Don't 'push' me that hard, it's just my accent! : global teachers, local identities

"Who says this accent or this way of thinking is the cultivated one?" Paulo Freire's inspiring words[ii] came back to my thoughts last month, as I was approached by a very kind man just after my Conference paper presentation in Canberra. His accent told me that he was not from an English speaking country. Next to the regular introductory conversation, he went straight to his point and asked: "Do your students pick on you about your accent?" When I smiled, he felt comfortable enough to tell me his experience, which was somewhat similar to my own one: he was a fresh migrant who had come at the end of last year to Australia from a Middle-East country to take up a position as a lecturer in an Australian university. After his first semester, he received the students' feedback on his course. He said the evaluations were sound; however he was really worried as a few students criticized his "strong accent".