Vaidehi Ramanathan

Bio: Vaidehi Ramanathan is an academic researcher from University of California, Davis. The author has contributed to research in topics: Vernacular & Language education. The author has an hindex of 15, co-authored 35 publications receiving 894 citations. Previous affiliations of Vaidehi Ramanathan include Manonmaniam Sundaranar University & Periyar University.

The English-Vernacular Divide: Postcolonial Language Politics and Practice

Abstract: Preface Introduction: Situating the vernacular in a divisive postcolonial landscape 1 Divisive post/colonial ideologies, language policies, and social practices 2 Divisive and divergent pedagogical tools for vernacular- and English-medium students 3 The divisive politics of divergent pedagogical practices 4 The divisive politics of tracking 5 Gulfs and bridges revisited: hybridization, nativization, and other loose ends Afterword Appendix References

Critical literacies and language education: global and local perspectives

Abstract: Increasingly aware of the “critical” turn in our disciplines, we offer a partial survey of scholarship in two key realms—English for academic purposes (EAP) and globalization—where the term “critical literacy” has particular relevance. We begin by addressing some key concepts and ideological tensions latent beneath the term “critical.” We then address the pedagogical priorities that arise from this conceptualization, in particular, the use of texts to distance individual and group identities from powerful discourses. Next, we review studies that demonstrate how different teachers and researchers have engaged in unraveling and cross-questioning the rhetorical influences of various texts types, including multimodal ones. In the final section, we discuss the intertwined processes of homogenization and diversification arising from the economic, cultural, and political strains of globalization with particular emphasis on their implications for critical literacies and language education.

TESOL and Policy Enactments: Perspectives From Practice

Abstract: Prior research in the area of language policy and planning (LPP) has been focused primarily on macro decision-making and the impact of national, local, and institutional policies in educational settings. Only recently have scholars begun examining the everyday contexts in which policies are interpreted and negotiated in ways that reflect local constraints and possibilities. The redirection of inquiry toward situated policy enactments in TESOL is the central theme of this special issue and the introductory article. In this article we address and expand on several key themes that arise from and unify the various contributions to the issue: (a) the enhanced status and implications of locality in policy research, (b) practitioner agency and the ethical concerns involved, (c) the globalization of particularistic agendas (i.e., neo-liberalism) and their impact on nation-state identities and policy enactments.

Rethinking Language Planning and Policy from the Ground Up: Refashioning Institutional Realities and Human Lives.

Abstract: At a time when connections between English and globalisation seem stronger than ever, and at a time when the ‘dominant’ status of English vis-a-vis other languages is very prominent, it seems imperative for the LPP scholarship to make room for grounded explorations regarding English and its relationship to vernacular languages in non-Western educational contexts. Drawing on an eight-year ethnographic study of English-and-vernacular-medium education in Gujarat, India, this paper argues that it may be time for language planning and policy studies to adopt a situated approach that begins addressing issues around language planning- and policy-related inequities by first focusing on what is on the ground.1 By gaining insight into how divides between English and other languages are perpetuated by the enforcement of particular policies and by understanding how institutions and humans refashion and re-plan theirs and others lives by countering language policies, such an orientation opens up a way for us to go bey...

Of texts AND translations AND rhizomes: postcolonial anxieties AND deracinations AND knowledge constructions

Abstract: This article uncovers some problems involved in culling and translating non-western texts-written in other languages, at particular times, for specific audiences, and rooted in particular local milieus-before assembling them into academic arguments in English in the west. Based on my longterm, evolving endeavour regarding English- and vernacular-language teaching in Gujarat, India, I argue that the seamless ways in which academic knowledge-which draws on translated texts-gets presented belie the murkiness, selectivity, and complexities underlying various stages of the translating and knowledge-building process. Drawing on eight years of extensive translating of Gujarati and Hindi documents and interviews in a variety of educational and community contexts, and on my own roles and experiences as postcolonial researcher who has had to translate herself divergently in across different geographical spaces and in different languages, I argue that uncovering the messinesses involved in selecting and translating ...

I and i

Abstract: There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality. Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

The archaeology of knowledge

Abstract: We may not be able to make you love reading, but archaeology of knowledge will lead you to love reading starting from now. Book is the window to open the new world. The world that you want is in the better stage and level. World will always guide you to even the prestige stage of the life. You know, this is some of how reading will give you the kindness. In this case, more books you read more knowledge you know, but it can mean also the bore is full.