World Englishes: A Resource Book for Students (review)

With the spread and diversification of English, any serious-minded student of the language has to become now a student of world Englishes. Jennifer Jenkin’s book provides a survey of the field as well as encouragement to the reader to pursue the subject further.

The structure of the volume, or indeed of each volume in the series, is two-dimensional: there are four sections (A: ‘Introduction’, B: ‘Development’, C: ‘Exploration’, and D: ‘Extension’), each consisting of eight units. The organization of the material allows the reader to follow the contents from a general overview to more specific issues, or to choose a topic and study it in progressively greater detail. Unit A2, for example, discusses the origins of pidgins and creoles. Units B2, C2, and D2 are correlated with it: B2 characterizes the two, C3 focuses on pidgins and creoles in the UK and US, and D2 is an additional reading on the topic by a well-known specialist, Charles Alobwede D’Epie. Other eminent authors whose contributions are published in this section include Alastair Pennycook, Henry Widdowson, Chinua Achebe, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Lesley Milroy, Alfred Lee, Dennis Bloodworth, Marko Modiano, Loreto Todd, Alan S. Kaye, David Li, Ulrich Ammon, and David Graddol. Topics include the historical, social, and political background of the development of world Englishes, a survey of their speakers, the types of variation across Englishes, the question of a standard or standards, the international nature of English, the role of English in Asia, and the possible scenarios for the future development of the language. Suggestions for further reading at the end of the volume guide the interested student to additional sources of information and opinion. The website accompanying the book (the URL can be found in the front matter of the volume) provides extra support for teacher and student alike.

Since this is a resource book, the volume also contains didactically oriented activities, many of them based on excerpts from writings on the English language and containing questions or topics for consideration and discussion in the classroom. Students are often encouraged to assume a critical position on a given issue. The overall impression that arises from these activities is that the crucial factors in shaping one’s views on matters of language are one’s individual experience and linguistic, social, and historical background.

Without well-organized guidance through the field of contemporary Englishes, an inexperienced student (or teacher) may easily be at a loss. J’s textbook, fortunately, offers precisely such guidance and encouragement to the more ambitious to delve more deeply into the subject.