I was lucky enough to spend most of my teaching career sharing the enjoyment of classical literature with pupils and students. Going to a grammar school in the forties had opened “the canon” to me and I felt privileged to continue the tradition by introducing the great works of English literature to the next generation. My last experience of literature teaching was sitting in deckchairs in the garden of a Cambridge college sharing the experience of English poetry with teachers from the Soviet Union, who were brought up in the same “Cultural heritage” tradition. It was so enjoyable that it felt superfluous to be paid for it.
However, I had long felt uncomfortable with the lack of theoretical structure underpinning the teaching of “English”, not least the total separation of English language from English literature. When I discovered Stylistics in the seventies, I seized eagerly on this link between the two. (Stylistics is the linguistic examination of literary texts.)At last the discussion has taken a big leap forward. I have just read a paper* by members of “the Sydney School”, which unpacks the assumptions which still dominate the teaching of literature in secondary schools (a paradigm fiercely defended by the National Association of Teachers of English).
The writers argue that, although success in English is a passport to a privileged education, its nature is “elusive, its mastery not available to many students. A powerful invisible pedagogy often applies, such that what is evaluated as success is tacitly understood, rather than clearly articulated.” This beautifully describes the source of my discomfort with traditional English teaching.
The writers take two exam answers at GCSE level, one from the UK and one from Australia, and “unpack” them, using the insights of Structural Functional Linguistics to reveal the grammatical structures that are awarded high marks and also the attitudes implicit in highly valued answers. They say rightly that, although the exam questions invite an open response, the way the answers are marked show that some answers are more equal than others.
For example, the sentence structures that are rewarded with high marks are complex sentences with relative clauses, dense nominal groups and clauses in apposition. At the level of the word, metaphors, abstract words and words denoting appraisal convey an overarching meaning about life and/or society which is “narrativized” by the story.
Further, it is clear that pupils who score high marks are familiar from their reading with the kind of literary demands made of them. Every English teacher is aware of this, but the precision of the examples move the discussion on to a higher plane. I share the writers’ view that, as with the abstract language taught in Breakthrough to Learning, if the teacher can describe the linguistic features that are awarded high marks, she can teach them, so giving the less privileged pupils a passport to success.
Like all the papers in this book, this is written for scholars in the same school, using their own arcane terminology. I have translated it in this summary, so that teachers with some knowledge about language from whatever source have a chance of grasping what the paper is about. It is a very important contribution to the demystification of “English” teaching and I hope someone will write up the contents so that English teachers can engage with the ideas and the potential transformation of practice which it makes possible.
*Frances Christie and Mary Macken-Horarik: Building verticality in subject English, in ed. Frances Christie and J.R. Martin (2007) Language, Knowledge and Pedagogy, Continuum