Comments on: The language that cannot speak its name https://languageonthemove.com/the-language-that-cannot-speak-its-name/ Multilingualism, Intercultural communication, Consumerism, Globalization, Gender & Identity, Migration & Social Justice, Language & Tourism Wed, 06 Apr 2016 23:04:00 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9 By: Language on the Move https://languageonthemove.com/the-language-that-cannot-speak-its-name/#comment-46760 Wed, 06 Apr 2016 23:04:00 +0000 http://www.languageonthemove.com/?p=19610#comment-46760 In reply to Sheila Pham.

Thanks, Sheila! ‘CALD’ is another of those muddleheaded terms that are more divisive than helpful … logically, every one is “diverse” but the way it’s used in Australia it refers to anyone who is not Anglo-Celtic or Aboriginal; and that could be a new immigrant from a country where English plays no role whatsoever, a new monolingual-English immigrant from a Commonwealth country, the descendants of non-white immigrants who have grown up in Australia etc. etc. … I’ve written about the discursive effects of locating diversity only in “the Other” a while ago here: http://languageonthemove.com/the-diversity-of-the-other/

]]> By: Sheila Pham https://languageonthemove.com/the-language-that-cannot-speak-its-name/#comment-46759 Wed, 06 Apr 2016 20:20:00 +0000 http://www.languageonthemove.com/?p=19610#comment-46759 Great post Ingrid. I’ve been working in high schools these past few months and that’s included me collecting data on whether children can speak a language other than English because one of our targets is children from “culturally and linguistically diverse” backgrounds. Indigenous has its own category and we don’t note whether they speak other languages. It wasn’t entirely straightforward at times, such as those from the Pacific Islands. There was one group where the teacher said at first that there was no one, but there was definitely one child from a Vietnamese background (I could see him and his name too). Maybe someone like him only speaks English at home but he’s certainly ‘culturally diverse’. In our case, we can pick up quickly how the children are faring in English — including children who only speak English — so we adapt the classroom activities. But I certainly noted that there was a bit of ambiguity at times.

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