Spoken English Language of Native Children – A Canadian Perspective
Abstract
Reading S.6. Harris’s timely article summarizing recent work in bilingual education (1) prompted me to write for readers of The Aboriginal Child at School, this brief report of part of a project I carried out in Canada in 1972/73. In particular, Harris’s reference to Susan Philips’s work (2) reminds us all of the complex and vexed matter of social contexts governing the use of language. It may be of interest to teachers of Aboriginal children to read examples of language interactions between white and native, and native and native people in several contexts, from another country which has similar ‘pluralistic’cultural problems – Canada.
References
Harris S.G. : Beyond common sense in bilingual education, The Aboriginal Child at School, 3 (4), 1975, 3.
op.cit., 13 and Philips S.U. : Participant structures and communication competence, in Cazden J. (Ed.) Functions of Language in the Classroom, Teachers College Press , New York, 1972.
A Pilot Study of the Spoken English of White and Native Students in School and Home, commissioned by the School Trustees’ Board, Saskatchewan, Canada, 1973
Harding D.W. : Experience into Words, Chatto & Windus, 1963.
Britton J. : Language and Learning, Pelican, 1970 .
Mead G.H. : Mind, Self and Society, University of Chicago , 1934.
Basso K.H. : To give up on words, Southwestern Journal of Anthropology , Autumn, 1970.
