Group 4 Language Blog

A major theme that I noticed in this reading is that other languages are thought to pose a threat to English language. Many opponents of bilingualism seem to interpret it as the major use of a language other than English, rather than the use of two languages, and they look down at those who are bilingual. What so many people don't understand is that, as research shows, learning in your native language shows rapid advantages when switching to the “standard” language. Also, knowing more languages makes you stronger in your native language, especially a language like English, one that borrows from other languages so readily. To prove the advantages of bilingualism, it is helpful to give examples of people who are actually bilingual: those who can choose one of two languages depending on the appropriateness of the situation, along with the evidence of increased test scores and enhanced self-esteem of bilingual children. Advantages include, immigrants who, as we read, are eager to learn and use English, but also want to maintain their ethnicity and own language.

In terms of testing, it is stated on page 220 that “Because many aspects of intelligence are learned or mediated through specific cultural experiences…it is impossible to devise a test of intelligence which is context-free and culture-independent.” My question here is then, how can we determine an individual’s intelligence while avoiding cultural bias for those who are bilingual? And when discussing bilingual education, why is it that foreign language education in the world’s major languages is seen as valuable while bilingual education for minority students is equated with poverty? Why should one be above the other? It seems to me that racism may be part of that answer.

In the article, Language in Society, I found the section about language differences in the classroom interesting. The powerful influence of school over its young pupils is discussed in the beginning of the article. While reading this article, I was shocked at how important a role that school has on our learning of language and the impact of language on our overall education. The section which discusses language differences in the classroom really got me thinking about how impacting a teacher’s relationship with a student could be. I find it exceedingly frustrating that many teachers choose to treat students differently, as he or she did in the example. Teachers are supposed to be fair and want to help all students learn. I feel that in many of the examples within the article, teachers haven’t been fair to all students. In many situations, a teacher has to explain things in many different ways or ask questions in different ways so that children can understand better. Why can’t teachers do that with story time? The example regarding the two communities was also frustrating to me. I feel that teachers need to be educated about the way they are teaching and asking questions and they then need to use all types of language to help all students. In my opinion, maybe doing a little bit of each “type of language” will help all students in understanding a concept or example. The teacher can work with the students in teaching them Standard English while at the same time, learning their language so that both sides can understand where the other is coming from. What other approaches can be taken to solve this problem of teachers and schools hindering children’s ability to perform well academically because of a lack of understanding Standard English?

My question was similar to that of Kate's and pertains to the language differences in the classroom. I was also quite upset to read that teachers treated children differently based on things such as their language. One of my roommates did a teaching internship this summer with underprivileged kids in Philadelphia she told me about the training that she underwent beforehand. It was stressed to her and her co-workers the importance of treating the kids equally, of not calling on one side of the room more than the other or one sex more than the other, etc etc etc. With this in mind when reading the article I am left to wonder if other teachers are not taught the same things of equality in the classroom. Are they once taught but revert back to old stereotypes after dealing with diverse groups of children? & if so how can we make sure that they don't go back to their old ways? With some children already being at a disadvantage over others for various reasons, shouldn't we be actively trying to make things as equal as possible and make sure that they stay that way?

Romaine makes it clear that our educational system needs vast improvement when it comes to teaching and accepting language. It is sad to read that the racial and ethnic problems that have plagued our country for so long are still far from being resolved. Personally, I was unaware of the extent to which language is used as a means of discrimination around the world. The only positive idea I was able to take away from the reading was that there is hope for change. So I think the most important question is how do we change things? To me, the best solution presented in the article was the “bridge” reader. It seemed to be an ideal middle ground between two of the arguments that were being made. There were two examples of letters in the New York Times in which the writers clamed that being exposed to strictly the foreign-majority language (in this case, Engligh) was ideal. One claimed “I am convinced a bilingual education would have impeded my integration into American society,” while the other wrote “The bilingual method is probably more confusing than helpful to many. Exposure to English throughout the day results in more rapid and more effective progress than dilution in a bilingual process.” These claims would lead us, at first, to believe that the bilingual approach is out of the question. Yet, what about the study on page 222 which indicated that the more non-standard speakers were corrected, the more they used non-standard language? Or the study in the inner city of Chicago that showed students taught entirely in standard English with no reference to their non-standard language resulted in an increase in usage of their non-standard language. Still, perhaps the best evidence for a middle ground is the success of the “bridge” readers. Clearly, a gradual shift from non-standard to standard language is the best approach. It is discouraging however that these readers were eventually eliminated because of negative reactions. How can this negative reaction to something that is so effective be countered? Perhaps requiring a class in the curriculum that teaches young children to understand language differences and to be accepting of those who speak differently would be the best solution. How else can we eliminate some of the negative labels on non-standard language?

As we have been discussing in class, people who do not speak the standard language of their society have a very difficult time being successful in an academic setting. We threw around several possible reasons for this problem in class, some of which dealt with a basic lack of being able to interpret what is being taught. This is a very significant problem. With this inability to learn, it is extremely difficult for immigrants to become educated. Without education one’s options in life are severely diminished. For this reason a study was done in an attempt to better understand why people have difficulty learning in a second language. Nursing students in Australia were evaluated based on an English Language Acculturation Scale (ELAS). Acculturation was an idea I was unaware of prior to reading this article. It is defined as, “those phenomena which result when groups of individuals having different cultures come into continuous first-hand contact, with subsequent changes in the original cultural patterns of either or both groups.” The evaluations of nursing students who spoke English as a second language were compared to their grades in nursing classes. A positive correlation was observed. This basically meant that the more acculturated the students were, the better they did in an academic setting. A positive correlation was also observed between acculturation and length of residence in Australia. The Authors believed that poor academic performance was due to low-English acculturation. Their suggestion for improving academic performance was to immerse the students in English, forcing them to be acculturated quicker. Does this seem like a good solution? Recall our reading for last class which discussed bridge readers. The non-English speaking students who were immersed in English and left to fend for themselves did not learn as quickly as those students who used bridge readers to slowly transition from their first language to English. So what are we to do? Is acculturation the best means of helping non-standard speakers to learn or should the problem be approached from another direction.

In the Difference vs. Deficit heading, Romaine states that it was argued that children of low-income families did not have a language becuase they didn't speak the same as middle-class children. How is it possible to not have a language? She presented an example of the elaborative way to speak (used by middle class) and the restricted way(used by low class). But neither ways that are presented are how anyone really speaks. We don't explain every single detail when talking, but we also use enough to in order to ensure that our listeners understand. So why is one way necessarily better than the other? Especially enough for some to say that the low class lacks a language altogether?

A recent and interesting article that I came across in Science Daily titled: Boys’ and Girls’ Brains are Different: Gender Differences in Language Appear Biological provided evidence for biological differences in language abilities between boys’ and girls’. Researchers from Northwestern University and the University of Haifa have shown that areas of the brain associated with language work harder in girls than in boys during language tasks, and found that boys and girls rely on different parts of the brain when performing these language tasks. For the study, fMRI was used to measure brain activity in 31 boys and in 31 girls from ages 9 to 15 as they performed spelling and writing language tasks. The study consisted of both visual (reading words without hearing them) and auditory (hearing words but not reading them) tasks. The researchers found that girls showed significantly greater activation in language areas of the brain than boys. The information in both of the tasks provided evidence for activating areas of the brain associated with abstract thinking through language in girls. In boys, however, accurate performance depended, when reading words, on how hard visual areas of the brain worked. In hearing words, performance depended on how hard auditory areas of the brain worked. This evidence could help inform teaching and testing methods, as well as providing support for single sex classrooms. And as a result of this study, the evidence shows that when testing, boys may be more effectively evaluated on their knowledge gained from lectures using oral tests and on knowledge gained by reading using written tests. Girls, however, would not benefit from these same methods because their language processing seems to be more abstract in approach. This study concludes by mentioning that if the pattern of females relying on an abstract language network and of males relying on sensory areas of the brain extends into adulthood, it could possibly explain why women often provide more context and abstract representation than men. A good example is that women tend to provide more information when giving directions than men do.

I feel that this study relates to topics we have already read about and discussed in class. A few of our readings have examined the different aspects of teaching in the classroom, and it seems that the evidence provided by this study could be one way to modify teaching and/or testing techniques to even the playing field for both boys and girls. We have already discussed changes that have been made and other possible changes that could be made for bilinguals when testing, but this study shows that maybe we should test boys and girls differently based on the knowledge that they activate different areas of their brain, or in other words, think differently.

click here to read about the study

On page 38, Agar discusses Emile Durkheim’s views on society. I found this section very interesting. Durkheim suggests that society is something that one is born into. Society sets limits on what one can do. I agree with this idea, because through our daily activities and social lives, we are required to act in a certain way. There are boundaries set up for us. Agar states, “When people cross the boundaries, go beyond the fences that social facts define, then they’re crazy or criminal or maybe both. They’re no longer members of the group. They’re locked into an institution until they are rehabilitated or, to put it another way, until they are brought back inside the fence.” I would like to know what happens when we go across the boundaries that society sets with language? What are the consequences? I understand that the way we speak and the language we use defines us as individuals, as well as part of a group. So then what happens when we use a different language to communicate? Are we kicked out of the group or viewed in a different way?

Michael Agar highlights the way in which Ferdinand de Saussure believed in language as a systematic structure serving as a link between thought and sound. He thought of language sounds as a series of linguistic signs that are purely arbitrary. It seems clear that Saussure is saying that any language is a self-contained system of signs, in which each element is meaningless by itself and meaningful only by its differentiation from the other elements in paradigmatic and syntagmatic relationships. However, did Saussure overemphasize the arbitrary, symbolic relation between signs and signifiers? I ask this because how do all of the relationships discussed (iconic and indexical included) connect to one another to create something meaningful, as opposed to meaningless?

And also, focusing on the way in which Saussure studied “language” over “speech”, distinguishing the two on pg 37, it is not clear to me how using this history Agar is suggesting we can erase the Circle?

Saussure stated that there is a difference between language and speech. He said that speech is what we do with language, which is filled with variations and mistakes. "Speech is a mess," he stated. On the other hand, "pure, clean, a steel skyscraper arising from the chaos in the streets." He says that it is people who mess up langauge, but would that be the case if the language was really perfect? It seems that he blames people for the problems with communication, but if our language was actually perfect then wouldn't those problems cease to exist? Shouldn't the language itself be seen as the root of the problem of miscommunication instead of as the victim?

The article spoke of “standard” language, or the way you’re supposed to talk, and “nonstandard” language, which doesn’t follow the same rules as standard. The article continues to say that when one uses nonstandard language it leads to the speaker being at a social disadvantage or being kept from more “formal” arenas in addition to unfortunate stereotypes. Standard language is what you are taught in school and is used in formal or official settings. My question regards how standard and nonstandard language came to be. How did we decide what became standard or the preferred language used in formal situations? Is it that nonstandard language was found to be more confusing or like the article suggested of having an “irrational mind”? However as the article also shows “double negatives ain’t no signal of an irrational mind.” So if they are used in all languages and dialects why are they thought of so negatively and where did this negative connotation come from?

Agar seems to conclude that language and culture are very closely related. He even uses the term languaculture. It would be difficult to argue this proposal. Clearly there are many different languages and even different dialects within languages that are based on the conditions of a culture. I think sometimes people can’t understand this tight link; and they don’t realize that when they make fun of someone’s language they are making fun of their culture as well. Making fun of another’s culture can be extremely hurtful and maybe even borderline dangerous. So why do we do it?
I think a lot of people cop out by saying, “well I just did not understand that it was hurtful and that I was offending someone.” This may be the case some of the time, but I think most of the time we know exactly what we are doing; and now having read this we have no excuses. But will that change the way we view the next person we hear that does not talk exactly the way we do? I am sure that the next time I meet someone who speaks a language I have never heard before, I will have the tendency to think that person is less educated or at least sounds funny. Why is that? And, how do we prevent this?

After watching the films in class which help us to look at the different accents across the country I thought it would be interesting to learn a bit more about the main features of accents because in one form or another, we all have them.

Accents typically are classified in two ways including Regional Accents and Foreign Accents. Our accents and that of others help us to identify a lot of features about a person such as their background, where they are from, etc. Problems arise with accents when we have trouble understanding someone, have to repeat ourselves constantly so others can understand us (which may cause one to avoid social interactions), or when a listener focuses on your accent more than the content of your language. With these problems at hand some put in the time and effort to change their accents which is known as “accent modification” or “accent reduction”. This can be accomplished with the help of a speech-language pathologist who can help you to learn to change your speech pronunciation. They will begin by evaluating your accent by looking at sound pronunciation as well as the stress, intonation, and rhythm of one’s speech. Also they will listen to your speech in conversation. After all evaluations have taken place the speech-language pathologist will set goals to help one modify their accent and improve your communication as a whole.

While accents can cause problems they are also an important part of showing who someone is. With this in mind it is important to realize that accents are not speech impediments and that they are an important part of our global culture.
http://www.asha.org/public/speech/development/accent_mod.htm