Affluent in semiotic resources and containing great communicability, Chinese university emblems have yet to attract much academic research. Drawing on studies of social semiotics, typographic landscaping and multimodal concepts, this paper explores the linguistic and social dimension of meaning-making practice and the entanglement of Chinese and…

In an era of internationalisation and globalisation, many institutional and national governments' higher education policies have embraced neoliberal agendas that encourage the use of English as a medium of instruction (EMI). Due to the postcolonial struggles of the Global South, it is important to critically examine the entanglement of EMI with…

Based on discussions of cultural empathy in intercultural communication and counselling and multicultural psychology, this paper presents a model and a measure of cultural empathy suited for a broad range intercultural interactions -- the Intercultural Empathy Index (IEI). We examined the IEI's psychometric properties via two studies involving…

This article offers a decolonial reading of professional development for English-medium instruction (EMI). The article zooms into the context of Taiwan, where the promotion of EMI has intensified since the 2030 Bilingual Policy was introduced. It is unclear, however, what constitutes EMI professional development, and to what extent the…

China has had an ambivalent policy for the learning and teaching of English as a foreign language (EFL) over much of its history. The explicit and implicit implementation of language policy has had a significant impact on the content of EFL textbooks and the ideologies underlying them. However, studies exploring such ideologies remain sensitive…

The purpose of the present mixed methods study was to investigate if enhancing Focus on Form (FonF) tasks with data-driven learning (DDL) affects English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners' task motivation from the self-determination theory (SDT) perspective. Following a quasi-experimental comparison group pretest-posttest and sequential…

Technology-mediated communication has become ubiquitous and digital multimodal learning has been increasingly integrated into second language education. Drawing on the concepts of transmediation and interpretant in social semiotic theories, this study explores the potential of digital storytelling (DST) in promoting EFL learners' willingness to…

Focusing on how a world of possibilities is opened up by language learners themselves, imagination has been regarded as an elusive but indispensable element in second language (L2) education. Drawing on notions of international posture (Yashima 2002), Ideal L2 Self (Dörnyei 2009), and imagined communities (Norton 2001), we theorised imagination…

With English hegemony sustained in 'multicultural' Anglophone universities, non-English speaking research students often develop diverse strategies to improve their English. While such strategies demonstrate a form of resilience, the symbolic power of English remains intact. To grapple with this paradox, we draw on the work of Pierre Bourdieu to…

This mixed-methods study explores whether undergraduates in a multilingual, multicultural university -- and more specifically in a multi-dimensionally internationalised classroom -- manifest transcultural competence when starting university studies. The article precisely focuses on the role of intercultural friendships and personal and family…

Although international students often report satisfaction with their studies and view Canada as being tolerant and multicultural, increasing anti-Asian sentiment triggered by the global pandemic has highlighted the importance of exploring whether international students, especially from South and East Asia, experience discrimination. This study…

This paper explores the ways in which apology functions as a stance act at public speech events. Rather than focusing on speakers' intentions, in this study I pay attention to indexical meanings associated with apologies in a specific context. The study primarily analyses apology sequences that involve code-switching, which were drawn from…

This study investigated the extent to which racialisation shapes EFL learners' conceptualizations of the 'native speaker' construct through an experimental design. Three hundred and fourteen university students studying at English-medium universities in Turkey were invited to take an online matched guise test. They were assigned to either the…

International students' attitudes towards teachers' codeswitching to the first language (L1) have not been adequately investigated in cross-cultural English-medium instruction (EMI) settings, where teachers and international students do not share the same L1 while they interact in English as a lingua franca (ELF). To fill that void, this study…