I came to Australia when I was year 6 back in 2003. Upon my arrival in Australia I was being put into an Australian primary school and immediately I was being oppressed by the physical barrier of not being able to communicate in English because of how little English I have learn before coming to Australia. This was the first thing I felt different back then, when doing work in class I take longer than other people because I had to go through the words one by one with my electronic dictionary and I felt even felt embarrassed when every time I was assisted by a ESL teacher next to me. A question of "Why am I different? Why do I speak differently? and Why do I look Different" was raised constantly in my head even though everyone was nice to me and gave me a lot of assistance in learning. The only time I felt a sense of belonging is when I am with a small group of Chinese who speaks, act and look the way I do. From this it is clear that culture and identity exists in the body we possess and through the world around me I am able to experience the cultural differences and raises questions of my own identity.
During my school career the idea of culture and identity can be experienced through the different learning expectations, and thus strength in certain subjects. For me, being raised in an Asian family, my parents have very high expectation of me when it comes to learning. They always expect me to get high marks in test and I have am always being oppressed by them, having pressure of not wanting to disappoint them and meet their expectations. In my school career I have no choice on what I wanted to do because they had everything planned out for me, e.g becoming a doctor or a lawyer in the future etc. The reason why we look at education differently than other culture is because of the different world different culture is surrounded by. The reason why my parents, and all other Asian parents, are strict and have so high expectations towards their children is because in the Asian countries, such as China, education is very competitive, resulting in how we value and see education differently than people with other culture. Overtime this becomes a custom and forms a identity when comparing with other cultures.
According to the story described by Phillip (2006) about how genital cutting tradition is being abolished when every one stop doing it at the same time, showing the fragile nature of cultural custom. This shows that people only do things according to custom and tradition simply because everyone else is doing it. (Phillips, A. 2006) In my experience in Australia this can be seen very clearly from the different attitude towards education different Asian parents base on the length of time they have been living in Australia. For parents that have been in Australia for a longer period of time usually have different expectation than the ones who just came to Australia due to the fact that they have been affected by the world around them for a period of time and change slowly.
Reference
Phillips, A. (2006) “What is
Culture?” In: Arneil, Barbara and Deveaux, Monique and
Dhamoon, Rita and Eisenberg, Avigail, (eds.) Sexual justice /
cultural justice. London, UK, Routledge pp 15-29
Hi Stephen,
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your story! It made understand more about international students and the emotions within ESL students. As I come from an Asian background I also understand the pressures of parents in education results.
What I found most interesting in your reflection is your place of belonging within a classroom as of being an ESL student. Spencer (1994, p. 557) claims that "the possession of both a common language and a common religious culture powerfully facilitates the development of a distinctive national consciousness", so being a Chinese student who has difficulties in language may have impacted on how you perceived the differences between yourself and the classroom whilst at the same time, you also saw the common similarities between yourself and other students with Asian ethnicity backgrounds.
In response to identity, I think it'll be even more interesting if you mentioned the factors of socialising with other students within the classroom and the identities that come with it. For my previous school, we didn't have many ESL students but we did have a few international students. As they come from Asian countries, they were welcomed into the "Asian group" because of cultural understandings and similar interests. However, because the "Asian group" had a majority of Asian students within the circle, those outside the group would label them as "Asians" or "Fobs". Luckily the group was fond of the identity because they were very proud of their culture and it was a simple pathway for them to be who they are without being pressured by cultural practices from the dominant culture.
For international students, I realise that they are hesitant to answer the teacher when asked a question. Olivo (2003, p. 64) comments that "although students spoke about their talk in the classroom as if it were a problem, this is not to say that they did not engage in illicit talk at all. In fact, ESL students were continuously attempting to evade the constraints that the teacher placed on their talk in the classroom". In respect to your experiences, language and the sense of belonging may have affected lack of voice within a classroom. As you said "[you] felt embarrassed" when assisted by an ESL teacher, which is very understandable. From reading your blog I got the notion that the 'ESL' class has ultimately separated you from your normal class students because it gave you an identity of being an international student who has difficulties with language. Perhaps having difficulties with the English language has made you realise that the western culture has become the dominant culture within Australia, making those from non-western backgrounds feel "different" and "out of place".
I enjoyed your blogpost!
Olivo, W. (2003). " Quit Talking and Learn English!": Conflicting Language Ideologies in an ESL Classroom. Anthropology & education quarterly, 34 (1), pp. 50-71.
Spencer, M. (1994). Multiculturalism,“political correctness,” and the politics of identity. 9 (4), pp. 547-567.