Assessing English for Professional Purposes (Routledge Research in English for Specific Purposes)

Reference

Knoch, Ute

Macqueen, Susy

Foreign Language Study & Reference

Routledge

** WINNER OF ILTA/SAGE Best Book Award 2020 ** Assessing English for Professional Purposes provides a state-of-the-art account of the various kinds of language assessments used to determine people's abilities to function linguistically in the workplace. At a time when professional expertise is increasingly mobile and diverse, with highly trained professionals migrating across national boundaries to apply their skills in English-speaking settings, this book offers a renewed agenda for inquiry into language assessments for professional purposes (LAPP). Many of these experts work in high-risk environments where communication breakdowns can have serious consequences. This risk has been identified by governments and professional bodies, who implement language tests for gate-keeping purposes. Through a sociological lens of risk and responsibility, this book: <ul> <li>provides a detailed overview of both foundational and recent literature in the field;</li> <li>offers conceptual tools for specific purpose assessment, including a socially oriented theory of construct;</li> <li>develops theory and practice in key areas, such as needs analysis, test development, validation and policy;</li> <li>significantly broadens the scope of the assessment of English for professional purposes to include a range of assessment practices for both professionals and laypeople in professional settings.</li> </ul> Assessing English for Professional Purposes is key reading for researchers, graduate students and practitioners working in the area of English for Specific Purposes assessment.

This book received the Cambridge/Language Teaching Brumfit Award 2010. Drawing upon a convergence of sociocultural theory and linguistic emergentism, this book presents a longitudinal investigation of the development of ESL users’ written lexicogrammatical patterning (collocations and colligations). A qualitative methodology (‘Lexical Trail Analysis’) was developed in order to capture a dynamic and historical view of the ways in which the participants combined words in their writing. This involved tracing single lexemes diachronically through individuals’ written corpora. The writers were interviewed about the histories of particular word combinations. Selected patterns were later tested using the principles of dynamic testing. The findings of these combined data types – essays, interviews and tests – suggest that sociocognitive resources such as memory and attention and the ability to imitate and adapt linguistic resources are paramount in the massive task of internalizing the lexicogrammatical patterning of a second language. The participants were agents of change, seeking assistance and adapting patterns to suit their changing goals. Their activity is theorized in a model of language patterning from which implications for second language learning and teaching are drawn.

The Emergence of Patterns in Second Language Writing: A Sociocognitive Exploration of Lexical Trails (Linguistic Insights)

English as a Second Language

Peter Lang AG, Internationaler Verlag der Wissenschaften

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