While I have previously invited higher education professionals active in a number of different fields on to this blog and will do so again, I thought this time around readers might be interested in a firsthand account of English language teaching in India.

Over the last four weeks, I have had the great pleasure of being invited to conduct English language and theatre workshops at Union Chapel School in Calcutta. I was and am truly delighted to be able to do this, as it enables me to draw on not only my language teaching experience but also my background in theatre.

I teach two groups of students in the fifteen to sixteen year age group, all of whom have a first language background in either Hindi or Bengali (Hindi is the national language of India, and Bengali is the language of the state of West Bengal). When I asked my students how they related to English – and if they felt that they were dealing with a foreign language, I got some interesting answers. Most felt that in fact they were simply dealing with another “Indian” language, in the same way that they might try and deal with one of the many languages of the country, except that in the case of English they could see an immediate “use” for their knowledge.

As a teacher, I think getting this kind of reaction from a student is pure gold. Affinity is half the battle. The idea that when one starts thinking in another language one has come close to native-speaker/first language speaker status is compelling. But what about when one starts feeling in another language? It’s for this reason that using theatre exercises and the support of a Shakespearean play (“As You Like It”) in these workshops, I think is particularly useful. Functional English can never be discounted, but enabling students to tap into their imagination through the medium of a new language allows them to develop a full or active presence in it. Active language, I think, has to go beyond the somewhat limited idea we have of what constitutes a language “skill,” and become a language capacity. By capacity I mean the nuanced ability to maintain your speaking position in the face of changing circumstances (or, as some would call it outside the world of the assessment rubric – life).

The logistical pressures of moving countries and cities – from London to Calcutta – and a nasty bout of flu meant that it was sensible to stay offline for a while.

Over the next few blogs I will seek to provide an overview of the educational climate in India, and the extent to which international alliances are changing or are likely to change the university experience .

Why are British universities seeking to find a presence in India?

The Indian government has plans to increase the number of university goers from a current 12 per cent of the population to 30 per cent. In plain terms this works out to a present university student population of 12 million, and a projected increase to 30 million. This is clearly a very ambitious plan and opinions are mixed as to whether it can or should be achieved.

In this first piece though I want to present a side to the global impact of the ongoing changes in the Indian university system that is seldom seen in the media.

That is, what is the university experience in India from the point of view of the student and the lecturer?

I went to school in Calcutta and also did my first undergraduate degree in the city. When I went to the UK to do my second undergraduate degree it wasn’t the differences in the educational culture that I noticed but rather the continuities. This was probably because both the school and university I attended were established in the nineteenth century when Calcutta was the capital of British India, and at the heart of a close engagement between the cultures of India and of Britain.

What I experienced in India was a meticulousness of detail and depth of approach which I am truly grateful for. Somewhere along the way I also became firmly imbued with the idea that the big picture matters. So valuing the humanities was important because it helped one to link the puzzle pieces of the world together.

A common expectation and hope amongst the educational community in India is, I think, that alliances with British or other overseas universities will mean more flexibility for students and teaching staff. By which I mean exposure to the arts, sciences and perhaps even technical knowledges together. It seems rather harsh to expect an eighteen year old to choose a “stream” and stand by it life-long.

A simple scan-through of the weekly educational supplement to the Kolkata edition of The Times of India gives a thumbnail picture of the kinds of degrees and career pathways being offered to current undergraduates. Management and science degrees predominate but there’s a wide range of IT -related and engineering courses, along with intriguingly specialist courses in things like wine-making, chocolate making and magicianship (though not at Hogwarts).

What I wonder as a global citizen and a teacher is this – how are we going to help students join the dots? Will the view that learning has value in and of itself because it nurtures creative and critical thinking hold in the new university environment being fashioned?

This wider view of the meaning and value of education already has a space both in India and in the UK. But I have also experienced the piece meal view – in both countries – that being educated in order to find and keep a job is all that’s needed.

It’s an interesting time to be in education – and I hope in succeeding pieces to chronicle more of the changes taking place. The future – not just for the UK and India but for the world – looks an utterly different place than most would have imagined it a mere ten years ago.

She is an academic, researcher and activist with substantial experience in gender and human rights issues. She has country knowledge and experience of working in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Serbia, Denmark, Mexico and the United Kingdom. Ritu is a founder and moderator of the South Asian Sexual Health (SASH) Forum and an Editor of the AIDS-ASIA eForum.

She is also the Director of Spatial and Social Development Perspectives – UK.

http://ritumahendru.wordpress.com/about/

http://mishtimli.blogspot.com/

Priyali: Hi Ritu, welcome to the “Let’s Talk” blog which is a platform for people within higher education and those simply interested in it, to talk about the things that concern us.

First off, many congratulations on completing your doctorate in Sociology. Would you like to comment on your early career experiences now that you’ve got it under your belt? What are your career plans, and what do you think of the present job market in the UK and outside it?

Ritu: Thanks Priyali. As you are aware, opportunities for PhD graduates are sporadic. I have not had much success in securing a full time academic position in the UK, something that I was looking forward to after finishing my PhD. However, I have specific engagements with various UK universities. Elsewhere, I am in negotiation with universities to establish international programmes – this is a lengthy and time consuming process.

Preferably, I would like to teach Gender and Public Health from sociological perspectives, and engage myself in social research simultaneously. I do have a company and would like to keep that as a tool to continue my engagement with countries like India, Afghanistan, South Africa etc. It may appear that I am adhering to the doctrine of utilitarianism. However, the job market in the UK is bleak so I have created a job for myself and carved my own path. I am hoping that one day the situation within UK universities will change, and I will have a full-time position at a University here.

Priyali: What or whom do you hope to influence with your work as a social science researcher?

Ritu: I wouldn’t necessarily like to influence anyone. Instead, I would like to facilitate and/or provide space for discussions on the issues of migration, gender and health. This would create knowledge of social marginalization through theoretical and methodological understanding. I am interested in the conceptualisation of diasporas and health and how the two are deeply interlinked. I made initiatives to enable this dialogue and founded SASH – an online forum that attempts to address the sexual health needs of migrants  and diasporic communities in the UK.

Next post: 7 March. Dr. Mahendru comments on being able to work across cultures, and on career planning for doctoral researchers.

As an Indian citizen who spends significant time living and working in the UK, I have been able to witness at first hand the changes taking place in the education sectors of both countries.

The Indian economy like the Chinese economy is expanding. India, like China, is investing heavily in education. New schools and universities are being founded at a steady rate.

British universities are looking to these two countries for expansion. The universities of Liverpool and Nottingham have already set up joint programmes and campuses in Xi’an Jiatong and Ningbo respectively.

I recently attended a meeting at which a reputed British university presented plans for a joint doctoral programme, to a group of senior faculty representing a number of established Indian universities. If the plan goes ahead, students will be able to show joint accreditation for their doctorates. Since a large part of the programme would be based in India, where both living expenses and tuition fees are significantly lower than in Britain, the overall cost of the doctorate would be reduced. A senior figure at the meeting remarked on the possibility that this could work not only in favour of Indian students seeking a UK degree – but also in favour of UK students wanting to cut down on university expenses.

I should mention of course that faculty at wellknown universities in India as with their counterparts in Britain, are highly distinguished. Students from both countries who are able to enroll  on such a programme should it go ahead, would also have that advantage on their side.

Are we going to see British students no longer simply taking a gap year in India but living and studying there in significant numbers? What will this mean for teaching methods, curricula and  – that impossible-to-define, mythical beast – global consciousness?

Is your department or university considering a move East?  If so, I’d love to hear your thoughts and expectations with reference to that?

I live and work in two countries: India and Britain and within two cultures which are usually perceived as extremely different to each other. From where I stand, it’s the similarities which strike home.

In both, the figure of the scholar standing apart from the crowd in a kind of meditative and ethereal calm holds popular currency.  As an undergraduate at Cambridge, one of the first jokes I read in the fresher’s pack was this one: “How many Cambridge students does it take to change a lightbulb?” Answer: One – s/he holds it to the socket and the world turns around her/him. (Okay, I admit the gender sensitive language is my addition but it’s in my bones : )).

There is probably no British university which doesn’t have a version of this joke, and I still think it’s quite good. For my purpose here I just want to point out that it’s funny because the idea of a self-enclosed and, materially speaking, rather at-sea scholar is, in my experience, widely accepted as a common truth.

In India, particularly in Bengal where I live for some of the year and where knowledge for it’s own sake is a core, cultural value, the attitude is a little different. A scholar is still seen often as detached from the material world-  but this is a positive thing. It shows that the person in question is following the life of the mind.

Teachers and researchers are far from being the only professionals who are thus subtly encouraged to live a unidimensional life. Any urban professional, anywhere – and the way our world works, an ambitious professional in any field does need to spend at least part of their career being urban – is similarly expected to focus on the visual and the mental.

But we are starving ourselves. At least, that’s how it feels to me. I didn’t realize how much until I took up a yoga and movement course, which has helped me to bring movement back into my daily work day. I am not just my head, I’m a complete human being. My research and teaching are better because I am, quite simply, happier. Yoga, of course, isn’t everyone’s movement-genre of choice but for anyone who’s curious to know how this might work, do take a look at this site, where I found the course I eventually signed up to : http://www.joyrebel.com/.

And now, to finally get that light bulb screwed in : ).