Week 11: English in an era of globalization

International English in Its Sociolinguistic Contexts by McKay and Heng, Chapter one: English in an era of globalization.

The reading for this week focused on English as a global language and how it has developed this status overtime.  What does it mean to be a global language? The article defined the commonly used term globalization as the reformulation of social space in which the global and local are constantly interacting with one another and that neither one should be afforded a dominant position. 

The chapter also discussed colonialism's effect on the spread of English allowing English to become a language of power and prevalence. English spread along with the empire and became associated with power because the individuals who spoke English often had more access to better jobs. This encouraged more to learn English and  unfortunately began marginalizing non-English speakers as "others". Looking at the history of English with colonialism and exploring why this language has become a global language, I for some reason kept connecting English as a global language with teaching about Christopher Columbus in schools. I believe topics like these, which may "other" a group of people is an opportunity for students to critically think and analyze. We should avoid teaching our students; "Christopher Columbus is a hero who discovered America" or that "English is the most important language globally today and everyone desires to learn it". We should have students challenge these statements, the people these statements affect and reflect.

The book also discusses the alchemy of English. It states on page 7, “English is seen as a key to knowledge and personal success”. The paragraph continues to relate English to Aladdin’s lamp- once you have it allows you to open many doors to new opportunities. English is widely spread and spoken by people around the world. Three quarters of the world’s mail is even written in English. My sister recently came home from studying abroad and while she knows a second language, she found English everywhere she went. Other friends of mine have told me they have had trouble speaking their second language abroad. Often times the person they are communicating with will begin to speak to them in English. The chapter also discussed how vital English can be in the global economy- which made me think of a movie I saw years ago. In the movie The Terminal, Tom Hanks plays an eastern European immigrant. What stuck with me from that movie, were the scenes where he struggled to communicate with those around him. It’s interesting to see that this movie showed that not being able to speak English, or Speak English to a certain degree is a disadvantage even in an airport where thousands of people from all around the world  go in and out of every day.

The chapter continued to talk about incentives for learning English including those relevant to me as a pre-service bilingual educator; economic, education and mass media incentives. I am familiar with the economic incentive to learn English. English has become very important in the world market. Even outside of the United States English is helpful for employment as we outsource and individuals attempt to enter the competitive world market. As for education incentives, English is found in classrooms around the world and there are pressures from scholars to publish their work in English first. In some cases as the chapter points out there is an extreme pressure to learn English from the government. In Chinese language-in-education policies, China requires students to study English and methods promoted in English language classrooms. These government policies also leads to pressure from parents to introduce English to their children.  In other areas English learning is in standardized tests for entry of institutions of higher education (page 14). The book uses Japan as an example as English is many times a de facto requirement for higher education. During my interview from our assignment my conversational partner who moved here from Japan last May actually brought this up. He told me that he felt pressured to learn English and that it was required because he needed to learn English to enter a university in Japan. I thought this was really interesting and was excited to see this idea in the book. Finally, the book discussed the final incentive of learning English, mass media including advertising, music, movies and electronic communication. These are great resources to use in our classrooms as ESL teachers. Much of this media is conducted in English- for example 75% of the world film making is controlled by the United States and connected with the English language. English has a great hold on many different types of media and often times these forms connect well with students and would be great to use in the classroom.  I know a family friend who learned Japanese solely because of her interest in Japanese films. Eventually she lived in japan, taught there and is now married and speaks fluent Japanese!  While pop culture is a great resources in language acquisition, the fact that English controls much of the media today is unfortunate as it ostracizes other languages.

The rest of the reading discusses the dangers of this wide spread English phenomenon. For one, widespread English leads to growing monolinguals among English speakers and an economic divide in English learning. I think these are two very important points clearly discussed in the article.Overall, I really enjoyed the readings this week as they allowed me to reflect on how my own future classroom and how I will have students view the English language and what I can do as a teacher to address student’s connotations of the English. 

Blog Post Week 10- Race, language and identity: Critical multiculturalism in TESOL

Arab TESOL Student’s Experiences of Racialization and Othering in the United Kingdom looked at five male Muslim Saudi Arab learners in a TESOL graduate programme at a University in the United Kingdom. The study looks at racialization defined as “ways in which the idea of race might contribute to an experience of Othering” for learners. Specifically, how the image of Arabs and Muslims affect their experiences in the learning community.

The article states that TESOL classes reflect important institutional, societal and global discourses. I think this is a very important statement. TESOL practice is neither value-free nor apolitical. As TESOL teachers this is very important for us to remember and address in our own classrooms. This can affect our learners in a number of ways and can be very dangerous when students are subjected to Othering, marginalizing or inferiority based on their cultural to ethnic backgrounds. Unfortunately race has a significant impact on social organization and identity formation. People see race as a REAL thing and not a social construction which excludes certain groups in our society.

The article also uses the term “Islamphobia”. This is designed as an “irrational fear of Muslims and what Islam represents” this has been around for years but since 9/11 has increased in academia, journalism and all other forms of media. Many individuals are affected by the discrimination post 9/11 on account of their religious affiliation, physical appearance and cultural norms and values. This article really made me reflect on my own conceptions and realize how many of images reinforcing Islamophobia I have seen in the media. During our last class we watched the documentary discussing the popular, racist and hurtful image of Arabs in popular media specifically in films. Aladdin is one of my favorite movies from my childhood. As many other twenty year olds Disney movies in general were a "right of passage". I remembered waiting at the door for my mom to return with the newest Disney movie on VHS tape. Before she was even able to take off her coat my sister and I would have the movie out of her hand and into the tape player sitting only a couple inches away from the flickering screen.

    We were Disney zombies.

Even today I still enjoy Disney films more than the average six year old. However, I have recognized and even written papers on the many controversial topics in these Disney films. It's surprising that I have researched, read articles on and written essays on the many things wrong in these Disney films but I have never seen anything that discusses the image of Arabs in Aladdin. As we watched the clip in class I could not believe how I hadn’t seen it before and how hurtful this image is. These ideas are unheard of in other films as well and very popular. These movies reflect an image of Arabs, a stereotype that it is rarely challenged.

"Irish Crossing"

The article also included some very personal experience of participants in their findings. One participant, Saif discussed how he is many times questioned by others especially about the treatment of women and marriage. I found his comment shocking and quite sad. For strangers to be questioning him based off of stereotypes and their preconceived notions is ridiculous. I tried to think of an example that would be applicable for my own heritage. I am Irish.  A popular image of the Irish that I have seen through media is that an Irishman is a drunk man, many times getting into arguments with other drunken Irish man. We even celebrate a holiday in the United States which while it embraces the Irish heritage, is celebrated with heavy drinking in green clothes. While I have never been to Ireland, I don't believe this one image accurately reflects the entire culture from my own experience with my family members that are recent immigrants and better judgment. If a stranger were to question me about my heritage and family members using only these stereotypes I'm sure I would be offended much like Saif as a Muslim Saudi Arab.

Becoming Black by Ibrahim was also a very interesting article to read. This article, like the others, discussed the interrelation between identity and learning. The article looked at a group of French-speaking immigrant and refugee continental African students entering a school in Canada where they were expected to fit in the social imaginary already in place. I found this article very interesting and had not considered this situation before. The research study examined the high school for over six months. I thought the student background info was presented in a really interesting way. Students experienced a lot in regards to identity formation. I think this article encourages us to understand, as teachers, student’s identities and help them. We should incorporate their own voices in our classrooms, not the prescribed ones and allow them to challenge the status quo while including their own personal identities in curriculum. 

Blog Post 6

I really enjoyed this week’s readings again, including the sections from the book which discussed refugees and the concept of social construction. I recently finished a project in which I had to find twnty-five texts related to immigration and was able to discuss and analyze a text about Hmong refugees. While I found these sections very interesting my reflection really focuses on the article, Construction of Racial Stereotypes in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Textbooks which discusses the images in EFL textbooks. As the article says, students consciously or unconsciously use, absorb and interpret the social, economic and racial realities present in the photographs, cartoons or pictures found in the images in their textbooks (page 65). I’ve never considered looking at how images are used to represent English culture(s) in EFL textbooks which is actually a really interesting topic. Learning Spanish, I know that images in these textbooks can reflect a culture weather it is true or not.

Taylor-Mendes believes that images in EFL textbooks should be questioned and discussed. Students and teachers should question race, class and gender imbalances of power as Brazilian philosopher Paulo Freire suggested in the 1960’s. While there was not much of this in my high school, in many of my college courses we discuss unequal power relations found in our everyday lives and are encouraged to take action. In many of my classes including my American Diversity course I took last year I have been pushed to examine who benefits from the existing power structures, who are the disadvantaged and to explore these unequal power relationships. This process has made me more aware of this issue inside and outside of the classroom. I think it is important for teachers to address this issue whenever it is applicable. I agree that looking at images in EFL textbooks is a great opportunity to discuss this issue.

Giaschi stated on page 67 that images in EFL texts that are produced in or by one culture and in context specific conditions are often used and absorbed in sometimes radically different contexts with different sociopolitical cultural realities. He examined images used in texts and made a connection with how physical positioning, body language and clothing suggested that men were more powerful than women. While I cannot connect this with EFL texts, I did write a research paper my freshman year of college examining ads in magazines and how they reflect gender stereotypes. It was actually very disturbing to see how many times a woman is depicted as vulnerable and weak. Even in ads for purses or shoes geared towards female consumers, a woman sometimes looks like she is lifeless or even beaten. Men are often muscular, standing tall and above women.  

Giaschi claims that teachers and students “passively accept and absorb “the images presented to them in their texts and seemed to suggest students cannot challenge these images. I like Taylor-Mendes, don’t necessarily agree with this statement. Just because a person is exposed to something does not mean they are incapable of critical discourse. While I had been exposed to these images of men and women in ads throughout my life, I was readily able to discuss and explore power relations in these images. While looking at ads closely made me conscious of what was actually happening , I was able to challenge these ideas on my own and did not accept these messages as true statements about society.

The study itself was really fascinating.  I thought it was interesting how the author discussed the personal factors that went into the students feeling comfortable speaking with him. I know in one of last week’s readings, the researchers were really concerned about not being able to connect with a culture outside their own. Taylor-Mendes also recognizes this boundary between himself and his Brazilian participants. However he believed he had more of a connection with his students because he spoke fluent Portuguese, married a Brazilian, believed he had started acting more “Brazilian” , met with the participants individually etc. What concerns would you have while conducting a study involving culturally diverse participants?  

In the study, he asked students what they saw in the images in textbooks they provided.  A second interview allowed him to discuss critical analysis questions and the third interview was intended to serve as a follow up.  Taylor-Mendes stated that he found three common themes in his research-that the U.S. is a land of the white elite, blacks are consistently seen as poor or powerless while whites are seen as wealthy and powerful and lastly, that race is divided by continent.

Pictures depicted American culture as economic or social success. These images included Americans on their cell phones, on vacation, shaking hands or making business deals. Participants also found that only whites represent power and that blacks represented the powerless.  I thought it was interesting how Roberto Carlos pointed out the picture of an African American woman using a computer. The caption of the image simplified this action as just “using a mouse”. Her body language made her look defeated, slumped over and bored unlike the images of powerful white business men smiling and standing straight.

I also thought the idea that race is divided by continent very interesting. I didn’t know what Taylor-Mendes meant by this at first but when he stated that many of the images reinforced the limiting stereotype in which the images implied that whites live in “North America, Asians live in Asia, Arabs live in Middle East and blacks live in Africa”. These images ignore migration, immigration, colonization or intermixing of race and identity.  I connected this to something that happened to me the other day while watching a show from the U.K. with two of my friends. One of my friends had never seen the show before and when a black character was introduced she commented on how strange it was to hear a black man with a British accent. She told me how “strange” this was. I think this idea is what Taylor-Mendes is speaking about in his article. Often times, even as educated college students we may stereotype by race and continent. I think these images and the images my friend has seen of the U.K. before the shows are really a disadvantage and can be hurtful. I also thought the image representing South America or Latin America was really shocking as Taylor-Mendes said there was only one image found among the textbooks. Not only was there a lack of images in the EFL textbooks but the image was highly stereotypical.  The image depicted South Americans as dark-skinned, tribal men and women wearing grass skits. I think a description was needed for this image. Last year I heard about a student my professor worked with who did not know there were modern day Native Americans, she believed Native Americans were solely historical figures found in our textbooks.  More of a description would be needed to avoid misconceptions like these with individuals from South America. While it’s great to incorporate these groups of people in the text book I agree that more information would be needed.  

As Taylor-Mendes states in EFL texts Americans look like wealthy, white, powerful, isolated members within their own race, free of problems. That is a very strong statement to make and something being represented in images found in textbooks used in educational systems. The article states that while textbook publishers seem to be trying to neutralize EFL textbook images, the participants in the study found the images were not accurate representations of culture but instead reinforced “made-in-Hollywood” version of culture that does not exist. While we are aware of these stereotypes we need to consider them.

I found this article very helpful for my future as an educator. I have never considered the images used in textbooks before and now realize what kind of messages these images can send about culture, race, power etc. While we cannot choose a text book by the images used in the book, or we may not have the power to choose textbooks used in the classroom- the important thing we must do is recognize these stereotypes in the images of these English-language textbooks and address them in classroom discussions.