---
title: 'Re-reversing priorities in language teaching'
url: 'https://rethunk.englishup.me/priorities'
markdown: 'https://rethunk.englishup.me/priorities.md'
date: '2020-06-01'
description: 'Re-reversing priorities in language teaching Roy Harris notes that rethinking language teaching will require undermining the traditional position of the language teacher. Traditional language teaching defines communities by their language thereby making the teaching of the language of the community…'
---

# Re-reversing priorities in language teaching

Roy Harris notes that rethinking language teaching will require undermining the traditional position of the language teacher. Traditional language teaching defines communities by their language thereby making the teaching of the language of the community easier to handle than if communities were defined otherwise. Harris describes this as a reversal of natural priorities and promotes his approach of integrational linguistics where a community

> "in which individual and collective activities are integrated in part by means of verbal signs is *eo ipso* a linguistic community". Harris 2009:43

This would mean that

> "such a community has no determinate membership and includes a vast range of disparate verbal and nonverbal abilities. Such communities overlap and intermingle: they do not divide up neatly, either geographically or grammatically." Harris 2009:43

What would language teaching look like if we did not ignore this complexity and did not define communities by reference to languages?

What would replacing notions of discrete linguistic communities by notions of the linguistics of contact look like? Would it be along the lines of translanguaging for example?

Why is this important? Because defining communities with reference to language

> "feeds the taproots of ethnocentrism, nationalism, social discrimination and many of the nastier forms of politics; as well as the cultural imperialism that nowadays promotes the notion of a miraculously neutral ‘world language’ (coincidentally called ‘English’) already in place." Harris 2009:45

Maybe the work on race and language offers another framework for language teaching? Do have a read of the paper [Worth the Risk: Towards Decentring Whiteness in English Language Teaching](https://ojs-o.library.ubc.ca/index.php/BCTJ/article/view/345) by JBP Gerald which inspired this post.

**References:**

Harris, R. (2009). Implicit and explicit language teaching. In Toolan, M. (Ed.), *Language Teaching : Integrational Linguistic Approaches* (pp. 32-54). Routledge.

---

## Navigation

- Previous: [Post humanist nods](https://rethunk.englishup.me/post-humanism.md)
- Next: [Assumption of progress in language teaching](https://rethunk.englishup.me/progress.md)