Transcript LOOKING BACK AND LOOKING FORWARD: CHANGES AND …

ELF AND SOME
IMPLICATIONS FOR ENGLISH
TEACHERS
Penny Ur
2007
Initial Concepts and
Assumptions
Probably between two and three billion
people speak English.
These may be defined according to
Kachru’s three circles: inner, outer,
expanding (Kachru, 1992).
expanding circle
outer circle
inner
circle
Kachru, 1985
Probably between two and three billion
people speak English.
These may be divided into Kachru’s
three circles: inner, outer, expanding
(Kachru, 1992).
But today the majority of English
speakers are located in the outer or
expanding circles, using English as a lingua
franca (ELF).
It is used for: academic purposes;
political negotiation; tourism; entertainment;
business and finance; information; personal
social interaction …
Most educated speakers of other
languages are at least bilingual.
Both centrifugal and centripetal trends
are developing: a proliferation of local
‘Englishes’, side by side with a generally
comprehensible ELF.
Colonialism / conquest of other
languages by English? (Phillipson, 1992)?
Or conquest of English by ELF-speakers
(Bisong, 1995)?
Some general implications
The ELF Speaker
Is defined as an ELF speaker, not as a
‘non-native’.
Is an ‘English-knowing bilingual’ (Alptekin,
2005).
Speaks an international (standard?) variety
of English.
Is not usually interested in aspects of
culture of ‘inner circle’ countries.
Is skilled in communicative and
comprehension strategies.
May or may not be (originally/also) a
native speaker of English.
Three circles redefined?
Perhaps it is more useful, therefore, to
define the three circles of users of English
internationally simply in terms of their level
of competence in the language rather than
in terms of where they live and whether or
not they are ‘native speakers’.
ELF Speakers
Limited
Competent
Fully
competent
Adapted from
Rajadurai, 2005
ELF as an international
‘dialect’
Hypothesis
An identifiable variety of English is coming into
existence, variously called ‘World Standard
English’, ‘International English’ or ‘English as a
Lingua Franca’ (‘ELF’), which is characterized by
forms, meanings and usages that are easily and
clearly comprehensible world-wide.
This is distinct from native dialects like ‘British
English’ or ‘Mainstream American English’.
It is, arguably, the variety most learners
worldwide need to know.
Some features of it are the following.
Pronunciation
/hi: cən du:/
/hi: cæn du:/
/raIzIz/
/raIzIs/
/ti:t∫ə/
/ti:t∫ər/
What sounds are essential in
ELF? What sounds are not?
Question:
What mispronunciations lead to a
breakdown in communication? What
mispronunciations make no difference
to understanding?
(Jenkins, 2002)
Results
The following items (among others) were
found to be essential for good understanding:
/I/ versus /i:/
/p/, /t/, /k/ versus /b/, /d/, /g/
initial consonant clusters eg. strong
use of tonic stress e.g. He came by
TRAIN versus HE came by train.
The following items (among others) were
found to be non-essential:
/ð/ and /θ/; (‘th’)
The schwa sound /ə/.
Spelling
program
programme
color
colour
center
centre
organize
organise
Vocabulary
Cheers!
Thanks!
queue
line
autumn
fall
flat
apartment
fortnight
lift
two weeks
pavement
sidewalk
elevator
GRAMMAR
I have / Do you
have?
I have got / Have
you got?
She just finished
She has just
finished
I have been
waiting for an hour
I am waiting for an
hour
You are studying
English, aren’t you?
You are studying
English, right? (/no?)
Some questions arising
from the rise of ELF
1. Is ELF a full, rich language, or a
minimal ‘pidgin’?
Both: but as English teacher we are
responsible for teaching the full language,
in all its richness and diversity.
Is ELF a clearly defined standard
language?
Certainly not today: there is no dictionary
or grammar of ‘ELF’.
But there are norms developing of
internationally acceptable usage.
Probably it is only a matter of time before
dictionaries and grammars are published,
simply because teachers need to know
what the most useful forms are to teach.
Is there a ‘general’ ELF? Or is it
always domain-specific (ESP)?
Again, probably both.
What we need to teach our students is
the generally accepted forms, meanings
and usages of ‘general communicative’
English.
In specific circumstances, we may need
to teach the features of particular
discourses (e.g. academic).
Is ELF a culture-free language?
To a large extent yes, in that it naturally
expresses the culture of its speakers, and is
therefore may function as a vehicle for a wide
variety of cultures.
It is arguable that in certain areas of behavior,
an ‘international culture’ is developing, parallel
with the development of ELF (hotels, dress,
greetings, thanks and apologies, business letters,
email formats, internet conventions …)
Is it endangering other languages?
Probably not: the evidence is that people are
becoming bilingual rather than moving over to
English: the languages are existing side by side.
There is even evidence for the actual growth in
the activity and number of speakers of some
minority languages during the same era that
English was / is becoming more widely spoken
(e.g. Welsh, Hebrew).
This goes also for the existence of local
Englishes, side by side with ELF.
Is ELF influenced by native
Englishes? Or vice versa?
Both, but ELF speakers are less and less
ready to accept the ‘authority’ of speakers
of particular native dialects, and more and
more deciding for themselves what shall be
acceptable usage.
Some implications for
English teaching 1
Norms and models
Teach ENL? Teach for diversity?
Teach ELF?
Teach ENL: Most teachers and students
worldwide still prefer to aim for ENL and
assume that this should be the model,
Teach for diversity: Many writers today
stress diversity and the need to make
learners aware that there are many
varieties of English, of which no one is
superior to any other.
‘Teachers and their learners, it is widely
agreed, need to learn not (a variety of)
English, but about Englishes, their
similarities and differences, issues involved
in intelligibility, the strong link between
language and identity, and so on.’
Jenkins, 2006a: 173
Teach ELF:
• Because you cannot possibly teach all
varieties
• Because ELF is arguably the most useful
variety to teach worldwide;
• Because ELF is achievable.
Teach for intelligibility? Teach
for correctness?
Some suggest that in our teaching today we should
ensure intelligibility rather than insist on correctness.
(McKay, 2002)
And that many so-called errors are in fact variant forms
acceptable in different places, and so should be accepted.
But:
There ARE norms of acceptable usage (e.g.
grammatical forms) in English, accepted and implemented
by fully competent and proficient ELF speakers.
Learners want to know they are speaking according to
these norms (i.e. ‘correctly’)
If they come across local-dialect variants, they need to
know how far these are also acceptable in ELF.
Some implications for
English teaching 2
The ideal English teacher: A native
speaker? An ELF speaker?
The native-speaker English
teacher
Has a good intuitive grasp of his/her
native variety of English.
Is likely to feel confident of own
knowledge of English.
The non-native-speaker English
teacher
Learned English as L2: may or may not be
fully competent
May feel less confident of own
knowledge of English.
May speak an inappropriate
(native) variety of English.
Is likely to speak an appropriate
variety of English (ELF).
May not be familiar with learners’
L1 and culture (in a monolingual
situation).
Is likely to be familiar with
learners’ L1 and culture.
Cannot serve as a role model for
ELF learners.
Can serve as a role model for
ELF learners.
The bottom line is that the argument
about whether native or non-native
teachers are better is rapidly becoming
irrelevant: what matters is that the teacher
should, besides his/her native language
(whether this is English or not) be a fully
competent speaker of ELF, be familiar with
the students’ home language and culture –
and, perhaps no less important, be a good
teacher!
Some implications for
English teaching 3
Materials
Content: culture, situations,
texts, characters …
The underlying culture is more likely to be based
either on the source culture or on international
cultures
The situations in today’s coursebooks are more
likely to be international in character, taking place in
various places around the globe, or in an unidentified
locale.
The characters are more likely to involve
characters who are ELF speakers, with ‘international’
or local names.
The texts are more likely to be adaptations of
international or local texts rather than ‘inner-circle’
‘authentic’ texts or literature.
Language
The forms of the language are based on ELF,
as described above.
There is far more acknowledgement and use
of the learners’ L1, since:
– The aim is to produce bilinguals, not imitation
(monolingual) native speakers: people who function
comfortably in both languages and are able to
codeswitch as necessary;
– Acknowledging and using the L1 implies respect
for that language and its underlying culture and
identity.
To Summarize
English as a Lingua Franca
English functions today mainly as a
lingua franca, used by people who are
native speakers of other languages.
A variety of the language is developing
which has universally accepted norms of its
own in grammar, lexis, spelling and
pronunciation, with some room for
acceptable variants.
ELF Speakers
Users of this language are termed ELFspeakers or English-knowing bilinguals
(rather than ‘non-native speakers of
English’)
The ‘role-model’ English speaker today is
the fully competent speaker of ELF (rather
than the ‘native speaker’)
English teaching
The international variety of English used for
lingua franca purposes is the variety which, in
most of the world, English learners should be
taught.
ELF speakers are the most appropriate
teachers of ELF.
Teaching materials for expanding circle
countries will be based on ELF, will use more
international and source-culture contexts, topics,
characters and texts and will include more use of
L1.