Urszula Clark

Towards a Pedagogical Stylistics

Since the 1950s, pedagogical stylistics has been intrinsically linked with the teaching of written texts (and especially literary texts) to speakers of English as a second language. This is despite the fact that for decades many teachers have also structured their lessons in L1 classrooms to focus upon the linguistic features of literary texts as a means of enhancing their students’ understanding of literature and language. Recognizing that instructors in both L1 and L2 settings were often employing related pedagogical techniques without realizing that their colleagues in the other context were facing similar challenges, the PEDSIG group of the Poetics and Linguistics Association (PALA) has sought to add a theoretical dimension to research undertaken into practice in the stylistics classroom. Its goals, then, were: to establish a working definition of pedagogical stylistics; to identify the theoretical and pedagogical underpinnings of the discipline shared by L1 and L2 practitioners; to point if possible towards any emerging consensus on good practice. The group determined that the principal aim of stylistics in the classroom is to make students aware of language use within chosen texts, and that what characterizes pedagogical stylistics is classroom activities that are interactive between the text and the (student) reader. Preliminary findings, from a pilot study involving a poem by Langston Hughes, suggest that the process of improving students’ linguistic sensibilities must include greater emphasis upon the text as action: i.e. upon the mental processing which is such a proactive part of reading and interpretation; and how all of these elements – pragmatic and cognitive as well as linguistic – function within quite specific social and cultural contexts.

Grammar in the Curriculum for English: What Next?.

It is clear from several government reports and research papers published recently that the curriculum for English in primary and secondary schools is about to change yet again. After years of bureaucratic stranglehold that has left even Ofsted report writers criticising the teaching of English, it seems as if the conditions are right for further revisions. One of the questions that inevitably arise when a curriculum for English is reviewed, relates to the place and purpose of the teaching of grammar. This paper outlines a possible curriculum for grammar across both primary and secondary phases, arguing that for the teaching of grammar to have any salience or purpose at all, it has to be integrated into the curriculum as a whole, and not just writing. A recontextualised curriculum for grammar, of the kind proposed here, would teach pupils to become critically literate in ways which recognise diversity as well as unity, and with the aim of providing them with the means to analyse critically and appraise the culture in which they live.

Women beware women: detective fiction and critical discourse stylistics

This article examines the work of four contemporary writers of detective fiction (P.D. James, Amanda Cross, Sara Paretsky and Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine) from a critical discourse stylistics perspective with the objective of raising the readers awareness of the ideological processes that are manifested in the language of these texts. It considers how these writers deal with stereotypical assumptions, how they cope with socially determined traditional roles and verify whether their choices result in the articulation of an alternative discourse. The investigation arrives at some identifiable cultural and linguistic characteristics which may be singular to this new group of writers. We suggest that by challenging traditional representations of women, these writers may be offering a reconstruction of the genre.

West Midlands English:Birmingham and the Black Country

This volume focuses on the closely allied yet differing linguistic varieties of Birmingham and its immediate neighbour to the west, the industrial heartland of the Black Country. Both of these areas rose to economic prominence and success during the Industrial Revolution, and both have suffered economically and socially as a result of post-war industrial decline. The industrial heritage of both areas has meant that tight knit and socially homogeneous individual areas in each region have demonstrated in many respects little linguistic change over time, and have continued to exhibit linguistic features, especially morphological constructions, peculiar to these areas or now restricted to these areas. At the same time, immigration from other areas of the British Isles over time, from Commonwealth countries and later from EU member states, together with increased social mobility, have meant that newly developing structures and more widespread UK linguistic phenomena have spread into these varieties. This volume provides a clear description of the structure of the linguistic varieties spoken in the two areas. Following the structure of the Dialects of English volumes, it provides: •A comprehensive overview of the phonological, grammatical and lexical structure of both varieties, as well as similarities between the two varieties and distinguishing features •Thorough discussion of the historical and social factors behind the development of the varieties and the stigma attached to these varieties •Discussion of the unusual situation of the Black Country as an area undefined in geographical and administrative terms, existing only in the imagination •Examples of the variety from native speakers of differing ethnicities, ages and genders •An annotated bibliography for further consultation

What is English for? Language Structure and the Curriculum for English

This article uses Bernstein’s theory of pedagogic discourse to account for both the processes by which curriculum change occurs and the failure of efforts to introduce meaningful attention to language structure into national curricula.

ARTICLE WITHDRAWN: Hegemony, Genre Theory and the Teaching of Academic Literacy in English

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Language, Literacy and Pedagogy

This chapter provides an overview of language based pedagogy (LBP) and its theoretical base, drawn linguistically from SFL/G, sociologically from Bernstein’s notion of pedagogic discourse and sociopsychologically from theorists such as Vygotsky. It shows the importance of language for learning generally, and the ways in which teaching grammar and metalanguage can help pupils’ and students develop their apprenticeship into the discursive practices that characterise different subject disciplines. The key argument put forward in the chapter is that recontextualising literacy, particularly across the secondary curriculum, relates to the expression of subject knowledge and the discursive practices that characterise all school subjects, and not simply that of English. Illustrative examples are taken from research into teachers’ practices undertaken in the two secondary schools discussed in more detail in Chapters 4– 6.

Introduction: Language and Literacy Across the Secondary School Curriculum

This chapter provides a context for the remainder of the project, by providing an overview of initiatives into developing language and literacy in English across the curriculum in England and associated teaching of grammar from the 1960s to the present day. It discusses how developing language and literacy across the curriculum is nothing new, and has long been of concern in education in the UK and beyond. The realisation of the importance of language for learning characterised early work in the field by Barnes et al. (1971) and The Bullock Report of 1975. At the same time, the theoretical underpinnings of what a pedagogic grammar could look like had as yet to be developed, which it now has. It discusses the ideological clashes in relation to the teaching of grammar that characterised the introduction of the national curriculum in the late 1980s through to the present day, and how various whole scale initiatives such as NLS in the 1990s and 2000s failed to impact upon teachers’ imagination and pedagogic practices. Its central argument is, that for any kind of literacy across the curriculum strategy to have any purchase, it has to align with teachers’ day to day affordances across all curriculum subjects in ways that take account of the local as well as the regional and national contexts within which they work, rather than as top down, generic initiative that are imposed upon them.

Devising and Implementing Whole School Literacy across the Curriculum (LAC) strategies in the 11 to 19 Secondary School Curriculum

This chapter discusses and outlines the research upon which Chapters 4– 6 of the project are based. One of the perceived barriers to an LBP approach to literacy is the perceived gap in many teachers’ knowledge about language, depending upon their own education history touched upon in Chapter 1 and discussed further in this chapter. A challenge in undertaking the research upon which this project is based, was how to develop teachers’ own metalinguistic awareness and that of their pupils’ and students’ at the same time. The approach taken, was to locate and situate developing teachers’ knowledge about language in the context of their own current assessment and curriculum goals, objectives and practices. It discusses how such curriculum intervention was made possible by changes to assessment and curriculum practices in the UK, together with changes to school inspection protocols. Taken together, such recent initiatives have brought the issue of literacy to the fore in secondary education in England in ways that are unprecedented. The chapter draws upon the research undertaken to discuss how teachers’ own metalinguistic awareness is bound up with their own autobiographies and experiences of schooling. Secondary school teachers are expert in the discursive practices that characterise their disciplines, which all too often remain assumed and implicit. It shows that teachers’ implicit knowledge about language can be brought to the surface remarkably quickly, particularly when focused and targeted at their own subject discipline.

Developing Literacy Across the Curriculum for Science and Maths

This chapter develops the ideas presented in Chapters 4 and 5 by further extending a pedagogic grammar for English in the context of the curriculum for subjects in the sciences. It identifies the main patterns of register and genre that characterise the texts that are talked about, read and written across the secondary school curriculum for science. It draws upon examples of schemes of work and lesson plans at each of the three key stages of 3, 4 and 5, together with interviews undertaken with teachers and samples of student work, to illustrate how paying attention to language structure can be integrated into the curriculum for the sciences.