Literacy, Literature and Identity; Multiple Perspectives

reviewed by Neil McBeath, Oman

Literacy, Literature and Identity; Multiple Perspectives
Adrian Roscoe and Rahma Al Mahrooqi (eds) 2012
Newcastle upon Tyne Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
ISBN 978-1-4438-4068-2
pp. 239

In March 2012 I gave a paper at the 18th TESOL Arabia Conference in Dubai. On one of the two evenings that I was there, I left my Indian-run hotel to dine at an Italian Restaurant. The waiter who served me was a Chinese-Indian with a Kenyan passport. The chef was from Indonesia. The cashier was Pakistani.

I relate this to give substance to Bauman’s (2012; 28) claim that today we are all living in a “mosaic of diasporas”, and against that background, the concept of identity – who we really are – becomes significant at both the personal and public level.

This book is itself an example. Adrian Roscoe is a New Zealander working in Oman. Rahma al Mahrooqi is an Omani woman who studied in America, and together they have combined to edit a collection of eleven papers, many of which are quite outstanding.

Christopher Denman’s “Cultural Divides between Arab-Muslim Students and Western Literature; Implication for the English Language Classroom” (Pp. 1-20) paints with a broad brush and includes some material which is of questionable value. Citing instances from Conrad’s Lord Jim to support the contention that Western writers frequently stereotype Muslims as passive is hardly a tenable theory in the 21st Century, particularly in the light of the Arab Spring. It is also noticeable that the literature Denman cites to support the suggestion that the divide between Muslim-Arab students and Western (please define) literature “are just too wide to bridge” (P. 14) are Lazar (1993) and Taglieber, Johnson and Yarbrough (1988). Both these studies antedate the rise of the internet, Youtube and social networking sites which have forced all students, everywhere, to determine for themselves what is acceptable, and what is not.

Denman’s paper, however, segues neatly into Al Mahrooqi’s “Culture and Identity in Student Response to Literature (Pp. 21-50). This makes the fairly common-sense point that female Omani students who have only been fed the restrictive diet of secondary schooling are likely to interpret literature through the lens of their own culture. Interestingly, Mahrooqi does not refer to Heble’s (2006) exposure of the possibility of student misreadings, but she cautions against what Kubota (1999; 28) describes as “the acculturation model /which/ stresses the explicit teaching of the conventions of dominant academic communities over expressions of authentic voice of ESL students.”

Two other outstanding papers are Roscoe’s “Identity Reflection in Maori Literature” (Pp. 125-135) in which he argues that the latter part of the 20th century saw a Maori Renaissance, marked by a far stronger sense of Maori identity, pride in that identity, and an upsurge in writing by and about Maoris.

By contrast, Tlhalo Sam Radithalo’s “’Pieces of my Life’; Aspects of South African Self-Writing in the 20th Century” (Pp. 152-192) explores the work of William Plomer, Roy Campbell, Peter Abrahams, Es’kie Mphahele, Bloke Modiane and Trevor Huddlestone, and the eternal problem of “knowing one’s place” (P. 187) in a society where skin tone counted for more than anything else. Apartheid let Bloke Modiane die in exile, because a black man with a Masters Degree in Literature literally had no “place”; like the mixed race, coloured-Jewish Peter Abrahams, he was estranged from a society based on the narrowest concept of identity.

Against this, Huddlestone’s (1956/1985; 16) statement “I believe that, because God became Man, therefore human nature in itself has a dignity and a value which is infinite. I believe that this conception necessarily carries with it the idea that the State exists for the individual, not the individual for the State. Any doctrine based on racial or colour prejudice and enforced by the State is therefore an affront to human dignity and ‘ipso facto’ an insult to God himself” (P. 182) becomes an even more eloquent testament.

References

Bauman, Z. (2012) Reconstructing Europe. RSA Journal Autumn 2012. 24-29

Heble, A. (2006). Cultural Interaction in the Classroom in the 21st Century. IATEFL Voices 190. 5-6.

Huddleston, T. (1956/1985) Naught for Your Comfort. Glasgow. Fount.

Kuboto, R. (1999.) Japanese Culture Constructed by Discourses; Implications for Aplied Linguistics Research and ELT. TESOL Quarterly 33 (1). 9-35.

Lazar, G. (1993). Literature and Language Teaching. Cambridge. Cambridge University Press.

Taglieber, L.K.; Johnson, L.L. & Yarbrough, D.B. (1988) Effects of pre-reading activities on EFL reading by Brazilian college students. TESOL Quarterly 22(3) 455-472.

Please check the British Life, Language and Culture course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Literature course at Pilgrims website.