Racializing the problem of and solution to foreign accent in business

2019 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vijay A. Ramjattan
Keyword(s):  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Foreign Accent ◽  
Power Structures ◽  
Skilled Immigrants ◽  
Business Environments ◽  
Immigrant Professionals ◽  
Global North ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Accent Reduction

AbstractGiven the desire to attract skilled immigrants to English-speaking countries in the Global North, business environments in these nations may see the increased presence of workers who speak English with a foreign accent. While organizations may tout this linguistic diversity, there is a concern that a foreign accent interferes with successful business communication. This apparent issue can result in a lack of employment opportunities for foreign-accented professionals and has also created a rise in private accent reduction programs that seek to improve the employability of these professionals. What is understated or even omitted in the discussion of these trends is the impact of racialization. First, the (lack of) employability of foreign-accented workers may be determined by a set of racial hierarchies in which some bodies are perceived as better for work than others. Furthermore, the notion that simply reducing an accent increases one’s employability ignores racialized power structures that truly prevent the employment of certain immigrants. Through the lens of raciolinguistic ideologies, which look at the intermingling of language and race, this article explores the above issues by arguing that foreign accent discrimination and accent reduction are indeed racialized and thus perpetuate the inequality experienced by immigrant professionals in business.

American Speech-Language Pathologists' Training and Legislative Knowledge When Working With Immigrant and Refugee Populations: A Qualitative Study

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (5) ◽  
pp. 1148-1161
Author(s):  
Camilo Maldonado ◽  
Alejandro Ashe ◽  
Kerri Bubar ◽  
Jessica Chapman
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Service Provision ◽  
Limited English Proficiency ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Speech Language Pathologists ◽  
Federal Mandates ◽  
Refugee Families ◽  
Provision Of Services ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Immigrant And Refugee

Background American educational legislation suggests culturally competent speech and language services should be provided in a child's native language, but the number of multilingual speech-language pathologists (SLPs) is negligible. Consequently, many monolingual English-speaking practitioners are being tasked with providing services to these populations. This requires that SLPs are educated about cultural and linguistic diversity as well as the legislation that concerns service provision to non-English or limited English proficiency speakers. Purpose This qualitative study explored the experiences of monolingual, American, English-speaking SLPs and clinical fellows who have worked with immigrant and refugee families within a preschool context. It investigated what training SLPs received to serve this population and what knowledge these SLPs possessed with regard to federal legislation governing the provision of services to culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) communities. Method Ten American clinicians with experience treating CLD children of refugee and immigrant families in the context of preschool service provision participated in the study. Semistructured interviews were utilized to better understand the type of training clinicians received prior to and during their service delivery for CLD populations. Additionally, questions were asked to explore the degree to which practitioners understood federal mandates for ethical and effective service provision. The data collected from these interviews were coded and analyzed using the principles of grounded theory. Findings The results of this study revealed that there was a general sense of unpreparedness when working with CLD clients. This lack of training also attributed to a deficiency of knowledge surrounding legislation governing service provision to CLD populations.

Accent Policy and Accent Modification Enterprises as Potential Indicators of Intercultural Power Relations: A Call for an Updated Research Agenda

2013 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 22-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brynne D. Ovalle ◽  
Rahul Chakraborty
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Identity Construction ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Cultural Organization ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

This article has two purposes: (a) to examine the relationship between intercultural power relations and the widespread practice of accent discrimination and (b) to underscore the ramifications of accent discrimination both for the individual and for global society as a whole. First, authors review social theory regarding language and group identity construction, and then go on to integrate more current studies linking accent bias to sociocultural variables. Authors discuss three examples of intercultural accent discrimination in order to illustrate how this link manifests itself in the broader context of international relations (i.e., how accent discrimination is generated in situations of unequal power) and, using a review of current research, assess the consequences of accent discrimination for the individual. Finally, the article highlights the impact that linguistic discrimination is having on linguistic diversity globally, partially using data from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and partially by offering a potential context for interpreting the emergence of practices that seek to reduce or modify speaker accents.

scholarly journals Orthorexia nervosa and Instagram: exploring the Russian-speaking conversation around #opтopeкcия

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yana Zemlyanskaya ◽  
Martina Valente ◽  
Elena V. Syurina
Keyword(s):  
Orthorexia Nervosa ◽  
Online Questionnaire ◽  
Level Of Evidence ◽  
Russian Speakers ◽  
Global North ◽  
Harmful Content ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Comparative Content ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Informative Text

AbstractThis mixed-methods study explored the conversation around orthorexia nervosa (ON) on Instagram from a Russian-speaking perspective. Two quantitative data sources were implemented; a comparative content analysis of posts tagged with #opтopeкcия (n = 234) and #orthorexia (n = 243), and an online questionnaire completed by Russian-speakers (n = 96) sharing ON-related content on Instagram. Additionally, five questionnaire participants were interviewed, four of which identified with having (had) ON. Russian-speakers who share ON-related content on Instagram are primarily female, around their late-twenties, and prefer Instagram over other platforms. They describe people with ON as obsessed with correct eating, rather than healthy or clean eating. Instagram appears to have a dual effect; it has the potential to both trigger the onset of ON and encourage recovery. Positive content encourages a healthy relationship with food, promotes intuitive eating, and spread recovery advice. Harmful content, in turn, emphasizes specific diet and beauty ideals. Russian-speaking users mainly post pictures of food, followed by largely informative text that explains what ON is, and what recovery may look like. Their reasons for posting ON-related content are to share personal experiences, support others in recovery, and raise awareness about ON. Two main target audiences were people unaware of ON and people seeking recovery support. The relationship between ON and social media is not strictly limited to the global north. Thus, it may be valuable to further investigate non-English-speaking populations currently underrepresented in ON research.Level of evidence: Level V, descriptive study.

scholarly journals Interdisciplinary and Intercultural Development of an Early Literacy App in Dhuwaya

Languages ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 106
Author(s):  
Gillian Wigglesworth ◽  
Melanie Wilkinson ◽  
Yalmay Yunupingu ◽  
Robyn Beecham ◽  
Jake Stockley
Keyword(s):  
Phonological Awareness ◽  
Early Literacy ◽  
First Language ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
Intercultural Development ◽  
Educational Challenges ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Surrounding Areas ◽  
Bilingual School ◽  
The Impact

Phonological awareness is a skill which is crucial in learning to read. In this paper, we report on the challenges encountered while developing a digital application (app) for teaching phonological awareness and early literacy skills in Dhuwaya. Dhuwaya is a Yolŋu language variety spoken in Yirrkala and surrounding areas in East Arnhem Land. Dhuwaya is the first language of the children who attend a bilingual school in which Dhuwaya and English are the languages of instruction. Dhuwaya and English have different phonemic inventories and different alphabets. The Dhuwaya alphabet is based on Roman alphabet symbols and has 31 graphemes (compared to 26 in English). The app was designed to teach children how to segment and blend syllables and phonemes and to identify common words as well as suffixes used in the language. However, the development was not straightforward, and the impact of the linguistic, cultural and educational challenges could not have been predicted. Amongst these was the inherent variation in the language, including glottal stops, the pronunciation of stops, the focus on syllables as a decoding strategy for literacy development and challenges of finding one-syllable words such as those initially used with English-speaking children. Another challenge was identifying culturally appropriate images which the children could relate to and which were not copyrighted. In this paper, we discuss these plus a range of other issues that emerged, identifying how these problems were addressed and resolved by the interdisciplinary and intercultural team.

Beyond the austerity-driven hypothesis: Political economic theses on penality and the recent prison population decline

2021 ◽  
pp. 147737082110006
Author(s):  
José A. Brandariz
Keyword(s):  
Prison Population ◽  
Population Decline ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
The Past ◽  
Economic Forces ◽  
Global North ◽  
Economic Perspectives ◽  
Political Economic ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Spending Cuts

In what might be called the ‘austerity-driven hypothesis’, a consistent strand of literature has sought to explain the prison downsizing witnessed in many jurisdictions of the global north over the past decade by referring to the financial crisis of the late 2000s to early 2010s and its effects in terms of public spending cuts. Since this economic phase is essentially over, whereas the (moderate) decarceration turn is still ongoing, there are good reasons to challenge this hypothesis. This article delves into the non-economic forces that are fostering a prison population decline that, 10 years on, is becoming the new ‘penal normal’. The article thereby aims to spark a dialogue not only with the scholarship exploring the prison downsizing but also with certain theoretical frameworks that have played a key role in examining the punitive turn era. Additionally, the article contributes to the conversation on the need to reframe materialist readings on penality in a ‘non-reductionist’ fashion. By revisiting heterodox theses and scrutinizing the impact of recent penal changes on traditional materialist accounts, the article joins the collective endeavour seeking to update political economic perspectives on punishment and the penal field.

Perceived foreign accent in first language attrition and second language acquisition: The impact of age of acquisition and bilingualism—ERRATUM

2013 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 417-417 ◽  
Author(s):  
HOLGER HOPP ◽  
MONIKA S. SCHMID
Keyword(s):  
Second Language ◽  
Second Language Acquisition ◽  
Language Acquisition ◽  
Open Access ◽  
First Language ◽  
Age Of Acquisition ◽  
Foreign Accent ◽  
Language Attrition ◽  
First Language Attrition ◽  
The Impact

The open access copyright line contained within this page was not included in the original FirstView article or the print article contained within this issue. We sincerely regret these errors and any problems they may have caused.

scholarly journals A comparison of vocal parameters in adult bilingual Hebrew-English speakers

CoDAS ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 27 (5) ◽  
pp. 483-491 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leah Nevo ◽  
Chaya Nevo ◽  
Gisele Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Fundamental Frequency ◽  
Speech Rate ◽  
English Speakers ◽  
Frequency Variation ◽  
Bilingual Speakers ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Acoustic Analyses ◽  
The Impact

ABSTRACT Purpose: There has been growing research on the effects of language on voice characteristics; however, few studies have examined the impact of language on vocal features within bilinguals. This study aimed to compare vocal parameters among bilingual Hebrew/English speaking individuals when speaking in Hebrew versus English. Methods: Forty bilingual participants (17 males and 23 females) between the ages of 23-60 years were asked to spontaneously speak about a neutral topic. Voice samples were digitalized into a tablet for perceptual and acoustic analyses of selected parameters. Results: Results show that there are changes in resonance, glottal attack, fundamental frequency variation and speech rate when adult bilingual speakers talk in Hebrew as compared to English. Conclusion: These findings provide evidence that language plays a role in affecting vocal characteristics of bilingual individuals when they speak different languages.

scholarly journals FROM INLAND TO OUTLAND: EXPERIENCES OF NON-NATIVE EXPATRIATE TEACHERS TEACHING IN A FOREIGN CONTEXT

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-37
Author(s):  
Remart Padua Dumlao ◽  
Trixia Mengorio
Keyword(s):  
English Language Learners ◽  
Language Learners ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Cultural Awareness ◽  
English Language ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Language Teachers ◽  
Future Research ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
Native English Speaking

The numbers of English language learners and limited domestic English language teachers have grown exponentially in Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam, as well as to the ASEAN region over the past decades due to the demand of globalization. Given the huge cultural and linguistic diversity among learners, educating these populations of English language learners can be a challenging but also beneficial for foreign language teachers. This study aimed to analyse the experiences of fifteen Non-native English Speaking Foreign Teachers (NNESFT) teaching in Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam. The results of this study suggested that although teachers’ reasons in teaching English language in a foreign classroom were more extrinsic reasons rather that intrinsic and altruistic. NNESFT recognized benefits of teaching in foreign classroom, namely, financial aspects, personal development, and building cultural awareness. Meanwhile, challenges were reported include as a non-native English speaking teachers in a foreign classroom, on the part of textbooks and curriculum, and cultural differences in the classroom. Implications were discussed in light of the findings and recommendations formulated for future research directions.

scholarly journals A Viewpoint on Accent Services: Framing and Terminology Matter

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Vikas Grover ◽  
Aravind Namasivayam ◽  
Nidhi Mahendra
Keyword(s):  
Scoping Review ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Speech Language Pathology ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
Speech Language Pathologists ◽  
Critical Attention ◽  
Language Pathology ◽  
Accent Modification ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Way

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to offer a contemporary viewpoint on accent services and contend that an equity-minded reframing of accent services in speech-language pathology is long overdue. Such reframing should address directly the use of nonpejorative terminology and the need for nurturing global linguistic diversity and practitioner diversity in speech-language pathology. The authors offer their perspective on affirmative and least-biased accent services, an in-depth scoping review of the literature on accent modification, and discuss using terms that communicate unconditional respect for speaker identity and an understanding of the impact of accent services on accented speakers. Conclusions: Given ongoing discussions about the urgent need to diversify the profession of speech-language pathology, critical attention is needed toward existing biases toward accented speakers and how such biases manifest in the way that accent services are provided as well as in how clinicians conceptualize their role in working with accented speakers. The authors conclude with discussing alternate terms and offer recommendations for accent services provided by speech-language pathologists.

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