JOHN ALGEO asks some awkward but highly pertinent questions about tomorrow's dates

The aim of this short article is to offer a belated defense of L. M. Boyd (author of a daily, nationally syndicated column ‘Trivia’ in numerous newspapers throughout the USA) against a critique published in English Today over a decade ago by Alan S. Kaye (2006), and present arguments in support of Boyd's beleaguered claim. Kaye (2006: 54) writes:

A student hovers over red-underlined text, clicks a button, and watches her errant writing replaced. The red line disappears. She continues typing, pausing to address the flagged words and phrases. When she stops typing, what appears before her is spotless – its errors coded out of existence by a modern grammar checker. Her teacher may never become aware of the artificial intelligence that has augmented her writing production. She submits her paper.

Following Elizabeth Anne Malischewski's report on the English of Newfoundland (ET24, Oct 90), a review of the many kinds of English in mainland Canada

The teaching of ‘grammar’ is a matter of controversy in educational circles. In recent decades the pendulum has swung away from traditional ‘parsing’ towards ‘language in use’ – accompanied by cheers and fears in roughly equal measure. Is compromise possible between the two extremes, or even something better than simple compromise?

It was the late Robert Hughes's remarkable TV series and book on modern art, The Shock of the New, first seen in the early 1980s, that with its title so deftly captured the both the excitement and the puzzlement to the beholder of creative novelty and innovation. And it is in many ways a self-fulfilling phrase, since epigrammatic, yet meaning-laden titles and names are the stuff of the broadcast programmer and the namer of new products. The new can indeed be shocking to the beholder, and Hughes's title says it in a sharp, monosyllabic manner whose five-word cadence has both balance and rhythm. Shuffle the words – or render them in a different grammatical format (‘novelty shocks’, for example) – and it falls apart. Words applied to new things and events matter, because they need to be repeated and, the makers hope, be talked about; resonance and repeatability are important to original things being launched on an unsuspecting public.

One new feature of English Today in this issue, and for future issues, is The ET Column, where we'll be asking people in the know – academics, broadcasters, educators, linguists, teachers and others concerned with English worldwide – to write a column for the journal on issues of controversy, debate, work in the field, and matters of topical and immediate interest. In this issue, David Graddol is writing from India, where he's currently researching English Next: India.

In 1977 two French men, Simon Nora, a high-level civil servant, and Alain Minc, an economist, co-authored a report entitled L'informatisation de la société to French president Valery Giscard d'Estaing, which was later translated into English and published as The Computerization of Society (Nora & Minc, 1980). However, in a paper of the same title written in English and published in 1987, Minc simply transplanted the French word informatisation directly into English rather than sticking to the old translation computerization. However that was not the first time the word informatisation was used in the English language. One year before, the word informatization had appeared in an article published in the American magazine Dædalus:

1. (1) This is what the information society is offering as a by-product of a new stage in the mechanization of the economy and the informatization of culture. […] It is no accident that the phrase “artificial intelligence” has become such an important term within the culture of those responsible for the informatization of society, because, if intelligence can be artificial, then the randomness of history will disappear (Smith, 1986: 165–6).

In many ways, Dalzell's is an exemplary slang dictionary, as one might expect from so experienced a slang lexicographer. Slang dictionaries do not usually explain the principles underlying inclusion, the selection of headword forms, the ordering of senses and the designation of country of origin, although this information is vital to any careful user.

JOHN D. BATTENBURG of California Polytechnic State University (CalPoly) discusses tensions currently inherent in university departments of “English”, especially in the United States

Changing emphases in the use of English and Chinese in the recruitment of business managers in a British colony soon to be reintegrated into China

I first heard of the term ‘Chinglish’ when I was at Baiduizi (白堆子) Beijing Foreign Languages School in the 1970s, through Janet Adams’ book, From Chinglish to English. The book contained 60 short dialogues in simple American English. It was meant to be teaching us colloquial English, compared to, I suppose, the textbook English written by Chinese teachers. I found the term Chinglish rather odd, and it was an odd thing for us pupils at that particular school to be made aware of, because the school was, quite literally, the only school in China at the time where foreigners were directly teaching Chinese children foreign languages and cultures. Few of these foreign teachers had formal teaching qualifications, and they were not using any textbooks written by Chinese teachers, but in their own ways using material the school compiled specially for the pupils. It was a form of audio-lingual and direct method. The language we were taught was pretty colloquial and we did not, as far as I could tell, speak Chinglish that the examples in Adams’ book illustrated.

Is the language really in need of protection, anywhere in the world? If it is, who could be the protectors? A freelance journalist offers some comments on usage gurus and linguistic popes.

The proliferation of English as an international language has had significant ramifications for the teaching and learning of languages in various educational contexts (Yu & Liu, 2022). Within the realm of higher education, the adoption of English-medium instruction (EMI) has been a particularly contentious issue, with debates raging over its potential benefits and drawbacks (Bolton et al., 2022; Bolton, Botha & Lin, 2023). One potential approach to addressing the challenges posed by EMI is the adoption of translanguaging practices, which involve the utilization of multiple languages or language varieties in communication and learning. While the concept of translanguaging has gained increasing traction in recent years, there remains a paucity of empirical research on its implementation and impact within Sino-US educational institutions where translanguaging and EMI are facing enviable pedagogical dueling.

A plain-language campaigner takes on the traditional linguistic apparatus of government and legislation in Britain