Secondary School Students’ Beliefs, Perceptions and Attitudes towards Communicative Language Learning (CLT) and Structural Approach (SA)

Hussein Islam Abdullah

Universiti Kebangsaan, Malaysia

Parilah Mohd Shah

Universiti Kebangsaan, Malaysia

Abstract

In English language learning, there are mainly two instructions being used in the classroom teaching which are the Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach. Many studies have looked into on teachers’ perceptions in implementing both approaches in the classrooms; few have looked into students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes with respect to these English language instructions in classroom practices. This study investigates the students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes with regard to classroom practices focusing on the Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach. The objectives of the study were to investigate students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes towards English language instructions and the correlation between students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes of the students towards Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach. 134 Form 4 students from a selected secondary school in an urban area in Seremban was chosen in a cluster sampling for this study. A set of questionnaire using 5 point Likert scale was used as one of the instruments in gathering the data. Quantitative data were analysed using the descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics such as mean and standard deviation were used to investigate the students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitude towards Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach. For inferential statistics, Pearson Correlation was used to analyse the correlations between the students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes towards Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach. The findings of the study showed positive students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitude towards Communicative Language Teaching as well as Structural Approach. However, the weight age inclined more towards Communicative Language Teaching. There is a significant correlation between the students’ beliefs, perceptions and attitudes towards Communicative Language Teaching and Structural Approach.

Keywords: Beliefs, Perceptions, Attitude, Communicative Language Learning (CLT), Structural Approach (SA), English Language Instructions.

The Relevance of Traditional Belief System among the Fakkawa of Zuru Emirate

Yusuf Abdullahi

Federal University, Dutsin-Ma, Katsina State, Nigeria

Abstract

Fakai kingdom is located in the western part of Zuru Emirate in Nigeria. The peoples of the kingdom though historically varied, are collectively referred as Fakkawa and their language as Fakkanci. Before the 19^th century, the predominant religion in the area of Fakai Kingdom was traditional in which people believed in what is called Magiro. This system of belief was said to have developed from the recognition and reverence given to the spirit of the ancestors. This explains the reason why Magiro is also addressed as Baba (Father). Although the adherents of Magiro belief do not invite people of other tribes to it, the belief was said to have spread to other areas because of peoples’ migration and intergroup relations. This paper therefore, examines the influence of traditional belief on the social, economic and political aspects of the society of Fakai kingdom. It was found that, the Magiro doctrine was not merely a belief system as some individuals come to believe, rather, it is also a political institution established for the maintenance of law and order in the society. The belief also influenced the social and economic undertakings of its adherents.

Keywords: Traditional belief, Magiro, Fakkawa.

The Question of Intertextuality and the Perception of Muslims: The Case of the New York Times Op-Eds

Rachid Acim

University Sultan Moulay Slimane, Beni Mellal, Morocco

“Texts are rarely completely original but borrow and quote from other texts.
Reporting other people’s speech or thought is a form of intertextuality.”

(Fairclough, 1992)

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to question intertextuality, as one literary discourse device, in the New York Times Op-Eds addressing Muslims inside and outside of the United States. The researcher argues that the New York Times employs a whole plethora of texts to disseminate specific arguments and assumptions about such people. The periodical use of poetry, for instance, enables reporters to trigger powerful emotions in their readers, and get them take sides as regards matters related to Muslims. Add to this, the continuous occurrence of different intertextual strategies such as quotations, allusions, translations, songs and so on, are fashioned to create fixed and unstable images about Muslims in the world of print media. It is thus claimed that the reporters of the New York Times take shelter in intertextuality with a view to producing a sense of intimacy with their readers and attract their full attention more easily. To approach the issue at hand more effectively, the researcher starts by introducing how some scholars have perceived intertexuality. Then, he shifts into demonstrating how intertextuality occurs and manifests itself in the overarching media as represented by the New York Times Op-Eds. Finally, he suggests some pedagogical implications to assist students (re)consider thoroughly the multiple voices spoken inside the New York Times Op-Eds.

Keywords: Intertextuality, The New York Times, Muslims, Op-Eds, Voices, Quotations.

Dit-On Liberté En Traduction Littéraire? Un Aperçu Critique De La Traduction Française Des Romans De Fagunwa

Gbadegesin, Olusegun Adegboye

Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti, Nigeria

Résumé

La traduction littéraire est touchée par tant des soucis dont le transcodage culturel et les nuances nuances socio-culturelles et stylistiques. Pour s’en sortir, le traducteur recourt aux différentes approches. Il prend la liberté des mots et expressions pour re-exprimer le message de l’original comme il croit que cela le convient. Ce qui paraît convenable selon la compréhension du “traducteur” d’une oeuvre littéraire surtout l’oeuvre qui se dispose de tous les atouts stylo-culturels d’une langue d’une nation particulière peut ne pas être le sens voulu de l’original. C’est le cas de la traduction française de deux romans de D.O Fagunwa (Ogboju ode ninu igbo Irunmole/ Le preux chasseur dans la forêt infestée de démons et Ireke-onibudo/ La fortune sourit aux audacieux. La liberté en traduction peut elle être panacée aux nuances yoroubas difficilement traduisibles au français? Voilà champ que cultive cette communication.

Mots clés: liberté, limite de liberté, culture, langage yorouba.

Purging the Ghost of the Past

Musa Al-Halool

Effat University, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Upon careful examination, Heart of Darkness reads like an interior monologue, with Marlow telling the whole story in practically one breath, while his foursome audience remains, for all practical purposes, entirely passive throughout Marlow's narration of his African jeremiad. Telling the story in retrospect has the quality of mediating the events of the past through the narrator's present frame of mind. In other words, the whole past is filtered through the prism of the present. This allows Marlow unlimited leverage to edit this past, modify it, alter it, reinvent it, comment on it, and interpret it to his own advantage.

Marlow's obsession with and apologetic attitude towards the evil Kurtz is another problematic issue in the novella. Since Kurtz is dead according to Marlow's own account and, therefore, belongs to the past, then Marlow's present justification is not so much slanted towards him who is long since dead as it is towards him who is still living. So, apparently Marlow has a vested interest that goes beyond the customary bond and sympathy between two company employees. Can it perhaps be that Kurtz, in the final analysis, is an alter ego of Marlow? Or an embodiment of a dark phase in Marlow's life in the Congo—a phase that he now prefers to suppress and deny? These questions, however unassumingly raised, tend to vitiate the realistic existence of a person named Kurtz. And indeed, there is in the novella enough textual evidence that lends reasonable credence to this argument.

Keywords: Heart of Darkness, the uncanny, alter ego, Marlow-Kurtz imbroglio, catharsis by narration.