i36

Issue 36. Spring 2024

The critical perspective in the teaching of additional languages

Thematic Section Editors Encarna Atienza (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Spain) and Marta García García (Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany)

 

Important dates:

- Deadline for submission of papers: 8 January 2024.

- Notification of review/acceptance: 28 February 2024

- Publication date: April 2024

*Pre-proposals with a 400-word abstract will be accepted until 30 September 2023 by writing to the editors.

 

Call for papers

The promotion of the critical perspective in the teaching of additional languages is an area that is still little exploited, both from the point of view of the creation of materials and pedagogical proposals and from the point of view of research. A first factor that may condition the scarce proliferation of studies has to do with the epistemological confusion surrounding what criticality entails. There are many disciplines, of very different kinds, which include the adjective critical in their names, which undoubtedly contributes, at the very least, to the confusion, turning the term 'critical' into a polysemic and at the same time empty concept. The same assessment applies to the concept of interculturality (Dervin 2012), which is why Dervin opts for the term renewed interculturality, whose proposal also entails a critical perspective of interculturality. In any case, in order to be able to carry out rigorous didactic proposals, it seems necessary to untangle the concepts and order the different theoretical assumptions of a critical nature, so that, with the didactic transposition, reductionism or contradictory approaches are not generated.

The truth is that the promotion of a critical attitude - understood in this call as the promotion of discussion and exchange of different points of view in the classroom on a subject (Cots, 2006) - is necessary for several reasons: on the one hand, because of the overabundance of information in Western society, which encourages the creation of false news and the opposite effect to the one intended, disinformation; on the other hand, because of the ideological polarisation of society, which can lead to radical confrontational approaches and the development of dogmatic and even anti-democratic attitudes; Also, because of the spread of neo-liberal discourses in all spheres of society, whose ideology becomes invisible, with a certain representation of the facts, that of the hegemonic neo-liberal discourses, appearing as natural; finally, because of the proliferation of nationalism, which encourages an essentialist vision of culture, associated with nationhood. Faced with the reality described above, it is therefore essential to turn aspects such as: dismantling information hoaxes or dogmatic attitudes, encouraging the ability to question one's own beliefs and the development of social awareness, as well as helping to unveil the underlying ideology of discourses or to deconstruct, from the postulates of renewed interculturality, identities conceived as uniform, homogeneous and immovable, into pedagogical objectives. All these approaches are fundamental in any educational context because, as Canagarajah (2023, 4) states, those teachers who do not define themselves as critical are in fact assuming a political stance and choosing to accept the status quo. Moreover, such approaches become even more important in the field of additional language teaching and learning, where learners may be more vulnerable to ideological discourses due to, on the one hand, unfamiliarity with the language and, on the other hand, the widespread reductionist association of culture with nationality, which perpetuates stereotyping, prejudice, differences and nationalisms. Teaching languages (first, second, additional or heritage) from a critical perspective therefore involves helping to question, to uncover the possible prejudices and ideologies underlying the social practices with which one interacts (through written, oral and multimodal texts), to uncover hegemonic and counter-hegemonic representations of events, to understand how linguistic choices play a fundamental role in relations of power and inequality, as well as to deconstruct the concept of identity and otherness for the sake of a multiple and changing identity construct.

However, although the first voices advocating the need to introduce a critical dimension in the fields of language learning and teaching date back to the work of Freire (1974), research and proposals for additional language teaching is quite recent (see, for example, Cots 2006; Correa 2011, 2018; Atienza and Aznar 2020; Gerlach 2020; Leeman 2014; Bori 2022), although for English language teaching there is more tradition, starting with the works of Wallace (1999), Brown (2001), Pennycook (2001), Canagarajah (1999, 2002) and Crookes (2013), among others. As far as proposals for the development of critical or renewed intercultural competences are concerned, the work of Dervin (2012, 2016, 2023) and Holliday (2011, 2012) stand out, but there are hardly any publications on EFL or languages other than English (Atienza 2020; García Balsas 2021). More abundant, however, are the works approached from the perspective of Critical Applied Linguistics, on the critical analysis of textbooks and teaching materials (Gray 2010, 2013, Pennycook 2001). In the field of ELE, the work of Bori and Kuzmanovic (2021) and Morales-Vidal and Cassany (2020) should be highlighted.

In this thematic section of RNLAEL, the editors seek to present results of recent or ongoing projects on:

1. The terminological difficulty surrounding the concept of criticality and/or interculturality.
2. The teaching and/or learning of an additional language which includes the fostering of a critical attitude, understood in a broad sense and including different conceptual frameworks (critical thinking, critical pedagogy, critical discourse analysis, critical literacy, Critical ELT, etc.).
3. The challenges and limitations of a critical approach to language teaching and learning.
4. Critical analysis of teaching materials, in line with the postulates of Critical Applied Linguistics.
5. Approaches to the development of intercultural competences from the perspective of critical or renewed interculturality.

In short, work that critically examines how politics, ideologies and power relations shape and transform the nature of language teaching and learning both inside and outside the classroom (Kubota and Austin 2007, 75).

Priority will be given to empirical studies of a qualitative, quantitative or mixed nature, as requested by RNLAEL. Proposals may be submitted in English, French, German, Spanish, Portuguese or Italian (in other languages, please consult the publishers).

Subject areas: Critical Applied Linguistics, Critical Discourse Analysis, Critical Pedagogy, Critical Linguistic Awareness, Critical Literacy, Critical Literacy, Renewed Interculturality, Didactics, Acquisition, Learning and Teaching of Foreign Languages (LE).

 

References

Atienza, E. (2020). El desarrollo de la interculturalidad desde una perspectiva crítica en español como lengua extranjera: un estudio de una investigación-acción. Lenguaje y Textos, 52, 35-46.  https://doi.org/10.4995/lyt.2020.12673

Atienza, E. y Aznar, J. (2020). Criterios para el desarrollo de las competencias interculturales en español LE/L2 desde una perspectiva crítica. Journal of Spanish Language Teaching, 7, 137­-149. https://doi.org/10.1080/23247797.2020.1844471

Blommaert, J. (2005). Discourse: A Critical Introduction (Key Topics in Sociolinguistics, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511610295

Bori, P. y Kuzmanovic, A. (2021). El mundo del trabajo en los libros de texto de ELE: Una perspectiva política y económica. Spanish in Context, 18(2), 237-258. https://doi.org/10.1075/sic.18025.bor

Bori, P. (2022). Estimular la conciencia crítica en el aula de español como lengua extranjera: una investigación acción. Didáctica. Lengua y Literatura 34, 71-81. https://doi.org/10.5209/dill.81349

Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. New York: Longman.

Canagarajah, A. S. (1999). Resisting Linguistic Imperialism in Language Teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hadley, G y Boon, A. (2023).  Critical Thinking. Applied Linguistics. London: Routledge https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amad006

Correa, M. (2011). Advocating for Critical Pedagogical Approaches to Teaching Spanish as a Heritage Language: Some Considerations. Foreign Language Annals, 44 (2), 308-320.

Correa, M. (2018). Critical Approaches to Heritage Language Learning: From Linguistic Survival to Resistance and Action. En P.P. Trifonas y T. Aravossitas (Eds.), Handbook of Research and Practice in Heritage Language Education, (pp 717-730). London: Springer International Handbooks of Education.

Cots, J. (2006). Teaching ‘with an Attitude’: Critical Discourse Analysis in EFL Teaching. ELT Journal, 60 (4), 336-345. https://doi.org/10.1093/elt/ccl024

Dervin, F. (2010). Assessing Intercultural Competence in Language Learning and Teaching: A Critical Review of Current Efforts. En F. Dervin y E. Suomela-Salmi (Eds.), New Approaches to Assessing Language and (Inter)cultural Competences in Higher Education, 157-174. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.

Dervin, F. (2012). International Sociodigital Interaction. What Politics of Interculturality? En J. Sharifian y M. Jamarani (Eds.), Language and intercultural communication in the new era, (pp 83-98). London: Routledge.

Dervin, F. (2016). Interculturality in Education: A Theoretical and Methodological Toolbox. Londres: Palgrave Macmillan.

Dervin, F. (2023). Interculturality, Reflexivity and Criticality in Teacher Education. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and power. Londres: Longman.

Fairclough, N. (1995). Critical discourse analysis: the critical study of language. Londres: Longman.

Freire, P. (1974). Education for Critical Consciousness. Nueva York: Seabury Press.

García Balsas, M. (2021). "Interculturalidad, dimensión crítica y lengua en uso: análisis de producciones textuales de aprendices de ELE". Tonos digital 41, 1-32.

Gerlach, D. (2020). Kritische Fremdsprachendidaktik. Grundlagen, Ziele, Beispiele. Tübingen: Narr.

Gray, J. (2010). The Construction of English: Culture, Consumerism and Promotion in the ELT Global Coursebook. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

Gray, J. (2013). Introduction. In J. Gray (Ed.), Critical Perspectives on Language Teaching Materials (pp 1-16). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Holguín Mendoza, C. (2018). Critical Language Awareness (CLA) for Spanish Heritage Language Programs: Implementing a Complete Curriculum. International Multilingual Research Journal, 12(2), 65-79. https://doi.org/10.1080/19313152.2017.1401445

Holliday, A. (2011). Intercultural Communication and Ideology. Londres: SAGE.

Holliday, A. (2012). Culture, communication, context, and power. En The Routledge Handbook of Language and Intercultural Communication, ed. Jane Jackson, (pp 37-51). Londres/ Nueva York: Routledge.

Holliday, A., Hyde, M. y Kullman, J.  (2010). Intercultural Communication: An Advanced Resource Book for Students. Londres/ Nueva York: Routledge.

Kubota, R. y Austin, T. (2007). “Critical Approaches to World Language Education in the United States: An Introduction”. Critical Inquiry in Language Studies 4(2-3), 73-83. https://doi.org/10.1080/15427580701389367

Leeman, J. (2014). “Critical Approaches to Teaching Spanish as a Local/Foreign Language”. En The Routledge Handbook of Hispanic Applied Linguistics, (Ed.), M. Lacorte, 275-291. Londres/ Nueva York: Routledge.

Morales-Vidal, C. y Cassany, D. (2020). El mundo según los libros de texto: Análisis Crítico del Discurso aplicado a materiales de ELE/L2". Spanish Language Teaching, 7(1), 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1080/23247797.2020.1790161

Pennycook, A. (2001). Critical applied linguistics: A critical introduction. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Wallace, C. (1999). Critical Language Awareness: Key Principles for a Course in Critical Reading. Language Awareness, 8(2), 98-110. https://doi.org.10.1080/096584(19908667121