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Tutorial (Isabel Schul) Wed 13-14
English is, arguably, the most widely spoken language worldwide. In addition to its strong role as a first language, It is increasingly used as lingua franca in almost all areas of public life: trade and transportation, culture, science or politics, to name just a few. How did an obscure mixture of Germanic dialects and Romance vocabulary from an island at the periphery of Europe manage to reach such a pre-eminent position? In this advanced seminar we will examine the historical, social and, especially, linguistic aspects of the rise of English as a global language and discuss reasons and consequences of this success, which has also attracted criticism. Course participants will describe characteristics and areas of use of today's English and investigate how the language is changing with increasing global use. Of particular interest are the influence of new forms of communication, the phenomenon of the "New Englishes" and possible future directions of development.
During the semester, we will also perform hands-on research by collecting data on a variety of World English as part of a new research project in cooperation with Sofia University, Bulgaria. Course participants will talk about a range of issues with a Bulgarian student counterpart via Skype, contributing to a corpus of International Academic English. Please note that in order to participate in this seminar, you will need access to a computer that can run Skype (any moderately modern laptop or desktop computer should be sufficient). The talks will form part of your course workload and are fully credited. A list of topics for presentations and research will be available in the first seminar session. The accompanying voluntary tutorial offers students the opportunity to further explore the topics discussed in the seminar. Near the end of the semester, a paper conference will be held to make sure students are headed in the right direction with their term papers. For detailed course requirements please also consult the respective module descriptions. Participants must register online via CLIX. For further questions please contact me at s.diemer@umwelt-campus.de. |
