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annwfynI found This while drifting around on the internet. It set off a train of thought about my EFL days, and I found myself pondersome.
The comment I wanted to leave was this:
However, all the race awareness communities are friends only, with moderated membership, and only allow friends only posting, so I find myself rambling here instead.
It must be said, however, while I kinda agreed with a lot of the original post I also found some of the comments stupid. The great comment of 'I think there is a lot of potential for someone to teach abroad in a way that challenges the system of supremacy. It may be a little awkward at first because of the language barrier, but English teachers have a lot of freedom in terms of what they can teach sometimes (depending on the school), so why not teach the students about white privilege itself? I'd say half the questions the students ask are not about grammar but about Western culture itself' was possibly one of the more arrogant and western-centric things I have ever seen.
It's wrong to go and teach English and assume you are superior by virtue of your skin tone, but it's OK to go over there and teach American campus sociological theory to them because you're a Black American? In what way is that not still cultural imperialism? To my mind, the very notion of 'white privilege' isn't something that would be appropriate to teach in a country like Nepal, which is a conservative hindu culture in which caste is a big deal. When I was out there, there was a great deal of racism - there were a lot of comments made about anyone of African descent, who was viewed as definitely being of a lesser status than someone of Asian/Indian descent. English/American were viewed through mixed eyes - on one hand, the west had money and power, and yet we were still seen as sexually promiscuous, brash, and in some ways less cultured than the east. It wasn't my place to challenge those views through argument, or tell them that their religion was wrong, and people weren't defined on some level by caste, for example. It was my place to behave as well as possible and give a positive impression of what an English girl could be like, and god knows I wasn't great with that at times.
And taking all that away, no matter what the culture, it surely isn't right to try and impress your own views of culture on to it. And a modern, American view of what race is, and how racial harmony works, is specifically still the product of your own culture, and it isn't appropriate to be trying to teach children from a different culture all about it, anymore than it would have been reasonable for me to be telling the girls all about modern western feminism, or trying to chat to the other teachers about polyamory, and how it's OK to love more than one person, and that monogamy is just a social construct.
In Europe and America we have our own views on how the world works. There's nothing wrong with that, and there's nothing wrong with having such things available to anyone who wants access to them. There is something wrong with going to a foreign country, where you've been hired to teach English, and trying to push those views onto impressionable kids, who are taught to respect and listen to their teacher, without even acknowledging that that is what you are doing.
Bah. And humbug.
The comment I wanted to leave was this:
- I'm not a member of this community - I just found this community while drifting through - but wanted to post with my agreement.
I spent nine months working as a teacher in Nepal when I was 18, and I agree with so much of what you've said. First of all, I find it really problematic that kids with no real teaching qualifications are able to go out there and become responsible for the education of children. I was 18 when I went out there. I wasn't a very good teacher, I didn't know anything, I didn't speak the kids' own language properly (I'd had a week's course in it) and yet I was the primary English teacher for 15 year old kids who were relying on me to get them through the exams which determined whether they got into university or not.
I've been told that the reason that native speakers were preferred was that English was an international language, and having a fluent grasp of it, especially in a country like Nepal which was then so heavily reliant on foreign aid and the aid industry, does affect job prospects far more so than English/American/Australian/native English speakers realise. Just being exposed to a native speaker does a lot for pronounciation, for developing an ear for it, and that will help in the long run. I've also been told that due to economic differences, there is no way a Nepalese government run school could afford a fully qualified TEFL teacher, and it would be pretty hard for one of them to afford to go out there.
I was paid with board and lodging, and that was it. I saved the money to go work there myself. By and large half of Nepal works that way - they get cheap teachers by employing backpackers, basically, who will work for nothing in return for the experience. It's not a great system, in that it does leave a lot of kids with fairly mediocre teachers, but I can see that it could be also seen as a two way street - the Nepalese schools get very cheap teachers (even a local wouldn't work for board and lodging. The Nepalese teachers got paid) and a bunch of English teenagers get to go abroad, see the world, and feel like they are doing something helpful.
I'd probably say that the system would be vastly improved if the English teenagers were happy to take all the money they saved to go out to Nepal and just donate it directly to the schools who could then look at employing a slightly more qualified teacher, but at the end of the day I don't think that there are many teenagers who are prepared to work in a factory or call centre for six months, just so they know they've done something worthy. They should, but they don't. The reason they are prepared to get that money together is because they feel that they are getting something out of it too, which is the ability to go to Nepal and experience a new and exciting place.
I also think you're right on with some of the awful attitudes that some of the EFL teachers come up with. I don't, however, think it was racism so much as a complete culture shock and lack of ability to understand that they were living with a different set of values. If you're living in a culture in which the women cover their shoulders and legs (as they do in Nepal - it's a conservative hindu country), then if you wander around wearing shorts and a spaghetti strap top, you're going to get looks. Complaining about the Nepalese men at great length and referring to them as 'sleazy' and 'leacherous' (which I heard a fair bit) isn't fair. They are responding in exactly the same way that a British guy would respond if a girl walked down the street in a bikini!
Having said that, I think your post is a little harsh in places. I do think there are some really decent people who go abroad and teach and do their best. There probably is a selfish side to it, in that a lot of the best EFL teachers I've met, do it to finance their travelling. I don't think it's entirely trading on white privilege - more I see it as using a skill they have (and some are pretty decent teachers. Not many 18 yr olds are, but some of the older and better trained ones) to finanace a desire to see the world, to see different cultures and a different way of life. And I think that actually leaving the very blinkered and spoilt world of western Europe and America and realising that there is an entirely different world out there is a good thing, on the whole.
I also think it's possible that some of the EFL communities may present a skewed view. I found, when I was out there, that there was a real difference between some of the EFL teachers who spent a lot of time with the locals at their schools, made real friends, and generally got on with their lives, and the EFL teachers who basically created their own little ex-pat community and spent (in Nepal) every spare moment in the tourist part of Kathmandu, drinking with their other English friends at the tourist bars.
However, all the race awareness communities are friends only, with moderated membership, and only allow friends only posting, so I find myself rambling here instead.
It must be said, however, while I kinda agreed with a lot of the original post I also found some of the comments stupid. The great comment of 'I think there is a lot of potential for someone to teach abroad in a way that challenges the system of supremacy. It may be a little awkward at first because of the language barrier, but English teachers have a lot of freedom in terms of what they can teach sometimes (depending on the school), so why not teach the students about white privilege itself? I'd say half the questions the students ask are not about grammar but about Western culture itself' was possibly one of the more arrogant and western-centric things I have ever seen.
It's wrong to go and teach English and assume you are superior by virtue of your skin tone, but it's OK to go over there and teach American campus sociological theory to them because you're a Black American? In what way is that not still cultural imperialism? To my mind, the very notion of 'white privilege' isn't something that would be appropriate to teach in a country like Nepal, which is a conservative hindu culture in which caste is a big deal. When I was out there, there was a great deal of racism - there were a lot of comments made about anyone of African descent, who was viewed as definitely being of a lesser status than someone of Asian/Indian descent. English/American were viewed through mixed eyes - on one hand, the west had money and power, and yet we were still seen as sexually promiscuous, brash, and in some ways less cultured than the east. It wasn't my place to challenge those views through argument, or tell them that their religion was wrong, and people weren't defined on some level by caste, for example. It was my place to behave as well as possible and give a positive impression of what an English girl could be like, and god knows I wasn't great with that at times.
And taking all that away, no matter what the culture, it surely isn't right to try and impress your own views of culture on to it. And a modern, American view of what race is, and how racial harmony works, is specifically still the product of your own culture, and it isn't appropriate to be trying to teach children from a different culture all about it, anymore than it would have been reasonable for me to be telling the girls all about modern western feminism, or trying to chat to the other teachers about polyamory, and how it's OK to love more than one person, and that monogamy is just a social construct.
In Europe and America we have our own views on how the world works. There's nothing wrong with that, and there's nothing wrong with having such things available to anyone who wants access to them. There is something wrong with going to a foreign country, where you've been hired to teach English, and trying to push those views onto impressionable kids, who are taught to respect and listen to their teacher, without even acknowledging that that is what you are doing.
Bah. And humbug.
