Abstract
Engaging in critical dialogues in language classrooms that draw on critical pedagogical perspectives can be challenging for learners because of gaps in communicative resources in their L1 and L2. Since critically oriented classrooms involve discussing social issues, students are expected to deploy “literate talk” to engage in critiquing society and a wide range of texts. Although recent studies have explored teachers’ and students’ engagement with critical materials and critical dialogues, research that explores language development in critical language teaching remains a concern for language teachers. In this paper, I share my experience of fostering language development, specifically the overt teaching of critical vocabulary to students of (Tagalog-based) Filipino language at a university in Hawai’i. Through a discussion of racist stereotypes targeting Filipinos and the impacts of these discourses on students’ lived experiences, the notion of “critical vocabulary” emerges as an important tool for students to articulate the presence of and to dismantle oppressive structures of power, including everyday discourses supporting the status quo. This paper defines critical vocabulary and advances its theoretical and practical contribution to critical language teaching. It also includes students’ perspectives of their language development and ends with pedagogical implications for heritage/world language teachers around the world.
Highlights
One of the facets of critical language pedagogy (CLP) is the active engagement of the students in critical dialogue among themselves, and between the teacher and the students
My past experiences with dialogic pedagogy addressing critical topics helped me realize that my students needed more time to be able to (1) learn new more advanced items and critical vocabulary to articulate in Filipino their understanding of the code presented and (2) express their understanding of how power relations strongly link to social issues discussed in class
My experiences of teaching Filipino as a heritage language and doing research in this context have informed me that the majority of our students need to build their vocabulary, among other things, to be more confident in demonstrating their productive skills
Summary
One of the facets of critical language pedagogy (CLP) is the active engagement of the students in critical dialogue among themselves, and between the teacher and the students. Shin and Crookes found that when the curricular contents and the classroom environment provide safe spaces for dialogic thinking and criticality, students engage in critical dialogue They reported that contrary to common essentialist perspectives, which have stereotyped East Asian students as passive, given the right environment, their Korean adolescent participants actively engaged in the dialogic process dealing with critical issues. This suggests that given the right mindset and theoretical background, teachers might be able to successfully implement and should not be afraid to explore critical pedagogy in their own teaching practices in spite of the perceived contextual constraints (see [10,11]). As pointed out earlier, CLP studies in the HL contexts have come mostly from US-based Spanish language scholars only, and additional studies, like this one, are needed to promote critically oriented teaching practices and research in less commonly taught languages (LOTE) in the US
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