Critical Perspectives in Intercultural Education: Identity, Citizenship, and Curriculum

1. CongRESO INTERNACIONAL, Córdoba, 3-6 junio de 2015“EDUCACIÓN Y COOPERACIÓN AL DESARROLLO” Indentity, Citizenship and Curriculum: Adopting a critical perspective towards / for intercultural Education Richard Fay (Manchester Institute of Education, The University of Manchester) richard.fay@manchester.ac.uk

2. Initial Thoughts – The ‘Critical Turn’ Adrian Holliday (small culture vs culturism) Ingrid Piller(IC - a critical introduction) Dasli & Diaz (intercultural pedagogy) Fred Derwin(ICC - alternative approaches/times) Uwe Bauer, BAAL IC SIG (closing comments on IC researchers’ critical engagement vs researching the privileged) Researching Multilingually at the Borders of language, the Body, Law and the State (what does it mean to be languaged and to language in a world of vulnerability, discrimination, inequity, trauma?) Critical Pedagogy research theme (what is the contribution of TESOL and IC to the ‘critical’ in educational thinking and purposes?) the ‘critical’ zeitgeist

3. My Thinking about Criticality Professional trajectory: refugee ESOL  TESOL  IC  Ic Education  advocate for social change re migration and asylum-seeking MATE(Greece - Multicultural Awareness Through English) IC Awareness through Encounters with ‘otherness’ (Cordoba’s Saharan practicum) Helpdesk for Intercultural Materials (Bulgaria  Balkans) Tales of Ladino (Bulgarian Sephardim – ICC as performance of intercultural experience)

4. https://talesofladino.wordpress.com/storytellers-by-location/andrey-daniel/https://talesofladino.wordpress.com/storytellers-by-location/andrey-daniel/

5. A time for criticality UK context - Scottish referendum + progressive political agenda - General and local elections May 2015 - Cameron’s EU membership referendum - ‘Red’ Manchester (6/6 + 96/96) - ‘Blue’ Essex (10/1)

6. A time for criticality • “an acceptance that people having different faiths or beliefs to oneself (or having none) should be accepted and tolerated, and should not be the cause of prejudicial or discriminatory behaviour“ • “an understanding of the importance of identifying and combatting discrimination” • Lytham Road (English, Urdu, Punjabi, Arabic, Cantonese, Korean, Spanish, Sikh, Polish …..) • UK context • 12m Syrian refugees + EU quotas (187/30k/1.8m) • Michael Gove + British democratic values (Trafalgar)

7. Two Primary Schools St James’ CE (Manchester) - Ethos = ‘love their neighbour’ = respect the cultural other - 240 pupils, almost 75% ‘ethnic minority’, - 15 main ethnic groups (largest = Pakistani heritage) …. mostly Muslim - 40+ languages - 50% ‘EAL’ ….. 25% = EMT, 65% multilingual, 10% = EMT

8. Two Primary Schools St Helen’s Catholic (Essex) - Ethos = respect - 210  420 pupils, 75% ethnic minority - Filipino, Polish, Spanish, various African … mostly Catholic - 30+ languages - 60% ‘EAL’ (parental classification)

9. Two Issues and a Story • “Prevent” strategy (to prevent radicalisation) • The Global School – mapping origins The characteristics of a critically-edged intercultural orientation to education? British democratic values - via school ethos (respect + Catholicity / Christian-underpinning)

10. Critical Applied Linguistics Pennycook (2010) …. CAL is “more than just a critical dimension added on to applied linguistics; it involves a constant skepticism, a constant questioning of the normative assumptions of AL ….”(p.10) the constant “problematizing of givens” (p.7-8). the “constant reciprocal relation between theory and practice” (p.3). the centrality of “social responsibility and social transformation” (p.6). Global school and the need to problematise the notion of each child having a cultural identity, a place of origin, a (heritage) language, etc

11. Building a Critical Underpinning (1) Culture can be understood not in national- and/or regional-level terms but rather as a small, emergent process (Holliday, 1999; Street, 1993). Communication can be understood as a process of meaning attribution (Porter & Samovar, 1994) Intercultural communication can be understood as a process of interpersonal communication between individuals between whom there are significant differences as well as potential similarities in cultural backgrounds, identities, etc; …. i.e. communication between individuals seen as culturally-complex and culturally-unique (Singer, 1998).

12. Building a Critical Underpinning (2) The term Intercultural is understood to be different from cross-cultural, transcultural, multicultural, international, global, etc but , as currently used in a more critical paradigm, e.g. Holliday, 2010, 2013; Piller, 2011), has some things in common with intersectionality. An intercultural stance is concerned with the experience of and perspectives towards differences and similarities within and between individuals connected with (i.e. citizens of) particular societies. Intercultural education seeks to encourage students to engage with their local, national and international contexts in a spirit of ethnorelativism, curiosity, open-ness, flexibility and tolerance.

13. A working definition of intercultural education IcEd aims to use educational processes, curricula, materials, examinations, teacher education practices, teaching methodological possibilities, etc… …. to inculcate a critical global-and-local mindedness in students towards (their engagement with) accepted and transmitted knowledge about the world so that … … both within their complex and emerging national social context(s) and beyond it/them, … they are able to approach diversity, complexity, and contested aspects (of history, etc) with a habit of mind of considering multiple perspectives (i.e. meaning attribution) on what they are learning.

14. Bulgaria Helpdesk Case Study Bulgaria = a small-ish (7-8 million) in SE Europe, ‘the Balkans’ Now EU member state, previously part of Soviet Block has a significant (25+ %) ‘ethnic minority’ population, e.g. Turkish-speaking muslims, Roma, Sephardic Jews, etc),

15. Bulgaria Helpdesk Case Study Helpdesk challenge - exploring the contribution (or otherwise ) of all officially approved school texts towards the objectives of Intercultural education. educational policy frames a notional, singular construct of Bulgarian identity (Bulgarian-speaking, Orthodox Christian) policy devalues the contribution to the cultural richness of Bulgaria (and all those for who do not share that singular, national cultural identity) Education supports a centralised discriminatory policy vis-à-vis ethnic identity

16. And beyond http://researching-multilingually-at-borders.com/ Developing FL pedagogy under siege conditions (online Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language in Gaza)

17. And beyond MATE (multicultural awareness in Greece where ‘to be Greek, is to be Orthodox) Generic Cultural Awareness (post TEFL criticality intercultural awareness in Mexico) Discourses of Intercultural Communication and English as a Lingua Franca(Thailand and ‘the West’) the politics of EMI-CLIL (Indonesia) CLIL + EAL (Manchester and Essex)

18. Comments? Questions?