Many minority students enter the university without the discursive ''codes of power" that they need both to find academic success and to self-identify as scholars. High schools and college preparatory programs too often ignore the role that academic language and literacy play in success at the college level. Even when academic…

This paper argues that the "world Englishes paradigm" and English as a lingua franca (ELF) research, despite important differences, have much in common. Both share the pluricentric assumption that "English" belongs to all those who use it, and both are concerned with the sociolinguistic, socio-psychological, and applied linguistic implications of…

While Kachru's Three Circles model of World Englishes (Kachru 1985, 1986; Kachru and Nelson 1996) has been highly influential in highlighting the changing distribution and functions of English, it has also been criticized for its inability to account for the heterogeneity and dynamics of English-using communities, and for perpetuating the very…

This paper offers an examination of the role played by ideology in the research and regulation of "English within a globalized context" (EGC). It analyzes the two major paradigms in this field: that which promotes English as a single, universal code; and that which advocates the need for the acknowledgement of discrete, localized varieties. It…

We describe an exploratory study carried out within the University of Milan, Department of English the aim of which was to analyse features of the spoken English of first-year Modern Languages undergraduates. We compiled a learner corpus, the "Role Play" corpus, which consisted of 69 role-play interactions in English carried out by…

Drawing on Pennycook's frameworks for understanding the global role of English, we discuss the paradoxes of English language usage in what Canagarajah terms "periphery communities" internationally. This analysis is complemented by Canagarajah's work on a "politics of location", which provides powerful insights into a periphery…

This paper draws on theories that describe interrelationships between identity, language and the media to investigate how the Kurds utilise two forms of electronic media--satellite television and the Internet--to construct their identities. The data for this study is generated from four sources: a Kurdish satellite television channel (Kurdistan…

This study investigated degrees of mutual intelligibility among 3 structurally related languages in South Africa: Sepedi, Sesotho, and Setswana. To compare reading proficiency of mother-tongue speakers who enrolled for freshman courses at the University of Limpopo, 4 reading experimental conditions, in the 3 languages and 1 in a harmonized text,…

It is not easy to look at the current momentum of the worldwide diffusion of English and imagine what the future trends will be by mid-century or even in the next two or three decades. A prudent undertaking is to review briefly the present situation and project what the coming decades hold in view of several developments that are shaping our…

This paper takes up three topics for discussion. The first is whether the Kachruvian three-circle model can accommodate the possible change of English use (e.g. native/non-native to individual proficiency, a special talent to a basic skill). The second is what transformation English would undergo if it survives as English as an international…

In 2008, the need for intra-European communication has long exceeded the limits set by language barriers. As a result, English acts extensively as a lingua franca among Europeans with different mother tongues, particularly so in the professional domains of education, business, international relations and scientific research. Yet, despite its…

This article examines three critical issues relating to the role of culture in teaching English as an international language (EIL): Firstly, the way in which top-down processes of globalisation, accompanied by the widespread desire for English in many former colonial countries, have in general fostered the negative effects of dominance,…

The worldwide spread of English has recently received much interest. Issues relating to the multifaceted roles of English around the world have been highlighted and purist positions about English challenged. In particular (a) the assumption that British English is the only valid standard of English; and (b) the notion that the "native speaker" is…

The role which English maintains as a lingua franca is currently being conceptualized in differing ways. English as an international language, Euro-English, and English as a lingua franca are analyzed from two main perspectives; first, the relevance that such descriptions of English-language usage have for variety building (for mainland Europe);…

The phenomenon of English as a lingua franca (ELF) has become the subject of considerable debate during the past few years. What emerges from much of the discussion, however, is that there seems to be a good deal of uncertainty as to what, precisely, ELF actually is, and how it relates to the much more firmly established field of world Englishes…