Analyzing Linguistic Hegemony In The Society: Attitudes Of Functional Native Learners Towards English

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Wafa Mansoor Buriro
Shafkat Kadri
Farheen Baqi Memon

Abstract

Learning English as to whether hegemony of English is reflected by learners’ attitudes towards English and their Mother Language (ML- Sindhi). The study also focused the way such linguistic hegemony was expressed by learners. The study was inspired by linguistically privileged and cursed? American university students and the global hegemony of English (Heinrich, 2010). Semi-structured, open-ended questionnaires were distributed among 20 students of Institute of English Language and Literature (IELL), University of Sindh, Jamshoro. 4 participants were male and 16 were female. They belonged to different linguistic and academic backgrounds but majority of them were Sindhi speakers. 5 questions were asked to ascertain the attitudes, which were analyzed qualitatively using the Gramscian perspective of co-optive hegemony as the basic theoretical construct. The responses were put into three: cultural, instrumental, and emotive for analysis. The attitudes reflected hegemony of English and showed negative attitudes towards Sindhi and MLs. Most of the arguments were cultural and instrumental; a few counter-hegemonic attitudes were also found which were underpinned by cultural and emotive arguments.

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