange, which has an enormous effect on the usage of English. English is now a worldwide language, being used in various social contexts, which Kachru presented as the Inner Circle, Outer Circle, and Expanding Circle. Is English being learned because it is needed in day-to-day life, or to succeed in formal and educational settings, or because of the pressures of globalization? These three learning contexts influence how language learners approach English and it can affect their motivation and even alter their social identity.

I found the alchemy of English to be a fascinating concept discussed in Chapter 1, which asserts that knowing English is like possessing Aladdin's lamp and it holds the dreams of linguistic knowledge and personal success. Many believe that investing in English provides power, which is why it continues to be such a global language, but to what extent is this good or bad? I do not believe it necessarily grants power and it makes English seem more superior to the many other languages of the world. I truly think it is important for ESL/EFL teachers to consider how their students view English and remember to incorporate their cultural values and languages into the curriculum, instead of placing full importance on English. As a native speaker of English, I cannot imagine putting so much faith in a language to bring success; but this belief has led to English being spoken by more second language speakers than native speakers. That is truly a sign of the impacts of factors such as colonialism and globalization on English.

Chapter 2 explained the many programs designed to teach English in the Inner Circle, Outer Circle, and Expanding Circle, which made me question which program would be the best. I was left feeling confused on how this should be approached because of the diversity of the three contexts and of course, there are always individual student differences. However, I do believe that when designing these educational programs, it is always important to consider the relationship between ethnicity and language support. I personally do not think a program should force students to fully assimilate themselves and lose their cultural identity, but it should be a balanced mixture between English learning and maintaining or adjusting cultural identity. I am confident that there will be more research in the TESOL field that will provide us with better ways to address the impacts of globalization on English teaching.

The Kubota article discussed the discourse of kokusaika (internalization), which tries to balance the tense promotion of English and nationalism. However, it pushes aside the local linguistic and cultural diversity. It has led to four premises for foreign language education: English is the foreign language, the model for English should be standard North American or British varieties, learning English leads to intercultural understanding, and national identity is fostered through English. I thought these were very pushing towards English and did not effectively promote other cultures or languages, which is always important.

Week 11: Race, language, identity

While reading “Becoming Black” by Ibrahim, I learned more about how students identify with cultural and linguistic influences and how that affects their learning. One quote I found very interesting was,  “Because language is never neutral, learning it cannot and should not be either.” We have discussed about the many diverse students and languages we will have in our classrooms, which implies that we need to teach to these differences. Ibrahim’s proposal is that rap, hip-hop and Black popular culture in general are curriculum sites where learning takes place and identities are formed. By using rap as a tool to teach, this would tie together the student’s investment in learning a specific marginalized language. I believe that rap and hip-hop would be more a site of critique than Ibrahim’s idea of a site of hope because it does not seem very appropriate for a class setting. I understand that it will help link the students’ world and identity with their language, but perhaps there are better ways of doing this. But in thinking this, I have caught myself valorizing my own language and giving it more legitimacy than Black English. This relates back to our class discussion on what makes Standard English and how we should value other forms of English in the classroom. I like the ESL pedagogy of engaging one’s identity and investment into their learning, but in my own classroom, I would maybe include other authentic texts that relate to the students or make sure the rap lyrics were appropriate. 

I thought the article “Cultural Stereotypes” by Kumar was very interesting and problematized the cultural stereotypes that exist in TESOL, specifically with Asian students. Many times we may find ourselves stereotyping and as teachers, we should look to the reasons of why we are doing this. I found myself relating to Kumar’s idea that stereotyping helps us reduce an unmanageable and unknown reality of our diverse students into a more manageable label. I think it can be overwhelming to be unfamiliar of your students’ backgrounds, which makes stereotyping an easy thing to fall back on. We should be critically aware of this and make sure not to generalize because there are many components that make up one’s identity. I found this quote about stereotyping to be very true: “People everywhere practice it, knowingly or unknowingly. It is an all-pervasive phenomenon that affects gender, class, race, language, religion, nationality, and ethnicity. We stereotype others, and others stereotype us.” 

Kubota and Lin’s article titled “Race, Culture, and Identities in Second Language Education” gave a basic overview of these key terms. There is no concrete way to define race, culture, and identity, which is what we have been learning throughout this semester.

Week 8: Culture and Material Evaluation

As we have been learning throughout the semester, culture is composed of multiple aspects and it can be a concept that is difficult to learn and teach. I have gained a lot of knowledge on how an ESL teacher can influence the way in which their students view culture (both the target language culture and their native identity), but this is the first time I have read about the significance of ESL materials. The readings this week by Tyler-Mendes, Giashi, and Hinkel have all demonstrated how textbooks can be a factor that may influence how gender roles or race are perceived in a specific culture. There has recently been an increased amount of focus on the images in textbooks in comparison with the textual content, which is why this is such an important topic. Tyler-Mendes argued that the images in the EFL textbooks should be discussed in order to counter racial stereotypes about English speakers and English-speaking nations and I completely agree. I have not had access to these textbooks yet, but this study found that their images create an American culture with economic and social success. The people in the images are also predominately white and represent the middle class, power, and money. If other races were shown, such as African Americans, they were represented in a poorer or powerless position. I found this to be very sad and it would reinforce the racial stereotypes that we want to avoid. The reading by Tyler-Mendes also addressed the critical pedagogy by Paulo Freire, in which we should examine the politics of unequal power relations and then take actions for social transformation. This relates to how ESL teachers should incorporate dialogue in our classrooms so that we can question who benefits from the existing power structure and what the purpose of the textbook is.

All three of the readings provided great implications for ESL teachers that I found to be very useful. We may not be able to choose the materials for our classes but we can employ literary skills to address this problem. Giashi stressed the importance of critical image analysis as a tool that can help us reveal underlying trends in the resources we use. This skill is especially important as we encounter ESL texts because they may be reinforcing stereotypes or serve to benefit a specific person or group. We should consider the textbook images and then initiate discussions with our students about them. Being able to critically analyze resources will help my future class to examine race and power issues in our surrounding society and how that affects one’s perception of culture and identity. I also found the implications in Chapter 11 by Hinkel to be interesting because they focus on how a teacher can learn along with their students. I love that idea and I hope to reflect on cultural awareness just as much as my students. The reading stated, “With encouragement, students can learn how to learn about cultures” and that reiterates the idea that one needs to critically analyze the information they are presented with to learn about culture and be aware of possible stereotypes.