Post #7

            The sections from the Holliday textbook were all about the media and the role it has in creating and confirming stereotypes and cultural misunderstandings. The first section talked about the issues that can arise when you have refugees in your class. I never thought about this possibility before now. Reza, a refugee from Afghanistan, appeared to be “unable to deal with the requirements of western society” according to his teacher. He refused to talk about his culture and seemed to resent females who were in positions of power, such as his teacher and the nurse. A year later, the teacher ran into him again and she noticed he was different. Reza explained how his anger during her class was due to many factors, especially being in a new country when is all he wanted to do was go back home. The teacher kept mentioning things that she thought explained his behavior, like the idea that most women in Afghanistan aren’t teachers and also the idea that there aren’t any decent hospitals in Afghanistan. These ideas are mainly because of what is portrayed on the media, which is another way that cultural misunderstandings can come about. Afghanistan is a good example since is all we see on TV about the country has to do with the war zones. Before reading this section, I didn’t even think about the media playing a hand in creating and confirming cultural stereotypes.

            In another section in Holliday, the media is also discussed. Chomsky states that “the news media provides us with is very narrow, very tightly contained, and grotesquely inaccurate account of the world in which we live” (195). I find this quote to be very contradicting but extremely true. I find it contradicting because the news is supposed to be accurate since it is our only means of knowing what is going on in the world. Also, the news is shown in such a confident way that it makes it look like they know exactly what they’re talking about, which we don’t know what else to believe so we just go off of what we hear from them. This same section also discusses the “New Racism” that has formed. This New Racism represents the idea that instead of minorities being “biologically inferior,” they are labeled as being different. The forms of this New Racism are discursive, which means that they are “expressed, enacted, and confirmed by text and talk.” This means that this New Racism has spread through the conversations that everyday people have. Something else that I thought was interesting in this section is the table that shows the frequency of cartooning characteristics.

            The article by Taylor-Mendes is about a study on how the images in textbooks which represent English culture, have an effect on teachers’ and students’ impressions of the culture of the foreign language they are learning. According to the article, this is a topic that there has been very little research on. The images in textbooks “define who is included or excluded from an advantaged societal position based, at least in part, on race.” I find it interesting that the author asked the EFL students who they picture as being the “ideal subject” of an English speaker and what characteristics this person has. This makes me wonder what speakers of other languages picture when they think of a native English speaker. Do they picture an American? Someone who is British, or maybe Australian? The English textbooks ask this question of the EFL students over and over again, through the images that are put on the pages. A concern is that these images reinforce certain racial biases. The article states that all of the 15 participants are among the wealthiest 20% of the population. This is because in Brazil, the opportunity to learn English for business or travel is only given to those who are privileged. I think that it is sad that not everyone can chose to learn English even if they really want to, especially since it is such a widely spoken language.