Language and Culture Pedagogy: From a National to a Transnational Paradigm
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Language and Culture Pedagogy: From a National to a Transnational Paradigm
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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781853599590 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Multilingual Matters Ltd. |
| Publication date: | 03/12/2007 |
| Series: | Languages for Intercultural Communication and Education , #14 |
| Pages: | 288 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.70(w) x 8.10(h) x 0.70(d) |
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CHAPTER 1
Modern Language Studies: Language, Culture, Nation
Introduction
Today, modern language studies take place in a world increasingly influenced by internationalisation and globalisation. Although the main focus of this book is foreign-language studies and foreign-language teaching, it has to be said that all language studies, whether the language in question is a first or second language, a foreign language or a community/heritage language, are social and cultural practices embedded in comprehensive and potentially global processes: transnational communication and migration, transnational cooperation of many types and at many levels, etc.
So language and culture pedagogy must learn to understand their field of reference from a transnational and global perspective. Language teaching can no longer make do with focusing on the target language and target countries – and on cultures as territorially defined phenomena. This applies not only to English as the most widespread international language at present but also to teaching in all languages, no matter how many native speakers there are. Apart from developing the students' communicative (dialogic) competence in the target language, language teaching ought also as far as possible to enable students to develop into multilingually and multiculturally aware world citizens.
This is not synonymous with ceasing to take an interest in national and ethnic identities. Language teaching can deal with many kinds of identities, including national and ethnic ones, but it has to understand them as processes that take place between particular players under particular historical and geographical circumstances in multicultural communities that form and develop across existing national boundaries. Modern language studies therefore have to break with the traditional national paradigm and start to define a transnational paradigm that places language teaching in a transnational and global context.
A prerequisite for making such a change is that language subjects also break with the traditional view that 'language' and 'culture' constitute an inseparable whole, and that language teaching must therefore work for maximum integration between teaching the target language and teaching in the target language culture (or, in other words, culture and society in the target language countries). Language subjects must work on the theory that the relation between language and culture is complex and multidimensional, and that linguistic practice and other cultural practice are parts of more or less comprehensive processes – also transnational and potentially global processes.
The aim of this book
The aim of this book is to establish a basis for a change from a national to a transnational paradigm in language and culture pedagogy. The most fruitful point of departure for such an analysis is theoretical culture pedagogy, i.e. the discipline that deals with the cultural dimension of language teaching, primarily understood as the development of insight into culture and society in the target-language countries. It is precisely in this discipline that many statements can be found concerning the relation between language and culture, and that between language teaching and culture teaching. At the same time, it is a discipline that has dealt to an astonishingly limited extent with the question of the national. When the analysis of culture pedagogy has been completed, I will, however, return to language and culture pedagogy as a whole, in order to retain the inner cohesion of the field.
The book comprises two sections: firstly, there is a critical analysis of the international culture pedagogy discourse concerning language, culture and nation since the 1880s, where it had its beginnings in the newly constituted German Reich. In the analysis, I give an account of a number of the most characteristic positions on the relation between language, culture and nation. This is the first time an attempt has been made to present culture pedagogy as a whole – both geographically and historically – and in a discussion of the possible transition from a national to a transnational paradigm it is important to know how strongly the national paradigm has influenced the culture pedagogy discourse in various ways, depending on such features as theoretical academic position and national background.
Secondly, I present the theory of the multi dimensional relationship between language and culture in a transnational and global perspective (cf. Risager, 2003 and 2006), and I formulate a number of proposals for a new transnational paradigm that deals with how one can work in language teaching with transnational connections and subnational localisations. Finally, I list 10 competence areas as comprising the intercultural competence of the world citizen, including languacultural, interpretative and ethnographic competences as well as knowledge of the world.
A transnational language and culture pedagogy must see itself as being interdisciplinary and thereby be interested in language, culture, society and the individual (the subject). This means that, apart from dealing with the complex relation between language and culture, it also deals with the social organisation of language and culture in a broad sense: national and transnational social structures and processes, national and international political relations, etc. It is thus also interested in national and ethnic issues, not only in the sense of national and ethnic communities, identities and discourses but also the societal and political structures that form frameworks and conditions for identity constructions. It places the national and the ethnic in a larger global perspective, and deals with the multilingual and multicultural subject as a world citizen.
This position can be termed postnational and postethnic, i.e. it does not operate with 'the national' and 'the ethnic' as essentialistic entities but as composite historical constructions that are constantly changing their nature by virtue of players' constant strategic use of them. That I in the following prefer nevertheless to use the concept of 'transnational' rather than 'postnational' is because I feel that the concept of 'transnational' points more specifically to processes in the real world, at both micro- and macro-level, including transnational migration flows and transnational flows of information in the media and the Internet. It is important to focus on these flows in order to reach an understanding of the complex relationship between language and culture, or, in other words, between linguistic practice and other forms of cultural practice. Later in this chapter, I will deal in more detail with this conception – and also return to the subject in Chapter 7.
The national paradigm in language studies is not that old
Modern language studies do not have to be nationally shaped. The present national shaping took place in a particular historical period, in connection with the establishment of nations in Europe and the rest of the world, particularly in the course of the 19th and 20th centuries. Not until the latter half of the 19th century did language subjects acquire the aim of conveying a uniform image of the various national states, of the language, the literature, the country and the people.
The national formation of language subjects becomes clear when compared with how they were conceived in the previous period. Before the national idea had a profound impact on language studies, they were more universal and encyclopaedic in orientation. For example, the philosopher and educationalist J.A. Comenius (1592–1670) wrote his Latin primer Janua linguarum reserata (The Messe of Tongues) (1649) with an encyclopaedic content divided into 100 chapters – about the elements, the earth, the body, the economy, grammar, music, geography, history and angels. It was extremely popular, was translated into several languages and also appeared in multilingual editions with reading passages divided into, for example, a Latin, Greek and French column. Another example of this exceptionally broad thematic approach is the Danish reader by Peter Hjort: Den Danske Børneven. En Læsebog for Borger- og Almue-Skoler [The Danish Children's Friend. A Reader for Primary and Board Schools] (sixth edition 1852), which is a reader designed for teaching Danish as a first language. It contains many reading passages of a slightly more practical nature, although still broad and encyclopaedic, e.g. about the globe and its surface, trees, Africa, Peter the Great, law and order and the human soul (cf. Risager, 2003; Risager, 2006; Hüllen, 2005).
The language subjects, however, gradually became nationalised and included in the general educating of populations towards a nationally structured view of the world. Ageographical division of labour developed between the language subjects which involved a narrowing and focusing with regard to content: the subject English looked towards England, the English and the English language; the subject French looked towards France, the French and the French language, etc.
Culture Pedagogy: A Presentation
Culture pedagogy arose as a subject for debate and theoretical reflection in the last decades of the 19th century. Language teaching has admittedly always had a cultural dimension in terms of content, either universal/ encyclopaedic or national. Reading pieces have been studied that have been written for the occasion, or taken from unadapted literature, and conversational exercises have been constructed on the basis of conversational examples and translated texts – some with a cohesive content, others strongly fragmented in character ('compositional exercises') (cf. the critical presentation in Jespersen, 1901). The whole philological tradition represents a relatively integrated approach to language, texts and history, if the teaching of grammar at elementary level is excluded (cf. Svanholt, 1968).
But not until the last decades of the 19th century did an interest develop in certain places in parts of the content of language teaching that go beyond literary education as such, and from the 1960s onwards culture pedagogy began to crystallise out as a more or less independent discipline. Culture pedagogy first arose, then, in the national phase of the history of language teaching. Language pedagogy, on the other hand, has roots that stretch back at least as far as 500 BC (Kelly, 1969).
Language pedagogy and culture pedagogy did not, however, have much to do with each other until the 1990s, when it was possible to see signs of a burgeoning awareness of each other's work and perspectives – in some respects also a rapprochement, especially under the banner of 'intercultural learning'. The expression 'language and culture pedagogy' captures precisely the point that the theoretical field is at one and the same time a unity and a duality.
The plethora of terminology
There are many terms for what I here refer to as culture pedagogy. In English, the title can, for example, be 'background studies' (now being abandoned) or 'cultural studies' (UK) or 'the teaching of culture' (US), in German Landeskunde, Kulturkunde (both more or less abandoned) or in recent years: interkulturelles Lernen, in French civilisation, culture étrangère or l'interculturel, in Russian stranovedenie, in Swedish formerly realia and kulturorientering, now more usually interkulturell förståelse, in Danish kulturpædagogik or kulturforståelse, in Norwegian kulturkunnskap, etc. This is by no means an exhaustive list, simply examples. The plethora of terminology reflects the difficulties in conceptualising the area and is also an expression of the diversity of national traditions. It would seem, however, that a common title is beginning to establish itself around 'the intercultural'.
Already at this early juncture, I must point out that 'culture pedagogy' is a category that 'pulls', to use an expression from the world of libraries: all approaches that in some way or other have cultural relevance I call 'culture pedagogical', even though their representatives might not do so themselves. Something similar applies to my use of the word 'culture educationalist' for theorists in the field.
The primary focus of culture pedagogy: General foreign and second language teaching
Culture pedagogy normally refers to language teaching with a general purpose, since it is here that 'language and culture' occur as a combined object for teaching. That language teaching with a general purpose ought to deal with both language and culture is something about which a broad consensus has gradually been established in most of the world, though more in theory (statements of intent) than in practice. It is mostly taken to mean that language teaching is to include teaching in cultural and social relations in the target-language countries. General language teaching thus has a dual syllabus. It is the basis for the fundamental pedagogical challenge of language teaching, i.e. the integration between the linguistic and the cultural dimension.
Furthermore, culture pedagogy has traditionally focused on foreign-and second-language teaching, with the main emphasis on foreign-language teaching. i.e. the teaching of languages that are primarily spoken in other countries than the country in which the teaching takes place. In both forms of teaching, great demands are made on the teacher to be a generalist who has an overview of the entire subject area, including language, literature, culture and society. On the other hand, teaching in the first language (as majority or official language) normally has a narrower linguistic–literary aim, since this teaching is supplemented by other subjects with special responsibility for (national) history, geography, social studies, etc. That foreign- rather than second-language teaching has been the main focus has presumably something to do with the fact that foreign-language teaching has the longest and most institutionalised history in the school systems. As far as teaching in the first language when it is a minority language (community/heritage language) is concerned, there has not been, as far as I know, any real theoretical debate or research on the cultural dimension.
As regards the level of teaching, culture pedagogy has gradually been introduced at all levels, from primary education to education and independent cultural learning in higher education.
Literature pedagogy as culture pedagogy
I do not intend to deal with the more specialised form of literature pedagogy that has an academic study of literature as its point of departure and focuses on such areas as literary critical competence and the development of insight into trends of literary history. When I include teaching by means of fictional literature, it is when thinking of the relevance of working with literature for linguistic and cultural learning, including the development of the ability to empathise with various cultural and societal conditions and undertake a shift of perspective between various types of experience.
In the language and culture pedagogy context, the work with written and oral forms of literature is an important portal to what some people refer to as 'foreign experiences': other ways of living, other ways of seeing the world, other perceptions, perspectives and states of mind. At the same time, it is also an important means for becoming aware of the fact that other people in other cultural, social and historical contexts can have universally human experiences that are very similar to one's own. Reading literature and literature-pedagogical activities can help learners apprehend differences and similarities.
I intend to operate with an open non-hierarchical concept of literature, as in the Cultural Studies tradition. That means that 'literature' for me refers to both high brow and low brow cultural forms (novellas, feature films, music videos, jokes, etc.). It also means that I do not sharply distinguish between fiction and non-fiction, but am of the opinion that it is best to operate with a continuum between relatively objective non-fiction via various hybrid forms ('faction', etc.) to undisputable fiction with a more or less realistic content.
(Continues…)
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Copyright © 2007 Karen Risager.
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Table of Contents
1. Modern Language Studies: Language, Culture, Nation2. Culture Pedagogy until the 1960s
3. Culture Pedagogy in the 1970s - Knowledge of Society
4. Culture Pedagogy in the 1980s - The Marriage of Language and Culture
5. Culture Pedagogy in the 1990s - Internationalisation and the Intercultural
6. Culture Pedagogy Today - Questioning of the National Paradigm
7. Language and Culture: The Structure of the Complexity
8. Towards a Transnational Language and Culture Pedagogy
9. The Intercultural Competence of the World Citizen
References
Subject Index
Name Index