During the last 20 years, "Critical Inquiry in Language Studies" has played an important role in advancing research on critical applied linguistics. Although the level of scholarly interest in critical research and its visibility have increased, issues that critical research has attempted to problematize, such as normative ideologies of…

The notion of language proficiency in English Language Teaching (ELT), as an internationalized educational enterprise, has tended to be operationalized in terms of stable lexicogrammar and enduring normative patterns of social use. It will be argued that this 'established' stability has been challenged by the scholarship in several fields of…

This paper discusses how critiquing the convergence of neoliberalism and coloniality can become a crucial juncture for imagining alternatives to neoliberal foreign language education. Neoliberalism and coloniality are both mediated by aspects of subjectivity, which not only obscures their co-dependence, but also naturalizes their logic as they…

The paper first reviews how conventionalized uses of dialogue in the language classroom have facilitated a neoliberalist agenda, mainly by positioning learners in a reproductive, consumer role, and teachers as deskilled operatives of scripted interactions. It then discusses three other conceptualizations of the role of dialogue which may offer an…

The author reports on a qualitative investigation of the language attitudes of multilingual British South Asian English language teachers. Data are drawn from both interviews and focus groups to demonstrate the participants underlying conception of language and their awareness and attitudes toward Indian English and how they coalesce their…

This article examines inequity as conceptualized and approached within and through the non-native English speakers in TESOL (NNEST) "movement." The authors unpack critical approaches to the NNEST experience, conceptualized via binaries (NS/NNS; NEST/NNEST). The authors then explore postmodern and poststructural approaches to identity and…

In language education, controversial issues sometimes emerge in either planned or spontaneous ways. Based on a classroom episode, this article illuminates dilemmas of approaching controversial issues for teachers who embrace critical pedagogy. A review of interdisciplinary literature demonstrates a general agreement on presenting balanced views…

In recent years, scholars have turned to cosmopolitanism as a framework for thinking through issues of language and citizenship. In this article, I present Daisaku Ikeda's philosophy of cosmopolitan education and compare it with others' in the extant literature. I examine, from a philosophical perspective, its roots in the Mahayana tradition of…

Questioning the traditional reading instruction that overly emphasizes literal comprehension of texts, one of the authors conducted action research and revised her advanced-level Japanese reading course at a university by incorporating some principles from critical literacy. The "critical reading" course aimed at developing students' ability to…

Recent and not-so-recent critiques of teaching English as a second or other language (TESOL) have explored the relationship between English language teaching and colonialism. Consequently, native speaker and non-native speaker practitioners have started to question their pedagogies and to re/consider their roles in relation not only to minority…

Over the past decade, English Language Teaching (ELT) scholars have shown an increased interest in exploring the intersections of racism and native speakerism, leading to more articles, special journal issues, and edited collections dealing with this topic. While this work has been valuable, it has largely been limited to considering one's…

This article advances a pedagogy of possibility for world language educators based on a redefinition of culture. To better link culture and language, the following qualities are proposed: being a conscienticized and reflective individual, seeking cultural and linguistic legitimacy, and developing intercultural communicative competence. By…

This paper examines the issue of social structure and individual agency in language learning through the life histories of three young engineering graduates in Hong Kong. English is identified as an important form of cultural capital, which to a considerable extent determines the development of the three individuals, each of whom comes from a…

This paper provides a multidisciplinary perspective on the complex relationality between foreign language education and the historical production and reproduction of language ideologies. It is argued that the construct of real Spanish is legitimated and invested with authority and authenticity with respect to the Native Standard Language, a…

This article takes the inquiry into "nativeness" and "non-nativeness" to the level of developing an ethical framework for professional practice in English language education. In so doing, our aim is firstly to use the "sociology of the stranger" as a framework to problematize discourses on the Other and Othering. We shall argue that these…