Abstract:This article explores the identity struggles of a community of Tibetan refugee women in the Indian Himalayas whose educational program combines a traditional Buddhist philosophical curriculum in Tibetan alongside a modern, secular bilingual curriculum in English-Tibetan. Ethnographic and action research data illustrate how negotiations of meanings in multicultural, multilingual EFL/EIL contexts go well beyond mere linguistic features to include cultural and gender identity struggles. Five students serve as cas… Show more
“…Even after resettlement, learning can continue to be impeded due to the after‐effects of torture and trauma. In the early 2000s more than 4,000 nuns were expelled from Tibet; this is the broader context of MacPherson's () study of how five female Tibetan nuns in bilingual Tibetan‐English classes in Dharamsala, India, negotiated the “extralinguistic reality” of “life in exile” (p. 604). One of the students, Tsepal, had been imprisoned and tortured in Tibet and “like many survivors, suffered from a litany of physical and psychological aftereffects” that seriously impeded her ability to pursue English and an education (p. 596):The alienation arising from occupation, political persecution, imprisonment, and torture … can leave courageous women like Tsepal much more than a refugee in body; they can become refugees in mind … [experiencing] deep anger, illness, and even mental anguish.…”
Section: Challenges For Learners and Teachers During And After Conflictmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…One of the students, Tsepal, had been imprisoned and tortured in Tibet and “like many survivors, suffered from a litany of physical and psychological aftereffects” that seriously impeded her ability to pursue English and an education (p. 596):The alienation arising from occupation, political persecution, imprisonment, and torture … can leave courageous women like Tsepal much more than a refugee in body; they can become refugees in mind … [experiencing] deep anger, illness, and even mental anguish. (MacPherson, , pp. 596–597, italics added)…”
Section: Challenges For Learners and Teachers During And After Conflictmentioning
Skyrocketing military spending, ongoing military conflicts, and human displacement worldwide have significant consequences for the teaching and learning of English. TESOL increasingly requires a robust research base that can provide informed, critical guidance in preparing English language teachers for work in and near conflict zones, for teaching refugees and asylum seekers, and, more broadly, for teaching English in highly militarized times. This investigation, which takes the form of a transdisciplinary, translocal literature review, consolidates and extends TESOL's peace-conflict studies through a close examination of two areas that are connected but rarely considered in tandem: TESOL's multiple involvements and entanglements in armed and militarized conflicts and their aftermath, and the challenges of teaching English in a conflict zone or for students who have escaped or been exiled from one. Implications for pedagogy and further research are suggested. The argument is, in short, that the dialectical relationship between TESOL and conflict is in urgent need of collegial scrutiny, that teachers need to be equipped to facilitate critical and creative engagement with English not apart from broader sociopolitical realities but in relation to these, and that the implications of conflict for language learning are relevant across the wider TESOL community, given world developments.
“…Even after resettlement, learning can continue to be impeded due to the after‐effects of torture and trauma. In the early 2000s more than 4,000 nuns were expelled from Tibet; this is the broader context of MacPherson's () study of how five female Tibetan nuns in bilingual Tibetan‐English classes in Dharamsala, India, negotiated the “extralinguistic reality” of “life in exile” (p. 604). One of the students, Tsepal, had been imprisoned and tortured in Tibet and “like many survivors, suffered from a litany of physical and psychological aftereffects” that seriously impeded her ability to pursue English and an education (p. 596):The alienation arising from occupation, political persecution, imprisonment, and torture … can leave courageous women like Tsepal much more than a refugee in body; they can become refugees in mind … [experiencing] deep anger, illness, and even mental anguish.…”
Section: Challenges For Learners and Teachers During And After Conflictmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…One of the students, Tsepal, had been imprisoned and tortured in Tibet and “like many survivors, suffered from a litany of physical and psychological aftereffects” that seriously impeded her ability to pursue English and an education (p. 596):The alienation arising from occupation, political persecution, imprisonment, and torture … can leave courageous women like Tsepal much more than a refugee in body; they can become refugees in mind … [experiencing] deep anger, illness, and even mental anguish. (MacPherson, , pp. 596–597, italics added)…”
Section: Challenges For Learners and Teachers During And After Conflictmentioning
Skyrocketing military spending, ongoing military conflicts, and human displacement worldwide have significant consequences for the teaching and learning of English. TESOL increasingly requires a robust research base that can provide informed, critical guidance in preparing English language teachers for work in and near conflict zones, for teaching refugees and asylum seekers, and, more broadly, for teaching English in highly militarized times. This investigation, which takes the form of a transdisciplinary, translocal literature review, consolidates and extends TESOL's peace-conflict studies through a close examination of two areas that are connected but rarely considered in tandem: TESOL's multiple involvements and entanglements in armed and militarized conflicts and their aftermath, and the challenges of teaching English in a conflict zone or for students who have escaped or been exiled from one. Implications for pedagogy and further research are suggested. The argument is, in short, that the dialectical relationship between TESOL and conflict is in urgent need of collegial scrutiny, that teachers need to be equipped to facilitate critical and creative engagement with English not apart from broader sociopolitical realities but in relation to these, and that the implications of conflict for language learning are relevant across the wider TESOL community, given world developments.
“…On the one hand, the community continues to struggle against generations of oppression at the hands of the Chinese occupation of their country. This occupation has entailed both overt and symbolic violence directed at "traditional" forms of education (MacPherson, 2005), which continue to propel many Tibetans to leave; however, once in exile, they face new challenges negotiating multiple multicultural and nation-state contexts in which they constitute small enclaves of migrating refugees or immigrants with varying degrees of ability to impact the institutions and educations in their host countries. Yet, between these two Downloaded by [University of Otago] at 12:59 30 July 2015 impossible conditions, they have organized and resisted in such a way to form a diaspora that in the last year has seemed like a David staring down Goliath before the witness of the world.…”
Section: Resultsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Gal's (1978) classic study found gender affected language shift among Hungarian women participants, who preferred to study German rather than their native language because of the perceived enhanced opportunities offered women in Germany. In her study of Tibetan nuns in India, MacPherson (2005), an author of this article, noted that women's relative facility in learning languages can offer an easy credential to compensate for the multiple negative discriminations they face elsewhere in society, where English language teaching and texts, "…”
Section: Gendermentioning
confidence: 97%
“…These findings are based on female youth participants; therefore, gender must be considered as a potential factor in multilingual ideology and maintenance. The direction in which gender affects language maintenance or loss varies with sociocultural contexts (Ehrlich, 1997;MacPherson, 2005). Early studies suggested that women play a more significant role as preservers of language and culture and in L1 maintenance than males (e.g., Clyne & Kipp, 1999).…”
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