{"id":2727,"date":"2011-08-19T15:46:48","date_gmt":"2011-08-19T14:46:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/edtechandtesol.info\/phd\/?p=2727"},"modified":"2011-08-19T15:46:48","modified_gmt":"2011-08-19T14:46:48","slug":"attack-on-the-british-council-office-in-kabul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/?p=2727","title":{"rendered":"Attack on the British Council office in Kabul"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Friday the 19th<\/sup> of August, the British Council office in Kabul was attacked by two suicide bombers. Several people were killed, mostly Afghani policemen. The attack took place on the day marking 92 years of Afghanistan\u2019s independence from the British rule in 1919. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Although the Guardian<\/strong> said that \u201cit was unclear whether the attack was related to the anniversary\u201d, I wonder if the two events were in fact somehow connected, even in a symbolic, unintended way, and if English is indeed such a mortal threat to some that it has to be fought against with bombs and AK-47s.<\/p>\n

So, here are a few re-heated, rhetorical (?) questions: Is English really<\/em> a hegemonic force re-colonising the world? Does it really<\/em> devalue local languages and cultures in order to promote itself as the new lingua franca which only serves the rich and the powerful, i.e. the West? Does teaching it really<\/em> result in educational endeavours and language policies that do not have the interests of non-Western countries at heart? And does it have to be fought against?<\/p>\n

Please, forgive the naivety of the above \u2013 as a teacher of English in an Arab, Muslim country I have to ask myself these questions on a daily basis, but try to retain my basic professional and personal belief that the language I teach to my Arab students does not lead to their \u201cre-colonisation\u201d but instead empowers them and gives them choices which otherwise could be denied to them (English certainly empowered me when I first studied it and discovered the opportunities it opened up to me). \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I do understand that many British TESOL practitioners may wish to distance themselves from the BC as an institution representing government (FO) interests and policies, but I also remember the British Council from its \u201cglory days\u201d in the communist Poland where it offered people access to a language which spelled freedom from political oppression. How paradoxical it is that the same language can mean another kind of oppression to another kind of people.<\/p>\n

I teach English in a country undergoing modernisation and opening up to freedom, but it is also a country where many people, including those studying in Education City, consider English-language education a threat to indigenous values (see below). By the way, the one terrorist attack that took place in Doha (on the 19th<\/sup> of March 2005) was aimed at a British amateur theatre and, most likely as a coincidence but a very significant one, killed an English teacher. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Here is a link to a short article in the Guardian about the British Council\u2019s operations in Kabul.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/world\/2011\/aug\/19\/british-council-do-kabul?intcmp=239<\/a><\/p>\n

And here is a link to an article in an English-language Qatari newspaper about a survey on how western education erodes local culture. \u00a0<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.thepeninsulaqatar.com\/qatar\/152336-survey-western-education-erodes-qatari-culture.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Magda<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Friday the 19th of August, the British Council office in Kabul was attacked by two suicide bombers. Several people were killed, mostly Afghani policemen. The attack took place on the day marking 92 years of Afghanistan\u2019s independence from the British rule in 1919. \u00a0\u00a0 Although the Guardian said that \u201cit was unclear whether the attack was related to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p865eh-HZ","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2727"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/58"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2727"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2727\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2727"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2727"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lantern.humanities.manchester.ac.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2727"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}