Comments on: Does internationalization change research content?

By: Ulfath Sadia

Ulfath Sadia — Sat, 14 Oct 2017 00:44:00 +0000

I agree that, the concept of academic internalization is in a way imposition of English medium Instruction. The internalization is changing the research content as all the researchers do not competent in English but forced to use English in their journals. I liked the Example on A cure of cancer, as it focuses on the secondary position of the English language as it is not the language that makes the research important but it is the content which is important. English in reality do not play any role in discovering a cure of cancer but still US or UK based journals seem to dominate the research publications.

By: English is excellence | Language on the Move

English is excellence | Language on the Move — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 04:16:27 +0000

[…] Research and publications usually privileges English because English-language journals and publishers are more highly ranked, more prestigious and “more international.” Accepting that achieving global impact is the most meaningful form of knowledge production means pub…. […]

By: Internationalization and Englishization in Higher Education | Language on the Move

Wed, 08 May 2013 19:16:45 +0000

[…] The fact that measurement of ‘research and publication,’ usually the most heavily-weighted crite… Reputation of graduates, too, is language-dependent as it is usually measured through surveys of the HR departments of international corporations where English is widely used. […]

By: Grace

Grace — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 08:17:02 +0000

I can’t agree more.
Utilizing English as a lingua franca in academia is not just about having a platform to communicate internationally but also implicitly imposing a certain value and criteria to everyone who wishes to stay in academia.
In addition, I also wonder the meaning of turning all the research into English based presentation. For instance, while I was trying to understand more of Mandarin syntax, I found myself lost in the journal papers and had to translate all the examples given in English spelling back to Mandarin in order to make sense. A lot of times, I needed to guess what words they exactly refer to since there are too many homophonic characters in Mandarin. What is the meaning for a researcher from non-English background trying very hard to write their pieces into English, while their local readers have to try very hard to translate back? In this sense, the language has slowed down and even hindered the benefit of dissemination of research.

By: Shiva Motaghi

Shiva Motaghi — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 03:28:23 +0000

Fantastic piece! Thanks Ingrid!
As Frans de Waal says (thanks to Madalena for sharing the link) “Good scientific ideas formulated in bad English either die or get repackaged.”

Shiva

By: Madalena Cruz-Ferreira

Madalena Cruz-Ferreira — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 12:26:02 +0000

Very, very important issues you’re discussing here, Ingrid.
These two resources may provide additional insight into it:

Frans de Waal’s ‘Seeing Through Cultural Bias in Science’:
http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/dewaal1/English

The 2008 AILA Review, ‘Linguistic inequality in scientific communication today’:
http://www.benjamins.com/cgi-bin/t_bookview.cgi?bookid=AILA%2020

Madalena

By: Dariush Izadi

Dariush Izadi — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 05:39:28 +0000

Dear Ingrid
That’s very true.
The idea of academic publishing in English journals has become a familiar dilemma for some. Persian could be a good example in this case, too. When I talk to my friends, some of whom have a Master’s degree, irrespective of their fields of studies, they confess that they might not be considered well-educated or knowledgeable unless they have published an article in English. Nonetheless, most of them have some articles published in the Persian Journals. In linguistics, for example, this (academic publishing in English), to the best of my knowledge, could have been one of the major reasons why many aspects of Persian language have been left unexplored.

By: Jean Cho

Jean Cho — Sat, 27 Aug 2011 04:42:28 +0000

Great post! I thoroughly enjoyed it.