This talk argues the case for moving beyond textbooks, given their enduring silence on key social issues. I report on how teachers and researchers have come together to design and produce materials which address gender and sexual diversity, and on the ways in which these are received by language learners.
In this talk I question the hold of published materials on second language learning and teaching and I argue for the need to consider alternatives. Despite thirty years of consistent applied linguistics critique, published materials remain remarkably resistant to change in terms of content – particularly when it comes to the representation of the world and the systematic erasure of certain groups of people from textbook versions of social reality. One (of several) particularly egregious examples is the refusal to include representations of those who are sexuality and gender non-conforming. This practice has been condemned by UNESCO's (2016) ‘Out in the Open’ report. The report concludes that education sectors globally deny recognition to students who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ), adding that pedagogical materials are relentlessly heteronormative in their representational practices and their perpetuation of traditional masculine and feminine roles. The report calls for the production of materials which challenge such representational practices while simultaneously addressing the issue of erasure. In this talk I will suggest that, despite such recommendations, the political economy of the TESOL publishing industry and its commitment to the profit that can be made from LGBTQ erasure means that any change in representational practices is unlikely to be forthcoming. However, I will argue that teachers and researchers working together can begin to address the problem. Here I report on a number of interventions – from the field of ESOL and modern foreign languages - in which teachers and researchers address issues of gender and sexual diversity in materials they have designed and produced themselves, and on the ways in which these materials are received and made sense of by language learners. UNESCO. 2016. Out in the Open: Education Sector Responses to Violence Based on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity/Expression.
