Questions about Heller's article

[Hala Jawlakh]

hi,

Ok, here is my impression of what's going on, if anyof you
think some of this stuff is inacurate, or disagree with me,
pls. e-mail me.

Heller usually works w/ English/French bilingualism since she
is in Canada.

Like every regional variety, French in Canada has a more
formal and a less formal form. So, what the francophone
(Quebecois) kids learn at school is a standardized (more
formal/ High) version of the variety that they speak on the
street with their peers.

The town that Hellerstudies with regards the phone call
centers is Bilingual. An asset in a world that sells
bilingualism.

However, The variety of french that that town speaks is a
stigmatized one. Callers from Quebec complain about the "bad"
(ie: different) French that these people use.

But, on the other hand there are schools (bilingual programs)
that teach French to Anglophone speakers. And there is a move
in the Fr. community to consider even 2nd language learners
of Fr. as bilingual. (c.f.the definitions of francophone in
the article targetted at raising money for community
programs). The English kid who learns Fr. in an immersion or
some other bilingual program, will have an advantage over hte
Fr. kid who learns fr. at home and on the street. He only
learns the Standard, Educated, Formal variety and not the
nonstandared one that is stigmatized.  Which means that
conceivably, at one point, firms might perfer to hire an
Englophone who learned french at school to do these jobs.

This theory works because in Canada, unlike the US, they have
the good bilingual programs. Their programs are intended to
teach teh other language, as opposed to the bilingual
programs in the US that are mostly replacive. They want to
make the studnet forget the other language and use English
instead.

One problem with saying that Anglophone bilinguals will
replace the fracophone ones is that regardless who's doing
this, we are talking about dead end jobs that people who are
not so highly trained are taking. For an anglophone speaker
to speak good french, they need a lot of training. (same
fora  francophone to speak good English). They are not paid
so well, so, someone with a lot of training will look for
another job. Hence these dead end jobs go to this town which
is uniquely bilingual.

I hope this is not a lot of crazy ramblings.


---- Original message ----
>Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 17:47:06 -0400
>From: Noriko Akimoto Sugimori <sugimori at BU.EDU>
>Subject: Questions about Heller's article
>To: CDA-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.LINGUISTLIST.ORG
>
>Dear all:
>
>The following are some discussion questions about Heller
(2003).
>
>1. Have you spoken with operators at call centers who speak
languages
>other than English? Have you found tendencies similar to
what Heller found
>about French/English bilingual voice operators? Heller
wrote, "While they
>[bilingual voice operators] say that monolingual
francophones, especially
>those from Quebec, complain about their French, we noted a
tendency to
>standardize their performance when on the lines" (p.484). Do
you have any
>complaints about the language use of the operators? If so,
in what ways?
>How can concepts, such as "authenticity" and "legitimation,"
explain your
>complaints?
>
>2. Heller wrote," Whether students coming out of the
region's immersion
>schools can compete for the area's bilingual jobs, indeed
whether or not
>they want to, given the limited career opportunities
attached to them,
>remians to be seen" (p.484). What is your prediction for the
future
>direction?
>
>
>If you have some questions or discussion topics on Heller's
article,
>please feel free to post them. Thank you.
>
>Sincerely,
>
>Noriko Sugimori
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Hala Jawlakh
University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign