Reading in the margins : EAP reading pedagogies and their critical, postcritical potential
- Publication Type:
- Thesis
- Issue Date:
- 2009
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International students for whom English is an additional language (EAL) commonly
undertake preparatory classes in English for Academic Purposes (EAP), delivered in
language institutes which exist as independent commercial colleges on the margins of
the university. EAP has been criticized for taking a purely pragmatic approach of
‘skilling up’ students rather than taking a critical, ‘literacies’ approach appropriate to
the rapidly globalising, ‘liquid’ contexts of the twenty-first century (Doherty &
Singh, 2005; Lea & Street, 2006; Luke, 2002b). In this thesis, I explore the ways in
which EAP reading pedagogies in Australian universities are responding to this call
for a more critical approach, asking the question: Do learning environments in EAP
support the development of critical reading practices, and if so, how?
In seeking answers to this question, I used an ethnographic-ecological methodology
(van Lier, 2004b) to gain an understanding of reading pedagogy in three EAP
learning environments. The study inevitably generated vast amounts of ‘messy’ data,
including transcriptions of classes, observation notes, interviews and examples of
students’ written work. Using Christie’s tools of Classroom Discourse Analysis
(Christie, 2002) in combination with Engeström’s third generation Activity Theory
(Engeström, 1999; Lantolf & Thorne, 2006) it was possible to generate a holistic
analysis of the interaction between the multiple, intersecting elements of each
environment.
I argue that more attention needs to be paid to ‘critical engagement’ in EAP
pedagogy. The data suggest that conditions for such a pedagogy entail a negotiation
of goals; texts and tasks which present high challenge as well as high support
(Hammond & Gibbons, 2005); and a positive and productive classroom community
(Dörnyei & Murphey, 2003). The study challenges teachers to see their role not as
‘arbiters of meaning’, mediating texts FOR students, but as setting up learning
environments which scaffold students’ direct engagement and dialogue WITH texts,
so that they themselves can experience legitimate participation in constructing
meaning, and develop an emerging identity as critical readers.
Finally, I argue that the constraints of EAP in its marginalised position on the
periphery of increasingly commercialised universities militate against the possibility
of a richly critical, postcritical pedagogy. EAP can, however, begin to sow the seeds
of critical reading practices, orienting students towards an active, dialogic
engagement with the texts they will meet in the coming years at university.
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