Australian Review of Applied Linguistics, Vol 31, No 3 (2008)

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A RESPONSE TO THE ARTICLE ‘ENGLISH AS AN INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE: CHALLENGES AND POSSIBILITIES’, BY MICHAEL CLYNE AND FARZAD SHARIFIAN

Robert Phillipson

Abstract


The brevity of the article makes it difficult for Michael Clyne (MC) and Farzad Sharifian (FS) to do justice to the multiplicity of contexts, functions, and forms of contemporary English. It is a hugely complex scene, as regards forms and functions, myths, ideologies, and realities that are harsh for some people and languages, uplifting for others. There is now a vast literature in this field, only a selection of which is drawn on. The range of topics is doubtless reflected in the variety of responses elicited for this thematic number of the ARAL. MC and FS correctly refer to masses of the relevant parameters of “international” English, but I feel that the article tends to over-generalise because of inadequate clarification of the contextual and functional dimensions in play in any given situation or country.

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