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Posts: 316

Shifu

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Q: Do you think its racism or not ?

All the job offers i have read through on this website are all for native speaker, English,American,Canadians, Australians, new Zealand. So the Asian countries which were under the British rule once, they have the English language as their official and for education as well. they can speak it very well and under the grammer to its best.

SO WHY THEY ARE NOT OFFERED WITH THE ENGLISH TEACHING JOBS THEN.

11 years 35 weeks ago in  Culture - Qingdao

 
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Posts: 461

Shifu

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It's not a matter of racism....gosh this word is really used for any context nowadays, which really make Apartheid looks like a common event...

 

I presume the reason is mainly because people who want to learn English, usually refer to countries in which English is not only the country's official language, but also ia country which has always had great English teaching traditions, either for professional or for academic reasons.

If I want to learn English, I would choose one of the countries you mentioned above (including the UK), but I won't waste my money to go to for instance Malta or Singapore to learn English. The same when you're learning French, you go to France, Canada, Switzerland, Belgium, but you don't go to Senegal or Algeria,even though French is one of the official languages.

There is nothing racist, it's just the demand that makes it like that.

What is racist is if when coming from one of the countries above, they choose you over an other candidate, because you're white as opposed to black, Latino, or else..

By the way, from the way you asked your question, you cannot make me believe that your English is a good as a native speaker and you would find yourself suitable as an English teacher. It doesn't make sense at all.

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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Emperor

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Personally, I don't think it is racism, but perception. I won't go so far as to say that native speakers of any language are the best, however, let's start there. If one is a native speaker, in this case of English, and one is qualified to teach others how to learn that language, then it would make sense on every level to have those teach students. However, both qualifications must be met; native speaker and teaching qualifications. 

 

That being said, there are many people in every English country who have regional accents. In America, Southerners speak differently from Mid-westerners, who sound different from North-easterners or those from the west coast (California, Oregon, and Washington State). So, one could be qualified to teach, but have a heavy regional accent, which would affect the way that they teach their students oral language, unless the individual was aware of their own accent and took steps to learn what used to be known as a "mid-atlantic" pronunciation. This is what radio and television announcers are taught to speak. Here, the object is to get rid of accent, and to produce the sounds of the letter combinations as they were intended. Inherent in this training is the proper stress and intonation of the English language, as well as the proper grammatical structure of phrases and words. 

 

This is inherent over a life-time of experience with any native language, something which takes time and exposure to in order to master. You can begin to see why someone who may have been taught English from a very early age, but whose native tongue is another language (such as Chinese) would have some problems, particularly with pronunciation and grammar.

 

I said all that to say this, and please understand this is not so much a criticism as it is an observation. Having met and talked to many Chinese teachers who teach on the collegiate level, I have yet to meet one who spoke really good English. Most have a limited vocabulary, and their grammar is passable, at best. I still have to slow down my speaking so that they can understand what I am saying, and I try to avoid any slang or idioms in my speech in order not to confuse them. As I said, these are teachers at colleges and universities.

 

The above just begins to point out the problems and misconceptions on the part of native speakers who feel their command of the language is as good as a native speaker, but if they were to record and play back their own voice and listen with an objective ear, they would soon discover that they are not as good as they thought they were.

However, a simple answer to your question is, no, it's not racism, but simply a case of matching up the best "product" to supply the need.

rasklnik:

Mid Atlantic is actually bad. Most people prefer a mid-western accent like Obama.

11 years 35 weeks ago
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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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Is it racism? Yes, technically it is.

Is it justified racism, most definitely.

 

Now why is it justified?

 

Your post contained this item:

 

So the Asian countries which were under the British rule once, they have the English language as their official and for education as well. they can speak it very well and under the grammer to its best.

 

That has a LOT of errors, 

 

they have the English language as their official LANGUAGE

under grammer to its best  - sorry that makes no sense at all, I assume you mean "and with perfect grammAr.

 

Sorry to cherry pick your English as no doubt it is much better than my Chinese, but your post has proven quite succinctly why so many companies want native English speakers. Our English isn't perfect and some of the speakers are not very good teachers, but on average the language abilities are superior to a non-native speaker, and the teaching abilities, well, that is something the employers should, in my opinion, pay more attention to.

 

 

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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exactly how is this depriving you of anything you have a right to? are you not allowed to eat? are you being deprived of political power? oh wait you are benefiting from discrimination when it comes to chinese  (that is ok, you can live with that) but when you you are the victim of discrimination (not racism) it is not cool. 

get over it.

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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funny thing is

in Australia we don't get into the grammar in a great way till university which shows in most of my posts

I have met plenty of Africans and Asians who speak better and clearer than most people I know at home.

in fact about 6 years ago I was going through the airport in Singapore and asked a lady how much were the ear rings in a display case and she replied in a well spoken English 

I remember saying  to myself    you idiot   they speak better English than you do here.

In general I  think that not only is your nationality judged but also your accent. 

 

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1142

Shifu

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Private school make money. White folks make the school money. Thus they hire them. Even though the white woman is from Kazakhstan and talks through her nose, she is hired over a black man with a degree in English.

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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I'd be much more on your side if your post didn't contain so many gramar errors! You 'under' the grammar?.... well, I understand how to speak the language.

 

Look, in all seriousness, I can understand the 'wanting a native speaker' thing because they're guaranteed to get somebody who can speak the language properly. It makes sense. They're guaranteed not to get somebody who's on their high horse about how incredibly awesome their English is while making multiple mistakes in a short space.

 

What drives me insane is when they make the "native speaker = caucasian' mistake because it's so backwards.

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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Shifu

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eveything is considered racism these days if you dont like obama s policiies the left calls u a racist if u didnt like bushes polices it ok  really dont get it

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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  Yeh, excuse me for being pedantic, but i'm going to chuck up your advert and underline the mistakes. Going to ignore punctuation and the like and focus on your general English as though you were speaking.

 

Do you think its racism or not ?

All the job offers i have read through on this website are all for native speaker, English,American,Canadians, Australians, new Zealand. So the Asian countries which were under the British rule once, they have the English language as their official (     )and for education as well. they can speak it very well and under the grammer to its best.

SO WHY THEY ARE NOT OFFERED WITH THE ENGLISH TEACHING JOBS THEN.

 

  Ironically I am not picky in the classroom, but focus on fluency and comprehension. A good friend of mine is not a native English speaker and his English is pretty shaky in places, but his students make fast progress under his instruction. Unfortunately employers rarely prioritize in this way when selecting new teachers. But I wouldn't call it racism.

 

 

 

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
Posts: 458

Shifu

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Yes, this is a type of racism. No doubt about it. And I find it very ignorant to be an apologist for this. The simple reason is that the problem has to do with fluency and qualifications. If I were a native French speaker with poor fluency and grammar knowledge of English then, no, I should not be employed as an English teacher. However, if I, as that same person, speak English fluently and have recognised qualifications to teach then I should be considered as equal, and probably better suited to teaching, than an English native speaker with no qualifications or awareness of learning a second language. That fact that so many 'teachers' in China are white native English speakers without qualifications to teach shows clearly the racist hiring policies throughout this country.

 

When I worked in Urumqi, two qualified candidates were turned away because 'they didn't look American' enough, meaning that being of Indian descent these two people were not considered native speakers despite having been born, raised and educated in America. FUCKING DISGUSTING! And I said as much at the time to my employer.

 

The language centre my girlfriend works for now in Hanoi in a professional organisation and hires non-native English speakers IF they meet the same qualification criteria as the native speakers. What a breath of fresh air. It is shameful of China to support such racist hiring policies.

 

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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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I'm a very white British gentleman (Celtic) who's been speaking English for at least 60 years.   I've lost count of the number of teaching jobs that I've been offered.   I can't teach and therefore have declined all offers.   I'm disappointed that being a native English speaker and white is seen as the most important criteria for teaching English in China, very racist..   I wonder how many unqualified so called English teachers there are in China.

So it's fine to take advantage of greed and niavety and forget about giving the kids the benefit of decent teaching.

rasklnik:

-Well since many jobs say the ideal candidate is white, has breasts and is under 30, is she unqualified?  You forget that English teaching in China isn't brain surgery, but an advertising driven market, of parents who can't understand what their children learn usually anyway.

-Case in point. I hire a house painter. He ruins my floors and furnishings, and paints every room the wrong colour. I know he sucks at his job.

-How does a 65 year old grandmother know I'm a good English teacher? She doesn't.

-Private schools are ignorant and arrogant. We all know this. Blaming foreigners is NOT the answer. Blame the naive parents and the corrupt, greedy private schools.

 

 

11 years 35 weeks ago
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mArtiAn:

  Well I can tell you that there are quite a few of us unqualified English teachers in China. But if you've been playing the guitar for 20 years, you probably know how to teach a tune.

11 years 35 weeks ago
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11 years 35 weeks ago
 
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