Blog post 8

First article that I read was Becoming Black:  Rap and Hip-Hop, Race, Gender, Identity, and the Politics of ESL Learning by Ibrahim. This article is about how some African students in French become black, want to speak black language, learn how to dress, hairstyles. This article was very interesting. Many African students learn English very fast by the television, and friends. When the one of the students said people judge her as student when she cannot speak English. That is true. It was very interesting how people judge someone just because they cannot speak English in America. When I went to take a citizenship, I was waiting to take the test. While I was waiting, this man did something wrong because he didn’t understand English very well. The security guy stopped the man and called him, “Dumb-ass.” I was very upset at this security guy. I wanted to say something but my mom stopped me. I went up to him and apologized about the things that ignorant security guy said. I sat down next to him and talked with him. This man who couldn’t speak English, he was a doctor in Iran and he wanted to get a citizenship because he wanted to learn English and wanted to be lawyer. This man is very smart guy, and just because he couldn’t speak English very well, people automatically judge him as not well educated. It was very interesting to see African students learn Black English. What is proper way to speak English? Isn’t Black English is part of dialect, like how people speak in Texas? I don’t know who can judge to speak what is proper language.

Second article by Kubota is about how the idea of race can shape social, cultural and political dimension of language teaching and learning. While I was reading this article, it made me think how powerful racism is. When is it okay to talk about races? This article made m realize that it was very important to talk about race.

Third article by Rich and Troudy is about a small scale study of five male Muslim Saudi Arab learners in TEOL graduate programmed at a university in the United Kingdom. Some students felt uncomfortable to answer some questions that are true about Arab. I understand how they feel. They understand why Arab people marry four wives in closed society because it is their culture. They just know. My friend called her brother Kuya which means older brother in Tagalong. However, she stopped calling him that name because she was sick of answering to people who asking the meaning. Those Arab students feel like the outsider because people look at them as outsider. I understand that we are individually different, but why can’t we accept each other? I sometimes get so frustrated because people judge me based on my skin color. It would be the same with Arab students. When I was working at Wood Field Mall during the spring break, this woman came up to me and asked me directions very slowly, thinking that I cannot understand her. I answered her, and I was upset that she automatically thinks that I cannot speak English very well. It would be the same for many of my other friends. As a future teacher, it is important to teach racism and understand the students.