MA International Education (Higher Education)

The course unit will cover key areas such as language and identity; linguistic prejudice; and language policy, in order to understand how these broad topics play out at the most relevant level for Education – the classroom. Students will also focus on an understanding of the role that World Englishes can play in the future of English language teaching. The course will further explore how identity, prejudice and policy apply to language, with World Englishes as one key example, and the overall implications this has for international education.

This unit aims to: 

• Critically explore the link between language and education, and the interplay between the two at the classroom level, in particular the English language;
• Introduce the impact of language policy on educational practice, and how this can reflect, and encourage, linguistic prejudice;
• Develop students’ awareness and appreciation for language and identity;
• Engage students with the concepts of linguistic capital and preferred forms of language use within educational contexts in various international settings;

Expose students to a range of teaching methods for classroom practice for a variety of language learners and learning preferences.

Interactive lectures supported by relevant e-learning tools (e.g. discussion board); groupwork. One example of this will be to have practical exercises in class in which we follow up a discussion of accents and dialects with video clips, as a means to help students become familiar with them.

• Identify how personal, professional and cultural identities are all enacted through language choices;
• Recognise and situate linguistic challenges experienced by individuals and marginalised social groups;
• Explain how personal and professional identities as enacted through language can sometimes clash in professional settings, such as teaching;
• Analyse linguistic prejudice, seen, for example, in the hegemony of inner circle English, to the detriment of non-inner circle varieties (e.g. Indian English);

Explore the different perspectives toward language in various international settings.

• Identify instances of linguistic preference and prejudice;
• Analyse how cultures develop the language they use and appropriate language forms;

Examine how this can come up against prejudice when compared with dominant language forms, such as standard inner-circle English.

• Apply their knowledge regarding linguistic identities to practical situations, such as future teaching; 
• Evaluate whether teaching methods are appropriate for a student body using multiple languages;

Have a better understanding of determining whether the English language used by their students is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

• Appreciate the legitimacy of all language varieties;
• Enhance cultural understanding through language;
• Recognise how dominant language attitudes, as part of a linguistic hegemony, have influence over the teaching practice internationally;
• Question these attitudes and how they play out around the world, especially regarding attitudes toward ‘correct’ English;
• Increased sensitivity to the linguistic challenges faced by some individuals, especially in classroom contexts;
• Develop speaking skills and abilities to work effectively in groups;
• Recognise aspects of coloniality, and the broader practice of epistemic injustice, and how this relates to oppression via one’s language;

As a response to the above, understand the potential for Linguistic Citizenship to address epistemic injustice related to language use, and the identity which emanates from that.

online via Blackboard