English as the “Global Language?”

March 27, 2023

While learning about Croft and elite schooling across the globe, I noticed that most of them place an emphasis on learning the English language. At Croft, they pride themselves on their four pillars: sports, arts, academics, and service. On their website, within the academics portion, they include how they choose to involve the English language. “An emphasis is placed on English language immersion in Lower and Upper Prep, with the aim that pupils become bilingual by the time they finish School.” To accomplish this goal, Croft’s classes are taught in English and base their teachings on the “traditions of English Public Schools.” The interviews that I analyzed by a Croft student began with the student asking if he could conduct his interview in Spanish since that is his first language and was more comfortable with answering questions in Spanish. After reading this interaction and having the background knowledge of Croft’s attention to the English language, I did not expect the student to have this request. Continuing with this curiosity and finding that 99.3 percent of the Chilean population speaks Spanish, I decided to look further into the influence the English language has on elite schools’ curriculum, what it means to be classified as the “global language,” and how language can be sold as a commodity.

Before looking into other elite schools, I wanted to understand the role of the English language in the world today. In this search, I found Rao’s (2019) article mentions English as the fastest-growing language in the world and analyzes how that affects international relations. In numerous scholarly articles, writers are declaring English the “global language” or “World English.” Due to this rapid growth, linguists have been critical of the effects, including Robert Phillipson, who called this expansion “linguistic imperialism” (p.70). Finally, Rao (2019) also highlights the basic needs of language and what it does in terms of communication, which is to convey thoughts, feelings, emotions, ideas, etc. Therefore, “language exercises cultural transmission, socialization, status, sharing power, politics, and knowledge and so on” (p. 70). Language constitutes various functions in society, making it an extremely powerful tool.

As I was researching the English language in elite schools, I found that in Taiwan, there is a relatively new phenomenon of private English language schools that are deemed a “necessary part of life for many Taiwanese people” (Chang, 2021, p. 54). In these private schools, students are simply there to learn the English language, which they find critical for their success in society and developing linguistic capital. Chang’s (2021) article on Taiwanese schools introduces the concept of the English language being sold as a commodity. They refer to private English schools as sellers of this commodity (English) which they market as desirable and essential. In this study, Chang (2021) refers back to Bourdieu’s theories of capital to support the idea that language holds power in our society. Bourdieu’s theories are intertwined with this topic of language because language is a form of cultural capital. Furthermore, the article states that “the position of English as a language that dominates the discourse on a global scale imbues the English language with an immeasurable weighting of symbolic capital…the possession of English is an issue of power or stratification, which is an ideology since English teaching and learning are viewed not being from an educational perspective” (p. 55). Many countries choose to invest in English language education because it is seen as a means of power. There are many countries similar to Taiwan that support English being the global language, so they choose to embrace learning this language to continue engaging in international competition. Further, into Chang’s (2021) study, they discuss the effects of English-centered policies and schools, which were not found to be as effective as they had hoped in creating proficient English language learners. Chang (2021) also found that these private English schools reproduce western-centric globalization ideals (p. 62). Thus, English in countries without it as their first language are experiencing high levels of globalization and pressure to invest in English language learning as a way to stay in the game of international competition.