The Struggle Towards a Democratic Nation Education Position Paper The Struggle Towards a Democratic Nation Imperialism of one sort or another has been occurring for centuries around the world. In the U.S. a specific form of imperialism is in full effect but is less noticeable than the normative physical imperialism. Linguistic imperialism occurs when a dominant group imposes their language on another, and within the United States this imperialism has been occurring through English. English is the language set up by the American society to be the dominant official language. America is supposed to be the melting pot of different languages and cultures but there is a specific connection between English speakers and dominance over non-English speakers. From this relationship a hierarchy develops in which those who are the representative English speaker in America (Caucasian), are more privileged and more recognized in society than non-English speakers normally of color. Bilingual Education brings this topic to light because it is a governmental supported idea that basically forces non-English speakers to learn English. As children grow out of bilingual education they seem to have two choices; move away from their own culture and assimilate, or retain their culture but don‘t be recognized by society. Of course these choices aren’t always so clear-cut and often the results are varied, but a conflict remains. This topic is explored in Americo Parede’s novel George Washington Gomez, when the question is raised, is it possible for a non-white non-English speaking person to become educated in America without losing their ethnic identity. The main character in this book Gualinto explores what it means to be Mexican-American and what that term means to him after being educated. Also my own experiences of the effects of linguistic imperialism and bilingual education in the California school system have lent to this paper. Ultimately all this information asks the question: Does the dominant white power structure and bilingual education in the U.S. allow non-English speakers, normally of color, to retain their cultural identity? The migration of the English to America and the eventual formation of the colonies led to the construction of whiteness as an ideology of privilege and dominance. Literature from this period shows how whiteness became the represen... ... middle of paper ... ...tural identity. The English language and linguistic imperialism attribute to this situation. While bilingual education is a way to assimilate non-English speakers into American culture, English and its place in the white dominant society, creates a possibility of forgetting ones culture or even self hatred. Like Gualinto many students find that the only real way to become upwardly mobile is to completely forget their heritage and become utterly American even if that means becoming “whitewashed”. Educators and enlightened minds alike will need to observe data and strive diligently toward a nation not dominated by white elitists but by open-minded educated people intent on the basic tenement of U.S. Democracy: Equality. Bibliography: Works Cited Babb, Valerie. Whiteness Visible. New York: New York University Press, 1998 7 April 2002 Mclaren, Peter, and Carlos J. Ovando. The Politics of Multiculturalism and Bilingual Education. Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2000. Paredes, Americo. George Washington Gomez. Houston: Arte Publico, 1990. United States. Dept. of Justice. Immigration and Naturalization Service. Law Enforcement and Border Management. 1999. 1 April 2002.
Ruth Frankenberg’s essay “Mirage Of An Unmarked Whiteness” begins as “ . . .an examination of how, when, and why whiteness has disappeared from the racial radar screen, with whites exempt (from the views of some people) from the definition as a racial category” (86). Frankenberg dissects the generalized assumptions of whiteness and its relationship with race by analyzing the malleable structures of whiteness and racialization throughout history.Frankenberg compares the power whiteness and race through historical contexts. The claim that whiteness is invisible is false. Rather, whiteness is a changing idea that is applied to specific colonial projects to the oppressor’s advantage. Race and whiteness were both created by the historical contexts
Bilingualism should be celebrated and encouraged, rather than stamped out. Anzaldúa recalls that a teacher told her, “If you want to be American, speak ‘American.’ If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong” (2947). The irony in her teacher’s statement is that Mexicans and Native Americans inhabited North America long before it was colonized; so, technically speaking, Anzaldúa belonged in America more than her teacher did.
Reginald Horsman’s Race and Manifest Destiny: The Orgins of American Racial Anglo-Saxonism explores the evidence and reasons of racial prejudices in America and discusses one of the most controversial topics in American history. The book also navigates the subjects of white superiority, and the creation of Anglo-Saxonism.
...r Conan Doyle loathed writing Sherlock Holmes. He would write the wrong name for major reoccurring characters and not care if the reasoning in his stories was completely illogical, yet he ironically created his own genre of mystery novels that are recognized even to those who have never read them. Doyle unwillingly created the most insane fanbase that is still alive and thriving today. Doyle’s stories are still popular even eighty-four years after his death because they keep readers enthralled with the story. He wrote war stories based on his own exciting experiences, stories that he believed brought him to the height of his writing capabilities, and stories that sent him crashing back down when a frenzy into Spiritualism crumbled his prestige as a writer. His stories manage to capture the reader’s attention, making them timeless classics in the world of literature.
Balderrama represents a caring teacher that found herself not understanding the difference between English and Spanish because she grew in California. This allowed her to effect pedagogical accommodations to the Latinos ass a teacher. However, she agrees that xenophobia is rife and hard to be eliminated within the society. The minority and new migrants within the society face numerous challenges ranging from culture shock to acclimatizing to the new environment and bilingualism and biliteracy would enhance their learning experiences. According to Colin Baker bilingualism and biliteracy indeed influences critical thinking, rationality, and sensitivity to other cultures, empathy, and detached or balanced awareness. Therefore, the importance of teachers is promoting biliteracy and bilingualism cannot be understated because it is the backbone of effective learning through integrating a minority group into the majority group. The majority need to learn the language to enhance their understanding that is the importance towards achieving critical thinking, rationality, and sensitivity to other cultures, empathy, and detached or balanced awareness. Additionally, realizing that bilingualism cannot be detached from any community that freely promotes and accommodates the language spoken by the other community helps in promoting biliteracy. Therefore, the
Prejudice was present, before slavery came about, when Englishmen first encountered Africans, the differences between the two, combined with the English push to turn the world English. “As England had absorbed people of every nationality over the centuries and turned them into Englishmen, including Negroes, and seemed to be successfully moulding a New World community on the English model (Morgan, 2).”
In the 20th century, the melting pot is not working, and the whole idea is under attack (Evans 76). The United States has changed from a melting pot to a vast culture with varying backgrounds. In years before, America was a collection of Chinese, Germans, Italians, Scots, Croats, etc., all craving freedom. Today, even the simple concept of an English-speaking nation is fading off the continent. In the old days, immigrants were taught in English in the public schools. (76). In America today, children are taught in German, Italian, Polish, and 108 other languages. Most of these schools are funded by 139 million federal dollars.
She describes it as “subtractive schooling,” a process in which students are left vulnerable to academic failure due to structural forces that impose on their ethnic identities and cultural backgrounds. The author explains that immigrants go through a dis-identification process, which seeks to Americanize them inadvertently forces minority status upon them. The division comes when their own ethnic identity of what it means to be Mexican to them is compromised. A prime example of this the use of linguistics and cultural practices. In the subtractive schooling process, all things Mexican or tied to the students’ identity is purposely diluted as is the use of the Spanish language. The concept of Mexicanidad becomes blurry as many Mexican/Mexican-American’s consider speaking Spanish as synonymous to what being Mexican is. In the subtractive schooling process, students are expected to know and speak English fluency, on the other hand in order to be considered truly Mexican they must also speak Spanish fluently. Many 2nd generational immigrants don’t fair as well as 1st generation because of the lack of bilingualism and biculturalism, skills that make the 1st generation more successful than the
James Fallows, a proponents of having bilingualism in the U.S. Fallows claim that there is no need to declare English as the official language in the U.S. “because it already is that” (263). Fallows argues that English is already the most powerful language in this world, and obviously the immigrants knew that fact. Therefore, bilingual services will not reduce the incentive of immigrants to learn English. However, his argument is not fully correct. From 2000 to 2010, over 9 million immigrants came to America (Camarota). Because of this huge population of immigrants, most of the immigrants merely formed communities within their own ethnic or linguistic groups. In their communities, they can live well by speaking their native languages. Furthermore, when they are facing public problems, they have...
Whiteness is a term that has been discussed throughout history and by scholarly authors. Whiteness is defined in many ways, according to Kress “pervasive non- presence, its invisibility. Whiteness seems at times to be everywhere and nowhere, even present throughout U.S. history, and yet has no definable history of its own. Whiteness as a historically rooted cultural practice is then enacted on the unconscious level. Knowledge the is created from the vantage point of Whiteness thus transforms into “common sense,” while practices or behaviors that are enacted based on the unspoken norms of Whiteness become the only acceptable way of being” (Kress, 2008, pg 43).
For more than 300 years, immigrants from every corner of the globe have settled in America, creating the most diverse and heterogeneous nation on Earth. Though immigrants have given much to the country, their process of changing from their homeland to the new land has never been easy. To immigrate does not only mean to come and live in a country after leaving your own country, but it also means to deal with many new and unfamiliar situations, social backgrounds, cultures, and mainly with the acquisition and master of a new language. This often causes mixed emotions, frustration, awkward feelings, and other conflicts. In Richard Rodriguez’s essay “Aria: Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, the author describes the social, cultural and linguistic difficulties encountered in America as he attempts to assimilate to the American culture. Richard Rodriguez by committing himself to speaking English, he lost his cultural ties, family background and ethnic heritage.
While reading this article one of the most shocking sections were when the students were talking to Monzó and sharing their outlook on their place and their language’s place in society. These students even at this early age are feeling how devalued their first language has been. They feel like they have to speak the right* English, only use English in public places, never their first language, and that they must assimilate to the American culture as much as possible. This reminded me of a chapter in Lippi-Green (2012)’s text. Within this chapter Lippi-Green (2012) discusses how in the United States Spanish speakers are not only expected to learn English but they are expected to learn and utilize the right* English determined by the majority and assimilate entirely to American culture. Throughout Monzó and Rueda (2009)’s text the children in conversations expressed their observation of the social order in relation to language and race. This was surprising to me since they are only in 5th grade. During a conversation with one of the children Monzó and Rueda (2009) recorded an alarming statement, “He said that his mother could not be considered American because she did not...
From my experience, bilingual education was a disadvantage during my childhood. At the age of twelve, I was introduced into a bilingual classroom for the first time. The crowded classroom was a combination of seventh and eighth grade Spanish-speaking students, who ranged from the ages of twelve to fifteen. The idea of bilingual education was to help students who weren’t fluent in the English language. The main focus of bilingual education was to teach English and, at the same time, teach a very basic knowledge of the core curriculum subjects: Mathematics, Social Sciences, and Natural Sciences. Unfortunately, bilingual education had academic, psychological, and social disadvantages for me.
Electric currents produce magnetic fields, they can be as small as macroscopic currents in wires, or microscopic currents in atomic orbits caused by electrons. The magnetic field B is described in terms of force on a moving charge in the Lorentz force law. The relationship of magnetic field and charges leads to many practical applications. Magnetic field sources are dipolar in nature, with a north and south magnetic pole. The magnetic field SI unit is the Tesla, it can be seen in the magnetic part of the Lorentz force law F magnetic = qvB composed of (Newton x second)/(Coulomb x meter). The smaller magnetic field unit is the
America, a country built on immigration dating back to the early 1600s Mayflower voyage, continues to thrive as a melting pot full of various cultures and ethnics. In the past, many immigrants came to America due to the offered freedoms and equality, yet today, many naturalized citizens suffer with injustices, including with educational practices. The use of bilingual education, which is teaching students in both English and their native language, has become a controversial topic. In 1968, the Bilingual Education Act, which recognized and offered education to students who were lacking English, was passed, yet the topic still seems questionable to some. Bilingual education provides a variety of beneficial attributes to equally help foreigners