Critical English For Academic Purposes Research Articles

Tecnologias da Informação e Comunicação na análise contextual da situação-alvo: aprimorando o desenho de cursos de CEAP online em países em desenvolvimento

ABSTRACT This paper discusses the benefits of information and communications technology (ICT) in the contextual target situation analysis at a distance to design online critical English for academic purposes (CEAP) courses. A contextual investigation of the publishing process of high-impact journals in computer science is presented, which is aimed at identifying issues that might influence the publication of Brazilian researchers’ papers. The beliefs and experiences of Brazilian authors in the aforementioned process were analyzed through electronic questionnaires and remote interviews. Moreover, research articles’ reviews were studied to identify the community´s criteria for accepting or rejecting papers. Via ICT, a wider contextual analysis was possible with participants located in different parts of the world. Results provided relevant information about researching and publishing in the field, which may substantiate the design of tasks aimed at improving students’ critical academic literacy. For developing continental countries such as Brazil, saving time and resources through ICT in CEAP courses’ design means the possibility of investing in a more relevant instruction, which better attends to students’ contextual needs and wants.

Investigating the Effectiveness of Web-Based Peer Review in Students’ Drafts Revision: A Critical EAP Perspective

Previous research on peer review considered it as a strategy of improving students’ writing (Baker, 2016; Hu, 2005). To investigate its effectiveness, this research has established a small corpus based on the data from the 22 students’ writing drafts and their corresponding written comments of 13,9261 words in total on the Peerceptiv National Writing and Feedback Contest (PNWFC). Then, Python was utilized as a tool to calculate the difference between four dimensions including accuracy, helpfulness, reviewing and writing. According to the quantitative analysis, it showed that students could hardly benefit from peer feedback. After that, three online structured interviews were arranged to further explore the development of English as a Second Language (L2) students’ discourse competence development. Given the consequence of qualitative data, students could revise their grammatical errors and language inaccuracies through peer review. They might implicitly develop their ability to think critically, which is the core of the formation of discoursal awareness in an English for Academic Purposes (EAP) course. More importantly, receivers could know of their weaknesses, and also perceive the accuracy and fairness of their discourses. Finally, essential implications might be helpful for teachers to carry out peer review and writing tasks in the future.

Analyzing English for Academic Purposes textbooks in China: A study of intercultural issues

An increase of English for Academic Purposes (EAP) teaching in China has resulted in a surge of EAP textbooks on the market. However, there has been little accompanying interest in how well intercultural issues are handled and presented in these publications. Accordingly, the present study employs Chinese students’ Cultures of Learning (CoL) and contrastive rhetoric (CR) as reflection points in the analysis of the content, production, and consumption of two series of EAP textbooks adapted from overseas textbooks. Findings revealed that intercultural differences are not given due recognition in the textbooks which in some cases can lead to confusion and misunderstanding. Meanwhile, the teachers involved in the study, as users of the other textbook series, were found to treat the textbooks only as a supplementary EAP teaching resource. Moreover, the continued confusion on the part of some of the students involved in the study highlighted the desirability for future textbooks to render intercultural differences in a critical EAP manner.

Sarah Benesch: Considering Emotions in Critical English Language Teaching: Theories and Praxis

Since the advent of the critical turn in Applied Linguistics and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), researchers have addressed previously ignored or glossed over issues of race, gender, class, sexuality, cultural politics, and identity in the language classroom. Curiously, the issue of emotion in language teaching and learning, which would seem to be an integral part of the aforementioned constructs in a person’s identifications and performativities, was left largely unexplored from critical perspectives. Benesch’s thought-provoking, and in many ways, groundbreaking book is a much needed and welcomed contribution to the exploration of emotions that extend beyond the cognitive approaches prevalent in Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research. Much like her 2001 book, Critical English for Academic Purposes, Benesch seamlessly integrates complex theories with illustrative classroom practices, providing avenues for researchers to pursue further explorations in this area as well as classroom examples for practitioners interested in expanding their own critical approaches with English language learners (ELLs).

Critical English for academic purposes: Building on learner, teacher, and program strengths

Using a critical EAP framework, the current needs analysis or rights analysis study (Benesch, 2001a), examines an EAP Writing Program at an urban Hispanic-serving college in the northeast U.S. Analysis of student-writing portfolios, student, professor, and EAP Writing-Center survey and interview data showed that restructuring institutional hierarchies better addressed program and student needs instead of a narrow focus on student “lacks”, “gaps”, or “deficiencies”, a common approach in traditional needs analyses. Using strategic institutional partnerships, the once marginalized EAP Program, primarily serving Generation 1.5 immigrant students, began its first steps in reimagining how to improve program course coherence, communication, content, and student learning objectives, as well as reimagining EAP teacher and student authority, building on and benefitting from stakeholder strengths.

Revitalising the essay in an English for academic purposes course: critical engagement, multiliteracies and the internet

This paper describes a content-based English for academic purposes (EAP) course, ‘Language and Public Life’, and its major assignment, a research essay that critiques media coverage of a current event or social issue. The pedagogical context in which this assignment is realised underpins the forms of critical inquiry expected. The selection of course materials integrates a variety of print- and image-based media, complemented by readings that encourage a multiliteracies framework with which to analyse and compare the various informational domains employed. Other important elements of context are the university setting and the formal expectations that arise in any EAP programme. Drawing on the work of Benesch, the course is conceptualised in terms of critical EAP, a dual strategy in which academic language learning and critical inquiry co-develop, towards the added goal of encouraging English as a second language (ESL) students to question the institutional arrangements in which they are positioned. The final section of this paper provides an example of a student essay. One of the key features of this particular essay is the utilisation of the internet, which offered access to diverse voices excluded in the mainstream media. The implications for the course and critical EAP are then developed.

Theorizing and practicing critical english for academic purposes

Theorizing and practicing critical english for academic purposes

Call for Proposals Special Issue on Critical English for Academic Purposes

Call for Proposals Special Issue on Critical English for Academic Purposes

Demystifying institutional practices: critical pragmatism and the teaching of academic writing

Three approaches to the teaching of English for Academic Purposes (EAP) are identified, the Critical approach, the Pragmatic approach, and the Critical Pragmatic approach. Critical EAP is appealing pedagogically because of its restive questioning of discourse norms, although it can seem reactionary at times. By focusing on the acquisition of the same dominant norms, Pragmatic EAP has a clear goal, but it often fails to acknowledge difference in community practices. Critical Pragmatism fuses Critical EAP's focus on difference in the academy with Pragmatic EAP's focus on access to the academy. The Critical Pragmatic approach is illustrated by activities for postgraduate and research students which centre on the use of personal pronouns and possessive adjectives.

Critical English for Academic Purposes: Theory, Politics, and Practice

Critical English for Academic Purposes: Theory, Politics, and Practice

CRITICAL ENGLISH FOR ACADEMIC PURPOSES: THEORY, POLITICS, AND PRACTICE. Sarah Benesch. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2001. Pp. xiv +162. $39.95 cloth, $18.50 paper.

In this short volume, Benesch makes a timely and useful contribution to emerging debates about future directions for English for Academic Purposes (EAP) and for ESL classes in university settings. The book is divided into two parts. The first, consisting of the opening four chapters, deals with historical, theoretical, and political issues; the second, entitled “Practice,” offers four case studies of Benesch's attempts to develop a critical EAP pedagogy in the New York area, followed by a closing “Implications” chapter.

Critical English for Academic Purposes

Critical English for Academic Purposes