E 323L l English as a World Language
Instructor: Blockley, M
Unique #: 35495
Semester: Fall 2017
Cross-lists: LIN 323L
Flags: Global Cultures
Restrictions: n/a
Computer Instruction: No
Prerequisites: Nine semester hours of coursework in English or rhetoric and writing.
Description: English has no equal for being the most widely used language, though this has not always been the case and will not always be so. We will look at the steps that brought it to this position: at earlier English in competition with other languages, at what might be the core features of English and what alters or preserves them, and particularly at the role of English’s role as an intermediary of translation and as one lingua franca among others. The focus of this course is on the description of the past and current varieties of the language, particularly grammar (and within grammar, sentence structure, inflection, and spelling), and, despite Greene’s subtitle, not on the politics of ESL or EFL use and planning.
Topics will include a review of the history of English as a second or official language; the distinctive features of English over time and space; defining characteristics of spoken and written varieties, their registers, and vocabulary; brief case studies of English from among the following environments: The United Kingdom (including Irish English), Australia and New Zealand, West Africa (e.g. Ghana), India, English-based creoles such as Tok Pisin and Sranan, and English in China.
Texts:
David Bellos, Is That A Fish in Your Ear? (Faber and Faber, 2011, ppb 2012)
Robert Lane Greene, You Are What You Speak (Random House, 2011)
Jennifer Jenkins, Global Englishes (2014)
J Nicholas Ostler, The Last Lingua Franca: English Until the Return of Babel (Walker and Company, 2010)
Optional:
David Crystal The Stories of English (2004)
Nicholas Ostler, Empires of the Word: An Language History of the World (2006)
James Pennebaker, The Secret Life of Pronouns: What Our Words Say About Us (2011)
Requirements & Grading: Grades will be awarded on a scale of 100 and converted into plus and minus letter grades at the end of the semester in accord with departmental policy: 94-100 (A), 90-93 (A-), 87-89 (B+), 84-86 (B), 80-83 (B-), 77-79 (C+), 74-76 (C), 70-73 (C-), 67-69 (D+) and so on.
Quizzes (20%): Weekly quizzes will be given as necessary to assess your grasp of essential points and data in the assigned readings (about 120 pages a week of nonfiction) and your powers of concise, accurate expression.
One class presentation on a short selection from the readings (10%).
Three in-class closed-book exams plus a final exam (70%).