Department of Language and Linguistics
Essex Graduate Student Papers in Language and Linguistics On-line
(EGSPLL) Volume 16
Department of Language and Linguistics
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park
Colchester, CO4 3SQ
UK
November 2016
EGSPLL Volume 16 is a collection of papers written by graduate students of the Department of
Language and Linguistics. On-line versions of previous volumes in the series are available at:
http://www.essex.ac.uk/langling/research/papers/default.aspx
The Department of Language and Linguistics offers taught Masters courses, PhD Programmes and
PhD by supervised research in a wide variety of subjects within the disciplines of Applied Linguistics,
English Language Teaching, Language Acquisition, Phonology, Psycholinguistics and
Neurolinguistics, Sociolinguistics and Syntax. Information about graduate study in the Department
can be obtained from the Departmental webpage:
http://www.essex.ac.uk/langling/
Or by contacting:
The Graduate Administrator
Department of Language and Linguistics
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park
Colchester
Essex, CO4 3SQ
Email: [email protected]
Tel: +44 1206 872199
Fax: +44 1206 871298
Editors: Wangchuk Rinzin, Roberta Mignardi, and Kan Ting Yan Rachel
© The authors, 2016
Acknowledgements
We acknowledge, with thanks, the help of the following in reviewing articles submitted to EGSPPL 16:
Professor Peter L. Patrick and Dr. Julian Good. We also acknowledge the support of the Department
of Language and Linguistics at the University of Essex for help in the production of this volume.
1 Table of Contents
Teachers’ Perceptions and Materials for Teaching Cultural Elements
3
By Saw Thanda Swe
The Development and Usage of Dzongkha Honorifics
15
By Wangchuk Rinzin
Teachers' Language Skills and the Influence on Their Teaching Skills
By Saw Thanda Swe
2 30
Teachers’ Perceptions and Materials for Teaching Cultural Elements
Saw Thanda Swe
Abstract
This paper is a small version of my PhD thesis about EFL teachers’ teaching experiences,
their choice of materials and activities for such cultural lessons. The findings revealed that
teachers use many outside materials (e.g. newspapers and magazines, video clips, pictures) to
support their cultural elements lessons. They extract such materials from libraries, youtube
and internet websites, and so forth. In addition, teachers’ perspectives on teaching cultural
elements were documented: more than half of the participants said that teaching cultures in
ELT classroom is essential, but a few still consider that this can be learnt through people and
that course books hold some stereotypical views.
1.
Introduction
The relationship between language and culture has been discussed by many scholars (such as
Kramsch (1998)), but there has been little exploration as to whether teachers from EFL
classrooms think it is necessary to cover this in their day-to-day teaching, and nor, for that
matter, have their experiences / perspectives been examined: i.e. whether they think it is a
struggle or a pleasure to teach cultural elements that are presented in coursebooks. According
to my experience, learning cultural elements (e.g. the do’s and don’ts of specific cultures)
helps language learners to understand the targeted language better (for example, whether or
not giving a present is acceptable in some cultures when someone is invited for dinner)
because language can be delivered through cultural messages in reading, and sharing
different cultural values in class helps learners to expand their knowledge to become
multicultural persons. As many scholars are aware of language schools and classrooms’
settings, many EFL teachers are assigned to teach course books. These course books (e.g.
New Cutting Edge, 2005; New Total English, 2010) have already presented some cultural
elements such as social behaviours (i.e. what are the do’s and don’ts in a specific culture),
and teachers therefore are compelled to deal with these in their practice of teaching. However,
teachers need to acquire cultural knowledge first before they deliver the lesson if they do not
belong to that specific culture, which will necessitate a substantial amount of time spent on
3 preparation: I have similarly explained all these aspects and needs in my PhD. It is interesting
to ascertain how long EFL teachers spend in lesson planning and what they do during the
stage of preparation. Therefore, I have studied this in my doctoral study.
Teaching both cultures and language will be more complicated than having purely traditional
ways of grammar-focused lessons. As mentioned above, teachers need to take more time in
lesson planning for cultural elements lessons such as finding materials, creating activities and
learning about their students’ cultures and backgrounds before they teach. I was therefore
interested in how EFL teachers are handling such cultural elements lessons, and whether they
think it is necessary to teach and learn them through coursebooks. Moore (1996: 272) has
also warned that:
“teachers must plan for teaching culture. They should create lesson plans with specific
performance outcomes, they should create activities for students to achieve the
outcomes and they should design some means of measuring the learned outcomes.”
I therefore studied how teachers plan, what activities are commonly used and how teachers
design them. Moreover, McKay (2012: 82) mentioned that “some aspect of Western
culture … appears in a textbook.” If this is the case, learning about EFL teachers’ experiences
of teaching cultural elements will be an interesting subject. In addition, EFL teachers’
thoughts on whether or not teaching and learning cultures is necessary have also been
expanded upon in the PhD study.
2.
The use of materials for teaching English
Murray and Christison (2011: 44) explained that “ELT is an intercultural enterprise”, for
learners who have different cultural backgrounds tend to learn English to exchange
information, to expand their business globally, or to buy products that cannot be
found/produced in their countries, etc. When students attend language classes, they are given
materials such as an article or shown some pictures or movie clips by class teachers, and
some are supported with high-technical learning-aid materials such as a smart-board or
computers. Rubdy (2003, cited in McKay, 2012: 71) said that “classroom materials provide a
‘route map’ for teachers and learners”, and therefore the coursebook can be considered as a
classroom material, particularly in rural teaching settings where less internet access is
provided (e.g. downloading materials from the internet or showing pictures and videos to
4 students are more possible in modern language classrooms which many of the participants
from my large-scale study applied in their teaching). In the past few years, the classrooms
and students in which I grew up (i.e. Myanmar, formerly Burma) have relied upon
coursebooks for learning and teaching (some teachers designed and extracted some materials
for their lessons in some language schools) as there were only a few classrooms wellequipped with high technological materials such as smart board, TV or computers.
Mishan and Timmis (2015: 3) said “materials are needed for language teaching”, and they
can help with visualization of language context (e.g. a set of kitchen appliances) so that
students’ understanding is enhanced. Mishan and Timmis (2015: 2), however, have raised
two questions about what should be called materials and the reasons for having them in EFL
classrooms:
1. What are materials?
2. What do we need materials for?
In terms of learning and teaching materials, the coursebook is counted as one of the materials
and many classrooms will use it, but it is not the only material that teachers and students can
have as learning tools. Thus, there are other materials such as newspapers (local/ international)
which can bring up-to-date news to students and which would encourage more students to
read. In consequence, Mishan and Timmis (2015: 2) defined materials as dictionaries,
grammar books, readers, workbooks or photocopied exercises as paper-based materials; and
they term newspapers, food packages and photographs as realia. Train/airline timetables can
also be termed as authentic materials as they are not pre-designed for learning purposes.
As for the textbooks’ presentations, Murray and Christison (2011: 53) explained that
“textbooks are mostly written for a wide range of learners, teachers find they need to adapt a
textbook that they or their institutions have chosen.” This could happen to any teacher,
especially those who are teaching students who are less exposed to English, such as
classrooms and teachers from rural areas in Myanmar. They may have to adjust the level of
language that students can understand (i.e. replacing vocabulary or removing some activities
which are impractical to run with a large number of students, or using some pictures, or
explaining in L1 if both parties share the same language). Adaptation/modifying will not only
happen at the linguistic level, but will also occur when teaching cultures. If there is a gap
between coursebooks’ presented cultures and students’ cultures (e.g. an Asian group of
5 students who have been less exposed to English or Western cultures through media or
through communities or who have never been outside of their own countries although internet
access has widened people’s exposure to Western cultures almost everywhere), teachers may
have to adapt the material in order not to offend anyone in the class (e.g. whether or not
talking about drinking or political issues is permitted to be discussed).
2.1
Cultural Elements and coursebooks
Murray and Christison (2011: 44) stated that there are two kinds of culture: big C and small c.
The big ‘C’ tends to mean culture as “contribution to civilization (architecture, art, literature,
music and so on) and the little ‘c’ refers to “everyday lives (what we like to call fiestas,
famous people, and food view).” Clandfield (2008, cited in Swe, 2016: 62) said “the terms of
culture can be divided into three: the cultural artefacts that people make and use, the cultural
knowledge of what people know, and the cultural behaviour of what people do.” The culture
in this study refers to small ‘c’ cultures such as customs, traditions, behaviours and festivals.
Gray and Block (2014: 45) used the term “a regime of representation” when describing the
role of the coursebook (textbook) in ELT. There are some cultural elements in language
coursebooks (see New Cutting Edge, 2005), but McDonough and Shaw (2003: 61) pointed
out that “no textbook or set of materials is likely to be perfect.” Thus, teachers may need to fit
learners’ learning aims and adjust to their local cultures, and this study aimed to search how
teachers deal with those cultural elements and their issues and experiences in EFL classes.
2.2
Is teaching cultures necessary?
Swe (2016) explained that there are differences between addressing someone in British and
Asian cultures. For example, the British accept being called by their first names on informal
occasions and surnames at formal occasions; however, many Myanmar people do not own
family names and full names (given names) are used in common practice. Hino (2012: 39)
also explained about the cultural clashes while following an American standard and said: “the
elderly are called by the younger ones simply by their given names, despite the fact that such
practice is against East Asia culture rooted in the Confucian tradition.” He then continued:
“The Japanese belief in seniority should be able find its expression in Japanese English also
in describing relationships with one’s siblings” (ibid). Moreover, Huang (2008: 96, cited in
Swe, 2016) gives some examples of politeness manners such as “to interrupt when someone
is talking is considered impolite behaviour.” This sort of culture should be taught as it is
6 helpful for learners to avoid being rude in a specific cultural setting, and Orton (2010: 224)
has also spoken of the benefits of having awareness of cultures:
“to be successful in exchanging meaning, we need to know and perceive the beliefs,
values and social practices in which our interlocutors are grounding the meaning of
their utterances, and be aware of our own.”
3.
Research Methods
This research has relied on qualitative methods which provide “a set of interpretative,
material practices that make the world visible” (Mertens, 2015: 236). As this research studied
EFL teachers’ experiences and difficulties, qualitative methods were considered more
suitable than other methods. To be able to carry out this study, I designed an open-ended
questionnaire and semi-structured interviews. Observation was initially considered as part of
the data collection, but it unfortunately needed to be discarded because of the poor level of
participation. Many of the participants disliked being recorded or they did not want to be
watched by someone else while teaching.
The open-ended questionnaire helps me to “catch the authenticity, richness, depth of
response..” (Cohen et al., 2011: 393), and the semi-structured interviews enable me to:
“have freedom to clarify people’s understanding and to ask follow-up questions to
explore a viewpoint, to determine knowledge or to open-up other explanations and
answers to questions that were not unforeseen when the research questions were
determined” (Newby, 2014: 356).
As this research is concerned with teachers’ experiences, problems and issues of teaching
cultural elements, the combination of open-ended questionnaires and semi-structured
interviews allowed me to obtain rich data.
3.1
Participation in this research
Eighty-five EFL teachers participated in this study. They were British, Polish, Sudanese,
African, Romanian, Malaysian, Myanmar, Chinese, Taiwanese, Chilean, Mexican and others.
They all brought their experiences/difficulties and shared their perspectives on teaching
cultures in ELT classrooms. They were contacted through course coordinators/directors and
some were through friends. They all signed the Consent Form and knew that their responses
7 would be presented anonymously. Most returned the questionnaire to me through their
coordinators, although some were returned by email.
3.2
Collecting and Analyzing the data
After collecting the data, the next phase involved its interpretation. I manually coded the
questionnaire, creating codes such as ‘CB’ for ‘coursebook’, CA for ‘cultural activities’, etc.
Nvivo 9 and 10 were used for the semi-structured interviews. The same codes were applied in
the interview coding, but there were many more new codes created depending upon the
participants’ responses.
4.
Findings
This research sought to ascertain teacher-participants’ use of outside materials along with
coursebooks for cultural elements lessons, their reasons for choosing such specific materials,
and their perspectives on teaching cultures in EFL classrooms. When asked whether teachers use outside materials for teaching culture, 64 out of 85
participants answered in the affirmative. The other 17 participants frequently use them and
the rest (4) answered that they infrequently use outside materials. The types of materials used
include newspapers (e.g. The Metro) or other authentic materials along with coursebooks. For
example, P1 said: “Yes, I do use magazines, newspapers, realia and on-line materials as
well.” P2 answered: “Sometimes – current newspaper articles.” P18 stated:
“Of course! Every time I teach cultural elements in the classroom, I use realia, since
it’s what my students love the most, videos and newspapers.”
P35 explained “I showed my students the mask I bought in Venice to explain the Mask
Festival”, and P23 used a variety of interesting and motivating authentic materials:
“Normally, I use powerpoint. For example, there is something about Korea. First I
will find video clip, maybe a map and population and their food .. and.. something
about their habits ..so .. something like that .. also more pictures about their food or
culture or traditional clothes and compare with different countries related to the
textbook or I add more other countries… maybe students are familiar with.”
Some participants chose songs and other kinds of music. Mass media such as the BBC
(including BBC news, BBC i-player and BBC radio) is used, and P19 said:
8 “I also use some clips or footages from BBC, British Council websites, etc. to teach
authentic language, especially for speaking activities.”
Using the internet is popular among EFL teachers, and P11answered: “I use internet,
powerpoint slideshow, movies, photos….” and P43 simply said, “I use internet a lot.”
Wikipedia has become one of the more ready-made translation tools for some teachers as it
provides several languages for the readers. P9 answered: “Wikipedia (to get some reliable
information).” One other respondent (P23) explained why he needs it:
“They have English version, Chinese and many other different languages, so really..
umm.. I would first look into Chinese version and pick some information. I think it’s
interesting to share with students and then translate into English or use both languages
because you know… junior students, their English is not that good, so I have to….
umm.. really need to mix Chinese and English.”
As visualizing materials helps learners to learn things effectively, Youtube is also utilised as
adapted materials along with the coursebook to support their cultural concerns lessons. P30
responded:
“In one class, there are .. umm.. 16 years old, 18 years old and 20 years old .. umm..
they just need visual and something different to engage them, that’s the key thing.”
Many teachers rely on technology and download pictures, charts, short stories, articles, news
and so forth. Having looked at the participants’ responses, TV, BBC and youtube,
newspapers (such as The Metro which is published in the UK) are the most popular teaching
materials used by teachers for listening, speaking and reading tasks. Some respondents used
libraries and resources to find some interesting materials and adapt them for their specific
lessons. Some teachers are provided with a share-drive internally by their schools so that any
materials and lessons can be shared with their colleagues.
This research enquired why EFL teachers need to adapt/modify materials for such lessons.
One of the given answers was that coursebooks and their materials are old and outdated.
Moreover, teachers complained that there was insufficient information or no information in
coursebooks. P31 highlighted the reasons for using outside materials: “The reality of youtube
videos, photos, magazine articles, realia brings these to life.” Some teachers needed to
localize materials to fit in with the context where they were teaching, such as P73 who
explained:
“It’s necessary to give an appropriate context for the language taught and it can also
be engaging.”
9 Participant P39 voiced:
“I can get involved and have better understanding of materials and students are more
motivated to learn them.”
In terms of activities for cultural elements lessons, teacher-participants use several activities.
Although they try to cover four language skills (reading, speaking, writing and listening), the
communicative skills are most favoured by my participants. They also have to teach some
grammatical function, pronunciation and vocabulary. Of the other kinds of activities,
discussion is one of the most popular among teacher-participants, and P19 said:
“this is a very good opportunity for comparison; I mean what people say about
specific cultures or people and what people say about you, so you can compare so
that’s… that’s a very good thing because that will generate more debate and
discussion which is enhancing the fluency and the speaking aspect of the students.”
P36 said “I will ask students to present and provide some topics for them to discuss”; and P38
voiced “sometimes started by a personal story as an opening of discussion.” Thus, discussion
seems to be the most applied activity among others (e.g. reading, writing or narrating stories
as activities).
Many teacher-participants argued that teaching cultures is essential in ELT classrooms with
the example of P1 who explained: “If the course is a language course then there is a necessity
for the teacher to teach the cultural elements as well because language is part of culture”, and
P10 emphasized as below:
“I think so because students should pay respect to the others’ cultures and should love
their culture too. Students should accept the differences of each culture. The lessons
would support them when they go abroad and study in other countries.”
P49 highlighted:
“I believe they should, as learning a new language is in itself a cultural exchange of
sorts and culture is also a significant part of our own.”
P52 stressed:
“I think it’s useful in order to give students a better knowledge of the country they’re
living in and it also helps to build a good dynamic in the classroom as students learn
about each other and build a rapport.”
10 P72 believes:
“I think teachers do inevitably, so I think they need to do so with knowledge and
sensitivity.”
Sixteen out of the 85 participants, however, had different views on teaching and learning
cultures. Some participants said that coursebooks bring stereotypical views and inadequate or
wrong information, such as P3 who highlighted that “learners should learn cultures through
people (teachers and classmates).” Thus, although there are some negative points of view,
these are still relatively low, and it can still be assumed that EFL teachers consider it
important to have such cultural elements in EFL classrooms as language is always attached to
culture and people speak a language through their own cultural contexts.
5.
Discussion and Implications
5.1
How to search for materials?
If an EFL teacher has run out of ideas and is struggling to find materials to explore cultural
things through language, s/he can pick an old or recent newspaper because newspapers bring
many aspects to the readers: not only local and the world’s news, but also some cultural
things through texts (e.g. how to celebrate Carnival in Brazil or in France, or how to serve a
traditional dinner or why people should attend a meeting on time, etc.) and it helps to expand
discussion on knowledge and experiences in the class. Dheram and Rani (2007, web accessed
07/08/2016) also experienced that “many language teachers advise their students to read
newspapers online to learn about cultural and political situations.” Therefore, I would suggest
that readers of this paper should try and use newspapers if they have not already been utilized
in the class.
Furthermore, using youtube as a source is fairly good for well-equipped classrooms. It can
provide not only songs, but also short movie clips and other kinds of visual things such as
how to make naan bread at home for those who have never tried them (e.g. some European
students might be interested in learning about using them if they are only familiar with using
traditional Western foods). The local TV channels of their countries can be a good resource.
Teachers can record them with a tape-recorder or video recorder and then bring this to the
class. Students can subsequently be asked to write a news report in English if the class is
upper-intermediate or advanced level.
11 I am aware that some classrooms are not permitted to have practical experiments such as
cooking local foods or baking cakes due to health and safety standards in schools. It could
also be messy to have such procedures done in the class. If this is the case, teachers can
prepare at home, take pictures at every single stage, and then put all photos on slideshows,
present what teachers have made (e.g. a cake), and then have vocabulary, grammar and
communicative lessons before students are allocated their portions of food. The stage of
lesson planning seems to take many hours, but it will produce an effective, enjoyable and
memorable lesson since students can remember and become familiar with words through
authentic materials. Teachers can expand the lesson on asking students how to cook their
favourite meals such as noodle soup, fried rice, etc.
5.2
How much authentic material should teachers use?
According to McKay (2012: 81), materials can be called authentic if “only to the extent they
are relevant to the students’ proficiency level, learning goals and styles and the social context
in which they live.” Therefore, novice teachers ought not to think that only newspapers or
videos are termed authentic materials. In my eyes, as explained above, teachers can also use
local foods as authentic materials and it would provide a good learning environment. The
main point is to consider why such materials are used and what skills will be provided to
learners. For example, if the class is for literary skills, reading skill can be enhanced by
utilizing short novels. However, articles from current newspapers can not only provide
reading skill, but can also help learners to acquire or extend their knowledge on what is
happening in the country or in the world.
5.3
What things are less favoured?
Teachers do more communication-oriented activities such as discussions and role-plays than
grammar. To my knowledge, the receptive skill (i.e. reading) is less focused. In fact, knowing
grammar and having a rich vocabulary will help learners to feel more confident when using a
foreign language according to my own foreign language learning experiences, and “without
knowledge of grammar and vocabulary, language learners will not be able to communicate”
(Green, 2014: 110).
5.4
Why do we think we need cultures to learn?
Things are valued differently in different cultures, and it underlines the sense of specific
meanings for two people from different cultures. As Kirkpatrick (2016: 101) explained “what
12 might be normal in one culture is impossible to accept in another”, and I believe that learning
at least a basic knowledge of cultures is essential for everyone in order not to have any
cultural faux pas (as, for example, Kirkpatrick (2016) who did not know about the Burmese
custom of crematorium and had a cultural faux pas in 1985). Therefore, I strongly suggest
that readers have some amount of cultural input for students so that they can avoid bitter
conflicts and become more intercultural persons.
6.
Limitation with this study
This study has not assessed learners’ perspectives on teaching cultures and their thoughts on
language improvement and socio-cultural knowledge after such cultural elements lessons
have been taught in the class. The classroom observation, which counted as a part of
assessment, was abandoned due to the low percentage of teachers’ participation as they were
not pleased to be video-taped or to be watched by someone else while teaching as explained
above. The findings, issues, experiences and thoughts in this research may still be different
from readers’ experiences based on the settings of classes (such as public or private schools
or one-to-one teaching) and the levels of classes (young or adult students’ classes or Business
or Academic English classes).
7.
Conclusion
This study has presented what materials and activities are commonly used for cultural
elements lessons. Teachers’ common reasons for choosing such specific materials have been
researched and their opinions on whether or not culture should be taught in EFL classrooms. I
hope that this study will enable novice readers / teachers to plan their lessons well and
anticipate potential issues that could happen in EFL classrooms.
References
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(7th edition). Oxon, UK: Routledge.
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Essex, UK: Pearson Education Limited.
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Pearson Longman.
13 Dheram, P. and Rani, N. (2007) Using English Newspapers in the ESL/EFL Classroom.
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14 The Development and Usage of Dzongkha Honorifics
Wangchuk Rinzin
1.
Introduction
Dzongkha, the national language of Bhutan, has many distinctive honorific forms to show
politeness and respect between speakers of different statuses. In this essay, firstly, I will
focus on how the semantic characteristics of the Dzongkha honorific forms were developed
and, secondly, how they are used in politeness strategies. The paper will also observe the
patterns and usage of different politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson (Brown
and Levinson 1987:68-71).
Honorifics in Bhutanese constitute a class of forms used in addressing a social superior, not a
social equal or a social inferior (Feurer 1996: 46). Thus, the Dzongkha honorific is made up
of special affixes for superior status; there is no need to add any affixes for normal/ordinary
status (Dorji et al, 2008:43). For example, Ku ‘body’ (ordinary) > Ku-zug ‘body’ (hon.).
Moreover, the concept of Dzongkha honorifics refers to both verbal and non-verbal features,
as gestures and intonations are inseparable aspects of the act of greeting (bowing, prostrating)
etc. (Feurer 1996: 46). Briefly, this essay will present some general rules of formation of
Dzongkha honorifics and their usage in different social statuses (Potapova 1996:215).
2.
The Development of Dzongkha Honorific Forms
Generally, Dzongkha honorifics are expressed through lexical, morphological and syntactic
structures, which have a connotation of respect and valuable social class marking. In
Dzongkha, all the forms of nouns, pronouns and verbs are marked with respectful affixes
with the exception of the 1st person singular, “I (my humble self)”, which is considered as
“self-denigration” even if s/he were of a higher status, such as a king or a minister (Feurer
1996: 46). For example, they would use only the unmarked pronoun or noun “nga > I”, even
if he were the king or the Prime Minister.
Dzongkha bears a close linguistic relationship (it belongs to the Sino-Tibetan family) to the
standard Tibetan language, as Driem explains: “Although spoken Dzongkha and Tibetan are
largely mutually unintelligible, the literary forms of both are highly influenced by the
15 liturgical and Classical Tibetan language, known as Chöke in Bhutan which has been used for
centuries by Buddhist monks. Chöke was used as the language of education in Bhutan until
the early 1960s and it was replaced by Dzongkha in public Schools” (Driem 1993:30). Thus,
I have adapted and elaborated the models of Tibetan honorific forms since there has not been
any study/research carried out on Dzongkha honorifics (Potapova 1996: 215-217).
2.1.
Dzongkha honorific terms are formed by adding extra-honorific affixes or by
excluding some affixes, which are derived by a process of affixation. Hence, the
general models of Dzongkha honorific forms are as follows:
A.
An honorific prefix is added to a nominal word-stem or monosyllabic word-stem
when a subordinate is talking to a superior. For example, Lham ‘shoe’ (ordinary) >
zhap-lham ‘shoe’ (hon.), ‘zhap’ being an honorific prefix with the primary meaning,
‘leg’ (Potapova 1996: 215).
Dzo. stem
English
Dzo. hon-prefix
Dzo. Hon.
English
Zug
body
ku
ku-zug
body
Gi
knife
chag
Chag-gi
knife
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
B.
An honorific prefix is added to a nominal word-stem, and the suffix is excluded or left
out when a subordinate is talking to a superior. For example, Komtshig ‘thirsty’
(ordinary) > zhel-kom ‘thirsty’ (hon.), ‘kom’ being an honorific prefix with the
primary meaning, ‘thirst’ (Potapova 1996: 215).
Dzo. stem
suffix
Dzo. hon-prefix
Dzo. hon.
Left out
English
kel
wa
ku
ku-kel
wa
share
Zhongpa
pa
thru
thru-zhong
pa
Wash-basin
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
16 C.
An honorific prefix is added to one of the categorical components of the word, and the
other categorical component is left out when a subordinate is talking to a superior.
For example, yonten ‘education’ (ordinary) > ku-yon ‘education’ (hon.); ‘ku’ being an
honorific prefix with the primary meaning ‘body’ (Potapova 1996: 215).
Dzo. stem
Other
Dzo. hon-prefix
Dzo. hon.
Left out
English
component
Pe
dep
chag
chag-pe
dep
book
Rue
rig
ku
ku-rue
rig
clan
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
D.
One of the components of the bi-syllabic words is substituted by a synonymous
component, which is also an honorific one.
For example, kang-je ‘foot print’
(ordinary) > zhab-je ‘foot print’ (hon.), where the component kang ‘foot’ is
substituted by the component zhab ‘foot’ (hon.) (Potapova 1996: 216).
Dzo.
bi- English
syllabic
Dzo. prefix Syn- Substitution
Dzo. hon.
English
component
Mig-shel
eyeglass
chen
mig/chen
chen-shel
eyeglass
Na-gen
earring
nen
na/nen
na-gen
earring
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
E.
At this juncture, it is slightly different from the above-sketched models. This model is
mainly characteristic of verbs. “Not only is an honorific prefix added to a verbal stem,
but also an auxiliary verb.” For example, shed ‘to speak’ (ordinary) > sung-shednang ‘to speak’ (hon.), sung being an honorific prefix with the primary meaning,
‘speech’ (hon.), and nang being an auxiliary verb with the primary meaning ‘to speak,
to give, etc. (hon.) (Potapova 1996: 216).
17 Dzo. V-stem
Auxiliary
Dzo. Prefix-hon. Dzo. hon.
English meaning
Tsed
nang
ku
ku-tsed-nang
to play
Kor
nang
zhap
zhap-kor-nang
to visit
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
F.
In addition, Dzongkha words have many honorific equivalents of different roots. For
instance, dod ‘to sit’ (ordinary) > zhug (hon.); sem ‘mind’ (ordinary) > thug (hon.),
etc. (DDC2002).
For more examples:
Ordinary
Honorific
English
Long
zheng
to get up
Che
jug
tongue
Extracted from the Dzongkha-English Dictionary by Dzongkha Development Commission (2002)
2. 2.
In many cases, the Dzongkha honorific components, which are developed in the
lexical-semantic structure of the words and denoting parts of body, are largely used as
honorific prefixes as follows:
A.
The basic meaning of the prefix ku is ‘body’ (hon.). “The word-stems taking this
prefix will have the following meanings, such as body, parts of the body, health
(sickness, recovery, birth, death, freezing etc.), relationships (relatives, enemies etc),
location, image, picture, clothing, ornaments, property, business and so forth”
(Potapova 1996:216). It is used when a subordinate is talking to a superior. For
example, ku-thrag- ‘blood’, ku-nyung- ‘sick’, ku-nye- ‘relative’, etc.
B.
The basic meaning of the prefix Jag is ‘tongue’ (hon.). “The word-stems taking this
prefix will have the following meanings, such as food, prize, number, counting, talk,
reading, order, breath and so on” (Potapova 1996:216). It is used when a subordinate
18 is talking to a superior. For instance, jag-lung- ‘oral instruction’, jag-tsha- ‘salt’, jagug- ‘breath’, etc.
C.
The basic meaning of the prefix Uu is ‘head’ (hon.). “The word-stems taking this
prefix will have the following meaning and connects to objects like hat, pillow, tent,
rank, hair, umbrella, vow etc” (Potapova 1996:216). It is used when a subordinate is
talking to a superior. Likewise, Uu-tra- ‘hair’, Uu-dug- ‘umbrella’, Uu-gen- ‘head
ornament’ etc.
D.
The basic meaning of the prefix Zhel is ‘mouth’ (hon.). “The word-stems taking this
prefix will have the following meanings like meeting/meeting hall, smile, student,
address, prayer and so on” (Potapova 1996:216). It is used when a subordinate is
talking to a superior. For example, zhel-jel- ‘meeting’, zhel.zum- ‘smile’, zhel-lop‘student’ etc.
E.
The basic meaning of the prefix Chag is ‘hand’ (hon.). “The word-stems taking this
prefix will have the following meanings: objects related to the hand”, such as knife,
shoulder, seal, palm, book, arrow, handwriting and so forth” (Potapova 1996:216). It
is used when a subordinate is talking to a superior. For example, chag-dri- ‘knife’,
chag-ta- ‘shoulder’, chag-tham- seal etc.
F.
The basic meaning of the prefix Zhab is ‘leg’ (hon.). It becomes the honorific when
taken by the following stems; parts of the leg, such as visit, footwear, walking, knee,
dance, barefoot, socks and so forth (Potapova 1996:217).
It is used when a
subordinate is talking to a superior. For instance, zhab-kor- ‘visit’, zhab-pue- ‘knee’,
zhab-thra- ‘dance’, zhab-so-‘socks; etc.
G.
The basic meaning of the prefix Chen is ‘eye’ (hon.). It is taken by the stems with the
subsequent meanings, which are related to eye-elements, such as tear, eyelash,
eyebrow, and eyeglass and so on (Potapova 1996:217). It is used when a subordinate
is talking to a superior. For example, Chen-chap- ‘tear’, chen-zi- ‘eyelash’, chen-zim‘eyebrow’ etc.
In addition, the discourse marker La at the end of a sentence is an indication of showing
respect for other people and used in ‘polite parlance’ even in Bhutanese English, Bhutanese
Nepali and Bhutanese Hindi, etc. It is also very much a part of Dzongkha honorific speech
(Driem 1992: 369). It is used when a subordinate is talking to a superior. For example, “Nga 19 lu chu phob gang zhu nang La”> “Please give me a cup of water”. It is equivalent to the
English word ‘please’.
3.
Usage of Dzongkha politeness strategies
Dzongkha, like the Tibetan, Japanese and English languages, has many special honorific
lexicons and politeness strategies in order to maintain each other’s face when Face
Threatening Acts (FTAs) are unavoidable. In this aspect, the notion of the universal face is
one’s “public self-image that every member wants to claim for himself”, which consists of
two related aspects: the negative face and the positive face, as defined by Brown and
Levinson (1987:61).
In this article, I will focus on discussing and observing politeness in
Dzongkha with its use of honorific forms and with the use of five different strategies to
minimise the threat of the hearer’s face. The five strategies are: “1) doing an act without
redress, baldly, 2) doing an act with positive politeness, 3) doing an act with negative
politeness, 4) doing an act indirectly (off-record) and 5) don’t do the FTAs at all” (Brown and
Levinson 1987:68-71).
Generally, Dzongkha is a polite and honorific form of speech, which reflects distance
between speaker and hearer. It is also likely to be a language of negative politeness
(Nakamura 1997:3). However, Dzongkha is a language of hierarchical society. It has various
polite and honorific speech forms for addressing and referring to people. It shows relative
social status and objects/things with communicative events in proper ways. In this respect, I
would say that the honorific system in Dzongkha is considered to be a type of noun
classification, which has thus become bound to the “function of deictic person marking” or
“what has traditionally been called pronominalization” (Beckwith 1994:6, cited in Feurer
1996: 46).
In so doing, one would deliberately need to employ one of five possible politeness strategies
to mitigate the addressee’s face threats as well as to achieve the speaker’s end-goals.
Therefore, this essay shall mainly examine the usage of different politeness strategies with
Dzongkha honorific forms based on the relative conventional contexts. The examples of
possible politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987:91-227) are as follows:
20 3.1 Bald on-record
This effective and foremost bald on-record (without redress) strategy is very appropriate in
Bhutanese society, as mentioned earlier. It is also appropriate for a higher status speaker with
a close relationship audience to minimise FTAs implicitly. It is relevant to the former because
“S is vastly superior in power to H, and can enlist audience support to destroy H’s face
without losing his own.” It is apposite to the latter because it can be used in a “direct, clear,
unambiguous and concise way” to request one’s friend or relative to do something (Brown
and Levinson 1987: 69). Some examples of bald on-record strategies are:
a)
Great urgency (Brown and Levinson 1987: 96):
“Watch out!”
Similar expression in Dzongkha (Driem 1992:361):
“Drem ton!” > “Be careful”
b)
Great efficiency (Brown and Levinson 1987: 96):
“Hear me out!”
Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 35):
“Namcho Goyeka!” > “Can you hear me?”
c)
Task oriented (Brown and Levinson 1987: 97):
“Lend me a hand here!”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:363):
“Nga lu droram chi bey nang!” > “Please help me!”
d)
Imperatives in formulaic entreaties (Brown and Levinson 1987: 96):
“Forgive me!”
21 Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 37):
“Gom ma threl!” > “Forgive me!”
e)
Communication difficulties: calling from a distance or with a bad connection (Brown
and Levinson 1987: 97):
“I need another $1,000.”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:365):
“Ngalu ngultram chutham dechi kelnang me.”> “Send me ten ngultram (BC) today.”
f)
When the speaker is powerful and has no desire to maintain H’s face (Brown and
Levinson 1987: 97):
“Bring me wine, Jeeves.”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:366):
“Dop dina chu kang marey.” > “Fill the bucket with water.”
g)
Doing the FTA when S cares about the hearer (Brown and Levinson 1987: 98):
“Your headlights are on!”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:360):
“Dosai thab dam!” > “Fasten your seat belts.”
h)
Doing imperative FTAs for farewell or advice in H’s interest (Brown and Levinson
1987: 98):
“Take care of yourself, be good, have fun.”
22 Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 41):
“Lekshom be joen la!” > “Please go carefully.”
3.2
Positive politeness strategies
Positive politeness strategies are used to mitigate the threats of the hearer’s positive face
especially in a friendly society like Bhutan. Moreover, within the same groups, these positive
politeness strategies are most suitable to make both S and H feel good about themselves and
their “interests and approval of each other’s personality and wants etc.” (Brown and Levinson
1987: 101). They are normally used in circumstances where S and A know each other quite
well. Hence, positive politeness does not necessarily have to be redressive action, such as in
cooperative and friendly societies. Thus, positive politeness utterances can be used even
“between strangers by claiming ‘common ground’ indicating that S and H both belong to
some set of persons who shares wants, including goals and values”, with a sense of friendship,
solidarity, compliments etc. (Brown and Levinson 1987: 103).
3.2.1
Attend to H’s interests, needs, wants (Brown and Levinson 1987: 103):
“You must be hungry; it’s a long time since breakfast. How about some lunch?”
Similar expression in Dzongkha (Driem 1992:236):
“Cho tow kiyi ga? Cho kha ma kom ga?” > “Are you hungry? Aren’t you thirsty?”
3.2.2
Exaggerate interest in, approval of, sympathy for H (Brown and Levinson 1987: 104):
“How absulutely marvellous!”
Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 51):
“Choki numkhor di ha le sisi chi mey” > “Your car is marvellous!”
3.2.3
Intensify interest in H (Brown and Levinson 1987: 106-107):
“I have never seen such a row!”
23 Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 51):
“Nga cho zum jarim namyang ma ched” > “I have never seen a beautiful girl like
you”
3.2.4
Use solidarity in-group identity markers (Brown and Levinson 1987: 107-112):
“Come here mate”
Dzongkha (Dorji et al 2008: 31):
“Doro na shosh” > “Come here village mate/country mate”
3.2.5
Seek agreement (Brown and Levinson 1987: 112-113):
“A:
John went to London this weekend!
B:
To London!”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:170:
3.2.6
A:
“Chum digis langpe ka!” > “This rice is enough?”
B:
“Langpe!” “Enough”
Avoid disagreement (Brown and Levinson 1987: 113-117):
A:
“You hate your mum and dad?”
B:
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:302):
A:
“Khaw chap ni inpey!” > “It will snow?”
B:
“Im zum dug!” “Looks like”
24 “Oh, sometimes”
3.2.7
Joke (Brown and Levinson 1987: 124-125):
“OK if I tackle those cookies now?”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:234):
“Nga gis nyilam na cho drang pa chin?” > “Ok if I hit you in my dream?”
3.2.7
Include both speaker (S) and hearer (H) in an activity (Brown and Levinson 1987:
127-128):
“Give us a break”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:242):
“Nga che nyigi go demi chap gey”> “We lock our door”
3.2.8
Be optimistic (Brown and Levinson 1987: 126-127):
“Look, I’m sure you won’t mind if I borrow your typewriter.”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:259):
“Nga gisshe nangpa chogis naglu tiru ngaja ki jinwong sey” > “I knew you wouldn’t
mind to lend (me) $500 tomorrow”
3.3
Negative politeness strategies
Negative politeness strategies are employed to mitigate the threats of the hearer’s negative
face. Furthermore, in a hierarchical society, like Bhutan to respect and mark the high level
social strata, these negative politeness strategies are courteously useful and oriented. The
negative face is the desire to remain undisturbed and thus, negative politeness is useful to
avoid imposition on the addressee. Hence, “they are therefore likely to be used whenever a
speaker wants to put a social brake on to the course of his interaction” (Brown and Levinson
1987: 129-130). Therefore, Dzongkha honorific forms are likely to serve not only with social
systems but also with situational contexts.
25 3.3.1
Be conventionally indirect (Brown and Levinson 1987: 129-130):
“Can you please pass the salt?”
Similar expression in Dzongkha (Driem 1992:370):
“Na gi tsen ngoma sung nang la”> “Please tell me your good name”
3.3.2
Use hedging strategies and questions (Brown and Levinson 1987: 145-173):
“I suppose that Harry is coming.”
“Do me a favour, will you?”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:370):
“Nagi tshen ngomadi sungru tupe la”> “I wish that you could tell your real name”
“Na gadem chibe joem mo?” > “You’ve come on the off chance, have you?”
3.3.3
Be pessimistic (Brown and Levinson 1987: 173-176):
“I don’t suppose there’d be any possibility of you...”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:260):
“Nga na inpachin numkhor di galuyang nyawar mijim wong la”> “If I were you, I
wouldn’t lend the car to anyone”
3.3.4
Minimise the imposition (Brown and Levinson 1987: 176-178).
“Could I have a taste of that cake?”
26 Dzongkha (Driem 1992:261):
“Nyi Dasho gis ngalu yigu kelwa chin gani mey la”> “I would like it, if my
honourable boss would send me a letter”
3.3.5
Give difference (Brown and Levinson: 178-187).
“Mr President...”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:373):
“Miwang ngada rinpoche la/Mije lyonchen chog la”> “His Majesty the King of
Bhutan/Honourable Prime Minister”
3.3.6
Apologise (Brown and Levinson 1987: 187-190).
“I don’t want to bother you, but...”
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:372):
“Na thug tsher rung ngi khimna tsagchi jonte kadrin chang nang la”> “I don’t want
to bother you, but I beseech you come to my house once in any event”
3.3.7
State the FTA as a general rule (Brown and Levinson 1987: 206-207).
“The committee requests the president...?
Dzongkha (Driem 1992:372):
“Thrim di druk zhung gis rang tsup mey lo la”> “We hear Bhutan government is
introducing this law”
3.3.8
Use plural pronouns (Brown and Levinson 1987: 198-206):
“We feel obliged to warn you that...”
27 Dzongkha (Driem 1992:339:
“Nga che dari honorable Drasho Rabgaygi khim na jogo la”> “We are going to
honourable dasho Rabgay’s house today”
3.4
Off-record (Indirect)
‘Off-record’ is the best politeness strategy to avoid FTA by using indirect speech. Such offrecord utterances are essentially indirect use of language; for example, metaphor, irony,
rhetoric, tautology, hints etc. Hence, the speaker can simply avoid potential face damage and
receive good credit for being non-coercive, but making the hearer uses some inference to
understand the actual meaning of S’s utterance (Brown and Levinson 1978, 1987: 211-227).
Likewise, Dzongkha has many highly cultivated indirect and ironic linguistic features to
communicate within society at different social levels. The basic example is:
“It’s cold in here” Brown and Levinson 1987: 215):
Similar expression in Dzongkha (Dorji 2008:55:
“Khangmig dinang nadung du inpey”> “It’s very dark in here/inside the room”
This sentence insinuates that it would be nice if the hearer would get up and turn on the light
without asking him/her to do it.
3.5
Don’t do the FTA
With regards to this strategy, S naturally avoids offence to H’s face, when s/he doesn’t do
FTA at all. Consequently S fails to achieve his/her desired communication as there is no overt
polite speech and no strategy exists to communicate with each other with different social
norms and strata.
28 4.
Conclusion
In conclusion, this article observed the special system of Dzongkha honorific forms and their
functions with different politeness strategies. As stated above, all the five politeness strategies
are fairly useful to Bhutanese society in general and negative politeness strategy has a greater
emphasis with honorific forms of Dzongkha in particular. Thus, Dzongkha, like Japanese
(Nakamura 1997:17), can be classified as a language of negative politeness based on its fixed
and complex system of honorific forms (Brown and Levinson 1987).
In addition, ‘bald on-record’ is more appropriate to one of a higher status to order his/her
support workers in a direct and clear acoustic manner. Hence, negative politeness strategies
are more relevant to those of lower status in order to address and refer to people of high rank
by using “negatives, subjunctives, hedging particles, and tags; of manipulations of deixis and
presuppositions; of plurality, tense, and person” (Brown and Levinson 1987: 227). In short, it
requires more study and research to examine the appropriateness of the universal principles
of linguistic politeness proposed by Brown and Levinson’s and other eminent researchers.
References
Brown, P. and Levinson, S. (1987) Politeness: Some Universal in Language Usage,
Cambridge University Press
Dorji, S., Thinley, K., Dorji, T., and Wangchuk, T. (2008) Dzongkha Grammar for Lower
Secondary Level, Dzongkh Development Commission, Thimphu, Bhutan
Dorji, S., Thinley, K., Dorji, T., and Wangchuk, T. (2008) Dzongkha Grammar for Higher
Secondary Level, Dzongkh Development Commission, Thimphu, Bhutan
Driem, George Van. (1992) The Grammar of Dzongkha, Dzongkha Development
Commission, Thimphu, Bhutan
Dzongkha Development Commission (2002) Dzongkha-English Dictionary (2002), Thimphu,
Royal Government of Bhutan
Feurer, F. (1996) The Contemporary Use of Honofifics In Lhasa Tibetan: Linguistics of the
Tibeto-Burman Area, Volume 19.2 – p. 45-54
Nakamura, K. (1997) Positive politeness and the case of Japanese honorifics, MA
Dissertation, Sociolinguistics, University of Essex, UK
Potapova, H. (1996) Semantic Characteristics of Tibetan Honorific Forms, MON-KHMER
STUDIES 27: 215-217
29 Teachers’ Language Skills and the Influence on Their Teaching Skills
Saw Thanda Swe
Abstract
This paper discusses the perspectives of 33 experienced EFL (native and non-native) teachers
on the impact of language proficiency on their language teaching and their experiences of
teaching language. It was found that many participants believe that a teacher’s language
fluency can influence his/her teaching skills as teachers are the models of language users for
students. Teachers should have accuracy and competency. However two (one native and one
non-native teacher-participant) out of 33 think language fluency cannot have an influence on
teaching. This small-scale study has also revealed some issues: for example, native speaking
teachers have some difficulties in teaching grammar in the early stage of their teaching.
Moreover, some teachers have been challenged and tested by students about their knowledge
of language skills.
1.
The use of English and Teaching English
The English language is widely used in many countries for a variety of reasons such as
diplomacy, tourism, and international trading, as “English is the fastest growing language in
the world” (Mahboob et al., 2004: 100). In terms of the use of English in countries over the
world, Mahboob (2010: 8) stated that “English is seen as one of the local languages in many
parts of the world (e.g. Ghana, India, Nigeria, Philippines, Pakistan, and Singapore) and is
given official status and recognition in the language policies of these countries.” Lopriore
(2016: 71) noted that “English is the language which is taught and encouraged the most
among all foreign languages at all school levels in all southern Europe countries”, and she
gave some examples of countries where English is used such as Spain, Portugal and Croatia.
Richards (2015: 90) explained about the use of English in Southeast Asia: “[in] Singapore
and the Philippines, English is widely used in many different domains in society, including
education, the media, and government.” This obviously gives an opportunity for people to
learn English and become bilingual speakers (i.e. using both their native language and an
additional language such as English or Chinese) throughout their studies or work. As
mentioned earlier, the English language is used and taught in many countries these days.
30 1.1
Native or Non-native teachers for EFL classes
When it comes to learning, according to my experience, many learners (mainly South East
Asian students) register at local language schools. Some prefer to learn with NS1 teachers,
and for that reason many NNES2 teachers fail to succeed in being employed as teachers of
English. Medgyes (1992) noted in Mahboob et al. (2004: 101) that recruiters state that
“international students studying in Britain preferred to be taught by native-speaking English
teachers.” Pasternak and Bailey (2004: 156) stressed that “the demand for English language
classes in both ESL and EFL settings far outweighs the supply of so-called native teachers.”
Mahboob et al. (2004) found in their study that NS teachers are hired more in the U.S and I
personally experienced that some vacancies have stipulated “native speaker(s) only”. Murata
(2016: 80) highlighted an advertisement from Japan in 2015 for the position of Professor or
Associate Professor where being a native speaker was a pre-requisite; this shows how much
the NS norm is still reserved in Japan. According to my experience, it is because many
learners feel it is worth paying a larger fee for a course as they can expect to have better
accents, a wider range of usage (such as colloquialisms or slang expressions), and quicker
improvement in language acquisition since they have to use English constantly in the class,
where the L1 is eliminated or they have the prestige of being NS teachers’ students. This
belief ensures that NS are favoured in terms of job prospects and therefore, Pasternak and
Bailey (2004:155) pointed out that any native speaker of English has much better
opportunities in finding English teaching jobs than local non-native English speaking persons:
“In many countries, the blond, blue-eyed backpacker who runs out of money and
looks for work may have better luck getting a position teaching English than a local
teacher with a master’s degree or an advanced diploma in TESOL.”
In an EFL learning and teaching setting, the issue of having either native or non-native
speakers at schools and students’ perceptions towards those speakers becomes increasingly
differentiated as mentioned earlier. For example, Walkinshaw and Duong (2012) mentioned
that:
“many English as a Second/Foreign Language (ESL/EFL) institutions maintain that
their students place greater value on learning from a native English-speaking teacher
(NEST) than from a non-native English-speaking teacher (non-NEST).”
1
NS- native speaker(s)
non-native English speaker(s) 2 NNES-
31 It seems that non-native speaking teachers are less favoured for teaching English, and Braine
(2004: 15) explained that:
“A nonnative speaker of a language is invariably defined against a native speaker of
that language. Naturally, nonnative speakers are thereby assigned to a second-class,
inferior position vis-à-vis native speakers.”
Braine (2004) agreed that one of the reasons for employing native speakers is because of
students’ preference towards native speakers as I explained earlier, and he learnt that an
English teacher whose only qualification was a teaching certificate from the British Council,
earned a higher salary than NNES teachers and was provided with accommodation as a fringe
benefit. Although native speakers can deliver good accents to learners, grammatical patterns
still need to be learnt. If a native-speaking teacher has not been in formal education for a
period of time, I believe that s/he will not be able to teach the language. I have personally
seen some people who speak English as their first language, but they are unable to write or
read in English. Therefore, a person who wants to work as a language teacher must know the
basic grammatical patterns and have a sufficient amount of knowledge of the target language
that s/he wants to teach (e.g. collocations, expressions, proverbs, etc.). Moreover, Kramsch
(1997) noted in Braine (2004: 15) that:
“native speakers do not speak the idealized, standardized version of their language;
instead, their speech is influenced by geography, occupation, age, and social status.”
I myself have experienced one Scottish person who lives in the UK and works at one wellknown university in Scotland saying “with out the UK” instead of “outside the UK” which is
used in British English. This suggests to me that there can be some different usages even
between first language users of English. Thus, there can be differences between non-native
educated English teachers and native speaking English teachers even if they have both had
several years of education, been exposed to the language and have some essential teacher
training.
Furthermore, Walkinshow and Oanh (2014: 3) also mentioned Mahboob’s (2003) study,
where NNESTs are “valued for their own experience as language learners, their strict
adherence to methodology, and their hard work.” It is true that NNESTs can foresee issues:
for example, which parts of language learning would be difficult for learners to cope (i.e.
pronouncing /p/ or /ʃ/ sounds or complex grammatical patterns or different composition of a
sentence in L1 and L2) as they have been once students. However, a teacher’s teaching skill
32 depends upon how much s/he has acquired the language or whether or not the teacher knows
how languages are constructed similarly or differently.
In the aspects of language teaching, as mentioned above, being a NS or NNS is immaterial if
one is not able to deliver an effective lesson, for students will not receive anything from
his/her lessons. Language proficiency, therefore, has to be combined with teaching skills.
Many NS teachers who have been unskilful in teaching fail to deal with students’ questions,
and Pasternak and Bailey (2004: 158) highlighted untrained/unqualified NS teachers who are
unable to give sufficient information to students: “It is not unusual to hear untrained NEST’s
respond to students’ grammar questions by saying, ‘I don’t know why. That’s just the way we
say it’.”
1.2
Teaching and language skills
I completely understand that NNS teachers have more difficulty in teaching English,
designing lessons and dealing with students. NNS teachers need to spend more time than NS
teachers when preparing a lesson (e.g. how to teach it, when these tenses are used, etc.). My
first language is not English and I always felt stressed when planning lessons because I
always thought about my students’ potential and predicted some difficult questions; and I was
also worried about verb agreements and correct uses (such as “There is a variety of reasons”
or “Reasons are varied”), and whether students will be happy to accept my explanations. For
example, “I am to Southern Japan” means I will be in the South of Japan, but “I am going
South of Japan” could mean anywhere south of Japan: both are grammatically correct, but
they bring different meanings to the listener. I also asked myself whether I could really give a
few more examples of usages expertly if a student raised a question (for example, “I will get
back to you as soon as I can” can alternatively be said “I will contact you soon”).
Pasternak and Bailey (2004: 166) supported these concerns when they said “many NNESTs
feel inferior when compared to their native English-speaking teacher counterparts, especially
in areas of language fluency and communication.” Moreover, students would tend to
challenge me more once they knew I was not a native speaker of the target language.
Therefore, I have had to anticipate what could be potential challenges (such as grammar or
lexical points). I understand that teachers need to be at an expert-user level before they
embark on teaching, and I therefore sought some other experienced teachers’ perceptions on
their fluency and the impact on teaching skills. Their experiences and difficulties are also
documented. To be precise, I am non-native and it affects my confidence in teaching at times,
33 especially when I have to deal with complex grammatical forms. Thus, I am interested to see
whether other EFL teachers have also passed through the same problems. This paper will
include the kinds of problems/issues that experienced teachers (NS and NNS) face throughout
their teaching profession.
1.3
The fluency of a language and a teacher’s teaching skill
Medgyes (1992, cited in Walkinshaw and Duong, 2012) suggested that “a very high degree of
competence in the target language is crucial for language educators.” One of Mahboob’s
participants from his study in 2004 (p.135) had explained that: “native speakers have never
learned grammar, so most of them don’t know how to teach grammar.” If a teacher (either NS
or NNS) is not well-prepared for a lesson or is unsure of the aspects of language composition,
it can leave some bad impressions on students. I therefore think a teacher’s teaching skill can
be influenced by his/her language ability and how wide a knowledge (in both lexical and
linguistics aspects) has been acquired. This is because the feeling of insecurity can be
overwhelming when teaching incompetently (such as having doubts and thinking of potential
questions in mind: am I saying the correct usage? What if students catch my weak points?
etc.). This, alternatively, causes anxiety to a teacher and it can affect his/her confidence in
teaching skills and classroom management even if s/he has been trained and qualified. This
study is a collection of experienced native and non-native teachers’ thoughts on teaching
skills, competency in language use and their difficulties and experiences of teaching English
through their teaching life.
2.
Carrying out the study
In terms of choosing methods for research, Flick (2007: 2) explained that a qualitative study
can reveal “perspectives of participants in everyday practices and everyday knowledge
referring to the issue under study.” As I was trying to seek teachers’ experiences and
perceptions, qualitative methods seemed more appropriate than quantitative methods as they
could help me to delve into someone’s beliefs and learn their experiences. The question was
composed with 22 questions in both a quantitative (i.e. asking whether a teacher’s proficiency
can have an impact on his teaching) and qualitative-style (i.e. if “YES”, then please explain
why) formats to save participants’ time.
34 When recruiting participants, I wrote to schools’ directors / coordinators of the course from
the UK who are “gatekeepers” (Mertens, 2015: 263) to ask permission for the study to take
place, and also old officemates and classmates who are currently in EFL teaching settings
(such as in the UK, Thailand, Colombia and Sudan) to ask whether they were happy to
complete my questionnaire. I emailed and sent texts through Facebook Messenger to get in
touch with them. I found that many of them were keen to take part in this study. Some others
were recruited through a friend of mine. I used a “Web-based questionnaire” (Mertens, 2015:
187) for some of the participants who did not reside at that time in the UK. They were sent
questionnaire packs through emails and Facebook Messenger and they all returned them to
me in the same way except the ones I collected in person from schools in the UK. After the
stage of collecting data, they were all coded and stored manually in Microsoft Excel 2010,
and the interpretation was processed qualitatively through codes.
3.
Findings
In this small-scale study, I sought to find whether a teacher’s language proficiency has an
influence on his/her teaching skills and the importance of language proficiency in language
teaching. Many participants underlined that teachers would be more confident in teaching if
they knew themselves that they are fluent, such as P1 who said that “the more proficient you
are, the more comfortable you feel and the better you teach.” Some teachers think students
absorb from teachers while learning, and if a teacher is knowledgeable, his/her students will
show improvement in language skills. P29 viewed that “If the teacher is proficient in
language, the students will improve their skills.” Some other teachers think teachers are
models of language users for students and, therefore, teachers’ proficiency is extremely
important in order not to deliver wrong usages. As P14 explained: “S’s learn to copy/imitate
what they hear/read.” P32 had similar words: “A teacher’s language proficiency in language
teaching is very important as a teacher must be a model for the students.”
If a teacher is not as expert as s/he is supposed to be in the language, s/he will not be able to
explain such concepts as linguistics and grammatical functions, and P26 explained: “If she
doesn’t have language proficiency in language teaching, she won’t be able to explain the
lessons to the students.” P3 said a teacher’s proficiency is extremely important in language
teaching, for otherwise s/he will be unable to facilitate students’ needs:
35 “Because learners are not all the same, even within just one class, there may be a very
wide varying range of different students’ needs to be met and provided for by the
teacher.”
Some teachers pointed out that having accuracy and competency in using a language is more
important, as is being knowledgeable about how language is used and having good
preparation before lessons. P7 shared her thoughts thus: “As long as you are well prepared
for class, things can’t go wrong”, and P33 explained “… as long as you are accurate,
competent and experienced language use/teacher, proficiency is not a big issue.”
After questioning participants’ thoughts on the importance of English in language teaching, I
asked whether or not there is an impact on teaching. The results show that 14 teacherparticipants believe that the level of proficiency has an influence on someone’s teaching. Of
these 14, there were 4 native and 10 non-native speaking teachers. However, the non-native
speaking teachers had some concerns about language and teaching skills, and their reasons
are explained in the following paragraph. Some other participants (12 out of 33) answered
that there is a possible effect on teaching as seen in the following table, while the other 4
believed that it might not have a serious impact. Only a few (1 native and 2 non-native
teachers) thought that there might be no influence correlation between language proficiency
and teaching skills.
Table 1. Teachers’ perspectives on the level of non-native speakers’ fluency and its impact on
teaching practice
When I asked for the details of their thoughts, participants said that teachers ought to know
linguistics, grammar and all aspects of language (e.g. pronunciation). For example, P15 said
“You should understand how the language works before starting to teach it”; and P16
explained “A person needs to have the knowledge required to deliver a lesson for that
36 specific lesson.” To teach at an advanced level, a teacher must have a good knowledge of
linguistic background, and P22 mentioned:
“Students of Upper Intermediate and Advanced levels require fine tuning in fluency
and pronunciation so these may be harder classes for a non-native speaker to teach if
they have not mastered these themselves.”
Some participants thought that teachers’ level of proficiency influenced one’s teaching skills.
As P1 explained: “If the teacher doesn’t know how to train him/herself, he/she won’t be able
to teach those things to students.” P19 said: “Less information is conveyed when the teacher
is less fluent.” P14 argued that teachers could teach the language with mistakes if they did not
understand the language functions properly:
“Without a high level, a teacher could miss mistakes, miss subtleties, teach / pass on
their own mistakes.”
P8 explained:
“Teachers struggling to put sentences together while sounding unnatural may end up
negatively influencing the students.”
P11 shared her thoughts as below:
“In terms of modeling and correcting the students’ mistakes as well as helping them
to improve their skills and upgrade their levels, a teacher’s level of fluency can play
an important role.”
In some other participants’ eyes, teachers are seen as models of language users for students.
They imitate from teachers, as P2 explained:
“Students (especially in early stages) are wonderful imitators and they like to follow
their teachers’ way of speaking. If teachers are not fluent enough, this gives bad
consequences.”
Looking at these participants’ thoughts, it shows that a teacher’s language fluency can lead to
students not making any or less mistakes while using the target language. Teachers can
monitor students and give good guidelines such as writing in formal or informal styles or
choosing words appropriately for some specific situations. Some participants explained that
the level of proficiency boosts self-confidence in teaching. On the other hand, if a teacher is
less fluent, s/he will lose respect from students. P9 said “… less confident probably if his/her
level of fluency is low.” P5 shared her thoughts as below:
37 “It can influence teaching skills in terms of teacher’s confidence and students’
trust/respect. Ss might not respect the teacher if they realize s/he is not fluent in
English.”
On the other hand, some other participants felt that a teacher’s teaching skill is more
important than his/her language skills, for a lack of teaching skill cannot make any native
speakers of the language good teachers. P9 shared her view as below:
“.. a teacher can be a native speaker and not have sufficient teaching skills, which is
worse in my opinion. Both language skills + teaching skills are required.”
P13 also said “..knowledge doesn’t mean ability to teach” and P10 explained that some native
speakers are not all successful teachers although they speak it as their first language:
“You don’t need to be completely fluent to be a good teacher. And, in my experience,
the contrary is also true; some native speakers believe that just because they know the
language, they can teach it- this is absolutely not true!”
P12 shared her learning experience with non-native speaking teachers thus: “My IELTS
teacher is not a native and his accents are not that good but he can teach good English.” P23
echoed that teachers need a teaching skill on top of the language proficiency: “Though the
teacher is good at teaching, she doesn’t know about the strategies of teaching. There might be
difficulties in the class.” P33 held similar thoughts:
“I do not believe in the association of the teaching of a language with the fluency
since this would exclude experienced, competent and accurate non-native language
teachers.”
These teachers’ words convey the message to me that the experience of teaching and
strategies to teach the language (i.e. to make learners able to function in the language) is the
key. Without having knowledge of how to teach the language, s/he will not be a successful
teacher. Although s/he may be a native speaker or have expertise in that target language, that
person still needs to gain some theoretical and practical knowledge of language teaching. In
my eyes, native speakerism would only help to make fewer mistakes in grammar or
punctuation than non-native users of the language, but still there are many people whose first
language is English and who cannot write/spell words correctly if they have not been in
formal education. Some teachers have also pointed out that students can judge and challenge
their teachers once they notice that their teachers are incompetent. P20 shared his experiences
thus:
38 “Students look for weakness. They may resent/or trick about the fees if they sense that
their own teacher is unsure about anything or not 100% comfortable with the
language.”
Similarly, P7 said “While beginner students will not notice, advanced ones definitely will.”
Having looked at these teachers’ comments, teachers with advanced level students should
have a certain level of language knowledge and linguistics background. Although this does
not mean that a teacher must be a native speaker of the language, any language teacher
should possess a good level of language knowledge and practical language teaching
experience.
I then asked participants’ experiences of their proficiency issues and the difficulties in
English language teaching. Many participants, both native and non-native speakers, explained
that they have faced some difficulties in teaching grammar, such as P17 who is a non-native
teacher: “With the advanced usage of tenses I may not 100% get it right or may get
influenced by my mother tongue.” Another non-native speaker shared her experience thus:
“When I started teaching, I had problems with 3rd mixed conditionals, quantifiers,
articles/prepositions.”
Some native speaking teachers (such as P6, P9 and P10) experienced difficulties in the
beginning of their careers concerning the pedagogy of how to teach the language. P9, who is
native, explained:
“…when I started teaching, I didn’t have sufficient subject knowledge, i.e. I didn’t
understand the grammar rules well. I knew how to use English but not how to explain
it.”
A few (3) who are non-native speaking teachers mentioned about pronunciations as an issue,
such as P23 who explained her reasons as below:
“I think I might have some experience of language proficiency issues. It is not about
grammar, just pronunciation. So, the teacher needs to pronounce the words
correctly.”
One non-native teacher (P5) mentioned lexical issues along with pronunciation:
“Probably small mistakes mispronouncing certain vowel sounds e.g. /i/, /^/. Probably
not being 100% about some rare collocations/ idioms.”
Through their teaching profession, some teachers have faced students’ strong L1 influence on
their foreign language learning, such as P32 who explained: “Sometimes I find it difficult to
39 train the students who are weak in grammar, writing and because of mother-tongue
influences.”
On a positive note, some participants who are experienced EFL teachers said that the
advantage of being a non-native speaking teacher is to be able to understand students’
difficulties in confusing language patterns as they have been through these processes (unlike
the native speakers). This is an additional support for a teacher as a teaching strategy to
approach and understand students fairly quickly. P2 shared his strategy:
“the English conditional ‘if’ is a good example when it comes to make a contrastive
grammar. I used to use Arabic examples to facilitate the use of conditional clauses to
students.”
Another non-native speaking teacher (P8) explained:
“ being a non-native speaker can help such as knowing the realm behind why a
student may not know the rules because the non-native teacher once went through the
same experience.”
Looking at these participants’ words, a teacher’s fluency has an impact on his/her teaching
and it underlines a teacher’s confidence in teaching (i.e. giving better explanation and
showing more language use of examples). The findings also suggest that having L1 teachers
does not automatically disadvantage students when learning English, and may even help them
learn the different grammatical patterns between L1 and L2.
4.
Discussion and Implications
4.1
Will the teachers’ teaching skills be influenced by their language skills?
Pasternak and Bailey (2004:163) contended that “Proficiency is not necessarily equated with
nativeness, and certainly not all native speakers are equally skilled users of English.” I
personally experienced that only native (British, in this case) educated speakers use/speak a
standard version of English which is commonly used in the media and press. It is good to
know non-standard English as well, but it could be seen as a rude or inappropriate use of
language (e.g. the use of “Could I” or “May I” instead of “Can I?” when asking permission)
for people who need to use English for formal meetings (e.g. a group of Government officials
need to learn English for diplomatic purposes). Therefore, anyone who is proficient in
English and has some training can teach English. If a teacher has poor proficiency or is
poorly trained, on the other hand, I recommend that s/he teaches lower level classes (such as
40 beginner or pre-intermediate levels) to give an introduction or some functions of the language.
A teacher with low proficiency will not be able to handle students’ linguistic questions and
P4 also pointed out that:
“at higher levels, a teacher whose level is not strong enough might not cope with
teaching higher vocab, grammar structures, idioms, phrasal verbs, etc.”
On the other hand, having a high proficiency for teachers is of paramount importance in
language teaching, and P18 explained why as below:
“If the teacher is not fully knowledgeable or has poor reading or writing skills or even
a poor/illegible handwriting, how can they encourage or inspire students to learn and
even improve their EN skills?”
4.2
Will NS or NNS teachers be better teachers?
In the English language learning setting, there is debate about whether we should learn from
native or non-native speaking teachers. Wardak (2014:125) was aware of the influence of NS
on employers and stated that:
“The majority of the employers around the world support the idea that NES teachers
are undoubtedly better qualified, skilled and competent in comparison to the nonnative speakers of the English language.”
In terms of the use of language ability, as Walkinshaw and Duong (2012) found, “nativespeaker pronunciation was an advantage of NESTs and a handicap of non-NESTs”, but they
(NESTs) should have been trained how to pronounce phonetically and teach the standard
English accents (if they know other accents, they can share them with their students) so that
they can deliver lessons better and learners would be able to pronounce words independently
in their own study time, and subsequently use them in a practical setting. Mahboob’s
participant from his study in 2004 mentioned the benefit of having NESTs as:
“The best part of having native speakers as teachers is you can learn natural
pronunciation from them. And it is very effective to your listening and speaking.”
Clearly, NS will have more confidence in using the language when teaching because it is
their first language and they know the meanings of words. This is where NNS fail to compete
with NS teachers in terms of employment. The language is learnt for NNS teachers and thus,
41 Pasternak and Bailey (2004: 159) pointed out one of the weaknesses of NNES: “[what they]
lack is the experience base for using the target language confidently and behaving
appropriately in the target culture..” However, this can be overcome by practising thoroughly
before lessons begin and finding good supplementary practical materials (such as having
video clips from youtube or facebook to allow students to be exposed into real language
usage by other native and non-native speakers of English).
In terms of fluency and language practice, Mahboob’s study (2004) found that NEST are
better at teaching oral skills and have stronger abilities in teaching vocabulary and culture.
However, they will not be able to explain or know the different grammatical patterns between
L1 (students’ first language) and L2 (i.e. English) when students get confused, and this is one
of the advantages of having NNES teachers as they can predict their learners’ difficulties in
understanding compositions. NNES teachers would generally be weaker in speaking than NS
teachers, but they can explain concepts in their L1 to ensure a better understanding. As an
example, P2 used his L1 (i.e. Arabic grammar) for contrastive grammar between two
different languages. This is in line with Hansen’s (2004:50) perceptions about the benefit of
being NNES: “Being a nonnative speaker of English helps me understand their language
learning experience in a more personal matter, which then helps me develop more effective
pedagogical practices.”
4.3
Should teachers have Training?
Due to the high demand of English use, people who speak fluently can get a chance to work
as English language teachers, including in the UK and in other parts of the world. According
to my experiences, many native English speakers are employed by schools and universities in
English speaking countries such as the UK, and native speakerism has a high level of
credibility with learners as explained above. For example, classes (including pre-schools with
native speaking teachers) are more expensive than those with non-native speaking teachers in
Myanmar where English is used as a foreign language.
Walkinshaw and Duong (2012) quoted one of their respondents as saying “At some subjects,
[NESTs] do not have degrees.” I have experienced that some schools from Southeast Asia do
not check a teacher’s qualification and are more impressed by their native-ness in the
language (for example, a British or an American has more chance to be employed). In my
opinion, anyone (i.e. either native or non-native) who wants English teaching as a profession
should be well-trained and knowledgeable in terms of language use (i.e. punctuation,
42 pronunciation, grammar and a wide range of vocabulary in formal and colloquial terms) as
teachers are the first-hand resource for many learners, in particular for classes which are
geographically far from an English speaking community or which have less supporting
materials. Therefore, I support Pasternak and Bailey’s (2004) statement which is mentioned
in Nemtchinova et al. (2010) that:
“professionals teaching English as an additional language need to aim to be both
proficient in the target language and be professionally trained and prepared in the
teaching of the language.”
Lipovsky and Mahboob (2010: 105) found in their study that “native speakers actually may
not know about grammar until they learn how to teach it.” However, in the EFL teaching and
learning world, native speakers are favoured by some employers and they are often paid
double (Braine, 2004), which is a serious waste of employers’ funds if learners cannot get a
clear understanding of language use. Therefore, a person, whether native or non-native,
should be trained or observe some classrooms before starting a teaching career. But still, as
Pasternak and Bailey voiced (2004: 162) “..even being a professionally prepared native
speaker is no guarantee of success as a teacher.” Pasternak and Bailey (2004, cited in
Nemtchinova et al., 2014: 224) stated that “teachers, regardless of whether they are native or
non-native speakers must be trained and have both declarative and procedural knowledge.”
Wardak (2014: 139) accessed five employers from the UK and found that “3 out 5 agree that
NNES require more training” although there were no specific reasons mentioned for this
observation. In my opinion, teachers (both NS and NNS) need some professional training (e.g.
CELTA) so that they know how to prepare for a lesson and can anticipate students’
difficulties in complex grammatical patterns. Without practical teaching or training, a person
will not know where to start, how to give tasks and when to end the lesson; therefore, a
person needs both a good language proficiency and a proper training. Liu (n.d.:104)
explained the drawback of hiring unskilled teachers: “Employing an untrained NET can result
in disorganised classroom teaching and a lack of continuity of teaching content”. I have had
some issues with the language as explained above, although I have been professionally
trained, and the findings of this study revealed that teachers (including NS) have faced some
similar kinds of difficulties in teaching language.
Language teaching is a combination of knowing language expertly (e.g. linguistics aspects)
and pedagogy about how a thing is to be taught and learnt in different contexts or at different
groups of ages. Therefore, training / teaching practicums are essential for both NS and NNS
43 teachers on top of their language fluency so as to be able to help learners to become users of a
learnt target language as they can advance teachers’ linguistics and pedagogical knowledge.
As Pasternak and Bailey (2004: 161) explained, “Whether a native or nonnative speaker, a
teacher without any formal training cannot be said to be professionally prepared.” Therefore,
a teacher should have both pedagogical, learning experiences and a linguistics background.
5.
Limitation of this study
I have used the term “small-scale study” as the number of participants seems relatively low
(33) for a survey method. I tried to include both native and non-native speaking teachers to
seek their perceptions on non-native teachers’ fluency and the impact on their teaching. It
could be different from readers’ points of view depending upon personal teaching
experiences (such as levels of classes which the readers teach or backgrounds of students;
whether they are familiar with English or less exposed to the language; etc.). As for the
teachers’ experiences of language teaching difficulties, participants were aware that I was
looking for particular aspects of language fluency and teaching skills. Therefore, the focus of
their answers was on grammar teaching and its complexity rather than classroom
management, cultural barriers and other pedagogical issues.
6.
Conclusion
As the findings suggest, teaching skills can be influenced by a teacher’s level of proficiency,
and even NS who were participants of this study have faced difficulties in teaching grammar
in their teaching lives. However, what could be more important is whether or not a teacher is
trained and is engaged with his/her students when delivering lessons. Any teacher (either NS
or NNS) needs to pass through a well-prepared lesson planning stage and learn all
aspects/content of lessons before they enter into classes. If a NNS teacher is unsure about a
usage (e.g. golden handshake in English), study and good preparation could expand his/her
knowledge in language and enhance competence in teaching. It is not so much a question of
being NS or NNS, but of more importance is proficiency of the language and the choice of
methods when delivering lessons. This is acceptable as long as a teacher is using a standard
educated version of English for students to use for personal communication, business,
education or in any other forms of international liaison (e.g. diplomacy).
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