28.99, Review: English; Lang Aquisition; Socioling; Text/Corpus Ling; Typology: Seoane, Suárez-Gómez (2015)
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LINGUIST List: Vol-28-99. Thu Jan 05 2017. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.
Subject: 28.99, Review: English; Lang Aquisition; Socioling; Text/Corpus Ling; Typology: Seoane, Suárez-Gómez (2015)
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Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2017 14:40:15
From: Ana Lucia Fonseca [analucia.sbf at gmail.com]
Subject: Englishes Today
Discuss this message:
http://linguistlist.org/pubs/reviews/get-review.cfm?subid=36193877
Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/27/27-305.html
EDITOR: Cristina Suárez-Gómez
EDITOR: Elena Seoane
TITLE: Englishes Today
SUBTITLE: Multiple Varieties, Multiple Perspectives
PUBLISHER: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
YEAR: 2015
REVIEWER: Ana Lucia Simoes Borges Fonseca, Universidade Federal de Sergipe
Reviews Editor: Helen Aristar-Dry
SUMMARY
Englishes Today: Multiple Varieties, Multiple Perspectives is composed of
scholarly articles based on presentations delivered at the international
conference ‘Englishes Today: Theoretical and Methodological Issues’, held in
Vigo, in 2013. It was edited by Cristina Suárez-Gómez and Elena Seoane and
first published in 2015, by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. The book is
organized into three parts: ‘Native Varieties of English,’‘Non-native
Varieties of English’, which treats Asian and African varieties, and ‘English
as a Foreign Language, English as a Lingua Franca’. The book consists of eight
chapters preceded by a Table of Contents, Acknowledgements, Introduction and a
list of Contributors. Those interested in the multiple varieties, approaches,
perspectives and methodologies that characterize the study of the English
language today, as Suárez-Goméz puts it, are certain to benefit from its
reading, considering that the book deals with different frameworks and
contexts showing challenging fields of research with a primary focus on
English. Each one of the eight chapters of the volume is innovative and
inspiring; and the approach of impelling the readers to implement changes in
the teaching and learning of English as a foreign language because of the
globalization of English deserves to be highlighted.
The authors’ and the contributors’ choice of the model proposed by Braj
Kachru, who classifies English varieties into three concentric circles: Inner,
Outer and Expanding (Kachru 1992, 357), serves as the general structure for
the volume and captures the diverse multicultural identities and the new
sociolinguistic realities involved when we think about the different Englishes
that exist today. Therefore, they succeed in responding to the recent
emergence of English as “the world’s first truly global language” (Crystal
2004, 4). The in-depth studies on native and non-native varieties of English
and on English as a foreign language presented in the three parts of this rich
book are certain to keep resonating across the most varied contexts and
inspiring those interested in the expansion of the English language around the
world.
The first chapter, ‘Element-final LIKE in Irish English: notes on its
pervasiveness, incidence and distribution’, by Mario Serrano-Losada, makes us
reflect on areas that are still understudied or obsolescent, such as the
pragmatic markers. The author analyses the incidence and distribution of the
pragmatic “like” in Hiberno-English to determine whether element-final “like”
is used beyond private communication. To achieve his goal, he analyses the
public spoken dialogue component of ICE-Ireland (Kirk and Kallen 2007) and his
findings suggest that pragmatic like often crosses into formal public settings
despite being more frequent in informal private conversations. His data show
that element-final “like” is well entrenched in Irish English and far from
being a receding dialectal marker.
The second chapter, ‘Morphological Variation of Verbs in Native Varieties of
English’, by Bárbara Balle-Mascaró and Cristina Suárez-Gómez, explores the
coexistence of morphological variation in the preterites and past participles
of the verbs burn, learn and sink in British, American, Canadian and New
Zealand English. By drawing data from the ICE corpora (International Corpus of
English) and after an extensive analysis, the authors show that morphological
variation exists not only in British and American English, regarding the verbs
aforementioned, but also in the other two varieties. A brief but very
interesting historical account of the verbs sheds more light on some aspects
of the issue that could not be covered in the study. A larger corpus is needed
to help to expand the search.
The third chapter, entitled ‘Does Present-day Written Ulster Scots Abandon
Tradition?’, by Göran Wolf, ends the first part of the book and provides the
readers with a thorough analysis of present-day Ulster Scots spelling, based
on a selection of texts from a web-derived corpus called MUST-C (Miscellaneous
Ulster-Scots Texts-A Corpus). The findings of such study, as the author puts
it, are successful when it comes to raising the profile of smaller language
varieties that, at present, do not attract much attention in a world of global
languages and globalized pan-regional varieties. The chapter discusses Ulster
Scots as a language variety, its spelling across time, and the renaissance of
Ulster Scots that has taken place since 1990.
The fourth chapter introduces the second part of the book and is entitled
‘Down the Passive Gradient: from agentive to borderline Get + Past Participle
Constructions in Singaporean English’, by Eduardo Coto Villalibre. The author
reports on his findings about “get”-constructions in contemporary Singaporean
English attested in the spoken part of the Singaporean component of the
International Corpus of English (ICE-SIN), using the corresponding part of the
British component (ICE-GB). This comparative study explores, in detail, the
five subclasses that illustrate the gradient, offering ideas that might be
used to carry out further research on the topic. Amongst the author’s
findings, is information that points towards a diachronic change and a process
of grammaticalisation in central “get”-passives and “get”-constructions in
general.
The fifth chapter ‘Be Going to and Have to: A Corpus Study of Sri Lankan
English Usage in Comparison to British and American English’, by Manel Herat,
investigates the use of the ‘quasi-modals’ be going to and have to in Sri
Lankan English (SLE), a variety of English that is originally based on British
English. She makes comparisons to two reference varieties: British English, as
the superstrate, and American English, a variety to which Sri Lankan English
is currently widely exposed. The use of these two forms is then compared with
the corresponding modals “will” and “must” in written SLE to determine which
forms are most common, and data from BNC and COCA is compared with the data
obtained in the research. The chapter treats a number of questions developed
on the basis of Schneider’s (2003, 2007) dynamic model.
The sixth chapter, ‘The Predominance of English in the South African Context:
An Issue of Identity’, by Pedro Álvarez Mosquera, focuses on some of the most
notable identity implications of the dominant role of the English language in
contemporary South Africa. Intriguing questions about the interrelation
between language and identity come to mind during the reading of this chapter.
The findings of this study are also intriguing, according to the author,
because they show the existence of different identity struggles for whites and
blacks. Such struggles result from the socio-historical background of each
language/ethnic group, the importance of inner group expectations, and of the
difficulties South Africans face in trying to fit in with the new social and
economic realities of their society .
The seventh chapter introduces the third and last part of the book and is
entitled ‘A Portrait of English and Its User in Japanese Junior High School
Textbooks’, by Amy Aisha Brown. The questions under investigation in the study
correspond to and intend to be comparable with the ones investigated in
Matsuda’s (2002), who conducted the first in a series of analyses
investigating representations in Japanese English as a foreign language. After
careful analysis, the author concludes that textbook publishers and the system
that sanctions them still relegate users from outside the inner circle to
peripheral positions. Despite demonstrating an unexpected amount of diversity,
the textbooks present an imbalanced picture of English use in the world today.
Such a fact calls the readers’ attention to their own reality and makes them
reflect on the importance of encouraging students to reflect on the wider use
of English in the world today.
The eighth and last chapter of the book, ‘Apologies in Interlanguage
Pragmatics: The Role of Retrospective Verbal Reports in Oral Production’, by
Vicente Beltrán-Palanques and Alicia Martinéz-Flor, reports on findings based
on an investigation which examined the cognitive processes of a group of
intermediate learners of English as a Foreign Language. In combination with
role-play tasks, the authors used retrospective verbal reports to elicit the
speech act of apologizing. By exploring students’ language of thought, aspects
of their speech behavior and information about their sociopragmatic and
pragmalinguistic knowledge, the authors point to the importance of fostering
pragmatic competence in foreign language classrooms, in order for students to
be able to communicate successfully in different contexts. The study does
contribute to the growing body of research in the area of Interlanguage
Pragmatics.
EVALUATION
That English has a reach that extends further than any other language in human
history (Kachru 2011, 156) and that it is no longer possible to speak of one
English language, but of Englishes (Kachru 1992, 357) are now commonly
accepted propositions. This volume, in line with these ideas and with previous
studies is an invaluable source for researchers interested in the expansion of
English around the world and in the development of distinctive first, second
and foreign varieties.
By reflecting topics related to multicultural identities, the promotion of
language equity, multilingualism, new sociolinguistic realities, and issues of
identity, amongst others, the data made available by the authors in this
volume are of great value. Researchers, postgraduate and graduate students and
teachers in foreign and second language teaching and in multi-disciplinary
courses are certain to benefit from the readings and the ideas provided by
them. What is more, those willing to study and/or expand the experiences
described in the scholarly articles might also also be motivated to adapt them
to their needs.
In impelling interested readers to take action, according to their own
sociolinguistic realities, this book goes beyond other literature on the
topics discussed. The articles also equip those interested in knowing more
about Englishes, with local responses that might be applied to global problems
everywhere; this is one of the major strengths of the book, in my view.
There is no doubt that the volume coheres and that the authors succeed in
conveying the main ideas and findings of their investigations. Something that
deserves appreciation from readers is the fact that the authors themselves
comment on the shortcomings of the research they carried out, instead of just
pointing out its credits and their merits. But by commenting on the book’s
drawbacks like, for instance, the need for larger corpora and further
research, the authors encourage the readers to search for new information and
shed more light on the issues under discussion.
Each chapter in the book provides thorough analyses of the issues investigated
and case studies, which are of the utmost importance for researchers
interested in similar approaches. The idea of English as a transnational
language motivates new fields of research dealing with different areas of
knowledge, methodologies, approaches and perspectives. The fact that the
studies presented use a variety of research methodologies, which can be
adapted to various situations in the most varied contexts, also provides a
stimulus to research in the area as well.
The only suggestion I have is to include a glossary of the terms that are
specialized or might be new to novice readers – although its lack does not
impair the quality of the volume.
Overall, the book is an invaluable source of empirical studies for
researchers, teachers, students and people interested in learning more about
Englishes today. Those in search of studies that will inform them about recent
literature on the topics and on empirical investigations that might (and
should!) be used as a model for future studies are certain to find some of the
answers they are looking for in this volume.
REFERENCES
Crystal, David. 2004. The Language Revolution. Malden, MA: Polity Press.
Kachru, Braj. 1992. Teaching World Englishes. In The Other Tongue: English
across Cultures, edited by Braj Kachru, 355-366. Chicago: University of
Illinois Press.
Kirk, John M., and Jeffrey L. Kallen, dirs. 2007. International Corpus of
English: Ireland Component (ICE- Ireland), version 1.2 (CD-ROM).
Matsuda, Aya. 2002. Representations of Users and Uses of English in Beginning
Japanese EFL Textbooks. JALT Journal 24: 182:200.
Schneider, Edgar W. 2003. The Dynamics of New Englishes: From Identity
Construction to Dialect Birth. Language 79: 233-81.
_______. 2007. Postcolonial English: Varieties around the World. Cambridge.
Cambridge University Press.
ABOUT THE REVIEWER
Ana Lúcia Simões Borges Fonseca is currently working as a professor at the
Department of Foreign Languages, at the Federal University of Sergipe, Brazil.
Her main areas of interest are language policy, language planning, language
attitudes, public policies, internationalization and teacher formation.
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