Critical Perspectives on Language Education: Australia and the Asia Pacific

ISBN-13: 9783319061849 / Angielski / Twarda / 2014 / 231 str.

Katie Dunworth; Grace Zhang

Opis

The studies in this volume investigate how multilingual education involves a critical engagement with questions of identity and culture, and a movement towards new ways of being and belonging. It addresses previously under-explored issues, in particular the integration of theories like 'thirdness', and practices of language education and maintenance with relevance to the Asia-Pacific region. The analyses reveal the delicate balance of interests of all stakeholders and offer detailed insights into the reality of multilingual education, with specific examples of Chinese, English, Japanese and Tamil. In a globalised world, effective language education has become increasingly important, and the studies presented here have the potential to inform and advance evidence-based multilingual education through adding important dimensions of theoretical exploration and refreshing empirical resources.

Recenzje

"This book, which brings together several perspectives on language education, mostly from Western Australia, consists of eleven chapters. ... this volume makes a useful addition to the scholarship about language education. Some of the chapters will be of particular interest to scholars interested in critical education, language contact and language maintenance." (Achilleas I. Kostoulas, The Linguist List, July, 2015)

Spis treści

Chapter 1: Introduction By Katie Dunworth and Grace Zhang.- Chapter 2: Occupying the ‘Third Space’: Perspectives and Experiences of Asian English Language Teachers By Toni Dobinson.- Chapter 3: Changing Perspectives of Literacy, Identity and Motivation: Implications for Language Education By Paul Mercieca.- Chapter 4: Constructing Meaning from the Unfamiliar: Implications for Critical Intercultural Education By Ilan Zagoria.- Chapter 5: Can Teachers Know Learners’ Minds? Teacher Empathy and Learner Body Language in English Language Teaching By Maggie McAlinden.- Chapter 6: Code-switching and Indigenous Workplace Learning: Cross-cultural Competence Training or Cultural Assimilation? By Ellen Grote, Rhonda Oliver and Judith Rochecouste.- Chapter 7: The Retention of Year 11/12 Chinese in Australian Schools: A Relevance Theory Perspective By Grace Zhang and Qian Gong.- CHAPTER 8: Towards the Establishment of a WACE Examination in Japanese as a Heritage Language: Critical Perspectives By Hiroshi Hasegawa.- Chapter 9: A Place for Second Generation Japanese Speaking Children in Perth: Can they Maintain Japanese as a Community Language? By Kyoko Kawasaki.- CHAPTER 10: Tamil Language in Multilingual Singapore: Key Issues in Teaching and Maintaining a Minority Language By Rajeni Rajan.- Chapter 11: Functional English and Chinese as Mediums of Instruction in a Higher Institution in Hong Kong By Zhichang Xu.- Subject index.

Blurb

The studies in this volume investigate how multilingual education involves a critical engagement with questions of identity and culture, and a movement towards new ways of being and belonging. It addresses previously under-explored issues, in particular the integration of theories like ‘thirdness’, and practices of language education and maintenance with relevance to the Asia-Pacific region. The analyses reveal the delicate balance of interests of all stakeholders and offer detailed insights into the reality of multilingual education, with specific examples of Chinese, English, Japanese and Tamil. In a globalised world, effective language education has become increasingly important, and the studies presented here have the potential to inform and advance evidence-based multilingual education through adding important dimensions of theoretical exploration and fresh empirical resources.

In learning a second language, neither do you fully accommodate yourself to the target culture nor merely stick to your original self. Rather, you engage in negotiations to create your new identities in “the third place.” Critical Perspectives on Language Education explores the current problems of multilingual education from this new angle, with concrete examples from the Asia-Pacific region. This volume provides a number of valuable insights both for educational policies and pedagogical practice in the face of the highly dynamic and fluid nature of cross-cultural interact

ions today.

Nobuyuki Hino, Osaka University, Japan