Symbolic power and the native/non-native dichotomy: Towards a new professional legitimacy

Martine Derivry-Plard

doi:10.1515/applirev-2016-0019

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Symbolic power and the native/non-native dichotomy: Towards a new professional legitimacy

Martine Derivry-Plard

Published/Copyright: August 31, 2016

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From the journal Applied Linguistics Review Volume 7 Issue 4

Abstract

Based on the research literature of the “native/non-native” distinction and on Bourdieu’s notion of field and social action, this paper proposes to use the specific case of foreign language (FL) teaching in the French educational system to conceptualize the FL teaching field as a highly contested space where unequal actors vie for symbolic power and influence. The FL teaching field is organised into two large spaces: one representing state school educational systems, the other representing private language schools. Symbolic power and teaching legitimacies have been jointly constructed giving more power and legitimacy to non-native teachers in state school settings, and more power and legitimacy to native teachers in private language schools. Universities occupy a middle position between the educational settings of the national education systems and the private settings of language schools: the teaching of language to future specialists is still in the hands of non-native speaker teachers whereas the teaching of language to non-language specialists seems more open to native speaker teachers. The “native/non-native” opposition that linguists thought to be relevant linguistically might no longer be a linguistic concept (Paikeday 1985; Davies 1991; Rampton 1990; Cook 1999; Muni Toke 2013), but, as a social construct, this opposition is still very much alive. It serves to design language policies within which actors-teachers of foreign and second languages confront one another. Due to the global deregulation of educational settings, language actors-teachers are therefore put into a highly competitive market: both native and non-native language teachers struggle to be recognized, and essentialist or even racist attitudes have developed into what Holliday (2006) calls “nativespeakerism”. Understanding the structure of the language teaching field worldwide makes it possible to clarify the power struggle and symbolic violence within the field, whose goals and values are paradoxically aimed at mutual understanding through language teaching and cultural mediation – and even more so in the age of multilingualism.

Keywords: symbolic power; FL teaching field; linguistic field; linguistic field of teaching; “native/non-native”; divide; plurilingual/pluricultural paradigm

1 Symbolic power through the FL teaching field

The notions of symbolic power and field are taken from French sociologist Bourdieu as they help understand the specificities of the linguistic field and the linguistic field of teaching. What is meant by linguistic field is that all social activities are performed through languages. The linguistic field of teaching belongs to the linguistic field but is only concerned with the social activities of teaching. Within the linguistic field of teaching, the FL teaching field only deals with languages taught as second or foreign languages by teachers who are “native” or “non-native” speakers of these languages (Derivry-Plard 2015).

The graph below shows the embeddedness of the fields and the ones that concern this paper.

The FL teaching field depends on a larger context, which is the linguistic field of teaching in so far as all teachings activities are always performed through language. Teaching activities and the languages used depend on the linguistic field including all the language forms we know, amounting to 6 000 to 8 000 languages. This linguistic field is multilingual and multicultural per se and is structured by the hierarchy of languages – languages that are recognised as such and languages like “dialects” or “pidgins” that are not recognised as languages. All these languages, forms of languages and repertoires have different statuses due to the history of mankind and to the infinite varieties of linguistic markets. What is striking in the linguistic field is that Latin, a dead language, is still very prestigious and learned whereas languages of today spoken by limited numbers of speakers have no status or prestige and are bound to disappear with little to be done about registering and keeping them as a matter of human knowledge.

It is therefore essential to take into consideration the symbolic power that is endowed on languages of the higher rank, as counting the numbers of speakers cannot be the sole criterion for ranking languages. For example, the Chinese language (Putonghua) should be the first language of the scale if numbers of speakers are retained, however, this language was not even known by European people for centuries. Moreover, sociolinguistics has taught us how complicated and approximate these measurements are as “languages” no longer benefit from a straightforward definition (Blommaert 2010; Coupland 2013; Calvet 2002; Calvet and Calvet 2013; Fairclough 2006). The same can be said of their speakers. O’Rourke et al. (2015) suggest the term “new speaker” to move away from older labels such as “mother tongue”, “native”, “first” or “family” language for language users. However, the term is still problematic. “New speaker” implies “old speaker” and the dichotomy still persists. As this dichotomy pervades either majority or minority languages, the term keeps much alive the monolingual-monocultural paradigm inherent to the development of nation-states and therefore does not provide a post-nationalistic kind of framework for languages and their speakers or users. To go beyond the “mono” paradigm of languages and language learning and teaching, Boyer’s works (2003, 2015) integrated contributions of Labov and Bourdieu by arguing that linguistic markets are the settings of speech communities or the contacts between diverse speech communities and they supply the ground or space for unequal abilities of language users, unequal perceptions and imaginaries of legitimate and illegitimate ways of expression.

Symbolic power deals with people’s representations and perceptions of languages, and as such, can be informed through questionnaires and interviews. People’s representations are incorporated into their linguistic habitus, which is ingrained in their social position, in the form of collective and individual powers in any linguistic market. Symbolic power emanates from people’s minds but it is also clearly linked to geopolitics, and wealthy economies with their powerful languages and cultures disseminate the symbolic power and capital they have accumulated. This overall perspective allows us to appreciate better what is actually occurring and what is not at the level of the FL classroom. The dynamics described by Bourdieu’s conceptual tools highlight the inter-relatedness of fields and of peoples’ habitus on the different levels of investigation mentioned above (FL teaching field, linguistic field of teaching, linguistic field,).

2 Symbolic power and representations

For Bourdieu, symbolic power “as the power to construct a version of reality that is accepted and respected by others” is ingrained in peoples’ worldviews and representations through language. Indeed, language and words act as a kind of semantic Trojan horse that conveys all sorts of attitudes and values that are powerful because they are usually misrecognised as language and not as discourse (Grenfell 2011: 202). In language, so much is taken for granted whereas discourses are always interest-laden according to the linguistic market and to what is at play within the communicative event of social encounters.

s’il est légitime de traiter les rapports sociaux – et les rapports de domination eux-mêmes – comme des interactions symboliques, c’est-à-dire comme des rapports de communication impliquant la connaissance et la reconnaissance, on doit se garder d’oublier que les rapports de communication par excellence que ont les échanges linguistiques sont aussi des rapports de pouvoir symbolique où s’actualisent les rapports de force entre les locuteurs ou leurs groupes respectifs. (Bourdieu 1982: 13–14)
[although it is legitimate to treat social relations –even relations of domination – as symbolic interactions, that is, as relations of communication implying cognition and recognition, one must not forget that the relations of communication par excellence –linguistic exchanges – are also relations of symbolic power in which the power relations between speakers or their respective groups are actualized.
(Bourdieu 1991: 37)]

Participants’ representations can be analysed through interviews or questionnaires and include the schemes of perception that are structured by their habitus as well as by their specific position within the many fields they participate in, each with its specific linguistic market. Learners and teacher are such participants, whose habitus structures and is structured by the linguistic field of teaching and more precisely the FL teaching field. Within the FL teaching field, the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy has been much debated in the last thirty years. The questions raised were first about the linguistic validity of such a category (Paikeday 1985; Davies 1991; Rampton 1990; Cook 1999; Renaud 1998; Singh 1998; Muni Toke 2013), then about the social, psychological, teaching and learning repercussions it has on teachers and learners (Medgyes 1992, Medgyes 1994; Braine 1999, Braine 2010; Llurda 2005, Llurda 2009; Moussu and Llurda 2008; Ma 2012).

There are two main confusions about the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy. The first one is related to the ‘native speaker’, which is used either as a linguistic category or as a social category (Davies 1994, 2013; Derivry-Plard 2006). As a linguistic category, the ‘native speaker’ has been rightly criticised by linguists and applied linguists (Paikeday 1985; Davies 1991; Rampton 1990; Cook 1999; Renaud 1998; Singh 1998; Muni Toke 2013). As a social and political category, the ‘native speaker’ is very much alive as advertising for language schools and language teachers keeps promoting the “native speaker teacher” worldwide and so do the general press or TV broadcasters (Blommaert 2010; Hackert 2012; Muni Toke 2010). This confusion has social implications for the language teacher or the social professional actor ^[1] of language teaching. This confusion entails the second one, which is another very common misperception that equates the speaker with the teacher once the teacher is a language teacher (Derivry-Plard 2014). As teachers usually define themselves as professional linguists, the confusion between linguistic and social category is even more common for FL language teachers. Linguists have coined the confusion and its pervading ideology the ‘native speaker fallacy’ by Phillipson (1992, 2009) or ‘nativespeakerim’ by Holliday (2006), Holliday and Aboshiha (2009), and Kubota (2002).

The whole debate is really about the disadvantages and complementarities of ‘native/non-native’ language teachers. What is also striking with the ‘native/non-native’ divide is that it concerns all languages and all language/FL teachers. As such, the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy belongs to the linguistic field as far as the speaker is ‘native’ or ‘non-native’. It also belongs to the linguistic field of teaching and the FL teaching field as far as the teacher is a ‘native’ or ‘non-native’ speaker of the language used in teaching (the linguistic field of teaching) and of the language used as the object of teaching (Language/FL teaching field) (Derivry-Plard 2015).

As my perspective in this article is about the “native speaker teacher” and the symbolic power attached to institutional/non-institutional language learning, to languages and cultures, to language teachers and learners, I will not discuss the whole debate about the “native speaker” and its historical emergence from a derogatory connotation (the Natives and the Indigenous) to an idealisation and politicisation when it was used by both politicians and linguists in the US for the promotion of the English native speaker in the middle of the nineteenth century (but see Renaud 1998; Hackert 2012; Bonfiglio 2010; Muni Toke 2013 for a review of this debate).

2.1 The learners’ perspectives

In order to outline the social representations concerning FL teachers, two surveys dealing with students’ representations on their FL teachers were carried out in France. One in 1997 was aimed at French learners of English (about 600 respondents) and the other one in 2007 (about 100 respondents) was aimed at international learners of French. Both types of learners were at university levels and they answered the same questionnaire in order to compare their perspectives (Derivry-Plard 2008). The questionnaire was mainly based on closed-ended questions with three main sections: one about themselves (who they were, age, gender, present studies), a second one about how they had studied English so far, if they were committed, worked well in class and outside class. In addition French students of English were asked whether they had had English native speaker teachers. International students of French were asked whether they had had French native speaker teachers during their secondary education. The last section was about their present attitudes towards native speaker teachers knowing that half of the respondents in the 1997 survey didn’t get an English native speaker teacher at the time. All the other students had a native speaker teacher at the time of the surveys. Based on their past experience with native speaker teachers, they were asked closed-questions about their preference if any and then open-ended questions about their feelings, attitudes, opinions (why they had such a preference) about native speaker teachers.

The result expressed in the two surveys from the close-ended questions shows that students clearly prefer a ‘native teacher’ (more than half of them declared such a preference). Furthermore, a content analysis used on the open-ended questions and the students’ answers were compared. Similar results in view of the different contexts were expressed: perceptions towards ‘native speaker teachers’ follow the same line and do not depend on the specific language taught. ‘Native speaker’ teachers were thus perceived as having a greater linguistic competence and this competence was understood as being the most important feature of a language teacher ^[2] compared to the cultural competence, which was valued but as a secondary or minor dimension of language teaching. Greater linguistic competence was first characterised by a better ‘accent or pronunciation’ then by ‘grammar’ and finally by ‘vocabulary’. However, the words used by the students to express the competences of the native/non-native speaker teachers of English or of French were remarkably similar in content. In both corpora ownership of culture was attributed to the ‘native teacher’: he/she represents the culture, so he/she knows better and therefore is a ‘better’ teacher … The same reified dimensions were at work when characterising the linguistic competence. ‘Accent’ represented the main criterion for ‘native speaker’ teachers’ greater linguistic competence. Then, ‘grammar and vocabulary’ combined with the other main criterion (accent) for appraising the ‘native speaker’ teachers’ greater linguistic competence.

These two surveys shed light on social representations of FL language teachers inasmuch as they were not restricted to native-speaker English teachers but were extended and relevant to the whole social notion of ‘native speaker teachers’. These opinions and perceptions of learners regarding ‘native speaker’ teachers have been reported and backed up by other studies as well. I would only cite a few authors. Medgyes (1992) in Europe asked the provocative question: “ native or non-native: who’s worth more?” He then defended the non-native teacher’s competences (Medgyes 1992, Medgyes 1994). Braine (1999, 2010) in the US pointed out the discriminations against non-native speaker teachers of English in the market place. Other studies brought the issue of the English native speaker teacher in other contexts worldwide from Europe to Asia (Llurda 2005; Lasagabaster and Sierra 2002; He and Zhang 2010; Mahboob 2010; Houghton and Rivers 2013; Ma 2012) and the issue is also relevant for the French native speaker teacher (Dervin and Badrinathan 2011).

2.2 The teachers’ perspectives

Teachers’ perspectives on the relative worth of native vs. non-native language teachers echo those of the learners above. They confirm the prevailing superior image of the ‘native speaker’ teacher and his/her greater legitimacy (Derivry-Plard 2015). Even ‘non-native’ speaker teachers recognise the ‘native speaker’ teacher’s legitimacy in explicit or implicit terms (Derivry-Plard 2013). As a general statement, Foreign Language teachers think it an advantage to be a ‘native speaker language teacher’ as exemplified by the following statement from a non-native English speaker teacher in France: the ideal is an English teacher who has a pedagogic sensibility and who is native!

The interviews I conducted were semi-structured and lasted from one to three hours. A thematic content analysis was then carried out, counting occurrences of themes and sub-themes in all interviews. The purpose of interviews was to let teachers reflect on their life and professional experiences and to probe the notion of “native speaker teacher” only if it was not freely commented upon. Based on these interviews of thirty-eight English teachers working at the tertiary level while being part of secondary education (nineteen of them were ‘native speakers’ of English), the thematic content analysis showed that the theme of the ‘native speaker’ teacher predominated in all interviews or in all discourses either from ‘native’ or ‘non-native’ teachers. This result focussing on the theme of the ‘native’ teacher revealed that for language teachers, the ‘native speaker’ teacher was seen as more legitimate as a teacher, being the dominant reference from which teachers have developed their professional discourses. All responses addressed the issue of non-native teachers, but only a small number of them acknowledged that native and non-native teachers had complementary roles or that both types of teachers were in fact the same professionals with no salient differences.

Furthermore, the professional discourse of these English teachers worked on binary oppositions imbued with value judgements: positive judgements came first when native teachers spoke about native teachers, and when non-native teachers spoke about themselves. However, non-native teachers were more critical of themselves than the native teachers were. The data revealed strong oppositions between teachers, expressing in a very significant way the “little warfare” (Price 2000) traditionally mentioned between foreign language teachers when they overtly or implicitly criticize their colleagues. When analysing these value judgements, the same categories expressed by learners were at work but in a more elaborated discourse.

‘Non-native’ teachers were extremely critical of the teaching competences of their native colleagues: “they have perfect command of the language but they are poor teachers”, “they do not know how to teach and assess their learners”, “they do not know how to explain grammar, or how to adjust to the learners’ abilities and needs” and “some teachers do not teach!”. ‘Native speaker’ teachers are thus, perceived primarily as ‘native’ speakers and not as teachers, which illustrates the confusion mentioned earlier between the ‘speaker’ and the ‘teacher’. More specifically, these perceptions convey the symbolic violence addressed towards their ‘native’ colleagues as unable to be ‘real teachers’ (Derivry-Plard and Griffin 2016). In other words, the ‘natural’ link they have with the language even hampers their teaching competence since it seems to imply that teaching competence is the fruit of some natural endowment and not a hardwon ability sanctioned by an institution. Non-native speakers devalue the native speakers’ competence in teaching English, as if teaching was the exclusive prerogative of non-native speakers.

As for ‘native speaker’ teachers, their main criticisms were about the insufficient linguistic competence of ‘non-native’ English speaker teachers: they cannot speak as well as a ‘native’ speaker as “it’s second language, it’s second-hand!”. Their “accent can be awful and barely understandable”, they make “a lot of grammar and vocabulary mistakes”. ‘Non-native speaker’ teachers are thus, perceived primarily as ‘non-native’ speakers and therefore as second-class teachers, which illustrates again the confusion mentioned earlier between the ‘speaker’ and the ‘teacher’. More particularly, these perceptions convey the symbolic violence addressed towards their ‘non-native’ colleagues as unable to be ‘real’ speakers (Derivry-Plard and Griffin 2016). Native speakers devalue the non-native speakers’ competence in speaking English, as if speaking good English was the exclusive prerogative of native speakers.

Thus, non-native teachers are critical of the teaching competence of their ‘native’ colleagues whereas the ‘native’ teachers criticize the linguistic and cultural competence of their ‘non-native’ colleagues. Symbolic violence is at play, reducing the ‘native speaker’ teacher to a ‘speaker’ who is denied any teaching competence, and the ‘non-native’ speaker teacher to a ‘teacher’ who is a ‘non-speaker’. All these misconceptions and misrepresentations are insidious and usually implicit. They have been well documented and deconstructed for the last thirty years and yet as Llurda (2009) said we are still writing about the “decline and fall of the native speaker teacher”.

3 The FL teaching field

In order to understand how these misperceptions are deeply rooted in our minds and hearts, one must consider the historical dynamics of the three fields (linguistic field, linguistic field of teaching, FL teaching field), which have structured the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy throughout time and space., and will focus on the FL teaching field.

As a general principle, the demand for teachers of foreign languages is linked to the dominant diplomatic, military and economic powers of the time (for example Chinese in Asia with the spread of Chinese characters in ancient times, Latin in the European Middle Ages, the development of Portuguese, Spanish and Italian languages with the European Renaissance, French in eighteenth century Europe, and English in the twenty-first century global world). The demand for language teachers is representative of the demands for languages within the linguistic field. The slow shaping of formalised languages and their standard norm is directly associated with the progressive construction of the linguistic field of teaching allowing any kind of instruction in a standard, legitimate language and of the FL teaching field allowing Foreign Languages to be taught only in their standard, legitimate variety. These processes reached a climax as a unified stable field of standard languages to be used and taught in nineteenth and twentieth century Europe with the support of the nation-states and their divisions of ‘public and private’ spaces.

3.1 The first principle of division of the FL teaching field: public vs. private

In fact, more or less all European countries created free and compulsory primary education for all from the nineteenth century onwards, and with the development of secondary education for the flourishing bourgeoisie, foreign language teaching progressively occupied two distinct spaces, that of secondary education and that of the private language schools like Berlitz.

Along with these changes, the terms ‘language masters, governesses, private tutors’ were to be replaced by ‘language professors and teachers’ (Fernandez Fraile 2005). The institutionalisation of educational systems in nineteenth century Europe entailed the steady institutionalisation of the FL teaching field. FL language teachers were recruited following standardised and strict procedures. Being a native of the country and a national citizen was an undeclared prerequisite (only nationals could instruct within the schooling system). On the other hand, language schools were not submitted to the strict procedures of the state and could employ ‘native speaker’ teachers. When European educational systems emerged under the powerful supervision of the nation-states (Thiesse 1999; Hackert 2012), two distinct foreign language teaching spaces were established: institutional and non-institutional. Non-native teachers were recruited in state-controlled educational institutions, whereas native teachers were more likely to be found in language schools or non-institutional education. For years, there were no exchanges between these two foreign language spaces in Europe, following a strict partition imposed by the states. However, two professional legitimacies developed at the same time, taking into consideration the different positions of the language teachers.

The following table summarises the structure of the language teaching field that was created in the nineteenth century in Europe with the formalisation of language teaching and which has spread worldwide and has functioned accordingly until now ^[3]:

Language taught as	Educational contexts	‘Native speaker teacher’	‘Non-native speaker teacher’
L1 (mother tongue)	Institutional	Very likely	Very unlikely
	Commercial	Very likely	Very unlikely
L2 (second language)	Institutional	Very likely	Very unlikely
	Commercial	Very likely	Very unlikely
FL (foreign language)	Institutional	Quite unlikely	Very likely
	Commercial	Very likely	Quite unlikely

What has to be underlined is that the same organisation prevails for languages taught as a L1 or L2 either in institutional or commercial contexts: the ‘native speaker teacher’ is taken as given. However, in grey in the table, the organisational structure is reversed once the language is taught as a FL in institutional contexts: the ‘non-native speaker teacher’ is the one who is taken as given.

Until recently, the structure of the FL teaching field has hardly changed as state educational systems favour their ‘nationals’ and therefore, ‘non-native’ FL language teachers continue to occupy the institutional space predominantly even though the borders between states and within states are challenged by economic globalisation (Houghton and Rivers 2013; Kramsch 2014; Derivry-Plard 2015). So, the first principle of division of the FL teaching field is expressed through the institutional/non-institutional spaces related to the two types of FL teachers being ‘native’ or ‘non-native’ of the language taught.

3.2 The second principle of the FL teaching field: ‘native’ vs. ‘non-native’

If the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy belongs to the linguistic field as a historical construction based on binary cultural oppositions such as ‘we’ and ‘them’, or ‘civilised’ and ‘barbarian, it also belongs to the linguistic field of teaching and is even more salient within the FL teaching field.

For years, there were no exchanges between the institutional and the non-institutional spaces, which followed a strict partition imposed by the French State or in other nation-states. ‘Non-native’ teachers of FL complied with the school or education curriculum. They dealt with young learners and had compulsory courses imposed on them. They prepared their learners for the diplomas and certificates validated by the nation-states and were appointed to the schools with diplomas and certificates in use in the country. They had their own methods and objectives and their own public of young leaners. Conversely, ‘native’ teachers of FL complied with the criteria of the language schools and their business requirements. They dealt more with adult learners who chose to attend these courses for professional or personal reasons. These teachers eventually prepared their learners for private certificates, which did not need to be accredited by the state. They had their own methods, objectives and public of adult learners. These teachers were not required to have certificates or diplomas recognised by the country they worked in. So there was no exchange between the two settings, which were strongly separated. At the same time, two professional legitimacies emerged and developed, taking into consideration the different positions of the foreign language teacher:

The professional legitimacy of ‘non-native’ teachers in institutional spaces was based on the assumption that they were the ‘best’ teachers as they went through the same learning process as their pupils and would be better able to explain the target language to learners sharing the same ‘mother tongue’. This is the legitimacy of the FL teacher as a learning model, which is still currently at work.
The professional legitimacy of ‘native’ teachers in non institutional spaces was based on the opposite assumption that they were the ‘best’ teachers because they taught their own ‘mother tongue’ and that they knew more about it. This is the legitimacy of the FL teachers as a language-culture model, which is still currently at work.

These two FL teaching legitimacies functioned within each teaching space and were not challenged for years. They still prevail in each space and account for the second principle of division of the FL teaching field. Thus, the FL teaching field is structured along the institutional/non-institutional divide and the ‘native/non-native’ teacher divide associated with two FL teaching legitimacies.

The FL teaching field and its two social principles of division

Institutional	Non-institutional
(educational systems)	(language schools)
‘non-native’ teachers	‘native’ teachers
with the legitimacy of the learning model	with the legitimacy of the language model

However, the ‘public’ and ‘private’ spheres have been steadily eroded with the breakthrough of economic globalisation and the marketing of educational systems worldwide at the end of the twentieth century. This overall political trend accounts for increasing tensions between native and non-native FL teachers as strict educational boundaries between institutional and non-institutional educations have collapsed and fierce competition has taken over.

4 Going beyond the monolingual, monocultural paradigm and the ‘native/non-native’ dichotomy within the FL teaching field

There is, nonetheless, a reshuffling of perceptions within the FL teaching field. The structure of the field still shapes our perceptions but is at the same time shaken by a currently globalising market of language teachers that enforces fierce competitive opportunities and the blurring of the private/public spheres. These perceptions are also undermined by the growing acknowledgement that the world is diverse, more multilingual and multicultural (Lüdi and Py 2003). These two driving forces (economic globalisation vs diversity) are conflicting and are the current challenges within the FL teaching field (Derivry-Plard et al., 2014a, 2014b; Kramsch 2014).

Developing a radically new professional legitimacy based on teaching expertise and qualifications inscribed in plurilingual and pluricultural teaching and learning repertoires should help counterbalance the excessive limitations of marketing attitudes towards language teachers that tend to reinforce essentialist dichotomies such as the ‘native/non-native’ one and the symbolic violence that accompanies them (Kramsch 2009; Derivry-Plard 2011; Zarate et al. 2011; Coste et al. 2013; Liddicoat and Scarino 2013).Today, even though non-native FL teachers outnumber native FL teachers worldwide, in particular in English, the model of the ‘ideal monolingual native speaker’ is still extremely powerful while communication in all languages is expanding through the growth of Internet and ICT and increasing migrations. Denying the complexities of reality, the monolingual, monocultural paradigm still functions as a very powerful doxa or ideology of ‘native-speakerism’ that can be easily supported by neo-liberal economic interests. However, acknowledging the plurilingual, pluricultural paradigm will allow teachers and learners to accept their intercultural, plurilingual repertoires whatever their gender, race, religion or ‘native’ language.

5 Symbolic power of language teachers: Towards a new professional legitimacy

Strongly equipped with the history of language teaching and the formation of the different fields (linguistic, linguistic field of teaching and language teaching field), language teachers need to develop a new professional legitimacy to meet the demands of a world that is more multilingual and multicultural and of learners who are more plurilingual and pluricultural ^[4] (Derivry-Plard 2015). To address these new challenges, they have to build new professional competences that take into account the cultural and intercultural dimension of language and of language teaching. First, the new plurilingual and pluricultural paradigm asserts continua to be substituted to dichotomies. Second, professional legitimacy can no longer be associated with reified notions of language and of culture that have been part and parcel of the monolingual paradigm and the advent of the native/non-native divide. Whether they are native or non-native, language teachers are qualified teachers, engaged in building plurilingual and pluricultural repertoires, facilitating the learning experience in specific contextualised educational settings. Working on language teacher training and its reconceptualization is the main issue of intercultural education programmes that flourish all around the globe. Teacher training for language teachers has to develop its own participation in symbolic power by facilitating and mediating communication across languages and cultures and by creating its own hybrid or third spaces through telecollaborative activities, ^[5] joined teams of teacher trainers and researchers, common degrees and certificates within the international educational field. Symbolic power does not exist per se but is expressed through the dynamic structure of the fields, in particular through the language teaching field from which emerges its own definition of the legitimate and competent, language teacher. This new dynamic in language and culture teaching creates new conditions of professional legitimacy of linguacultural teachers that teachers and researchers have to seize and develop through professional rationale and statements:

This means that symbolic power does not reside in ‘symbolic systems’ in the form of an ‘illocutionary force’ but that it is defined in and through a given relation between those who exercise power and those who submit to it, i.e. in the very structure of the field in which belief is produced and reproduced. What creates the power of words and slogan, a power capable of maintaining or subverting the social order, is the belief in the legitimacy of words and of those who utter them. And words alone cannot create this belief.
(Bourdieu 2001: 170)

In other words, symbolic power resides in the interrelationship between the individual language teacher and the different symbolic systems and fields he/she deals with as a social actor within a specific position. In order to develop symbolic power, global language teachers need to change their own perceptions of legitimacy to empower teachers and learners alike with the language multi-faceted learning experience. Words are symbolically important but they are not enough. They need to be supported with a set of new social belief and practice in order to subvert ancient traditions and unquestioned power attached to them. New communities of practices and their symbolic power will emerge through the step-by-step development of a language teaching legitimacy free of any given or taken from granted ‘native/non-native’ divide.

A lot of scholars in language learning and teaching are investigating the new ‘pluri’ paradigm and research seems particularly fruitful worldwide in dealing with different aspects of interculturality within languages and cultures and within language learning and teaching. As language teaching becomes a much more complex endeavour once language, cultures and symbolic power are progressively better understood, researchers and teachers need to work together in order to build their professional legitimacy within a lingua-cultural teaching field subsuming language and language teaching traditions in order to meet the challenges of a more multicultural or super-diverse world (Derivry-Plard 2015). The notions of multiculturality, diversity, interculturality and pluriculturality have also to be closely analysed in the way they circulate from one context to another, from one language to another as their meanings refer to different scholastic, research and political fields. As ideas and concepts and their potential misunderstandings flow as fast as ever nowadays with the digital age, the symbolic power attached to these notions has also to be probed and related to individuals and institutions in the kind of relational analysis advocated for by Grenfell (2011). As I have tried to argue in this paper the following points are of paramount importance:

looking not only at teachers or actors but at fields and how they influence the habitus of teachers, administrators and parents … – taking an historical view of the development of fields, of the national/international/global spheres, and of the private/public spaces.
considering the symbolic struggles among fields, perceptions and beliefs among actors using languages as speakers or as professionals.

In sum, if the focus in Applied Linguistics has been on individual teachers’ efficiency and proficiency, this is time to look at issues of professional legitimacy in training. Language teachers and of any language taught or used within a plurilingual/pluricultural paradigm should embrace World Languages with all the intra and inter hierarchies of language or repertoires in the necessary dialogic attitude between research and teaching, between teaching and learning, between languages and cultures and the symbolic power that these different domains convey.

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Published Online: 2016-8-31

Published in Print: 2016-11-1

Articles in the same Issue

https://doi.org/10.1515/applirev-2016-0019

Keywords for this article

symbolic power; FL teaching field; linguistic field; linguistic field of teaching; “native/non-native”; divide; plurilingual/pluricultural paradigm