Business card promoting private English tuition

In Iran, as in many other countries around the globe, the craze for learning English has been on the rise. This tendency is attributed to, inter alia, the country’s rather young population who need the language for various purposes such as furthering education abroad, immigration or trade. As a consequence, all kinds of English teaching have become big business. While the majority of learners of English attend private English language institutes, private tutoring, too, has mushroomed in the past few years.

In the past few months, I have been collecting marketing materials for private English language tuition in Isfahan. While well-established language institutes usually rely on local newspapers, magazines or TV channels to promote their English classes, individual language tutors choose less expensive methods of advertising. The main promotional method is the distribution of brochures, fliers and business cards.

Despite the low costs associated with their production, these advertising materials can easily be distributed among target audiences which often include those who need a certain score on standardized tests such as TOEFL or IELTS in a rather short period of time. Business cards are usually personally distributed among tutors’ networks. Additionally, they are also found in the city’s language bookshops. Brochures and fliers are found in all kinds of public spaces frequented by young people.

A close look at such marketing materials enables us to explore social issues embedded in the discourse of the private TESOL industry in Iran today. In my corpus of more than 100 marketing materials for private tutoring, the following ideologies of English language learning can be found:

• Learning English is associated with personal success. One business card, for instance, has the Persian mottoدانش زبان انگلیسی قدرت دنیای امروز است  on the front and the English translation “English knowledge is power” on the back.
• The ideal tutor is a person who has the experience of living in an English-speaking country, usually in Australia, Canada and the UK. Another business card, for example, describes the tutor as a person who has lived in Australia for five years (٥ سال زندگی در استرالیا) and uses the slogan Learn English from one who has lived in an English-speaking country.
• The ideal tutor is linked to an international organisation. Examples of such organizations, which are typically included in brackets after the tutor’s name, include “TEFL Canada”, “British Council” and “ETS”.
• English learners come in distinct groups based on age, gender or occupation. One example promotes semi-private English classes for housewives (انگلیسی برای خانمهای خانه دار), who, as the description on the flier reveals, “are usually free in the morning and are able to attend English classes.” In this context the English language is dividable into different packages which are separately accessible. Other examples includeانگلیسی برای کودکان  (English for children), انگلیسی برای نوجوانان (English for teenagers), انگلیسی برای توریست ها (English for tourists) andانگلیسی برای تجار  (English for businessmen), to name a few. No information is provided about the course content and the name of the course corresponds to the social role of the target group (e.g., ‘housewives’).

Overall, the unprecedented demand for English has caused English tutors in Iran, as in many other countries in the world, to compete for students. In this respect, English language tutors are driven by the competition for profit and English language learning is thus marketed in specific ways. As my corpus shows, private tutors typically use a variety of strategies in order to be deemed legitimate and meritorious. It appears that in this context the quest for a better tutor (as a form of identity) has long replaced the identification of practices designed to address the complexity of language learning.

The Omidvar brothers on the road: amazing feats of discovery and language learning?

In his most recent round of interviews with the magazine Særzæmin-e Mæn (“My Country”), Issa Omidvar, one of the two adventurous Iranian brothers who undertook a 10-year motorbike journey across the world (1954-1964), shares details of how he and his brother learned English and Spanish, the two languages they needed most for their long journey. Before they left Iran in 1954 they barely knew any foreign languages, so they took some English courses and managed to learn the language in less than three months.

After they set foot on Mexican soil, they learned Spanish, a language they did not know even a single word of. Issa Omidvar claims that, in two weeks, they were both fluent in Spanish and had no difficulty communicating with Mexicans, who went out of their way to welcome them to their country. He goes on to relate that after a month, they were even able to deliver lectures in Spanish for their enthusiastic hosts:

روزی که قدم به مکزیک گذاشتیم زبانشان را نمی دانستیم. اما در عرض پانزده روز توانستیم به زبانشان صحبت کنیم. ما حتی بعد از یک ماه توانستیم به اسپانیایی کنفرانس بدهیم.

[The day we set foot on Mexican soil we didn’t know their language. But within 15 days we could speak their language. We were even able to hold talks in Spanish after a month.]

Issa Omidvar does not share any details about their language learning methods and his account of the brothers’ language learning feats is certainly impressive. But is it really true?

We know for a fact that most language learners take much more than ‘two weeks’ to achieve even a modest level of conversational fluency. Yet, we should not dismiss Issa’s account as an exaggeration. Therefore, we need to ask ourselves as language educators faced with students who usually take years to achieve substantial proficiency, what can we learn from the Omidvar brothers’ account?

The situation described by Issa Omidvar seems to include crucial components of successful language learning: they were young and talented and they had a communicative need:

چون هم جوان و مستعد بودیم و هم واقعا احتیاج داشتیم.

[The reason is that we were both young and talented and we were really in need of the language.]

Reading carefully between the lines, one would be able to establish how imperative their ‘need’ must have been. They made documentaries on the road and held impromptu screenings in universities, halls and arts centers. They needed to know the language of the locals in order to charge an entrance fee and thus finance the next leg of their trip!

Examples of the kind of language learning described by Issa Omidvar can easily be found today. The Fluentin3Months website, for example, whose “language hacking tips” are provided by an alleged polyglot, promotes a more or less similar language learning experience. The first and foremost question that readers have when they arrive on the website is how is it really possible to achieve fluency in three months (or actually much less)? The website features interviews with people who claim to have reached conversational fluency in a language in three months or less, “thanks to a combination of passion for the language, full time immersion, and a general good knack for learning it.”

What this ‘knack’ entails is not usually revealed unless you buy one of their language learning packages. At the same time, one must not lose sight of the fact that this type of language learning, however effective it is claimed to be, is not for those who want to get an A in their language class, nor is it for those who want to learn a language to take an academic test, to write perfectly, to pass a class, or to use grammar appropriately.

If you need a language to use it in academic or professional contexts at any level of complexity, it seems unlikely that there is a way around learning a language the hard way.

Constructing language learning as global choice on melale.ir

Persian version of Vahid Parvaresh, “Supermarket Language Learning”; translated by Behnam Keimasi (بهنام کیماسی)

در ایران، همانند بسیار دیگری از کشورها، دولت به صورت مرسوم نقش پررنگی در عرصه یادگیری زبان دوم ایفا نموده است و امتیاز انحصاری سیاست گذاری های رسمی را در دست دارد. در این زمینه، یک سیاست رسمی کلی که وزارت آموزش و پرورش آن را تدوین و تنظیم نموده است، معرفی زبان انگلیسی (و عربی) به دانش آموزان پس از رسیدن به سن 11 سالگی می باشد. هر چند این سیاست، آن گونه که از این مصاحبه کوتاه اما آشکار کننده با معاون وزیر آموزش و پرورش بر می آید، هم اکنون در حال بازنگری می باشد. طبق گفته های معاون وزیر، سیاست جدید به مدارس دولتی اجازه می دهد تا زبان های خارجی (نه تنها انگلیسی و عربی، بلکه فرانسوی و آلمانی) را در قالب “بسته های سوپرمارکتی” گوناگون به دانش آموزان پیشنهاد دهند تا آنها بتوانند هر زبانی را که بیشتر دوست دارند انتخاب نمایند. علاوه بر این، سیاست جدید به دانش آموزان این اجازه را می دهد تا بسیار زودتر از 11 یا 12 سالگی به “انتخاب زبانی که دوست دارند” بپردازند. این حقیقت که وزارت آموزش و پرورش ایران تصمیم گرفته است تا از سیاست زبان خارجی سفت وسخت خود در راستای اجرای یک سیاست انعطاف پذیر تر دست بکشد، قابل توجه است.

اما چه چیزی می تواند موجب این تغییر باشد؟ یا به عبارتی دیگر، چه اتفاقی افتاده است که وزارت آموزش و پرورش را بر آن داشته است تا سیاستِ زبانِ خارجی خود که همواره تنها شامل زبان های انگلیسی و عربی بوده است را بازنگری کند؟ مصاحبه پاسخی قطعی ارائه نمی کند اما نگاهی موشکافانه تر به سیاست های اجرا شده در مدارس غیر دولتی در فهم موضوع به ما کمک می کند.

در ایران نابردباریِ مرسوم در خصوص تنوع زبانی – همین حقیقت که آموزش زبان های خارجی محدود به زبان های انگلیسی و عربی شده است – با سیاست های زبانی که بخش خصوصی اعمال می کند، همخوانی ندارد. مدارسی که به بخش خصوصی تعلق دارند، خیلی وقت است که به آموزش زبان های فرانسوی، آلمانی و انگلیسی به کودکان، اغلب از سن 5 سالگی، پرداخته اند. نتیجه این آموزش، بازاری رقابتی نه تنها برای زبان انگلیسی که برای زبان های فرانسوی و آلمانی بوده که با نابردباریِ مرتبط با تنوع زبانی در تضاد است. بدین گونه بخش آموزش خصوصی شکل های جدیدی از کالای زبانی را پدید می آورد؛ حقیقتی که مسائل پیچیده ای را در رابطه با تغییر تعادلِ میانِ سیاست های زبانی دولتی و خصوصی به وجود می آورد.

علاوه بر این، اینترنت فضای بزرگ و تقریبا غیرقابل کنترلی را برای مدارس خصوصی جهت استفاده از بسته های آموزشی زبان فراهم می آورد.  ملل یکی از چنین وب سایت هایی است که متعلق به یک مدرسه خصوصی با نام ملل می باشد. هدف ادعایی مدرسه تشویق دوزبانگی از طریق روش موضوع محور می باشد. مجموعه آموزشی ملل آموزش زبان های انگلیسی و فرانسوی را فراهم آورده است. در این محیط، شکل های کاملا انعطاف پذیرِ آموزش زبان ارائه می شود تا پاسخگوی نیازهای گوناگون مشتریان باشد. به عنوان مثال، در این مجموعه یادگیری زبان فرانسوی (در ایران!) طبق سیاست های وضع شده توسط اتحادیه اروپا ممکن است. بنابراین بسته های آموزشی زبان در شکل ها و اندازه های گوناگون ارائه می شوند آن چنان که گویی وارد یک سوپرمارکت بسیار بزرگ زبانی شده اید.

به طور کلی، این که دولت تصمیم گرفته تا سیاست های مرتبط با زبان خارجی سابق خود را اصلاح کند به نظر پاسخی به تغییرات ایجاد شده در روش هایی است که از طریق آن هم دانش آموزان و هم والدین در جریانِ گفتمانِ آموزشِ زبانِ بخشِ خصوصی قرار گرفته اند؛ جایی که آنها به مصرف کننده تبدیل شده اند. بسته های سوپرمارکتی نه تنها در بخش خصوصی که هم اکنون در بخش آموزش عمومی نیز به این مصرف کنندگان پیشنهاد می شود. در این روند، سیاست گذاری مربوط به زبان های خارجیِ مرسوم و ریشه دار نیز همسویِ “انتظاراتِ جهانی” می شود.

برچسب ها: زبان عربی، مصرف، زبان انگلیسی به عنوان زبان جهانی، زبان فرانسوی، جهانی شدن، ایران، آموزش زبان، سیاست زبانی.

Constructing language learning as global choice on melale.ir

In Iran, as in many other countries, the state has traditionally been a very powerful actor in the field of second language learning and has the monopoly of formal policy making. In this context, a general official policy formulated by the Ministry of Education has been to introduce English (and Arabic) to students no sooner than when they are 11 years old. However, this policy is currently under review as revealed in this short but illuminating interview with Iran’s Vice Minister for Education. According to the vice minister, the new policy allows state-run schools to offer foreign languages (not only English and Arabic but also French and German) in various “supermarket packages” so that students can “choose” whatever language they like more. Further to this, the new policy allows students to “choose the language they like” much earlier than when they are 11 or 12 years old. The fact that the Iranian Ministry of Education has finally decided to abandon its sacrosanct foreign language policy in favour of a more flexible policy is significant.

What could be the cause of this radical shift? Or to put it differently, what has happened that has finally convinced the Ministry of Education to modify its foreign language policies which had always been aimed at English and Arabic only? The interview does not reveal a definitive answer but a close look at language policies implemented by private, non-state-run schools provides a clue.

In Iran the traditional intolerance of the state of linguistic variation – the very fact that the teaching of foreign languages is geared toward English and Arabic – is not matched by the politics of language that operate in the globalized, private sector. Schools that belong to the private sector have long taught French, German and English as foreign languages, often aimed at children as young as 5. The outcome of this has been a competitive market not just of English but also of French and German which defies the state’s traditional intolerance of linguistic diversity. The private education sector thus creates new forms of linguistic commodification; a fact that raises quite complex issues related to the shifting balance between state and private language policies.

What is more, the Internet provides these private schools with a wide and virtually uncontrolled space for language learning packages. Melale.ir is one such website that belongs to a private school named melal (“nations”). The purported aim of the school is to encourage bilingualism through content learning and the target audiences are elementary and secondary students. Melal provides instruction in English and French, among others.

In this environment, highly flexible forms of language learning are offered to cater to diverse customer needs. For example, it is possible to learn French (in Iran!) according to the policies set by the European Union. Language learning packages thus come in all shapes and sizes as if you have entered a giant linguistic supermarket.

Overall, that the state has decided to modify its former foreign language policies seems to be a response to the changes in the ways that both students and parents are positioned in private sector discourses of language learning. There, they have been turned into language-learners-as-consumers. These consumers are offered supermarket packages of foreign languages, now not only in the private sector but also in public education. In the process, a traditional, deep-rooted foreign language policy becomes transformed in line with “globalized expectations.”

Branded kids' products on display in an Iranian store

Recently, I had occasion to visit a toy store in Isfahan to buy a present for my seven-year-old cousin, who had invited me to his birthday party. Grand, impressive and splendid, the store in question offered a variety of products, from children stationeries and toys of different shapes and colours to XBOX games.

My original intention was to buy something of the Dara & Sara brand, an Iranian line of dolls, books and audio materials. Yet, to my surprise, the store had almost no trace of local toys such as these. I left the shop in disappointment hoping to find something more ‘culturally relevant’ in another shop but I failed again. Eventually, I gave up and bought a Ben 10 watch and a Ben 10 backpack as gifts.

The majority of the products in these toy stores had English messages or expressions and were clearly coded as “global” rather than “Iranian.” The prestige, the price and the quality of imported toys have consigned local products to a marginal role such that I, the customer, was just a passive and helpless recipient and left without any choice. Unsurprisingly then, it turned out that I was not the only one without a choice: at the birthday party, I was disappointed to find out that almost all the guests had brought more or less similar presents.

However, there is a further twist to this story: A few days after the birthday party, I met my little cousin again at yet another family gathering. He was wearing one of his birthday presents, a Spiderman t-shirt, which was emblazoned with the slogan “The Amazing Spiderman.”

As members of my extending family were spending time together, the TV was on in the background. The channel was set to one of the Iranian national TV channels and the program that was running was an episode in a crime series featuring the Iranian police, which in Persian is called naja. In one of the scenes a group of naja commandos raided a building and arrested the bad guys.

The word naja was printed in bold letters on the back of their uniforms and my little cousin obviously made a connection between the uniform of these TV heroes and his own T-shirt: he shouted in amazement: “The amazing naja!”

When I had started my quest for a toy that was culturally relevant, I had been disappointed. However, my cousin’s reaction demonstrates that global, cultural symbols are always appropriated locally – often in unexpected ways. The episode throws into question the long-established assumption that linguistic and cultural hegemonies always work in a top-down manner and paves the way for a totally different interpretation: the spread of English and its related cultural products operate in complex and at times contradictory ways. Ultimately, Spiderman t-shirts display their own ‘local’ orders of indexicality.

Intercultural grocery shopping

It is now widely agreed that human beings have moved into a phase of modernity in which they have to tackle the extreme dynamism in modern institutions and provide an explanation for the discontinuities they experience. As a result of migration, human society has undergone a stretching process whereby different social contexts and regions have become networked across the globe, displaying inevitable tension. The following personal story reveals how this kind of dynamism is played out locally:

A few weeks after my arrival in Sydney, I went grocery shopping in an Iranian convenience store. That was my first encounter as a sojourner with an Iranian immigrant in Sydney. A bit grimy and disheveled, the store offered a wide range of products: from nondescript packages and copies of local Persian newspapers to fruit and vegetables. I filled my basket and then had to wait a bit at the counter before it was my turn to pay. Once it was my turn, the following conversation unfolded between myself and the cashier, a woman in her mid-fifties:

Cashier:     bebæxʃid ke wait ʃodinā?! I am very sorry! [Sorry I kept you waiting?! I am very sorry!]

VP:          mohem nist! be hær hāl āxære hæftæs dige! [Doesn’t matter! It is the weekend!]

Cashier:     āre in weekend hā hæmiʃe hæmintorije! emru:zæm hæmkāræm nist, xodæm cashier hæm hæstæm! [Yes weekends are always like this! Today my colleague isn’t here, so I am the cashier too!]

VP:          tʃe ghædr ʃod?! [How much is it?!]

Cashier:     Seventeen! bagæm bedæm? [Do you also need a bag?]

VP:          tʃi?! [Pardon?!]

Cashier:     bagæm bedæm? [Do you also need a bag?]

VP:          āhān! Næ! Mæmnu:næm! [Got it! No! Thank you!]

Cashier:     Welcome! See you!

For those people who have not experienced life in migrant contexts, Persian is still the language of choice between two native speakers of Persian even if the convenience store, where the interaction takes place, is located in Australia. However, this observation fades to insignificance if one looks closely at this typical conversation. As is evident in this exchange, my Persian differs markedly from the cashier’s. Hers is interspersed with English to such a degree that I couldn’t always understand her. A case in point is ‘bagæm bedæm.’ “Bag” is such an unusual loan word in Persian that I needed to ask for clarification.

Arguably, the above conversation links us to different worlds: my exclusive use of Persian links me up to my community back home in Iran while her use of English chains her up to her host community.

The cashier’s speech may also be interpreted as an attempt to forget Persian, her mother tongue; an attempt which is motivated not only by the speaker’s personal preferences but also by the sheer forces in a globalized world; the forces that may cause migrants to pride themselves in going to the length of claiming themselves unable to speak their first language.

Strictly speaking, the cashier’s speech represents a state of liminality between the global and the local and thus questions the homogeneous categories of knowledge and culture. Liminal situations are ambiguous and ambivalent; they slip between the global and the local, between the public and the private, between work and home, and between commerce and culture. And it is the diversity and richness of such practices that need to be explored in studies of language and globalization.

“وقتی پای عشق به میان می آید ژاپنی ها محبوب ترین موجودات روی کره ی زمین نیستند. تلخ است ولی حقیقت دارد.”

این ادعای میکو مشیزوکی شوارتز، یک به قولِ خودش “کارشناسِ” دو زبانه و دو فرهنگه و نویسنده ی كتاب آنلايني با عنوان  Nihonjin no Otoko wa Motenai (مردان ژاپنی محبوب نیستند)، است که من اخیرا به طور اتفاقی به آن برخوردم. این کتاب دراصل  به عنوان راهنمایی جهت کمک به مردان ژاپنی برای ایجاد و حفظ رابطه با زنان “خارجی” (این جا بخوانید “غربی”) تبلیغ شده است. ادعای کتاب این است که دربردارنده ی توصیه های آموزشی در مورد مسایلی از این قبیل است:

1. چگونه حالات چهره و زبان بدن را بفهمیم

2. چگونه نشانه های گفتاریِ انگلیسی را بفهميم

3. چگونه حتی با مهارت های انگلیسیِ ضعيف تاثیر خوبی از خود بر جا بگذاریم

4. برای اولین قرار کجا برویم و چه کارهایی بکنیم

5. چگونه عذر خواهی کنیم

صفحه یِ اینترنتیِ ژاپنیِ کتاب از تعریف و تمجید های پُرشورِ خوانندگان خود پُر است. بعنوان مثال تي- سَن با بيست سال تجربه ی زندگي در آمريكا اظهار داشته است:

[این کتاب باید به صورت رایگان رویِ میزِ درخواستِ ویزایِ سفارتِ آمریکا در توکیو قرار داده شود. افراد بسیاری وقت خود را تلف می کنند. به خاطر ژاپنی های شلخته است که آمریکایی ها هر روز دارند دختر های ژاپنی جذاب را از ما می گیرند (ترجمه از من).]

اگرچه محتوای اصلی و مفروضات بنیادی کتاب، که نیروی محرک اصلی آن به نظر می رسد، به اندازه ی کافی گیج کننده است، هشداری که بر صفحه ی اینترنتی کتاب  نوشته شده بود مرا بهت زده کرد. با خط قرمز (!) هشدار می داد که این کتاب:

“… کاملا به زبان ژاپنی نوشته شده است. اگر ژاپنی نمی فهمید، این کتاب برای شما مناسب نیست…. اما بگذارید دوباره تاکید کنیم که اگر ژاپنی را در سطح زبان مادری نمی فهمید، این کتاب به درد شما نمی خورد. فقط صفحه ی اطلاعات کتاب را به زبان انگیسی آورده ايم؛ آن هم به این دلیل که نظامِ ذخیره ی اطلاعات آمریکا ما را ملزم به انجام این کار کرده است. هدف این صفحه دعوت غیر ژاپنی زبانان به خرید این کتاب نیست. اگر شما یکی از خوانندگان احتمالی ما هستید شما را به صفحه ی ژاپنی خودمان دعوت می کنیم…”

چی؟! این باید یکی از عجیب ترین تبلیغ ها برای معرفی کتاب در طول تاریخِ چاپ باشد! چرا یک ناشر باید این قدر خودش را توی  درسر بیاندازد و دست به هر کاری بزند تا یک مشتری احتمالی را از خرید منصرف کند؟

من یکی که کنجکاو شدم. وب سایت آن ها مرا به این فکر واداشت که در ژاپن ارتباطات زبانی اکثرا چگونه به تصویر کشیده می شوند. همان گونه که پیلر و تاکاهاشی (2006، ص.60) اشاره می کنند، روابط زنان ژاپنی با مردان غربی هم در کتب تخصصی  و هم در کتب عمومی توجه زیادی را در رشته های مختلف به خود جلب کرده است. در چنین گفتمان هایی زنان ژاپنی به دلیل داشتن اخلاق جنسی قابل نقد در ایجاد رابطه با مردان خارجی (مثل درون مایه ی “تاکسی زردِ” شکولدا در سال 1991) معضل تلقی شده اند. در این روابط، مردان غربی نیز مورد تمسخر قرار گرفته اند. به عنوان مثال، “مرد جذاب”، شخصیت کارتونی یک مجله ی مربوط به مهاجران در ژاپن، یک بازنده ی کانادایی لاغر، بیعرضه، از نظر جنسی بی تجربه و بی دست وپا است که ناگهان وقتی برای کار به عنوان یک معلم مکالمه ی انگلیسی به ژاپن می آید به یک مرد محبوب و جذاب تغییر می کند (بیلی 2007؛ اپلبی، 2009). سِری پر فروش اگوری ساوری (2001)، “عزیز من یک خارجیه“، با لحن بسیار ملایم و محترمانه تری از یک ساختِ کارتونی به عنوان ابزاری بهره جسته تا راز های ظاهرا درک نکردنیِ روابط بین اللمللی را از سویی به صورت داستان عاشقانه نشان داده  و از سویی دیگر پرده از آن ها بردارد. اتفاقا کتاب اگوری اخیرا به صورت فیلم در آمده و از موفقیت تجاری چشم گیری برخوردار است.

اما نمره ای که باید به روابط بین زبانیِ میانِ مردانِ ژاپنی و زنان خارجی داد چند است؟ چنین گفتمان هایی نیز شایستگی بررسی را دارند چرا که، بر خلاف باور کلیشه ای حاکم، در ژاپن اکثر همسران خارجی را زنان تشکیل می دهند (جونز و شن 2008، ص.12). اصلِ این همسرانِ مردانِ ژاپنی عمدتا کره ای، چینی، تایلندی وبرزیلی است. اکثر آن ها به  اصطلاح nooson hanayome (همسران آسیاییِ غیر ژاپنیِ کشاورزان ژاپنی) نامیده می شوند که از آن ها انتظار می رود “یاد بگیرند” چگونه دقیقا مثل زنان ژاپنی باشند (پایپر 2003؛ سوزوکی 2005). به طور قطع برنامه ی “این خانم یک خارجیه” اثر توکیو ِتربی برنامه ی تلویزیونی محبوبی بود که برای چندین سال هرهفته اول وقت پخش می شد. هر قسمت یک مرد ژاپنی و همسر خارجی اش را به تصوری می کشید. ساختِ برنامه ساده بود- تمرکزش روی این بود که چگونه آن زوج یکدیگر را ملاقات می کردند؛ یک ارزیابی کلی از اینکه آیا آن زن به زندگی در ژاپن عادت کرده است و اینکه تا چه اندازه می تواند به نیاز های شوهر ژاپنی اش پاسخ گوید. هر قسمت شامل یک مسابقه ی آشپزی بود که در آن 10000 ین در اختیار زن خارجی قرارداده می شد و او می بایست با آن برای مصاحبه کننده و میهمانان دعوت شده مهمانی شامی تدارک می دید. در انتهای برنامه، شخص سرشناسی همواره پیشنهاد های مقدس مآبانه، تحقیر آمیز، و عاقل اندرسفیهانه ای را، که فکر می کرد به زن خارجی کمک می کند تا خود را با زندگی در ژاپن وفق دهد، ارایه می کرد (پیشنهادهایی مثل “ژاپنی ها کفش هایشان را داخلِ اتاق در می آورند”).

همانگونه که درجایی دیگر (جکسون 2009، صص43-44) بحث کرده ام، گفتمان های روابط بین زبانی به طرز قابل توجهی نژاد پرستانه شده اند. نام اتحادیه های سفید ها (نژادِ سفید پوستان) در ژاپن تلویحا چنین می رساند که موقعیت اجتماعی مسلمی (انگلیسی و رمانتیک) وجود دارد که به غیر سفید پوستان مربوط نیست. برعکس، خارجی های غیر سفید پوست در روابط بین زبانی شبیه فرصت طلبان فقیری به تصویر کشیده می شوند که  برای کاهش مشکلات اقتصادی، نیروی تولید مثلی و جنسی خود را با همسران ژاپنی خود مبادله می کنند (پایپر 1997، کوجیما 2001).

کتابی که در ابتدای این نوشته به آن اشاره کردم از این جهت از گفتمان غالب “مردان ژاپنی-زنان خارجی” متمایز است که مصر است اگر مردان ژاپنی می خواهند زنان خارجی را “به دست آورند” باید خودشان را اصلاح کنند و یک راه “به دست آوردن” زنان خارجی که این کتاب پیشنهاد می کند از طریق زبان است (فهم نشانه های زبان انگلیسی). قضیه از این قرار است: از زنان غیر غربی که درصدد برقراری ارتباط با مردان ژاپنی هستند انتظار می رود که ژاپنی را فرا گیرند. این در حالی است که مردان ژاپنی که زن غربی می خواهند باید انگلیسی را به طرز ظاهرا پیچیده و ماهرانه ای به کار گیرند. پیدا کنید پرتقال فروش را!

من از اینکه ناشر از من نمی خواهد برای این کتاب 25 دلار بپردازم خوشحالم چرا که من به چنین ترکیبی از ذات باوری (essentialism)، تبعیض جنسیتی و نژاد پرستی، که به آموزش زبان انگلیسی گره خورده است، نیاز ندارم و می توانم بدون آن هم به کارم ادامه دهم.

توصیه ی من برای این کتاب به زبان فارسی و ژاپنی: این کتاب را نخرید! この本を購入しないでください！

References:

Appleby, R. J. (2009a). Charisma Man: Discourses of desire and western men in Japan. Discourses and Cultural Practices Conference. University of Sydney, July.

Appleby, R. J. (2009b). Reflections on ‘Charisma Man’. The Teaching-Learning Dialogue: An Active Mirror. 35^th Annual international Conference of Japan Association of Language Teaching. Shizuoka, Japan. November.

Bailey, K. (2007). Akogare, ideology, and the ‘Charisma Man’ mythology: Reflections on ethnographic research in English language schools in Japan. Gender, Place & Culture 14(5), pp. 585-608.

Ieda, S. (1991). Ieroo Kyabuu: Narita wo tobitatta onnatachi. Tokyo: Kodansha.

Jackson, L. (2010). Bilingual child-rearing in linguistic intermarriage: Negotiating language, power, and identities between English-speaking fathers and Japanese-speaking mothers in Japan. Unpublished PhD thesis, The University of Queensland.

Jones, G. & Shen, H. (2008). International marriage in East and South-East Asia: trends and research emphases.Citizenship Studies 12(1), 9-25.

Kojima, Y. (2001). In the business of cultural reproduction: Theoretical implications of the mail-order bride phenomenon.Women’s Studies International Forum, 24(2), 199-210.

Piller, Ingrid & Takahashi, Kimie (2006). A passion for English: desire and the language market Aneta Pavlenko. Ed. Bilingual minds: Emotional experience, expression, and representation (Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, 59-83

Piper, N. (1997). International marriage in Japan: ‘Race’ and ‘gender’ perspectives. Gender, Place, and Culture, 4(3), 321-338.

Piper, N. (2003). Wife or worker? Marriage and cross-border migration in contemporary Japan. International Journal of Population Geography, 9(6), 457-469.

Suzuki, N. (2005). Tripartite desires: Filipina-Japanese marriages and fantasies of transnational traversal. In N. Constable (Ed.), Cross-border marriages: Gender and mobility in transnational Asia. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Reading 'Culture Shock' in Isfahan

In the past three decades attention has shifted from communicative competence to discourse as a frame for understanding the challenges faced by language learners. Yet, the question of how stereotyping in language teaching can be avoided seems as unresolved as ever. Is it enough to instruct teachers to avoid stereotyping?

This question crossed my mind a couple of weeks ago when I was teaching a reading passage titled ‘Culture Shock’ to a number of EFL learners in Isfahan as part of their obligatory reading syllabus. Originally written in 1998 by a New York writer, the text recounts the experiences of Tamara Blackmore, an Australian exchange student in the USA. The following lines are taken from the passage in question:

In Australia, students and teachers have little contact outside the classroom. It’s a formal and depersonalized relationship. College is a place you go for a few hours every day and then go home. Your social life and school life is separate.

Going to school here [in America] is a lifestyle, whereas at home [in Australia] we’re just a number. We attend school to get a degree so we can graduate, get a job, and . . . .

Another pleasant shocker was the close and open relationships American students enjoy with their teachers. It is a sharp contrast to Australia . . . .

[In America] students go out to dinner with their lecturers . . . . We just don’t do that [in Australia]. (‘Culture Shock’ by B. Weinstein, in Lee & Gundersen, 2000, Select Readings Intermediate, pp. 27f.)

In the first place, one might wonder why learning about ‘culture shock’ has to be part of an EFL curriculum seeing that EFL students mostly study English to use it in their native contexts. Even for ESL students who study English in the USA, reading about the experiences of another English speaker, who by definition does not face the challenges of language learning, seems irrelevant. Transposing the reading from an ESL to an EFL context such as Iran, it becomes an exercise in alienation.

Having read the text, students are required to discuss a series of questions, including this one: “[W]ould you rather study for a year in Australia or the United States?” For my students, the answer was, almost unanimously – and unsurprisingly –, ‘in the United States’! Obviously, the text had not made Australia sound particularly attractive. By contrast, the text is extremely positive about American universities. Indeed, one of my students summed up her interpretation of the text as follows: “Australia means culture shock and I don’t like it!”

As a bit of an Australia-fan, I did my best to turn the tide by sharing my daily experiences in Australia with my students but I failed miserably. For them, a text that bore the stamp of “a New York journalist” was much more reliable than the personal experiences of their teacher! Some even criticized me for having spent time in Australia.

Considering that TESOL and study abroad are two markets where Australia and the USA compete for students and thus market share, it’s hard not to read an ulterior motive into this passage, originating as it does in the USA. In this context, and unbeknownst to them, EFL learners such as the students in my class are turned from learners into an audience for advertising. What does that mean for language pedagogy? And where does it leave me as an EFL teacher if I have to teach to a syllabus with a not-so-hidden agenda?

In point of fact, what he had in mind was a chapter titled Iran written by an American anthropologist in the four-volume set Countries and their Cultures. The text touched upon various demographic, socio-economic, political and cultural aspects of Iran. However, the written text, no matter how accurate, had been mediated by the images with which it was associated. A picture is worth a thousand words, as the adage goes, and my housemate clearly had remembered the images rather than the text.

Having been born and raised in Iran and having travelled widely across the country, I dare say the pictures seemed rather outlandish even to me, let alone to my housemate! The pictures showed either far-flung villages or people riding donkeys and driving trashy cars. For a foreigner unfamiliar with the country, the association is clear: Iran is a backward place.

As a matter of fact, anecdotes of similar intercultural miscommunication experienced by Iranians in the West are not uncommon. Several friends of mine have told me of being asked similarly misguided questions. Taken together, such anecdotes are evidence of stereotypical views based in media representations.

But why are such backward pictures used to spruce up the text while Iran’s modern life as evident in its major cities, where the vast majority of the population live, is totally absent from the pictures? The answer seems to have already been provided by Edward Said. In Orientalism, Said describes the features of the body of knowledge which was produced not only by poets, novelists, or travel writers but also by learned scholars especially in the 19^th century. These people almost unanimously represented the Orient as a repository of Western knowledge, rather than as a society and culture in its own right. In this connection, the Orient was described in terms of the way it differed from the West. Eastern countries have often been described in ways which denigrate them, which produce them as a negative image, an ‘other’. Over time, these representations have accrued truth-value to themselves through constant usage and familiarity.

The pictures presented in this recent encyclopedia suggest that Orientalist ways of thinking and writing are too established to die out.

Orientalism is not just a mis-depiction of the East; rather, as my encounter shows, orientalist representations are the basis of ways of seeing that inform mundane interactions between “Easterners” and “Westerners.” Uncovering the orientalist tropes of texts is thus much more than a hermeneutic exercise. It continues to form the basis of lived experience and daily interactional challenges “Easterners” have to contend with.

Reference

Beeman, W. O. (2001). Iran. In M. Ember & C. R. Ember (Eds.), Countries and their cultures, Vol. II (pp. 1057-1077). New York: Macmillan.

In this context, where so many people want to leave the country, the private, commercial foreign language sector has been expanding rapidly. Iran in general and my home town, Isfahan, in particular have undergone an unprecedented boom in foreign language learning and teaching. Accordingly, commercial language schools have mushroomed. It has been reported that, besides hundreds of unregistered ones, a whopping 3700 registered language schools are operating across the country.

The phenomenal market growth in commercial language teaching has also increased competition among language institutes and advertising materials for such institutes are a ubiquitous sight. Ranging from broadcast ads, via billboards, to all kinds of brochures and flyers, advertising materials are all designed to persuade even more members of the target group, i.e. Iranian youths, to engage in foreign language learning. In this way, language learning is no longer about education but about consumption and languages become nothing more than consumer commodities.

This typical flyer presents a case in point. I found this flier in Isfahan’s New Jolfa district, one of Isfahan’s hippest areas frequented by “modern” Iranian youths. The New Jolfa area is a gathering spot for fashionable Iranians to hang out. Consequently, it is also an ideal spot for promoting language schools.

In this flyer, the commodification of language learning is inscribed in the very grammar of the advertising text. For instance, ‘courses’ (دوره ها) and ‘classroom teaching’ (کلاس ها) are animated as participants and thus displace human agents such as ‘teachers’ or ‘students.’ That means that the ‘products’ themselves are ascribed roles and attributes that are in educational contexts normally associated with teachers. Modalities such as disappointment, failure, or risk do not even appear; all that is expressed is that ‘customers’ will receive a predictable, stable outcome. As the flyer has it, success is “100 percent guaranteed” (۱۰۰% تضمینی)!

Language learning thus becomes a product consisting of discrete units, which are separately accessible, and can be bought and sold as distinct goods in the range of commodities available in the market. In such commodified educational discourse, it is the duration of the course that takes on a symbolic significance; one can learn, say, Spanish in 90 days     (اسپانیایی ۹۰ روز)!

Apparently, the market is too competitive and the time is too short to check for typos. Infelicities such as “TOFLE” (i.e. TOEFL), “discution” (i.e. discussion), and “crusive” (i.e. cursive) are by no means limited to the flyer under scrutiny.

Last but not least, the use of flags in such a typical flyer perfectly fits its international and future-oriented purposes. These flags seem to have been intended to foster the link between language learning and mobility and hence to increase the marketing hype surrounding foreign language learning. The more language schools are hyped up, the more difficult it is to resist the urge to “buy” the advertised “products.”

Courtesy Hoda Arabi

Armenian version of my blog post about English in Iran

Translated by Alina Der Sookiasian (Ալինա տէր Սուքիասեան)

2006-2007 թւերին սովորում էի MA(մագիստրատուրա) Թեհրանի համալսարանում,հայրենի քաղաք,Սպահանից 450 կմ հեռաւորութեան վրայ.Հետեւաբար միշտ ուղեւորւում էի միջքաղաքային աւտոբուսներով,որոնց վարորդները կամ միայն պարսկերէն էին խօսում,կամ թուրք_պարսկերէն.
Որպէս կիրառական լեզւաբանութեան ուսանող,հաճախ զայրանում էի տեսնելով հատկանշական անգլերէն հաղորդագրութիուններ,որոնց հիմնականում տեսնում էի աւտոբուսների առաջի դռան վրայ.Օրինակ տեսնելով “Well come to my bus! We go to trip! Good bey” ինքս ինձ հարցնում էի “ինչքա<ն դժւար է վարորդների համար գտնել այս բառերի ուղղագրութիւնը” կամ “ինչու< վարորդները չեն կարեւորում թէ ինչ է գրւած իրենց աւտոբուսներում.”
Մի անգամ մօտեցա վարորդներից մէկին ակնարկելու համար այն ինչ այդ ընթացքում համարում էի աններելի սխալ,բայց նա բարկացած նայեց վրաս եւ առարկեց “քեզ ինչի< տեղ ես դրել.Իջիր իմ աւտոբուսից եթէ իմ անգլերէնը քեզ դուր չի գալիս.” Իսկ այժմ,հաւելեալ զննումներով,ես համոզւած եմ առարկել անգլերէնի բազմազանութիւններին իմ կողմից չափազանց անխոհեմութիւն էր.Վարորդների ինչպէս նաեւ պարսիկների մեծամասնութեան համար նշանները լեզւաբանօրէն արտահայտիչ են` միայն նվազագույն անգլերէն իմաստով.Նրանց անգլերէնը լեզւագիտական չէ այլ պատկերական.Այլ կերպ ասած Իրանում,անգլերէն գրութիւնները սիմւոլիկ աշխատաձեւ ունեն եւ մատնանշում են կապացական իմաստների հաւաքածո.Իմաստներ որոնց կարելի է անգլերէն պռեստիժ բառով անւանել.Այս պռակտիկան` կապակցել անգլերէնը արժանապատւութեան հետ,դարձել է այնքան համատարած որ համարեա անհնար է այն չանւանել հաւաքական թալիսման.
Այսպիսի պռակտիկան արձանագրում է այն փաստը որ գլոբալիզացեան չի նշանակում միանմանութիւն.Փոխարէնը գլոբալիզացեան շարժման է դնում ոչ միայն ոչտեղական այլ նաեւ տեղական շուկաները.Այդ կապակցութեամբ անգլերէնը այլեւս միատեսակ մարմին չէ որի համար պէտք է շուկա գտնել,ավելի ճիշտ այն ռեսուրսների մի համալիր է,իուրաքանչիուրը իր տարածմամբ,արժէքով,իրաւունքներով եւ ազդութիւններով.
Հարցականի տակ պատկերը բացահայտում է այն թէ ինչպէս տեղական մարդիկ գլոբալիզացեաի լեզու անգլերէնը կարող են հասցնել տեղական եւ տարածաշրջանային մակարդակի,նրա հետ վարւելով տեղական նոռմերով.Նման պռակտիկայի տարածումը շրջագծում լաւ բացադրում է թէ ինչու հայտնի Մեկ Դոնալդիզացեան կարող է միայն մասամբ հաշւի առնւել սկզբնական գլոբալացման գործընթացների միասնականութեանը 21 րդ դարում.

British Royal Wedding

Recently, the British royal wedding made international front-page news. It was globally portrayed as an auspicious occasion for the world to remember; much like a well-written fairy-tale. The outcome was record-breaking: the Westminster Abbey event attracted the eyes of millions of people from around the globe. Personally, I have too many more immediate concerns to care about the royal wedding. However, my lack of interest or the fact that I live in Iran didn’t allow me to escape snippets about ‘the extraordinary palace reception’, ‘the locally grown food’, ‘the secrets of Kate’s hairdo’, ‘the pomp and pageantry’, ‘the after-event private party’ and, of course, that ‘balcony kiss.’

Readers outside Iran may be surprised to hear that the British royal wedding was as much a media event in this country as anywhere else in the world. In particular, Iranians applauded the way how gently and appropriately Kate Middleton dressed and used facial make-up (see, for example, here). As so often, when global media events get adapted locally, this applause has in fact nothing much to do with the British royals but everything with Iranian women. Praising Kate’s modesty and demureness has become a way to implicitly criticize Iranian women for their lack of modesty and demureness, for their provocative dresses and their gaudy make-up.

Until I lived in Australia and experienced life in the so-called “West,” I might actually have agreed with this view of Iranian women mediated through an interpretation of British royal femininity along the lines “If an icon of Western femininity can dress so appropriately, why can’t Iranian women?!” “Kate’s simple dress and gentle make-up are a great role model for Iranian women.”

However, after my time in Australia I see the representation of Kate Middleton as a role model for Iranian women a bit differently and consider it a myopic cultural generalization aimed at humiliating Iranian women and make them toe the line of virtuous femininity. When I was in Sydney, for example, my house was across from Curzon Hall, a sandstone manor set in two magnificent gardens. It is a luxurious venue hosting, inter alia, formals and weddings. Weather permitting, parts of the celebrations would be held in the un-walled gardens and not in the main castle. Accordingly, I was a regular, even if accidental, spectator of the events unfolding in the gardens. The scenes or people I witnessed stand in stark contrast to ways Western weddings are nowadays depicted by some Iranian media. In these weddings the guests naturally comprised a variety of individuals. As far as female dress-codes were concerned, I observed some modestly dressed women, and many not-so-modestly dressed ones. In fact, I saw an abundance of artificially tanned skins and low-cut dresses.

It is axiomatic that the great majority of Iranians are Muslims and are thus expected to dress in accordance with Islamic doctrine. However, extolling the virtues of modest female dress codes through generalizing (incorrectly!) from the wedding dress of a British royal to all Western women and then recontextualizing it as a ‘fact’ to blast a large group of people in another country is the last approach any discerning mind would advise even if it is done with the best intentions.

From the 15th to the 20th century the Orient was described in terms of the ways it differed from the West. Colonised countries were denigrated and produced as a negative image, an ‘other.’ The production of a positive, civilised image of British society and its inverse – the negative, uncivilised orient – was a way to justify colonial relationship between “the west and the rest”. What is discomforting today is, however, not orientalism emanating from the West but from within Iranian society: a kind of self-orientalism that has the aim not to justify a neo-colonial relationship but a patriarchal one. If the British have already done this to us, why are we doing it to ourselves?

Courtesy Hoda Arabi

In 2006 and 2007 I was doing my MA at the University of Tehran, about 450 kilometers away from my hometown, Isfahan. For this reason, I was a regular passenger in intercity buses driven either by Persian monolinguals or by Persian-Turkic bilinguals. As a student of Applied Linguistics, I would often be annoyed at the sight of peculiar English messages I used to see mainly on the front doors of such buses. Having seen, for example, “Well come to my bus. We go to trip! Good bey,” I would ask myself “How difficult is it for the drivers to look up the spelling of such words?” or “Why don’t the drivers care about what is written on their own buses?” Once I approached one of the drivers trying to hint at what I would at the time consider as an unpardonable error, but he furiously glared at me and retorted “Who do you think you are? Get off my bus if you don’t like my English!”

But now, upon further contemplations, I think it was utterly inconsiderate of me to have objected to such English varieties. For the drivers, as for the majority of Iranians, the signs are, linguistically speaking, only English in a minimal sense; their Englishness is not linguistic but semiotic. In other words, in Iran, English messages usually function emblematically by signaling a variety of associative meanings, which can be captured under the English term prestige. Such a practice, i.e. associating English with dignity, has become so ubiquitous that it is barely possible not to call it a collective fetish.

This kind of practice puts on record the fact that globalization does not necessarily mean uniformization. Instead, globalization sets in motion not only translocal but local markets as well. In this connection, the global English is no longer a unified entity to find a market for; it is, rather, a complex of resources, each with its own distribution, value, rights, and effects.

The picture in question reveals how local people can bring English, the language of globalization, down to the level of the local and regional by treating it in the local norms. The prevalence of such practices in the periphery well explains why the well-known McDonaldization can only partially account for the prima facie uniformity of globalization processes in the 21^st century.

Blommaert, J. (2010). The sociolinguistics of globalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

My 88-year-old grandma, my mamanjoon

My 88-year-old grandma, my mamanjoon, is the most wonderful nana anyone could have and I am very close to her. She has played a significant role in my development. Throughout my education, she has always been a great source of support and encouragement. When I crammed for various high-stake national exams, I suffered from anxiety and tension. However, no sooner would I begin to speak with my grandma that all my worries would fade away! The melodious tone of her voice, the words and expressions she uses, would serve to relieve any anxiety or tension. She speaks an old Isfahani dialect which is not only different from the Persian of other parts of Iran but also differs markedly from the speech of younger Isfahanis. In particular, my nana’s speech is characterized by older Isfahani words that are no longer in use and religious terms borrowed from Arabic. Whatever she says bears a spiritual connotation which is sweet, encouraging and uplifting. Yet, her dialect can no longer be heard in the streets of modern Isfahan. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why she feels alienated as she walks in the streets and prefers to stay at home. Her dialect is dying out.

I have often felt saddened by the lack of attempts to preserve the old Isfahani dialect. It goes without saying that, as time passes by, all languages change and that this process cannot be foiled. However, shouldn’t we at least try to record and document this dialect which is so intimately interwoven with our history?

As a professional linguist, I could start by recording the many conversations I have with my grandmother. However, there is a problem! The problem is that my grandmother objects to recordings of any kind for religious reasons. It is only during wedding ceremonies that old women like her can be caught on tape because during these ceremonies the camera nowadays keeps rolling no matter what, and old women have to choose between their objections to being recorded on camera and blessing the newly-wed couple and the next generation. Of course, the latter wins.

Isfahani Muslim women of my grandmother’s generation are not the only ones who object to being audio- or video-recorded. Many traditional peoples around the world have similar objections. This makes me wonder whether saving endangered languages is really all it is cracked up to be. Who are we to disregard the explicit wishes of speakers – people – so that we can “save” a language, which is, after all, nothing more than a set of practices and ideas?

The other day, I sat in my office reading a research article about narratives and the discursive construction of identity (Hayati & Maniati, 2010). The analysis is a familiar one in the Labovian vein, but it was the data that touched me. The examples made me miss my home country and its beggars (!) very much! This is an example I found particularly moving:

bæradæra! mæn geda nistæm! mæn æhle Y hæstæm ælan do hæftæs ke tu šæhretun hastæm hæmeye puli ke dæštæm hæmun ruzæye ævvæl tæmum šod ælanæm vaqeæn hiči nædaræm mæjburæm šæba tu park bexabæm bexætere hæmin qiafæm šekel motada šode bædæm miad mærdom be češme motad mæno negah konæn væli mæjburæm ye kæm pool mixam ke bærgærdæm šæhræm xoda pedæro madæretuno biamorze

Dear brothers! I’m not a beggar! I’m from Y and it is about two weeks that I’m in your city. I had come here to find a job, but unfortunately I couldn’t find any. All the money I had was spent the first days and I’m really broke now and have to sleep in streets and parks, that’s why I look like a drug addict. It’s so disgusting for me to be looked upon as a drug addict and beg other people but I have no other choice. I just need some money to get back to my hometown. May God have mercy on your parents’ souls. (English translation by Hayati & Maniati)

In Iran, beggars usually beg in or around mosques since such holy places give them the upper hand in arousing the religious feelings of worshipers. Some beggars display enormous creativity in their begging! They may artistically sing wistful songs for the worshippers even if worshippers try to stonewall beggars’ attempts either by quickening their pace as they walk toward the mosque or even by pushing beggars away. This beggar’s artfully enacted narrative transported me back to my homeland. To me, as a person living out of my home country, this personal begging narrative was trans-historical and trans-cultural. The narrative was there like life itself.

When I read this story, I started to co-construct an identity with the begging speaker while listening to him reciting his narrative in my mind and in my first language which I had been longing for. The narrative which was being recited was to me what I had been missing for weeks. This narrative had a potently pleasant impact on me just because it was being rendered in my mother tongue!

The beggar’s narrative imitates life and life imitates narrative. For the beggar, life is an achievement of memory recall; beyond that, recounting his life is an interpretive feat. And, I think, this memory recall is assisted more through narratives of personal experience formulated in my first language. From now on, when someone tells me their life, I will try to scrupulously listen to them. I will try to consider it as an achievement and not merely a panhandling attempt which I used to egotistically evade.

Hayati, A. M., & Maniati, M. (2010). Beggars are sometimes the choosers. Discourse and Society, 21(1), 41-57, DOI: 10.1177/0957926509345069.