Job’s ChildrenIt collapsed on them, and they are dead.
—Job 1:19
God let Satan kill Job’s children.
Seven sons and three daughters.
But it’s all okay because God later gave Job back
seven sons and three daughters.
Different ones.
But the same number.
Sometimes Job would take his new ten children
to the graves of the old ten children.
The boys would stand on the graves of the boys.
The girls on the graves of the girls.
Job would make them stand in age order.
Each had their place by a particular grave.
Sometimes when Job wasn’t looking
the children would switch places
because they were bored
because they were disobedient
because they wanted to remind each other
because they wanted to remind themselves
that they were not the same children
as the dead children.
These in the graves were dead.
Those on the graves were alive.
When Job caught them at it, he murdered them all.
Then he went out and bought new children.
Praise
God.
In crimson dawn, the conch did cry, A lion roared beneath the sky. Trident gleamed in morning’s breath, Durga rose to conquer death.
Mahishasura, proud and vile, Mocked the gods with wicked guile. He wore the skins of beast and man, And laughed at fate’s divine plan.
But Durga stood, her eyes aflame, Each hand a weapon, each name a name. She danced with wrath, a cosmic tide, The stars bowed low, the winds replied.
Her sword sang hymns of sacred rage, She struck him down, page by page. Ten arms moved like thunder’s grace, She carved justice on his face.
Blood turned to dust, pride to plea, The demon fell, unbound, unfree. Peace returned to heaven’s dome— Durga smiled, the world found home.
International Tagore Awardee Poet Dr. Ratan Bhattacharjee is a former Affiliate Faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University USA, and ex-associate professor and head of the post-graduate department of English at Dumdum Motijheel College, the President Kolkata Indian American Society, Associate Editor for Ayomoy and multilingual international Poet/Columnist for national dailies.
Abstract: This article discusses the issues of speech culture and communicative competence in English. Speech culture is defined as the combination of correctness, clarity, politeness, and expressiveness in communication.
Cultural competence in ESL refers to the ability to understand, communicate with, and effectively interact with people across cultures. It involves being aware of one’s own world view, developing positive attitudes towards cultural differences, and gaining knowledge of different cultural practices and world views. Language and culture are inextricably linked. The nuances, idioms, and colloquialisms of a language can provide insights into its subtleties and complexities, which are crucial for effective communication.
Today’s increasing globalization and English use as a global language, people’s need of teaching and learning English is really important. Education around the world prioritizes English as a mandatory subject in schools and universities. Most parents, for example, want their children to learn and communicate in English. These parents would be proud if their children were competent and excellent in English. From the mid to late 1970 to nowadays, experts introduced and developed kinds of methods and approaches in teaching and learning English. Some of them are Grammar-Translation, Direct Method, and Audiolingualism.
These methods mainly focused on grammatical knowledge and rules, translation, and repetition. The purpose of these classical methods was to reinforce constant repetition and positive reinforcement through continuous process of drills and practices. Students’ accuracy was the main purpose of these methods. However, other experts criticized the previous methods as focusing solely on grammatical competence and repetition through positive reinforcement. Demonstrating a clear shift of emphasis among scholars who work on language, Hymes (1972) coined and defined the term communicative competence as the knowledge of both the rules of grammar and the rules of language use appropriate to a given context.
As reported in Alptekin (2002) and Uso-Juan and Martinez-Flor (2008, 158), Hymes’s conceptualization of communicative competence has been further developed by several researchers who attempted to define the specific components of the model as grammatical competence (i.e. knowledge of the language code in a way that refers to Chomsky’s linguistic competence); sociolinguistic competence (i.e. knowledge of the sociocultural rules of use in a particular context); strategic competence (i.e. knowledge of how to use communication strategies to handle breakdowns in communication) and discourse competence (i.e. knowledge of achieving coherence and cohesion in a spoken or written text). Pragmatic competence is essentially included in this model under sociolinguistic competence, which Canale and Swain (1980, 30) described as ‘sociocultural rules of use’. Being grounded on this taxonomy, communicative competence was repeatedly divided into some lesser known sub-competences like physiological mechanisms (Bachman, 1990) and actional competences.
Following the emergence of the nation of intercultural communicative competence and its relations to (foreign language) education, many studies have been produced concerning different scopes and focal points. Questioning what makes a learner’s communicative competence in English and hypothesizing that it cannot be accomplished without having an orientation towards the other’s culture, Akalın (2004) examined with an intercultural eye the textbooks used in Turkey to teach English.
Based upon her findings, she suggests that textbooks for especially young learners should firstly be predicated on characters, pictures, illustrations, texts and subjects from Turkish and even local culture and move slowly to the target culture and to crosscultural experiences so that students would not feel inhibited and strange as we proceed from the simple to the more complex and from known to the unknown in any educational process. In order for this to happen, she proposes as a solution that large foreign publishing companies should communicate with each target nation’s English teachers and educationalists.
Emphasizing the fact that the objective of language learning is no longer defined in terms of the acquisition of communicative competence in a foreign language but rather in terms of intercultural competence, which is “the ability of a person to behave adequately in a flexible manner when confronted with the actions, the attitudes and the expectations of the representatives of foreign cultures” (Meyer, 1991, 138). Similarly, teachers are now expected not only to teach the foreign linguistic code but also to “contextualize that code against the socio-cultural background associated with the foreign language and to promote the acquisitions of intercultural communicative competence” (Castro, 1999, 92). Atay, Kurt, Çamlıbel, Kaşlıoğlu and Ersin (2009) investigated the opinions and attitudes of Turkish teachers of English on intercultural competence teaching to see how, and to what extent, these opinions and attitudes are reflected in their classroom applications.
In specific reference to and support of Alptekin (2002) based upon direct experience and observation from Japan, Samimy and Kobayashi (2004) strongly object to the current implementations of communicative English teaching in the country claiming that they were imposed upon with a top-down approach by political and bureaucratic authorities on the assumption that any idea that seems to work in the U.S. and the U.K. and/or EFL contexts should work equally well in countries like Japan and/or any ESL context.
While the Japanese education system like the one in Turkey is characterized by crowded classrooms and masses of students associating the study of English with the university entrance exams, which emphasizes grammar, vocabulary and reading comprehension, the authors question how reasonable it is to recruit native speaker English teachers (which is a hot controversial issue at present in Turkey too) and force Japanese English teachers to fill students with Western values embedded in Communicative Language Teaching.
As a study with a fairly different perspective, Garcia and Biscu (2006) can be cited here. It is about the introduction of a new course called “Language Mediation” at the School for Interpreters and Translators of the University of Bologna, which is a project to teach intercultural communicative competence through theatre. The idea emerged from the Council of Europe’s definition of “mediation” as a communicative activity of the language user/learner, thus the undergraduate interpreter/translator as well, in which s/he acts as an intermediary between interlocutors who are not able to understand each other. In pursuit of what constitute a language mediator’s competences and skills, the authors found that he/she, besides language competence, should also possess sociolinguistic, discursive, strategic and sociocultural competence (Oliveras, 2000, 24) and intercultural communicative competence (Rodrigo, 1999, 235) comprising verbal and non-verbal aspects of communication, intercultural awareness and the mastery of pragmatics, behavioral patterns and negotiation (Oliveras, 2000).
In this context, the authors were inspired by the belief that theatre is a means to achieve the awareness and knowledge necessary to experiment intercultural exchanges, since the re-expression of a dramatic text in a foreign language -in with other space and another time- leads to dialogue with the mental context of the other culture.
References:
1.Alred, G., & Byram, M. (2002). Becoming an intercultural mediator: A longitudinal study of residence abroad. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Education. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.
2.Alptekin, C. (2002). Towards intercultural communicative competence in ELT. ELT Journal Oxford.
3.Atay, D., Kurt, G., Çamlıbel, Z., Kaşlıoğlu, Ö., & Ersin, P. (2009). The role of intercultural competence in foreign language teaching. Inonu University Journal of the Faculty of Education, Special Issue, Malatya.
4. Balboni, P. E. (1999). Parole comuni, culture diverse. Guida alla comunicazione interculturale. Venezia: Marsilio.
5.Ball, J. C., & Lau, M. P. (1966). The Chinese narcotic addict in the United States. Social Forces, Chapel Hill.
6.Byram.M. Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence. Great Britain: WBC Book Manufactures, Ltd.
Hayley sat silently on the sofa in her living room; a shiny brass pole lamp scattered illumination over the four walls and the television was on but muted. The colorful figures on the television danced in confusion in reflections on the linoleum floor. Hayley was slender, almost petite; she had raven black hair and attractive features: a pretty face, bright blue eyes and an old-fashioned rosy complexion. But her eyes were clouded. She sat quietly, still as a statue, except for her hands, which twitched furiously, Hayley had just turned forty and had had Parkinson’s Disease for the past twenty years.
She continued sitting because standing and walking was such an unwelcome adventure, frequently resulting in missteps, staggering collisions with the furniture or walls, even falls. At length, the telephone rang–the land line, not the cell she kept at hand–and she was forced to get up off the sofa. As she rose, her head swam, she saw little white spots in front of her and she teetered on her feet. She was unalarmed, for the dizziness often came and went. The phone rang again. She hurried a little, struggled to put one foot unsteadily before the other. She brought her cane into play. The telephone continued to bleat.
It was like walking through deep water, thought Hayley, as she reeled and staggered to the telephone table. It was always worse when she had been sitting or reclining for a while. Reaching a trembling hand out, she grasped the phone just as it stopped ringing. She put the receiver to her ear and listened intently. She spoke hello into dead air, frowned, and slammed up the phone. She glanced at the Caller I.D. screen and scowled. No number or message appeared.
Another hallucination! she thought bitterly. She’d cancel the land- line, except she never knew when her cell might lose power or malfunction; and she needed a reliable connection to emergency services. She’d have to get an extension wire in order to place the phone nearer the sofa. She sighed. The hallucinations were a new addition to her condition. The tremors and the difficulty in standing and walking was one thing, but the delusions were something else again. She couldn’t trust what she heard, what she saw.
Suddenly Hayley glanced at her cell, noted the time “I’ve got to get going,” she murmured aloud. “I’ve got a date, and that doesn’t happen every night!” Indeed it didn’t. Hayley hadn’t dated regularly in ten years, ever since her disease began worsening. The half dozen dates she’d had over the last couple years or so didn’t count, she decided. They had all been unspeakable disasters, blind dates set up by friends or family. They clearly hadn’t been expecting the cane or the hand tremors or the clumsiness. Oh, they were nice enough guys, just not prepared for a woman with disabilities. She sighed, shook her head at the disappointing memories.
This time, however, she had covered all the bases: she used a computer dating service that catered to clients with “special circumstances,” such as age or, in her own case, a disability. She had listed Parkinson’s on her app and been contacted by a man about her age, who also had the disease. The man–Roger–had had the condition, he said, for about nine years. Not as long as she, but then, Parkinson’s progressed at different rates in different people; at any rate, he could at least relate to her situation, surely. They’d settled on dinner, at a moderately-priced restaurant and they would go “Dutch.” That suited her right down to the ground; this last year, particularly, had been difficult. The lonleiness was often discomfiting, sometimes simply overwhelming. Oh, Hayley had girl friends, but they couldn’t really relate to her situation; they were all married or dating in serious relationships. They were always trying to set her up, but the few resultant dates had been unmitigated disasters. She resolved to just hope for the best. Roger had sounded nice on the telephone.
Two Hours Later
Hayley arrived at the restaurant a little early, so she wouldn’t make a spectacle of herself walking in and stumbling into a chair. In spite of Roger’s similar affliction, she felt almost helplessly self-conscious around other people. She shooed the waitress away, telling her she was waiting for someone. Her date! She felt curiously giddy. Hayley watched the other patrons, all dressed fairly casually: sports jackets and blazars and off-the-rack outfits. The men all looked handsome and the women were pretty as well. It was a young crowd. They stood at the bar talking and sipping drinks, lurid concoctions with umbrellas for the women and shots of some amber liquid–whiskey?–for most of the men. She noticed pointedly that as they all drew their drinks to their lips, not a hand shook. Hayley placed her own hands in her lap, out of sight.
At length, Roger walked in, not self-conscious at all, thought Hayley. He was standing straight, walking smoothly and as he got nearer she noticed that his hands didn’t shake at all. What was his secret, she wondered. He looked just as handsome as his computer image had been. Blond hair, tall, around six one, nothing extra around his middle. He was rather nattily attired, keeping with the unofficial dress code. She met his eyes and smiled. She really was very pretty, she told herself, and Roger seemed to pick up on that right away. “Hi, Hayley, how are you?” He offered his hand. She reluctantly pulled her own hand from her lap and clasped his hand in a firm grip. “I’m fine, Roger, how are you?” He seated himself opposite her. “I’m good; it’s nice to finally meet you–in person, I mean,” he returned, then fixing his eyes on her glass, asked, “What are you drinking?” “Just water,” she answered, taking a sip.
“Well,” he said in a jolly voice “we’ll have to change that.” He signaled for the waitress. When she turned up, he said, “Scotch and water; Hayley?” he turned to her. “I’m fine,” she said. “Oh, c’mon, don’t make me drink alone,” he said persuasively. “Well, Seven-Up,” she said. “Make it a Seagram’s Seven,” he added.
“No, Roger, I don’t want any alcohol.” Turning to the bewildered waitress, she corrected, “Just a plain Seven-Up.” The waitress hurried off. Hayley looked up; Roger was staring at her blankly. “My medication,” she explained. “I can’t have any alcohol with my medicine.” “Oh,” he said, genuinely surprised. “None at all?” he asked her, incredulous. Silently she shook her head no. The waitress returned with their drinks.
“Don’t you take any medication?” It was her turn to be surprised. Roger took a heavy slug of his scotch before shaking his head and saying, “Nope. Nothing.” “How do you manage that?” Hayley wanted to know. “You seem so…normal. Look at that,” she indicated the hand holding his drink, which he was fast polishing off. “You don’t have a tremor at all!” Roger raised a finger at the waitress, pointed at his now empty glass. He waited until the waitress returned with his new drink before replying,
“Well, the truth, Hayley, is that I don’t have Parkinson’s Disease at all.” He took another big gulp of his scotch. Hayley blinked, utterly surprised. “You mean…you mean you’re not sick at all?” Roger frowned. “You make it sound like that’s a bad thing,” he complained.
But…why did you say you did? What was the point of that?” While Hayley had been speaking, Roger had silently ordered yet another drink and was half-way through it already. Hayley observed that Roger wasn’t nearly as attractive as he’d been when he first arrived. Perhaps the alcohol was revealing his true self. And he was thoroughly in his cups now, obviously something of a lightweight. “Answer me,” she said sharply, surprising even herself.
“Well,” he replied, slurring his words a little, “I figured I take one of them disabled chicks, I might get lucky, you know,” he grinned lecherously. Hayley’s stomach roiled. “I mean,” he said more expansively, his voice rising, you get a girl who’s got something wrong with her, that don’t get around much, maybe doesn’t get much action.” He winked grotesquely, ordered still another drink. How many drinks could he hold? wondered Hayley. Already he seemed drunk. Hayley was feeling a little ill herself now.
Their waitress appeared again, asked if they were ready to order. “I…I’m not hungry,” said Hayley, waving her hand at the girl. “Well, I am,” insisted Roger, pushing away the menu. “I want a big steak, rare, baked potato, sour cream, and asparagus!” he demanded. The waitress turned back to Hayley. “Nothing for me,” she murmured. The waitress withdrew.
“One other thing, Hayley,” said Roger, slurring his words anew. “Can you…you know,” he pointed at the table, made a circling motion with his finger. “Take care of this?” She stared at him blankly. “I’m a little short,” he explained. She regarded him coolly, then said, “I’m not interested in your sexual inadequacies. But pay for your own meal; you drank it, you pay for it!” And with that, she was on her feet, headed for the door. Roger, chagrinned, called after her, “I would have made it worth your while!” Hayley turned back only long enough to reply, “I doubt that; I really, really do.” She continued toward the exit, her cane accidentally knocking against a diner’s chair. “If I knew how bad you were, I never would have taken you out!” Roger shouted at her back. She made her way through the exit, out to an available taxi, where a man was just getting in. He halted, looked her way.
“Hayley?” he said. She stopped, surprised. It was Mr. Beasley, a man who lived in her building. “Hi, Mr. Beasley,” she managed, clearly upset. “Do you want to share a taxi?” he asked. “Uh…sure. Thanks.” They both climbed in. Mr. Beasley gave the driver the address and they sped away. She sat slumped in her seat. Beasley looked over and said, “Are you alright, Hayley?” She shook her head no. “You want to talk about it?” She took a shuddering breath. “I just had the most awful date I’ve had…in years,” she exclaimed. He nodded encouragingly. “I met him online, at a dating service. It was a site where if you have a disability, they hook you up with someone similar…you know, my Parkinson’s. I have Parkinson’s.” “Yes,” he said. “I thought you did.” They hadn’t talked much, he’d lived for years on the floor above her. He was at least fifteen years older than Hayley and she hadn’t given much thought to him before. She glanced at him, noticed that his hand shook a little and his head darted to the left, then to the right. It wasn’t pronounced, but noticeable.
“You…you don’t have it too, do you, Mr. Beasley?” she asked hesitantly. “Oh, you don’t have to answer me if you’d rather not,” she hurried on. “No, it’s alright. No, my own cross to bear is Tourette’s Syndrome; you’ve heard of it?” he asked. “Oh, yes, of course. I didn’t know you had it, though.” “Usually it’s controlled by medication; this is one of my ‘unfortunate days,’ however.” Hayley nodded.
“What happened inside?” Beasley asked. She rolled her eyes. “My ‘date’ was some predator who pretended he was disabled, just to prey on women he thought would be easy.” She went on to describe the scene inside the restaurant. “How about you?” she asked him. “Just on my way home from work,” he replied. They rode in companionable silence for a few moments. He’s not at all unattractive, she thought. And she knew he lived alone. Maybe he’s gay, she thought. Not that that would make him a bad person, but as far as boyfriend material, it would be a little limiting. Still, he had always seemed very nice. “Well, did you at least get a decent meal out of it?” Beasley asked. She frowned.
“No. I was so mad that I walked out without even eating.” “Well, you know, I’m pretty hungry right now myself.” She looked across the seat at him. “And I’m a pretty good cook,” he continued with a smile. She smiled back at him. “And call me Ron, won’t you Hayley?”
As World- renowned poetess Miss Til Kumari Sharma is a Multi Award Winner in writing from an international area from Paiyun 7- Hile Parbat, Nepal. She is known as Pushpa Bashyal around her community. Her writings are published in many countries. She is a featured-poet and a best-selling co-author too. She is a poet of the World Record Book ” HYPERPOEM”. She is co-organizer of it too. She is one of many artists to break a participant record to write a poem about the Eiffel Tower of France. Her World Personality is published in Multiart Magazine from Argentina. She is a feminist poet. She is published as the face of the continent ( Cover Page of Asia) in Humanity Magazine. She is made as portrait ” Poetic Legend of Asia” by Nigerian Painter. She is world creative hero of LOANI.
Her published single books in Nepal and India are following.
1. Philosophy: Tilaism/ Pushpaism
2. PushpaLakshya (Nepali language )
3. Priyanka and Nanda (Nepali language)
4. Letter to Father (Nepali language)
5. Drama
6. Dynamic World Leading Poetry
7. World Moving Poetry
8. Creation within Nature
9. Give Death Penalty to Cyber Criminals & Thunderbolt of Feminism against Them – S. India
10. Poems that Shake the World (Nepali language )
11. Humanity & Morality in Essence – S. India
12. Pushpa Journey’s Flower in World Leadership ( Nepali language )
13. Leading World with Humanity and Morality
14. Society and Nation in World Literature ( Nepali language )
