In the book Representation: Cultural representations and signifying practices
(Sage Publications 1997) Stuart Hall defines culture as a set of shared meanings which enable
people to understand and communicate with one another.
In his view these meanings are not static things - for example, objects of high culture with
eternal value - nor are they
simply a collection of particular behaviours or values that characterize a social group.
Instead cultural meanings are
produced and exchanged. Culture, according to Hall is "a process, a set of practices."
(Hall:2) This emphasis on social
practices is important. It refers to the way cultural meanings structure and control social
interaction across every area
of experience, from the most public to the most personal.
Hall sees meaning as being produced and exchanged in various ways:
- group identity and group differences
- personal and social interaction
- mass media and global communications
- everyday rituals and practices of daily life
- narratives, stories and fantasies
- rules, norms and conventions
These different aspects of culture are of course intimately connected - mutually interacting
in the construction and
transmission of social meanings. As if examining an onion, Hall peels away culture to reveal
shared meanings and the
different ways they are produced in a society. He peels away another layer to reveal the
centrality of language in this
whole process. As Hall sees it, meaning relies on representation through language.
What this implies is that words and images have no direct relationship with the things they
symbolize. Representation is a
process of constructing reality - a process that is clearly different across cultures and
historical periods.
The centrality of language for Hall's argument is clearly influenced by structuralist and
post-structuralist philosophy.
The focus on language as a system structured independently from the world of things is
seen quite clearly in Saussure's work
in linguistics - language terms do not correspond directly with the things they refer to,
instead it is the differences
between terms that structure the whole field of meaning.
As Hall points out, Saussure effectively gave birth to a constructionist view of language,
developed later in the work of
philosophers such as Barthes and Foucault. This is in contrast to either (1.) reflective or
(2.) intentional views in which
language conveys meaning directly from (1.) an objective source (the world out there) or (2.)
a subjective source
(inner feeling states).
The constructionist approach to language explains why meaning is so difficult to pin down,
why it shifts across cultures
and different times. Take for example the artwork by Damien Hirst (Hall: 20). In what way is
a sheep preserved in a
see-through tank a 'work of art'? What people forget is that 'art' is not a natural concept.
It is clearly an
institutionalised practice with different meanings shaped by its social context (for example,
religion, aristocracy,
political regime, or bohemian avant-garde).
The shifting nature of meaning has important implications, especially regarding the hallowed
notion of truth. As quoted by
Hall, Foucault argued that, "Each society has its regime of truth, its 'general politics' of
truth: that is, the types of
discourse which it accepts and makes function as true" (Hall: 49). The term "regime of truth"
makes clear the status of
knowledge as power. In this view the educator's role is simply to transmit the kinds of
discourse that the society find
acceptable.
The connection between language and culture was extremely important to me during the two and a
half years I lived and
worked in Japan as an English Language teacher. In order to limit the scope of my discussion,
I will focus my comments
on the place of English language education as I experienced it.
English conversation schools are extremely popular in Japan. The main ones are marketed as
providing the experience of
being in an English speaking culture (Nova's slogan is "Study overseas, near the station").
This 'foreign' culture of
English is of course an artificial construct shaped to meet the expectations of the students,
and bears only a passing
resemblance to the actual social make-up of English-speaking countries.
According to Hall, "Things don't mean: we construct meaning using representational systems -
concepts and signs." (Hall:25)
If we apply this to the experience of teaching in a foreign country, it is not clear who is
teaching whom. The way foreign
teachers are inducted to conversation schools simply assumes they have no need to negotiate
meaning with their students.
Influenced by Western methods of education, most foreign English language teachers in Japan
rely on eliciting individual
differences from students, and encouraging alternative opinions on controversial topics.
Many of their students just as
strongly resist being put into an adversarial position, prefering to communicate in ways that
respect the status of the
various interlocutors and strengthen the communal bonds.
On the other hand there were many times when students felt free to temporarily become 'the
other'. Speaking English gave
them freedom to act differently, to try another role. I realised that students will resist
taking a role that is not
consonant with their idealised self-image. Unfortunately many students were also incapable of
directly questioning the
teacher's actions. The position of the teacher or 'sensei' is a priveliged one in Japan, and
any criticism will be directed
through a third party.
In order to have a feel for the cultural difference, the EFL teacher needs some grasp of the
student's first language.
Knowing that certain distinctions do or do not exist, helps the process of sequencing and
focusing on distinctions in
English. The concept maps of teacher and student will of necessity interact and influence one
another.
The ideas presented by Stuart Hall show that communication is not a spontaneous and natural
occurance even when the
interlocutors share exactly the same concept map. A mutual process of teaching and learning
is involved whenever any
two people attempt to communicate - and much more so when those people come from different
cultural backgrounds.
