Practitioner Agency and Identity in English for Academic Purposes

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This book provides an insightful series of windows into the identity of the English for Academic Purposes (EAP) practitioner in a range of cultural contexts across the world. With contributions from Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore, South Africa, the UK, and Zimbabwe, each chapter combines theoretical underpinnings with practical applications, and implements suggestions and recommendations for how EAP teachers roles can be taken forward. In a globalised world where EAP practice plays an increasingly important role, the reader comes face to face with the challenges and possibilities facing those who are supporting academic language development within higher education (HE) frameworks. This involves considerations of power dynamics, of differing perceptions of power and identity within an EAP unit and across an HE institution. The study also discusses how the field can be enriched through a deeper understanding of issues of agency and identity that emerge from challenges facing EAP practitioners who work in contexts beyond the hegemonic West. Drawing on ethnographic data, the contributors present a broad set of strategies for countering disciplinary marginalisation and employment precarity, concluding with a call for enhanced critical research into the lived experience of EAP professionals, as a key avenue for effecting change.

Author Bio

Alex Ding is Associate Professor of English for Academic Purposes and Director of Scholarship at the University of Leeds, UK. Laetitia Monbec is Lecturer in the Centre for English Language and Communication at the National University of Singapore, Singapore.