Date of Award

5-2021

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in English Composition

Department

English

First Reader/Committee Chair

Caroline Vickers

Abstract

Despite of the ELT varied research on the native speakerism ideology with the aim to resolve/dissolve its ideological issues and the NESTs/NNESTs dichotomy created within, that favors one group above the other, the effects of the ideology continue to persist (Holliday, 2014; Selvi, 2016; Lowe and Kiczkowiak, 2016; Mahboob and Golden, 2013;.) Much of the awareness of native speakerism ideology the has been at the research level and not at the local level of our education systems (teacher to teacher). Therefore, this research seeks to expose how the native speakerism ideology is permeated and enacted in a local NNEST ELT community of practice in Colombia via qualitative, semi-structured interviews about their views regarding NEST versus NNEST. The interviews were examined through Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Andrews’ (2003) definition of Teacher Language Awareness (TLA), in order to highlight the subtle linguistic choices used to navigate the conversation regarding this sensitive subject among NNESTs. Findings revealed first, pedagogical knowledge more than the label NNEST upholds participants to assert their membership in the ELT community. Thus, academic status pushes to the side the label NNEST and ends the feeling of marginalization based on language status. Second, language expertise, years of experience, time and/or schooling abroad, accent reduction, and cultural assimilation in native English speaking countries played a role in determining status within the NNEST community (Gonzalez and Llurda, 2016). This shows that NNESTs qualify each other according to a Sub-Native-Speakerism Ideology developed to obtain higher statuses in their local/non-local ELT communities. This focus on local NNEST communities, where this status-based gatekeeping is most apparent, has been missing in previous research, but has significant implications for the direction the Native Speakerism Ideology is taking.

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