Social stigma and grammatical autonomy in nonnative varieties 
of English

The spread of English has created a rich array of varieties, which are often grouped into a tripartite division: the ENL, ESL, and EFL of Quirk, or the inner-circle, outer-circle, and expanding-circle of Kachru. These varieties, especially ESL, differ among themselves in both form and function. It is often assumed in the literature that these varieties are autonomous systems of communication. This article challenges this assumption by showing that the innovative phonological features of one ESL variety, the vernacular English spoken in Singapore, cannot be analyzed without reference to native English. These change-in-progress features fall into two types: those that originate in phonemes, and those that originate in words. Social stigma associated with them poses a formidable barrier to their stabilization and diffusion, and consequently to their autonomization. Nonnative English is grammatically dependent on native English.

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Noun phrase complexity in Nigerian English

English Today ◽

10.1017/s0266078416000626 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 33 (3) ◽

pp. 31-38 ◽

Cited By ~ 8

Author(s):

Mayowa Akinlotan ◽

Alex Housen

Keyword(s):

Noun Phrase ◽

American English ◽

Important Variable ◽

Indian English ◽

Outer Circle ◽

Form And Function ◽

Inner Circle ◽

And Function ◽

Structural Simplicity

Structural simplicity/complexity is an important variable with which New Englishes and native varieties are identified and conceptualised, but predicting such variation in complexity has received little attention in the literature. New Englishes, especially the outer circle varieties such as Nigerian or Indian English, differ in form and function from the inner circle varieties, such as British or American English, but the extent of such variation varies greatly and merits further investigation. According to Gorlach (1998), we should expect New Englishes to demonstrate simplification at the levels of morphology, lexis, and syntax. This has indeed been shown to be the case in some varieties, but it has also been shown that this variation differs according to different linguistic and non-linguistic factors. Most recently, Schilk and Schaub (2016) have shown how noun phrase (NP) structure can reveal the underlying structural simpification predicted in the New Englishes varieties. Brunner (2014) examined NP complexity across three New Englishes (British, Singaporean, and Kenyan English), explicating how grammars of the indigeneous languages in Singapore and Kenya influence NP simplicity/complexity.

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The polemics of Singlish

English Today ◽

10.1017/s0266078401001055 ◽

2001 ◽

Vol 17 (1) ◽

pp. 39-45 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Lee-Wong Song Mei

Keyword(s):

United States ◽

United Kingdom ◽

Sri Lanka ◽

The United States ◽

The Philippines ◽

Linguistic Ideology ◽

Outer Circle ◽

The United Kingdom ◽

Inner Circle ◽

And Function

An examination of the culture, identity and function of English in Singapore.The widespread use of English in Singapore has placed Singapore in the Outer Circle, along with India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Ghana, Nigeria, the Philippines and others, in contrast with Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States and others who belong to the Inner Circle (Kachru,1991). Placing countries in different circles – inner vs outer or expanding, based on the concept of nativization – has generated questions of democracy in linguistic ideology and related issues of norms and standards. These are discussed.

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A Comparative study on English language teaching to young learners around the world

Contemporary Educational Researches Journal ◽

10.18844/cerj.v7i3.2656 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 7 (3) ◽

pp. 114-118

Author(s):

Cansu Orsel ◽

Fatih Yavuz

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

Language Teaching ◽

World Englishes ◽

English Language Teaching ◽

Lingua Franca ◽

Outer Circle ◽

Young Learners ◽

The World ◽

Expanding Circle ◽

Inner Circle

Usage of the English language as Lingua Franca has caused an increasing demand on the English Language Teaching (ELT) in early childhood and according to Braj Kachru’s Three Circles Model of World Englishes as the Inner Circle, the Outer Circle, and the Expanding Circle the approaches to the Young Learners dramatically differs. Besides the features of English as a global language and the nature of early language learning, this paper also focuses on the comparison of the three different examples from the Three Circles Model of World Englishes. They are compared in terms of techniques that are used and the approaches to the Young Learners. The examples taken are from the official websites of the three countries from the Inner Circle, Outer Circle, and the Expanding Circle; respectively, New Zealand’s Ministry of Education, Indian Ministry of Human Resource Development, and the Turkish Board of Education and Instruction. Keywords: Young Learners, The World Englishes, Lingua Franca, Braj Kachru, English Language Teaching (ELT).

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Selling English: advertising and the discourses of ELT

English Today ◽

10.1017/s0266078404001026 ◽

2004 ◽

Vol 20 (1) ◽

pp. 3-10 ◽

Cited By ~ 9

Author(s):

MARK PEGRUM

Keyword(s):

New Zealand ◽

Lingua Franca ◽

Outer Circle ◽

The Us ◽

Expanding Circle ◽

English Speaking ◽

Inner Circle ◽

The Uk ◽

The Way

FOR SOME time, a growing chorus of voices has been expressing concern over the way in which English is promoted by English-speaking countries, primarily the UK, the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand (cf. Phillipson 1992, Pennycook 1994 & 1998, Canagarajah 1999, Skutnabb-Kangas 2000). Identified by Kachru (1985) as the ‘inner circle’ countries, these make vast profits from linguistic sales to ‘outer circle’ countries such as Singapore and India – despite the fact that the latter have largely developed their own Englishes – and even more so to the ‘expanding circle’ of countries which require access to the default international lingua franca.

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Kachru’s Three Concentric Circles Model of English Language: An Overview of Criticism & the Place of Kuwait in it

English Language Teaching ◽

10.5539/elt.v13n1p85 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 13 (1) ◽

pp. 85

Author(s):

Mohammad A. Al-Mutairi

Keyword(s):

Social Life ◽

English Language ◽

World Englishes ◽

Outer Circle ◽

Expanding Circle ◽

The Usa ◽

Concentric Circles ◽

Inner Circle ◽

The Government ◽

The Uk

This paper attempts to examine in a descriptive way the pioneering model of “World Englishes” proposed by Kachru in the mid-1980s that allocates the presence of English into three concentric circles: The Inner Circle, the Outer Circle, and the Expanding Circle. The Inner Circle presents the countries where English is used as a native language and as a first language among people. These countries include the USA, the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The Outer Circle includes countries that have old historical British colonial relations and where English is commonly used in social life or the government sectors. Most of the countries that belong to this circle are former colonies of the British Empire, such as India, Malaysia, Singapore, Ghana, Kenya, and others. The usage of English in these countries is similar to what is known as English as a second language. The third circle, The Expanding Circle, includes countries that introduce English as a foreign language in schools and universities, mostly for communicating in English with the Inner and Outer Circles. Such countries include Turkey, Saudi Arabia, The Emirates, Japan, China, Korea, and others. Since its first introduction in 1985, Kachru's Three Concentric Circles Model of English Language has occasioned a great debate. Many linguists considered it one of the most influential models for understanding the use of English in different countries. Some, on the other hand, including Kachru himself, criticized the model for its oversimplification and the unclear membership to the circles. In addition to an overview of criticism on Kachru's model based on different studies, this paper tries to locate the place of ELT in Kuwait among the three circles.

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Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) of DNA and RNA

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100152148 ◽

1989 ◽

Vol 47 ◽

pp. 34-35

Author(s):

Patricia G. Arscott ◽

Gil Lee ◽

Victor A. Bloomfield ◽

D. Fennell Evans

Keyword(s):

Molecular Structures ◽

Inorganic Materials ◽

Resolving Power ◽

Scanning Tunneling ◽

Tunneling Microscopy ◽

Form And Function ◽

Dna And Rna ◽

Calf Thymus ◽

And Function ◽

The Relationship

STM is one of the most promising techniques available for visualizing the fine details of biomolecular structure. It has been used to map the surface topography of inorganic materials in atomic dimensions, and thus has the resolving power not only to determine the conformation of small molecules but to distinguish site-specific features within a molecule. That level of detail is of critical importance in understanding the relationship between form and function in biological systems. The size, shape, and accessibility of molecular structures can be determined much more accurately by STM than by electron microscopy since no staining, shadowing or labeling with heavy metals is required, and there is no exposure to damaging radiation by electrons. Crystallography and most other physical techniques do not give information about individual molecules.We have obtained striking images of DNA and RNA, using calf thymus DNA and two synthetic polynucleotides, poly(dG-me5dC)·poly(dG-me5dC) and poly(rA)·poly(rU).

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