Volume 3, Issue 2

This article discusses the possibility of English becoming a lingua franca in Estonia. It builds on Laitin's (1996) observations regarding the fact that English would become the country's language of inter-group communication among Estonian and Russian speakers. By providing ethnographically collected data and discussing it from the paradigm of language ideologies, the present article clarifies some of Laitin's original observations. While it appears that English has not become a lingua franca in Estonia, this possibility works in given circumstances, even if just sporadically, in order to help solving possible communicative obstacles. It is therefore argued that ELF is actually an extra resource, a tool that speakers can make use of if needed.

This study identifies strategies used by speakers of ELF from Asia-Pacific countries for managing rapport in response to potentially face-threatening utterances in informal, non-hierarchical situations. The analysis, which draws on the Asian Corpus of English (ACE), reveals numerous points of contact with existing studies of English as a lingua franca. Potentially face-threatening utterances were usually – though not always – countered with a move to normalise the flow of conversation and maintain interactional rapport. There was also a preference for safe topics and an avoidance of potentially sensitive ones. Humour and laughter were frequently employed, possibly to signal equanimity with interlocutors. Yet two communicative strategies emerged which appeared to depart from the general pattern of rapport preservation. The first was mock impoliteness, which was possibly employed to signal solidarity with recipients but which risks evaluation as impolite regardless of intentionality. The second was bald on-record contradiction of or counterclaim against potentially face-threatening propositions or assessments. We theorise that these were delivered on-record to facilitate lingua franca communication: speakers avoided using complex or idiomatic language to ensure addressee comprehension, while recipients refrained from making an evaluative judgment of direct disagreement to allow for limitations or idiosyncrasies in their interlocutors' speech.

This paper discusses the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) in relation to research conducted on English as a lingua franca (ELF). The following aspects will be considered: (a) the native speaker and native language culture foci particularly of the proficiency level descriptors in the CEFR, and why they are conceptually problematic from an ELF perspective, and (b) the ways ELF speakers have been found to regulate language in ELF interaction (e.g., by correcting and commenting on language) and how the regulation can be seen to construct alternative norms for English used in lingua franca settings. The paper seeks answers to McNamara’s (2012) call for articulating the construct of ELF communication in a way that it can act as the focus for the assessment of English. It will be argued that a crucial aspect in reaching this goal is to reconsider some of the fundamental assumptions of language use presented in the CEFR. This includes not only moving beyond native speaker--non-native speaker contacts and the idea of a native speaker target culture, but also moving towards more context-aware assessment criteria, which would be informed by research on language regulatory practices in ELF interaction.

The paper discusses the challenges and opportunities that the English as a lingua franca (ELF) paradigm raises for ESOL teacher education. I argue that one of the prominent implications of the ELF paradigm for ESOL teachers is the need to review and ultimately change their convictions about key aspects of foreign language teaching, such as normativity, the role of native/non-native speakers, and the function of teacher feedback in the foreign language classroom. I review evidence from the ELF literature that supports such a perspective and discuss the kind of reflective reviewing that teachers need to engage in. I argue that, while the critical approach is certainly the right way to go, it is not enough. What is necessary is a more rigorous approach that would go beyond merely exposing teachers to the principles and criteria of ELF and prompt them to critically consider and ultimately transform their deeper convictions about these issues. I present a framework for such a transformative perspective that aims at educating the ELF-aware teacher.

In the last few years many universities have internationalised their courses by offering them in English. Very often the lecturers remain the local ones, who adopt English as a means of instruction although they are not native speakers of that language. In many cases the teaching of such courses is assigned to foreign lecturers, who are not chosen specifically for their language competence but rather according to their expertise in the subject they are supposed to be teaching. As they are taught in English, these courses attract many students from other countries. The result is a typical ELF situation in which most lecturers and students – although they are not native speakers of English – use this language as a common means of communication and instruction. The present paper examines communicative interactions taking place in such contexts. The data are taken from “international” courses on specialised disciplines offered by the University of Bergamo, recorded and transcribed according to the conventions adopted in the compilation of the ELFA Corpus (Mauranen et al. 2010). In particular, the first part of the paper examines the most common strategies employed by lecturers to explain the main specialised terms and technical concepts concerning the specific courses they are teaching, as well as those adopted to overcome the difficulties of comprehension experienced by their students. The second part of the paper takes into consideration the cooperative work carried out by both learners and teachers in the explanation/comprehension of specific topics in order to facilitate the achievement of the teaching/learning objectives of the courses.

English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) is today a research area which has attracted a lot of attention. This paper builds on recent research in this field and explores Taiwanese English as a foreign language (EFL) and international students' (FLF) perceptions toward Englishes. The participants were (i) EFL sophomores who took college English courses ( n  = 1965) and (ii) ELF graduate students in an international MBA (IMBA) program ( n  = 97) in Taiwan. Comparing the survey results enables the researchers to investigate English learning perceptions between undergraduate students, who learn English as a foreign language, and IMBA students, who study in ELF classrooms and use English for academic learning to communicate with instructors and fellow students. In addition to survey, interview data were collected from 13 ELF students so that qualitative data were available for analysis. The result of this study suggests the need to reformulate English education in Taiwan so that English becomes an effective tool for learning and communication in academic ELF settings. This will involve raising awareness of English varieties, fostering cross-cultural understanding, and developing accommodation strategies to facilitate international communication.