Which side are you on? IATEFL in a messed up world

I was asked to write a piece for IATEFL Voices reflecting on this year’s IATEFL conference, and I’m pleased to say they agreed to publish it, so members of IATEFL can read it here. Below is an earlier draft of this article. It isn’t as well-referenced, but it’s a bit more direct with its wording and in some ways I prefer it to the one that ended up in Voices. Comments very welcome, as always.

Image source: Truthout.org

I don’t think it’s very controversial to say that the world is in a pretty awful state right now. The development of a global consumer society over the past few decades has led to excessive production and consumption, causing massive environmental damage through carbon emissions, deforestation and the generation of waste. Increased transfer of power to global corporations in recent decades (Levitas 1986: 3) means they now hold a tremendous amount of political influence, to such an extent that many political decisions (the continued use of fossil fuels, the arms trade, the deregulation of the financial sector etc.) are made because they serve the interests of corporations rather than society (Monbiot 2016). The obvious consequence of this is that those powerful people and organisations who form the corporate elite are able to increase their power, while those in more vulnerable positions become increasingly marginalised and disempowered. Society has always been hierarchical and unequal, but now it’s getting ridiculous.

What’s this got to do with English Language Teaching? Well, the ELT profession itself is heavily influenced by global corporations and other for-profit organisations. Providers of globally-recognised teacher training qualifications drive methodology, publishing companies drive materials content, and examining bodies dictate learning outcomes. What’s more, the enormous private ELT sector and the increasing commodification of state-funded ELT means that decisions are largely made for commercial, rather than educational, reasons. Our profession promotes inequality through a private sector that only the privileged can afford. It positions countries like the UK and USA as superior by promoting a native speakerist discourse. It excludes LGBTQIA communities and other minorities by airbrushing them out of materials. It fetishizes neoliberal values through materialistic aspirations embedded in materials content. It actively undermines the professional worth of teachers by reducing ELT to a series of technicist practices that can be acquired in the space of 4 weeks. It allows commercial enterprises to make money out of ELT by uncritically embracing tech products and other “innovations” that are likely to have little or no positive impact on learning but are sure to make a small number of people very rich.

As Keith Copley puts it, ELT is ‘…not merely reflecting a neoliberal zeitgeist, but in many respects is strategically positioned within it (Copley 2018: 59). The ELT profession as a whole is guilty of sleepwalking into a situation where global corporations wield so much power that we find it difficult to conceive of an alternative. “That’s just the way the world is”, we say with a shrug. Then we go off and plan a lesson about shopping, or how to become a billionaire like Bill Gates, or how to pass an expensive exam that gives students access to a course in international business.

What’s this got to do with IATEFL? Well, as one of the largest international associations for English Language Teachers, you might expect IATEFL to be critical of the damaging impact of corporate-driven globalisation on ELT and, perhaps more importantly, the ways in which ELT has become complicit in promoting corporate-driven globalisation. You may also expect IATEFL to then speak out against the ways in which these practices negatively affect teaching, learning and, ultimately, society as a whole. After all, it doesn’t have to be like this. In many contexts ELT is used to indoctrinate learners into a neoliberal world of individualism, competitiveness and self-interest, but it could equally be used as a source of emancipation, giving people language skills that allow them to challenge hegemony and have a positive, transformative impact on global society. Over the years though, IATEFL has been noticeably reluctant to take a position against corporate ELT.

One clear reason for this reluctance is IATEFL’s desire to maintain a position of “impartiality”. If, for whatever reason, IATEFL was to be openly critical of a publishing company, or a qualification provider, or an examining body, or a chain of language schools, this might suggest bias against some of its own members in favour of others. IATEFL is quite explicit about this:

‘We do not…get involved in specific campaigns, issues, or politics, at a local, national, or international level, and do not favour or prioritise the needs of one group of teachers over another’ (IATEFL 2017).

The problem with this position, however, is that remaining silent about practices that favour the privileged and disadvantage the vulnerable means that these practices are allowed to become implemented and then normalised. Silence becomes collusion, or, as Freire put it: ‘Washing one’s hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless is to side with the powerful, not to be neutral’ (Freire 1996: 122). If refusing to engage is as much a political choice as becoming engaged, a position of impartiality is impossible. IATEFL’s mission statement also tells us that its purpose is to ‘…serve the needs of the wider ELT community’ (IATEFL 2017) but, by refusing to criticise practices that damage the profession’s potential as a source for good, IATEFL opens itself up to the allegation that is doing the wider ELT community a disservice.

IATEFL’s silence on the way ELT promotes social and economic injustices is made all the more uncomfortable when we consider how it relies so heavily on corporate sponsorship for its own existence. Membership and conferences fees are one source of income, but corporate sponsorship from publishing companies, teaching institutions and examining bodies is what allows the annual IATEFL conference to be such a massive, high profile event. Acceptance of this sponsorship compromises IATEFL’s ability to speak out against such organisations.

Having said all of this, it would be unfair to dismiss IATEFL as nothing more than a corporate mouthpiece. It appears that the organisation is becoming increasingly self-conscious about the role of corporate ELT at its conferences. This year, the confinement of the exhibition centre to the basement made it easy to avoid the in-your-face commercialism of publishing reps trying to sell their products, and the recently adopted practice of highlighting sessions that are sponsored by publishers meant that you could go through the entire conference without having a single book or digital product shoved down your throat. This makes a welcome change from previous years.

It’s also possible to see an increasing trend towards the inclusion of talks related to social justice, inclusion and equity at IATEFL. This year saw the Global Issues and Teacher Development SIGs holding a pre-conference event on the topic of social justice in ELT. Plenary talks by Paula Rebolledo and John Gray conveyed messages about the importance of teacher empowerment and the application of queer pedagogy in ELT materials design respectively. The closing plenary explored the future of ELT and included discussion about ELT’s potential and responsibility to play a more positive role in the development of global society. Various conference sessions directly addressed issues like heteronormativity, native speakerism, hegemony, and the mental health of teachers within our profession. A talk by Neil McMillan, which included criticism of IATEFL’s lack of engagement with instances of teacher exploitation or injustice, even led to IATEFL president Harry Kuchah actively engaging in a Twitter discussion with ELT professionals who had hitherto given up on IATEFL as an advocate for improving teachers’ working conditions. I don’t think that’s ever happened before.

It is certainly possible to criticise – and be frustrated by – IATEFL’s reluctance to directly oppose the organisations that have shaped ELT’s development into a neoliberal, market-driven profession. But there’s some evidence from the 2019 conference to suggest that IATEFL is at least becoming more self-aware about its current role, and there’s a hint that it is becoming increasingly uncomfortable with its current position. It seems unlikely that IATEFL will stop accepting sponsorship from global corporations or start criticising unethical employers and government policymakers any time soon. But it can use its own conference to offer a platform to those of us who do wish to challenge the status quo and to offer alternatives, and there seems to be a desire to do more of this.

And, let’s face it, can we expect it to do more right now? The neoliberal paradigm is so all-encompassing that we’re all obliged to go along with it to some extent, or risk our livelihoods. The invisible hand of the market is still the hand that feeds us and, much as we’d love to, very few of us are in a position to bite it off. IATEFL is in a similarly delicate position and has to tread carefully. Whether it will take steps towards more direct action, or whether it will increase its platforming of those who advocate change, at least we can start to believe that it understands the unsustainability of the current paradigm. This in itself is encouraging.

 

References

Copley, K. (2018), ‘Neoliberalism and ELT Coursebook Content’, Critical Inquiry in Language Studies, 15:1, pp. 43-62.

Freire, P. (1996), Pedagogy of the Oppressed (revised edition), London: Penguin.

IATEFL (2017), IATEFL’s Missions, Goals and Practices, available from: https://members.iatefl.org/downloads/member_info/IATEFL_mission_goals_practices.pdf [accessed 6 April 2019].

Levitas, R. (ed.), (1986), The Ideology of the New Right, Cambridge: Polity Press.

Monbiot, G. (2016), ‘Neoliberalism – the Ideology at the Root of all our Problems’, The Guardian Online, 15 April 2016, available from: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot [accessed 27/04/2019].