Picture this.

We're in a feedback session on a CELTA course. I'm giving feedback to my trainee on how she's dealt with a pronunciation issue in her class (she made an obvious mistake). She looks at me with a lot of doubt in her eyes, at some point she rolls her eyes and doesn't actually take any of my words seriously. Next time she makes the same mistake and uses the argument 'that's what we, native speakers, say'. 

I'm a qualified teacher, ex-manager in a language school, ELT business owner, and a Cambridge-qualified teacher trainer. She doesn't care. 

So if you're bored of the native versus non-native speakers in ELT debate then you may as well be bored of feminism. Because it's exactly the same. We still need to talk about it and we need our own activists. It's still extremely unequal.

Unfortunately, people interpret the activism and support of non-native speakers as diminishing towards native speakers. That often comes from their own insecurities. But we need to stop thinking that giving more attention or recognition to one group means taking it away from the other. LEVEL PLAYING FIELD, anyone?

This episode touches on the obvious aspects of the problem but I also wanted to add my own passionate voice to the discussion. I share stories, reflections, statistics, thoughts, and ACTION POINTS for all of us.

Give it a listen and let me know your thoughts. Have you ever been discriminated against as a non-native speaker? What do you do to level the playing field for yourself or for others?