ENG26-2-GUO

From Sociolinguistic Theory to Pedagogical Practice: Contesting Pronunciation Instruction in Chinese ELT Contexts

Yuxi GUO, a doctoral research fellow at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (Japan)
✉ guo.yuxi.w0@tufs.ac.jp

Received 17 July 2025, Accepted 31 January 2026, Available online 3 February 2026
doi: coming soon
View PDF

Abstract

English now operates as a global lingua franca, yet pronunciation teaching in many EFL settings remains largely anchored to Standard English Varieties such as RP/GA. Rather than adjudicating which pedagogical orientation is “most appropriate,” this article examines a persistent mismatch in China between WE/ELF-oriented pedagogical advocacy and attitudinal research reporting learners’ continued preference for native-model accents. Drawing on a concept-driven, purposively sampled review, it synthesizes two decades of Chinese accent-attitude studies alongside major WE/ELF pedagogical arguments and critiques. The analysis highlights four recurring tensions that appear to sustain the discrepancy: (1) operational instability in naming and defining “China/Chinese English,” which complicates attitude measurement and limits pedagogical uptake; (2) the continuing influence of native norms through curricula, materials, and exam-driven accountability; (3) the tendency to conflate L1 identity with accent, which may understate learner agency and instrumental aims; and (4) the market dynamics of ELT, in which “unequal Englishes” are differentially valued through prestige and hiring practices. The article therefore encourages moving beyond binary judgments and single-cause explanations by attending to sociolinguistic ecology and learners’ situated goals. It suggests that WE/ELF perspectives may be more productively introduced as awareness-building resources that support intelligibility and stylistic flexibility, while remaining sensitive to the institutional and economic conditions that shape pronunciation targets in practice.

Keywords: World Englishes, ELF, Chinese ELT, pronunciation instruction, attitudes

Introduction

The global diaspora of English language

The global spread of English is often framed in terms of two diasporas: the first involved large-scale migration of English speakers from the British Isles to North America, Australia, and New Zealand, whereas the second involved more limited movement of English-speaking populations to regions such as Asia and Africa through colonization. Despite the smaller scale of settlement in the latter, English became highly significant for much larger local populations and continued to expand in function, often with greater vigor in postcolonial contexts (Kachru & Nelson, 1996). Industrial and scientific innovation in Anglophone centers positioned English as a conduit to high-value knowledge in science and technology; higher education has therefore normalized English use, often even where it lacks official status, and in turn accelerated the expansion of English language teaching (ELT). Under contemporary conditions of globalization, English functions as a global lingua franca across domains, facilitating communication among speakers of different first languages as economic and political interdependence intensifies. A language attains global status when it is formally recognized in key national functions—such as government, courts, media, and education—or when it is systematically prioritized in foreign-language education even without official status (Crystal, 2003). Around the turn of the millennium, media discourse further positioned English as a shorthand for globalization, diversification, progress, and identity. Yet in many postcolonial contexts, the expansion of English has been accompanied by a recurrent tension between global intelligibility and national or cultural identity, while outright rejection of English has been rare. As the number of L2 users has far exceeded that of L1 users, with diversification occurring largely at the lexical level, “New Englishes” can thus serve as identity carriers while preserving cross-border intelligibility (ibid). Kachru’s (1985) World Englishes (WE) framework conceptualizes English across postcolonial contexts and argues for pluralistic ownership, treating non-native varieties as legitimate, systematic, and socially meaningful rather than inferior or erroneous. Extending this line of thinking, Seidlhofer (2006) argues for English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) as a framework, on the grounds that English pedagogy and description have not sufficiently theorized lingua-franca users in their own right; this motivates more systematic description of ELF features and practices. Related work, particularly in ASEAN contexts, likewise suggests that ELF interactions prioritize mutual intelligibility over native-like accuracy (Jenkins, 2006; Kirkpatrick, 2007a).

Paradigm shift in pedagogy

Historically, Standard English Varieties (SEVs) such as Received Pronunciation (RP) and General American (GA) have been treated as the default pedagogical models (Hu & Li, 2009), but critics argue that this exonormative dominance marginalizes competent L2 users by holding them to often unrealistic targets: privileging native norms can obscure the legitimacy of successful L2 users (Cook, 1999) and, in non-native contexts, may be pragmatically irrelevant and damaging to learners’ self-perceptions (Chan, 2015). As L2 speakers now constitute the majority of English users and increasingly shape English’s evolution (Jenkins, 2006), both WE and ELF—despite differing emphases—challenge the traditional Second language Acquisition (SLA)-oriented assumption that native-speaker standards are the sole benchmark, prompting calls for greater attention to localized norms, flexibility, and classroom practices aligned with local communicative realities, and sharpening questions about targets in the Outer and especially the Expanding Circle. Research on language attitudes, especially toward accents, offers insight into how phonological and prosodic features shape perception, evaluation, and behavior (Huang & Hashim, 2020). In this context, “accent” primarily indexes geographical and social identities, and the rise of ELF communication has heightened attention to accent variation as speakers from diverse linguistic backgrounds communicate globally while negotiating identity options (ibid). Crucially, accent is not synonymous with communicative success. Munro and Derwing (1995) clarify that a foreign accent may be salient and even evaluated negatively, yet it does not necessarily impair either perceived ease of understanding (comprehensibility) or actual understanding (intelligibility); pedagogy and assessment therefore benefit from treating these as distinct constructs. This distinction underpins intelligibility-oriented proposals such as Jenkins’s Lingua Franca Core (LFC), which identifies a set of segmental features prioritized for maintaining intelligibility in intercultural communication. At the same time, pronunciation is socially perceived and linguistically evaluated as an index of whether one speaks English “well,” and it is also a domain in which learners can make deliberate, conscious adjustments. Attitudinal research on perceptions of different accents can therefore serve as relevant evidence for assessing learners’ receptiveness to ELF- and WE-oriented approaches to pronunciation instruction.

Against this broader backdrop, WE scholarship highlights how localized varieties can carry social meaning and function as identity resources, particularly in Outer Circle contexts where English has long-standing institutional roles. In countries such as India, Singapore, and South Africa, localized Englishes incorporate indigenous linguistic and cultural features, and attitudinal studies indicate that these varieties can index cultural identity and community belonging; the institutional recognition of Indian English (Kachru, 1992) and Singapore English (Rubdy, 2001) exemplifies this trajectory. By contrast, acceptance of non-native varieties remains far more contested in Expanding Circle settings, which encompass the largest population of English learners worldwide. Empirical work in Greece (Sifakis & Sougari, 2005), Denmark (Ladegaard & Sachdev, 2006), China (Fang, 2016), and Japan (Chiba et al., 1995) consistently reports a preference for native accents, with both teachers and learners frequently favoring RP or GA for pronunciation instruction; teaching materials often reinforce these preferences. As Chan (2015) observes, debates over the “appropriate linguistic target” are inseparable from prestige and economic value, not merely pedagogical principle. Accordingly, efforts to de-center native norms have made limited headway, sustained by native-speaker ideology, the symbolic capital attached to standard varieties, the influence of social agents (i.e., teachers, parents), entrenched materials, limited exposure to diverse accents, and the cultural force of global media.

Debates in the expanding circle

This tension is especially visible in China. Following the late-1970s Reform and Opening-up policy, EFL education expanded nationwide and became aligned with national economic priorities, with English now compulsory from primary school through university (Fang, 2016). Yet public discourse continues to criticize learners’ limited communicative competence despite years of study, and the question of an appropriate model re-emerges as communicative approaches gain traction and the limitations of SEV targets in non-Anglophone settings become more widely recognized. Since the early twenty-first century, WE-oriented scholarship has documented locally salient features of English use in China and has called for incorporating non-native varieties into pedagogy; however, much of this advocacy remains largely theoretical rather than operationalized for classrooms. In a market-driven system where English functions as linguistic capital, assessment regimes, employment markets, and learners’ self-guides continue to privilege standardized norms, creating a persistent gap between ideological aspirations for linguistic “liberation” and classroom realities.

This paper examines pronunciation instruction in China, where pronunciation functions as both a pedagogical target and a social signal. Here, “Chinese/China English” and ELF are not treated as fixed linguistic models to be mastered like RP/GA, but as sociolinguistic orientations that shape how pronunciation goals, norms, and evaluation are framed. Rather than deciding which orientation is “most appropriate,” the review synthesizes two decades of attitudinal research on English accents in China alongside WE/ELF pedagogical arguments to explain why advocacy and learner preferences often diverge. It traces how curriculum aims, assessment, learner identities, and market incentives sustain native-model preference and widen the research–practice gap. As part of a broader doctoral project, the aim is explanatory rather than exhaustive: learner attitudes are treated as evidence of what is socially plausible and institutionally sustainable, showing how exam-driven curricula, accent prestige, and opportunity-linked self-guides reinforce native norms. The paper also notes that sociolinguistic advocacy may understate pragmatic dimensions of learning, and that equating L1-accented English with cultural identity risks slipping into tokenism, particularly for learners who rely on widely recognized standards for mobility. In a marketized ELT ecosystem, where access to “better” English remains stratified, stability and recognizability in pronunciation targets may function less as conservative defaults than as practical conditions of equity.

The paper is structured as follows. The literature review first outlines the conceptual frameworks of World Englishes and English as a Lingua Franca, summarizing their core pedagogical claims and the major critiques they have attracted. It then synthesizes two decades of research on Chinese learners’ attitudes toward English accents. This body of work is organized into (a) earlier, more SLA-oriented studies and (b) more recent, ELF-oriented studies, in order to trace both continuity and change over time. The methodology is then briefly described. The discussion and analysis then proceeds in four moves to explain why efforts to shift away from traditional SLA-oriented advocacy in China have had limited practical effect: (a) operational challenges in naming; (b) the continuing dominance of native-norm influence; (c) the conflation of L1 identity with accent; and (d) Unequal Englishes in ELT market. The paper concludes with pedagogical implications, acknowledged limitations, and directions for future research.

Literature Review

World Englishes (WE)

Kachru’s (1985) three-concentric-circle model frames the global spread of English in terms of acquisition histories and functional domains: the Inner Circle, where English is a native language; the Outer Circle, where it functions as a second language and has become embedded in administration, education, and public life; and the Expanding Circle, where it is taught primarily as a foreign language and where norms have typically been imported. (Figure 1) In this schema, Inner-Circle varieties are commonly treated as norm-providing, Outer-Circle varieties as norm-developing, and Expanding-Circle varieties as norm-dependent (ibid). The model’s value lies in making cultural pluralism and sociolinguistic heterogeneity visible, resisting the assumption that “English” is a single, uniform entity. This pluralist stance is captured in Kachru’s use of “Englishes,” which “symbolizes the functional and formal variations, divergent sociolinguistic contexts, ranges and varieties of English in creativity, and various types of acculturations in parts of the Western and non-Western world (Kachru, 1992, p. 2)”. In pedagogical terms, Kachru (1992) argues that teaching WE raises three practical questions—why teach it, what motivates a shift in paradigm, and what resources exist for teaching—and he emphasizes a cross-cultural and cross-linguistic orientation in which Inner-Circle norms no longer enjoy exclusive authority. Instead, non-native literatures and localized uses can be treated as resources for cross-cultural awareness and for understanding linguistic creativity and innovation. The core claim, then, is not simply that variation exists, but that non-native Englishes are legitimate in their own right rather than inherently inferior or erroneous. A WE-oriented approach to pedagogy therefore rejects the assumption that British or American native varieties are the only legitimate targets for learners. On this view, traditional ELT’s reliance on native norms as universal benchmarks is problematic because it can be unattainable for many learners and can devalue non-native varieties, sometimes with discriminatory effects. WE pedagogy consequently favors broadening learners’ exposure to multiple Englishes, valuing learners’ existing linguistic resources, and emphasizing communicative effectiveness and intelligibility rather than native-like accuracy. In doing so, it participates in a broader reorientation of ELT that seeks to reframe ownership, reposition culture within language learning, and redefine the intended interlocutor beyond an implicit Inner-Circle audience.

WE has attracted sustained critique on both conceptual and practical grounds. A common objection is that the three-circle model is static: it maps historical and functional distributions of English, but it does not readily capture the contemporary movement of speakers, varieties, and norms across circles under globalization (Bruthiaux, 2003). Related concerns follow from the very issues WE foregrounds —codification, standardization, nativization, teaching, and description—and from the contested status of varieties within and across communities (Kachru, 1985). These debates are not merely theoretical. Because attitudes shape learning behavior and outcomes, classic work in the social psychology of language (Gardner & Lambert, 1972) underscores that pedagogical targets cannot be discussed apart from how varieties are perceived, valued, and rewarded, particularly in Expanding-Circle settings. Among the most persistent practical challenges is codification. Even in Outer-Circle contexts where English is institutionalized and holds official functions, many localized varieties have relatively few codificatory instruments, leaving norms diffuse and difficult to teach beyond small, educated groups. Where stable reference materials are limited, WE-oriented pedagogy offers less guidance for curriculum design, classroom sequencing, and assessment. A further critique concerns intelligibility and status in international communication. Quirk (1990) warned that abandoning a common standard in favor of localized norms risks fragmenting English into mutually unintelligible varieties and weakening its role as an international language; on that basis, he urged continued attention to shared standards to avoid English dividing up into unintelligible varieties. Taken together, these critiques suggest that while WE pedagogy is normatively appealing in its inclusivity, its practical viability depends on addressing codification, reach, and cross-community intelligibility; otherwise, it risks offering learners forms of English with limited institutional recognition and uneven payoff.

Figure 1: Three-concentric-circle model (1992)

English as a lingua franca

Building on WE’s pluralism, ELF reframes the pedagogical question from “which native norm?” to “what enables effective L2–L2 communication?” Jenkins (2006) defines ELF as a functionally determined contact language among non-mother-tongue users and argues that pedagogy should prioritize features that sustain intelligibility in intercultural interaction rather than conformity to a single native standard. This perspective legitimizes accent variation as an identity resource and resists mandatory accent modification when learners neither need nor desire it. Jenkins’s LFC operationalizes this stance by foregrounding high-yield, teachable contrasts—particularly key segmentals and consonant clusters—and by downplaying prosodic conventions whose payoff is uneven across diverse interlocutors. Seidlhofer (2006) retains Kachru’s historical mapping but criticizes its static architecture, distinguishing localized WE varieties (nation-based, oriented toward endonormative codification) from globalized ELF (a cross-border, negotiated repertoire used across circles). Because much L2 English use now proceeds without L1 speakers, native-speaker competence is often irrelevant as a default target. She further argues that mainstream SLA’s ESL/EFL focus produces a kind of backwash: findings are generalized to lingua-franca users, and classroom and testing targets are set by assumptions that do not reflect actual ELF use. She also challenges Standard English ideology, noting that much native usage—especially spoken—does not conform neatly to an idealized standard, so equating “proper English” with NS/SEV lacks a clear empirical basis. In this view, ELF is not a degraded variety but a functionally motivated repertoire: variable, negotiated, and context-sensitive, yet sufficient for intelligibility, and sometimes more effective for intercultural tasks than strict ENL conformity. Pedagogically, this entails recalibrating targets and assessment norms and grounding decisions in empirical descriptions of spoken interaction (Seidlhofer, 2006, 2011).

The weaknesses of ELF-oriented pedagogy emerge precisely where description is asked to do the work of prescription. Cogo (2008) stresses that ELF is descriptive rather than prescriptive, and Seidlhofer (2006) likewise places pedagogical decisions in the hands of local teachers rather than descriptive linguists. But once teachers are told to decide locally, the practical question follows: decide relative to what reference? The problem of codification remains underspecified in much ELF work (Scheuer, 2010). Although “freeing English” from native-speaker dominance has gained traction in theory, ELF perspectives have had limited influence on research design and even less on mainstream materials. Walker’s (2010) attempt to operationalize an ELF approach to pronunciation has seen little uptake in school-based TESOL, and the broader influence of ELF on pedagogy remains limited (Chan, 2015). The central difficulty is conceptual. ELF rejects deficit linguistics and resists fixed native norms, yet intelligibility is situational and interlocutor-dependent. That makes it unclear whether one should propose broad, inclusive guidelines or narrow, context-specific features, since what is intelligible for one audience may not be for another. Empirical counter-evidence further complicates claims about particular breakdown points: Huang and Hashim (2020), for example, report Chinese learners whose perceptions did not confirm Jenkins’s (2002) specific predictions about certain vowel distinctions. As Scheuer (2010) notes, any selection of “core” features inevitably involves a degree of arbitrariness and is often steered by extralinguistic aims, such as asserting the distinctiveness of a variety. Even within Jenkins’s account, the LFC is sometimes presented in ways that invite confusion—at times resembling a phonological model, at other times explicitly not a model—leaving teachers uncertain how, or whether, to implement it. If treated as a target to imitate, the LFC risks replacing one prescriptive package with another, undermining ELF’s anti-prescriptive premise: the attempt to move from fluid practice to teachable rules reintroduces the very stability ELF theory problematizes (Dauer, 2005).

Work in pronunciation research clarifies both the appeal and the limits of this move. Levis (2005) contrasts the nativeness principle (the desirability and attainability of native-like speech) with the intelligibility principle, arguing that priorities have often been ideology-led and calling instead for evidence-based attention to features that most affect understanding. In ESL settings, suprasegmentals such as primary and nuclear stress can aid comprehension (e.g., Derwing & Rossiter, 2003), but segmental mergers can also become lexical “deal-breakers.” Jenkins’s LFC usefully re-centers high-impact segmentals for many ELF/EIL interactions, while Dauer (2005) cautions that ESL/EIL boundaries are porous, so prosody still matters for learners who must address L1 audiences or succeed in test settings. Levis also notes that pronunciation is filtered through social evaluation: even intelligible speech may be judged negatively, so targets cannot be set on intelligibility alone but must remain sensitive to learners’ goals and contexts. In high-stakes domains—exams and other forms of gatekeeping—SEV models may remain the practical default; more broadly, the defensible principle is to teach what most advances understanding and aligns with learners’ opportunity structures, rather than tradition for its own sake.

Chinese English learners' language attitudes

(1) Early SLA-oriented studies

Over the past two decades, research in China has repeatedly examined learners’ attitudes toward pronunciation targets and pedagogical models. In a context where English proficiency is closely tied to educational selection and social mobility, model choice carries real stakes. The default has typically been Inner-Circle norms as targets for learners in the Expanding Circle. Yet scholars such as Medgyes (1992) argue that native-speaker models can set unrealistic benchmarks, positioning Chinese learners as perpetual “non-native” apprentices rather than legitimate users, even as English functions widely as an auxiliary lingua franca. In response, and in line with WE debates, parts of the literature began to advocate attainable, intelligibility-oriented goals. Still, early attitudinal work consistently found positive evaluations for native varieties and widespread preference for NS models in teaching (e.g., Xu et al., 2010). For instance, Zhang and Hu (2008) reported that 30 advanced Chinese ESL learners in the U.S. favored U.S. and U.K. English over Australian English, rating the former higher for comfort, naturalness, and pleasantness. Recognizing that overseas exposure can shape preferences, later studies increasingly focused on home-context cohorts in mainland China. Among the earliest large-sample studies, Kirkpatrick and Xu (2002) surveyed 171 university students on Chinese English, finding broad acknowledgment of multiple standard Englishes and rejection of the claim that “only native speakers can speak standard English,” yet limited appetite for a distinct “Chinese English” identity (e.g., 104 disagreed with “I want people to know I am from China when I speak English,” especially among women). Hu (2004) surveyed 1,261 students and found low familiarity with WE (5.8% recognized English as plural; 9.4% had heard of WE). Preference patterns favored AmE and BrE (AmE 79.1%; BrE 29.9%; CaE 3.3%; AuE 1.4%; CE 2.2%), and 100% identified U.K./U.S. varieties as “Standard.” He and Li (2009) (N = 1,030: 820 students, 210 teachers) similarly reported limited WE awareness (44.7% had heard of WE) and strong attraction to NS models (81.9% wanted to sound like native speakers; 78.6% preferred American English for teaching in a matched-guise task), alongside a nuanced view of ownership (79.6% believed NNS can speak standard English; 56.7% agreed that an English variety developed in China could best express Chinese culture). Notably, explicit openness to a future CE rose—from 28.1% in Kirkpatrick and Xu (2002) to 60.5% in He and Li (2009)—suggesting a gradual attitudinal shift. Complementing this, Evans (2010) elicited country/variety associations without audio; RP drew broadly positive descriptors (“traditional,” “polite”) but also “conservative/orthodox,” echoing Ladegaard & Sachdev (2006) on RP’s attractiveness and highlighting the ideological processes (Bourdieu, 1991) behind prestige assignments—complicating Hu’s (2004) emphasis on U.S. dominance. Pre-Olympics work by Xu et al. (2010) similarly linked materials and learning environments to learner attitudes, noted nascent recognition of CE as a cultural marker, and cautioned about sample imbalance (101 men vs. 7 women). Overall, studies before and around 2010 portray a field negotiating between institutionalized NS standards and emergent WE awareness, with learners’ stated preferences still skewing toward native models even as discourse began to open space for localized legitimacy.

(2) Recent ELF-oriented studies

Contrasting with earlier works, recent studies have taken an ELF perspective but have generated similar preferences for native-based models, scholars have attributed them to factors such as native-speaker ideology, dominant teaching materials from Inner Circle countries (UK/US), interlocutor influence, limited exposure to diverse Englishes, and low ELF awareness. Fang (2016) surveyed students at a university English Language Center—as a simulation of the ELF community—and found that students reported that UK/US accents were easiest to understand due to familiarity. Moreover, 71% of participants were dissatisfied with their own accents, 79.3% wanted to sound like native speakers, and only 10.7% were happy with their current pronunciation. Nevertheless, some students noted that native-like fluency is unnecessary for effective communication, Fang argued this indicating growing awareness of English’s global status. Kung and Wang (2019) similarly adopted an ELF lens, identifying cultural media, social agents, and learning discourses as key influences on students’ perceptions. They found that learners rarely consider Outer or Expanding Circle Englishes legitimate. Interestingly, the same factors motivated both of those who aspired to pursue a native accent—anticipating international interlocutors—and those who did not, valuing mutual intelligibility within predominantly Chinese interactions. A noticeable trend can be observed in recent studies is that researchers have paid more attention to learners’ identities in English learning. Sung (2014) adopted a qualitative approach to investigate how accent preferences among L2 speakers in ELF communication relate to their identities, revealing the complexity underlying these preferences and their connections with identity construction. 15 out of 18 participants reported that they wanted to acquire native-like accent due to its connection with status and prestige. They also think native accent is related to English proficiency. All this positive feedback they may gain from interlocutors will in turn help them secure access to other forms of social and symbolic capital, like respect and acceptance by other interlocutors as part of their community. In terms of avoiding HK accents, they mentioned the general negative evaluations associated with local accents. Someone also gave another reason why she felt expressing HK identity through accent would be unnecessary. Concern of intelligibility was found in both groups as a reason to pursue native accent and to keep their own local accent. Huang and Hashim (2020) quantitatively explored how Chinese learners’ identities surface in their accent attitudes. While most participants hesitated to project Chinese identity through L1-accented English, a minority emphasized pragmatism and cultural identity markers, challenging native-speaker benchmarks. They also found that ELT teachers and syllabi strongly influence attitudes, with negative views toward non-native accents often attributed to teaching materials and instructors. Yet even satisfied learners sometimes strive for native-like pronunciation, and those with higher self-confidence tended to have more positive accent self-assessments. In probing why university students were dissatisfied with their own accents and wanted to sound native, Wang (2020) found that instrumental motives such as higher test scores, job prospects, and graduate admission drove these preferences. Tevar (2020) challenged earlier findings by showing that Chinese-accented English ranked among the top three varieties alongside BrE and AmE. His findings aligned with Sasayama (2013) and McKenzie (2008), Tevar suggested that solidarity influences these ratings. Using the Affective Priming Paradigm, Tevar also demonstrated that gender cues and visual primes affect accent perceptions: male-accented samples fared better without faces present, whereas female accents received more positive reactions when paired with ethnically average faces.

Methodology

This article reports the conceptual/literature-review component of a doctoral dissertation. It adopts a critical–integrative review approach, synthesizing scholarship on pronunciation targets in Expanding Circle ELT—especially China—across WE, ELF, and attitude/identity research. Reference chaining from seminal works (e.g., Kachru, Jenkins) is used to capture influential texts not surfaced by database queries. Inclusion focused on peer-reviewed articles, monographs, and chapters that (a) examine pronunciation models/targets or codification in WE/ELF; (b) report attitudes toward accents/varieties among learners/teachers in China or comparable Expanding Circle contexts; or (c) analyze assessment, materials, or policy shaping norm orientation. Exclusion applied to purely anecdotal reports, opinion pieces without evidential grounding (except widely cited theoretical interventions), and studies unrelated to pronunciation or norm choice. Analysis followed an iterative, thematic synthesis: texts were open-coded and then organized under four axes—(1) norms & codification, (2) stakeholder incentives (exams, employment, materials market), (3) identity & agency (attitudes/L2 self-guides), and (4) Outer vs Expanding Circle asymmetries. This is a purposive, non-systematic review; while it prioritizes breadth, influence, and recency, it does not claim exhaustive coverage. The approach is appropriate to the paper’s aim: to delineate the problem space, consolidate dispersed evidence, and frame a practicable pathway for pronunciation pedagogy in China.

Analysis

This section analyzes the tensions that emerge from the literature reviewed above. Read together, the theoretical claims and the empirical attitudinal findings do not simply diverge on the surface; they point to deeper structural and conceptual conflicts.

(a) Operational challenges in naming

A substantial body of research has examined learners’ attitudes toward a Chinese English variety, often treating it as if it were already a recognized and self-evident object. Across studies, however, negative or rejecting evaluations predominate. It is easy to attribute this to learner conservatism or to the lingering pull of native-speaker ideology. But that explanation skips a prior, more basic question: what exactly are participants evaluating when they are asked about “Chinese English”? Put differently, has the construct acquired a stable name and a shared meaning, and do learners understand it in the way researchers assume?

WE-oriented scholarship has long argued that adopting a local variety could strengthen learners’ sense of ownership by aligning English with lived realities and enabling users to communicate local culture internationally (Kirkpatrick, 2007b; McKay, 2010). He and Li (2009) propose introducing Chinese English as an alternative model alongside native varieties, while others (e.g., Hu, 2004) go further and suggest replacing the native model with a Chinese one. Yet the concept remains difficult to operationalize because the naming itself is unsettled. Although “Chinese English” has gained wider circulation, He and Li (2009) argue that terminological clarity is essential and prefer “China English (p. 83)” as the more appropriate label for a performance variety. Kirkpatrick and Xu (2002) likewise used “China English” in earlier work, whereas Xu (2017), in Researching Chinese English: The State of the Art, adopts “Chinese English” and revises the definition accordingly. Li (2024) also shifts position, arguing that “the time is ripe for China English to give way to Chinese English …(p. 32) ”. For readers and respondents without specialist training, this oscillation is not a minor academic detail; it invites confusion—particularly because scholars largely agree that “Chinglish” is a stigmatized interlanguage “blend of Chinese and English (Kirkpatrick & Xu, 2002, pp. 269–271) ”. In practice, “China English” and “Chinese English” are easily conflated, and prior studies show that both labels often attract negative perceptions despite repeated attempts to draw conceptual boundaries (e.g., Hu, 2004). Moreover, many scholars (e.g., Fang, 2016) still treat CE primarily as a performance variety rather than a nationally codified, institutionalized norm. This instability complicates interpretation of the attitude literature. Studies sometimes use “China English” and “Chinese English” interchangeably, or without specifying whether they refer to the same construct, making comparisons across datasets and time periods unreliable. Few reports state whether participants were given a clear definition before responding, or whether they distinguished “CE” from stigmatized “Chinglish.” Under these conditions, claims of rising acceptance cannot be taken at face value: if respondents do not share a stable understanding of what the label denotes, shifts in reported attitudes may reflect shifts in interpretation rather than shifts in evaluation.

(b) The continuing dominance of native-norm influence

In the Chinese educational context, recent work has called for adjustments to materials and classroom practice, yet the evidence continues to point in the same direction: ENL-oriented preferences remain the default. Si (2018), for instance, reports that Business English undergraduates generally judge ENL-informed materials the most practical. AmE/BrE are routinely equated with high intelligibility, while many non-native varieties are perceived as difficult. Interview data make the logic explicit: native-like speech is linked to employability and to social distinction from non-majors, a view sustained by ENL-dominated input and materials that rarely model multilingual interaction or accommodation strategies. Si further argues that many textbook “ELF scenarios” are largely decorative. Non-native accents may appear, but the interactional work that defines ELF—accommodation, negotiation, repair—is largely absent. Her recommendation is not to discard ENL, but to redesign sequencing and rationale: retain ENL where it fits learners’ goals, introduce localized features in a principled way, and incorporate authentic ELF interaction so learners can see why multiple models are included and how strategic competence operates under real constraints of power and authenticity. Wen (2012) treats ELF as a legitimate object of inquiry but argues that its classroom influence remains minimal in China because the system reproduces native-speaker norms through examinations, policy, materials, and teacher accountability. She therefore proposes a pragmatic teaching framework that combines NS, NNS, and local forms, while shifting the stated aim from native-like fluency to communicative competence in global settings and aligning assessment with communicative success rather than error tallies. Wen (2016) complements this position with the Production-Oriented Approach (POA) for universities: an output-driven, teacher-mediated sequence (motivating–enabling–assessing) intended to convert inert knowledge into usable competence by anchoring input to authentic tasks and evaluating performance against co-constructed criteria.

These proposals, however, must be read against an institutional fact: native norms continue to dominate, not only because they are ideologically valorized, but because they are embedded in the mechanisms that allocate rewards. WE and ELF advocates seek to de-center native models, yet native-speaker ideology is reproduced through teacher beliefs, classroom routines, assessment practices, and public expectations—channels that shape what learners regard as legitimate and worth striving for. Holliday (2006) terms this “native-speakerism”: an ideology that elevates native speakers as ideal teachers and language models and associates “proper” English with a presumed Western cultural authority that sets methods and standards. In such an environment, learners’ negative evaluations of non-native varieties are not simply personal prejudices; they are rational responses to a prestige economy in which Inner-Circle varieties are treated as the safe currency. The belief that native-like proficiency is required for a positive self-image as a competent user, and that only native norms guarantee international intelligibility, remains widespread (Jenkins, 2007). Scholars often attribute learners’ limited awareness of ELF principles to teachers’ failure to expose students to diverse accents—whether through unfamiliarity or entrenched beliefs—but the deeper point is that teachers themselves operate within institutional and market constraints that reward conformity to standardized, native-norm targets.

The third conflict between the rhetoric of “linguistic liberation” and the realities of learning concerns identity. Both WE and ELF scholarship often foreground group identity in ways that can eclipse individual subjectivity, and in doing so they risk treating learners’ choices as ideological symptoms rather than purposive decisions. When a “Chinese English” accent is implicitly positioned as the natural—or even the morally preferable—vehicle for expressing L1 identity, the argument can slide into tokenism. It reduces identity to a single phonological display and, in the process, can delegitimize learners who seek greater mastery in pronunciation for reasons that are practical, aspirational, or simply personal. This problem is not adequately explained by the familiar story that earlier research was purely native-speaker/SLA framed and that later work represents a clean shift toward ELF awareness. Fang (2016) and Huang and Hashim (2020) draw that contrast, but the boundary is blurrier. Even when WE/ELF were not widely visible in public discourse, signs of emerging ELF awareness appeared among university students (see Xu et al., 2010). Moreover, different studies have not treated “identity” in the same way. Kirkpatrick and Xu (2002) did not explicitly prime identity as a pedagogical concern, whereas He and Li (2009) placed identity and culture near the center. The point, then, is not simply that learners lack ELF awareness; it is that the analytic lens can pre-structure what counts as a legitimate preference and what must be explained away.

ELF research is right to show that accent preferences and identity are intertwined, and sociolinguists are justified in warning that relentless pursuit of native norms can create identity pressures for some learners. Kirkpatrick’s (2007b) identity–communication continuum captures the basic tension: speakers may wish to index local identity while also prioritizing intelligibility in international settings (Walker, 2010). In SLA, Norton’s (1997, 2000) account of identity as a dynamic relation to social worlds, and her notion of “Investment” (drawing on Bourdieu, 1991), is particularly useful because it treats learning choices as oriented to anticipated material and symbolic returns. But none of this implies that L2 users must, or even generally want to, index their lingua-cultural identity through an L1-influenced accent. McCrocklin (2015), for example, reports that 72% of participants preferred a native accent when learning a new language, associating it with ultimate mastery and social appropriateness. Promoting local varieties may strengthen group identity, but it can also flatten internal differences by treating the group as homogeneous and by substituting a collective narrative for individual goals. Critiquing native norms should not require eliminating individual choice. The same caution applies to explanations that attribute learners’ preferences chiefly to native-speaker ideology. Such accounts can cast learners as passive recipients of discourse rather than agents who respond to real incentives, past experience, and future aims. Canagarajah (2007) frames local-variety pedagogy as resistance, yet learners may also benefit from pursuing mastery within globally recognized models. Even when global norms are implicated in power, they also function as widely legible credentials—resources that many Chinese students use to compete for mobility. A pedagogy that treats these aspirations as mere false consciousness risks misunderstanding what learners are doing and why.

(d) Unequal Englishes in the ELT market

The final conflict concerns the fate of “linguistic equity” once English enters a neoliberal marketplace. In theory, WE and ELF promise pluralism; in practice, markets price difference. Advocacy of ELF has been criticized not only by “traditional” linguists such as Quirk (1990), who defend the pedagogical necessity of a common standard, but also by scholars such as Kubota (2016) and Tupas (2015), who reject both native-norm pedagogy and the utopian equalizing rhetoric that sometimes accompanies WE/ELF. Their framework of “Unequal Englishes” insists that real hierarchies among varieties must be named rather than masked by celebratory language. This position is consistent with Levis’s (2005) point that English is not socially neutral: pronunciation and variety carry social attributes that communities value, and these valuations shape what is rewarded.

In the Expanding Circle, ELT labor markets routinely favor native English-speaking teachers—a pattern visible across Japan, Korea, and China—and the Chinese case provides especially clear illustrations. Litman (2022) shows that online education companies market North American and Filipino teachers on different terms: the former as ideal native models, the latter as cost-effective trainers. Liu (2022) reports that stakeholders tend to rate native English teachers as more proficient than non-native teachers, particularly local Chinese EFL instructors. Guo (2024) documents how private providers deploy labels such as “native,” “authentic,” and “EuroAmerican” to equate instructional quality with native-speaker hiring. Jovic (2017) provides a stark measure of the incentive structure: applicants falsely claiming Inner-Circle origins reportedly achieved a 93% recruitment success rate. The pattern is not subtle. Those who can afford premium tutoring purchase the most prestigious signals; those with fewer resources accept whatever the market supplies. ELT thus operates as an industry oriented to profit, commodifying language proficiency and teaching expertise under commercial logics rather than pedagogical ideals. Within that system, native-speaker status is monetized, and linguistic identity—often intertwined with racialized traits, especially the association of Inner-Circle nations with whiteness—becomes part of the product. The result is a hierarchy that elevates native teachers as “authentic” while systematically positioning local Chinese teachers as less competent and less legitimate, regardless of their actual skill.

Discussion

A growing number of domestic scholars argue that “Chinese English” is emerging as a lingua franca and point to features that appear to distinguish it. The problem begins when description is treated as destiny. A still-developing, unevenly distributed set of usage patterns is presented as if it were already a stabilized variety, and then recommended as a pedagogical target—sometimes even as a replacement for RP/GA. That is a larger step than Kachru’s (1992) own position requires. His case was not that Inner-Circle norms must be removed from pedagogy, but that they no longer hold exclusive authority, and that non-native literatures and innovations can be added as resources for cross-cultural awareness and linguistic creativity, rather than installed as a wholesale substitute for established standards. This is not merely a dispute over labels. It reflects a deeper conceptual tension shared, in different ways, by both WE- and ELF-oriented prescriptions: the attempt to turn a heterogeneous sociolinguistic reality into a teachable and assessable object with sufficiently fixed norms. WE seeks an endonormative model, yet the empirical basis for “Chinese English” is often drawn from narrow segments—typically student populations in educational settings—while intranational communicative use remains constrained and, more importantly, the intended recipients frequently resist recognizing it as a legitimate target. Hou (2020) argues that Chinese ELF is difficult to legitimize officially and apply in teaching precisely because this immanent contradiction is reinforced by public attitudes. The ELF position faces a parallel difficulty. If ELF is taken seriously on its own terms, it cannot be treated as the language of a single, coherent global speech community (Ehrenreich, 2009). ELF is commonly described as dynamic and situational, tied to diverse socio-linguacultural identities (Seidlhofer, 2011), and as fluid, flexible, contingent, hybrid, and deeply intercultural (Jenkins, Cogo, & Dewey, 2011). Yet the moment one proposes to “teach ELF” as a target, one reintroduces what the theory denies: stable forms, teachable norms, and assessable benchmarks. As O’Regan (2014) cautions, endonormative practices risk reifying ELF as if it were a stable variety, turning a descriptive claim about variability into a prescriptive demand for codification.

The demographic fact that non-native users now outnumber native speakers is often invoked to justify this prescriptive turn. The argument runs: native norms neither guarantee nor are required for intelligibility; therefore, it is unnecessary to privilege them, and the future of English should reflect its non-native majority. But it is a mistake to treat numbers as a substitute for institutions. Non-native users are not a single community; they are dispersed networks with divergent incentives, and many so-called ELF “features” are interaction-bound accommodations rather than shared norms. Language change does not diffuse simply by numerical weight; it travels through high-centrality institutions—media, education, assessment, publishing—where standards are codified, taught, and rewarded. Crystal’s (2003) account of English’s global status underscores this path dependence. In short, the very fluidity that makes ELF workable in interaction limits its viability as a classroom target. In systems anchored by exams, teacher training, dictionaries, and high-stakes selection, stable standards remain the currency. If ELF or a localized endonormative model is to gain pedagogical standing in such contexts, it will require institutional pathways and codified benchmarks—not demographic arguments alone.

Some scholars explain the limited uptake of WE- or ELF-oriented pedagogy in China by pointing to the lingering influence of Western native norms. On this view, the obstacles are mainly ideological: traditional materials, teachers’ admiration for native-like proficiency, and the persistence of native-speaker standards are blamed for blocking reform. That diagnosis is not wrong so far as it goes, but it stops where the practical problems begin. Teachers are being asked to implement approaches that provide few stable, usable tools. In classrooms, good intentions do not substitute for teachable sequences, clear models, and assessment-linked materials—especially in an exam-oriented system that rewards accuracy and penalizes deviation. Where such tools are scarce, pedagogy defaults to what is available, testable, and institutionally recognized. “ELF-based materials” remain marginal for a simple reason: teachers are accountable to curricula and examinations that require standardization, not to theoretical elegance. This gap between attractive theory and workable classroom procedure becomes clearer once the sociolinguistic ecology is stated plainly. Mandarin already performs the role of a national lingua franca; English does not. It is a foreign language with limited functional space beyond classrooms and occasional encounters with foreigners, so intranational English use among Chinese speakers is minimal. Meanwhile, schooling and selection are dominated by written examinations that treat reading, writing, and grammatical accuracy as the main indices of proficiency. Large classes, teacher-centered routines, and constrained time reinforce what the tests reward. Under these conditions, “flexible” usage-based norms are not merely difficult; they are structurally mismatched to an assessment regime that depends on explicit, stable benchmarks—particularly when the very notion of “Chinese English” remains contested and therefore cannot supply consistent reference points. Wen’s ELF-oriented proposals of Production-Oriented Approach (2012, 2016), may read as coherent on paper, but they presuppose a communicative culture and classroom conditions that do not exist at scale. Output presupposes input, and the suggestion to expose learners to a wide array of native and non-native models (e.g., Si, 2018) can overwhelm lower-level students rather than build durable control. In large, exam-driven classes, teachers cannot provide fine-grained feedback, monitor individual trajectories, or operationalize shifting local norms within limited time. Given that most students’ motivations are instrumental—exams, admissions, employment, professional gatekeeping—pedagogical prescriptions that assume learner-centered, output-heavy instruction grounded in fluid targets often mistake theoretical inclusivity for practical feasibility. The costs of that mismatch are not merely instructional; they are economic. In an ecosystem still governed by prestige norms, decoupling instruction from widely recognized benchmarks can weaken credential portability, increase assessment penalties, and reduce signaling power in hiring. In a competitive, exam-driven market where English functions chiefly as a gateway to educational and economic opportunity, the question is not whether “equal Englishes” is morally attractive, but whether it equips learners for the institutions that allocate rewards. Without confronting power and ideology in their institutional form, appeals to multiculturalism and hybridity can become complicit with domination, leaving intact the incentives that reproduce inequality (Kubota, 2016, p. 483).

In recent years, increasing attention has been paid to non-native learners’ L1 and cultural identities. As a corrective to earlier SLA-oriented pedagogy that treated the L1 as interference to be isolated from learning, this shift has clear value. But in sociolinguistics the correction has often overshot the mark, and the costs become most visible when descriptive claims are converted into pedagogical prescriptions. Learner agency is too easily displaced when the cultural lens—often inherited from postcolonial critique—casts students primarily as victims of external structures rather than as purposive actors with competing goals. Even advocates of critical and postmodern approaches to language policy, while offering “a rich picture” of how policy can reproduce inequality, have been criticized for becoming too deterministic and for underestimating human agency (Ricento & Hornberger, 1996). Pennycook’s (2001) call to attend to everyday practices at the micro level similarly emphasizes how dominance is reproduced through ordinary routines, but this can slide into a view in which people are treated mainly as conduits of a system they did not choose, rather than as agents who selectively comply, negotiate, and sometimes ignore policy demands.

A more balanced position is to treat structure and agency as jointly operative. Johnson’s (1995) formulation captures this: language policy can marginalize minority and indigenous languages, but it can also expand access to education and legitimacy for those same languages, and the crucial task is to understand the “balance between structure and agency” in language policy research—between policy as a mechanism of power and the capacity of policy agents to interact with policy processes in “unique and unpredictable ways (p. 8)”. Students, teachers, parents, and local officials are not passive recipients; they interpret policies through local incentives and constraints, and their behavior often diverges from what governments intend. The same logic applies to accent and identity. Sung (2014) argues that an L1-influenced accent is only one option among several for identity construction; learners who do not pursue native-like pronunciation may still achieve both intelligibility and identity indexing. More broadly, drawing on Pennycook (2001), she treats learners’ preferences as complex and agentive, suggesting pedagogy should cultivate critical awareness so learners can articulate why they choose particular models and what goals they seek, rather than attributing choices mechanically to native-speaker ideology. In China, these distinctions matter because English is not simply a cultural symbol; it is a school subject embedded in national development goals and, in the twenty-first century, a tool for multilingual and multicultural interaction (Hou, 2020). Many learners are instrumentally motivated. Accents—the face of language (Derwing & Munro, 2005)—do index identity, but identity is not formed in a vacuum; imagined interlocutors are central. Drawing on Anderson’s (2006) “Imagined Communities,” affiliations are built through shared ideologies rather than physical proximity. Evans (2010) reports that learners typically imagine Inner-Circle interlocutors; Huang and Hashim (2020) similarly found students unlikely to anticipate non-native interlocutors such as Indians or Japanese. These perceptions sit uneasily with Jenkins’s (2002) emphasis on English for L2–L2 communication and with Kirkpatrick and Xu’s (2002) argument that a localized Chinese variety would be the most appropriate model. Much of the ELT industry is not run by people primarily concerned with pedagogy; it is run by people concerned with demand, branding, and revenue. Scholars can rightly criticize public attitudes toward non-native teachers as biased or discriminatory, especially when many non-native teachers are fully competent. Yet once those attitudes exist as a structural fact, the industry has incentives to supply what customers believe they are buying. Markets do not wait for ideological enlightenment; they respond to willingness to pay. If parents and learners equate “good English” with native accents and “good classes” with native teachers, providers will package and sell that image, regardless of whether it improves learning outcomes. The irony is that many parents and learners are not acting out of malice. Their perceptions are the product of long-running discourses that assign prestige to native norms, and they also reinforce those discourses by treating them as common sense. The result is that attention shifts from measurable learning gains to symbolic signals—pronunciation as status, teaching as performance—while non-native teachers are sidelined or pressured to imitate the prestige script simply to remain employable. Those who can afford premium offerings benefit most from this hierarchy; those who cannot are left with whatever the system supplies. In that context, “liberation” rhetoric can become a marketing layer rather than an equity mechanism: it changes the story while the incentives stay intact. This is why an uncritical celebration of linguistic fluidity and hybridity can be politically comforting yet materially thin. Pennycook (2001) cautions that embracing hybridity risks blurring social and linguistic categories without confronting the inequalities that those categories reflect. Kubota (2016) similarly argues that the “multi/plural turn,” while challenging essentialist notions of language and identity, often fails to grapple with power asymmetries, social injustice, and the neoliberal pressures shaping academic and educational spaces. Lorente and Tupas (2013) therefore ask a question that is too often skipped “who is included, and who is excluded, in the celebration of hybridity (p. 70)?” If hybridity is prescribed as an unquestioned ideal, WE/ELF approach may overlook unequal resource distribution: those with means will still purchase prestigious norms because the market rewards them, while marginalized groups are left with less recognized varieties and weaker credentials. Under these conditions, the rhetoric of equality can coexist with, and even stabilize, the very hierarchies it claims to dismantle.

Conclusion

This paper has examined the tensions between WE/ELF advocacy of shifting away from teaching Standard English varieties in pedagogy and the persistent preference among Chinese learners for it—most visibly in pronunciation teaching—by foregrounding the conflicts that underlie the debate. While WE and ELF compellingly challenge the exclusive authority of native norms and promote linguistic pluralism, they often underestimate the complexity of local educational ecologies, alongside facing the challenges from the theories within. Expanding Circle contexts differ materially from Outer Circle settings: without long-standing institutional codification of localized norms, it is premature to infer that China is ready to teach a fully-fledged local standard or conclude the readiness of Chinese ELF community on the basis of limited samples or university cohorts. In a competitive ELT market where the rhetoric of “authentic” native teachers remains a selling point, declaring victory for endonormative targets would be optimistic. At the same time, English functions as both social and linguistic capital with direct consequences for educational and economic mobility. Attraction to native-like pronunciation is therefore not reducible to “native-speaker ideology” alone; it is intertwined with exam systems, employment incentives, and learners’ identity aspirations to be recognized as competent. Over-attributing preferences to ideology or insufficient ELF awareness risks flattening the picture: it neglects institutional gatekeeping and, equally, the agency of learners as rational, strategic actors.

Pedagogical Implications

This paper offers pedagogical implications by clarifying the gap between sociolinguistic theory and classroom practice and by situating pronunciation targets within the interplay of sociocultural, economic, and personal factors. Learners can be guided to reflect critically on the ideological influences behind their accent preferences, rather than being moved uncritically from one normative model to another. A central takeaway is that adopting a particular model for instruction does not require treating that model as the learner’s ultimate goal; the model may function as a reference point, but it need not define the endpoint of learning. This is where WE- and ELF-informed perspectives can contribute most constructively: by broadening learners’ awareness of global variation, supporting tolerance of accented English, and strengthening intelligibility-oriented and stylistically flexible communication. The paper therefore does not reject the relevance of WE or ELF in ELT; instead, it recommends introducing them primarily as awareness-building resources, rather than as mandates for wholesale pedagogical change in the name of equity while instrumental needs remain salient. In this framing, constructs such as “Chinese ELF” or “Chinese English” are more productively treated in ideological rather than strictly linguistic terms: less as homogeneous codes to be mastered than as communities and orientations shaped by shared commitments and communicative purposes.

Limitations and call for future research

This article is a critical, concept-driven review based on purposive sampling rather than a protocol-driven systematic review; accordingly, the coverage and synthesis procedures are not fully replicable. The attitudinal evidence surveyed is also heterogeneous—spanning different populations, instruments, and time periods—which limits strict cross-study comparability and constrains broad generalization to contemporary classrooms. Although the manuscript explicitly acknowledges the contested terminology surrounding China/Chinese English, uneven usage across primary studies further reduces comparability. The aim, therefore, is to delineate the contours of the problem and surface key tensions rather than to offer exhaustive coverage or a definitive resolution, leaving room for future work that adopts a formal search protocol and builds a tighter, operationally comparable evidence base.

Future research should move beyond binary blame narratives to examine how learners weigh affective, instrumental, and identity-related considerations, and how pedagogy can respond to those trade-offs within assessment-driven systems. Progress will likely require context-sensitive models that preserve a stable SEV baseline for access and recognition, while incorporating ELF-informed intelligibility awareness and locally grounded variation as resources for stylistic range. Engaging these complexities is essential if pronunciation teaching in Expanding Circle contexts such as China is to become both institutionally realistic and genuinely learner-centered.

References

Anderson, B. (2006). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism (Rev. ed.). Verso.

Bourdieu, P. (1991). Language and symbolic power (J. B. Thompson, Ed.; G. Raymond & M. Adamson, Trans.). Polity Press.

Bruthiaux, P. (2003). Squaring the circles: Issues in modeling English worldwide. World Englishes, 22(2), 159–178. https://doi.org/10.1111/1473-4192.00042

Canagarajah, S. (2007). Lingua franca English, multilingual communities, and language acquisition. The Modern Language Journal, 91, 923–939. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.2007.00678.

Chan, J. Y. H. (2015). A multi-perspective investigation of attitudes towards English accents in Hong Kong: Implications for pronunciation teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 50(2), 285–313. https://doi.org/10.1002/tesq.218

Chiba, R., Matsuura, H., & Yamamoto, A. (1995). Japanese attitudes toward English accents. World Englishes, 14(1), 77–86.

Cogo, A. (2008). English as a lingua franca: Form follows function. English Today, 24(3), 58–61. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266078408000308

Cook, V. (1999). Going beyond the native speaker in language teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 33(2), 185–209. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587717

Crystal, D. (2003). English as a global language (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press.

Dauer, R. M. (2005). The Lingua Franca Core: A new model for pronunciation instruction? TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 543–550. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588494

Derwing, T. M., & Munro, M. J. (2005). Second language accent and pronunciation teaching: A research-based approach. TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 379–397. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588486

Derwing, T. M., & Rossiter, M. J. (2003). The effect of pronunciation instruction on the accuracy, fluency, and complexity of L2 accented speech. Applied Language Learning, 13(1), 1–17.

Ehrenreich, S. (2009). English as a lingua franca in multinational corporations: Exploring business communities of practice. In A. Mauranen & E. Ranta (Eds.), English as a lingua franca: Studies and findings (pp. 126–151). Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Evans, B. E. (2010). Chinese perceptions of Inner Circle varieties of English. World Englishes, 29(2), 270–280. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971X.2010.01642.x

Fang, F. (2016). Investigating attitudes towards English accents from an ELF framework. The Asian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 3(1), 68–80.

Gardner, R. C., & Lambert, W. E. (1972). Attitudes and motivation in second language learning. Newbury House.

Guo, Y. (2024). The prevailing issue of native speakerism: A critical discourse analysis of ELT institutions’ websites. Journal of Modern Languages, 34(1), 76–95. https://doi.org/10.22452/jml.vol34no1.5

He, D., & Li, D. C. S. (2009). Language attitudes and linguistic features in the ‘China English’ debate. World Englishes, 28(1), 70–89. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-971X.2008.01570.x

Holliday, A. (2006). Native-speakerism. ELT Journal, 60(4), 385–387. https://doi.org/10.1093/elt/ccl030

Hou, Y. (2020). From Chinglish to New Chinglish: A critical exploration of Chinese ELF. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 10(4), 353–359. http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1004.02

Hu, X. (2004). Why China English should stand alongside British, American, and the other ‘world Englishes’. English Today, 20(2), 26–32. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266078404002056

Huang, Y., & Hashim, A. (2020). A quantitative study of Chinese learners’ identities as reflected in their attitudes toward English accents. GEMA Online Journal of Language Studies, 20(1), 151–168. https://doi.org/10.17576/gema-2020-2001-10

Jenkins, J. (2002). A sociolinguistically based, empirically researched pronunciation syllabus for English as an international language. Applied Linguistics, 23(1), 83–103. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/23.1.83

Jenkins, J. (2006). Points of view and blind spots: ELF and SLA. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 16(2), 138–162. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1473-4192.2006.00111.x

Jenkins, J. (2007). English as a lingua franca: Attitude and identity. Oxford University Press.

Jenkins, J., Cogo, A., & Dewey, M. (2011). Review of developments in research into English as a lingua franca. Language Teaching, 44(3), 281–315. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444811000115

Johnson, D. C. (2013). Language policy. Palgrave Macmillan. (Springer Link)

Jovic, A. (2017). Native speakerism in the online ELT market. International Journal of Multilingual Education, 24, 87–93. https://doi.org/10.22333/ijme.2023.24007

Kachru, B. B. (1985). Standards, codification and sociolinguistic realism: The English language in the Outer Circle. In R. Quirk & H. G. Widdowson (Eds.), English in the world: Teaching and learning the language and literatures (pp. 11–30). Cambridge University Press.

Kachru, B. B. (Ed.). (1992). The other tongue: English across cultures (2nd ed.). University of Illinois Press.

Kachru, B. B., & Nelson, C. L. (1996). World Englishes. In S. L. McKay & N. H. Hornberger (Eds.), Sociolinguistics and language teaching (pp. 71–102). Cambridge University Press.

Kirkpatrick, A. (2007a). Setting attainable and appropriate English language targets in multilingual settings: A case for Hong Kong. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 17(3), 376–391. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1473-4192.2007.00170.x

Kirkpatrick, A. (2007b). World Englishes: Implications for international communication and English language teaching. Cambridge University Press.

Kirkpatrick, A., & Xu, Z. (2002). Chinese pragmatic norms and “China English”. World Englishes, 21(2), 269–279. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-971X.00247

Kubota, R. (2016). The multi/plural turn, postcolonial theory, and neoliberal multiculturalism: Complicities and implications for applied linguistics. Applied Linguistics, 37(4), 474–494. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amu045

Kung, F., & Wang, X. (2019). Exploring EFL learners’ accent preferences for effective ELF communication. RELC Journal, 50(3), 394–407. https://doi.org/10.1177/0033688218765306

Ladegaard, H. J., & Sachdev, I. (2006). “I like the Americans…but I certainly don’t aim for an American accent”: Language attitudes, vitality and foreign language learning in Denmark. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 27(2), 91–108. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434630608668542

Levis, J. M. (2005). Changing contexts and shifting paradigms in pronunciation teaching. TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 369–377. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588485

Li, D. C. S. (2024). China English or Chinese English. English Today, 40, 32–39.

Litman, R. (2022). “Neutral” vs. “pure” accents: The racialization of Filipino and EuroAmerican teachers in China’s online education industry during the COVID-19 pandemic. Asian Anthropology, 21(3), 224–237. https://doi.org/10.1080/1683478X.2022.2100069

Liu, J. (2022). Discourses of Chinese ELT stakeholders on native speakerism. Chinese Journal of Applied Linguistics, 45(2), 224–242. https://doi.org/10.1515/CJAL-2022-0205

Lorente, B. P., & Tupas, T. R. F. (2013). (Un)emancipatory hybridity: Selling English in an unequal world. In R. Rubdy & L. Alsagoff (Eds.), The global-local interface and hybridity: Exploring language and identity (pp. 66–82). Multilingual Matters.

McCrocklin, S. (2024). Understanding accent and identity on the border: Exploring bilinguals’ perceptions of intelligibility, accentedness, and language-learning goals. Ilha do Desterro, 77, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.5007/2175-8026.2024.e98724

McKay, S. L. (2010). English as an international language. In N. H. Hornberger & S. L. McKay (Eds.), Sociolinguistics and language education (pp. 89–115). Multilingual Matters.

McKenzie, R. M. (2008). Social factors and non-native attitudes towards varieties of spoken English: A Japanese case study. International Journal of Applied Linguistics, 18(1), 63–88. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1473-4192.2008.00179.x

Medgyes, P. (1992). Native or non-native: Who’s worth more? ELT Journal, 46(4), 340–349. https://doi.org/10.1093/elt/46.4.340

Munro, M. J., & Derwing, T. M. (1995). Foreign accent, comprehensibility, and intelligibility in the speech of second language learners. Language Learning, 45(1), 73–97. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-1770.1995.tb00963.x

Norton, B. (1997). Language, identity, and the ownership of English. TESOL Quarterly, 31(3), 409–429. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587831

Norton, B. (2000). Identity and language learning: Gender, ethnicity and educational change. Longman.

O’Regan, J. P. (2014). English as a Lingua Franca: An immanent critique. Applied Linguistics, 35(5), 533–552. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amt045

Pennycook, A. (2001). Critical applied linguistics. Lawrence Erlbaum.

Quirk, R. (1990). Language varieties and standard language. English Today, 6(1), 3–10. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0266078400004454

Ricento, T. K., & Hornberger, N. H. (1996). Unpeeling the onion: Language planning and policy and the ELT professional. TESOL Quarterly, 30(3), 401–427. https://doi.org/10.2307/3587691 (onlinelibrary.wiley.com)

Rubdy, R. (2001). Creative destruction: Singapore’s Speak Good English Movement. World Englishes, 20(3), 341–355. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-971X.00219

Sasayama, S. (2013). Japanese college students’ attitudes towards Japan English and American English. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 34(3), 264–278. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2013.767341

Scheuer, S. (2010). Can (an) ELF have a life of its own? Poznań Studies in Contemporary Linguistics, 46(3), 331–347. https://doi.org/10.2478/v10010-010-0014-6

Seidlhofer, B. (2006). English as a lingua franca in the Expanding Circle: What it isn’t. In R. Rubdy & M. Saraceni (Eds.), English in the world: Global rules, global roles (pp. 40–50). London: Continuum.

Seidlhofer, B. (2011). Understanding English as a lingua franca. Oxford University Press.

Si, J. (2018). English as a native language, World Englishes and English as a lingua franca-informed materials: Acceptance, perceptions and attitudes of Chinese English learners. Asian Englishes. https://doi.org/10.1080/13488678.2018.1544700

Sifakis, N. C., & Sougari, A.-M. (2005). Pronunciation issues and EIL pedagogy in the periphery: A survey of Greek state school teachers’ beliefs. TESOL Quarterly, 39(3), 467–488. https://doi.org/10.2307/3588490

Sung, C. C. M. (2014). Global, local or glocal: Identities of L2 learners in English as a lingua franca communication. Language, Culture and Curriculum, 27(1), 43–57. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07908318.2014.890210

Tevar, J. M. (2020). Perceptions of World English varieties by Chinese EFL students: Effects of average ethnic faces and speaker gender. International Journal of English Studies, 20(3), 29–56. https://doi.org/10.6018/ijes.393891

Tupas, R. (Ed.). (2015). Unequal Englishes: The politics of Englishes today. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137461223

Walker, R. (2010). Teaching the pronunciation of English as a lingua franca. Oxford University Press.

Wang, W. (2015). Teaching English as an international language in China: Investigating university teachers’ and students’ attitudes towards China English. System, 53, 60–72. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.system.2015.06.008

Wang, Z. (2020). A study of English accent: Attitudes of Chinese undergraduate English-major students in Southwest Forestry University in China. Language in India, 20(9), 1–26.

Wen, Q. (2012). English as a lingua franca: A pedagogical perspective. Journal of English as a Lingua Franca, 1(2), 371–376. https://doi.org/10.1515/jelf-2012-0024

Wen, Q. (2016). The production-oriented approach to teaching university students English in China. Language Teaching, 49(4), 526–540. https://doi.org/10.1017/S026144481600001X

Xu, W., Wang, Y., & Case, R. E. (2010). Chinese attitudes towards varieties of English: A pre-Olympic examination. Language Awareness, 19(4), 249–260. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09658416.2010.508528

Xu, Z. (2017). Researching Chinese English: The state of the art. Springer.

Zhang, F., & Yin, P. (2009). A study of pronunciation problems of English learners in China. Asian Social Science, 5(6), 141–146.

Zhang, W., & Hu, G. (2008). Second language learners’ attitudes towards English varieties. Language Awareness, 17(4), 342–347. https://doi.org/10.1080/09658410802147337

Page updated

Report abuse