Carl James - Böcker

Language Awareness in the Classroom addresses the central educational question of the impact that explicit language knowledge has on learning and language learning.

Language Awareness in the Classroom addresses the central educational question of the impact that explicit language knowledge has on learning and language learning.A substantial Introduction defines the issues and key concepts and relates them to contemporary educational policy and practice in Europe and internationally. The papers are organised into four thematic sections: the extent and nature of language awareness in teacher education; school-based language awareness programmes; tertiary education initiatives and modes of evaluation of language awareness programmes.

Errors in Language Learning and Use is an up-to-date introduction and guide to the study of errors in language, and is also a critical survey of previous work. Error Analysis occupies a central position within Applied Linguistics, and seeks to clarify questions such as `Does correctness matter?', `Is it more important to speak fluently and write imaginatively or to communicate one's message?' Carl James provides a scholarly and well-illustrated theoretical and historical background to the field of Error Analysis. The reader is led from definitions of error and related concepts, to categorization of types of linguistic deviance, discussion of error gravities, the utility of teacher correction and towards writing learner profiles. Throughout, the text is guided by considerable practical experience in language education in a range of classroom contexts worldwide.

The areas explored are: the federal multicultural policy and its articulated discourse, intentions and outcomes in today's Canada; how ethnic, racial and religious minorities and immigrants have fared in a society with official multiculturalism; the limits and possibilities of multicultural education; and the capacity of employment equity to address discriminatory employment practices in today's cultural context. The contributors demonstrate that instead of opening opportunities for full and effective participation in Canadian society, the current discourse of multiculturalism often operates to homogenize, essentialize, racialize and marginalize ethnic and racial minority group Canadians, and in the process negates individual and intra-cultural group differences as well as cultural variations and complexities of groups. In light of this situation, we observe that there is a need for a paradigm shift that would facilitate the development of policies, programs, curricula, practices, strategies and pedagogies that would bring about equitable conditions for minority group Canadians and immigrants.