Contributor: David Simanjuntak, Branch Manager of LBPP LIA Pramuka
The 43rd RELC Seminar held on 21 – 23 April 2008 brought up the issue of Language Teaching in a Multilingual World: Challenges and Opportunities. Twelve invited speakers and ninety-one presenters from various countries, including two from Indonesia, participated in this annual event. The seminar itself was officially opened by the Malaysian Minister of Education who acted as the president of SEAMEO Council.
World Englishes became one of the highlighted topics. Andy Kirkpatrick, one of the authorities in World Englishes mentioned in his session, “… that the majority of English speakers in today’s world are multilingual speakers who have learned English as a second or later language…Native speakers of English now represent only a small minority of English speakers.” Thus, new, non-native varieties of the language with distinctive properties at the levels of lexis, pronunciation and even structure have evolved. Nevertheless, whether these forms can be accepted is still debatable. During the plenary session, those taking the conservative positions argued that only Standard British English is acceptable as a norm while others questioned the relevance of an ideology on a standard language in today’s world. The latter group even showed their concern about controversy over the labeling of native speakers as more effective teachers than non-natives.
Another interesting issue raised was the socio-cultural aspect of English in the context of globalization and its implications to ELT practices. Adrian Holliday (UK) invited participants to look critically at the way in which cultural differences have been perceived in ELT in a multi-lingual and cosmopolitan world and how prejudices are often found in defining the behavior of other cultures. Alastair Pennycook (Aus) on another occasion talked about changing ways of thinking about language, native speaker, culture and translingual language use. These will bring a range of new concerns and possibilities now confronting English language teachers.
In general, the 43th RELC Seminar ran well and the theme was able to arouse enthusiasm of both presenters and participants. Let’s wait for the next one in 2009. See you in Singapore!