This research investigates the ideological character of the English language in East Asia. It focuses on the prevailing beliefs, values and propositions relating to English as a global language and the spread of English in the non-English East Asian countries, namely China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. By analyzing how English is presented in governmental and educational documents, news reports and advertisement, it examines the presentation and construction of discourses and explores public assumptions on the English language. First, in the second section, it reviews the development of English in East Asia in the late 20th and early 21st century. The third section discuses the relations between language, ideology and discourse. Section Four illustrates the research questions and the rationale and hypothesis of this study. In the fifth section, the construction of discourses concerning English and ideological assumptions regarding the English language in these East Asian countries is investigated. Finally, discourses and presuppositions identified in the texts and their implications are discussed. This study sugests that discourses concerning English in East Asia are conditioned by the external global structure and the local socio-cultural context. Concepts such as globalization, internationalization, economic development, national competitiveness and individual competitiveness influence the discourses on English. In the context of East Asia, the ideology of English consequently functions as part of the mechanisms involved in the global spread of English.