The Emergence of an “Intersecting Circle” in Kachru’s Three Concentric Circles of World Englishes: A Case of Ethno-linguistic Neutrality in Central Nigeria

There is evidence that contemporary Nigeria is drifting towards a society of monolingual English users a component of which could be defined as lacking in ethno-linguistic identity. This trend is found among a generation of young Nigerian urban dwellers (between the age bracket of (12 and 25) who can neither communicate in their parents’ native language(s) nor indeed in any other Nigerian indigenous language; their only medium of communication is English. Although based on their childhood exposure to the English language and their relative competence in it, English can be described as their ‘‘mother tongue’’ but the fact that they are not native speakers given the socio-geographical circumstances of their birth excludes them from Kachru’s (1988) Inner Circle classification of native speakers. Consequently, these Nigerians are left without a clearly defined ethno-linguistic affiliation. This paper interrogates this emerging sociolinguistic phenomenon in especially Central Nigeria, with the aim of stimulating scholarly consciousness on the ethno-linguistic identity of this category of Nigerians, and its implications for English usage among them. The submission of the paper is that another circle, “the intersecting circle”, be created for them since they bestride both the inner circle in having English as their “mother tongue” and yet they are not native speakers of the language

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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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Impacts of World Englishes on local standardized language proficiency testing in the Expanding Circle

English Today ◽

10.1017/s0266078421000158 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-17

Author(s):

Qiusi Zhang

Keyword(s):

Proficiency Testing ◽

Language Proficiency ◽

Native Speakers ◽

World Englishes ◽

The World ◽

Expanding Circle ◽

The Usa ◽

Concentric Circles ◽

Inner Circle ◽

Changing Demographics

The world Englishes (WEs) paradigm describes the spread of English in three concentric circles (Kachru, 1985) – the Inner Circle (e.g., the USA, UK, and Australia), the Outer Circle (e.g. India, Philippines, and Singapore), and the Expanding Circle (e.g. China, Indonesia, and Thailand). With Englishization and nativization outside the Inner Circle and the changing demographics of English users (e.g. non-native speakers [NNSs] considerably outnumber the native speakers [NSs] in the Inner Circle [Crystal, 1995; Graddol, 1999], the WEs research strongly advocates to recognize the NNS varieties. Until today, the WEs paradigm has not only posed challenges to, but also encouraged changes in, the language testing (LT) profession that has been traditionally relying on the Inner Circle standard (e.g., Kachru, 1985; Lowenberg, 2002; Davies, Hamp–Lyons & Kemp, 2003; Hu, 2012; Brown, 2014).

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Teaching English in India —The Use of Technologically Enhanced Realia in the Classroom

Studies in English Language Teaching ◽

10.22158/selt.v2n2p149 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 2 (2) ◽

pp. 149

Author(s):

Priya K. Nair

Keyword(s):

Foreign Language ◽

English Language ◽

Native Speakers ◽

Mother Tongue ◽

Teaching English ◽

Job Market ◽

Native Speakers Of English ◽

Listening And Speaking ◽

Speaking Skills

In India acquisition of English language is imperative if one wants to sell oneself in the increasingly competitive job market. With a booming population the nation is filled with educated, technologically literate youth. English is not merely a foreign language in India. As India is separated by a plethora of languages knowledge of English is imperative. As the teachers in India are not native speakers of English the language they teach is not free from errors. The articulation is quite problematic as the mother tongue influence is quite pronounced. Technology helps to reduce these errors. Movies as a tool can enhance the listening and speaking skills of our students. It is quite boring to work with disembodied voices and the recorded conversations available in language labs do not sustain the learner’s interest. However learners are often forced to listen to recorded conversations of people they never see, the conversation is often stilted and contemporary idiom is hardly used. However, a completely new dimension to aural practice can be added in the classroom by using movies.

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Dialect Levelling: A Case Study of Ìkàr??-Àkókó Dialect

International Journal of Language and Literary Studies ◽

10.36892/ijlls.v3i3.640 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 3 (3) ◽

pp. 290-315

Author(s):

Esther Olayinka Bamigbola ◽

Fadekemi Rukayat Umar

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

Native Speakers ◽

Mother Tongue ◽

Indigenous Languages ◽

Work Place ◽

The People ◽

Restricted Domains ◽

The Status ◽

Lack Of Commitment

This study investigates the factors that are responsible for the levelling of Ìkàr??-Àkókó dialect. Specifically, the paper examines the impacts of Nigerian indigenous languages, especially Yorùbá, on the dialect. The study aims at identifying the patterns of changes in the dialect and their impacts on the ethnic identities of the people. The work is based on the variationist approach pioneered by William Labov in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The tools used for data collection include questionnaire, oral interview and observation. The findings of the study reveal that the dialect manifests different stages of changes, vital domains like home, school and work place, which are supposed to be the strongholds of this dialect are being encroached upon by languages other than the mother tongue in the study area. It was found that the changes in the dialect are not due to the influence of English language only, but to indigenous Nigerian languages, mostly Yorùbá. It was concluded that the gradual levelling of Ìkàr??-Àkókó dialect is caused in part by restricted domains of use, increase in population; lack of commitment to indigenous language use by the native speakers; and suppressive language policy in the nation. The study recommends sensitization campaigns as a way of maintaining and sustaining the status of indigenous languages.

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English language students’ productive and receptive knowledge of collocations

ExELL ◽

10.1515/exell-2016-0003 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 2 (1) ◽

pp. 46-67 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Mirna Begagić

Keyword(s):

Language Learning ◽

Second Language Learning ◽

English Language ◽

Native Speakers ◽

Mother Tongue ◽

Poor Performance ◽

L2 Acquisition ◽

Language Performance ◽

Lexical Collocations ◽

Language Students

Abstract The importance of collocations in second language learning has been recognized in the past few decades. There have been numerous studies in L2 acquisition research that investigated how the knowledge and use of collocations at different levels of proficiency affect learners’ communicative competence and language performance. Moreover, it seems important to mention that most of the studies investigating the collocational knowledge of students learning English as their L2, indicated students’ poor performance (Fayez-Hussein 1990; Aghbar 1990; Bahns and Eldaw 1993; Stubbs 2002; Wray 2002; Nasselhauf 2005; Ozaki 2011). The aim of this paper is to explain the notion of collocation as well as its most common classification, and to point out the importance of its proper use for English language students who are native speakers of the Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian (BCS) language. Furthermore, this study examines the productive and receptive knowledge of lexical collocations in order to access students’ collocational competence. The results indicate students’ poor collocational knowledge. This can be due to the fact that collocations of the language students are learning are interfering with the collocations of their mother tongue, but also due to the way students are taught English (vocabulary negligence in comparison with grammar and unawareness of the importance of collocations in language learning).

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Verbs of falling in English language: corpus data and typology

Acta Linguistica Petropolitana ◽

10.30842/alp2306573716103 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol XVI (1) ◽

pp. 115-151

Author(s):

O. Vinogradova ◽

◽

A. Viklova ◽

K. Pospelova ◽

◽

...

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

Native Speakers ◽

English Speakers ◽

Written Production ◽

Scope Of Application ◽

Native Speakers Of English ◽

The Subject ◽

Corpus Data ◽

Language Corpus

The paper presents the results of the studies carried over the group of English verbs with the meaning of falling. The research goals included classification of the lexical meanings, both direct and metaphorical, rendered by those verbs, on the basis of the analysis of the components of the situations put together in the special questionnaire. This was carried out together with native speakers of English, after which the collected set of examples was verified and expanded with searches in the big corpora of English speakers’ oral and written production available at the SketchEngine platform. Besides being a great source of extracting lexical meanings, Sketch Engine also provided the data and the statistics for the analysis of collocational behaviour of the verbs in question used with different subjects of falling. The scope of application of the umbrella verb fall and the distribution between it and its two rivals — drop and fall down — was in focus of the three corresponding sections in the paper, while the range of peripheral verbs of falling with all the comparative analysis of their lexical features formed one more section. Separately from the verbs conveying the direct meanings of falling, metaphoric shifts in the meanings of these verbs made up the content of section 6. Based on the findings presented in the previous sections, the conclusions regarding the concept of falling in English are discussed in the last part of the paper. The research confirmed that the verb fall is by far the most widely used in various contexts of falling. Whether used alone or combined with adverbial or prepositional particles, it covers the overwhelming majority of meanings of falling, both literal and metaphorical. Although drop proved to be the most frequent synonym of fall, there is a distribution of meanings between the two related to the nature of the subject and the intentionality of the action. As shown in the paper, the choice between fall and fall down appears to be determined by the trajectory of the fall and whether the typical position of the subject is vertical or not. Likewise, the distribution between fall off and fall down is conditioned by the trajectory, with the surface mentioned with the latter. Among the various peripheral verbs of falling, come and go — the most general verbs of movement — are also used in combination with down in specific cases of falling.

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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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Which English Should We Stand For? Voices from Lecturers in Thai Multicultural Universities

RELC Journal ◽

10.1177/00336882211054650 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 003368822110546

Author(s):

Yusop Boonsuk

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

World Englishes ◽

English Language Teaching ◽

Structured Interviews ◽

Expanding Circle ◽

Linguistic Conventions ◽

Inner Circle ◽

Thai English ◽

University Lecturers ◽

Rapid Transformation

The rapid transformation of English linguistic landscapes has introduced the world to newly emerging English varieties or World Englishes, which are not typically employed in the Inner Circle. To address the defying phenomenon, this qualitative study explored the perceptions of Thai university lecturers on World Englishes, Thai English and the feasibility of implementing World Englishes and Thai English in the classrooms. Data were collected from semi-structured interviews with 15 English lecturers in 5 universities across the Thai regions. Analyzed by content analysis, findings revealed that the participants demonstrated mixed perceptions. While most of the participants viewed British and American Englishes as representations of standard English varieties and questioned the legitimacy of World Englishes and Thai English, others reportedly recognized and accepted the existence of World Englishes and considered Thai English as a tool to convey Thai identities and cultures. The findings also indicated that most participants outright disapproved of World Englishes and Thai English in teaching practices, and these varieties were substantially marginalized and devalued. However, to prepare learners for realistic use of English and increase their awareness of World Englishes and Thai English, the remaining participants suggested that English language teaching should embrace flexible linguistic conventions that allow spaces for Inner Circle, Outer Circle and Expanding Circle Englishes.

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Attitudes of Non-native Speakers of English Studying in Australia towards World Englishes

10.31235/osf.io/53e7w ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Aditya Nur Patria

Keyword(s):

Native Speakers ◽

World Englishes ◽

Direct Approach ◽

Positive Attitudes ◽

Significant Difference ◽

Native Speakers Of English ◽

The Subject ◽

Research Questions ◽

Inner Circle ◽

English Students

The present study explores attitudes of non-native speakers of English studying in a reputable university in Melbourne, Australia, towards world Englishes. In particular, the study investigates different attitudes between students enrolled in a university subject, which indirectly promotes the students’ acceptance towards them and those who have not taken the subject towards world Englishes. The present study uses the direct approach, which allows informants to give an account of their attitudes (McKenzie, 2010). By adopting a questionnaire designed by Yoshikawa (2005), the present study seeks to answer two research questions: (1) Do non-native English students taking the subject have different attitudes from non-native English students who have not taken the subject towards world Englishes? (2) Do the students enrolled in Linguistic-Related majors have different attitudes from the students enrolled in Non-Linguistic-Related majors towards world Englishes? The findings of the study will contribute to the literature on world Englishes and the identification of a possible way to promote the acceptance of world Englishes. The results show that informants who are taking/have taken the subject tend to have more positive attitudes towards non-Inner Circle varieties than those who have not taken the subject. Similar results are also shown among informants grouped based on their majors in which Linguistics-Related ones are more acceptant. However, there is no significant difference regarding their attitudes toward Inner Circle English.

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Pragma-linguistic Difficulties in the Recognition of Phrasal Verbs by Iraqi EFL University Learners

Advances in Language and Literary Studies ◽

10.7575/aiac.alls.v.9n.6p.148 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 9 (6) ◽

pp. 148

Author(s):

Mohanad A. Amret ◽

Sinan A. Yousif

Keyword(s):

English Language ◽

Native Speakers ◽

Mother Tongue ◽

First Language ◽

Target Language ◽

Linguistic Knowledge ◽

Phrasal Verbs ◽

Efl Learners ◽

First Language Transfer ◽

Culture Gap

The purpose of this paper is to recognize the level of pragma-linguistic difficulties Iraqi EFL university learners face when handling phrasal verbs. Despite the fact that phrasal verbs are easy to understand by native speakers of English, non-native speakers usually encounter some difficulties in understanding the meaning of a phrasal verb depending on the meaning of the root verb, or different phrasal verbs of the same root. The problem might be attributed to pragma-linguistic knowledge. However, culture gap could be the reason behind such difficulties. The aim of the study is (1) to evaluate the pragma-linguistic level of interpreting phrasal verbs as understood and used by Iraqi EFL university learners, (2) to check the level of difficulty they experience while recognizing phrasal verbs, and (3) to find out reasons behind such misinterpretations. It is hypothesized that (1) the pragma-linguistic interpretation of phrasal verbs tends to play an important role in understanding the message conveyed by the speaker; (2) cultural gap could be the reason that EFL learners recognize phrasal verbs incorrectly, and (3) mother tongue language might make it difficult for EFL learners to understand phrasal verbs. To verify the aforementioned hypothesis, a test has been constructed and administered to a sample of 100 fourth-year Iraqi EFL university learners, morning classes at the department of English Language and Literature, College of Arts, in Mustansiriyah University, during the academic year 2017 – 2018. The responses of the students have been collected and linguistically analyzed according to a model given by Richards and Schmidt (2010). It has been found that Iraqi students’ lack of cultural norms of the target language makes it difficult for them to understand phrasal verbs. The lack of this knowledge is considered as a factor of confusion and then failure. The influence of the first language culture on the recognition of phrasal verbs may be seen as a negative first language transfer. The reason behind this negative transfer is that the norms and principles of first language are different from the norms and principles of the target language. It has been concluded that Iraqi EFL university learners have difficulties in pragma-linguistic knowledge as far as phrasal verbs are concerned. Iraqi EFL university learners face great difficulties in using phrasal verbs while communicating with other people. While using phrasal verbs, Iraqi EFL university learners have been highly influenced by their mother tongue language.

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