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Linguistic Perspectives on Sexuality in EducationIntroduction: Language and Sexuality Studies Are Crucial for Inclusive Education

Linguistic Perspectives on Sexuality in Education: Introduction: Language and Sexuality Studies... [Back in 2018 I witnessed an instance of verbal behaviour which—I believe—would be categorised as hate speech, for instance, in the UK, yet regrettably remains unpenalised in the Polish legal system. A social media group intended for teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL) in Poland, I used to be a member of, featured a post asserting that non-heteronormative students should not be treated on a par with the heterosexual majority. It contained denigrating and devaluating claims about such students. What is more bewildering and saddening, it was authored by a teacher. Would you expect an instant reprimand on the part of the group community defending the rights of such student minority? I certainly did. For this reason, I was rather taken aback to read only a few moderately critical comments that were followed with somewhat vehement replies by the author becoming even more verbally aggressive. My reaction was instinctive: to label the behaviour appropriately, refute the ludicrous argumentation and direct the fellow group members to relevant research literature. If I recall correctly, I was supported by merely one more member and at the same time chastised by the group admin for “name calling”, that is, using the word homophobe. In an ensuing private conversation with a group administrator, I was advised of the fact that the group was not intended for “social polemics” as it was conceived of as a platform fostering discussions on language teaching only, as if language could be taught in a social vacuum. Deeming it pertinent to the case in point, I indefatigably pursued this subject by creating a new post informing fellow teachers of the insidiously perilous dangers of maintaining uncritical attitude towards using homophobic language in educational settings, including acts of suicide, and cross-referenced a report on gender and sexuality in the Polish EFL I co-authored (Pakuła et al. 2015). This was met with a preventive measure, according to the admin, of deleting it in order to avoid an “ideological war” on the forum as this was “a space for people of divergent worldviews”. I can only recall my feeling of disillusionment and disappointment. In the report I mention, one of the interviewees who had been an EFL textbook reviewer for a number of years christened EFL practitioners members of a vanguard group due to their insightful knowledge not only of the language per se but also of the broader socio-cultural context. This, however, at least in this case, can be only cast away as mere wishful-thinking. A vision of an inclusively oriented teacher need not be utopian, though. However, in order to arrive at this, a certain set of criteria need to be fulfilled. First and foremost, the vital role of teacher training programmes needs to be widely acknowledged (Bellini 2012, Paiz this volume). They ought to incorporate explicit content related to LGBT+ students and their rights in order to equip educational practitioners with required conceptual and practical tools to interrupt heteronormativity for the benefit of vulnerable minorities (Kearns et al. 2014; Tompkins et al. 2017). Unremarkably, Gorski et al. (2013) found that in the USA this basic precondition is somewhat neglected in Multicultural Teacher Education. Once in service, awareness should be complemented with institutional support (Bartholomaeus et al. 2017) and access to relevant and up-to-date resources which can be used on both an in-class and out-of-class basis, for instance by ensuring that library resources and library staff are fully committed to catering for all segments of student populations (Gartley 2015). Implementation of practical social justice-driven actions should be strategically adjusted to and take into account the local context in which teachers serve, that is, whether they teach in the city or the countryside, a factor that has been found to correlate with the levels of religiousness of a given educational venue (Page 2017; Peter et al. 2018). Some argue that local legal-cum-cultural restrictions can be bypassed by adopting a “global human rights approach to LGBTIs in teacher education [which] can be flexibly transferred across a range of contexts” (Jones 2019, p. 305).] http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png

Linguistic Perspectives on Sexuality in EducationIntroduction: Language and Sexuality Studies Are Crucial for Inclusive Education

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Publisher
Springer International Publishing
Copyright
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2021
ISBN
978-3-030-64029-3
Pages
1 –25
DOI
10.1007/978-3-030-64030-9_1
Publisher site
See Chapter on Publisher Site

Abstract

[Back in 2018 I witnessed an instance of verbal behaviour which—I believe—would be categorised as hate speech, for instance, in the UK, yet regrettably remains unpenalised in the Polish legal system. A social media group intended for teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL) in Poland, I used to be a member of, featured a post asserting that non-heteronormative students should not be treated on a par with the heterosexual majority. It contained denigrating and devaluating claims about such students. What is more bewildering and saddening, it was authored by a teacher. Would you expect an instant reprimand on the part of the group community defending the rights of such student minority? I certainly did. For this reason, I was rather taken aback to read only a few moderately critical comments that were followed with somewhat vehement replies by the author becoming even more verbally aggressive. My reaction was instinctive: to label the behaviour appropriately, refute the ludicrous argumentation and direct the fellow group members to relevant research literature. If I recall correctly, I was supported by merely one more member and at the same time chastised by the group admin for “name calling”, that is, using the word homophobe. In an ensuing private conversation with a group administrator, I was advised of the fact that the group was not intended for “social polemics” as it was conceived of as a platform fostering discussions on language teaching only, as if language could be taught in a social vacuum. Deeming it pertinent to the case in point, I indefatigably pursued this subject by creating a new post informing fellow teachers of the insidiously perilous dangers of maintaining uncritical attitude towards using homophobic language in educational settings, including acts of suicide, and cross-referenced a report on gender and sexuality in the Polish EFL I co-authored (Pakuła et al. 2015). This was met with a preventive measure, according to the admin, of deleting it in order to avoid an “ideological war” on the forum as this was “a space for people of divergent worldviews”. I can only recall my feeling of disillusionment and disappointment. In the report I mention, one of the interviewees who had been an EFL textbook reviewer for a number of years christened EFL practitioners members of a vanguard group due to their insightful knowledge not only of the language per se but also of the broader socio-cultural context. This, however, at least in this case, can be only cast away as mere wishful-thinking. A vision of an inclusively oriented teacher need not be utopian, though. However, in order to arrive at this, a certain set of criteria need to be fulfilled. First and foremost, the vital role of teacher training programmes needs to be widely acknowledged (Bellini 2012, Paiz this volume). They ought to incorporate explicit content related to LGBT+ students and their rights in order to equip educational practitioners with required conceptual and practical tools to interrupt heteronormativity for the benefit of vulnerable minorities (Kearns et al. 2014; Tompkins et al. 2017). Unremarkably, Gorski et al. (2013) found that in the USA this basic precondition is somewhat neglected in Multicultural Teacher Education. Once in service, awareness should be complemented with institutional support (Bartholomaeus et al. 2017) and access to relevant and up-to-date resources which can be used on both an in-class and out-of-class basis, for instance by ensuring that library resources and library staff are fully committed to catering for all segments of student populations (Gartley 2015). Implementation of practical social justice-driven actions should be strategically adjusted to and take into account the local context in which teachers serve, that is, whether they teach in the city or the countryside, a factor that has been found to correlate with the levels of religiousness of a given educational venue (Page 2017; Peter et al. 2018). Some argue that local legal-cum-cultural restrictions can be bypassed by adopting a “global human rights approach to LGBTIs in teacher education [which] can be flexibly transferred across a range of contexts” (Jones 2019, p. 305).]

Published: Mar 24, 2021

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