Jun 2007, Volume 4, No.6 (Serial No.

42)

Sino-US English Teaching, ISSN1539-8072, USA

Definition of Standard English and its enlightenment on English teaching

ZHANG Yong-lan
(Department of Foreign Languages and Literature, Huaiyin Teachers College, Huaian 223001, China)

Abstract: Standard English is defined not as a language, a style, an accent, but as standardized grammar and vocabulary with different accents. And from a linguistic point of view, Standard English is no more correct than any other form of English. Yet it is most prestigious, and a desirable educational target. However, different varieties of English should also be taught for international communication. Key words: Standard English; regional varieties; EFL teaching

1. Background: English as a Global Language

Today we are living in a Global village. English plays a central role in this globalization and it has become the common language choice for communication among various nations of the earth. In Crystals book English as a global language (1997), he assesses that a total of 670 million people use English with a native or native-like command of the language, increasing to approximately 12,000-1,500 million if vague criteria are adopted. However, more than 50 years ago, the number was not so large. Since 1950, many chief international organizations have been founded. Usually a small number of languages have been designated official languages for an organizations activities: for example, the UN was established with five official languagesEnglish, French, Spanish, Russian and Chinese. There is now a widespread view that it makes sense to try to reduce the numbers of languages involved in world bodies, if only to cut down on the vast moment of translation and clerical work required. The need for a global language is particularly appreciated by the international academic and business communities, and it is here the adoption of a single lingua franca that is the most in evidence, both in lecture-rooms and board-rooms, as well as in thousands of individual contacts being made everyday all over the world. At this moment, English is in charge for its elastic vocabulary and its democracy (Crystal, 1997).

2. Varieties of English
It is known that since 1950s, English has changed a lot. In another word, it has been globalized. Another obvious characteristic of it was the birth of many regional varieties. If you travel throughout a wide geographical area in which a language is spoken, and particularly if that language has been spoken in that area for hundreds of years, you are almost certain to notice differences in pronunciation, choices and forms of words, and syntax. There may even be very distinctive local colorings in the language which you can notice as you move from one location to another. Such distinctive varieties are usually called regional dialects of the language. The term dialect is

ZHANG Yong-lan, associate professor of Department of Foreign Languages and Literature, Huaiyin Teachers College; research fields: language teaching, sociolinguistics, western culture. 4

Definition of Standard English and its enlightenment on English teaching

sometimes used only if there is a strong tradition of writing in the local variety. Old English and to a lesser extent Middle English had dialects in this sense. In the absence of such a tradition of writing, the patois may be used to describe the variety (Wardhaugh, 1998, p. 40). As Denning & Leben (1995) say, when we use so-called the English language, it actually refers to American English, Australian English, Canadian English, Scottish English, and Wales English and so on. According to the theory of concentric circles (Kachru, 1985), English being used around the world is divided into three groups: inner circle, outer circle and expanding circle. The inner circle refers to the countries where English is a native language: the USA, UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia and New Zealand; the outer circle denotes EFL countries (e.g. former English colonies), such as India, Singapore, Malaysia, South Africa; and the expanding circle involves EFL countries like China, Japan, Israel, Greece, Poland, etc. Another division is divided as native language, second language and foreign language (MacArthur, 1998).

3. Standard English
No matter how we call these varieties, nothing can deny that English does not belong to a country or nation. It should be reasonably clear that which variety of English is the one that has been subjected to the process of standardization, and what its characteristics are. Peter Trudgill (1999) characterizes Standard English in his paper Standard English: what it isnt. Firstly, Standard English is not a language. Standard English is often referred to the Standard Language. Whatever it is, it is less than a language, since it is only one variety of English among many. Standard English may be the most important variety of English, in all sorts of ways: it is spoken by educated people and used by mass media to communicate to a wider non-regional public audience (Crystal, 1995). But most native speakers of English in the world are native speakers of some nonstandard varieties of the language, and English, like other Ausbau language (Kloss, 1967), can be described (Chambers & Trudgill, 1997) as consisting of an autonomous standardized variety together with all the nonstandard varieties which are heteronymous with respect to it. Standard English is thus not the English language but one variety of it. Secondly, Standard English is not a style. Trudgill characterizes styles as varieties of language in terms of formality. Styles are varieties of language which can be ranged on a continuum ranging from very formal to very informal. Formal styles are employed in social situations which are formal while informal styles are employed in social situations which are informalwhich is not to say, however, that speakers are sociolinguistic automata (Giles, 1973) who respond blindly to the particular degree of formality in a particular social situation. On the contrary, speakers are able to influence and change the degree of formality of a social situation by manipulation of stylistic choice. Thirdly, Standard English is not an accent. There is one thing about Standard English, on which most linguists, or at least British linguists do appear to agree that it has nothing to do with pronunciation. From a British perspective, we have to acknowledge that there is in Britain a high status and widely described accent known as Received Pronunciation (RP) which is socio-linguistically unusual when seen from a global perspective in that it is not associated with any geographical areas, being instead a purely social accent associated with speakers in all parts of the country, or at least in England, from upper-class and upper-middle-class backgrounds. It is widely agreed, though, that while all RP speakers also speak Standard English, the reverse is not the case. Perhaps 9%-12% of the population of Britain (Trudgill & Cheshire, 1989) speaks Standard English with some form of regional accents. It is true that in most cases Standard English speakers do not have broad local accents i.e.
5

Definition of Standard English and its enlightenment on English teaching

accents with large numbers of regional features which are phonologically and phonetically very distant from RP, but it is clear that in principle we can say that, while RP is in a sense, standardized, it is a standardized accent of English and not Standard English itself. This point becomes even clearer from an international perspective. It is important to stress the distinction between RP and Standard English because RP serves various purposes. Standard English speakers can be found in all English-speaking countries, and it goes without saying that they speak this variety with different non-RP accents depending on whether they come from the USA or Australia or wherever, for the USA has its own General American prototype, and the Australians would hardly want to assess their national varieties in terms of a POM-prototype. Standard English is connected with grammar and vocabulary but different from accent (Trudgill, 1999). Accent prejudice is the typical phenomenon, just as Shanghai dialect in China. If a person in Shanghai whose accent conceals that he is from northern Jiangsu rather than local Shanghai, he is always despised. Fourth, Standard English is not a register. We use the term register in the sense of a variety of language determined by topic, subject matter or activity, such as the register of mathematics, medicine, or pigeon fancying. In English, this is almost exclusively a matter of lexis, although some registers, notably the register of law, are known to have special syntactic characteristics. The British National Curriculum document for English talks frequently about Standard English vocabulary. It is not at all clear what this can mean. Trudgill (1999) argues above that it cannot mean vocabulary associated with formal styles. Is it supposed to mean vocabulary associated with academic or technical registers? If so, this would not make sense either, since the question of register and the question of standard versus nonstandard are also in principle entirely separate questions. It is of course true that it is most usual in English-speaking societies to employ Standard English when one is using scientific registersthis is the social convention, we might say. But one can certainly acquire and use technical registers without using Standard English, just as one can employ non-technical registers while speaking or writing Standard English. There is, once again, no necessary connection between the two. Besides, Crystal (1995) also gives his opinion that Standard English is a minority variety (identified chiefly by its lexical, grammar and orthography) which carries most prestige and is most widely understood. Standard English may be spoken with any accent, but it is spoken by educated people and used by mass media to communicate to a wider, non-regional, public audience. It must be stressed that from a linguistic point of view it is no more correct than any other form of English (Akmajian). Still, as it is most prestigious, it is a desirable educational target, taught to native speakers and foreign learners alike.

4. EFL Teaching
Besides the theory of three circles, Kachru also tells us (1992) that English spoken by inner-circle is norm-providing; by expanding-circle is norm-dependent and by outer-circle is norm-developing. In many cases, people who speak English as a foreign language use English as a lingua franca in order to communicate with other people who also speak English as a foreign language. At this point, students often wonder what kind of English they are learning. Facing this problem, teachers need to evaluate how important learning standard and/or idiomatic usage is for their students. We can find the importance just as Widdowson (1994, p. 379) says: As the language spreads, there are bound to be changes out in the periphery; so much can be conceded. But these changes must be seen not only as peripheral but also as radial and traceable back to the stable center of the standard. If this center does not bold, things fall apart; mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. Back to Babel. Obviously, if we are
6

Definition of Standard English and its enlightenment on English teaching

teaching students English as a second language for them to integrate into an English speaking culture, specific types of Standard English and idiomatic usage should be taught. Teachers need to carefully take into consideration their students needs when deciding on the syllabus. They need to ask themselves questions, such as, Do my students need to read about US or UK cultural traditions? Does this serve their objective for learning English? Should idiomatic usage be included in my lesson plan? What are my students going to do with their English? And, with whom are my students going to communicate with? From what is discussed above, we find that Standard English is especially important for us to learn because it is the first step when we want to use English to communicate with different people from different countries. Along with community members such as learners and parents, teachers may view their principal linguistic responsibility as one of inculcating correct language without realizing that, even for educated native speakers, natural and correct language includes a variety of language forms, not a single variant (Beebe, 1988; Milroy, J. & Milroy, L., 1985). According to Trudgills theory, Standard English does nothing with accent; the accent can be chosen when we learn Standard English. For example, if a businessman from China wants to do a deal with a businessperson from Germany, what difference does it make if they speak either British or American English? With a firmer understanding and appreciation of the multiplicity of language forms and functions, each chosen according to communicative contexts, situation, audience, and purpose, teachers can become developers of sensitivity toward many varieties of language rather than pedantic linguistic enforcers (Mckay & Hornberger, 1996). Besides sensitizing students themselves to language variability, educators are also charged with developing learners active mastery of the standard language in oral and written modes. This is a pedagogical as well as a social and political challenge. Pedagogically, it requires teachers to design and implement methods, materials, and activities which allow use of many language varieties, including but not necessarily limited to the standard, in different communicative contexts; this diversification is equally important in second language (Swain, 1993; Swain & Lapkin, 1994) and native language literacy settings (Farr & Deniels, 1986; Heath, 1983).

5. Conclusion
So far, many debates have appeared concerning the relationship between Standard English and EFL teaching. In the 21st century, while the communication among different countries and communities is increasing quickly, English learners face the problems of not only inner-circle English, but also outer-circle English and expanding-circle English. It makes the comprehension of culture become important. As LIU (1998) says, the point of learning culture in teaching EFL is to make target language learners be capable of using English appropriately according to the contexts and necessity. If it is allowed that many regional verities should be the medium of communication, it surely arouses the problem of how the varieties and the usage conform to each other. English teachers should be able to make clear the differences between varieties in expression, or they will fail to evaluate students output. During the debate over Standard English, a new view is that it considers English as CLOCAL language (Pakir, 1999). So-called CLOCAL is the combination of global and local. That is to say that English should keep existence and development of varieties as it serves as an international language. Of course, it is difficult to give satisfying answers to these problems; however, the debates on those questions will benefit EFL teaching.

Definition of Standard English and its enlightenment on English teaching References: Akmajian, A., et al. 1997. Linguistics: An introduction to language and communication. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Beebe, L. 1988. Five sociolinguistic approaches to second language acquisition. In: Beebe, L. (Ed.), Issues in second language acquisition: Multiple perspectives. New York: Newbury House/Harper and Row, 41-47. Chambers, J. & Trudgill, P. 1997. Dialectology. (2nd ed.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Crystal, D. 1995. Encyclopedia of the English language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Crystal, D. 1997. English as a global language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Denning, K. & Leben, W. R. 1995. English vocabulary element. New York: Oxford University Press. Farr, M. & Deniels, H. 1986. Language diversity and writing instruction. New York: ERIC Clearinghouse on Urban Education, Institute for Urban and Minority Education. Giles, H. 1973. Accent mobility: A model and some data. Anthropological Linguistics, 15, 87-105. Heath, S. B. 1983. Ways with words. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kachru, B. B. 1992. The other tongue: English across culture. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. Kloss, H. 1967. Abstand languages and Ausbau languages. Anthropological Linguistics, 9, 29-41. LIU D. 1998. Ethnocentrism in TESOL: Teacher education and the neglected needs of international TESOL students. ELT Journal, 1(52), 3-10. McArthur, T. 1998. The English languages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mckay & Hornberger. 1996. Sociolinguistics and language teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Milroy, J. & Milroy, L. 1985. Authority in language: Investigating language prescription and standardization. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Pakir, A. 1999. English as a global language: Implications for English language teaching worldwide. Plenary speech at the 33rd IATEFL conference, March 31, 1999, Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK. Swain, M. & Lapkin, S. 1994. Problems in output and the cognitive processes they generate: A step towards second language learning. Unpublished manuscript, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Swain, M. 1993. The output hypothesis: Just speaking and writing arent enough. Canadian Modern Language Review/La revue canadienne des language vivantes, 50(1), 158-164. Trudgill, P. & Cheshire, J. 1989. Dialect and education in the United Kingdom. In: Cheshire, J., Edwards, V., Mnstermann, H. & Weltens, B. (Eds.), Dialect and education: Some European perspectives. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters, 94-109. Trudgill, P. 1992. Introducing language and society. London: Penguin. Trudgill, P. 1999. Standard English: What it isnt. London: Routledge, 117-128. Wardhaugh, R. 1998. An introduction to sociolinguistics. (3rd ed.). Beijing: Foreign Language Teaching and Research Press, 40. Widdowson, H. G. 1994. The ownership of English. TESOL Quarterly, 2(28), 377-389.

(Edited by Stella and Hanna)