What is Critical Thinking?

What is Critical Thinking?

Janpha Thadphoothon

**

Every educationist on CT seems to agree on one thing --- critical thinking is dispositional. In this section, how English has become a global language is invoked as a metaphor for a critical thinker and is invoked as being ‘open-minded.’ In the context where more and more people learn English, its users are varied culturally and geographically, the need for its users, be they native or non-native, to be flexible and open is greater than it used to be a hundred or so years ago.

Life is organic and flexible. Our brains are, according to Kagan (2002, Fall) ‘social organisms’. The dinosaurs, some believe, were extinct because they were not able to adapt to the new environment. A living language changes and adjusts itself to new reality. English is changing and is becoming an international language, a global means for people from different parts of the world to ‘talk together,’ In this section, English is being personified as a person who is open-mended, a dispensable quality of a critical thinker.

Indeed, how English has attained its global status is in itself a remarkable story. Melvin Bragg, in his audio book The Adventure of English (2003), has personified English as a traveler, an adventurer, survived the Romans, the Danes and the Normans. In this research, English, a great adventurer, is also an example of a ‘critical thinker’. This analogy may offer the readers some valuable lessons in terms of thinking qualities: open and flexible. Circumstances have forced it to be open; flexibility made it survived. Historical records confirm one thing: English, as its speakers were controlled, once thought to be suitable for the peasants, the language not suitable to be printed on the Bible (Bragg, 2003). Moreover, throughout its long journey, English has been scolded by many critics as the remains of colonization, mocked by its rivals as a language of mass destruction (e.g. Swales, 1997), the language that has lost its purity, etc., with its enduring soul, English prevails and moves on.

To be open like English means to be open to criticism and open for changes. English has also been a very successful ‘collaborator,’--- someone who works well with others. It collaborated with its conquerors, challenged the Latin for its right to be used in the church. It adjusted, adapted, and survived. Nowadays, English has become a window of opportunities for many people. Its users, upon reflection, may wish to learn about its journey as a source of inspiration. This research urged its readers to appreciate English, to see its beautiful qualities.

Widdowson (quoted in McKay, 2002) explained the logic behind this internationalization of English as follows:

As soon as you accept that English serves the communicative and communal needs of different communities, it follows logically that it must be diverse. An international language has to be an independent language. It does not follow logically, however, that the language will disperse into mutually unintelligible varieties. For it will naturally stabilize into standard form to the extent required to meet the needs of the communities concerned. Thus it is clearly vital to the interests of the international community … that they should preserve a common standard of English in order to keep up standards of communicative effectiveness.

(p. 53).

However, if his statement is interpreted correctly, Widdowson did not seem to refuse that there may be many norms and they are evolving all the time. So the key is its flexibility. As English has become a global language, its users need to become more open-minded, more tolerant to language variation, e.g. non-native accents or ways of expressing their ideas and feelings. In this respect, the success of English can be invoked as a good example, or rather as a metaphor. The message is as follows: A learner of English needs to be open and flexible. This research would like to use the success of English as a ‘metaphor’ for a critical thinker, a possible way to become a critical thinker. Carl Sagan, a science-fiction writer, has been quoted as saying that: “ The creation of the Ionian [2500 years ago off the coast of Turkey] derived from the freedom of inquire, the conflict of different perspective, and the importation of writing as a tool of thinking” (quoted in Bielaczyc & Collins, December 2002). With tools, freedom of expression, and different perspectives, the conditions are there for them to learn. The ancient Ionians were open to new experiences. To be open-minded also means to be intellectually humble, ready to change one’s mind if evidence has proven otherwise. In this regard, Bertrand Russell (1872-1970), in his autobiography, wrote in the preface that he had lived for three passions: love, knowledge, and a desire to alleviate human suffering. With regard to knowledge, his attitude towards learning was humble. He wrote: “I have sought knowledge. I have wished to understand the heart of men. I have wished to know why the stars shine. And I have tried to apprehend the Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the flux. A little of this, but not much, I have achieved”(The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 1967).

**