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A sociolinguistic approach to the multifaceted Roles of English in English-medium education in multilingual university settings

  • Emma Dafouz and Ute Smit
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Applied Linguistics Perspectives on CLIL
This chapter is in the book Applied Linguistics Perspectives on CLIL

Abstract

Over the last twenty years, English-medium education in tertiary settings has turned into a global reality, with higher education institutions (HEIs) across the world aiming to become increasingly international. Yet this apparently uniform move towards English-medium instruction comes in such a variety of highly diverse local realisations that, when looked at in detail, the homogenising function of English turns out to be more complex and multifaceted than initially expected (Smit & Dafouz 2012). Within this context, the chapter draws on a recently developed conceptual framework for describing English-medium education in multilingual university settings (or EMEMUS), known by the acronym ROAD-MAPPING (Dafouz & Smit 2016) and focuses specifically on one of the six core dimensions, namely Roles of English (in relation to other languages). With the help of illustrative discursive examples from two different HEIs, we contend that well-established notions (such as EFL, EAP, ESP and ELF) while useful for initial categorizations of English language usage, are, firstly, complex in themselves and, secondly, adopt predominantly linguistic perspectives, potentially sidelining other relevant societal, institutional, pedagogical and communicational factors.

Abstract

Over the last twenty years, English-medium education in tertiary settings has turned into a global reality, with higher education institutions (HEIs) across the world aiming to become increasingly international. Yet this apparently uniform move towards English-medium instruction comes in such a variety of highly diverse local realisations that, when looked at in detail, the homogenising function of English turns out to be more complex and multifaceted than initially expected (Smit & Dafouz 2012). Within this context, the chapter draws on a recently developed conceptual framework for describing English-medium education in multilingual university settings (or EMEMUS), known by the acronym ROAD-MAPPING (Dafouz & Smit 2016) and focuses specifically on one of the six core dimensions, namely Roles of English (in relation to other languages). With the help of illustrative discursive examples from two different HEIs, we contend that well-established notions (such as EFL, EAP, ESP and ELF) while useful for initial categorizations of English language usage, are, firstly, complex in themselves and, secondly, adopt predominantly linguistic perspectives, potentially sidelining other relevant societal, institutional, pedagogical and communicational factors.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction
  4. Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) 1
  5. Part I. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) perspectives
  6. Introduction to part I 19
  7. CLIL and SLA 33
  8. Motivation, second language learning and CLIL 51
  9. Investigating pragmatics in CLIL through students’ requests 67
  10. Part II. Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) perspectives
  11. Introduction to part II 91
  12. Genre and appraisal in CLIL history texts 105
  13. Speech function analysis to explore CLIL students’ spoken language for knowledge construction 125
  14. Multi-semiotic resources providing maximal input in teaching science through English 145
  15. Part III. Discourse analysis perspectives
  16. Introduction to part III 167
  17. Classroom interactional competence in content and language integrated learning 183
  18. Multimodal conversation analysis and CLIL classroom practices 201
  19. Assessment for learning in CLIL classroom discourse 221
  20. Part IV. Sociolinguistic perspectives
  21. Introduction to part IV 239
  22. “I always speak English in my classes” 251
  23. CLIL teachers’ professionalization 269
  24. A sociolinguistic approach to the multifaceted Roles of English in English-medium education in multilingual university settings 287
  25. Afterword
  26. Emerging themes, future research directions 307
  27. Subject index 313
https://doi.org/10.1075/lllt.47.17daf

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction
  4. Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) 1
  5. Part I. Second Language Acquisition (SLA) perspectives
  6. Introduction to part I 19
  7. CLIL and SLA 33
  8. Motivation, second language learning and CLIL 51
  9. Investigating pragmatics in CLIL through students’ requests 67
  10. Part II. Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) perspectives
  11. Introduction to part II 91
  12. Genre and appraisal in CLIL history texts 105
  13. Speech function analysis to explore CLIL students’ spoken language for knowledge construction 125
  14. Multi-semiotic resources providing maximal input in teaching science through English 145
  15. Part III. Discourse analysis perspectives
  16. Introduction to part III 167
  17. Classroom interactional competence in content and language integrated learning 183
  18. Multimodal conversation analysis and CLIL classroom practices 201
  19. Assessment for learning in CLIL classroom discourse 221
  20. Part IV. Sociolinguistic perspectives
  21. Introduction to part IV 239
  22. “I always speak English in my classes” 251
  23. CLIL teachers’ professionalization 269
  24. A sociolinguistic approach to the multifaceted Roles of English in English-medium education in multilingual university settings 287
  25. Afterword
  26. Emerging themes, future research directions 307
  27. Subject index 313
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