Novitas-ROYAL,
2008, Vol.: 2 (1), 28-48.[i]
THE
ATTITUDE AND THE IMPACT OF THE AMERICAN ENGLISH AS A GLOBAL LANGUAGE WITHIN THE
SAUDI EDUCATION SYSTEM
Abstract: This paper investigates the impact of 9/11 on the educational system
in
Keywords:
educational
system, September 11, culture, language, hidden curriculum, Saudi Arabia.
Özet: Bu çalışma 11 Eylül
saldırısının Suudi Arabistan eğitim sistemi üzerindeki
etkilerini araştırmayı amaçlamaktadır. Özellikle, meydana
gelen bu olayın Suudi Arabistan toplumu ve eğitim sistemi üzerindeki
etki sürecini, Arap dilbilimcilerin daha çok İngilizce daha az İslam
görüşü ışığında incenmesi hedeflenmiştir. Bu
çalışma ayrıca, Suudi Arabistan, Cidde’deki Kral Abdül Aziz
Üniversitesinin birinci sınıfında okuyan Suudi öğrencilerin
katılımında yapılmış bir durum
çalışmasını kapsar. Yeni müfredatla İngilizce
öğrenen, birinci yılın ikinci dönemindeki 65 Suudi
öğrenciyle ilgili konuya dair 12 maddelik bir anket
uygulanmıştır. Sonuçlar, gençliğin Batılı
ideolojiye, İngilizce öğrenmeye ve Batı kültürüne
karşı duygularına dair önemli bulgular sağlamaktadır.
Bulgular sadece ilgili örneklemle sınırlı olsa da
görülmüştür ki, katılımcıların büyük
çoğunluğu İngilizce bilgilerini artırmak amacı ile
İngiliz dili ve kültürünü öğrenmenin gerekli olduğunu
düşünmektedir.
Anahtar
Sözcükler: eğitim sistemi, 11 Eylül, kültür, dil, örtük program, Suudi
Arabistan.
Global terror demands a global solution. …
Condoleezza Rice[1]
April 29, 2002
1.
INTRODUCTION
After the
September 11 terrorist attacks and the revelation by the US Government that the
19 hijackers were Muslim Arabs, mostly from Saudi Arabia, “the editorial pages
of American newspapers have been full of articles discussing Arab educational
systems, and particularly Saudi schools” (Friedman, 2001). According to Freidman, these writers proclaim
that the educational institutions in the Arab world foster a mind-set of
intolerance and even hostility towards the West, so “these institutions deserve
much of the blame for fostering anti-U.S. terrorism” (p. 13, 2002). This paper is divided into five sections:
Section 1 will discuss the pressure immerged from this particular incident upon
the
1.1.
Saudi Arabia Faces
Questions and Suspicious on its Religious Regime
Since the
dramatic events of September 11,
Consequently,
several commentaries and news reports were raising doubts on the role of the
education system in producing Islamic extremists. The reason behind these
doubts on Saudi religious education is mainly because these acts have been
committed in the name of Allah,[6]
and hence, in the name of Islam, the religion of
Therefore, because of these increasing suspicious beliefs in blaming the religious educational system and policy in the K.S.A., Karmani (2005) believes that “an extraordinary unparalleled degree of pressure has been escalating on Muslim government [by the United States of America] to reform its educational curricula, the underlying belief being that current educational system in place in the Muslim world was partly responsible for motivating the terrorist attacks,” (p.262) in New York and Washington, D.C. respectively. Interestingly, in the same article written by Sohail Karmani[8] on ‘English, “Terror’, and Islam’, he provides a concrete example on his claims from the Congress published in June 2002, (H. Con. Res 432), when a study “concurred that some of the textbooks being used in Saudi educational curricula were focusing what is described as a combination of intolerance, ignorance, anti-Semitic, anti-American, and anti-Western views in ways that posed a danger to the stability of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Middle East region, and global security.” Ironically; however, a study done in the same year in America by Rugh[9] stating: “the lack of sufficient information to make definitive statements about the effect of Arab schools on tendencies of graduate to become terrorists” (p. 396, 2002).
Nevertheless,
because of such claims by numerous media services and politicians in the United
States towards the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, “some organizations and individual
researchers have made initial attempts [at that point] to review Arab textbooks
[K.S.A. in this case] for political content,” (Brown, 2001) and contrary to
these claims, according to Brown, on the same line of thought as Rugh: “no one
has yet collected sufficient data in a systematic way, and analysed it
dispassionately, on what Arab textbooks actually say, or what goes on in Arab
classrooms” (p.15). Because of the conservative nature of the
1.2. Saudi
Officials Respond to the White House Demand
The
international reaction was based largely on the
Furthermore, in the same week on October 20, 2002, Saudi Defence Minister Prince Sultan Ibn Abd Aziz, discussed the same issue with Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, and stated that: “We will never change our education policy, and there is no demand that we change it. Our country has a policy; …and above all, religious curricula that must never be harmed. Any demand by another country in the world [meant the United States here] that Saudi Arabia changes its curricula is unacceptable interference in Saudi sovereignty”. Clearly, the high officials of K.S.A. took America’s concern as interference on the country sovereignty and its stability. Furthermore, in Al-Watan[15] Newspaper, Muhammad Al-Najimi, a member of The Islamic Figh[16] Academy (IFA), said, “Some of the calls for curricular change harm national principles, and this threatens national identity. There are those who argue that our curricula contain takfir [accusations of apostasy against other Muslims], as there is a religious spirit to some of the content, but the truth is that there is not a single word calling for takfir in the curricula, and the curricula adhere to Islam and not to any particular religious group.”
1.3. Saudi
Arabia Promises to Reform its Educational Policy
However, despite this strong resistance from the Saudi officials, in July 2004, just less than two years from the above defensive attitude, Prince Khalid Al-Faisal[17] on his weekly program Idhaat on Al-Arabiya TV[18], dealt with the ideological perspective presented upon the Saudi society and the educational system/policy. In the interview Prince Khalid Al-Faisal, on the issue of the school curricula said: “The school curricula constitute 20% of the issue [extremist and violence], but 80% is the hidden curricula and the way in which these ideas of violence and extremism are inculcated by those who are responsible for the students in the schools, institutes, faculties, and universities.” This bold statement by the Prince is a historical improvement in acknowledging the source of the problem and can be regarded as a major stepping-stone in understanding the issue involved in the Saudi curricula.
The issue of hidden curricula is a bit vague and was not clearly explained by the Prince. If one can understand the educational system in Saudi Arabia, what was meant by ‘the hidden curricula’ can be seen as madrasah[19] in the mosques, summer camps for young youths with interests in the Islamic religion, and possibly brainwashing by the actual teachers teaching the subjects. For instance, according to a report in the Saudi daily Al-Watan, a Saudi English teacher was fired after it was revealed that he had deviated from the curriculum and had devoted time to readings from the Koran instead of English studies. The report, also, claims that a few other teachers devote the time of English studies to another topic to avoid teaching in English. Clearly, we can assume that Education in K.S.A. is considered very sacred, and teachers are regarded as second to Allah.
Another
remarkable interview in the West was conducted with Prince Turki Al-Faisal[20].
In his interview with USA Today,
where he was asked about the Saudi textbooks and the steps that are undertaken
by the government to combat the issue of extremism, he states that: “we admit
we have people in our midst who are bigots, who are intolerant and who see the
world through ‘us’ and ‘them’.
Nevertheless, do we consider this acceptable behaviour? Absolutely not. Are we working hard to change
mind-sets that encourage prejudice and intolerance? Yes, absolutely.” (
This recent and definitely changed attitude towards changing of the textbooks in K.S.A. occurred not long after the recently appointed King Abdullah’s[21] interview on ABC News with Barbara Walters. The King states, when asked about the textbooks in Saudi Arabia: “I will not deny that such extremism existed in the K.S.A., but such extremism exists in almost every country in the world” (SUSRIS, 2006). In addition, on May 18, 2006, Saudi Arabian Foreign Minister Saud Al-Faisal, at a press conference with Secretary Rice following the U.S.-Saudi Strategic Dialogue meeting, was asked for an update about educational materials. He said: “the education reforms in K.S.A. go beyond textbooks rewriting, … and they go into training, directions …and so the whole system of education will be transformed from top to bottom. Textbooks are only of he first steps which have been taken by Saudi Arabia” (USA Today, 2006).
1.4. The
Ideological Ideas Presented towards the ‘Others’ in the Saudi Education System
Because the fear from producing more Islamic fundamentalists, and the fear of losing its strong connection with the White House, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has begun its first initial stage of introducing English and its culture to the primary schools (not previously taught at that stage). This introduction to the West is greatly needed as Dankowitz[22] (2004) in is his article ‘Saudi Study Offers Critical Analysis of the Kingdom’s Religious Curricula,’ concluded in his study on the Kingdom’s religious curricula finding that “there is a great defects in the curricula, particularly with regard to attitude toward the ‘other’-that is toward anyone whose views are not in line with the Wahhabi[23] religion that is dominant in Saudi Arabia” (p. 1). According to Dankowitz, he stated that the researchers found that there was no attempt to inculcate in the students an legitimacy for civil values such as human rights and political awareness, and that there was much less discussion of social issues and civil values than of religious matters. Not only that, but they also teach them that any other public affairs and customs which are not similar to them are unbelief.
The researchers said that “after the curricula label ‘others’ as [belong to] the camp of bid’ah[24] without giving accuracy, they present rules for treating the people who commit bid’ah [rules which] contradict the principles of Shari’a[25] by stating “it is forbidden to visit with or spend time in the company of anyone who commits bid’ah” (Dankowitz, 2004, p.2) In addition, the researchers further found that the curricula attempt to limit the types of relationships between Muslims and non-Muslims, to highlight aspects of enmity toward non-Muslim, and to refrain from underlining aspects pf Shari’a that hold all humanity. Thus, for example, the curricula state, “It’s forbidden for believers to love the polytheist and to form relationships with them-even if they were relatives [as translated from Al-Tawhid curriculum, third year high school].”
The curricula go great lengths to depict how polytheism is spreading, how Muslim world is being flooded with forbidden innovations bid’ah, and how society is suffering from moral disintegration. Some examples are following statements: “Most Muslims imitate infidels in forbidden innovation and polytheism”; [as translated from Al-Tawhid curriculum, third year high school] “Polytheism, destructive principles, and deviant cults have spread throughout the Muslim nation, and they have caused many people to leave the fold of Islam” [as translated from Al-Tawhid curriculum, third year high school].
Also, outside
the schools arena, in an article published on May 31,
1.5.
Introducing English into Saudi Primary Schools
As commentators
have observed in 2003, Saudi Arabic government decided to introduce English
into all primary schools (not previously taught at this level). In a study by
Azuri[29]
for MEMORI[30]
(2006), he published an article titled ‘Debate
on Reform in Saudi Arabia’ which dealt with the current issues of Saudis,
the Westernization in their society, and the educational system in
Nevertheless, because of White House pressure and the domestic attitudes towards the West, an immediate measure had to be taken. Subsequently, the Higher Committee on Education Policy in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (under this present pressure from the American Government) discussed a program to introduce English language studies at primary schools in the Kingdom in order to expose its youths to the idea of acceptance and tolerance of others, [USA and the West] introducing the concept living in harmony with the ‘Others’ or the ‘West’.
Interestingly
enough, in an article published by Arab News in
Also, the postpone of this program may require a huge amount of budget which K.S.A. was not ready for, at that time after coming out of the Gulf War. Although, Dr. Al-Mushrif in his interview with Arab News[33]: “emphasised ‘both in the newspaper and TV interviews’ that English would not be taught at the expense of other subjects such as Arabic and Islamic sciences taught to 5,837 primary schools from Class IV,” (2002) according to the Islamic website[34], the actual truth is far from that as “Islamic classes have been cut since 2003 to one class a day instead of four classes a day.”
It is noteworthy to know that: “Scholars have estimated that within Saudi public school curriculum, Islamic studies make up quarter to a third of the students’ weekly classroom hours in lower and middle school, plus several hours each week in higher school” (Washington Post, 2006). However, because of the “threat to U.S. national security interests, there were soon calls to cut back on the amount of religion being taught at schools, colleagues and universities and to begin introducing ‘broader, more secular based curriculum’ in the Muslim world” (Washington Times, 2003). Consequently, more English less Islam.
1.6. More
English less Islam: A Debate on the Current Issue
This new trend taking place in the Gulf, especially in the K.S.A., has provoked an anger and resentment by many Arabic and Muslim scholars notably Karmani and others. For example, Karmani’s paper (2005) entitled ‘English, “terror” and Islam’ proposed one of the most
astonishing formulas that has emerged amid these developments, and which concerns us directly as TESOL professional, is the resounding call these days to promote ‘more English and less Islam’, in the belief that such a position will somehow serve in eradicating the seeds of Islamic terrorist activity (p.263).
Karmani’s conceptualization can be seen ensconced in the ‘conduit metaphor’ (Reddy, 1979), where ideas are objects, language is a container, communication is sending. Hence, according to Karmani, English is served in the Middle East, and especially in the Gulf States, as a container of ideologies which may results in reshaping the ideas impeded in it and, therefore, sending the wrong messages to the society in general. According to Argungu (1996), supporting Karmani’s’ argument, the English language “apart from its central role in education, was (and still is) one of the major weapon with which the West launched its massive intellectual and cultural onslaught against the Muslims …for not only is English strategic but it is also a catalyst in the Islamization process since it cuts across almost all disciplines acting as a conveyor of knowledge and culture” (p.331). According to (Phillipson, 2003) “it is the economic and political interest of the United States to ensure that if the world is moving toward a common language, I be English; that if the World is moving toward telecommunications, safety, and quality standards, they be American and that if common values are being developed, they be values with which the Americans are comfortable” (p.9).
As a
consequence, Karmani believes that the teaching of English in this modern DNA
age, as it has been practised in
Moreover, in TESOL Islamia[35] (2006) discussion forum, on the same token as of Karmani, Arab English teachers argue that
the current designed English syllabus in the Arab world doesn't reflect the true aspiration of the Muslim Nation. It does not contribute to the right upbringing of a true Muslim generation. The English syllabus that we have in our educational institutions is completely based on the western culture which is totally different and far away from the Islamic teachings.
This debate goes on to call for the actual “syllabus designers in the Arab world to be inspired with their approaches in designing a syllabi “from the wealthy and glorious Islamic Heritage of this ‘NATION’ [capitalization emphasised in the original] and provide an outstanding syllabus that contributes to Islamic propagation to reflect the ‘GREAT Message of ISLAM’ [capitalization emphasised in the original].”
Also, another
interesting study done by TESOL Islamia site is a poll: "Is the way English is currently taught in the Muslim World contrary
to Islamic values?” The result of this
study in 2006 was resounding 62% in affirmative. However, we need to acknowledge the fact that
these results - obtained and accessed by highly educated English speakers in
the Arab world (although the number of votes did not exceed 129) seem to reflect,
possibly, the widely held belief that most EFL materials used in Muslim
countries are produced from a mainly Euro/American-centred cultural
perspective. However, is
Interestingly, taking into consideration Karmani’s (2005) view of new conceptualities of English and Islam, we can assume that this new trend in the role of the hegemony of English on the Islamic curricula may not be far from taking place in Saudi Arabia. For example, the Islamic sciences courses, indeed, have been cut from four courses taught regularly for five days to be encapsulated in one course a day. Not dissimilarly, in an article entitled “English as a Weapon to Fight ‘Terror’,” the editorial of The Weekend Australian (2002) reveals how “the U.S. Government is considering encouraging U.S. English teachers to work in the force against terrorism and Muslim extremists” (cited in Karmani, 2005, p.263).
One cannot help but question the legitimacy of such accusations, that so far only have only been dealt with by a few Muslim scholars, mainly Karmani who is a British Muslim scholar teaching in the United Arab Emirates. In fact, we need to question ourselves, as linguists and thinkers: Does Islam, the religion of forgiveness, encourage violence? Does even English call for more ‘English and less Judaism or Buddhism’? Are Arabs the only problem we are facing with the 21st Century? We as researchers and writers ought not to fall into the trap of generalization of such matter. We could argue that such claims are utterly preposterous and only driven by Western extremists as much as any other extremists.
In his legit
made self-defence of Arabic/Islamic culture and identity, Karmani (2005) in his
narrative ‘More English and less Islam’
points out a classic belief that English, the language of modern day technology
and humanitarian sciences (in sharp
contrast to Arabic, the language of the 19 highjackers, Al-Qaeda, and suicide
bombers in Israel) is exclusively endowed to promote the values of freedom,
democracy, justice, openness, and decency. Commenting on recent global events,
the British historian Paul Johnson (2003) notes that in a globalised world, the
On the other spectrum of debate, having explored the concept of English and Islam by the Arabic scholar Karmani, Ahmed Kabel (an Arabic scholar from Morocco), in his paper entitled ‘The Discourse of appropriation: a response to Karmani (2005)’, argues that although English can be considered as “putative hegemonic discourse as inhibitive and imposed encumbrance, we need to take into account how the language is constantly and unpredictable appropriated and creatively reshaped and expropriated to give voice to emerging agencies and subjectively” (p. 136).
Despite the fact that learners are exposed to a language ‘embodying’ values and ideologies of the West sometimes in conflict with their own and drawn by coercion or alluring fascination, it can be seen as a stimulating mind activity, and in turn, an opportunity to look ‘outside the box’ and appreciate differences between the two cultures. The idea of embracing someone else’s values and ideologies can be very positive. Youssef and Simpkins (1985) found that Arabs who lived in a U.S.-dominated culture for a long time held a positive view of their ethnicity. Despite the fact that those Arabs were under daily exposure of the Western ideology, they still held proud of their own and did not suffer from so-called de-Islamization of their values. Thus, Karmani’s (2005) view is highly questionable and not based on any study.
Moreover, in the same line of thought, Kabel (2007) proposes the idea of ‘the power potential’. He strongly argues, drawing his analogies from Caliban in Shakespeare’s The Tempest, that “‘the power potential’ is latent in any language system, ready to be realized to construct, resist and reconstruct discourses and power of all sorts” (p.139). Language is a fluid concept can be shaped and reshaped according to its carrier. Learners of English (or any other language for that matter), Kabel argues “have a mind of their own,” and can carry their own “hidden agenda” (p.139) in learning a language. Thus, according to his argument, Kabel believes that: “Reproducing and delivering ideologies that are in conflict with the views of our Muslim learners cannot be taken at a face value” (p.139).
Despite the fact that learners of English tend to carry the cultural influence of the English culture when speaking or writing, this can be easily manipulated and manoeuvred accordingly. As clearly can be witnessed in other corners of applied linguistics research namely contrastive rhetoric (Kaplan, 1966; Connor, 1996) and Interlanguage Pragmatics (Beebe et al., 1990; Kasper, 1992) cited in Kabel (2007, p. 138). Thus, drawing from Keble’s argument, language can be at the service of its users. It shaped, reshaped, and reproduced effectively according to its surroundings and users. For this example, I like to use the term “the virtual language” (Widdowson, 2003, p.48). In his oft-quoted statement, Achebe (1975) has this to say:
I feel that English language will be able to carry the weight of my African experience. But it will have to be new English, still in communion with its ancestral home but altered to suit its new African surroundings (p. 62).
Thus,
drawing from Achebe’s logical perspective on leaning of a new language, English
in K.S.A. does not pose any danger to eroding the identity of its locals, but
on the other hand, it can be served as a tool for modernization and a jet for a
brighter new future of K.S.A. under its new King, His Highness King Abdullah Al-Saud. Also, Al-Sheikha Lubna al-Qasimi, U.A.E.
economic minister stated in her interview with the CNN that she believes “in
the co-existence of modern and traditional values” (CNN, 2007), and is at the
same time drafting a new law to open economy to greater foreign ownership.
Obviously, new changes will occur under the new King and many problems are
being addressed in regards to education in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and
especially since ELT promises more doors to the economy and serves as a tool to
‘brighten’ youths mind as some claim.
1.7. The
values of English
Certainly English in Saudi Arabia plays a major role in their lives starting from work, daily life, and entertainment wise. For instance, there are TV, Satellite TV, Radio, Video Games, and popular Hip Hop which are taking Saudi youth by storm, and not to mention English is essential in the domains of science, technology and medicine. In addition, its importance is reflected in the large numbers of Saudis who study abroad in English-speaking countries. Although Arabic is the only official language of Saudis, it is usual for English to be used alongside Arabic in road signs and names of the shops. Printed materials in places such as Banks, Airports, Travel Agencies and Post Offices are usually both in English and Arabic. In fact, in the main shopping strip in the up-market shopping districts in Jeddah, names such as Toys’R’Us, Body Shops, Diesel, Starbucks, Next, Mother Care, are only written in English with Latin alphabet and without any kind of translation and became household names in the Saudi fabric. Fast-food restaurants, and not to mention the upper market restaurants scattered in cosmopolitan cities such as Jeddah, Riyadh, Teheran, Yun’bu, and Dammam are severed by employees who speak English as a medium of communication with little Arabic. However, not all the population are able to speak it. It is considered sign of status and high privilege for the educated ones and the upper middle class who send their kids abroad to develop their English skills and locally to private schools where English is more emphasized there than in public schools.
Recently, with the economical growth, Saudi Arabia has gone through a huge process of modernization in all fields of life: from schools, hospitals, to way of life. This new trend of modernization required a transfer via westerns cultures and values where English is served as the medium of communication and carrier of the wave. It has also been found to be an essential tool in the modernization of K.S.A., besides its importance as means to propagate Islam among non-Muslims foreigners.
The new trends
of western involvement taking place through the popular American media such as
2. RESEARCH
STUDY AND FINDINGS
This paper cannot be complete without proving either points of Karmani’s and Kabel’s’ in relation to the idea of More English and less Islam, to demonstrate the actual impact and attitudes towards this new trend of more English culture and ideology and less Islamization of English.
3. METHOD
In order to get
a clear picture of the Karmani’s and Kabel’s claim, a 12-item questionnaire,
related to this topic was distributed to 65 Saudi students studying English in
their second semester of the New English Curricula at
The participants were asked to show the extent of their agreement and disagreement with each item on a five-point Likert scale questionnaire: Strongly Agree (SA), Agree (A), Neutral (N), Agree (A), and Strongly Agree (SA). However, since these students are only in their second semester, a translation of each item into Arabic had to be done carefully to convey the correct meanings contained in the questionnaire.
The questionnaires were distributed and returned to the researcher in the same day during a 130 minutes classroom time.
4. FINDINGS
The findings are presented in Table 1- 6a, followed by discussion of the findings.
|
|
SD |
D |
N |
A |
SA |
|
1. My English textbooks
contain some alien or taboo information. |
6 |
10 |
8 |
18 |
5 |
|
2. I believe
that the English culture should be separated from learning English. |
17 |
10 |
4 |
10 |
6 |
|
3. I believe
that there is imperialistic purpose in learning English in |
10 |
31 |
3 |
3 |
0 |
|
4. The topics in the textbooks are important
for my daily use outside my classroom. |
12 |
10 |
8 |
10 |
7 |
|
5. The topics
seem to be important for my advanced courses. |
5 |
8 |
10 |
22 |
2 |
|
6. I believe
that my English background is not good because of previous English
educational system in the |
2 |
6 |
7 |
11 |
21 |
|
7. My textbooks are
above my limit and might be too complicated to understand. |
2 |
12 |
7 |
16 |
10 |
|
8. Learning
English language and culture is a must for an English major. |
6 |
5 |
1 |
11 |
24 |
|
9. I have
entered English Department to be a teacher. |
13 |
12 |
6 |
4 |
11 |
|
10. I have
entered this program to get a job as quickly as possible. |
6 |
2 |
3 |
14 |
22 |
|
11. This program
is the best at Faculty of Arts and Humanities. |
3 |
2 |
2 |
15 |
25 |
|
12. I will have to take extra English courses outside the
University. |
2 |
6 |
1 |
5 |
33 |
Table 1. The
number of the participants’ responses on the items, which are relevant to this
issue and the new content of the textbooks Mosaic 1.
Table 2. The
percentage of students who believe there is taboo/alien info. in the textbooks
Table
2a. The percentage of students who
believe there is taboo/alien info. in the textbooks
The findings from Table 2 an 2a indicate that more than a third of the number of students (37%) does think that alien/taboo information might hurt their Islamic identity while the next highest number (22%) shows those who think otherwise. Clearly, when neutral responses are ignored, still more than half (59%) remain, who think that there is taboo information which they prefer not to be exposed to in their English textbooks.
Table 3: The
percentage of students who support separating English and culture in their leaning
process of English
Table 3a. The
percentage of students who support separating English and culture in their
learning process of English
Interestingly enough, the findings in Table 3 and 3a indicate the majority of the Saudi students in this study oppose the idea of separating the learning of English and the culture of English. Culture, for these students, is meant here as simply understanding the ‘others’ without hurting their Islamic identity. Again, when we ignore the neutral responses, 68% remain who think that leaning English culture will not harm their Islamic identity, while less than half (40%) think otherwise.
Table 4. The
percentage of the first two tables combined.
Table 4 compared Table 2 and Table 3. Here, we can observe that the highest graph shows (39%) the students who oppose the idea of taboo in the textbooks, yet approximately half of these students (22%) agree to the idea of separating English and culture.
Table 5. The
percentage of the students’ attitudes towards learning English language and
culture as a must for an English major
student
In Table 4. after taking the data of Table 2, 2a, 3, 3a, 4, 4a, and 5 into consideration, I wanted to examine further the idea of English culture with the same group of students. Table 4 shows the students’ attitudes towards learning English language and culture as a must for an English major student. Only (18%) of the who group believe that culture is not a must for their English learning process while (51%) strongly agree with the concept of learning English hand in had with the culture. Also, when we combine (SD+D) and (A+SA) we came up with a significant number of (83%) who believe that leaning English cannot be done without learning the culture of the language itself.
Table
5a. The percentage of the students’ attitudes
towards learning English language and culture as a must for an English major
student
Table 6. The
percentage of the students who think/believe that there is/are imperialistic
purpose in learning of English in KSA.
In order to test
this idea further, another graph was developed to test the students’
understanding of the imperialistic purposes for learning English in
Table
6a. The percentage of the students who
think/believe that there is/are imperialistic purpose in learning of English in
KSA.
4. CONCLUSION
In light of the
debate of the role of English language teaching in the Arab world, a small
scale study was conducted at
The demand for English is always going to be there, stronger than ever with increasing globalization. After 9/11, the need to learn English in order to understand what is being said and written about Arabs is present more than ever. Arabs cannot stand still not knowing what the Others are thinking and presuming about them. Arabs need to know how to interact with the West. They need to understand the West better than anyone else. English is here to stay, but the people are reshaping, remoulding, and adjusting it to suit them best. Hence, it will be interesting to see whether the Arab world will adapt its own version of the English language, or embrace the present one together with its cultural and social norms.
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