You are right – that really is such an important topic! Next time 🙂 … we have a post about the ways in which the dominance of English in academic publishing affects *what* is being researched at http://languageonthemove.com/does-internationalization-change-research-content/ – enjoy!

A second example: I was training Chinese university debaters with a fluent English-speaking colleague who had a Singaporean accent. Many debaters complained they could not understand the Singaporean trainer’s English because it was not good enough. (My own accent is often described to me as “soft” Australian, or British, and was not complained about.) I suggested to the debaters that it was their lack of exposure to various English accents that was the barrier, not the trainer’s proficiency, and challenged them to take responsibility for improving their own English proficiency by attentively listening to interviews, TV or even music in English from different parts of the world. (I suspect it was also their perception of Singaporean English as non-standard, based on a standard language ideology.) I wanted to prompt them to think about themselves as bilingual listeners and focus some of their assiduous approach to English learning on that proficiency.