The Mutual Symbiosis Between Inclusive Bi-lingual Education and Multicultural Education

In this article the authors postulate a mutual symbiosis between multicultural and inclusive bi-lingual education. Combining bi-lingual and multicultural education to create a symbiotic relationship can stimulate reform in schools and can promote inclusive educational systems, thereby keeping native languages and cultures alive for minority students and enhancing native English speakers’ language and cultural understandings.     

Resisting Assimilation: Deliberate Acculturation by the American English Language Learner

Education policy has historically been viewed as having an influential part in crafting the roles of immigrants in American society. However, while policy makers continue to push their own agendas on English language learners (ELLs), ELLs continue to push back to create their own sense of what it means be an American. This article analyzes how formal and informal language policies have historically driven the instruction of ELLs and argues that despite attempts to enculturate and/or assimilate ELLs into American schools through strict English instruction, students employ a variety of cultural resources to act agentically in their acculturation.     

Investigating Pragmatic Competence,Metapragmatic Awareness and Speech Act Strategies among Turkmen-Persian Bilingual and Persian Monolingual EFL Learners: A Cross-Cultural Perspective

ABSTRACT

This study investigated the effect of bilinguality on pragmatic production and metapragmatic awareness in third language learning. Thus, 59 Turkmen-Persian bilinguals (using Turkmen as their L1 and Persian as their L2) learning English as a third language and 55 Persian monolinguals learning English as their second language were selected and given a WDCT and a metapragmatic awareness questionnaire. The results showed that bilingual EFL learners outperformed monolingual EFL learners in pragmatic production and metapragmatic awareness. The findings also confirm the pragmatic differences among the three languages and the bilinguals’ advantage over monolinguals concerning the appropriate use of speech act strategies.     

International Faculty in Chinese Universities’ Foreign Language Teaching Preferences

ABSTRACT

International college faculty in China are stakeholders in foreign language teaching. This project was designed to find out what international instructors’ pedagogical choices were in regards to English as a Foreign Language instruction. Twenty-eight international college instructors who taught oral English or English writing participated in interviews. Interviewees were employed at various tertiary institutions in large and small cities throughout China. Some interviewees described an audiolingual approach to foreign language teaching. Most interviewees took a situational approach to teach English as a Foreign Language. Finally, remaining international faculty described an intercultural approach when delivering EFL instruction.     

Literacy as social (media) practice: Refugee youth and native language literacy at school

Research indicates that immigrant and refugee students benefit from use of their native languages in education. Nevertheless, what this means in practice has infrequently been examined by researchers, and teachers often struggle to find ways to use their refugee students’ native languages as resources that encourage the development of the native languages as well as academic language and literacy in the new language. This small-scale, exploratory project employed an innovative, five-day critical media literacy curricular unit, and then examined how it served as a context for native language and English literacy development. Participants were 14 adolescent newcomers to the U.S. from Somalia, Kenya, Djibouti, and Ethiopia, all speakers of Somali with limited or interrupted formal schooling experiences. Participants had varying but mostly beginning levels of print literacy skills; yet as recent migrants, most used social media to interact with others locally and globally, in multiple languages, oral and written. As described here, our efforts to foster peer-to-peer Somali language communication resulted in multilingual interaction across a range of social and academic purposes in the classroom. These research findings highlight how in-class use of social media analysis can serve to achieve multilingual and (critical) literacy learning aims.     

Regional creative industries policy-making under New Labour

This article analyses creative industries policy in the English regions under New Labour (1997–2010). It examines the ideas behind regional creative industries policies (RCIPs) and their implementation. Focusing on the activities of the English regional development agencies, the primary bodies responsible for the implementation of creative industries policy in the British regions, the article places regional cultural policy during the New Labour period within its broader political, social and economic contexts. It explains and evaluates New Labour's RCIPs, arguing that creative industries policy at the regional level changed over the course of New Labour's three terms of office, becoming increasingly economistic at the expense of a more social democratic vision of regional equality and democracy. We identify three issues that were problematic for New Labour's RCIP: a reliance on the idea of “clusters”, commercialisation and shifting regional governance.     

The Languages of Peace During the French Religious Wars

ABSTRACT

The desirability of peace was a common topos in sixteenth-century political rhetoric, and the duty of the king to uphold the peace for the benefit of his subjects was also a long-established tradition. However, the peculiar circumstances of the French religious wars, and the preferred royal policy of pacification, galvanized impassioned debate among both those who supported and those who opposed confessional coexistence. This article looks at the diverse ways in which peace was viewed during the religious wars through an exploration of language and context. It draws not only on the pronouncements of the crown and its officials, and of poets and jurists, but also on those of local communities and confessional groups. Opinion was not just divided along religious lines; political imperatives, philosophical positions and local conditions all came into play in the arguments deployed. The variegated languages of peace provide a social and cultural dimension for the contested nature of sixteenth-century French politics. However, they could not restore harmony to a war-torn and divided kingdom.     

An investigation of ELT students’ intercultural communicative competence in relation to linguistic proficiency, overseas experience and formal instruction

This study aims at exploring how linguistic proficiency, target culture experience, and formal education are related to the learning of intercultural communicative competence (ICC). It presents the theoretical underpinnings of ICC in the light of recent literature. Then, it continues with the methodology section that includes a quantitative research study in which 35 students at the Department of English Language Teaching (ELT) at European University of Lefke (EUL) participated. The participants of the study had different linguistic proficiencies ranging from waystage or elementary level (A2) to vantage or upper intermediate level (B2). The paper concludes by stating the findings of the research and also by making some recommendations for language teachers to better develop the learners’ ICC in teaching English as a second language (TESL)/teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) contexts.     

Patterns of some measured mental abilities among persian bilingual and monolingual children

The purpose of this study was to provide some empirical answers regarding the effects of home and school language upon some cognitive abilities of elementary school bilinguals where the two languages involved do not bear any resembalance.A Persian translation of CTMM adjusted to Persian population was administered to elementary school children of two types of bilingual and one Persian monolingual school. The results indicate that within bilingual schools home language does not show any consistent effect upon non-language abilities. The only consistent effect was in the language measure of Delayed recall, in favor of Persian speaking homes. Comparison of various schools indicate that in the third and sixth grades Persian control was superior to both type of bilingual schools in terms of Immediate recall and to immersion schools in terms of Delayed recall. An exposure variable to Persian was then defined showing a direct relationship with amount of retention. This relationship was explained by resistence to forgetting due to the degrees of overlearning of Persian in various groups.     

When is a foreign‐language film not a foreign‐language film? When it has too much English in it: The case of a Singapore film and the Oscars 1

Abstract

In December 2005, a film called Be With Me, by Singapore director, Eric Khoo, was disqualified from entering the Best Foreign Language Film category at the following year’s Academy Awards on the grounds that it contained ‘too much English’. An Academy spokesperson attempted to explain this decision with what was apparently obvious, that ‘English is not a foreign language’. In an age where issues of cultural migration, hybridity, diaspora and globalisation are de rigueur, this intractable declaration seems almost comic. However, it indicates a continued ambivalence in the role of the English language in the making of a cultural identity: the perennial post‐colonial conundrum that shows no sign of going away. Singapore’s post‐independence decision to keep English as the first language of the country means that the use of English, albeit with local variations, is a quotidian reality. I would like to use this incident to reflect, not so much on the politics of Oscar selection, as perhaps more importantly, on the implications it presents for the internationalisation, and thus the ownership, of English, as well as its role as a marker for both local and global subjectivities – especially when the irony of the situation is compounded by the fact that Khoo’s film is, in effect, mostly silent.     

Bilingualism,federal policy on bilingual education and intercultural relations

Bilingualism, or facility in two languages, is one of the most powerful tools employed in cross-cultural communication. Its effect is far greater than the simple improvement of understanding between two groups. Rather, bilingualism is a complex concept with demographic, socioeconomic, and political overtones. Though not always the case in the past, most governments are now sensitive to the questions surrounding bilingualism and are aware of the consequences of misguided policies. This paper discusses the background of bilingualism and bilingual education both within and outside of the United States. It presents an analysis of current federal government policy toward bilingual education and the implications for intercultural relations in the United States. These implications are discussed in terms of language use, education, employment, equal opportunity, politics, and international relations.     

Developing intercultural competence in college business English students: A study of innovative teaching in China

Despite the increasing need to develop students' intercultural competence in China, the relationship between the approaches used to teach the English language and the cultivation of students' intercultural competence remains largely under-researched. Based on Byram's intercultural model and the intercultural language teaching framework, using action research we developed and implemented new teaching approaches to cultivate intercultural competence among students using a quasi-experimental design that combined qualitative and quantitative methods. Two classes of undergraduate students majoring in Business English were randomly selected, with one being assigned as the treatment group (n = 33) and the other as the control group (n = 32). The primary data consisted of questionnaires, journals, and interviews. After participating in a three-month intercultural speaking course where the treatment group students were guided through an intercultural learning process of noticing, comparing, and reflecting, findings revealed that they developed intercultural competence regarding their attitudes, knowledge, skills, and awareness. Implications for facilitating students' intercultural competence are discussed.     

Conceit and Capacities of the Vulgar Sort: The Social History of English as a Language of Politics

The growth of England from Norman-Angevin colony to imperial power began with the social development of a national community that conducted its arguments in English. In this sense vernacularization was the constituting process of English history. This article connects the history of language to constitutional history, and affirms recent calls for an approach that transcends conventional boundaries between late medieval and early modern periods, and between intellectual, cultural, social, demographic, economic, political and constitutional histories. Vernacularization is seen as a movement from below. It is linked in various ways to traditions and customs of resistance and rebellion that are seen as having shaped the history of England from the thirteenth century to 1649.     

Constructivist Approaches in a Dual-Language Classroom

Dual-language programs are becoming increasingly popular among educators and the public in general. In these programs, students aim at attaining full proficiency in English and another language while reaching an academic achievement at or above grade level. This article describes a series of pedagogical practices in the context of dual-language classrooms. We set the discussion across three defining characteristics of our constructivist perspective: learning as collaboration, teachers as facilitators, and language and culture as intertwined elements in schools. In sum, we postulate that dual-language programs bring equity to schools.     

Sociopolitical change and perceived vitality

This paper addresses the issue of how ethnic groups cognitively represent some of the societal forces impinging upon them and relevant outgroups before and after a naturally-occurring event. By utilizing the concept of “vitality” and its attending measurement instrument (the SVQ), Chinese Hong Kong students were required to rate the perceived vitalities of Chinese and Western groups in the Colony as well as their respective languages before and after the Sino-British Treaty. Results showed that the status of the English language was perceived lower in a number of situations after the international agreement. This was complemented by a decrease in the perceived level of immigration and emigration patterns of Westerners, by an increase in their perceived political power locally, and by an increase in the status of the English language internationally. The findings, many of which manifest judgemental reversals from before to after the Treaty, are discussed in terms of the psychological acceptance of the agreement by the Hong Chinese and in the context of maintaining a positive ethnic identity.     

Closing a window on the world: Convergence and UK television services for schools

‘Closing a Window on the World: convergence and UK television services for schools’ is about the proven value to UK schools of the two free television services provided by Channel 4 and the BBC, and a serious threat to their future.

The first part of the chapter discusses the first ‘revolution in learning’, based on the development of television as a ‘window on the world’ for UK schools since the 1960s. Research evidence for the very positive teacher attitudes to their use of the services in the 1990s is cited.

The second part begins by discussing a BBC consultation exercise undertaken in the autumn of 2000, seeking support for a policy decision to develop a new ‘digital curriculum’ for schools. Recent research into the effectiveness of such technologies is reviewed. While schoolchildren enjoy using ICT (and especially video components it may include), there is as yet no firm evidence to support the confident claims being made for its effectiveness in promoting learning.

The chapter concludes that the BBC decision to begin the rundown of its ‘traditional analogue’ television service for schools is premature. At a sensitive time for public service broadcasting, it threatens the future of free services teachers have used and respected for many years. Without government action to include relevant provision in forthcoming broadcasting legislation, UK schools seem likely to lose this distinctive and valued support for their work and their ICT resources are also likely to be impoverished.     

Communication Traits in First and Second Languages: Puerto Rico

Early research relating to communication apprehension (CA) indicated a strong association between CA in first and second language interactions in Puerto Rico and Micronesia. More recent research has indicated similar associations involving individuals from a variety of Asian cultures. The study discussed in this paper broadens the focus of attention to a variety of communication traits rather than a single trait. In addition to CA, the other traits studied include shyness, assertiveness, responsiveness, compulsive communication, self-perceived communication competence, and willingness to communicate. This report is directed toward communication traits in Puerto Rico in both Spanish and English. This report includes discussion of relationships among communication traits in each language and the differences and similarities in those traits between the languages.     

The Heuristic for Thinking About Culturally Responsive Teaching (HiTCRiT)

Michèle was hurrying to class. How, she thought, could she offer the students in her African American English in Society and Schools class a method of understanding, comparing, and abstracting the studies they had been reading in class? The heuristic described in this study evolved from a desire to capture aspects of several seminal studies that illustrated how African American English was deployed in classrooms for productive work with African American students. Michèle recalled that whenever she asked graduate students or practicing teachers what they, other teachers, and schools might do to improve the schooling of students of color, one of the most consistent responses was Culturally Responsive Pedagogy (CRP). However, when pressed and asked what one would detect in classrooms where CRP is being put into practice, few were able to specify what an observer might see. Specifying the dimensions of CRP and its relationship to the heuristic had not been on Michèle’s mind. Even so, it was during the class discussion that the heuristic’s relevance to CRP became clearer. Jonathan, who had been tapped as a teaching assistant in an English language arts methods class, believed HiTCRiT could be modified to use with teacher education candidates, as a substitute for the standardized lesson planning tool used in the department. He piloted its use with the class the following semester. Utilizing HiTCRiT to explain research and existing practices as well as to assist teachers in creating culturally relevant instruction modified and shaped it, creating a more robust tool. Thus, the HiTCRiT came into being and came to inform our thinking and teaching practice.     

Can a Successful ESL Teacher Hold Deficit Beliefs of Her Students’ Home Languages and Cultures?

In this article the author explores the seeming contradictions between the successful teaching practices of an English as a Second Language teacher and the deficit beliefs she expressed toward her students’ home languages and cultures. This teacher believed her students were smart and capable, and she held herself accountable for her students achieving academic success.     

Mapping cultural assets and evaluating significance: theory,methodology and practice

Over the last decade in the UK, there has been a notable shift in the popularity and use of cultural mapping as a methodology for policy making at a regional and local level. This follows increased demand for an informed framework for planning arts and cultural facilities from local and regional government and from within the cultural sector (Evans, 2008: p. 65). The article begins with an exploration of cultural mapping within cultural policy, which explores the context for the growth in this area of activity, and why this kind of activity appeals to policy makers and organisations. It then goes on to examine four cultural mapping exercises which have been undertaken in recent years in the UK. These studies have been chosen because although they all focus the mapping of cultural assets within a specific geographic area, they differ to one degree or another in purpose, context, definition, geographic scale and methodology. They illustrate the narrow range of approaches deployed in the cultural mapping field in the UK, and as such provide a useful means of critically reviewing their limits as well as highlighting the issues and challenges faced by cultural cartography in practice. The article concludes by considering the type of mapping research that is “allowed” within the discursive confines of consultancy based cultural policy research.