Discourses of writing among teachers of L1 Swedish in Swedish compulsory education
Submitted by:
Erika Sturk
Abstract:
In this paper we explore what views, or discourses, of writing are currently active in among Swedish as L1 teachers in Swedish compulsory education, ages 7–15. Gee defines a discourse as ”a socially accepted association among ways of using language, other symbolic expressions, and ‘artefacts’ of thinking, feeling, believing, valuing, and of acting which can be used to identify oneself as a member of a socially meaningful group” (Gee 1996, 131). Thus, we acknowledge that discourses of writing, similarly to any other discourse, become visible in the language we use to talk about writing (c.f. Fairclough, 1989), and through the actions we undertake, for example in the classroom. Our starting point is Ivanic (2004) six discourses of writing and writing education: writing as a skill, as creativity, as a process, as genre, as part of a social context or as sociopolitical act. Ivanic concludes that a holistic perspective on writing, encompassing a multi layered view of text as well as different views of what wiring is, can contribute to writing education and that “teachers of writing can benefit from being aware of the existence of all six views of writing and learning to write and the pedagogic practices associated with them, and from recognising which discourse(s) of writing they are inhabiting” (p. 242). Based on these six discourses we developed a questionnaire including 17 questions with a focus on teaching Swedish as L1. The questionnaire was distributed among teachers in compulsory education in one region and in total 60 teachers responded. A thematic content analysis was used to categorise every teachers replies into a main discourse or main discourses and secondary discourse/s. Results show that the most common discourse among the teachers was the process discourse, both as a single discourse and in combination with another discourse (e.g. creativity, skill or genre). The two discourses of writing as part of a social context or as a sociopolitical act were absent in the form of main discourse/s but occurred in some cases as a secondary discourse. The results will be discussed from a pedagogical perspective and from the perspective of citizenship and the goal of the curriculum to foster democratic citizens.
Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and Power. London: Longman
Gee, J.P. (1996). Sociolinguistics and literacies: Ideology in discourses (2nd ed.). London: Taylor & Francis.
Ivanic, R. (2004). Discourses of writing and learning to write. Language and Education, 18 (3): 220-245.