How to Foster Equality in the Language Classroom

Introduction

As world language teachers and researchers, we are fortunate enough to be in a privileged position to fight systemic racism and inequality. Our classroom should be a safe space where all the students not only feel but are ‘actually’ equal and treated fairly. Language instructors should be committed to the goals of preserving and defending human dignity, promoting a peaceful existence among different cultures, of teaching anti-racism principles, and bringing all of these goals into the curriculum. How we teach and what we teach needs to change. For too long, we have been almost afraid of talking about serious and sensitive issues. Nevertheless, now more than ever, it is time to talk about the elephant in the room openly: systemic racism, which exists and destroys our country’s different cultures’ peaceful cohabitation.

The profound crisis that has struck our society in the past year has made us question humanity’s fundamental core values. One crucial step to help solve this crisis is to change our rhetoric and use a language that promotes acceptance and, the classroom is the right place to start doing this. We must recognize the unique opportunity we have by being language teachers. Clearly, all instructors don’t share an identical background. Indeed, some teachers might have experience in being the ‘other’ (the outsider looking in.) Others might know about the ‘other’ but don’t necessarily have the experience of being it. However, all of us collectively, being vectors languages and culture have something in common: we appreciate diversity, welcome the ‘other,’ and look at the world from different perspectives. Our unique opportunity is to bring all this into the classroom and infuse our students with the same principles. We can help our learners understand that there is no ‘other’ and no reason to be troubled by diversity. We can show them that while we might do things differently, we all deserve equal respect.

The language class should be thought of as a journey of discovery of the target language culture and the ‘cultures’ in your classroom. The best approach to promote and teach equality is to create an environment where everybody feels comfortable sharing. To achieve that, we should adopt a culturally responsive teaching approach.

Culturally responsive teaching, also known as culturally relevant teaching, is a pedagogical approach that recognizes the importance of including students’ culture and background in all aspects of learning. It is a methodology that moves away from the traditional teacher-centered classroom, where the teacher is considered the absolute authority in the subject matter, toward a student-centered environment. It is essential to shift the attention from us-teachers- to them – the students- because we really need to know who is in our class to deliver a fair educational experience. As Childers-McKees (2020) says:

Culture is influential, and it should be at the center of all we do in education. It represents who we are; it refers to our traditions, family values, and how we move, eat, dress, dance, and socialize. It is part of our identity, and we can’t separate ourselves from it. Hence when we walk into the classroom, we bring our culture with us, the same way our students bring theirs: