English as a lingua franca
(ELF)

Teaching and learning English as a

lingua franca (ELF) is probably the most

radical and controversial

approach to emerge in recent years. It

squarely addresses some of the issues

which global English raises.

1. An inexorable trend in the use of global

English is that fewer interactions now

involve a native-speaker. Proponents of

teaching English as a lingua franca (ELF)

suggest that the way English is taught and

assessed should reflect the needs and

aspirations of the ever-growing number of

non-native speakers who use English to

communicate with other non-natives.

2. Understanding how non-native speakers

use English among themselves has now

become a serious research area. The

Vienna-Oxford International Corpus of

English (VOICE) project, led by Barbara

Seidlhofer, is creating a computer corpus of

lingua franca interactions, which is intended

to help linguists understand ELF better, and

also provide support for the recognition of

ELF users in the way English is taught.

3. Proponents of ELF have already given

some indications of how they think conventional

approaches to EFL should be

changed. Jenkins (2000), for example,

argues for different priorities in teaching

English pronunciation.

4. Within ELF, intelligibility is of primary

importance, rather than native-like accuracy.

Teaching certain pronunciation features, such

as the articulation of ‘th’ as an interdental fricative,

appears to be a waste of time whereas

other common pronunciation problems (such

as simplifying consonant clusters) contribute

to problems of understanding.

5. Such an approach is allowing researchers

to identify a ‘Lingua Franca Core’ (LFC)

which provides guiding principles in creating

syllabuses and assessment materials.

6. Unlike traditional EFL, ELF focuses also

on pragmatic strategies required in intercultural

communication. The target model

of English, within the ELF framework, is

not a native speaker but a fluent bilingual

speaker, who retains a national identity

in terms of accent, and who also has the

special skills required to negotiate understanding

with another non-native speaker.

7. Research is also beginning to show how

bad some native speakers are at using

English for international communication. It

may be that elements of an ELF syllabus

could usefully be taught within a mother

tongue curriculum.

8. ELF suggests a radical reappraisal of the

way English is taught, and even if few adopt

ELF in its entirety, some of its ideas are

likely to influence mainstream teaching and

assessment practices in the future.