Hostname: page-component-669899f699-qzcqf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-05-05T22:54:23.607Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Sympathy for the devil? A defence of EAP

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 June 2018

Ken Hyland
Ken Hyland*
Affiliation:
[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The ability to communicate in English is now essential to academic success for many students and researchers. Not only has the language established a fairly firm grip in higher education, particularly in the lives of postgraduate students, but also in academic research, where careers are increasingly tied to an ability to publish in international journals in English. Countless students and academics around the world, therefore, must now gain fluency in the conventions of relatively ‘standardized’ versions of academic writing in English to understand their disciplines, to establish their careers or to successfully navigate their learning (e.g. Hyland 2009). English for Academic Purposes (EAP), and the teaching of academic writing in particular, has emerged to support this process (Hyland & Shaw 2016; Hyland 2017a). However, EAP, and its relationship to English language education more generally, is seen from a number of different perspectives, not all of which flatter the field. Among the more critical are that it is complicit in the relentless expansion of English which threatens indigenous academic registers (e.g. Phillipson 1992; Canagarajah 1999), that it is a remedial ‘service activity’ on the periphery of university life (Spack 1988), and that it imposes an imprisoning conformity to disciplinary values and native norms on second language writers (e.g. Benesch 2001).

Type
First Person Singular
Information
Language Teaching , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , July 2018 , pp. 383 - 399
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

American Association of University Professors (2015). Background facts on contingent faculty. www.aaup.org/issues/contingency/background-facts. Accessed 22 May 2017.Google Scholar
Ammon, U. & McConnell, G. (2002). English as an academic language in Europe. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.Google Scholar
Bamgbose, A. (1998). Torn between the norms: Innovations in world Englishes. World Englishes 17.1, 1–14.Google Scholar
Benesch, S. (1996) Needs analysis and curriculum development in EAP: An example of a critical approach. TESOL Quarterly 30.4, 723–738.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benesch, S. (2001). Critical English for academic purposes: Theory, politics and practice. London and New York: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benesch, S. (2009). Theorizing and practicing critical English for academic purposes. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 8.2, 81–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benesch, S. (2010). Critical praxis as materials development: Responding to military recruitment on a U.S. Campus. In Harwood, N. (ed.), English language teaching materials: Theory and practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 109–128.Google Scholar
Bloor, M. & Bloor, T. (1986). Language for Specific Purposes: Practice and theory. In CLCS Occasional Papers. Dublin: Centre for Language & Communication Studies, Trinity College, 1–39.Google Scholar
Bordons, M. & Gomez, I. (2004). Towards a single language in science? A Spanish view. Serials 17.2, 189–195.Google Scholar
Bjork, B-C., Roos, A. & Lauri, M. (2009). Scientific journal publishing: Yearly volume and open access availability, Information Research 14.1. www.informationr.net/ir/14-1/paper391.html.Google Scholar
Campion, G. C. (2016). ‘The learning never ends’: Exploring teachers’ views on the transition from general English to EAP. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 23, 59–70.Google Scholar
Canagarajah, S. (1999). Resisting linguistic imperialism in English teaching. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Christie, F. (1987). Genres as choice. In Reid, I. (ed.), The place of genre in learning: Current debates. Deakin, Australia: Deakin University Press, 22–34.Google Scholar
Clark, R. (1992). Principles and practice of CLA in the classroom. In Fairclough, N. (ed.), Critical language awareness. London: Longman, 117–140.Google Scholar
Craig, N. (2010). Students from abroad treated like cash cows. The Melbourne Age. www.theage.com.au/national/students-from-abroad-treated-like-cash-cows-20100522-w31k.html. Accessed 22 May 2017.Google Scholar
Ding, A. & Bruce, I. (2017). The English for Academic Purposes practitioner: Operating on the edge of academia. Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Edge, J. (2004). Of displacive and augmentative discourse, old doubts and new enemies. TESOL Quarterly 38.4, 717–721.Google Scholar
Ellis, R. (1994). The study of second language acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Fenton-Smith, B. (2014). The place of Benesch's critical English for academic purposes in the current practice of academic language and learning. Journal of Academic Language & Learning 8.3, A23–A33.Google Scholar
Fox, H. (1994). Listening to the world: Cultural issues in academic writing. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English.Google Scholar
Freedman, A. (1994). ‘Do as I say?’ The relationship between teaching and learning new genres. In Freedman, A. & Medway, P. (eds.), Genre and the new rhetoric. London: Taylor & Francis, 191–210.Google Scholar
Freedman, E. B. (2007). Is teaching for social justice undemocratic? Harvard Educational Review 77.4, 442–473.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Giannoni, D. S. (2008). Medical writing at the periphery: The case of Italian journal editorials. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 7.2, 97–107.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green, M. (2016). Boom time for UK universities as fee income encourages expansion. Financial Times 28 April 2016. www.ft.com/content/49b1ef76-0c5f-11e6-9456-444ab5211a2f.Google Scholar
Ha, A. & Hyland, K. (2017). What is technicality? A Technicality Analysis Model for EAP vocabulary. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 28, 35–49.Google Scholar
Hadley, G. (2015). English for Academic Purposes in neoliberal universities: A critical grounded theory. London: Springer.Google Scholar
Harwood, N. (2017). The EAP practitioner as researcher and disseminator of knowledge. Teaching EAP. https://teachingeap.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/restes-talk-nigel-harwood.pdf.Google Scholar
Harwood, N. & Hadley, G. (2004). Demystifying institutional practices: Critical pragmatism and the teaching of academic writing. English for Specific Purposes 21.4, 355–377.Google Scholar
Huckin, T. (2003). Specificity in LSP. Iberica 5, 3–17.Google Scholar
Hutchison, T. & Waters, A. (1987). English for specific purposes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyland, K. (2004). Disciplinary discourses: Social interactions in academic writing. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2006). Representing readers in writing: Student and expert practices. Linguistics and Education 16, 363–377.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2009). Academic discourse. London: Continuum.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2010). Community and individuality: Performing identity in applied linguistics. Written Communication 27.2, 159–188.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyland, K. (2012). Disciplinary identities. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2013). Faculty feedback: Perceptions and practices in L2 disciplinary writing. Journal of Second Language Writing 22.3, 240–253.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hyland, K. (2015). Academic publishing: Issues and challenges in the construction of knowledge. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2017a). Learning to write for academic purposes: Specificity and second language writing. In Bitchener, J., Storch, N. & Witte, R. (eds.), Teaching writing for academic purposes to multilingual students: Instructional approaches. London: Routledge, 24–41.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. (2017b). English in the discipline: Language provision in Hong Kong's new university curriculum. In Sung Park, Eun (ed.), English education at the tertiary level in Asia. New York: Routledge, 27–45.Google Scholar
Hyland, K. & Shaw, P. (eds.) 2016. The handbook of English for academic purposes. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Jenkins, J. (2014). English as a lingua franca in the international university: The politics of academic English language policy. Abingdon: Routledge.Google Scholar
Johns, A. M. (1997). Text, role and context: Developing academic literacies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Krashen, S. (2011). Academic proficiency (language and content) and the role of strategies. TESOL Journal 2.4, 381–393.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krause, K. L. D. (2014). Challenging perspectives on learning and teaching in the disciplines: The academic voice. Studies in Higher Education 39.1, 2–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kumaravadivelu, B. (2006). Dangerous liaison: Globalization, empire and TESOL. In Edge, J. (ed.), (R)elocating TESOL in an age of empire. Houndsmill: Palgrave Macmillan, 1–26.Google Scholar
Lather, P. (1992). Post-critical pedagogies: A feminist reading. In Luke, C. & Gore, J. M. (eds.), Feminisms and critical pedagogy. New York: Routledge, 120–137.Google Scholar
Lea, M. R. & Street, B. V. (1998). Student writing in higher education: An academic literacies approach. Studies in Higher Education 23.2, 157–172.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Li, Y-Y. & Flowerdew, J. (2009). English or Chinese? The trade-off between local and international publication among Chinese academics in the humanities and social sciences. Journal of Second Language Writing 18.1, 17–29.Google ScholarPubMed
Lillis, T. (2001). Student writing: Access, regulation, desire. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Macallister, C. J. (2016). Critical perspectives. In Hyland, K. & Shaw, P. (eds.), 283–293.Google Scholar
Marginson, S., Nyland, C., Sawir, E. & Forbes-Mewett, H. (2010). International student security. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Meneghini, R. & Packer, A. L. (2007). Is there science beyond English? Initiatives to increase the quality and visibility of non-English publications might help to break down language barriers in scientific communication. EMBO Reports 8.2, 112–116.Google Scholar
Morgan, B. (2009). Fostering transformative practitioners for Critical EAP: Possibilities and challenges. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 8, 86–99.Google Scholar
Morgan, B. & Ramanathan, V. (2005). Critical perspectives and language education: Global and local perspectives. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics 25, 151–169.Google Scholar
Mudaraya, O. (2006). Engineering English: A lexical frequency instructional model. English for Specific Purposes 25.2, 235–256.Google Scholar
Nesi, H. & Gardner, S. (2012). Genres across the disciplines: Student writing in higher education. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Paltridge, B., Starfield, S. & Tardy, C. (2016). Ethnographic perspectives on academic writing. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Pennycook, A. (1997). Vulgar pragmatism, critical pragmatism, and EAP. English for Specific Purposes 16.4, 253–269.Google Scholar
Pennycook, A. (2001). Critical applied linguistics: A critical introduction. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Pessoa, R. & Freitas, M. (2012). Challenges in critical language teaching. TESOL Quarterly 46.4, 753–776.Google Scholar
Phillipson, R. (1992). Linguistic imperialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Raimes, A. (1991). Instructional balance: From theories to practices in the teaching of writing. In Alatis, J. (ed.), Georgetown University roundtable on language and linguistics. Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, 238–249.Google Scholar
Shen, Fan (1989). The classroom and the wider culture: Identity as a key to learning English composition. College Composition and Communication 40.4, 459–466.Google Scholar
Spack, R. (1988). Initiating ESL students into the academic discourse community: How far should we go? TESOL Quarterly 22.1, 29–52.Google Scholar
Swales, J. (1997). English as tyrannosaurus rex. World Englishes 16.3, 373–382.Google Scholar
Swales, J. (1998). Other floors, other voices: A textography of a small university building. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Tardy, C. & Miller-Cochran, S. (2018). Administrative structures and support for international L2 writers: A heuristic for WPAs. In Rose, S. & Weiser, I. (eds.), The internationalisation of US writing programs. Utah State University Press.Google Scholar
Tribble, C. (2017). ELFA vs genre: A new paradigm war in EAP writing instruction? Journal of English for Academic Purposes 25, 30–44.Google Scholar
Turner, J. (2012). Academic literacies: Providing a space for the socio-political dynamics of EAP. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 11.1, 17–25.Google Scholar
Valipouri, L. & Nassaji, H. (2013). A corpus-based study of academic vocabulary in chemistry research articles. Journal of English for Academic Purposes 12, 248–263.Google Scholar
Widdowson, H. (1983). Learning purpose and language use. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Wingate, U. & Tribble, C. (2012). The best of both worlds? Towards an English for Academic Purposes/Academic Literacies writing pedagogy. Studies in Higher Education 37.4, 481–495.Google Scholar