Employing neoliberal governmentality as a conceptual frame, this paper presents evidence from the mushrooming English language academies from Pakistan to demonstrate that how neoliberal rationality as a normative order of reason governs the minds of learners and teachers without governing. Drawing on the analysis of an open-ended interview…

Given the widened access to Chinese higher education, a large proportion of students studying at Chinese colleges come from rural lower-class families and encounter different challenges in English language learning. By using Bourdieu's social theoretical lenses, this case study explores how the interplay of capital, habitus and social fields…

Online eikaiwa, or English conversations via teleconferencing platforms, is a popular informal English learning avenue among Japanese nationals. Although online eikaiwa has received scholarly attention in recent years, only a few studies have investigated the current diversification efforts in the industry in terms of hiring teachers from various…

This article aims to contribute to the explanation of why bilingual education (CLIL) may reduce the differences in motivation and English proficiency commonly seen between students from different SES backgrounds (Shepherd and Ainsworth 2017). From a mixed-methods approach involving a questionnaire and focus group interviews, fourth year Secondary…

The study presented here is the first empirical investigation of attitudes towards Multicultural London English (MLE), the multiethnolect spoken in England's main metropolis. An online questionnaire was used to gather data from 800 participants, including MLE speakers as well as non-MLE speakers from a wide variety of different backgrounds. The…

This paper examines diasporic language ecology based on a sociolinguistic study of a Chinese complementary school (CCS) in Birmingham, England. The study applies a historical perspective to investigate local multilingual practices in relation to language ideology and identity. The discussion in this paper draws on "heteroglossia" to…

We investigated whether consensus-based test translation review procedures can be used effectively in cultural contexts with high social stratification. We staged two test translation review panels in China -- where social stratification may potentially inhibit individuals' ability to express opinion and disagreement. We adapted a consensus-based…

Contemporary movements of people and resources across rural and urban settings, city locales and national and regional borders produce challenges for familiar ways of studying languages as located and stable systems and of literacies as standardised ways of reading and writing texts. This study contrasts children's digital communicative literacy…

Although the modern multicultural European metropolis has brought previously disparate groups into close contact, little research has focused on the effect of these shifting demographic patterns on language attitudes and ideologies. This is probably due to the sensitive nature of issues relating to immigration which may evoke contexts of…