Various examinations are administered at universities across the US as a means of assessing bilingual/multilingual international teaching assistants' (ITAs') proficiency in spoken English before they are permitted to teach. While such exams are taken by students in a range of academic disciplines, recent research suggests that communicative…

A study of Greek speakers' ability to understand and produce two varieities of codes--Katharevousa (K) and Demotic (D)--is reported. The investigation was undertaken to provide evidence supporting or refuting the Greek government's decision to legislate Demotic as the official language of the country. A sample of 545 informants were tested with a…

The paper discusses some issues that language variation creates for English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) instruction, identifies research strands relevant to program development, and describes two dialect program exemplars. It also suggests considerations for educational policy formation with respect to dialects. The introductory section gives…