VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES TRẦN THỊ BÍCH NGỌC A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF GENDER DISCRIMINATION IN USING PICTURES IN UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL ENGLISH TEXTBOOKS (TIENG ANH 10, TIENG ANH 11, TIENG ANH 12) PHÂN TÍCH DIỄN NGÔN PHÊ PHÁN VỀ SỰ KÌ THỊ GIỚI TÍNH TRONG CÁCH SỬ DỤNG HÌNH ẢNH TRONG CÁC SÁCH GIÁO KHOA TIẾNG ANH THPT (TIẾNG ANH 10, TIẾNG ANH 11, TIẾNG ANH 12) M. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201 HANOI - 2017 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES TRẦN THỊ BÍCH NGỌC A CRITICAL DISCOURSE ANALYSIS OF GENDER DISCRIMINATION IN USING PICTURES IN UPPER-SECONDARY SCHOOL ENGLISH TEXTBOOKS (TIENG ANH 10, TIENG ANH 11, TIENG ANH 12) PHÂN TÍCH DIỄN NGÔN PHÊ PHÁN VỀ SỰ KÌ THỊ GIỚI TÍNH TRONG CÁCH SỬ DỤNG HÌNH ẢNH TRONG CÁC SÁCH GIÁO KHOA TIẾNG ANH THPT (TIẾNG ANH 10, TIẾNG ANH 11, TIẾNG ANH 12) M. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201 Supervisor: Dr. Huỳnh Anh Tuấn HANOI - 2017 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com DECLARATION I hereby declare that the thesis, entitled “A critical discourse analysis of gender discrimination in using pictures in upper-secondary school English textbooks (Tieng anh 10, Tieng anh 11, Ttieng anh 12) has been carried out in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Art at the University of Languages and International Studies.
This work is original and all the sources that I have used or quoted have been indicated and acknowledged by means of complete references. Hanoi - 2017 Trần Thị Bích Ngọc i TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS During the period of completing the Master thesis, the author has received the support of a great number of people. First and foremost, I wish to express my deepest gratitude to Dr. Huynh Anh Tuan, my supervisor, who has generously given me insightful guidance and valuable feedback during the process of carrying out the thesis, without which this thesis would be far from completed.
I would also like to give my sincere gratitude to all of the lecturers at ULIS - VNU, Hanoi for their scholarly knowledge and enthusiasm in their lectures. My profound thanks are also to all my friends and classmates in the cohort 23, who have always stayed by my side, given me constructive comments and perked me up every time I need. Last but not least, my heartfelt thanks go to my family for their immeasurable support and continual encouragement. The Master thesis could not have been fulfilled without them.
ii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com ABSTRACT The study is an attempt to investigate the manifestation of gender discrimination in the national English language teaching textbooks, namely, Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11, Tieng Anh 12. For this study, the researcher focuses on analyzing the non-linguistic features - visual images in terms of gender representation in an effort to extract the ideology behind their constructions. The research approach is based on critical discourse analysis in combination with methods of quantitative and qualitative content analysis. The results reveal that these textbooks present a gender discriminatory attitude mainly toward women, in which male characters are over-presented visually.
The proportion of females to males in illustrations is 1:2. Furthermore, regarding social plus domestic settings, men monopolize and dominate more social roles than women do. In contrast, domestic roles are profoundly demonstrated by females. In addition, males often take a center position in drawings, which is considered important.
It is suggested that gender equality is still a controversial issue in Viet Nam‟s society and Vietnamese culture mirrors the way gender represented in the textbooks. iii TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 1. Distribution of males and females in illustrations. Males and females in occupational roles.
Males and females in family roles. Activities performed by males and females. Colors applied to males and females. Blumberg‟s criteria of obstacles to gender equality and evidences in textbooks.
Analytical framework of the study. Procedure of the analysis. Future jobs, english 12 (basic). Future jobs, english 12 (advance).
Women in society, english 12 (basic). Home life, english 12 (basic). Home life, english 12 (advance). Asian games, english 11 (basic).
Asian games, english 11 (basic) .41 iv TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION. iii LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES. Rationale of the study. Objectives of the study.
Scope of the study:. Method of the study:. Structure of the study. Review of theoretical background.
Critical discourse analysis. Fairclough‟s three-dimension model. Multimodal critical discourse analysis. Roles of visual images.
The three metafunctions of meaning. Grammar of visual images. The meaning of composition. The information value of centre and margins.
Gender issues in the school textbooks .15 v TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail. Review of previous studies related to the research area of the thesis. Studies of gender discrimination in textbooks in the world .2 the studies of gender discrimination in textbooks in vietnam. Summary of the chapter.
Summary of the chapter:. FINDINGDS AND DISCUSSIONS. Findings and discussions of research question 1. Distribution of different genders in pictorial representations.
Gender representation in occupational roles. Gender representations in family roles. Gender representations in different activities. Gendered attributes in terms of colors.
The placements of males and females in drawings. Findings and discussions of question 2. Summary of the chapter:. Limitations of the study.
Suggestions for further studies. I vi TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com PART A INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study Viet Nam‟s education in certain respects is not different from that of other countries around the world in such a way that there still exists problems within its own system no matter how well-constructed it used to be; as a result, there is an urge to reform the education system to meet the expectations of the society. It is undeniable that the innovation should be comprehensive as each part of the educational system is of equal importance and they are mutually related.
Therefore, the change in the curriculum should go with the alteration in teaching methodologies as well as textbooks (Markee, 1997). In the process of innovation in 2001, the national textbooks for all the three levels including primary, lower and upper secondary especially the implementation of new English textbooks had received the great concern of the government and the public. The English textbooks for upper secondary school students also had undergone significant reforms ranging from the syllabus to the topic. Textbooks belong to education and education is heavily involved in the ideological development of one person; therefore textbooks with the knowledge they contain could affect individuals‟ perception.
It is apparent that linguistic features are not the sole components of one textbook; there appears the contribution of non-linguistic elements such as images or pictures. The visual images utilized in textbooks not only are meant to delight the lesson, to assist the reading passages or any kinds of activities but also affect the students‟ awareness of specific issues (Fang, 1996). Pictures and photographs present meanings of their own (Kress & Leeuwen, 1996); therefore the misapplication of them could lead to the negative effects such as showing the discrimination of race, sex, religion and so on. Looking back at the book of “Sự kì thị giới tính trong ngôn ngữ” (Sexism in language) by Trần Xuân Điệp, the author discussed the phenomenon of sexism in teaching materials and exposed that the discrimination against women appeared in both 1 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com linguistic and non-linguistic levels.
Nguyễn Thị Hương, 2014 also confirmed in her study that gender stereotypes existed in the verbal and non-verbal form in the Vietnamese language textbooks for primary level. It is also noticeable that textbooks play a key role in transmitting knowledge including gender role information to students at all levels. Accordingly, evaluating English textbooks in terms of gender representation is a must in order to provide both teachers and learners with the critical outlook of gender discrimination. The aforementioned issues are some incentives to study the series of domestic English textbooks designed to teach upper-secondary school students, namely Tieng Anh 10 (basic), Tieng Anh 11 (basic), Tieng Anh 12 (basic), Tieng Anh 10 (advanced), Tieng Anh 11 (advanced), Tieng Anh 12 (advanced).
Objectives of the study The study aims at: - Investigating gender representations via pictures utilized in the upper secondary school text books Tieng Anh 10 (basic), Tieng Anh 11 (basic), Tieng Anh 12 (basic), Tieng Anh 10 (advanced), Tieng Anh 11 (advanced), Tieng Anh 12 (advanced) in Viet Nam. - Scrutinizing whether these representations promote or challenge gender equality in education. Research questions: The study will be addressed by the following questions: (1) How are different genders demonstrated via pictorial representations in the series of national English textbooks Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11 and Tieng Anh 12? (2) To what extent do these gender representations promote or challenge the gender equality in education? 2 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail. Scope of the study: The Vietnamese upper secondary English language textbooks, entitled as Tieng Anh 10 (basic) , Tieng Anh 11 (basic), Tieng Anh 12 (basic), Tieng Anh 10 (advanced), Tieng Anh 11 (advanced), Tieng Anh 12 (advanced) are chosen as the data of this study.
In fact, linguistic features of these English textbooks will not be analyzed. The researcher focuses on examining non-linguistic ones - visual presentations to extract the ideologies embedded in these productions. The three national textbooks from basic set Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11, Tieng Anh 12 (basic) were written by Hoang Van Van et al and three others from the advanced set: Tieng Anh 10, Tieng Anh 11, Tieng Anh 12 (advanced) were written by Tu Anh et al. Both of the two sets were published by MOET in 2006, 2007, 2008 respectively.
Method of the study: The methodological approach is built entirely on the foundation of discourse analysis. The research method involves a quantitative and qualitative content analysis. Within this area of investigation, the three dimension model given by Fairclough (2001) will be combined with the grammar of visual image by Kress & van Leeuwen (2006) and analysis technique employed by Esmaili, F & Amerian, M (2014). Structure of the study The organization of this thesis is presented as follows.
Part A: Introduction This part presents an overview of the research in which the rationale, the aims, the research questions, the scope as well as the organization are shortly expressed. Part B: Development Chapter I: Literature Review (This section provides basic concepts, theoretical framework and related research of the study). 3 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com Chapter II: Research Methodology (This part presents a detailed description of methodological choices for the study: data collection procedures and data analysis procedures.) Chapter III: Findings and Discussion (This sector gives the findings and discussions of the study). Part C: Conclusion The last part summaries the study, gives some conclusion points to the study, and discusses the limitations of the study as well as suggestions for further research.
4 TIEU LUAN MOI download : skknchat@gmail.com PART B DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I. LITERATURE REVIEW This chapter discusses linguistic theories consisting of critical discourse analysis (CDA), multimodal discourse analysis (MDA). The researcher also mentions the concept of visual images including pictures. Furthermore, in this chapter is the discussion of gender as a concept as well as gender discrimination.
Additionally, it provides the previous related studies from research experts in the world as well as in Vietnam. Review of theoretical background 1.