Language and Culture
Enticing Literary Landscapes: Motivating Heritage Speakers of Foreign Languages to Read in the Target Heritage View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Rosalie Barrera
Language studies regarding best practices for teaching heritage learners of foreign languages compel the professors of these courses to use the top-down approach, incorporating much reading and writing into the course plan. One of our challenges is that our current student population prefers courses that are not strictly based on the traditional literary canon. In this paper I provide a brief overview of the top-down approach and why it is a beneficial framework for heritage learners. I then share several ideas to provide students with opportunities to engage in meaningful ways with traditional literature as well as non-traditional forms of text.
A Critical Policy Analysis of Equity and Inclusive Education Strategy in Canada: The Dynamic of Non-performativity View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Goli Rezai-Rashti
This paper provides an analysis of the 72 equity and inclusive education policies that were drafted by eight school boards across southwestern Ontario in response to the Ministry of Education’s mandate. Drawing on the theoretical work of Sara Ahmed (2012), our analysis of the policy documents suggests that these policies function to protect the institution and its image rather than seeking to challenge social and educational inequities. Our findings demonstrate that these documents fail to construct localized policies that include procedures, enactment strategies, and evaluation methods that respond to existing challenges within each local context, and ultimately function as “non-performative” that fail to address enduring systemic inequities in the Ontario education system. This paper contributes to the field of critical policy studies that seeks to uncover and make visible the structural processes that reproduce subordination and marginalization in education. The paper contributes to a growing body of literature that seeks to problematize the reproduction of systemic barriers in the context of Canadian education, where discourses of liberal multiculturalism have long replaced the need to acknowledge systemic racism and other inequities. As the inclusion of equity policies across Ontario’s school boards are meant to demonstrate a concern for social and educational equity and an effort to make remedial changes, the findings of this study problematizes such efforts, which has implications for the realization of equity in Ontario schools.
On-Screen Literature: Teaching Literary Works through Cinema in the Foreign Language Classroom
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Mary Alison Chanslor Cransac
This paper demonstrates the intellectual imperative of studying the Humanities by sharing strategies for teaching literacy and cultural competency in the foreign language classroom. This demonstration explains ways to empower students to learn inclusivity and growth inside the classroom and apply it to their daily lives. To do this, I explore three French films in which canonical texts play a primary role. First, I introduce Alceste à bicyclette (2013) as an example of Molière and the importance of rhythm, intonation, and pronunciation in French language, as well as introducing students to socio-cultural norms. Second, I discuss another work from the XVIIe with the documentary Nous, Princesses de Clèves (2011), where students gain an understanding of the pressures involved in Baccalaureate preparation and challenges faced by multi-cultural communities. The third film, La tête en friche (2010), is a paradigm of how literacy enriches individuals’ lives and their connections to the community. Finally, I conclude by showing how the films presented provide multiple opportunities for secondary and post-secondary courses to deepen students’ knowledge of French literature, phonetics, and cultural references through a multi-faceted analysis of different scholastics regimes. The intention is to help students inside and outside the classroom by teaching the importance of cultural context, inclusivity, and interconnectivity.
