Building Resilience in the Classroom: Empowering Students/Teachers Against Linguistic Discrimination via Linguistic Skills (66314)

Session Information:

Session: On Demand
Room: Virtual Video Presentation
Presentation Type:Virtual Presentation

All presentation times are UTC-10 (Pacific/Honolulu)

This study aims to bring Linguistics to classrooms to advocate Linguistic Equality and build resilience against discrimination. Modern linguists regard all languages and language varieties as equal in value; however, academic and social discourse practices regard standard variety as essentially superior to non-standard varieties (Collins, 1999). Such discrimination includes all native speakers, particularly the variations associated with racial, ethnic, or cultural minorities (Lippi-Green,1994), and extends as far as discrimination against those whose accents are of foreign origin. This study argues that linguistics can contribute to equity and social justice and prevent language-based discrimination in formal education and consequently in public discourse. In a pedagogical model that brings linguistics into the English classroom and includes community building, non-discriminatory linguistic practices could empower students to achieve their best by building resilience. To that end, teachers create linguistically justified non-discriminatory learning environment where clarity and efficiency in communication is valued more than competent accuracy in language use. Anti-discriminatory practices in the classroom include understanding and uncovering of implicit bias and prejudice for or against any dialects/accents spoken by linguistically diverse learners. Language can be "a point of focus for those in pursuit of social justice and change" (De Korne, 2021) Social activism is a way to reach the goal of social justice/equity and peace in the society. Education is a way to reach the goal of building a socially active and conscientious society consisting of individuals who know how to be open to new ideas and can change the world for the better.

Authors:
Gulsat Aygen, Northern Illinois University, United States


About the Presenter(s)
Prof. Aygen is a Distinguished Professor of Linguistics at Northern Illinois University. Research interests: theoretical and applied linguistics, ; language education, Linguistic Human Rights and Linguistics for Social Justice.

Connect on Linkedin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/gulsat-aygen-976774b

Connect on ResearchGate
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Gulsat-Aygen

Additional website of interest
https://sites.google.com/site/gulsataygen/

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Posted by Clive Staples Lewis

Last updated: 2023-02-23 23:45:00