Knowledge of and attitudes towards Global Englishes in Japan: a study of Japanese high school students

With the ever-increasing recognition of non-standard varieties of English as legitimate alternatives to Kachru's (1992) standard Inner-Circle varieties, more and more we are witnessing a shift in TESOL from the traditional native-speaker-like target pronunciation to models which focus on intelligibility, understanding, and communicative competence. The English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) movement has given rise to suggested pronunciation models (and even grammars) based on achieving effective communication rather than native like proficiency. It is now regularly accepted that, worldwide, NNS-NNS interactions in English outnumber NS-NS interactions (Seidlhofer, 2005). This trend holds particular relevance for Japanese speakers of English, who, due to a combination of well-known geographic and economic factors, are more likely to interact in English with NNSs than NSs. Because of this, Japanese users of English are likely to require the ability to comprehend accents of NNSs from both the Expanding and Outer Circles.

This study set out to investigate current Japanese high school students' attitudes towards English study, their awareness of and ability to distinguish between native and non-native accents, and their attitudes and opinions of various native and non-native accents. A survey was carried out to this end, and results indicated a need to adjust educational methods and materials to better reflect the realities of English usage for Japanese speakers of English to prepare them for future English interactions.

References

Kachru, B. B. (1992). World Englishes: Approaches, issues and resources. Language teaching, 25(1), 1-14.

Seidlhofer, B. (2005). English as a lingua franca. ELT journal, 59(4), 339-341.