English Language In Rural Malaysia: Situating Global Literacies In Local Practices

Abstract

This paper claims that underlying the naturalisation of teaching and learning of English in theMalaysian education system are ideological pressures and political dogmas, often emerging fromcolonial, urban/rural and even local ethnic conflicts and hierarchies. It suggests therein lie theinherent difficulties of teaching and learning English in rural communities in Malaysia. Threeparadigms frame this view in the paper: the overarching view of literacy as a situated andvariable social process; the use of an ethnographic perspective in investigating English languageand literacy education in Malaysia; the stance on the need for Malaysians to acquire English asan additive rather than as a deficit philosophy