Análisis Conductual Aplicado

It is useful to conclude this chapter with several remarks about how the views, behaviours and values of learners in the participant schools revealed particular patterns or narratives of socially cohesive attitudes reflective of schooling culture and context, learner identities and knowledges, and how they located themselves as South Africans. These narratives draw together the themes of linguistic identity and social cohesion by showing how these contributed to and reflected the factors identified above.

Definitions of social cohesion are multiple and varied, ranging from behaviourist and attitudinal approaches to those advocating substantive social justice as the foundation of creating a lasting social compact (Portes & Vickstrom, 2011; Barolsky, 2013; Sayed et al, 2015). Public schools are important sites of transmitting values of social cohesion because the majority of the country’s children are educated and socialised through them. This study has shown how linguistic and social identities are influenced by language education in three different public schools, with resulting effects on how learners develop confidence, find their voices, and afford value to the languages they speak (and thus the spaces they can access). Each case study school seemed to operate on the basis of a particular narrative of social cohesion,

derived from a negotiation of the multiple layers of complexity that characterise the school as a social space.

Figure 8

The graphic above illustrates how the school is at the intersection of multiple facets of social life that negotiate, exchange and develop meaning around belonging on a daily basis. It captures the complexity of the teacher’s task in mediating the exchanges between each layer in order to facilitate learning. South Africa’s social context affects and acts on these layers because every level of social space has both a historical and contemporary identity that is particularly racialised, classed, and geographically located (alongside further boundaries of gender, religion, culture and language). This deep segregation affected the narratives of social cohesion that schools could produce and inscribe.

The influence of the relationship between individual contexts, school culture and wider society on learning was an unexpected finding of the study that provided new insights into the nature of this complexity. Further research is needed on how a school culture is negotiated and how this negotiation infuses learning with meanings and approaches to social cohesion, but it is still useful to reflect on how this operated in the participant schools. These impressions were not based on the quality of teaching or on learners being particularly well behaved, but rather on the

'THE NATION' PUBLIC LIFE SCHOOL MEMBERS' LOCAL COMMUNITIES SCHOOL CLASSROOM SPACE iNDIVIDUA LS AND THEIR CONTEXTS

environment and relationships that were facilitated in the classroom and how these reflected broader ideas of what constituted a positive social compact. Several theorists suggest definitions of ‘narrative’ as the accounts of agents located within processes of change or development (Bruner, 1991; Sewell Jr., 1992; Steinmetz, 1992). Narratives are located within relationships to time and space that invest them with particular meanings (Bruner, 1991). These meanings are constantly negotiated, affirmed or challenged by the agents who encounter them in the process of change. Further, the reality that meanings are contextually produced and negotiated means that narratives are invested with normative conceptions of the world (Bruner, 1991; Steinmetz, 1992). Arguably, the participants in this research developed narratives of social cohesion through ongoing engagement with their own experiences, the school culture and context, and its location within broader social dynamics. This echoes Bruner’s (1991) assertion that the accrual of individual narratives and experiences contributes to the development of collective narratives, histories and cultures.

Ms Fisher’s classroom typified what could be classed as a ‘deep’ narrative of social cohesion. Clear rules of engagement, based on mutual respect and kindness, were evident in the observations; learners were supportive of each other and supported by the teacher. Because of the school’s struggle history and legacy, learners were also inculcated into a particular political tradition and ethos alongside strong values of discipline and academic achievement. The implication of this political history is important: the school’s history implicitly validated the humanity and agency of black South Africans through its role in the struggle, meaning that learners entered a context that resisted apartheid narratives of their inferiority and believed in their ability to be excellent. While at the social level there were some divisions along lines of race, country of origin and religion, learners still expressed strong bonds in spite of these differences and treated each other respectfully and considerately. There was thus a strong alignment between Constitutional values, the school’s political ethos and learner contexts, which likely contributed to the creation of holistic social agents. It was interesting to note that learners from other African countries, especially vulnerable because of widespread xenophobic attitudes in South Africa and exclusionary practices in schools (Neocosmos, 2010; Sayed et al, 2015), expressed a sense of familial belonging with their peers. Invoking this sense of familyhood was a sensitive discursive move; families are complex and imperfect units, with conflict

and differences, but connected by deeper bonds that are able to transcend and negotiate these differences for mutual benefit. Learners indicated this in their awareness of inequalities and historic divisions, and while they did not always manage these sensitively, they exhibited a willingness to learn and transform their beliefs.

This was a more difficult process for learners in Ms Bezuidenhout’s class, who presented what could be called ‘conflicting’ or ‘dissonant’ narratives of social cohesion. Findings illustrated that learners struggled with their racial identities and both invoked and tried to discard these in their responses. Their appeals to what this study called colourblind cosmopolitanism juxtaposed with the often stereotypical attitudes they exhibited towards racial difference, likely confirming Hook’s (2011) suggestion that cosmopolitanism is a premature and insufficient response to dealing with the trauma contained in fractured, historical identities. The victimhood stemming from this trauma was evident in learner attitudes; while they sought to distance themselves from the apartheid legacy, they continued to appeal to its racial logic and the sense of marginality experienced in coloured communities as a result of racial and social liminality. They were also resistant to acknowledge this victimisation in others, leading to highly disturbing exchanges that showed the depth of the dissonant relationship between learners’ own values and those they knew they were expected to embody as non-racial South African citizens. The school’s context and low status, alongside the challenges to consistent and focused learning in the classroom, inserted these attitudes into a learning environment that confirmed learners’ feelings of alienation and marginality.

Learners in Mr Haxton’s class, compared to their peers at the other participant schools, did not receive as much opportunity to engage with broader social issues, often because their learning materials were so removed from the South African experience. Arguably, the emphasis on achievement at Lillie High fostered an ‘alternative’ narrative of social cohesion, more specifically ‘social cohesion through excellence’. Any social or political identity the school may have had was secondary to its culture of academic and extramural excellence; learners excelled individually, became part of and contributed to communities of excellence in ways that it was assumed would transcend difference. The collective identity of the school was built on this culture and, while advocating equality and human dignity, did not fully

recognise the effects of structural and symbolic differences on learner experiences at the school. Both Mr Haxton and his learners were aware of the inequalities that persisted in society, but this was never allowed to come out in class because they were rarely exposed to content that enabled them to collectively engage with these issues. The conflation of excellence with whiteness (Soudien, 2012) also further served to neutralise the assimilation process for those learners who were historically excluded from the school.

These narratives should not be seen as attempts to place each school in silos, and in fact elements of each narrative could be seen in different schools. For example, the alternative narrative of social cohesion at Lillie High, in its behavioural-attitudinal orientation, could also be seen as dissonant when one considers the reality that learners did not enter the school from the same backgrounds and yet were still expected to display particular, raced qualities in order to gain access – this while the school considered itself to have a respect for diversity. What is important to take from the above examples is that alongside holding particular institutional identities, schools also transmit particular narratives of belonging, inequality, and social justice in the exchanges between teachers and learners in the context of the school environment and culture. As this chapter argued, linguistic identities are contextually located, negotiated and experienced, often influenced by broader social dynamics that reproduce specific values, attitudes and beliefs.

Chapter Six

Conclusion

This study has sought to understand how teachers manage linguistic and social identities in the process of English language teaching in a manner that deals with challenges to social cohesion. It has argued that language is central to issues of belonging in South Africa, and that the pursuit of social cohesion as a desirable characteristic of society is contingent on language education that recognises the inequalities underpinning linguistic diversity in the country. Three research questions were posed in attempt to capture how these issues are dealt with in teacher practice.

1. How do Grade 11 English teachers address issues of linguistic identity and social cohesion in their teaching methods?

1.1 What skills and values are transmitted by Grade 11 teachers in their teaching?

1.2 What are the effects of their teaching on learners’ linguistic identities and on creating social cohesion?

Data was gathered in response to these questions using the methods of observation, semi-structured interviews, and focus groups. These findings were discussed in the respective chapter and particular existing and emerging themes drawn out in the analysis. It became apparent that context remained a significant factor in how the participant teachers engaged in their practice, even where school contexts have adapted to the post-1994 dispensation. The historical characteristics of the participant schools had both changed and amplified in the time since the end of apartheid, with the result that they could not be understood through the same analytical lens as schools of the past. Nevertheless, the continuing effects of both local and school contexts on contemporary education practice was a salient influence on the strategies teachers used to inculcate particular attitudes towards English language study, as well as on how learners captured the value and usefulness of their own linguistic repertoires.

This chapter will discuss the key findings from the study and the significance and implications of these for research and practice. It will also reflect on the process of

the research journey and the challenges of the study that became apparent. Further, avenues for further research will be discussed with the view to considering how particular phenomena and ideas can be developed and interrogated in future studies.