Native speaker Englishes

[Woravut]

I was thinking about the close relationship between language and culture.

In the old days, learning a language is also learning a culture. With "Global Englishes" or perhaps "Glocal Englishes", what kind of cultures should be embed in our classroom teaching, given a variety of contexts where Englishes are used?

[Richard]

Ignoring the previous few messages, an interesting point about the problems with non-standard accents is in 'A spy and a traitor' by Ben Macintyre. This is the story of a KGB officer who became a British spy, but, while working for the KGB in the UK, one of his most important jobs was to recruit new sources. There was a left-wing Scottish MP who seemed very sympathetic to the Soviet Union and a likely recruit. The KGB officer met the MP a few times to try to recruit him, but couldn't understand anything he said because of his strong Scottish accent. The KGB man actually said that, after a meeting, he had no idea if the MP was talking about politics or football since he understood nothing. So if you ever end up teaching English to spies, exposure to a range of accents would be an important teaching focus.

[Richard]

what kind of cultures should be embed in our classroom teaching

Risager (2018) 'Representations of the World in Language Textbooks' looks at language coursebooks used in Denmark focusing on the content they cover (not the language). She takes 5 perspectives: national (which nations are referred to - a variety of core countries for her English textbook), citizenship education (whether a sense of citizenship is promoted - a chapter on environmental issues is her example), cultural (what cultural identities are represented - attempting to show diverse class, race, religion even for people from core countries), postcolonial (how are global power issues dealt with - she argues that her textbook is very northern hemisphere dominated but includes issues like native peoples), and transnational (how are transnational networks represented - positive issues of ease of travel and global communication). I found these 5 perspectives on culture interesting and potentially useful. If I were writing a language coursebook, I think the citizen education perspective would probably be the easiest to put into practice.

[stevelouw]

Using Risager's 5 perspectives, would the transnational category be the most useful place for a focus on World Englishes? I remember using Language in Use, a course book popular in Cambodia the early 00s, and there were quite a few listening tasks where the speaker was Chinese (talking about a Dragon Boat festival), or Italian (talking about renting a summer house in Tuscany) and so on. At the time I didn't think much of it, but the students sometimes complained (especially about the Italian) that it wasn't easy to follow, even though it was clearly a graded listening task with the speaker talking pretty slowly. Adrian Doff and Christopher Jones were ahead of their time! Is this the kind of transnational perspective Risager identifies as being part of course books do you think?

[Richard]

the speaker was Chinese (talking about a Dragon Boat festival), or Italian (talking about renting a summer house in Tuscany)

These examples are of national cultures. Just by identifying speakers with a certain nationality (and especially if they are talking about their own country), the focus is on the national culture. An example of transnational culture would be someone of indeterminate nationality talking about the friends they make through playing, say, World of Warcraft.

[sgtowns]

Risager (2018) 'Representations of the World in Language Textbooks' looks at language coursebooks used in Denmark focusing on the content they cover (not the language).

Thank you for a very interesting book that might come in handy as we are revising our LNG curriculum to better meet the university's new strategy and goals. The book is in the RC at LNG 866 if anyone else wants to take a look.

Scanning through the book made me wonder how the textbooks we use at KMUTT would be analyzed using this framework. I was thinking about the coursebook for LNG 107, National Geographic Pathways 3, and my gut feeling was that a lot of nations and cultures were mentioned, so I thought it was fairly multicultural and inclusive. But a quick look through it today with Risager's 5 Perspectives in mind, I now realize that the mentions of nations and cultures are very superficial. The main focus in almost every reading is on science and technology, not culture or communication.

In the past few weeks in the Department, there have been several big group discussions about the relationship between liberal arts education (soft skills) and science and technology workforce education. Perhaps if we believe that liberal arts education is still important, even in the engineering workplace, then a framework like Risager's can help us to design our language curriculum. If I have understood her argument correctly, it's not necessarily a matter of choosing which cultures to represent in the classroom, but more about showing how different cultures interact in local and global contexts. This would also include discussing and learning about all of the benefits and problems those interactions create.

[Wannapa]

The best place that I can hear global englishes is a hostel where travellers from different parts of the world come into contact.

That makes sense. Sounds like we need to create a "World Englishes for Backpackers" course.

Just out of curiosity, does the topic of communication in World Englishes come up in hostel chats? Of course, young backpackers wouldn't call it "World Englishes", but do topics like accents and understandability come up in conversation? It seems like a lot of WE research is done in educational or work settings, but interviewing/surveying backpackers and other travelers might give some interesting insights as well. (Plus they would be an easy group to locate in Thailand.)

Accent and intelligibility is what ELF people are discussing. The focus of World Englishes is, generally, to describe 'deviated' features/characteristics of different non-native varieties. ELF pays more attention to how people from different varieties interact and negotiate their meaning. They do believe that intelligibility is co-constructed, context-specific and familiarly is an important element.

[sgtowns]

Accent and intelligibility is what ELF people are discussing. The focus of World Englishes is, generally, to describe 'deviated' features/characteristics of different non-native varieties. ELF pays more attention to how people from different varieties interact and negotiate their meaning. They do believe that intelligibility is co-constructed, context-specific and familiarly is an important element.

Ahhh, now I understand. Thanks for the explanation!