The Politics of English Language Teaching
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THE POLITICS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHING1
INTRODUCTION
Because of its close association with structuralist and, later, Chomskyan linguistics, English language teaching (ELT) remained apolitical for a long time, treating language learning as the psycholinguistic mastery of value-free grammar for instrumental purposes. The uses of ELT in the process of colonization, the purposes of Cold War cultural hegemony, and the needs of economic globalization could be identified as other historical motivations for the delay in addressing the politics of ELT (see Canagarajah, 2005). It is only fairly recently, in the early 1990s, that issues of power have received sustained attention (see also Janks, Teaching Language and Power, Volume 1). Though it was initially treated as another optional school or method under the label critical pedagogy (hereafter CP), a power-sensitive orientation has quickly pervaded all areas of ELT. Although many teachers still find it uncomfortable to directly address the politics of ELT, a social and ideological sensitivity colors everything we do in the profession in unacknowledged and subtle ways. No sensible professional can practice ELT today without being alert to the heterogeneity of English varieties, the conflicting claims of community and identity, the values behind methods and materials, and unequal classroom relationships and roles. E A R LY D E V E L O P M E N T S
The early developments of a political orientation were understandably structuralist and Marxist. Phillipson’s (1992) Linguistic Imperialism 1
Due to limited space, this chapter focuses only on the conceptual debates and theoretical considerations relating to English language teaching. For how these considerations are negotiated in diverse classrooms at the everyday level, see ethnographies such as Canagarajah, 1999; Lin and Martin, 2005, Heller and MartinJones, 2001. A comprehensive geographical coverage of scholarship and pedagogy is not attempted here. The works reviewed derive mostly from ESL situations in North America and the postcolonial contexts. For a consideration of issues relating to EFL in Europe, see Phillipson, Language Policy and Education in the European Union (Volume 1). There is of course an under-representation of research and pedagogical practices in periphery communities in mainstream journals. Makoni et al. (2005) highlight this problem and also introduce some themes important for such communities.
S. May and N. H. Hornberger (eds), Encyclopedia of Language and Education, 2nd Edition, Volume 1: Language Policy and Political Issues in Education, 213–227. #2008 Springer Science+Business Media LLC.
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SURESH CANAGARAJAH
critiqued the intentions of British Council and other Anglo-American institutions sponsoring ELT worldwide. Showing how the dominant pedagogical assumptions based on monolingualist norms and the methods and materials influenced by Anglo-American interests affected the educational autonomy and socioeconomic development of other communities, Phillipson hoped for a time when the rise of globa
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