ELF Users Research Articles

Does contextual information within a sentence affect the relationship between word level intelligibility and the Functional Load principle among ELF users? A preliminary study

ABSTRACT The Functional Load (FL) principle predicts that a high FL phonemic substitution lowers the intelligbility more than a low FL phonemic substitution. However, as yet no study has comprehensively investigated whether contextual information could attenuate any loss of intelligibility due to FL phonemic substitutions. As such, this study investigates the triangular relationship among the FL principle, word level intelligibility, and contextual information within a sentence. A Chinese speaker of English recorded sentences with more and with less contextual information that also had words with no FL substitutions, low FL substitutions, and high FL substitutions. Japanese university students transcribed the missing words from each sentence. The central hypothesis of this study is that missing words with more contextual information within their sentences will be more intelligible than missing words with less contextual information, regardless of any FL substitution. The results supported some of the hypotheses of this study, but not all.

Nogami, Yoko: Identity and pragmatic language use: A study on Japanese ELF users (Developments in English as a Lingua Franca [DELF] 11)

Article Nogami, Yoko: Identity and pragmatic language use: A study on Japanese ELF users (Developments in English as a Lingua Franca [DELF] 11) was published on March 1, 2022 in the journal Journal of English as a Lingua Franca (volume 11, issue 1).

Individual Sensitivity to Change in the Lingua Franca Use of English

The study of ongoing change in English typically focuses on studying evidence from codified varieties of the language. Recent corpus studies show, however, that advanced non-native users of English may display heightened sensitivity to features undergoing frequency shifts similar to that experienced by native speakers. In addition, most studies aiming to detect patterns of linguistic regularity utilize large data sets that attempt to minimize the presence of the individual. In this study, we focus on change in ELF and place non-native individuals at the center of attention. Our empirical section examines how aggregated features that are currently undergoing change in codified varieties of English vary in the repertoires of ELF users of Twitter. To carry out this task, this study utilizes geo-tagged tweets retrieved from the Nordic Tweet Stream. The data obtained from this real-time monitor corpus are freely available for research and re-use athttps://cs.uef.fi/nts/. For the analysis itself, we selected the idiolects of 150 individual users who actively tweet in English from geographically varying locations in Finland. As American English predominates with several patterns of linguistic change in codified varieties of English, a simplified dichotomy between American and British features is utilized as a conceptual tool for inspecting variation. The idiolects are analyzed from the perspective of spelling and lexico-grammatical and morphological variation, such as V+ -ing|V + infinitive (e.g.start doing|start to do) and expanded predicates (e.g.take a look|have a look). The quantitative observations show that, particularly in the case of grammatical features, ELF speakers appear to have generally adhered to ongoing linguistic change.

Thai elf Users’ Characteristics of Relative Clauses

Abstract To build up the empirical description of elf’s morphosyntactic system, this study examines Thai elf users’ characteristics of relative clauses and analyses the causes underlying their use of the construction. Data were taken from the writing of 116 advanced and upper-intermediate English majors at a university in Bangkok. The results indicated that Thai elf users’ relative clauses exhibit preferences for unmarked and explicit structures. Both linguistic and functional causes are responsible for their production of the construction: they form relative clauses full of basic and transparent structures in order to ensure simple and successful communication. The overall results reveal the nature of elf communication. Although Thai elf users’ relative clauses are associated with some specific patterns, their use of this grammatical construction is governed by general linguistic processes which have been found to operate in the interactions of many groups of elf speakers, especially at the phonological and pragmatic levels.

ELF Users’ Attitudes and Orientations in Tourism Interaction

ELF Users’ Attitudes and Orientations in Tourism Interaction

What is the effect of successive segmental repair on the mutual intelligibility of ELF users?

This study assessed the effect of successive segmental repair on the mutual intelligibility of ELF users using a quasi-experimental design. Twenty-six pairs of ELF users completed three English phonemic discrimination tasks, once a week for three weeks, in which maintaining intelligible pronunciation was essential to the completion of the tasks. The pairs were randomly assigned to one of two conditions: an interaction condition or a no interaction condition. Pairs in the interaction condition could segmental repair when mutual intelligibility faltered; pairs in the no interaction condition could not. Although pairs in the interaction condition were consistently more mutually intelligible than pairs in the no interaction condition, pairs in the interaction condition did not become successively more mutually intelligible across the three weeks. Accordingly, segmental repair seems to facilitate the development of mutual intelligibility, but successive segmental repairs do not necessarily cumulatively increase mutual intelligibility.

Processing implicatures in English as a Lingua Franca communication

The paper argues that cognitive mechanisms responsible for implicatures are the same no matter what language someone uses. However, linguistic knowledge, conceptual knowledge, encyclopedic knowledge and contextual effect that are all needed for producing and comprehending implicatures vary significantly in ELF users. They cannot be expected to act in accordance with the conventions and norms of the societal culture of native English-speaking communities. It is claimed that in ELF discourse participants must create their own temporary norms and conventions with implicatures among them. Consequently, it seems mistaken to test L2 users or ELF speakers on the use of L1-based conversational and/or frozen implicatures (functioning as idioms) as many studies have done.The paper offers a modified understanding of implicatures with the notion of “simplicature”, and a model to explain the relationship and interplay between factors that affect implicature processing: linguistic knowledge, conceptual knowledge, encyclopedic knowledge and contextual effect.

Exploring ELT practices, teachers’ professional profile and beliefs: Analysing data from the PRIN survey and envisaging pedagogical projections

This paper presents selected findings emerging from the survey related to the PRIN Prot. 2015REZ4EZ questionnaire, created and administered by the Unit 3 of the same PRIN project. This tool of investigation was specially devised in order to research and acquire the main values and beliefs ascribable to a volunteer group of teachers, operating in the Italian territory and catering for different levels of education in the national system. From the authentic data collected, it is possible to draw an overall profile of those professionals engaged in the diversified educational contexts above referred to. Even though still connected to and partially influenced by a SE and native-speaker’s model authority, there is evidence of the presence of an active ELF-aware perspective emerging from the respondents; the qualifying questions where this aspect specifically occurs are analyzed in details, particularly in relation to which sociolinguistic model of English are those teachers inspired by in their teaching. Furthermore, those values and beliefs, in connection to the pedagogical approach of choice, are interpreted from a prospective point of view, envisioning their potential developments in the future, also projecting them into the frame of reference provided by a social constructivist model as designed by Kurt Kohn in MY English (2018) and further developments (forthcoming 2020). The emancipation of the ELF users and their adaptive appropriation of the lingual capabilities inherent in the ELF-aware approach, together with the acknowledgement of the ELF-users’ expressive means affordable according to that perspective, are highilighted, also in terms of individual and collective creativity, from the side of both teachers and learners, in the variegated educational contexts.

The dynamics of question / answer moves in ELF spoken discourse in cross-cultural migration domains

In this paper we will analyze question and answer moves in a corpus of approximately eight interviews taken from transcripts published on the site Storie migranti ( www.storiemigranti.org ). Our focus will be the different ways questions are employed and formulated to elicit ideational information (Halliday 2004) and also the way in which answers to these same questions are formulated. A major point of interest within cross- cultural migrant domains (Guido 2008) and in particular in the context of asylum seekers using ELF is how the delicate balance of the demands of questioner and answerer are negotiated and satisfied, or not, as the case may be. In addition to purely lingua-structural concerns, we also consider pragmatic considerations within the specific theoretical contexts of relevance (Sperber, Wilson 1986) and conversation implicatures (Grice 1975). With an in-depth analysis of individual cases, we will seek to identify the instances where answers satisfactorily provide the information elicited by the question in view of being able to describe successful strategies both from the perspective of questioner and answerer within the specific context of spoken interaction between ELF users in cross-cultural migration domains.

Communication Strategies in BELF: Implications for Business English Language Teaching

Research has shown that Communication Strategies are one of the main tools employed by ELF users to reach common understanding and effectiveness in communication, with participants cooperatively and jointly constructing meaning through several pragmatic moves. In English as a Business Lingua Franca (BELF) in particular, Communication Strategies aimed at enhancing explicitness and checking comprehension, such as requests for clarification and repetition, or paraphrasing and reformulation, are seen as an essential skill, together with business know-how, clarity of message and explicitness. The pedagogical implications of findings in BELF communication have so far been researched to a certain extent, for instance looking at the inclusion of Communication Strategies in ELT business materials, and at BELF-oriented training in some higher education programmes. This paper aims at contributing to this research area by exploring how BELF findings can be taken into account in terms of materials development and classroom practices that are oriented at fostering the development of communication skills to effectively communicate in international and intercultural business contexts.

Translating child protection assessments for ELF users: Accommodation, accessibility, and accuracy

AbstractThis paper analyzes the translation of five child protection assessments and decisions from Finnish into English. Translators of such text have to make difficult decisions in relation to the linguistic resources of the end users, namely the child’s parents or custodians, because it is impossible for the translator to assess their linguistic resources. Therefore, it is difficult to strike a balance between an accurate translation and a pragmatically felicitous translation. Besides, these texts are typically translated by community interpreters who have no formal training in translation. A total of 18 examples of translation problems related to terminology, nominalization, passive constructions, and speech representation were analyzed by mobilizing different linguistic theories related to each category. The results show that the target texts present several accommodation strategies aimed at rendering the translations more accessible. Thus, terms are explained or glossed, and terms, grammatical constructions, and complex forms of reported speech are simplified. More awareness-raising among different stakeholders is needed in order to produce translations that really empower migrant communities.

Cross-cultural Mediation in ELF Migration Contexts: Pedagogical Implications on ELT Multilingual Settings

ELF cross-cultural interactions and mediation processes in specialized migration settings are often characterized by ‘gatekeeping’ asymmetries between the participants involved challenging a successful meaning negotiation (Guido, 2008). The exploration of migration encounters (Sperti, 2017) is particularly useful in the analysis of naturally occurring dialogues among ELF users, since it shows how ELF speakers, engaged in intercultural interactions, appropriate the English language according to their own native linguacultural and paralinguistic schemata, and to specific pragmalinguistic purposes and processes. The multimodal investigation of the occurring hybridization processes is focused on (i) ELF redefinition of existing native paralinguistic correlates in the pragmalinguistic use of an ELF variation; and (ii) resulting L1 transfers affecting the performing of speech acts and the conversational composition and progress. The analysis reveals (a) the mediation of meaning, experience and intentionality in terms of resulting lexical, syntactical, and register performance; and (b) the role played by prosody and paralanguage in the mutual acceptance of speakers’ intentions, attitudes, and cognitive schemata, in spoken specialized discourse related to medical and legal integration, mediated migration narratives, cross-cultural conceptual representations and reception of traumatic experience. The heuristic approach applied to the analysis of data derived from the exploration of real plurilingual cross-cultural exchanges is particularly useful in the promotion of the conscious use of cross-cutting strategies as powerful learning tools embedded in the language learning process, with the ultimate aim of (i) investigating the possible impact of migration on teacher education, (ii) defining an ELF-aware pedagogical framework in plurilingual educational settings, and (iii) enhancing the development of learners’ skills in intercultural communication.

The role of affinity in attitudes towards the English of native and non-native speakers

Abstract – To examine the issue of how far ELF can be endonormative, we report on a matched-guise test experiment (Lambert et al. 1960) measuring NNES ELF users’ reactions to ostensibly different speakers, some of whom identified as NES, others as NNES ELF users from the outer circle. Two speakers – one NES, the other a highly proficient NNES (Graddol 2010) – made various short recordings in a studio. Each of these was modified using specialist software to make them sound like different people without affecting intelligibility as regards pronunciation. On a Likert scale, respondents rated how happy they would be to speak like the persona in question. The object was to identify patterns in the way that the features of Nativeness, on the one hand, and Affinity on the other, interacted to affect attitudes to different manifestations of English, and whether any affinity effect (our provisional term) can be shown to exist as a possible alternative to the nativeness principle (Jenkins 2007; Seidlhofer 2001, 2011). That is, whether ELF users may use other ELF users that they find attractive as models for language use rather than the idealized NES.

The role of celebrity in attitudes to the English of native and non-native speakers. A case study of female Italian ELF users

The nativeness principle is a major factor in attitudes to the use of ELF (see: Seidlhofer 2001, 2011; Jenkins 2007). Aside from issues of identity and the maintenance of an increasingly unjustifiable disparity in status between NES and NNES users of English, the emulation required by the nativeness principle is difficult to justify in the face of the fact that no single NS model of English exists (Seidlhofer 2011) and that research shows that NNES users are, in any case, unreliable at identifying NESs (Christiansen 2014), thus casting doubt over whether such models are as important in practice as conventional wisdom maintains. In this paper, we report on an experiment broadly following the matched-guise test technique (Lambert et al. 1960). In this, we collected NNES ELF users’ reactions, in the form of a Likert Scale, to recordings of various speakers, some of whom NES from the inner circle, others highly proficient ELF users from the outer circle (see Graddol 2010). Respondents were presented the same set of six speakers under different randomised guises according to the two parameters of ±NES (Native English Speaker) and ±Celeb (Celebrity), the latter chosen as a feature particularly relevant in the context of models and the motivation for emulation. Respondents, female Italian ELF users, were asked to rate how happy they would be to speak like the persona (whether genuine or invented) in question. The object was to see whether any discernable pattern could be identified in the way that the features of ±NES and ±Celeb interact to affect attitudes to different manifestations of English, and whether a “celebrity effect”, in particular in respect to NNES, can be shown to exist as a possible rival to the nativeness principle. In discussion of our results, we identify a possible third parameter namely affinity between respondent and speaker.

Are native speakers the only model for ELF users

Abstract – In this paper, we report on an experiment broadly following the matched-guise test technique (Lambert et al . 1960). In this, we collected NNES ELF users’ reactions, in the form of a Likert Scale, to recordings of various speakers, some of whom NES from the inner circle, others highly proficient ELF users from the outer circle (see Graddol 2010). Respondents were presented the same set of six speakers under different randomised guises according to the two parameters of ±NES (Native English Speaker) and ±Celeb (Celebrity), the latter chosen as a feature particularly relevant in the context of models and the motivation for emulation. Respondents, female Italian ELF users, were asked to rate how happy they would be to speak like the persona (whether genuine or invented) in question. The object was to see whether any discernable pattern could be identified in the way that the features of ±NES and ±Celeb interact to affect attitudes to different manifestations of English, and whether a “celebrity effect”, in particular in respect to NNES, can be shown to exist as a possible rival the nativeness principle (see Seidlhofer 2001, 2011, Jenkins 2007). In our conclusions, we identify a possible third parameter namely affinity between respondent and speaker.

A phonopragmatic analysis of ELF spoken interactions

Abstract – ELF cross-cultural interactions occurring in specialized migration settings are often characterized by ‘gatekeeping’ asymmetries between the participants involved, challenging successful communication. The ‘phonopragmatic’ approach is here applied to the analysis of naturally occurring dialogues among ELF users with the aim of investigating how ELF speakers engaged in intercultural encounters differently appropriate the English language, not only according to their own native linguacultural and paralinguistic ‘schemata’, but also to specific pragmalinguistic purposes and processes. The phonopragmatic analysis is applied to a number of case studies – illustrating unequal encounters between asylum-seekers, language mediators and legal advisors, taking place at an important centre for legal counselling and assistance to refugees and performed through ELF and Italian Lingua-Franca – with the ultimate objective of exploring the occurring prosodic and auditory processes activated in such cross-cultural dynamics. The investigation of prosodic strategies employed for a pragmatic purpose by ELF speakers from different L1 backgrounds is focused on (i) ELF redefinition of existing native prosodic and acoustic correlates (in terms of stress, intonation, speech rate, and disfluency) in the pragmalinguistic use of an ELF variation; (ii) resulting L1 phonological transfers affecting the conversational composition and progress; (iii) the cross-cultural mediation of meaning, experience and intentionality in terms of phonopragmatic strategies and resulting lexical, syntactical, and stylistic performance; and (iv) the role played by prosody and paralinguistics in the negotiation of speakers’ attitudes, emotions, and socio-cultural ‘schemata’ in spoken specialized discourse related to medical and legal integration, mediated migration narratives, socio-cultural divergences, and cross-cultural representations of traumatic experience.

The cultural and creative use of English as a Lingua Franca

Abstract – This paper argues that just as globalization calls for a reconsideration of conventional ways of conceiving of communication and community, so the use of English as a global lingua franca, ELF, prompts a rethinking of the associated concepts of culture and creativity. With globalization has come a realization that cultures, like communities, are continually adaptive and emergent networks of social interaction, not the bounded entities that they once were thought to be. Similarly, ELF interaction can be described as a process of pragmatic creativity and cultural adaptation which effective communication requires in a globalized world. As such, ELF is expressive of new realities but not those represented by verbal art, but the actual immediate realities of the here and now. Thus ELF it is argued is a naturally creative process which provides for the communicative needs of culturally complex and variable communities of users. As such it not the creative use of language as it is in verbal art for the representation of an imagined counter-reality, but for the expression of the actual everyday social experience of ELF users of different linguacultural backgrounds around the world.

The linguistic features of ELF by Chinese users in China–ASEAN communication contexts

Abstract Based on the Chinese component of the Asian Corpus of English (ACE), this study focuses on the lexicogrammar features of ELF by Chinese speakers in China–ASEAN communication contexts. It is found that non-standard forms do exist systematically in high distance social talk by the Chinese ELF users of comparatively high English proficiency. Examples and analysis are provided to illustrate the common non-standard lexicogrammar features in terms of lexical innovation, non-standard use of prepositions, the omission of subjects, objects and copula, grammatical disagreement, subject pronoun copying and tag question. These non-standard forms appear to be adopted due to mother tongue transfer, facilitation of communication or exploitation of language resources. However, no misunderstandings occur due to the non-standard forms.

Repositioning English and multilingualism in English as a Lingua Franca

Abstract In the relatively few years since empirical research into English as a Lingua Franca began being conducted more widely, the field has developed and expanded remarkably, and in myriad ways. In particular, researchers have explored ELF from the perspective of a range of linguistic levels and in an ever-increasing number of sociolinguistic contexts, as well as its synergies with the field of Intercultural Communication and its meaning for the fields of Second Language Acquisition and English as a Foreign Language. The original orientation to ELF communication focused heavily, if not exclusively, on form. In light of increasing empirical evidence, this gave way some years later to an understanding that it is the processes underlying these forms that are paramount, and hence to a focus on ELF users and ELF as social practice. It is argued in this article, however, that ELF is in need of further retheorisation in respect of its essentially multilingual nature: a nature that has always been present in ELF theory and empirical work, but which, I believe, has not so far been sufficiently foregrounded. This article therefore attempts to redress the balance by taking ELF theorisation a small step further in its evolution.

Culture and complexity through English as a lingua franca: rethinking competences and pedagogy in ELT

Abstract English as a lingua franca (ELF) research highlights the complexity and fluidity of culture in intercultural communication through English. ELF users draw on, construct, and move between global, national, and local orientations towards cultural characterisations. Thus, the relationship between language and culture is best approached as situated and emergent. However, this has challenged previous representations of culture, particularly those centred predominantly on nation states, which are prevalent in English language teaching (ELT) practices and the associated conceptions of communicative and intercultural communicative competence. Two key questions which are then brought to the fore are: how are we to best understand such multifarious characterisations of culture in intercultural communication through ELF and what implications, if any, does this have for ELT and the teaching of culture in language teaching? In relation to the first question, this paper will discuss how complexity theory offers a framework for understanding culture as a constantly changing but nonetheless meaningful category in ELF research, whilst avoiding essentialism and reductionism. This underpins the response to the second question, whereby any formulations of intercultural competence offered as an aim in language pedagogy must also eschew these simplistic and essentialist cultural characterisations. Furthermore, the manner of simplification prevalent in approaches to culture in the ELT language classroom will be critically questioned. It will be argued that such simplification easily leads into essentialist representations of language and culture in ELT and an over representation of “Anglophone cultures.” The paper will conclude with a number of suggestions and examples for how such complex understandings of culture and language through ELF can be meaningfully incorporated into pedagogic practice.