week 4,Cultural Globalization and Language Education Chapter4&5(Kuma)

Chapter 4
First off, I indeed enjoy reading Kuma’s definition about the cultural stereotypes which is written from such a refreshing and original perspective, particularly in the description of Asian students,such as the unconditional obedience to the authority, lack of critical thinking ability. I am so delighted that Kuma speaks in defense of those Asian students who have suffered a long time from their stereotype images.

When talking about stereotype, what often comes to my mind is the conventional image/impression of a certain group of people who we have assumed even before getting to know them.(P.50) “ It is a simple and simplistic description of people about whom we have very little personal knowledge” Stereotype is so annoyingly pervasive that sometimes block teachers away from the students. It is true the way that teachers judge students will have a completely different impact on them. The fear and the threat of the stereotype students got from their teachers may affect students’ performance in the long run. Thus, as ESL teachers, we need to learn to overcome this oversimplified and shallow conception.

Chapter 5
The immigration waves over the past centuries contributed tremendously to America’s ethnic, cultural, linguistic, and religious diversity. I didn’t understand the importance of culture in ESL classes before taking TESOL courses, probably because I come from a small town in China. After reading this chapter, what have come acrossed my mind is a well-known phrase by John Donne: No man is an island. Currently, we are living in a globalized and multicultural society, in which increasingly more people assimilate and share the same values, attitudes and beliefs. While assimilating the new culture, some make great effort to maintain theirs and some deliberately tried to get rid of their own culture.

What has attracted my attention is Schumann’s Social Distance in this chapter. As far as I am concerned, the social distance is somewhat similar with the social identity I have read last week,Schumann pointed out (P.90)”Even formal teaching, he concluded, will be of extremely limited benefit to the second language learner who lacks social and psychological proximity to the members of the TL community”I do realize the existence and influence of social distance that will affect second language learner’s English performance. But after having read so many theories,I am not sure of what other factors affect students SLA to the largest extent, besides the formal English teaching in school. However, I have a very naïve idea. After school, some students will review the knowledge they have learned,some students just throw the text books away and have fun. Undoubtedly, those hard-working students have made great progresses in English and seem to better fit in after they moved abroad. Therefore, I am simply wondering if their diligence were taken into account in the SLA.