Researching and teaching China and Hong Kong English: Issues, problems and prospects

The English curriculum in China, including Hong Kong SAR, has traditionally been dominated by NS-based pedagogic models. This is a source of many problems, from learning outcome to teaching performance, from cultural inappropriacy to speaker identity. Research in World Englishes (WE), English as a lingua franca (ELF) or international language (EIL), and to a lesser extent second language acquisition (SLA) has shown that a curriculum informed by a deficit model by measuring learner performance using the yardstick of NS-based standards is by nature disempowering, and should be replaced with a model of difference whereby learner’s L1 identity and ownership of English are respected. To put theory into practice and let WE and ELF insights inform the local English curriculum, much remains to be done, including basic research in local(ized) English features across all linguistic levels. The main challenge is intelligibility in international communication, which is currently the focus of intensive ELF research. Identity, ownership and intelligibility are important issues that bear principally on social interaction, and so they should receive more attention in the teaching of speaking and listening. The learners’ needs for reading and writing are rather different. Contrary to radical proposals of replacing the NS-based pedagogic model with local(ized) models, it is argued that Standard (written) English (lexico-grammar, hereafter: Standard English) is indispensable. As Trudgill (2002:165) has observed, Standard English, with all its idiosyncracies (pp.167-68), is “by far the most important dialect in the English-speaking world from a social, intellectual and cultural point of view; and it does not have an associated accent”. Its role in writing for speakers of all dialects is “unassailable” (p.169). In the context of China, learners need it to absorb information written in this ‘social dialect’, particularly in printed sources, including the Internet. It is also crucial for upward and outward mobility. True to the spirit of empowerment, Standard English should remain an important part of a newly re-structured curriculum.