The Discursive Construction of Teacher Identities: Flemish Teachers' Perceptions of Standard Dutch

Abstract

As a starting point, this paper offers a theoretical discussion of a number of widely used yet diversely conceived concepts: (standard) language ideology, identity, agency, and indexicality. Using these concepts, we analyze a number of illustrative interview extracts from a corpus of sociolinguistic interviews with Flemish primary and secondary school teachers. Our goal is twofold. First, we discuss how Flemish teachers perceive (the importance of) Standard Dutch and other, nonstandard varieties of Dutch. Second, we show how these perceptions discursively shape teacher identities of authenticity, authority, and professionalism.

Measuring language attitudes in context: Exploring the potential of the Personalized Implicit Association Test

“…Regional dialect was only deemed suitable in the most informal and private settings. In a similar vein, Delarue & Lybaert (2016:254) report that Flemish school teachers say they try to use SBD in formal settings (e.g. giving instructions), but prefer using CBD in more informal interactions with their pupils.…”

Language educators’ regard for variation in late modernity: Perceptions of linguistic variation in minority contexts

“…Research on African American English (AAE) in the U.S. (Blake and Cutler ) shows that a majority of teachers studied view AAE positively, consider it to have its own grammatical structure and disagree that ‘standard’ English is the best form of English. Dutch teachers stress the importance of ‘standard’ Dutch; however, they are concerned that the overuse of the variety potentially damages relationships with learners (Delarue ; Delarue and Lybaert ). Even code‐switching, often considered deviant, is evaluated positively by teachers in Kuwait when responding to Kuwaiti–English code‐switching (Akbar ).…”

Lietuvių kalbos mokytojai standartinės kalbos ideologijos nelaisvėje: nuostatos, praktikos, pasekmės

“…Pavyzdžiui, Belgijos Flandrijoje pastebėta, kad nepaisant restriktyvios viešosios nuomonės spaudimo mokytojai (tiek kalbos, tiek kitų disciplinų) oponuoja standartinės olandų kalbos ideologijai autentiškumo, profesionalumo ir pedagoginiais argumentais. Reprezentatyvaus flamų tyrimo duomenimis (Delarue & Lybaert 2016), išmoktinė standartinė kalba, mokytojų manymu, gali sudaryti neautentiško kalbėtojo ir komunikacijos atmosferą, kurti nelygiavertį mokytojo ir mokinio santykį, signalizuoti nereikalingą atstumą, trukdyti realizuoti bendravimo pamokoje dinamiką, neadekvačiai atitraukti dėmesį nuo spontaniškai komunikuojamo turinio į kalbos formą. Mokytojai panaudoja šias kritiškas nuostatas savo, kaip švietimo sistemos profesionalo, tapatybei įtvirtinti.…”

“…Praktiškai visi mokytojai pabrėžė žinantys, kad iš jų tikimasi standartinės kalbos ir kad jie prireikus sąmoningai pereinantys prie standartinės kalbos siekdami išvengti neigiamos asociacijos, jog jie galimai nemokantys standarto (daugiau žr. Delarue & Lybaert 2016, plg. Delarue 2013.…”