Race

While interpreting the readings for this week I was able to gain a more in depth understanding of different concepts that are tied to TESOL.  For example, I had considered how complex race is and how closely tied to ethnicity, culture and religion it is.  It was interesting to read about how the concept of race has changed over time.  Kubota and Lin point out how the term “race” was a development of science in the late 18^th century which referred to biological categories of human beings.  They also discuss the more contemporary definition of race and how it has been increasingly replaced by the notion of cultural differences and how it used as a category to distinguish groups based on sociocultural characteristics.  This got me thinking about how teachers and peers may misinterpret the term race and use it to categorize or stereotype their students and classmates. This could in turn be detrimental to students’ identity formation, education, and just overall self esteem.  Kumaravadivelu writes about cultural stereotypes in TESOL, so I thought these two articles tied well together.  Kumaravadivelu’s main focus is on Asian students and the three most common stereotypes that exist among them.  I think that people are always so quick to assume that these specific types of classroom behaviors are confined solely to Asian students, however; they are greatly mistaken.  Kumaravadivelu’s research suggests that passivisity and lack of participation in class is common among all second language learners (or any student for that matter) due to low language proficiency, and it is not attributed to culture.  Second Language Learners might be afraid to participate or speak in class because he or she is not confident in his or her speaking abilities and is afraid of getting teased by other students.  Kumaravadivelu sites Atkinson’s argument that, “critical thinking is a special characteristic of the American upper and middle classes.”  Atkinson also cautions against teaching critical thinking to international and language minority students because he doubts whether they will even benefit from education.  I personally do not understand how this so called argument even makes sense.  In other words, I don’t see how this ignorant statement can be backed by statistics and research.  Ibrahim’s article really brings to light the influences behind identity formation among black youth.  Ibrahim’s research findings show that black youth can in fact have a marginalized linguistic norm (Black English as a second language) as a target language.  Ibrahim explores the reasons as to why these youth would chose the margin as a target.  The implications conclude that in choosing that marginalized language norm as a target language it gives them a sense of investment and contributes to the identity formation process.  I think it is important for teachers to identify and understand sites in which students invest their identities and desires.  Ibrahim suggests that teachers must also develop materials that engage students’ raced, classed, gendered, sexualized, and ablled identities.  Overall, each article had insightful research, arguments, and information to offer.