Re: [xmca] Inside Outside

Dear Wolff-Michae:
   
  I enjoyed "Talking Science" a lot, and I agree that it is "real" cultural-historical research. But I think my research is real research too.
   
  A lot of your work uses gesture, and also stress and intonation, to include the way language serves to integrate human activities. My work also looks at this.
   
  Here, for example, is one of my graduate students starting a guessing game in English:
   
  T (showing a picture and pointing to the picture) Look! What's this?
  Ss: Munyeyo. (It's a door.) Door? Matna? (Is that right?)
  T: Right. This is a door. (pretends to open door) A door to...?
  Ss: Chilpan? (Blackboard?) Jibeuroyo (To a house.) Undongjangiyo. (To the playground.) Playground! Heaven! Cheonguk? (Heaven?)
  T: Maybe a door to heaven (upward intonation). Maybe a door to....?
   
  In each T turn there is only ONE new idea (marked by heavy stress). There is also some kind of open question marked by UPWARD intonation.
   
  In each S turn there is a large pool of answers, from which the teacher (and eventually the children too) select one that is appropriate to continue on to the next exchange.
   
  To do this, the teacher uses UP intonation to suggest an entry point for the children and DOWN intonation to suggest the one new idea that has been agreed on.
   
  We see a lot of this in expert teacher talk. Compare:
   
  T (pointing): This is JINHO. (DOWN intonation new information)
  Ss: ...
   
  T (pointing): This is Jinho. WHO'S this? (UP intonation--checking question)
  Ss: Jinho.
   
  T (not pointing): Who's THIS? (DOWN intonation--teacher and children foregrounding familiar information together)
  Ss: Jinho!!
   
  T (holding a picture of Jinho with his new girlfriend): This is Jinho. Now, who's THIS? (DOWN intonation, new character)
  Ss: Moreugessumnida (We don't know)!
   
  To me, it is important that in some cases the teacher gestures and in some cases the teacher relies on intonation, just as it is important that in some cases the teacher relies on intonation and in other cases the teacher relies on lexicogrammar ("Now") and intuition.
   
  I think that the difference between gesture and intonation is well described by saying that gesture is "internalized" as intonation. We use intonation (and stress) to point with our voices the same way that we sometimes use eye contact to point with our eyes. I don't see any problem with saying that one is more internal than the other.
   
  But I also think that the difference between UP intonation and DOWN intonation is well described by saying that UP intonation tends to refer backwards to OLD, SHARED information ("What did you say?") and the other refers to NEW, SHARING information ("What do you say?"). I don't see any problem with saying that one is more internal than the other.
   
  Merely because both questions are made of the same sonic material does not mean that one cannot be more internal than the other. My trouser pocket has an inside and an outside, and both are made of the same material and intimately connected.
   
  One reason that it's useful to talk this way is that we can then HEAR the dynamic change of new information into old. But we can also hear the REITERATION of old information as if it were new information.
   
  T: Good morning, everyone.
  Ss: Good morning, teacher.
  T: How are you...today?
  Ss: I'm fine. Thank you. And you?
  T: Me? I'm so happy today.
  Mingi: Why? (DOWN intonation)
  T: Why? (UP intonation)
  Ss (insisting) Why! Why! (DOWN intonation)
  T: Why? (UP intonation) because it's Saturday! Saturday today!
  Ss: Aha!
  Jinhaeng: Me too!
  T: You too? (UP intonation)
  Ss: Me too! Me too! (DOWN intonation)
   
  In contrast, here is a so-called "native" teacher (actually a "native speaker" teacher, that is, a foreigner) introducing a similar activity:
   
  NT : Nice to meet you. My name is... Actually not my name is. Okay. (points to two students sitting in front of him) Can you stand up? (UP intonation) You, two come here, come here. (pointing to two students) They don't know each other. Who is he? (DOWN intonation) Who is she? (DOWN intonation I'll introduce them, okay? (UP intonation) in English.
   
  This teacher ALSO uses open, unfinished sentences (My name is...), but he uses them to reformulate his own ideas and not to formulate them with the children. This teacher ALSO uses stress and up/down intonation, but it means something very different. "Can you stand up?" simply means a yes/no question, while "who is he?" simply means a Wh-question.
   
  In November, a right-wing Bush clone came to power in Korea, and he is currently using this type of teacher as a kind of wedge to take English teaching out of the hands of Korean teachers. The idea is that this kind of teacher provides more and better "comprehensible input" and this will lead to better subconscious acquisition.
   
  I am doing research to try to show that this is not necessarily happening. Foreign teachers tend to use sentences that are four or five times longer than the utterances used by children, with very little overlap and very little uptake.
   
  Where there is little uptake, there appears to be little take away. The teacher and the children not only speak different languages but they speak different kinds of ENGLISH, and there is very little evidence that one is turning into the other.
   
  I think this is real research not simply because it is consistent with your own work and consistent with that of Vygotsky and with that of Volosinov (both of whom, after all, do use terms like "inside" and "outside"). I think it is real research because there are real jobs at stake here for real people.
   
  David Kellogg
  Seoul National University of Education

       
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Received on Mon Mar 24 22:26 PDT 2008