TEGCOM? What's THAT?: Moving toward a globalized communication model of English

You won’t find “TEGCOM” as a field of study when you update your FaceBook profile, but perhaps you may…one of these days. In their 2002 article “Appropriating English, expanding the field: From TESOL to teaching English for glocalized communication (TEGCOM),” Lin, Wang, Akamatsu, and Riazi (2002) find common threads in their collective life-stories to suggest a way of viewing English as an International Language, revisioning TESOL as Teaching English as a Glocalized Communication.”

And, chances are, Word will claim “glocalized” is misspelled.

The authors – all EFL learners of English – arrived in Canada, confident in their English-speaking competence. Wendy explains how, after learning English in China, where she was viewed (and viewed herself) as “+English,” she became “-English” upon arriving in Canada and realizing her English was “marked” (303). This concept of feeling as if one’s additional language has moved from beneficial status to negative is echoed by the three other narratives. Therefore, Lin et al. (2002) propose approaching TESOL pedagogy from a local perspective, situating the instruction within the context of the student/language-learning/native community. Thus, English becomes a tool of global communication, taught locally within context, erasing the binary of “native” and “non-native” speaker.

I’m not sure why I was surprised to read – again – that I am in the minority. The majority of speakers of English have acquired the language as an additional language. It is my L1, and, frankly, my only language if you do not count my limited grammatical competence with Spanish (and my next-to-nil pragmatic competence). What also strikes me as interesting – and disheartening – is that this paradigm shift, from English as a second language to English as a tool of global communication taught in local context, is not moving very quickly. Lin et al.’s article was written 11 years ago. Over a decade. Why haven’t we heard of TEGOM until now? Why is this shift not recognized in the pedagogy? Or, is the theoretical shift mired in the muck? What can WE do about it?

McKay and Bokhorst-Heng’s Chapter 7 discusses this point as well, only without introducing the shift in terminology to accompany the shift in vantage point. They do discuss EIL pedagogy, however, after they examine ELT materials in other communities. Interesting to note is that some of these materials, even though approved by the Ministry of Education, promote Western values even though the official community’s stance is an anti-Western one (example of Japan, pp. 186-7). McKay and Bokhorst-Heng’s point is that ELT materials and methods in Outer and Expanding Circle countries often create tensions between local values/beliefs and global “standards,” in addition to Othering the students learning from those textbooks and methods. Echoing Lin et al.’s (2002) term “glocalization” with TESOL becoming TEGCOM, McKay and Bokhorst-Heng call for a hybrid method of teaching English as a global language taught within local contexts. They propose “principles for a socially sensitive EIL pedagogy:”

• “EIL curricula should be relevant to the domains in which English is used in the particular learning contexts.” This is the “local context” part, the principle that Lin et al. (2002) also underscore with their concept that, instead of being informed by Inner Circle communities, pedagogy needs to be informed by local knowledge  (307).
• “EIL professionals should strive to alter language policies that serve to promote English learning only among the elite of the country.” If we agree that English as a global language can open doors for members of a global society, all members should have the opportunity to walk through those doors, not just those of higher economic backgrounds.
• “EIL curricula should include examples of the diversity of English varieties used today.” All varieties of English are equal, fluid, and hybrid.
• “EIL curricula need to exemplify L2-L2 interactions.” This is a good point, and another interesting revelation regarding EIL materials. More L2-L2 interactions occur in English than L1-L2 interactions. Materials need to reflect actuality.
• “Full recognition needs to be given to the other languages spoken by English speakers.” One of the narratives in Lin et al. (2002) discusses how learning English in her native country involved code-switching, that the instructor encouraged this practice. ELT professionals need to value other languages as a “plus” and not a “minus.” Code-switching is a valuable tool for language learners in learning/using English as well as in maintaining the students’ other languages.
• “EIL should be taught in a way that respects the local culture of learning.” The culture of learning in Inner Circle countries should not be imposed upon the ELT practices in other communities. There is no one “learning culture” that is “correct.”

Written later than Lin, et al. (2002), the chapter in McKay and Bokhorst-Heng (2008) does not use “TEGCOM” as a replacement for “TESOL.” Why not? And, how long until we see a more glocalized vision of TESOL in the theoretical literature? Not soon enough, as we all know how long it takes theory to trickle to the classroom. So, then, I propose it is up to us.

Variations of and in World Englishes, and a focus on accent with Lippi-Green

“How was your weekend?” I asked my sister.
“It was fine. We had to go out to Itasca,” she responded.

The way she dragged out the middle syllable of “Itasca” reminded me of something. She didn’t talk like that before she graduated from college. What was it?

Oh. She’d moved to the Chicago area to take a job in the suburbs. And she’d picked up what I then considered to be a … twang. A Chicago twang. Different from that of Wisconsin. Or MinnesOtah. Or the small rural area three hours south of Chicago, where we grew up.

Oddly, at the same time, she picked up a couple of behavioral and preferential quirks. No longer was she a country girl. And, once married a few years later, everything in her house had to be either black or white. Even the photos of her kids. That was her “style.”

I’ve refused to generalize and say that what I consider her accent is in some way related to her slightly-changed identity. But I wonder sometimes if her disdain for all things “south of I-80” except Monical’s Pizza is connected ever-so-subtly to her adopted pronunciation. Is this resistance? Is her adoption of a regional accent part of her shedding her rural-Illinois skin?

At any rate, I picked up on it quite quickly. Just as others do when they hear my voice.

“So, where are you from?” the bartender at the hotel in Hawaii asks me. Hmm. Do I not look American? In Italy, I expect to be viewed as a foreigner (I have to have a map. That always gives me away). But not in Hawaii.

And, yet, this week we read of accent, dialect, and language and learn that there was a competent meteorologist from Hawaii who did not get a job for which he was (almost over-)qualified because he spoke Hawai’ian Creole English (Ok, so Hawaii is in America, and it’s a type of English…where is the problem?? Wouldn’t people be able to comprehend when he said it would rain? Snow?).

Foregrounding Lippi-Green’s chapter on accent is our reading in McKay and Bokhorst-Heng that illustrates how linguistic varieties “live” on a micro-level. I use the word “live” because, as we’ve learned, that’s exactly what languages do: They are not static, they have movement, they morph and vary and fluctuate, depending on user, context, and interlocutor. We’ve discussed World Englishes as a concept already, but now we read of the norms and variations of those World Englishes (and between them).

Several different models of organizing ranges of varieties of language are given in the text; my favorite is Pakir’s (1991) as it seems to be the most adaptable as well as the one that makes the most sense in terms of all the variables. Two points, though, that McKay and Bokhorst-Heng make about these models bears repeating:
• What all of these interpretations attempt to do is to develop a model that describes and legitimizes a pluricentric view of English and one that moves away from any view of there being just one standard form against which all others are measured.
• …new Englishes cannot be characterized in terms of acquisitional inadequacy, or be judged by the norms of English in Inner Circle countries. (128)

The authors state then, in summary, that “The World Englishes paradigm thus stresses the pluricentric nature of English: as a result of its spread and contact with indigenous languages, English has acquired many centers from which norms and innovations are created” (128).

The authors’ motivation in making these points? To counter monolingual ideology, the implication that Standard English is something concrete, something other than an abstraction or an idea. Something that can be “acquired.”

An argument in support of a monolingual, “standard” English that is used as a benchmark for all Englishes is made by Randolph Quirk. As discussed in the text, Quirk felt that acceptance or condoning of variations of English would be detrimental to English as an international language. The “standard” needed to be upheld, according to his theory, or else all other Englishes would run amok and become unintelligible.

Countering this monolingual stance was Braj Kachru (this debate occurred in 1984, according to our text) who asserted that linguistic varieties were not only not detrimental to intelligibility but would yield an “educated variety” of English that would be highly intelligible across cultures.

McKay and Bokhost-Heng venture into pragmatics when discussing intelligibility and explain that, because communication is an interactional thing, we need to look at the three categories of interaction that are central to communication (as provided by Smith, 1992 in the text): intelligibility, comprehensibility, and interpretability, with interpretability being the most important part of the act. Thinking to the example of the Australian woman in a taxi driven by a Turkish man in Instanbul, we see that, indeed, we may be able to intelligibly understand the words, we may be able to comprehend the act or intent of the speech act, but unless we can interpret – or make sense of the cultural or linguistic loading of the message – we cannot really communicate.

Lippi-Green answered a question I’ve had since the beginning of this course (and probably before, but I didn’t really think about it): What is the difference between accent, dialect, and language? Lippi-Green insinuates that, really, there isn’t a difference; however, she sees value in using the term “accent” and so leaves it, operationalized as a way to talk about phonological differences among variations of a language.

Interestingly, her allegory of second-language acquisition to building a Sound House is includes space for Universal Grammar and the Critical Period Hypothesis, but it seems very simplistic (granted, for this article, there was no way she could cover the whole area of SLA). She does dismiss some SLA research that claims that there are plenty of adults who can build a new Sound House (not in the same way they built their first one, but they can build it to fool native speakers!). But I’m left wondering how this judge made this decision regarding Mr. Kahakua, and I’m wondering if – really – we are still THAT far away from

The worldliness of English, English in the world, and English language pedagogy

Alastair Pennycook states, “English language teachers…have been poorly served by a body of knowledge that fails to address the cultural and political implications of the spread of English” (54, English in the world/The world in English). This idea underlies the purpose of this week’s readings: To determine just how English teachers have been “poorly served” and to figure out how English teachers can themselves negotiate the cultural and political implications of teaching their subject matter and the teaching methods/angles they employ.

McKay and Bokhorst-Heng’s Chapter 4 discusses the various varieties of both language planning and language politicking around the world. While these two terms – language planning and language policy – are defined differently, they are inextricably linked. Language planning, according to the text, “involves things like making decisions about the status of a language, determining a new language-in-education policy, and coining a new word” (89-90). Language policy, on the other hand, involves the linguistic, political, and social goals that course through the language planning of an entity (89). This is the same language policy concept that takes place in families, albeit on a much smaller scale than the language politicking that McKay and Bokhorst-Heng call “worldly.” We read a bit about family language policies in Dr. Kang’s research article, and we read more about it in the article by King and Fogle (2008).

McKay and Bokhorst-Heng discuss language policies on a global scale. For example, they illustrate how people in Singapore have been encouraged to become bilingual because of the international capital English can help one obtain, but the Singlish variety is denounced as inappropriate. The result, according to the authors, is that this is a form of bilingualism “that in fact tends to reinforce ethnic boundaries, with students going to segregated mother tongue classes (each with their own curriculum, developed in isolation of each other), rather than unify the different ethnic communities” (115). The situation in Singapore occurs due to a tension between national identity and internationalism (105). The language politicking is even evident in pop culture, when the Prime Minister quietly asked the producers of a sitcom to send the main character (who spoke Singlish on the program) to English school. Coincidentally, the Ministry of Education also sent 8000 teachers to school “for remedial English lessons” (107) so that these educators could help the youth learn to speak better English.

In the U.S., this division has occurred and is still occurring, just as in Singapore. The English-only movement, underscored by language policies that promote English over other languages, trickles into the classroom in the form of ideology that promotes English as the main, desired language and all other languages as having little value (non-standard varieties are “othered”). McKay and Bokhorst-Heng provide as one example the politicking in California and note four principles inherent in the CA language debates, which McKay and Bokhorst-Heng state “are echoed around the world where English is taught” (100):

1) “language was seen as a common bond unifying the nation”
2) “language was seen as a key to personal and economic success”
3) “language was viewed as a symbol of one’s ethnic identity” and
4) “language was viewed as a symbol of nationhood and good citizenship” (100).

These language policies – and the tensions underlying them – inevitably bleed into English classrooms, especially bilingual classrooms and programs. McKay and Bokhorst-Heng illustrate this relationship in the discussion of the Ebonics debate, predominantly in the Oakland School District in California in the 1990s. Faced with trying to teach students who spoke a non-standard variety of English outside of school (as well as inside school), the Board asked that Ebonics be considered a legitimate dialect. If Ebonics was viewed as a legitimate language, then the district could obtain funding for bilingual education; the Board recognized that language and school performance were strongly linked.

What does all of this have to do with teaching? Especially ESL and bilingual education? McKay and Bokhorst-Heng note “three main ways in which the designation of an official language has consequences for language learning and teaching: a) the insight the destination provides into prevalent social attitudes toward particular languages; b) the effect of approved language policies on the stated language-in-education policy; and c) the setting of linguistic standards” (114).

McKay and Bokhorst-Heng cite several reasonable, “Yes!”-producing, ideas.
• First, they cite Delpit (1998) as wondering if it is possible “to embrace both realities in classroom instruction – the reality that Ebonics, the linguistic form a student brings to school, is intimately connected with their loved ones, community and personal identity, and the reality that students who do not have access to the politically and socially popular linguistic form of Standard English are less likely to succeed economically than those who do?” (111)
• The idea of “bidialectism”: Instead of teachers trying to prevent students from using non-standard varieties in the classroom, they view these non-standard varieties as part of students’ linguistic “code”. Students are allowed to use their chosen varieties, but the standard variety is encouraged in the classroom and on school work (especially written work). McKay and Bokhorst-Heng state, “Rather than a ‘fix-something-that-was-wrong’ approach, it seeks to add to the funds of knowledge that student come with to the classroom” (116). Having mastery over other languages, dialects, and varieties is viewed as additive and beneficial.
• McKay and Bokhorst-Heng cite Kramer-Dahl (2003) as taking this idea of bidialectism even further to  an appreciation of dialect difference (117). This approach, then, is one that recognizes “the worldliness of language and a pedagogy of critical language awareness” (117).
• This idea of bilingualism as “additive” and “beneficial” is evident in the article by King and Fogle (2008) and illustrated just how much of a push toward bilingualism – or away from, or toward with language inequalities – is a matter of perspective and ideology. King and Fogle’s article looks at the impact on family language practices (parents choosing to raise bilingual children) by public discourse, extended family attitudes, and cultural identity

And, Pennycook (as many others do) calls for critical awareness as well as involvement from language teachers:

Thus, as applied linguists and English language teachers we should become political actors engaged in a critical pedagogical project to use English to oppose the dominant discourses of the West and to help the articulation of counter-discourses in English. At the very least, intimately involved as we are with the spread of English, we should be acutely aware of the implications of this spread for the reproduction and production of global inequalities.” (55)

WE, diglossia, and practical high school classroom plans for critical awareness

McKay and Borkhorst-Heng’s Chapter 3 describes the various roles of English as an International Language within countries with diglossia and bilingualism and countries without. McKay and Borkhorst-Heng define diglossia as the state of “a community where two or more varieties of the same language have different roles to play in society” (60). The authors use the example of Singapore English to describe classic diglossia. Singapore Standard English (SSE) functions as the formal (or high, H) language while another variety of Singapore English – Singapore Colloquial English – functions as the informal (or low, L) variety. The key here, according to the authors, is the functionality of each of the dialects (60). Thus, the dialects have specific rhetorical functions, depending on the situation. In contrast, communities with no diglossia have bilingualism without any guidelines (overt or covert) distinguishing the rhetorical use of the dialects/varieties.

McKay and Borkhorst-Heng juxtapose the sociohistorical backgrounds, past and current roles of EIL, and problems inherent with the various uses of EIL of both of the prior categories (bilingual contries with diglossia vs. bilingual countries without diglossia). Then, they compare the situations in South Africa with those in India (bilingualism with diglossia), and they compare the situations in the United States with those in Britain (bilingualism without diglossia).

The main picture is a complicated one. The situation and way of dealing with languages in India differs from the methods in South Africa. Both countries have colonized histories, making English a language introduced to (forced upon) the community members. In India, the function of English was to supply the elite with a way to communicate with the colonizers. Now, it is a source of monetary capital, as India is a leading source of off-shore operations for many companies (my sister has to schedule conference calls at odd hours because some of the computer systems work at her company is now handled by people in India). McKay and Borkhorst-Heng state, “In broad strokes, the overriding incentive for the learning of English in diglossic multilingual societies is the very status of English as the H-language, and its use in H-domains” (63). India, however, has attempted to instill a sense of linguistic balance with its Three Language Formula (65). Likewise, South Africa instituted its Language in Education Policy to help ensure that all South Africans would become bilingual.

These efforts, while well-intentioned it seems, also furthered an ideology of English as an “Aladdin’s lamp”:  “Indians secretly believe, if not openly say, that competence in English makes a considerable difference in their career prospects…” (Gupta 1995 qtd. in McKay and Borkhorst-Heng 67). The belief in the importance of learning English to further one’s social/class standing, increase income and opportunities, etc. not only places English on a pedestal in the hierarchy of languages, but this belief also aids in the demise of local varieties/languages by not valuing the mother tongue as EIL is valued. Languages are disappearing as a result of the placement of EIL in a supreme position among languages. For instance, the use of Zulu in the South African classroom is discouraged or prohibited (71).

But while parents and officials may demand education in English, they don’t necessarily want English-only policies (71). And, the English the students are exposed to or taught in the classroom does not have as its outcome speaking fluency; rather, the students are often taught grammar or literature. Thus, they cannot utilize their English learning for what they need it for (job interviews are mentioned on p. 69); they are not equipped to succeed. Yet, as the authors contend, the students “nonetheless continued to maintain belief that these classes would somehow improve their social status and life chances” (69). What a frustrating situation: A post-colonial community attempts to utilize a tool used to colonize them, and ironically end up not well equipped at all to use that tool to improve their situation (as they would see it). McKay and Borkhorst-Heng state that the current learners of EIL “do not necessarily want to learn or internalize the cultural norms of native speakers of English from the Inner Circle. Rather, they want to learn English for very particular purposes, to gain access to the benefits that knowledge of English brings” (70). Yet, not every is gaining that access.

Continuing concerns with these two bilingual diaglossic communities:
• not all members have equal access to learning/practicing/participating in English
• code-switching in the South African classroom, for example, is not necessarily used to maintain or support the mother tongue (for example, Zulu), but it is used primarily to learn English.
• English input may include colonial overtones in post-colonial communities
• the situation remains complicated, as policies enacted to limit language inequalities have little effect. McKay and Borkhorst-Heng state, “It is not a story of English imperialism and the unstoppable killer effect of global English. Rather, it is a story of the mediations between languages and their ecologies, and of the negotiation of power relationships between languages” (74).

The situation in bilingual countries without diglossia (such as the United states and Britain, as examples in this text) is complicated, yet it seems to me as if there is more room – more agency – to make the changes necessary to abolish harmful language ideologies. McKay and Borkhorst-Heng contend that the overriding goal of these countries – despite the different histories and policies – is to make their communities monolingual.  The authors cite “a strong economic interest in Britain to promote the hegemony of English” (75) and the desire in the U.S. for bilingual programs to serve as transition programs which would “promote rapid transition to English” (77).

The authors list citizenship and social integration as well as socioeconomic factors as motivations for learners to acquire English in these two countries. When it comes to English input, the question arises of whether to mainstream ELLs or to pull them out to separate classrooms. McKay and Borkhorst-Heng use Harklau’s study and findings as support that mainstreaming provides more positive, authentic input for language learners, but that the instruction available is often lacking as teachers are not often trained to deal with the great diversity of languages in the mainstream classroom. The language diversity in the classroom, the authors point out, “is commonly seen as a temporary barrier to ‘real’ learning” (81).

Some continuing concerns/complexities:
• the diminishing number of Equal Education Opportunity programs (82)
• the pressure on districts to raise AYP thresholds due to the NCLB (which, the authors note, could have been a way to increase opportunities for ELs but instead took time and resources away from EL programs). Farr and Song (2011) also discuss NCLB, specifically how the foundational policies can be interpreted in two very different ways (655).

Farr and Song (2011) demonstrate how beliefs and political orientations can inform language policies. The goal of this article is to raise awareness, especially among teachers, so that they can “negotiate language policies in their local contexts in ways that best serve their multilingual learners” (651). This, to me, is perhaps the best way to attack the problem of damaging language policies that are informed by ignorant language ideologies. Attempting an overhaul from the top-down is a huge task, and raising awareness so that action can be taken at the local level is an easier task to undertake (“easier” is a relative term, of course). Farr and Song insist that “the negotiation between top-down and bottom-up processes in the implementation of language policy, in fact, is both common and necessary in adjusting policies for different parts of society and groups of people” (655).

Kubota and Ward (2000) had the same idea in their article in The English Journal: Equip high school English teachers to raise critical awareness among their students of the issue of language diversity. Instilling damaging (or even neutral, at times) ideologies in the public school system is questionable ethically; however, instilling critical awareness using the public school forum is, essentially, one of the purposes of public education. Kudos to Kubota and Ward for providing a detailed, day-by-day unit plan on raising awareness of language diversity. I know as a former high school English teacher, time is short and a unit plan like this takes time to design; resources like The English Journal are invaluable and help teachers stay current with theory and methods.

Farr and Song (2011) reiterate this bottom-up action: “When language education policies conflict with research findings on language learning, bottom-up initiatives seomtimes pressure to alter the policy” (659).  The authors cite as examples of grass-roots efforts “Multilingual Chicago” and the notion of “English Plus” as initiatives to maintain mother-tongue varieties and promote true bilingualism (resisting English-only practices) (659).

These readings created more chaos that understanding in my mind regarding language policy. McKay-Borkhorst-Heng’s chapter especially complicated WE and multilingualism. What I did get from the readings is a better awareness and an example of how to raise awareness among high school students in countries that have bilingualism without diglossia (the U.S.). While these global issues seem overwhelmingly complex (who among us is on his/her way to South Africa with all of the answers?), Farr and Song as well as Kubota and Ward charge us as educators:

Teachers produce, affirm and/or disconfirm language policies every day – when they allow or disallow the use of one language or variety rather than another, when they choose to use a particular variety of a language to communicate with their students, when they prefer a certain structure over another in the curriculum, when they show their lack of knowledge about certain languages or varieties, etc. (Farr and Song, 2011, p. 660).

The future of our local and global society depends on human communication across cultural borders. Younger generations must become aware of linguistic diversity and must take communicative responsibility in intercultural interaction. (Kubota and Ward, 2000, 86)


(I really want to close with those two powerful paragraphs, but I have two questions regarding Farr and Song’s statements: How can I as an individual choose a certain variety of a language to communicate with my students? My variety is my variety. Is the intent that I learn a different variety in which to communicate?

My second question is related: There are so many languages and varieties. How do I have adequate and applicable knowledge of all varieties, as implied in the last sentence?)