Responding to Silence FOR FURTHER REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION
المؤلف:
Tara Goldstein
المصدر:
Teaching and Learning in a Multilingual School
الجزء والصفحة:
P78-C4
2025-09-27
250
Responding to Silence
FOR FURTHER REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION
Unearthing and Deconstructing Stereotypes Around Varieties of English. Anne Yee believes that silence can be a sign of insecurity and that students who do not speak English as their primary language sometimes worry about others laughing about their accents. In chapter 5 of her book, English With an Accent: Language, Ideology and Discrimination in the United States, Rosina Lippi-Green unearths and deconstructs the way Disney animated films such as Three Little Pigs, Aladdin, and The Lion King teach children to discriminate against other people on the basis of the way they speak. Listening to one of these animated films with critical ears helps us understand what we have learned about people who speak different varieties of English or English with different accents. After renting or borrowing a copy of The Lion King from a video store or library, analyze the different varieties of English each animal character speaks. Which characters speak standard American English? Which characters speak with a British accent? Which speak a variety of Black Language/Ebonics? Link the different ways the characters speak to the different characteristics they portray in the film. For example, which varieties of English are associated with intelligence, strength, bravery, and self-reliance? Which are associated with weakness, foolishness, and dependence? Thinking about the different varieties of English the students in your own classes speak, what kinds of messages about the ways your students speak have you and your students absorbed? How are you and your students perpetuating and reinforcing these negative messages? How can you both begin to challenge them?
The Myth of the Non-Accent: Personal Reflection. As far as linguists are concerned, it is not possible for adults to substitute one accent for another consistently and in a permanent way.1 Yet, as Rosina Lippi-Green explains in chapter 2 of her book, English With an Accent, many people believe that if we only try hard enough, we can acquire a perfect language, one that is clean, pure, and free of variation. They also believe that language that is not perfect does not have to be accepted. Such beliefs are problematic as they can lead to people using accents to discriminate. For example, Lippi-Green tells us about the court case of James Kahakua, a Hawaiian meteorologist with 20 years of experience and considerable educational background, who applied for a promotion, which required that he read prepared weather reports on the radio. Mr. Kahakua was not given this promotion, because as a bilingual speaker of English-Hawaiian Creole English (HCE) (often referred to, mistakenly, as Hawaiian Pidgin), he had a Hawaiian accent. Mr. Kahakua sued his employer under Title VII of the American Civil Rights Act, on the basis of language traits linked to national origin. He lost his case because the judge, who was not a native of Hawaii, believed that it was reasonable to require that radio announcers speak "Standard English." The speech pathologist who testified on behalf of the employer gave the judge ammunition when she testified that "Pidgin can be controlled" and suggested that Mr. Kahakua seek professional help to lessen his "handicap."2 Thinking back on your own personal experiences and those of family members and friends, in what ways did particular ways of speaking impact on opportunities that were available to you? Have you or others you know ever been discriminated against on the basis of accent and dialect?
Developing Communicative Competence and Confidence: Professional Reflection. Rosina Lippi-Green reminds us that accents have little to do with what is generally called "communicative competence" or the ability to effectively use and interpret language in a wide variety of contexts. She provides us with a list of ESL speakers who never lost their accents, but have demonstrated that they can use English in effective ways. This group includes such public and political figures as Corazon Aquino, Benazir Bhutto, Cesar Chavez, Joseph Conrad, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, and Henry Kissinger. As teachers working in multilingual classrooms, many of our students will speak English with a variety of accents. How can we assist our students to develop the communicative competence and confidence they need to thrive in a world that sometimes discriminates against the ways people speak?
Performing and Engaging With Silence. During an Australian reading of the play Hong Kong, Canada (included in Appendix A), the student who played the character of Carol left the classroom in the middle of the reading because she knew that she did not have to speak for the rest of the play. She returned before the reading ended, and in the discussion that followed, revealed that she had felt excluded from the story of the play because she only spoke in one of the 16 scenes. She also said this feeling of exclusion was followed by a feeling of alienation from the others in the group who were actively engaged in performing the story of Hong Kong, Canada. Educated in an Australian school, the student playing Carol associated speech with agency and being part of the story and silence with absence from the story. However, as Asian-American scholar King-Kok Cheung writes, some modes of silence, such as attentive silence, can be empowering. Attentive silence, which demonstrates a quiet understanding is the antithesis of passivity and absence. At the same time, Cheung argues that all modes of silence can fluctuate between being enabling or debilitating. Looking back at the scenes in which Carol appears, but does not speak, discuss the mode or tonality of silence (stoic, protective, attentive, inhibitive and/or oppressive) with which Carol is performing or engaging. Is her performance or engagement with silence in the scene enabling or debilitating?
Speaking English and Acting White. In the commentary, Charles associated English with being "Whitewashed." In the play Hong Kong, Canada Sam accuses Wendy of "acting White" when he finds out that she has made a personal decision to only use English at school. In linking speaking English to acting White, Sam points to the way the dominance of Whiteness and English intersect to produce a culture of dominance that some high school students and their parents feel is in their best interest to comply with. Wendy's compliance makes Sam very angry. Why? How might we understand Sam's anger?
1 See Lippi-Green (1997) for further discussion of the myth of nonaccent.
2 See Lippi-Green (1997, pp. 44 - 45) for a fuller discussion of this case.
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