Abstract
JALDA has been officially recognized as a Scientific Grade B Journal by Iranian Ministry of Science, Research and Technology recently. A main interest of the Journal lies in the contextualized sense of science; the studies should take place in real world contexts and they should be intended to help ...
Read More
JALDA has been officially recognized as a Scientific Grade B Journal by Iranian Ministry of Science, Research and Technology recently. A main interest of the Journal lies in the contextualized sense of science; the studies should take place in real world contexts and they should be intended to help solve everyday problems. The fields of applied linguistics and applied literature create the scope of the Journal for the purpose of coming into close encounter with the problems researchers may experience in their everyday lives both within and without school; they are encouraged to use their expertise, even in an interdisciplinary mode, to tackle issues that hinder their subjects and people on their way to success and improvement. From such a perspective, the decontextuzlized selection and reading of a literary text, for instance, may not be regarded as fruitful. There are stories by both teachers and researchers about how the “literary taste” of students at rural areas of our country differ radically from the taste of those from urbanized areas. Should the students be introduced to the same material in their English language and literature courses? JALDA prefers to consider the diversity in the world and it intends to publish the findings that help show how new ways are sought for improvements in the fields. This results from a sense of protecting the world and its diversity we experience in our everyday lives while, thanks to access to the technology, complicated (conspiracy) theories spread faster than any biological virus could to keep us far from one another and from the real world.
Bahram Behin
Abstract
A new vocabulary item has been added to English dictionaries: Covid-19. For linguists, the addition of a meaningful linguistic element to any language should change the whole language as, for T. S. Eliot, a new poem changes the whole literature of a nation. But let us see how seriously the addition of ...
Read More
A new vocabulary item has been added to English dictionaries: Covid-19. For linguists, the addition of a meaningful linguistic element to any language should change the whole language as, for T. S. Eliot, a new poem changes the whole literature of a nation. But let us see how seriously the addition of the vocabulary item Covid-19 might change the English language. According to Cambridge online dictionary, Covid-19 is “an infectious disease caused by a coronavirus (= a type of virus), that usually causes fever, tiredness, and a cough, and can also cause breathing problems. I do not think that the change brought about by the item is a radical one especially when the definition claims that most often the disease caused by the virus is not serious! (I wonder whether there is a Newspeak type conspiracy going on!) But when one turns to the “real world,” the situation turns out to be extremely serious: Not only has Covid-19 brought the whole world almost to a total stop, but it has also been the cause of many deaths all over the world. People have died, families have lost their breadwinners, doctors and nurses have been affected and died while on duty and we are still on the verge of being affected by the virus everyday if the necessary safety measures are not taken. Millions have lost their jobs and economies are on the verge of collapse. Governments are keen to see their state enemies crush under the heavy burdens by Covid-19 upon their economies and medical systems! Schools are shut down and much more other factual events can be added to these, all of which lead many to claim that in the post-Covid-19 era peoples’ behaviours should change.
Bahram Behin
Abstract
According to Patrick Colm Hogan, in the US academic context, few people in literary theory or comparative literature have much familiarity with non-Western literary theories, and fewer still have research expertise in the field. While working on a project in non-Western literary theory, he was surprised ...
Read More
According to Patrick Colm Hogan, in the US academic context, few people in literary theory or comparative literature have much familiarity with non-Western literary theories, and fewer still have research expertise in the field. While working on a project in non-Western literary theory, he was surprised to find that many of his friends and colleagues found it difficult to understand what non-Western literary theory might be. And when he explained that by non-Western theory he meant theory before European colonialism, he was, more often than not, faced with looks of blank incomprehension. Hogan blames ethnocentrism for this blank incomprehension because “it is at least in part a matter of assuming that theoretical reasoning is somehow peculiarly Western, that abstract reflection must have its source and impetus west of the Black Sea and north of the Mediterranean. It is closely related to the blank incomprehension which greets such phrases as ‘Classical Indian logic,’ ‘Medieval Arabic mathematics,’ and ‘Ancient Chinese empirical science and technology.’”
Bahram Behin
Abstract
JALDA, therefore, would like to show inclination towards the view that the reality of the world is not a fixed entity standing out there to be measured by our pre-fabricated ‘scientific’ instruments. In line with Haghshenas’ argumentation, not only can theories and instruments shrink ...
Read More
JALDA, therefore, would like to show inclination towards the view that the reality of the world is not a fixed entity standing out there to be measured by our pre-fabricated ‘scientific’ instruments. In line with Haghshenas’ argumentation, not only can theories and instruments shrink to ornamental entities but also they can turn into what Karl Popper calls pseudo-science, knowledge of an ‘ideological’ rather than of a ‘scientific’ nature (see Fuller, 1996). The knowledge based on positivism is prone to shrink to pseudo-science, for instance, because it is knowledge based solely on natural phenomena and their properties and relations that are accounted for according to man-made networks of laws. Any biased insistence upon such knowledge and hostility towards what lies outside the network, the darkness of the world, an experience of the recent politico-scientific history of the world, should push what was expected to be ‘scientific’ towards ‘pseudo-science.’ JALDA’s policy is to see its pages colourfully arrayed with findings and views from even the darkest corners of the world, where things are seen in ways quite different from the ways we are used to seeing them.
Bahram Behin
Abstract
The decision by the Ministry of Higher Education in Iran to revise and update the subjects for the MA and PhD courses in TESOL should pave the way towards a more comprehensive understanding of teaching English to speakers of other languages. The Ministry’s revisions can be seen in line with the ...
Read More
The decision by the Ministry of Higher Education in Iran to revise and update the subjects for the MA and PhD courses in TESOL should pave the way towards a more comprehensive understanding of teaching English to speakers of other languages. The Ministry’s revisions can be seen in line with the English language teacher’s awareness. Awareness of context in social sciences and humanities should have significant consequences for us in TESOL. One of the consequences, for instance, is our need for tracing the history of TESOL in Iran (or any area and country), and the building of an archive, without which TESOL in Iran maybe being trapped in the vicious circle of doing experiments that do not relate to our situation in a useful way. The Ministry’s new subjects should provide us with an invaluable opportunity to experience new horizons in researching TESOL. Scientific attitude we all have been brought up with has led to an epistemology that does not seem adequate in today’s world anymore. It is not adequate because it is reductionist in nature; it sees the social phenomena relating to one another solely on the basis of cause and effect relationship; it treats human beings as objects and it does not leave room for competing epistemologies. The new materials should be regarded as a platform to throw us into the unknown world of social world whose existence for us is a matter of interpretation rather than description. Science and critique in the sense we have learned and used them so far have turned into fixed standard curricula preventing us from experiencing an authentic life. All over the world, Englishes are learned by people wishing to communicate with one another for different reasons, and English teachers should see what they can do to help them in this regard.
Bahram Behin
Abstract
The editor’s notes in our Journal have been so far a site for the clarification of the Journal’s policy and the task still continues. With an inclination towards solving our real world problems in language teaching (and literary studies, which I will discuss in the next issue of the Journal), ...
Read More
The editor’s notes in our Journal have been so far a site for the clarification of the Journal’s policy and the task still continues. With an inclination towards solving our real world problems in language teaching (and literary studies, which I will discuss in the next issue of the Journal), we would like to take that the introduction of the concept of “life-world” to Social Sciences can be a ground-breaking movement to open up new horizons for researchers. I will further illustrate JALDA's position and policy here. The current issue of JALDA features an interview, seven research papers of national and international scope and a book review. The interview is with Professor Glenn Fulcher, the distinguished British applied linguist working in the field of language testing and assessment. The first paper by Behrooz Azabdaftari is a tribute to Professor Henry Widdowson on his visit to Azarbaijan Shahid Madani University in 2018. Cosmas Rai Amenorvi draws on the theory of cohesion to show how both linguistic and aesthetic effects are achieved in Malcolm X’s ‘The Ballot or the Bullet’. The paper by Sarvandy and Ekstam focuses on English as Lingua Franca with attention to Iranian context. The paper by Karimnia and Sabbaghi is a study of Ta’ziyeh and its discourse with an emphasis on how language varieties help frame a culturee’s perception of religion. Ameri's contibution is an example of applied literature. She applies New Jungian findings to the reading of Sweetness in the Belly. The paper by Abbasi and Khosrowshahi explores the role of experience in EFL teachers’ satisfaction of the in-service teacher education programs in Iran, and Ashrafi and Ajideh explore culture-related content in the advanced series of Iran Language Institute. And, finally, Jane Ekstam has reviewed Loving Literature: A Cultural History, by Deirde Shauna Lynch for us.
Bahram Behin
Abstract
Our Journal's tendency towards the real world in applied linguistics and literary studies should have significant epistemological and methodological consequences in researching the fields. The interest in the real world makes the problems we may have in our everyday lives our 'points of departure' in ...
Read More
Our Journal's tendency towards the real world in applied linguistics and literary studies should have significant epistemological and methodological consequences in researching the fields. The interest in the real world makes the problems we may have in our everyday lives our 'points of departure' in research. According to my experience of research in our universities throughout their history, researchers in both applied linguistics and literary studies have attributed great significance to ‘learning’ theories giant scholars have formulated and their main job has been to put the theories to use in the Iranian context for the purpose of teaching English language and literature. The assumption that researchers should confine themselves to theories, frameworks, methodologies and the use of instruments that are of positivistic nature is a dominant characteristic in the Iran context. The paradigm shift, as I understand it, is required firstly as a turning away from linguistics as a science and the unlearning of linguistic theories because no linguistic theory is comprehensive enough to provide us with a real world description of language; new ways of analyzing and understanding language are needed. According to this view, applied linguistics should not be confined to ‘language teaching.’ Its function should be ‘language teaching in the context of the real world,’ although, according to Rajagopalan (2004, p. 415), “There is still a long way to go and many stubborn resistances … to be overcome.”
Bahram Behin
Abstract
Applied Literature, however, does not have literature at its centre. Literature in this domain is a tool to solve problems and achieve goals. Using literature to teach and learn languages, the application of literature to language education, is a very handy example. Health Humanities (by Crawford, et ...
Read More
Applied Literature, however, does not have literature at its centre. Literature in this domain is a tool to solve problems and achieve goals. Using literature to teach and learn languages, the application of literature to language education, is a very handy example. Health Humanities (by Crawford, et al. and reviewed by A. Ramazani in our Journal's previous issue) comprises chapters on how literature can be used for health purposes. Medical Humanities is introduced as “the engagement of medicine with the humanities and arts, social sciences, health policy, medical education, patient experience and the public at large.” A shift is observable here from pure objective scientific endeavour based on the segregation of seemingly unrelated fields to the integration of them for more practical purposes.The role attributed to the public at large in these equations demands careful consideration. In traditional literary studies, as stated above, the textuality of literature is central. But in Applied Literature the text is no longer our precious object. Some reader-oriented literary theories have shifted our attentionradically from the text to the reader. In these theories, the literary critic is no longer the sole source of justification and interpretation of literature.Determining the literariness of the text and its interpretation lies with the reader. This might eventually lead to the well-beingness of the reader, which, once achieved, fulfils the applied literature critic’s wish! Thus, those with inclination towards the reader in literary studies may have an affinitywith applied literature critics that move towards the public at large.
4. Dynamics between Applied Studies on Language and Literature
Bahram Behin
Abstract
Applied Linguistics and Applied Literature in the sense that we would like to use them should result in academic activities that are social in their orientation. Academics are not isolated individuals equipped with scientific tools and working within laboratory like situations. Their close encounter ...
Read More
Applied Linguistics and Applied Literature in the sense that we would like to use them should result in academic activities that are social in their orientation. Academics are not isolated individuals equipped with scientific tools and working within laboratory like situations. Their close encounter with the real world situations is a fundamental necessity. Reading theories and literary texts in the library is not undertaken for the sake of creating mentalities to judge what lies outside our reading and library. There should, instead, be an interactional process between what we read and what we experience in the world out there that seems to be unruly and messy in nature. This attitude seems to have consequences for us in our academic behaviour. One of them, for instance, should be our attempts to look for non-traditional forms and formations of research and practice. Employing mere quantitative research methods, what we have inherited in the name of ‘science’ from the past, we may end up in failures. ‘Science’ is no longer a sacred institution whose colossal columns are untouchable, especially for us in developing countries that seem to be lagging behind the fast moving states and institutions forming categories of insiders and outsiders for themselves, for instance. There have been so many glossy theories of language and literature that are regarded either as totally obsolete or impractical for many reasons today.
