Job Discussion Forums

[leeroy]

Referring to this thread...

http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/job/viewtopic.php?t=6592

A few of us concluded that students from ChinaJapanKorea often had cultural barriers to cross regarding learning English. (well duh! ) They see speaking English, somehow, as a "westernisation". As people from these nations are often fiercely patriotic/nationalistic - we reasoned that there may be a subconscious barrier or fear of being able to speak English - as this may (somehow) make them "less Chinese", or whatever.

And, it has to be said, the East Asian students in London who are good communicators in English do seem, somehow, to be "more western".

So - if it is our goal to raise our students' communicative abilities in English as much as possible - how can this be done while reassuring them that we are not threatening their culture or way of thinking? (If, in fact, that is possible).

Text-books depicting tall blonde people describing their life in London may not be the way to go... In order to make English "less threatening" - I suppose English should be adapted to whichever cultural practices, formalities and norms that are relevant to the learning context. In short, we should remove the "western culture" aspect of learning English - and try to integrate it with their own instead. From the sound of things, Chinese and Korean educational systems already half do this with their English instruction - but while they successfully remove the cultural and functional aspect of language (instead, reverting to the mechanics of grammar etc...) - they do not demonstrate how English could be practically used to describe and function in their own environment.

Where I come from, it is considered normal form to ask what someone did on the weekend (on a Monday!). In Indonesia, however, they simply don't do this (for whatever cultural reasons). Hence, a phrase such as "what did you get up to on the weekend?" would be lost on the students - it is a function relevant only to an alien (and, possibly, intimidating) culture.

What do Chinese students usually talk about (in Chinese)? How do they say hello? How does conversation structure (and other communicative strategies) differ in Chinese compared to "western" ones? To what extent can we tailor the English presented to Asian students to more closely resemble forms and functions that they are used to?

Which leads to an even bigger question, I suppose. Should we be doing this - or is part of the package of "English instruction" that they also learn about our culture?

Thoughts welcome

[been_there]

Yes, language is cultural transmission. "Language does not mirror the world, but creates it." (I think it's from a book by Dariusz Galasinski and Chris Barker, but I'm feeling lazy and not going to go check. It's a good quote).

I would agree with you that students should be taught language that is REALVANT to their lives (death to the Headway series).

Bonnie Norton Pierce's 1995 article "Social Identity, Investment and Language Learning" is a good read on language and identity.

Little tale to think on:
At the Defence Language Institute in Monterey California (one of my professors was a curriculm designer and told us this story) they have language programs for the military translators. The programs are organized by how hard the language is to learn; therefore, the Arabic program is (something like-I forget the specifics) 32 weeks, the Chinese program 28 weeks, Tagalog is less, and Spanish is the shortest. They were very exact on what is learned, how long it takes. Very military.

Well, the story goes that a group of DEA (Drug Enforcement Agency) and Immigration officers who worked in California and Texas were taking the Spanish program because most of the people they busted were Mexican. The problem was they weren't learning. They did the course in proper military fashion, but at the end they knew nada.

My professor evaluated the course, and found no problems, then did a survey of the participants.

The problem was that these representitives of the law enforcement community thought Spanish was for lawbreakers. They didn't want to "buy into" that culture. So they failed at learning.

Leeroy has a good question,

[Wolf]

When I learned Japanese, I wasn't afraid to "buy into their culture" or whatever. It didnt' mean that I instantly gained all of the bad traits of their culture - just that I was open to new ideas.

I've mentioned elsewhere that my humanity is more important than my nationality. I also personally belive that any sort of mindset that leads one group to alienate another is outdated and worthy of change. I think that we could do without the ardent nationalism. This isn't a throwing the baby out with the bathwater thing, this is just an "eliminating the cause of strife in this world - in this case via proper foreign language learning" thing. The east Asian nations are not the only culprits; it just so happens that we're talking about them now. My own country (Canada if you must know) also struggles with seeing other cultures in a spirit of acceptance rather than one of ignorance/mistrust/fear.

Hymes's idea of "communicative competence" includes a willingness to be open to ways of thought, expression, and the overall social rules of a different culture. Will embarking upon such a journey change a person? Yessiree. Will it change them for the better? I believe so.

Now, people are free to choose their own destiny. If the Chinese government decides that learning English is important, then so be it. They are - in my case quite literally - the boss. If they decide to go about this massive project in a way that has been proven ineffective; once agian they're the boss. If the people decide to be open to new ideas (after all, didnt' the famous Communist director Eisenstein promote thesis + antithesis = synthesis? And don't the Japanese government and many of their people at least say that other ideas are welcome? The germ of the idea is already there in the first place... ) then our students are likely to learn the language better. Oh, and the world would become a bit of a better place.

Is speaking English "Westernization." Well, yes. But that's a qualified yes. Learning a foreign language is "foreignization," if you will. I suppose one could argue that immigrating and learning the language of one's new home would be "assimilation." But, since when is the introduction of new ideas such a bad thing? Oh, sure, the influence of Western civilization on the world, what whith its over the top media and all, is huge. Let's leave that aside. Learning a language - really opening up and learning a language - I believe is a very different phenomenon. With real benefits.

[Roger]

Oh, how I wished my students and their parents/teachers/principals did not have such FOREIGN ideas about me, English, learning English and how to use English!
Look, last Christmas I had the hardest time in China of all Christmas seasons: why? For years, Christian holidays were "Western cultural imperialism" and "pollution of our minds". So we Westerners had - privacy, peace and a Christmas all to ourselves.
But last year every school that knew me thought they were entitled to a piece of mine, preferably the whole person. And no, they can't take a No for a No. It is "impolite" to turn a Chinese down. Why?
In the end, I celebrated Christmas in the company of hand-picked guests, both Western and local, and it was great although the "losers" couldn't lose with any dignity and tried to take revenge by being rude.
I wonder what cultural transfer can take place when people are inculcated such behaviour? What's the use for them to know English? They can't interact with normal people, let alone with Westerners!

[leeroy]

Globalhitchhiker,

In the year and a half I spent in Indonesia, I was never made aware that Thursday and Friday were the weekened. Oddly, the schools I worked for (and all others) were open over the weekend, and closed on the weekdays of Saturday and Sunday. The supermarkets, too, were open reduced hours in the middle of the week. Perhaps we are referring to different areas of a very large archipelago? Indonesia is not as muslim as some might think...

The question of "What did you do at/on the weekend?" was translated for me by the local teachers at the school directly - as I wanted to learn Indonesian when I first arrived and asked them for some stock phrases. They gave me the translation - followed by an explanation that it was not a question you would usually ask. I consequently questioned others and my students about this - which they verified for me - hence my confidence in posting it as fact.

[nomadder]

Where I come from "What did you do at the weekend?" is considered wrong. Where is this used? Isn't it British?

Maybe the Indonesians like their privacy and don't want to discuss their weekend. In Japan you could rarely get a decent answer to this question so I figured they didn't do anything much or they weren't telling. Usually they said they slept-which must have meant relaxed. I dunno. Must be an Asian thing.

[ls650]

[Celeste]

One of the things that I find very unpalatable about a lot of integrated curriculum textbooks is that they are subtle ( and sometimes heavy handed) propaganda. Having been raised by immigrant parents in Canada, I have a certain perspective on the world, and how things "should be". I know that this is very different form the way my grandmother from the old country thinks things "should be" and different again from how my students think things "should be". However, many of these textbooks get very didactic about such topics as family realtionships, the role of women in society, recycling, animal rights, etc. I am not opposed to textbooks touching on controversial areas, but I find that most of the books tend to try and convince one that the American or British way is the best way (Sorry, I haven't used many Canadian textbooks yet. Most of the schools I have worked in like the American and British ones best.)

[leeroy]

nomadder - "at the weekend" must be British then, though we do say "on" the weekend too. I teach my students both.

Anyway.

Yes perhaps Asians see it as "nosy" to enquire what someone did on (ahem) the weekend, or maybe they simply don't do much - either hopefully backs up the original point.

If it's not culturally relevant, should we teach it? In London I do, in fact we go through "what did you get up to on/at the weekend?" pretty much religiously every Monday. But they're in London - if I were in Japan it might be a different story...

Are coursebooks "cultural propaganda"? Wording it like that implies some kind of secret, sinister organisation plotting to spread westernisation through the innocent facade of "English schools"

Would (say) Chinese students be more receptive to books depicting Chinese people using English, in familiar "Chinese" situations? It would be easier for them to relate to, I suppose...

[struelle]

[arioch36]

i also find it distateful when a book for learning a language contains to much propaganda, when the book is basically saying "we have the right culture, you don't. By I find this to rarely be the case.

Most of my Chinese students state that they want to learn the "Western" culture. But many think that Chinese culture is so superior, they refuse to truly try to understand any other culture (AKA the police who weren't interested in learning the language of lawbreakers?) So they can never understand the west because they will only look at it from what makes sense in China. Other students are too lazy too open their minds, others just don't seem to have the ability to open their minds to a new culture (not hard to imagine if you know the high school education system here.

Someone mentioned "communicative competence", which requires an "attitude of availability", going to class with a mind that is available to learn. And be open to learning another culture is esential to being able to truly comunicate. These students are the superior ones, most often.

I think a bigger problem then education books that propagandize the west, is all these books written by Chinese that just give totally off base, or highly departmentalized views of the west. Then in China, at least, the students must memorize these tidbits of information/trivia, and then thay think, "now I know what the west is". their minds are often closed to truly learning anything that is different from the propaganda they recieved via government or TV.

In learning Chinese, of course I try to learn Chinese ways. And if a Chinese student isn't interested in learning about Western ways, I think he is destined to be speaking "Crazy English" for a long time, where he is the only person who can understand himself, in which case he is probably happy, and considrs himself successful

[shmooj]

Well this is interesting.

Dilemma:
Fact A: Asking students what they did at the weekend is "not done."
Fact B: If these students live or visit for an extended time an English-speaking country, they are likely to have to field this question not only every Monday but also every Friday using future tenses when everyone says "What are you doing this weekend?"

What is the teacher to do when Fact A and Fact B are mutually exclusive if you don't want to alienate your students?

Someone mentioned that this is a function relevant to an "alien" culture to students in Indonesia. Surely though, this culture is not alien to them in any negative sense since they are, as Wolf points out Hymes claims, positively disposed to the language in the first place. Does that mean they have to take the cultural stuff with the language? I would say yes, to a great extent.

I say that because it is a simple but discomforting fact that any student who has cultural issues in the language classroom in Jakarta is going to experience total psychological meltdown in a real-life communicative situation with a native speaker who speaks this way. It is best to point this out to them in Jakarta than on a counselling couch in Ealing and let them decide why they want to learn English.

Sure, they don't have to use their English to communicate with any other native speakers. They could stick to using it to communicating, say, with Singaporeans. But the point is that whoever they communicate with is going to rub them up the wrong way culturally at some point and they will have to learn to work through this.

We cannot expect students to conform to British/US culture while studying English, but we are surely fair to expect them to conform to Culture as a sociolinguistic issue in cross-cultural communication. This is basic to the learning of any living language.

[nomadder]

Agreed. When you take on a language you also take on the culture and the way that language is used. I wouldn't call it propaganda. They need to know what things are like in English speaking cultures as books assume this is where they would most likely use it. Plus it's interesting. Or should be. Otherwise you could only have some strange, awkward translations of the things done in the students' native culture and this we wouldn't call properly taught English. I would want to know all things about the language culture I took on though we foreigners are often excused from going through all of the rituals.

Just because they never did much on the weekend didn't mean I stopped asking that question. Eventually some came up with things to say as they knew this question was coming. That's progress.

[struelle]