e-journal

Overcoming Colonial Policies of Divide and Rule:Postcolonialism’s Harnessing of the Vernaculars

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This chapter1 offers a situated account of English and vernacular literacy practices from a postcolonial perspective. Postcolonial scholarship in disciplines such as cultural studies and English literature has alerted us to the extent to which colonial rule partially created and reproduced negative images regarding “natives” so as to be better able to govern. Within applied linguistics, this awareness provides a necessary sociohistorical background against which to understand current grounded realities around language teaching and learning. Colonial policies in South Asian education—especially the policy of Divide and Rule—created schisms between the English medium (EM) and vernacular medium (VM) of education (Phillipson, 1992). This breakdown assumes neocolonial hues and dovetails directly with local societal stratifications (of caste and class) that exacerbate unequal conditions between those who are educated in the two tracks. Situated in ongoing endeavors in a variety of local contexts in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India, where I was raised and schooled, this chapter calls attention to some key educational sites through which these policy-related
inequities are reproduced, and some ways in which individual teachers and institutions assume the responsibility to make conditions more just and equal. The chapter concludes with a discussion of how a postcolonial research framework allows us to understand not only grounded inequities around language policies in terms of historical colonial pasts but also how fellow humans draw on particular rationalizations to harness the veranaculars and work toward moving us all to more equal footings (Canagarajah, 1997).

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Informasi Detail

Judul Seri

Review of Research in Education

No. Panggil

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Penerbit

: AERA., 2014

Deskripsi Fisik

Review of Research in Education March 2014, Vol. 38, pp. 290-311

Bahasa

English

ISBN/ISSN

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Tipe Isi

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Tipe Media

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Tipe Pembawa

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Edisi

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Subjek

EKONOMI

Info Detail Spesifik

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Pernyataan Tanggungjawab

Wati/Agus

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