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English Proficiency: Japan vs. the Philippines

Here’s a tangential comment I wrote over at Autono Blogger which I thought might be interesting to the readers here.

In response to Autono Blogger’s post–which was itself a response to a recent post over at jarinefl–I stated the following…

I can really relate to your feelings here:

my growing awareness of a belief among Japanese students of English that they can somehow learn English ONLY by being in the presence of an English-speaking foreigner - “English by osmosis” - and that practice (alone or with a Japanese partner), drills (both oral and written), learning vocab, are either irrelevant or can somehow be bypassed when you have a real, live, English-speaking (and preferably blond(e) and blue-eyed because we all know that those are the only real foreigners) “gaijin” to yourself, if even for a few minutes;

My recent trip to the Philippines has me raving about the fluency possibilities for all students in Asia. Some of my students have asked why I think the Filipino people have been so [much more] successful [than Japanese] in adopting English as their second language. I’ll leave the historical differences between the two countries alone this time and simply point out that there are two major differences in their approaches to English education:

1) In the Philippines, the government took the bold step of making English their second national language. Effectively, this means that the citizens are receiving a single, unified message: English proficiency is important for this country and each of its citizens, and we will all start using English. In Japan, we see something along the lines of ‘English is important for your class ranking and college admissions, but not so important that we adults are going to start using it,’ which is the policy equivalent of ‘Do as I say, not as I do.’

2) Filipinos speak English with each other. Why would they do such a strange thing? Many reasons, I suppose, but the most important is that knowing both of your country’s national languages can only be beneficial. Furthermore, as socio-economics are closely tied to level of education, English ability is seen as a symbol of status. I’m sure there is an ugly side to this as well, but it drives the younger generations to approach English proficiency as a tool for communication, and one that will open doorways, even in their own society. Nothing even close to this happens in Japan, where English is looked at as a foreign language, to be employed when in foreign lands or in the presence of a foreign ‘visitor.’

Any thoughts?

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This entry was written by Steven Nishida and posted on July 9, 2007 at 9:46 am and filed under human nature, community, perspective, TOEIC, autonomous learning, japan, language, economics, history, education, teaching, learning. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post. Post a comment(Latest is displayed first) or leave a trackback: Trackback URL.

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13 Comments so far (Add 1 more)

  1. Hi Steven,

    I’ve been to the Philippines twice and immediately loved the country and its people. I agree with your two ideas regarding their success with English. I’ve been in japan since 1989 and yet, still wonder whether it is a case of what Japan is doing wrong or is it more a case of what it’s not doing right that causes English to be in such a pitiful state?

    It seems that the negative effects of English study here being a “grueling, rigorous academic mental hoop that everyone must jump through” are possibly more detrimental than we English foreigners can imagine. My wonderful Japanese co-worker says, “HS students have to STUDY English but they don’t have to LEARN English.” He is totally right, yet how can this make any sense? Only in Japan…

    I also wonder if the fairly well-hidden Japanese pride gets in the way of putting a more realistic emphasis on actually adopting English as a second language.

    Great topic. I’d love to hear others ideas or even get together for a beer over the summer. Great work on your blog!

    Steve Herder

    1. japanactionresearchinefl on July 9th, 2007 at 2:59 pm

  2. Hey Steve: Good to see you’re keeping yourself busy. Your blog is really shaping up!

    I think we share a lot of views on problems facing Japanese students and the obstacles to resolving them. We definitely need to get together for a beer! It would be good if you could come out to observe and/or participate in an event or two at my school.

    We’ve got a pretty solid community of learners with just the attributes you speak of: a balanced multi-strand approach to proficiency, confident, highly motivated, committed to learner autonomy, etc. We see success in our students’ achievements everyday, so we know what’s possible here in the land of Wa, but ours is a very particular classroom atmosphere and we have a very particular brand of student. We tend to attract students who understand the importance of commitment and focused, quality guidance. I have serious doubts whether what we do could be replicated in a large classroom setting.

    Talk soon,
    Steve N

    2. realityonastick on July 10th, 2007 at 7:42 pm

  3. Can you imagine the possibilities if Mexico would adopt English as their second national language? The reality that they must face is that many of their citizens come to the States for work. Many of these workers bring their families, which consists of children. These children have a right to a public education. However, they often come to school totally unprepared to speak English. School’s then spend an inordinate amount of money on getting these students to fluent in English.

    I think economically it’s just the right thing to do for both counties. My only question is do Filipino’s remain fluent in Tagalog?

    3. ms_teacher on July 18th, 2007 at 10:56 pm

  4. Hi ms_teacher: Thanks so much for you comment, and congratulations on your blog’s 1 year birthday:-)

    It’s true that the average Mexican citizen could probably benefit greatly from increased English fluency, especially with greater internet access becoming a reality in developing countries. Having said that, I have major doubts about whether the Mexican government would be willing to spend its precious resources on improved English education. Admittedly, I am not terribly knowledgeable on Mexico’s education policies, but they seem to have much bigger fish to fry.

    Filipino’s who become functional English speakers are indeed able to keep their Tagolog fluency. The idea that learning a second/foreign language impairs L1 is a widely held myth–and a prevalent one here in Japan. Looking to countries like Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, we see that learning 3+ languages is the rule rather than the exception.

    Steve

    4. realityonastick on July 19th, 2007 at 9:13 am

  5. Interesting discussion. I came here for the 2001 video and found this post. I’m an American who grew up in a diverse multi-cultural community. It seems Americans just take it for granted that the rest of the world will speak their primary language. The US is rapidly moving towards having Spanish as a second language. I have mixed feelings about this, but I will say that ballots where I grew up are now printed in six languages. Is this a good thing?

    5. museditions on September 1st, 2007 at 6:36 am

  6. Hi museditions: Thanks for joining in.

    I was born and raised in Los Angeles, so I can relate to your experiences. When I was growing up, I didn’t think much of the knee-jerk reaction that many Americans have to situations involving immigrants with low-English ability: “Learn to speak English!”

    It’s pretty harsh when you think about it, and not something I’ve experienced in any other culture (though the French have a bit of a reputation along these lines). While it’s convenient that English has become the lingua franca of our era, this fact alone has discouraged Americans (young and old) from learning foreign languages. How many Americans do you know who have learned a second language of their own accord? I don’t know many at all.

    Having only recently acquired relative fluency in Japanese, I can say without question that learning a second language brings only benefits to your life. There is no negative side to it. Furthermore, it broadens your perspective and your capacity to see that there is not only one way of understanding the world, even grammatically.

    Moving on to your question, ‘Yes.’ I definitely think it’s a good thing that ballots are now printed in multiple languages, and ‘Yes,’ I think it would be a step in the right direction if Spanish were to become a second national language in the U.S., though I suspect that it would only be adopted at state levels and primarily on the coasts. Think of it this way: the first language of 80-90% of Central and South America is Spanish and yet the vast majority of U.S. citizens can’t communicate with them, nor can we understand their news, spoken or written. Given the economic state of most countries in those regions, we can hardly expect their masses to learn English and participate in _our_ dialog in _our_ native language. Increased cooperation with Spanish-speaking countries in the Americas may seem unimportant now, but if Asia ever gets its act together, the US isn’t going to be quite the dominant economic position we are in now, and will certainly help if we’ve established closer cultural ties with our neighbors.

    But, I’m not really an authority on the topic:-)

    Thanks again for stopping by. Hope to see your comments again.

    Cheers,
    Steve

    6. realityonastick on September 2nd, 2007 at 7:03 pm

  7. When I was in high school, we had 3 languages to pick from: French, German, and Spanish. Most of us had had some Spanish earlier. We didn’t take learning these too seriously, though, unless we needed one of them for a “college thing”. Many of my friends, whose cultural background didn’t include the above languages, were sent to language school after regular school by their parents, i.e. Chinese, Hebrew, Japanese, Russian school. I still remember my best friend saying “I can’t go to the concert, I have to go to Cantoneeeeese school”. (The “eeeee” still rings in my ears!). These parents, though, were helping to maintain cultural identity in the “melting pot” and we all just took it for granted. It has become a political issue, now. I hope that all of us will remain open-minded about diverse cutures and their expression. Cheers, keep up the good work. I enjoy reading it.

    7. museditions on September 3rd, 2007 at 7:05 pm

  8. (Imported from old blog site.)

    MARTIN // November 27, 2007 at 9:11 am (edit)

    The topic seems so interesting, the Philippines adopt the english as second language during the colonization of america. Filipinos adopted it easily making them master of their skills. Japan had many things to offer in terms of technology and innovation but not in english as their second language.
    #

    Alyssa // November 29, 2007 at 8:56 am (edit)

    Indeed it is true that the Philippines adopt English as a second language and are using it more and more frequently as the years go by.

    However as a fellow Filipina, I noticed the development of “Taglish” (the combo. of Tagolog, the true national language & English). Nobody speaks true Tagalog anymore. Slowly but surely Tagalog will disappear along with Filipino’s unique culture because of the overusage of English.
    #

    wilmarc // November 30, 2007 at 7:19 pm (edit)

    just a thought. i think that us filipinos being able to adapt english as our second language shows how dependent we are on english-speaking powers, e.g. u.s.a.

    don’t get me wrong, in any way. i have never been to other countries, but i can see how they flourish using their own language.

    i just hope that the image of filipinos being a maid-race may soon be vanished together with other stupid racist stereotypes and generalizations.
    #

    8. Steven Nishida on December 1st, 2007 at 12:30 pm

  9. MARTIN, Alyssa, wlmarc: Welcome, and thanks for joining the discussion!

    MARTIN: Yes, it’s true that it’s not really possible to have an intelligent discussion about English education in the Philippines without commenting on the history of the region. It makes sense that colonization by an English speaking country would lead to wider adoption of the language. There are certainly countries in which this is not the case, however. I’d be very interested in reading such a discussion, but I don’t have enough background knowledge on the topic to comment on it now. Anyone?

    Alyssa: You’re right about the widespread adoption of loan words threatening the authenticity of languages. This becomes especially problematic when two languages are shared by the same group (country) of speakers. I’m not sure that this is avoidable, however, if we are going to allow the any language to become the international standard. Also, I’m no authority, but it seems to me that Tagalog (or Filipino, as my EFL/ESL colleagues call it) lost its authenticity long before English became widely adopted. While staying with Tagalog speaking families I was able to follow conversation topics just by listening for the (little) Spanish that I know! As my host told me, “The Philippines has been invaded by all of our neighbors, but they never succeed in controlling the archipelago, and they always leave new elements of culture and language behind.”

    wilmarc: My friends in the Philippines voiced many similar concerns. I don’t think the maid-race stereotype is as prevalent as it once was, though it really depends on where you go. Recently, the Philippines has gained wide attention as a hotbed for dental and medical training. Unfortunately, in the media, this attention is muffled by stories of the booming call center industry. I’m afraid that some care will have to be taken to avoid the long-term image that the Philippines is a destination for low-level telecommunications jobs. I suppose that’s a step up from the ‘maid-race’ brand of prejudice, but it certainly doesn’t do justice to the skill and education level of the Filipino work force.

    Thanks again for all your comments.
    Steve

    9. Steven Nishida on December 1st, 2007 at 8:00 pm

  10. Just curious about the English proficiency tests that are used in Philippines for things such as job placement. From your knowledge, are they valid?

    10. Melissa on February 29th, 2008 at 11:55 am

  11. Melissa: Thanks very much for your question. I’m afraid I’m not informed on the topic of English proficiency test in the Philippines. Perhaps someone else can help us out here?

    11. Steven Nishida on March 1st, 2008 at 2:33 pm

  12. I really enjoyed reading this discussion. I’m a Filipino exchange student here in Korea, and the case of English education in Japan is rather quite similar to that in Korea. Koreans, as I have read, spend trillions of won a year just to learn English, while we Filipinos need not go bankrupt to acquire English as a second language. I always think that probably Koreans, as well as the Japanese, fail to develop fluency in English because they don’t have an “English environment”. For example, in the Philippines, media (television in particular) have a very strong impact on people’s lives, and English is the preferred language by advertisers. By constant exposure to media, Filipinos learn English, even to just a small degree. In my observation, here in Korea, it’s totally not the same. TV programs and commercials are seldom in English; even internet websites, books, and international magazines are translated in Korean.

    About the effect of learning a second language on the proficiency in the first language, I should say I’m one of those victims of “L1 declination”. I grew up in Manila, and everyone speaks Filipino or English or often both. The ability to speak both languages is a must in a Manileño community, but as one reaches the higher levels of education, the importance of one’s proficiency in Filipino somehow diminishes. I feel embarrassed when I ask people the meaning of certain Filipino words that they use, even those that are very simple. It also feels weird correcting each other when we make grammatical errors in spoken Filipino. I think Filipinos are now more concerned about being an Anglophone. It saddens me.

    And it’s not exactly just the “status symbol” that forces us to be good at speaking English. It’s more of the “social dictate”. It’s tough, but that’s how our nation is. I don’t regret being part of it, and I don’t blame anybody for causing this thing to happen. I guess that’s just how nations grow.

    12. Marco on March 23rd, 2009 at 8:50 pm

  13. Hi Marco: Thanks so much for your comments. Very insightful stuff. You have a very clear grasp of the important issues, and a mature perspective on the ebb and flow of cultural/linguistic dominance in transitional societies. On a personal note, the reason I ended up in Japan is that my grandparents’ generation stopped speaking Japanese–completely–during World War II. Their children (my parents) weren’t even taught the language. It was a price that had to be paid in order for the younger generations to flourish. As you so rightly point out, it is fruitless to harbor regrets or resentment in such situations. If it is important to you to acquire–or reacquire–a language/culture, the only thing to do is make it a priority. So here I am, still in Japan, raising my child bilingually (and taking a stab at introducing him to Spanish as well).

    13. Steven Nishida on March 24th, 2009 at 12:28 pm

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