Getting Clearer

As one reads more and more into WWW the message and construct of the book becomes clearer. Chapters 7 to the end actually deal with the different ways of learning. I found the comparison between the ways townspeople and Trackton and Roadville inhabitants learn. One thing, I think, that runs right through this research is that the way people learn is highly dependent on their upbringing. I am also happy that Shirley Heath highlights that and also shows how, given this knowledge, researchers and teachers are constantly faced with the task of learning the different ways of learning of different sets of people. The discussion of Black English and Standard English also proved quite interesting. However, the big question is how do we get ethnographers and teachers to accept their opacity and position themselves to learn about peoples' different forms of learning?

Strange Ethnography

This week's reading is coming from just one book, Ways with Words, by Shirley B Heath. In these first six chapters she is examining the socio-historical development of Roadville and Trackton. What I find particularly disturbing is that her ethnographic study of these two communities actually read like narratives or stories in which different characters in these towns play a part. we are given a kind historical transformation from the days of slavery in the South, when inhabitants in these towns were engaged with textile production in mills, unto the days of education and refinement. Maybe, more reading will reveal the larger framework of her engagement with these two communities.

Ethnography Galore

This week's readings provide concrete examples of ethnographic method of research as exemplified in the articles of Canagarajah, Kathy Mills, Athanases and Heath, and a critical theoretical approach to the method of ethnography itself in the article of Hammersley. The issues raised in Hammersley's article are useful in interrogating some of the ethnographic research practices of some analysts. I am particularly drawn to the ethnographic research conducted by Canagarajah in Sri Lanka with some college students to determine issues of domination and resistance among students. He uses the American Kernel Lessons (AKL) intermediate pre-packaged materials to see whether students would be receptive or reactive to that material. It turned out that most students resisted the AKL materials because they didn't fulfill their expected desire of learning "standard" grammar to pass standardized test. This is to say that the ESOL course did not meet the student's ESP expectations. Furthermore, most students aspired towards "Standard English" acquisition for various socio-political reasons. One question that comes to mind at this point is which context - local or global - determines the literacy choices of these students in Sri Lanka? Although most of these students found the textual situations in the AKL difficult to interpret because of cultural difference, they nevertheless aspire towards global citizenship through a monolingual approach to language.