English has been increasingly used in Thailand as a lingua franca; that is, a means of communication between people who do not share a mother tongue nor speak English as a native language. Given the integration of ASEAN nations to form an economic region, the use of English as lingua franca (ELF) in Thailand and other member states of ASEAN will likely continue to increase at a significant rate. Kagnarith, Klein and Middlecamp (2012) observe that the increasing use of English as an inter-regional language of communication probably results from two causes. First, the use of English as ASEAN's working lingua franca has already been in effect. Second, the promotion of English as an international business language is one objective of the plan for the regional integration of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC). In fact, the campaign to promote English as an official lingua franca in ASEAN is based on Article 34 of The ASEAN Charter ratified in February 2009: ‘The working language of ASEAN shall be English’.

When a Canadian exchange student returns home from a semester abroad in the capital city of China, she might tell her friends that she had Peking duck every day, but she would never, as a 21st-century liberal arts student, say that she stayed in Peking for a semester. Rather, she would say Beijing, as would most English speakers in the present day. But such discrepancies between English transliterations of Chinese words are far from uncommon. Is it the Nanking Massacre or the Nanjing Massacre? Who is the author of Tao Te Ching: Lao-Tzu or Laozi? What, then, is the Daodejing? This paper will focus on the English representation of Mandarin Chinese phonology, particularly the consonant sounds. The inconsistency of English transliteration of Mandarin is caused by historical exchanges and encounters between the British and the Chinese and a lack of a monolithic standardization of Mandarin. Paradoxically, while these transliterations attempt to unify and standardize themselves and the representation of Mandarin sounds, they simultaneously represent the concept of a diverse Mandarin.

The term ‘structure in linguistics’ is mostly used to refer to a sequence of units that are in a certain linguistic relationship to one another. Thus no matter how minimal a sequence is, if it can be analysed in terms of a relationship within it, then that is a structural unit. For example, one of the structures of a noun phrase may be ‘article + adjective + noun’ as in the vicious circle (Richards & Schmidts, 2002). Structures entail relationships which may be syntagmatic or paradigmatic. According to Finnegan (2014) when we say language structure we are essentially talking about syntax, semantics and phonology of a language. When it comes to idioms the same principles apply. The structures of idioms are essentially their syntactic behaviour. This behaviour cannot be predicted solely on the basis of their form or figurative meaning alone, but it must be due to some relation between the form and meaning (Gibbs & Nayak, 1989). An idiom is an institutionalised and conventionalized sequence of at least two words or free morphemes that is semantically restricted so that it functions as a single lexical unit, whose meaning cannot or can only to a certain extent be deduced from the meanings of its constituents. (Skandera, 2003: 60). To Nurnberg, Sag and Wasow (1994), idioms are characterised as having conventional meaning, figuration, inflexibility of form, and proverbiality. Idioms have been called ‘multiword units’ (Grant & Bauer, 2004), metaphors (Gibbs, 1993; Toris, 2011), phrasemes (Howarth, 1998), fixed expressions (Moon, 1997; Carter, 1998) and formulaic expressions (Wray, 2002). Structurally, idioms do not form a unique class of linguistic items such that all idioms belong to it, but that they share many of the same properties normally associated with more literal expressions.

Because standard English lacks a true a gender-neutral singular pronoun, there has long been debate over how to refer to generic persons whose genders are unknown, or those who reject binary male or female identities. Singular (or epicene) ‘they’ has a long history as a pronoun to refer to individuals of unknown gender (Balhorn, 2004), and has also been adopted as a personal pronoun by those who identify as neither male nor female. Borthen (2010) argues based on a corpus study of Norwegian that, crosslinguistically, plural pronouns allow for vague reference, and that their lexical features (e.g., number, person) need not match their interpretation in context, which makes these pronouns prime candidates to be used in gender-neutral contexts. Chen and Wu (2011) contend that this is true for both singular and plural pronouns, but Borthen (2011) disputes this, arguing that the data show that for definite plural pronouns, but not singular, the antecedent need not be activated in the speaker's or addressee's mind, and thus can be inferred.

The concept of the linguistic landscape (henceforth LL) includes all linguistic objects that characterise public environments, including but not limited to warning signs, instructions, public road signs, advertising billboards and posters, street names, graffiti, and notices on government and nongovernment buildings (Landry & Bourhis, 1997: 25). There is no doubt that the LL is a very significant domain for the examination of the cultural, socio-political, and economic changes that occur in a speech community (Backhaus, 2007; Gorter, 2017; Jaworski & Thurlow, 2010; Pakarinen & Björklund, 2017). The use of the LL approach to analyse how English is constructed and negotiated in the Jordanian context can provide new and important insights and evidence into the wide spread of English in a little-explored area, and can contribute to our understanding of the use of English as a global language.

English is becoming the default language of knowledge construction and dissemination (Kuteeva & McGrath, 2014; Zheng & Gao, 2016; Fuentes & Gómez Soler, 2018). However, English as a monolingual and mono-rhetorical means of disseminating knowledge may maximize its ‘Tyrannosaurus rex’ side (Tardy, 2004; Espinet et al., 2015; Zheng & Gao, 2016). The use of English as an Academic Lingua Franca (EALF) is depicted as hegemonic, totalitarian, colonial and imperialistic, silencing other academic traditions, imposing Anglophone ideologies of norms and rhetorical conventions, and controlling other academic territories (Phillipson, 1992; Bennett, 2013). It is claimed that an orientation towards the norms and rhetorical conventions of the Anglo-Saxon discourse demotes non-English languages, cultures and rhetorical conventions (Tardy, 2004; Espinet, Izquierdo & Garcia–Pujol, 2015), disadvantages non-native English-speaking scholars and their scholarship (Flowerdew, 2013; Zheng & Gao, 2016), erodes alternative forms of knowledge construction (Martín–Martín, 2005; Bennett, 2011), and reduces intellectual, cultural and epistemological diversity (Tardy, 2004; Bennett, 2011).

The rupture between China and the former Soviet Union in the 1960s saw English replace Russian to become the most important foreign language in mainland China, and with the implementation of opening-up in the late 1970s, English was used more and more widely, especially in foreign-related public service areas. The use of English in China was accelerated by the 2008 Beijing Olympics and 2010 Shanghai Expo. However, there were various problems with the use of English, notably in bilingual public signs (BISU-CSRC, 2007; Wang & Zhang, 2016) (see Figure 1). As a result, the derogatory word ‘Chinglish’ was invented by Pinkham (2000) as an umbrella term for all kinds of problematic English used by Chinese people. Since 2006, in response to this situation, the provincial and central governments in the country have made great efforts to offer guidelines for the use of English in public signs. For example, on June 20, 2017, the Ministry of Education (MOE), the State Language Commission (SLC) and the Standardization Administration of China (SAC) jointly issued the Guidelines for the Use of English in Public Service Areas (GUEPSA) which came into effect on December 1, 2017.

Previous research on the grammar of English has led to the development of a number of useful reference books (e.g. Quirk et al., 1985; Biber et al., 1999; Huddleston & Pullum, 2002; Berry, 2012), which have substantially contributed to the teaching and learning of English language in EFL contexts. However, I found that from an (advanced) EFL learner's perspective, EFL learners are often left to our own choices when we want to express a specific meaning in spoken and/or written communication, such as acknowledgement-making for example (Hyland & Tse, 2004). One major reason for this is that these reference books have mainly focused on discussing issues such as word classes, types of clauses, tense and aspects, etc. They have not attempted to document systematically the lexicogrammatical means by which specific meanings can be expressed, though they do have selectively described some. This stimulated me to think whether it is possible to develop, what I tentatively call, a meaning-based grammar of English, i.e. a grammar which is primarily concerned with meanings and their typical lexicogrammatical realisations.

In the present paper, I pursue a Construction Grammar (CxG) characterization of English modal auxiliaries (e.g., can-could, must, have (got) to, should, ought to, need to, will-would) that seeks to add to established lexical approaches. It is argued that Construction Grammar (e.g., Goldberg, 1995, 2006; Tomasello, 2003) can successfully account for underlying modality patterns, the understanding of which can lead to distinct gains for both linguistics and second language acquisition research. To that end, some of the tenets of CxG are invoked.

Research exploring the role of English in Pakistani education system usually focuses on the use of English as the medium of instruction. However, in this paper I argue that English language should also be discussed in the context of its indispensibility in social mobility and survival in Pakistan. In fact, English plays a number of crucial roles in some developing countries, of which Pakistan is one (Mansoor, 2003; Rahman, 2002). In Pakistan, English is one of the official languages and a prerequisite for professional jobs (Rahman, 2005). Because of its use in the domains of power, English can be seen as a source of self-improvement and as a means of career success (Mansoor, 2003; Rahman, 2002). Thus, the knowledge of English is a key indicator of social class and people consider it superior to other languages (Shamim, 2008). However, the use of English in education is one of the main sources of failure for many ordinary people (Bruthiaux, 2002). English is used as a control mechanism to play a gate-keeping role in access to higher education and key social positions (Coleman, 2010; Rahman, 2002). The imposition of English in education and its perceived prestige create additional problems for low socioeconomic status (SES) students who often have limited access to English.

Indonesia is the second most linguistically diverse nation in the world. It has established its reputation as one of the largest markets of English language education. This paper examines the context of multilingualism in Indonesia in relation to the increasingly dominant role of English from my viewpoint as a researcher. I begin the paper by outlining how Indonesia is currently adapting to the role of English as a global language. I then discuss the position of English within the linguistic ecology of the country, highlighting how its promotion in the educational system adversely affects the maintenance of the indigenous and heritage languages. Finally, I point to the need for deliberate action in education that promotes multilingualism. I argue for a redirection in the Indonesian educational system towards multilingual education in order to ensure the preservation of the indigenous and heritage languages while adopting English as a Lingua Franca.

The study of the paradigmatic traits of teenage slang has shown that a sense of togetherness is predominant (Eble, 1996; Allen, 1998; Mattiello, 2005, 2008; Smith, 2011). This cohesive linguistic device is not consciously intended to exclude unwished members from conversations or common understanding, but the idea of relying on a preserved sense of solidarity and acceptance is a human urge, especially among teenagers or young adults (cf. Mattiello, 2005: 13). These features are a necessary starting point to understand that the colloquial nature or social restriction of these words and phrases are precisely aimed to ‘establish or reinforce social identity within a group or with a trend or fashion in society at large’ (Eble, 1996: 11).

The British National Corpus (BNC) has been available to the research community for more than two decades. Over the course of its three editions to date, this 100-million-word database, containing samples of both transcribed speech and written texts representing British English of the 1990s and earlier, has established itself as a valuable resource used around the world in a wide range of language-related applications.

It is probably safe to say that whenever an expert encounters their field of expertise outside of science or academia, they shudder at misrepresentations, over-simplifications or flat out untruths. This sort of thing sometimes happens to me when I indulge in a bit of couch potato lounging and come across remarks about English or language in general on sitcoms. Thanks to Netflix, I can watch all the shows I missed when they first aired. I say this so that you, dear reader, will understand why my focus is on shows that aired several years ago and are now run as repeats or binge watched via streaming.