English-Speaking Countries' Literature and Prospective Teachers' Perceived Social Status

Proceedings The 5th International Seminar 2011 "Teacher Education in the Era of World Englishes", Salatiga, November 21-22, 2011, p. 22-28The growing number of schools offering English as the teaching medium of, at least, several subjects, implies the public enthusiastic response and preference to such education institutions. Underlying this phenomena is a mindset that knowledge and mastery of English language is an access to a promising future; thus social status. At the same time, World Englishes is increasingly accepted and practiced. A means to resist the domination of particularly British and American English, World Englishes accommodate local culture that it is also considered different nations' own language. Such a wide acceptance should lower the prestige knowing English bears to learning English as well as its literature, 37 Prose students who acted as participants of this study should be aware of this issue. As a social member, they may share similar perception as the society. However, learning English canon literature which provides authentic English, they also learn to break dominating forces. Aimed to find out how students perceive their social status as learners of English and how much English canon literature by native speaker authors affected their self-perception as those who knew English, this study utilized a reader-response approach. The same questionnaire given at the beginning of the course and after the class had discussed four short stories revealed that despite the diverse opinion the participants first had, they tended to reflect the societal notion. The literary works did influence their perception although it did not make a significant differenc