The construction of overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) in educational discourse among maritime training institutions in the Philippines: A Sociolinguistics of globalization

• Main Author: Sioson, Irish Chan
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Animo Repository 2014
• Online Access: https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/etd_doctoral/372
• Institution: De La Salle University

This study investigated the role of maritime training institutions in the propagation and formation of students training and instruction for overseas employment in relation to the institutions beliefs, policies, practices and the aspirations and motivations of aspiring overseas workers. Employing Blommaerts (2010) a sociolinguistics of globalization, this study documented the discursive practices observed in the institutions before deployment of the graduates for overseas work. To investigate the discursive practices of training institutions as well as the collective and individual perspectives of the participants, the study used a qualitative-ethnographic research design employing interviews, classroom observations, and textual analyses as sources of data. The study involved 30 student-informants and 20 staff-informants from three maritime training institutions located in Manila. Informed by Blommaerts (2010) sociolinguistics of globalization in a globalized setting such as the maritime industry, the study found that the notions of multilayered, multiscalar and hierarchical view of globalization are reflected in the policies and practices such as instruction, assessment, and marketing strategies and are reflected in the testimonials of trainees of these institutions. By capitalizing on the notion and image of global competitiveness, Filipino seafarers are presented as competent workers who answer to international standards, producing a homogeneous group of maritime workers, situated in a hierarchical and highly porous setting. Moreover, a sociolinguistics of globalization may be approached not only from a top-down but also from a bottom-up perspective, thus providing a different angle in the development of a pool of vocabulary to represent the phenomenon of globalization. Terms such as exclusive iii accommodation, scalar prerequisites, triggers and linguistic versatility were derived from the results of the study in an attempt to provide a rich description of the phenomenon.