Alex Way
Assignments & Activities Archive
Activity Description
There are power dynamics at play in spoken and written language. Language is wielded by people and institutions to exert power over others or to maintain the power they already possess. But power dynamics in language are not always obvious. For instance, one manifestation of power dynamics is in the form of ideologies which we attach to language, and which impact how we view reality. Language ideologies disproportionately impact historically marginalized groups of people, so our students need to become critically aware of these harmful ideologies. When our students become critically aware language users, they not only become better citizens and allies, but they also work towards creating a more equitable society. This translingual activity invites students to explore ideology in written language through an analysis of kanji characters. To clarify, “translingual” in the context of this activity refers to meaning-making which occurs across and beyond named languages. This activity’s focus on ideologies stems from translingual scholars’ work which troubles boundaries and static depictions of language deriving from the ideology of monolingualism. Ideologies like monolingualism (and others) advantage those who are already in positions of power. Kanji is a logographic script that writers deploy with two or more phonetic scripts in Japanese writing. It derives from Chinese characters which were brought to Japan beginning in the 1st century CE (Frellesvig). In this activity, students analyze a list of kanji characters which are broken down into their radical (semantic) and additional components. To illustrate, the kanji 好 (like) is divided into its component parts: the radical 女 (woman), and addition 子 (child). Students analyze characters in this manner to discover possible connotations about power relationships in the logograms and to gain a greater awareness thereby of the ways in which language is inherently ideological. For instance, by analyzing 好 (like) and other characters with the 女 (woman) radical, students recognize a gender bias. Finally, students connect what they have learned about ideology in kanji to the English language by engaging with discussion questions at the bottom of the activity prompt. In this way, students draw analogies between English and kanji, thereby becoming more critically aware language users. This activity builds students’ metalinguistic awareness while 1) informing them about non-alphabetic writing technologies and 2) de-centering alphabetic literacies (Cushman). This activity works best as part of a larger unit on language and power, representation, language ideologies, or a similar topic. Scaffolding for this assignment will take the form of readings and/or class discussions assigned at least one class session prior the activity.