Editorial mobilities, immobilities and inequalities interrogating travelling ideas in english language education and english medium instruction in world contexts

doi: 10.1386/tjtm_00001_2 Editorial Dat Bao Monash University Phan Le ha Universiti Brunei darussalam and University of Hawaii at Manoa osman Barnawi royal Commission Colleges and instit

Transitions: Journal of Transient Migration

Volume 3 Number 2

© 2019 Intellect Ltd Editorial English language doi: 10.1386/tjtm_00001_2

Editorial

Dat Bao

Monash University

Phan Le ha

Universiti Brunei darussalam and University of Hawaii at Manoa

osman Barnawi

royal Commission Colleges and institutes at Yanbu

mobilities, immobilities and

inequalities: interrogating

‘travelling’ ideas in english

language education and

english medium instruction

in world contexts

This special issue interrogates the mobility and mobilization of major ideas that

have been driving policy, pedagogy and practice of English language education

(ELE) and English medium instruction (EMI) in varied world contexts since

the 1980s These travelling ideas include ‘on-going professional development’,

‘English as an international language’, ‘English as a lingua franca’, ‘shared ownership of English’, ‘teacher as facilitator’, ‘learner-centered education’ and

‘communicative approach’, to name a few Indeed, these constructs do not always travel freely or at the same speed They often bear very different mean-ings across different contexts and settmean-ings Most often, they do not possess any

‘intrinsic power’ to enable desirable changes and/or to bridge perceived gaps between ‘global’ and ‘local’ standards at all levels of policy, pedagogy and prac-tice regarding ELE and EMI They, nevertheless, carry many aspirations for change Such aspirations, in many ways, could also bring about and generate inequalities, immobilities and unequal access to social mobilities and educa-tional opportunities In the same vein, not all forms of mobilities and immobili-ties are equal, either All these observations have implications for ELE and EMI

In today’s world where many teachers, including English-language teach-ers, are increasingly living their profession transnationally and globally, researchers in applied linguistics, international education and education more broadly find themselves responding to such experiences through reinforming and (re)constructing theoretical discourses As we are becoming more mobile,

or less so, within and across geographical, cultural spaces, we find ourselves submerging within a greater, or more restricting, whole This dynamic, in a dominos effect, creates new travels and interactions that question and reshape the ways in which we understand equity, identity and (trans)national policies and practices This Special Issue captures specific realities in various educa-tional contexts with respect to the questions of transnaeduca-tionality, (im)mobility, equity and equality Instead of attempting to draw conclusions on current trends and confirm prevalent realities, the Special Issue stretches beyond that and seizes deviating thoughts from well-known evolvements In doing so, we hope to be able to contribute towards the understanding of less recognized nuances surrounding these intertwined phenomena and processes

Sara Hillman’s article in this issue is a case in point While very often English has been identified as a universal tool of soft power and advantage, Hillman demonstrates that English in Qatar’s ecological context has gener-ated deeply rooted inequalities and disadvantages rather than empowerment Drawing on empirical data, Hillman argues that by neglecting the power of linguistic diversity in the country and giving in to English, educators find themselves in situations whereby the cultivation of Qatar’s past and future legacies seems to be facing tremendous constraints The work stimulates our thinking about language issues that are further complicated by globaliza-tion and by many accompanying language policies and practices that often uncritically embrace and celebrate the assumed universal power of English, as Barnawi also argues in his work (2018) Indeed, English coupled with globali-zation has marginalized other languages, but Hillman’s work also invites us

to consider seriously how the international role of English could also function more as an amiable language that thrives equitably and in harmony with our multilingual worlds

Examining the experiences of international and local teachers teach-ing at a Sino-international school in China, the article by Alex Kostogriz and Gary Bonar in this collection approaches mobilities, transnationality and teacher identity formation from a unique angle, which is centred on the kind

of relational tensions occurring as both sides try to fit in and make sense of so-called varied international school cultures International teachers are not the only ones who are mobile, as often assumed and highlighted in the exist-ing literature and scholarship on international schools and expatriates Local

teachers are constantly on the move across China in response to the

increas-ing demand of bilincreas-ingual and bicurricular international schools in the country

The authors show how all these teachers, in their attempts to adapt to a new

school context in China, care more about local adaptation than global

fulfil-ment in the profession Arising from such dynamics is the need for all to

navi-gate differences and build a sense of belonging At the same time, in the midst

of these teachers’ relational tensions at work and after work are also language

issues that Kostogriz and Bonar unpack, again, from an interactive vantage

point These language issues do not only stem from the teachers’ own

percep-tions and pedagogies but are also caused by particular educational aspirapercep-tions

from students and parents Kostogriz’s and Bonar’s article offers productive

space for thinking more about how teacher mobilities and

internationaliza-tion could enable meaningful conversainternationaliza-tions about all kinds of professional

tensions that teachers, whether international, transnational or local, all share,

although they may express such tensions differently and via different means

All in all, this article has moved beyond addressing business as usual

dichot-omous characteristics between ‘international’ and ‘local’ teachers in

interna-tional school settings It corresponds with new scholarship such as Collins

and Ho (2018), Hickey (2018), Phan (2018), Poole (2019), Xu and Montgomery

(2018) and Yang (2018) in urging more in-depth studies to better understand

nuanced relational dynamics of academic mobilities that are born out of and/

or imposed by internationalization and local and individual desires for

inter-national education

Sulaiman Jenkins’s essay offers another case that forces us to think and

question many deeply entrenched practices and ideologies that we encounter

or even participate in everyday readings, writings and doings in our

profes-sional lives On the one hand, it is common in our knowledge that non-native

English teachers tend to be marginalized and discriminated against in many

educational contexts and settings around the globe (Ling and Braine 2007;

Llurda 2005; Pae 2017; Park 2015) On the other, under the category of ‘native

English teachers’, factors particularly race, ethnicity and skin colour have also

been used for within-group discrimination among teachers, by

administra-tors, students, parents and employers (Kubota and Lin 2009; Motha 2014)

Informed by his qualitative research conducted with African American Muslim

teachers teaching English in Saudi Arabia, Jenkins brings fresh insights and

analysis into this very phenomenon The author’s rich analysis of the

multi-layered intersections of religion, ethnicity, language (English and Arabic)

and the politics of transnationality is powerful While native-speakership is

presented elsewhere as a source of dominance and privilege that marks the

ideal model of language practice (Rahman 2005; Ruecker and Ives 2015),

Jenkins gathered data about native-speaker teachers of English as being,

atypically, marginalized practitioners The discussion of the data alerts readers

to a range of identity factors that govern the native-speaker concept, among

which religion, skin colour, race and sociocultural capital speak the loudest

All of these are inherent components of social equity or inequity, and they

travel and are mobile These expanses, which are less commonly discussed in

the discourse in relation to native-speakership and that happen to downplay

teachers’ English competency and self-esteem, deserve more scholarly

atten-tion particularly through the lens of raciolinguistics, as argued by Jenkins in

his article The essay reminds readers of the importance to identify both power

and the illusion of it when discussing the role of English and its associated

identity of teachers of English across multiple contexts and domains

Following up on the theme of equity versus inequity, Giang Le’s article shifts perspectives, not from the shoes of a scholar anymore, and looks at the privation of equity through the lens of a practitioner who feels powerless for having little say in the context of Vietnam’s internationalization of higher education The discussion draws from the author’s more-bitter-than-sweet reminiscence as a disadvantaged student who grew into a disadvantaged teacher: the author’s two roles over the years signify different bottles that hold the same flow of inequity and inequality With self-driven data from memory and journal logs, Le signifies the reality that unfairness does not cease if we

do not choose to address it in the everyday deed within the education system From a sociocultural-imagination point of view, the article with its quotes from journal entries tells a story that represents a personal view on a larger social, educational problem In a broad picture of internationalized/interna-tionalizing education in Vietnam, integration means more than simply looking out and competing with the external world, but more importantly it requires more efforts in assisting individuals within the national system to integrate internally with due respect of their contributions Readers are encouraged to think about the extended meaning of equity: educational development means more than just to push as a system to growth, but also implies the urge to care for every individual who helps build that system

Global discourses around EMI represent another area of controversy over the past many years One distinctive example is Nigeria, where national policy and practices in medium of instruction (MOI) have been experiencing discrep-ancies Babatunji Hazekiah Adepoju’s research article, which is based on observation of child play and documentation of parents’ aspirations for their children’s education, highlights the complexities and contradictions that occur within language choice in schooling and education Against the vast literature that critiques EMI and the neglection of mother-tongue education in many postcolonial countries including those in Africa, Adepoju justifies the advocacy

of EMI in Nigeria by gathering evidence from parents’ views on their children’s communication experience and by recognizing EMI as an operative factor in social mobility Adepoju’s research takes into account Nigerian parents’ atti-tudes towards both English and the mother tongue It offers a well-balanced picture in which the everyday living environment plays a role in preserving the mother tongue while formal education will take care of students’ English development This project makes a contribution towards the increasing schol-arship on EMI and MOI by drawing together various opposing perspectives about the role of EMI in Nigeria: some scholars advocate the implementation

of mother-tongue formal education while others choose to support English The article eases this tension by arguing that language choices do not have to

be mutually exclusive but the promotion of both languages can be co-existent

in two relevant settings The discussion implies how ideas might travel from the voices of local communities to educational policy and the everyday class-room It also invites our reflection on the reality that language adoption is not the sole task of educational leadership but it would be more equitably rewarding to consider the views of teachers, parents, students, scholars and policy-makers in context

Having addressed (im)mobility, transnationality, identity and equity in English language teaching (ELT), EMI and TESOL, the Special Issue would not

be complete without venturing into the domain of pedagogy (without the fear

of finding nothing new) Over half a century’s debate in pedagogy has given us

a plethora of diversity, tensions, dilemmas and widely promoted approaches,

to the extent that it becomes a challenge to identify what is original anymore

In Canagarajah’s words, teachers are now free to choose any from the

‘super-market of ideas and practices’ (2006: 28) for their own use To take this further,

we would like to encourage more playfulness than pure selection and

compla-cency Instead of selecting tools from a menu, one might wish to experience

a roller-coaster ride by trying out new spaces and fill them with innovative

nuances as they derive from personal experiences Along this line, Dat Bao’s

article views pedagogical domain not as a choice but rather as reconstruction,

not as out-there resources from competent teachers or knowledgeable

schol-ars but rather as the work of creative learners themselves Approaching the

theme from a learner perspective, the article argues that new ways of revising

pedagogy could be initiated by learners as they choose to liberate themselves

from classroom structure and academic counselling It narrates the real

experi-ences of eight Japanese learners of English who decided to abandon the

class-room and move into the real world to contest their own adventurous learning

aptitudes Drawing on his longitudinal research data, Dat Bao followed the

footpath of creative learners of English and in the end demonstrated how the

vibrant experiences of these individuals offer lessons for teachers to consider

in improving classroom practices The work provokes our thoughts of how

ideas travel: classroom dynamic in many cases might restraint learning, and

one way to free oneself from that space would be to summon ideas from

real-world experiences in a new context to bring out individualized ways of

teach-ing oneself What stands out amidst all this is learners’ nerve to play with the

unpredictable and to cope with the unknown: for a change, these

individu-als decided to give their teachers a break and acted in the dual roles of

self-teaching and self-learning What seems new here is that this experience looks

more like the practice of sovereignty than conventional autonomy: while the

latter is subject to control, the former is not

We also take this opportunity to recommend two recent books from the

guest editors: Creativity and Innovations in ELT Materials Development: Looking

beyond the Current Design by Dat Bao (published in the New Perspectives on

Language and Education book series, Multilingual Matters, 2018), as reviewed

by Mayyer Ling, and Neoliberalism and English Language Education Policies in

the Arabian Gulf by Osman Z Barnawi (published by Routledge, 2018), as

reviewed by Mirza Muhammad Zubair Baig These works go well with this

Special Issue in many ways In Barnawi’s book, global mobility is deeply

influ-enced by factors such as neo-liberalism, the flow of human capital and the

liberalized economy, among others All of these exert an impact on English

education policies around the globe including the Arabian Gulf region Dat

Bao’s book, which looks at creativity in TESOL from a curriculum

perspec-tive, makes an effort in enhancing the learning experience of students and

the teaching repertoire of teachers in novel ways It does so by

recommend-ing less commonly employed resources that would inspire pedagogy, learnrecommend-ing

engagement and coursebook innovation Both works are rich in their

theo-retical understanding and practical implications, which very much reflect the

nature of the Special Issue

Overall, the strength of all the contributions rests well on a range of

empiri-cal research that is also rich in reflection and practiempiri-cal pedagogiempiri-cal offering, all

of which provokes scholarly curiosity, and taps into practitioners’ and students’

voices and the authors’ intellectual engagement The theoretical debates and the

fresh and painstaking reflections and provocation presented in this Special Issue

are informed by the amazing diversity of the editorial team and contributing

authors, whose educational backgrounds, theoretical and methodological orientations, work experience, life journeys, resilience, dedication and commit-ment are to be celebrated We would like to acknowledge the importance of encouraging, nurturing and supporting new voices, new works, new research and new insights, irrespective of how labour-intensive the process could be For the advancement of knowledge, for the joy of learning and engaging mobility, transnationality, identity and equity in fruitful manners, the role of editors and guest editors in practising this sense of support and community building is key These voices of students, parents, teachers and scholars hopefully will inspire practitioners, policy-makers, administrators and scholars who would be more open to multiple possibilities of practising and adding more nuances to educa-tion and everyday schooling and theorizaeduca-tion

reFerenCes

Barnawi, O Z (2018), Neoliberalism and English Language Education Policies in

the Arabian Gulf, Abingdon and New York: Routledge.

Canagarajah, A S (2006), ‘TESOL at forty: What are the issues?’, TESOL

Quarterly, 40:1, pp 9–34

Collins, F and Ho, K C (2018), ‘Discrepant knowledge and interAsian

mobi-lities: Unlikely movements, uncertain futures’, Discourse: Studies in the

Cultural Politics of Education, 39:5, pp 679–93

Hickey, M (2018), ‘Thailand’s “English fever”, migrant teachers and

cosmo-politan aspirations in an interconnected Asia’, Discourse: Studies in the

Cultural Politics of Education, 39:5, pp 738–51.

Kubota, R and Lin, A (eds) (2009), Race, Culture, and Identities in Second

Language Education: Exploring Critically Engaged Practice, Abingdon and

New York: Routledge

Ling, C Y and Braine, G (2007), ‘The attitudes of university students towards

non-native speakers English teachers in Hong Kong’, RELC Journal, 38:3,

pp 257–77

Llurda, E (2005), Non-Native Language Teachers: Perceptions, Challenges and

Contributions to the Profession, New York: Springer

Motha, S (2014), Race, Empire, and English Language Teaching: Creating

Responsible and Ethical Anti-Racist Practice, New York: Teachers College

Press

Pae, T (2017), ‘Effects of the differences between native and non-native English-speaking teachers on students’ attitudes and motivation toward

learning English’, Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 37:2, pp 163–78.

Park, G (2015), ‘Situating the discourses of privilege and marginalization in

the lives of two East Asian women teachers of English’, Race Ethnicity and

Education, 18:1, pp 108–33

Phan, L H (2018), ‘Higher education, English, and the idea of “the West”:

Globalizing and encountering a global south regional university’, Discourse:

Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 39:5, pp 782–97

Poole, A (2019), ‘International education teachers’ experiences as an

educatio-nal precariat in China’, Joureducatio-nal of Research in Internatioeducatio-nal Education, 18:1,

pp 60–76

Rahman, T (2005), ‘Passports to privilege: The English-medium schools in

Pakistan’, Peace and Democracy in Southeast Asia, 1:1, pp 24–44.

Ruecker, T and Ives, L (2015), ‘White native English speakers needed: The rhetorical construction of privilege in online teacher recruitment spaces’

TESOL Quarterly, 49:4, pp 733–56

Xu, C L and Montgomery, C (2018), ‘Education China on the move: A typology

of contemporary Chinese higher education mobilities’, Review of Education,

9 October, https://doi.org/10.1002/rev3.3139 Accessed 1 October 2019

Yang, P (2018), ‘Compromise and complicity in international student mobility:

The ethnographic case of Indian medical students at a Chinese university’,

Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 39:5, pp 694–708.

Dat Bao, Phan Le Ha and Osman Barnawi has asserted their right under the

Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the authors of

this work in the format that was submitted to Intellect Ltd

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