Jason Litzenberg | The Pennsylvania State University (original) (raw)
Papers by Jason Litzenberg
Multilingual Matters eBooks, Dec 30, 2024
Globalisation, Societies and Education, Oct 9, 2023
Multilingual Matters eBooks, Dec 30, 2024
ELT Journal
Intensive English programmes (IEPs) are college and university units that provide international s... more Intensive English programmes (IEPs) are college and university units that provide international students with academic English instruction for the purpose of admission to the host institution. IEPs are colonial endeavours: they commodify and promote a language with a traceable colonial history that is reinforced through modern structures of knowledge distribution within higher education. Reliance on colonial architectures limits creativity and enforces hegemonic structures upon a field that tends to manifest more social justice orientations. This article argues that the position of IEPs allows them to contest their colonial nature through conscientious, incremental change. It considers the core activities of the IEP ecology (i.e. instruction, discipline, profession, business, and service), looking at how each facet may be utilized to enact a decolonial option. These interventions lend themselves to goals of decolonial projects by reducing bias and hegemony in how IEPs approach langu...
Linguistic Landscape. An international journal, 2018
This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic l... more This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic landscape of Yachay, two administratively independent government-funded institutions in Ecuador. Although the institutions share a geographic location, name, and goal of becoming a sciences and technology hub for Latin America, they maintain distinct identities through their official signage, providing opportunity for consideration of how recent political and cultural ideologies toward Ecuador’s language policy have been realized in the linguistic landscape of parallel institutions. Kichwa, a constitutionally-recognized minority language of the region, is largely absent from the landscape, providing little more than a shared institutional nomenclature. Instead, the language and culture are used as a commodity for promoting pan-Ecuadorian interculturality and indigenous values, even if these values are not otherwise overtly supported. Kichwa thus represents the ‘traditional’ Ecuador, while...
TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………………..v LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………... more TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………………..v LIST OF FIGURES…………………………………………………………………………... xi LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………………xii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………..1 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………………………………3 2.1 Overview of chapter .
International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2014
This article reports on part of a quantitative/ qualitative study investigating the attitudes of ... more This article reports on part of a quantitative/ qualitative study investigating the attitudes of pre-service English language teachers in the United States towards native/non-native Englishes in interaction. The study is unique to language attitude research in that participants evaluate speech-in-action of multiple speakers rather than isolated speech samples. It is therefore relevant to linguistic approaches that emphasize communication, such as English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), which until now has been under-represented in North American research. Results indicate a willingness among pre-service teachers to use non-native Englishes as pedagogical models for certain language skills and course types. Implications for English language teacher training are discussed. Dieser Artikel beschreibt einen Teil einer quantativ-qualitativen Untersuchung, die sich mit den Verhaltensweisen zukunftiger Englischlehrende in den Vereignigten Staaten gegenuber muttersprachlichen und nicht-muttersprachlichen Varianten des Englischen in Gesprachen befasst. In der Sprachverhaltensforschung ist die Studie einzigartig, da die Forschungsteilnehmer und -teilnehmerinnen interaktive Gesprache anstelle von isolierten Sprachproben einschatzten. Die Ergebnisse dieser Untersuchung erweisen sich dadurch als wichtig fur linguistische Ansatze, die die Kommunikation in den Vordergrund stellen – wie zum Beispiel English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), ein Ansatz, der in der Nordamerikanischen Forschung bisher selten diskutiert wurde. Die Untersuchungsresultate lassen auch eine Bereitschaft zukunftiger Englischlehrende erkennen, nicht-muttersprachliche Englischstile als padigogische Modelle fur bestimmte Sprachlernkonzepte und Kurstypen zu verwenden. Ausserdem werden praktische Ansatze zur Ausbildung von Englischlehrende diskutiert.
Social Dynamics in Second Language Accent, 2014
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 2009
The main strength of this work is that it provides a comprehensive overview of research methods o... more The main strength of this work is that it provides a comprehensive overview of research methods on bilingualism. The overview of each research method is very brief and clear; thus, this book is appropriate for beginning students of bilingualism. This volume will also be helpful to new researchers in the fi elds of linguistics, psycholinguistics, and sociolinguistics who are beginning to conduct their own research on bilingualism. However, additional resources presented in each chapter need to be explored to understand fully the various research methods explained in this work. Another strength is this book’s call for interdisciplinary research. The editors promote this call themselves by combining various research methods throughout this book and providing research ideas for interdisciplinary work on bilingualism. One weakness of this volume is that it does not clearly state in the introductory chapter what is meant by the term bilingual . Wei says that bilinguals are those who can communicate in more than one language either orally or through writing, but he does not state whether communication ability has to be nativelike. The issues with defi ning bilingualism have been discussed previously: Profi ciency level is often a major difference in the existing defi nitions (Gass & Selinker, 2008 ; Marian, 2008 ). To avoid confusion regarding what, exactly, bilingualism is, the editors could have provided a comprehensive overview of the defi nitions of bilingualism used throughout this work as well as the fi eld at large. Additionally, readers should be aware that the chapter ordering may not be optimal. For example, to enhance comprehension, it may be better to read chapter 12 on statistics before chapters 6–8, which describe statistics-laden experimental studies. Aside from these slight criticisms, this volume is, overall, an excellent resource for both students and researchers of bilingualism.
Intercultural Pragmatics, 2009
The investigation of pragmatic strategies in ELF interaction is a relatively new area of research... more The investigation of pragmatic strategies in ELF interaction is a relatively new area of research. This paper examines intonation as a pragmatic resource in ELF interaction. There is considerable research pointing to the critical role played by intonational structure in NS-based discourse to establish a state of informational and social convergence (Brazil 1997; Chun 2002; Hewings 1995; Pickering 2001; Wennerstrom 2001). The question of whether similar practices can be identified in ELF interaction remains open. In this paper, I review current understanding of the role of intonational structure in NS-based interaction and then examine data from ELF interactions. Using a model of intonation in discourse (Brazil 1997) to interpret these data, I argue that both pitch movement (tone choice) and relative pitch level (key choice) contribute to intelligibility and interactional success in ELF interaction. Participants appear to orient to pitch cues both as a signal of a possible trouble source and as a means to indicate that negotiation or repair sequences have been accomplished successfully.
Journal of Second Language Pronunciation, 2016
Research on communication difficulties between native and nonnative speakers (NNSs) has generally... more Research on communication difficulties between native and nonnative speakers (NNSs) has generally focused on NNSs. However, native speakers’ (NSs) level of familiarity with nonnative accents can also affect communication. This study investigates whether implicit training (exposure to Korean-accented English through sentence transcription) and explicit training (learning about linguistic differences with a focus on Korean-accented English) can improve NSs’ comprehension of Korean-accented English. Participants in both training conditions showed greater improvement than the control group on sentence transcription tasks but not on multiple choice questions that assessed comprehension of a brief lecture. The results replicate past findings showing the effectiveness of implicit training and provide novel evidence of the effectiveness of explicit training. This suggests that explicit training can be effective in improving NSs’ understanding of short utterances when the training ensures pa...
English has become the default language of global communication, and users around the world are a... more English has become the default language of global communication, and users around the world are adapting the traditional standards of grammar and interaction. It is imperative that teachers of English keep pace with these changing conceptualizations of the language as well as the changing expectations of its users so that they can best prepare language learners for the sociolinguistic realities they will encounter. Teacher training programs have a critical role to play in that they must keep pace with both the changing global linguistic landscape and how these changes influence pre-service teachers. It is therefore imperative to understand the attitudes of pre-service teachers towards the varieties of English that their students will encounter. This study considers the attitudes of pre-service TESOL teachers towards varieties of native and non-native English as used in naturalistic communicative situations. It considers personal factors that may play a role in how participants evalu...
Arvioitu kirja/Reviewed book: Wei, L., & Moyer, M. G. (Eds.). (2008). The Blackwell Guide to Rese... more Arvioitu kirja/Reviewed book: Wei, L., & Moyer, M. G. (Eds.). (2008). The Blackwell Guide to Research Methods in Bilingualism and Multilingualism (1st ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, Ltd.
Applied Linguistics
This article considers Intensive English Programs (IEPs) affiliated with higher education institu... more This article considers Intensive English Programs (IEPs) affiliated with higher education institutions of the Global North from the perspective of a decolonial option in which English is viewed as a tool of modernity used for colonization and the maintenance of unequal socioeconomic and power structures. Via nuanced description (Pennycook and Makoni 2020) of two colonizing practices typical to IEPs—namely, recruitment and advocacy—the article argues that the traits of resiliency, innovation, and genius commonly ascribed to IEPs are qualities that lend themselves to the refoundation, reconfiguration, and reconstruction (de Sousa Santos 2019) of alternative visions. In this way, IEPs have the opportunity to promote the liberatory visions of applied linguistics’ practitioners and to positively influence decolonialization of the field. Because of their historical involvement in English language teaching and the industry it has spawned, applied linguists have an obligation to foster thes...
TESOL Quarterly, 2020
Intensive English Programs (IEPs) have traditionally been central actors in promoting teacher pro... more Intensive English Programs (IEPs) have traditionally been central actors in promoting teacher professional development, curricular innovations, and applied linguistics and SLA research. Yet at the same time, the programs are also central actors of neoliberal linguistic commodification. This article demonstrates how neoliberalism influences the covert policy discourses of the decision-making processes of an IEP. Using an analytic auto-ethnographic approach to present an interwoven series of narratives and analyses, the article argues that IEP administrators, faculty, and staff are limited in how they can contest their complicity at propelling at a neoliberal institution profiting from language education. The article also demonstrates how neoliberal positioning took precedence over pedagogical discourses in certain decision-making processes as well as impeded the experimentation and exercise of an innovative curriculum, and it suggests ways that the neoliberal orientation of IEPs currently impacts and eventually may alter the nature of MA TESOL. The issues presented here reflect not only the experiences and concerns of professionals in ELT, but they are also timely in that IEPs have been largely underrepresented in the expanding discussions of the relationship between applied linguistics, its sub-fields, and neoliberalism.
European Journal of Applied Linguistics
Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely... more Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely embodied in the tripartite and trilingual state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in which Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs all make claim to their own mutually-intelligible varieties of local “languages”. This study utilizes a linguistic landscape methodology to consider language use in Sarajevo, the capital of BiH, approximately 20 years after a brutal war that led to the establishment of the country. Data originate from three municipalities within the Sarajevo Canton – namely, Old Town, Center, and Ilidža – because of their representation of the region’s diversity and history. Signs were classified according to the three primary language varieties, i.e., Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian; BCS, representing a common core among the three varieties, as well as English, other languages, and mixed languages. The application of BCS uniquely positions the present research in comparison to other studies o...
European Journal of Applied Linguistics
Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely... more Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely embodied in the tripartite and trilingual state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in which Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs all make claim to their own mutually-intelligible varieties of local “languages”. This study utilizes a linguistic landscape methodology to consider language use in Sarajevo, the capital of BiH, approximately 20 years after a brutal war that led to the establishment of the country. Data originate from three municipalities within the Sarajevo Canton – namely, Old Town, Center, and Ilidža – because of their representation of the region’s diversity and history. Signs were classified according to the three primary language varieties, i.e., Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian; BCS, representing a common core among the three varieties, as well as English, other languages, and mixed languages. The application of BCS uniquely positions the present research in comparison to other studies o...
This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and... more This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and ideology research on non-native English, English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), and non-native speech in other languages. Attitudes to non-native English and ELF varieties have most often been found to be negative, especially on status dimensions, leading to learners of English being “corrected” for accents that deviate from a particular native variety and tested on how “nativelike” they are. Given this situation, it is hardly surprising that studies typically find that these learners have internalized the preference for nativelike English, including clearly prejudicial beliefs about personal traits of individual speakers. If nativelike accents were inherently preferable rather than certain identities associated with those accents being preferable, we should see similar negative attitudes towards native English speakers’ pronunciation of other languages, but the few cases in which it has bee...
Linguistic landscapes, 2018
This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic l... more This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic landscape of Yachay, two administratively independent government-funded institutions in Ecuador. Although the institutions share a geographic location, name, and goal of becoming a sciences and technology hub for Latin America, they maintain distinct identities through their official signage, providing opportunity for consideration of how recent political and cultural ideologies toward Ecuador’s language policy have been realized in the linguistic landscape of parallel institutions. Kichwa, a constitutionally-recognized minority language of the region, is largely absent from the landscape, providing little more than a shared institutional nomenclature. Instead, the language and culture are used as a commodity for promoting pan-Ecuadorian interculturality and indigenous values, even if these values are not otherwise overtly supported. Kichwa thus represents the ‘traditional’ Ecuador, while at the same time serves as the backbone in the formation of a collective, future-oriented national identity.
This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and... more This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and ideology research on non-native English, English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), and non-native speech in other languages. Attitudes to non-native English and ELF varieties have most often been found to be negative, especially on status dimensions, leading to learners of English being “corrected” for accents that deviate from a particular native variety and tested on how “nativelike” they are. Given this situation, it is hardly surprising that studies typically find that these learners have internalized the preference for nativelike English, including clearly prejudicial beliefs about personal traits of individual speakers. If nativelike accents were inherently preferable rather than certain identities associated with those accents being preferable, we should see similar negative attitudes towards native English speakers’ pronunciation of other languages, but the few cases in which it has bee...
Multilingual Matters eBooks, Dec 30, 2024
Globalisation, Societies and Education, Oct 9, 2023
Multilingual Matters eBooks, Dec 30, 2024
ELT Journal
Intensive English programmes (IEPs) are college and university units that provide international s... more Intensive English programmes (IEPs) are college and university units that provide international students with academic English instruction for the purpose of admission to the host institution. IEPs are colonial endeavours: they commodify and promote a language with a traceable colonial history that is reinforced through modern structures of knowledge distribution within higher education. Reliance on colonial architectures limits creativity and enforces hegemonic structures upon a field that tends to manifest more social justice orientations. This article argues that the position of IEPs allows them to contest their colonial nature through conscientious, incremental change. It considers the core activities of the IEP ecology (i.e. instruction, discipline, profession, business, and service), looking at how each facet may be utilized to enact a decolonial option. These interventions lend themselves to goals of decolonial projects by reducing bias and hegemony in how IEPs approach langu...
Linguistic Landscape. An international journal, 2018
This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic l... more This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic landscape of Yachay, two administratively independent government-funded institutions in Ecuador. Although the institutions share a geographic location, name, and goal of becoming a sciences and technology hub for Latin America, they maintain distinct identities through their official signage, providing opportunity for consideration of how recent political and cultural ideologies toward Ecuador’s language policy have been realized in the linguistic landscape of parallel institutions. Kichwa, a constitutionally-recognized minority language of the region, is largely absent from the landscape, providing little more than a shared institutional nomenclature. Instead, the language and culture are used as a commodity for promoting pan-Ecuadorian interculturality and indigenous values, even if these values are not otherwise overtly supported. Kichwa thus represents the ‘traditional’ Ecuador, while...
TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………………..v LIST OF FIGURES………………………………………………... more TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………………..v LIST OF FIGURES…………………………………………………………………………... xi LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………………xii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………..1 CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………………………………3 2.1 Overview of chapter .
International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 2014
This article reports on part of a quantitative/ qualitative study investigating the attitudes of ... more This article reports on part of a quantitative/ qualitative study investigating the attitudes of pre-service English language teachers in the United States towards native/non-native Englishes in interaction. The study is unique to language attitude research in that participants evaluate speech-in-action of multiple speakers rather than isolated speech samples. It is therefore relevant to linguistic approaches that emphasize communication, such as English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), which until now has been under-represented in North American research. Results indicate a willingness among pre-service teachers to use non-native Englishes as pedagogical models for certain language skills and course types. Implications for English language teacher training are discussed. Dieser Artikel beschreibt einen Teil einer quantativ-qualitativen Untersuchung, die sich mit den Verhaltensweisen zukunftiger Englischlehrende in den Vereignigten Staaten gegenuber muttersprachlichen und nicht-muttersprachlichen Varianten des Englischen in Gesprachen befasst. In der Sprachverhaltensforschung ist die Studie einzigartig, da die Forschungsteilnehmer und -teilnehmerinnen interaktive Gesprache anstelle von isolierten Sprachproben einschatzten. Die Ergebnisse dieser Untersuchung erweisen sich dadurch als wichtig fur linguistische Ansatze, die die Kommunikation in den Vordergrund stellen – wie zum Beispiel English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), ein Ansatz, der in der Nordamerikanischen Forschung bisher selten diskutiert wurde. Die Untersuchungsresultate lassen auch eine Bereitschaft zukunftiger Englischlehrende erkennen, nicht-muttersprachliche Englischstile als padigogische Modelle fur bestimmte Sprachlernkonzepte und Kurstypen zu verwenden. Ausserdem werden praktische Ansatze zur Ausbildung von Englischlehrende diskutiert.
Social Dynamics in Second Language Accent, 2014
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 2009
The main strength of this work is that it provides a comprehensive overview of research methods o... more The main strength of this work is that it provides a comprehensive overview of research methods on bilingualism. The overview of each research method is very brief and clear; thus, this book is appropriate for beginning students of bilingualism. This volume will also be helpful to new researchers in the fi elds of linguistics, psycholinguistics, and sociolinguistics who are beginning to conduct their own research on bilingualism. However, additional resources presented in each chapter need to be explored to understand fully the various research methods explained in this work. Another strength is this book’s call for interdisciplinary research. The editors promote this call themselves by combining various research methods throughout this book and providing research ideas for interdisciplinary work on bilingualism. One weakness of this volume is that it does not clearly state in the introductory chapter what is meant by the term bilingual . Wei says that bilinguals are those who can communicate in more than one language either orally or through writing, but he does not state whether communication ability has to be nativelike. The issues with defi ning bilingualism have been discussed previously: Profi ciency level is often a major difference in the existing defi nitions (Gass & Selinker, 2008 ; Marian, 2008 ). To avoid confusion regarding what, exactly, bilingualism is, the editors could have provided a comprehensive overview of the defi nitions of bilingualism used throughout this work as well as the fi eld at large. Additionally, readers should be aware that the chapter ordering may not be optimal. For example, to enhance comprehension, it may be better to read chapter 12 on statistics before chapters 6–8, which describe statistics-laden experimental studies. Aside from these slight criticisms, this volume is, overall, an excellent resource for both students and researchers of bilingualism.
Intercultural Pragmatics, 2009
The investigation of pragmatic strategies in ELF interaction is a relatively new area of research... more The investigation of pragmatic strategies in ELF interaction is a relatively new area of research. This paper examines intonation as a pragmatic resource in ELF interaction. There is considerable research pointing to the critical role played by intonational structure in NS-based discourse to establish a state of informational and social convergence (Brazil 1997; Chun 2002; Hewings 1995; Pickering 2001; Wennerstrom 2001). The question of whether similar practices can be identified in ELF interaction remains open. In this paper, I review current understanding of the role of intonational structure in NS-based interaction and then examine data from ELF interactions. Using a model of intonation in discourse (Brazil 1997) to interpret these data, I argue that both pitch movement (tone choice) and relative pitch level (key choice) contribute to intelligibility and interactional success in ELF interaction. Participants appear to orient to pitch cues both as a signal of a possible trouble source and as a means to indicate that negotiation or repair sequences have been accomplished successfully.
Journal of Second Language Pronunciation, 2016
Research on communication difficulties between native and nonnative speakers (NNSs) has generally... more Research on communication difficulties between native and nonnative speakers (NNSs) has generally focused on NNSs. However, native speakers’ (NSs) level of familiarity with nonnative accents can also affect communication. This study investigates whether implicit training (exposure to Korean-accented English through sentence transcription) and explicit training (learning about linguistic differences with a focus on Korean-accented English) can improve NSs’ comprehension of Korean-accented English. Participants in both training conditions showed greater improvement than the control group on sentence transcription tasks but not on multiple choice questions that assessed comprehension of a brief lecture. The results replicate past findings showing the effectiveness of implicit training and provide novel evidence of the effectiveness of explicit training. This suggests that explicit training can be effective in improving NSs’ understanding of short utterances when the training ensures pa...
English has become the default language of global communication, and users around the world are a... more English has become the default language of global communication, and users around the world are adapting the traditional standards of grammar and interaction. It is imperative that teachers of English keep pace with these changing conceptualizations of the language as well as the changing expectations of its users so that they can best prepare language learners for the sociolinguistic realities they will encounter. Teacher training programs have a critical role to play in that they must keep pace with both the changing global linguistic landscape and how these changes influence pre-service teachers. It is therefore imperative to understand the attitudes of pre-service teachers towards the varieties of English that their students will encounter. This study considers the attitudes of pre-service TESOL teachers towards varieties of native and non-native English as used in naturalistic communicative situations. It considers personal factors that may play a role in how participants evalu...
Arvioitu kirja/Reviewed book: Wei, L., & Moyer, M. G. (Eds.). (2008). The Blackwell Guide to Rese... more Arvioitu kirja/Reviewed book: Wei, L., & Moyer, M. G. (Eds.). (2008). The Blackwell Guide to Research Methods in Bilingualism and Multilingualism (1st ed.). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, Ltd.
Applied Linguistics
This article considers Intensive English Programs (IEPs) affiliated with higher education institu... more This article considers Intensive English Programs (IEPs) affiliated with higher education institutions of the Global North from the perspective of a decolonial option in which English is viewed as a tool of modernity used for colonization and the maintenance of unequal socioeconomic and power structures. Via nuanced description (Pennycook and Makoni 2020) of two colonizing practices typical to IEPs—namely, recruitment and advocacy—the article argues that the traits of resiliency, innovation, and genius commonly ascribed to IEPs are qualities that lend themselves to the refoundation, reconfiguration, and reconstruction (de Sousa Santos 2019) of alternative visions. In this way, IEPs have the opportunity to promote the liberatory visions of applied linguistics’ practitioners and to positively influence decolonialization of the field. Because of their historical involvement in English language teaching and the industry it has spawned, applied linguists have an obligation to foster thes...
TESOL Quarterly, 2020
Intensive English Programs (IEPs) have traditionally been central actors in promoting teacher pro... more Intensive English Programs (IEPs) have traditionally been central actors in promoting teacher professional development, curricular innovations, and applied linguistics and SLA research. Yet at the same time, the programs are also central actors of neoliberal linguistic commodification. This article demonstrates how neoliberalism influences the covert policy discourses of the decision-making processes of an IEP. Using an analytic auto-ethnographic approach to present an interwoven series of narratives and analyses, the article argues that IEP administrators, faculty, and staff are limited in how they can contest their complicity at propelling at a neoliberal institution profiting from language education. The article also demonstrates how neoliberal positioning took precedence over pedagogical discourses in certain decision-making processes as well as impeded the experimentation and exercise of an innovative curriculum, and it suggests ways that the neoliberal orientation of IEPs currently impacts and eventually may alter the nature of MA TESOL. The issues presented here reflect not only the experiences and concerns of professionals in ELT, but they are also timely in that IEPs have been largely underrepresented in the expanding discussions of the relationship between applied linguistics, its sub-fields, and neoliberalism.
European Journal of Applied Linguistics
Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely... more Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely embodied in the tripartite and trilingual state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in which Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs all make claim to their own mutually-intelligible varieties of local “languages”. This study utilizes a linguistic landscape methodology to consider language use in Sarajevo, the capital of BiH, approximately 20 years after a brutal war that led to the establishment of the country. Data originate from three municipalities within the Sarajevo Canton – namely, Old Town, Center, and Ilidža – because of their representation of the region’s diversity and history. Signs were classified according to the three primary language varieties, i.e., Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian; BCS, representing a common core among the three varieties, as well as English, other languages, and mixed languages. The application of BCS uniquely positions the present research in comparison to other studies o...
European Journal of Applied Linguistics
Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely... more Language in the Balkan region of Southeastern Europe has a complex and turbulent history, acutely embodied in the tripartite and trilingual state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) in which Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs all make claim to their own mutually-intelligible varieties of local “languages”. This study utilizes a linguistic landscape methodology to consider language use in Sarajevo, the capital of BiH, approximately 20 years after a brutal war that led to the establishment of the country. Data originate from three municipalities within the Sarajevo Canton – namely, Old Town, Center, and Ilidža – because of their representation of the region’s diversity and history. Signs were classified according to the three primary language varieties, i.e., Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian; BCS, representing a common core among the three varieties, as well as English, other languages, and mixed languages. The application of BCS uniquely positions the present research in comparison to other studies o...
This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and... more This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and ideology research on non-native English, English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), and non-native speech in other languages. Attitudes to non-native English and ELF varieties have most often been found to be negative, especially on status dimensions, leading to learners of English being “corrected” for accents that deviate from a particular native variety and tested on how “nativelike” they are. Given this situation, it is hardly surprising that studies typically find that these learners have internalized the preference for nativelike English, including clearly prejudicial beliefs about personal traits of individual speakers. If nativelike accents were inherently preferable rather than certain identities associated with those accents being preferable, we should see similar negative attitudes towards native English speakers’ pronunciation of other languages, but the few cases in which it has bee...
Linguistic landscapes, 2018
This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic l... more This study considers the parallel expression of language policy toward Kichwa in the linguistic landscape of Yachay, two administratively independent government-funded institutions in Ecuador. Although the institutions share a geographic location, name, and goal of becoming a sciences and technology hub for Latin America, they maintain distinct identities through their official signage, providing opportunity for consideration of how recent political and cultural ideologies toward Ecuador’s language policy have been realized in the linguistic landscape of parallel institutions. Kichwa, a constitutionally-recognized minority language of the region, is largely absent from the landscape, providing little more than a shared institutional nomenclature. Instead, the language and culture are used as a commodity for promoting pan-Ecuadorian interculturality and indigenous values, even if these values are not otherwise overtly supported. Kichwa thus represents the ‘traditional’ Ecuador, while at the same time serves as the backbone in the formation of a collective, future-oriented national identity.
This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and... more This chapter considers the nature of attitudes towards L2 pronunciation, drawing on attitudes and ideology research on non-native English, English as a Lingua Franca (ELF), and non-native speech in other languages. Attitudes to non-native English and ELF varieties have most often been found to be negative, especially on status dimensions, leading to learners of English being “corrected” for accents that deviate from a particular native variety and tested on how “nativelike” they are. Given this situation, it is hardly surprising that studies typically find that these learners have internalized the preference for nativelike English, including clearly prejudicial beliefs about personal traits of individual speakers. If nativelike accents were inherently preferable rather than certain identities associated with those accents being preferable, we should see similar negative attitudes towards native English speakers’ pronunciation of other languages, but the few cases in which it has bee...