The linguistic disadvantage of scholars who write in English as an additional language: Myth or reality

Abstract

Academics are coming under increasing pressure to publish internationally. Given the global dominance of English, this very likely means publishing in English-medium journals and with publishers which publish in English. This raises the important question of the possible disadvantage of those scholars whose first language is not English and who therefore have the additional burden of having to develop adequate proficiency in an additional language, English. As a student of modern languages to university level and of other languages to rather lower levels of proficiency and as a teacher of English for academic purposes (EAP) and of English for research and publication purposes (ERPP), since I became aware of this issue, I have always believed this extra burden on the English as an additional language (EAL) academic writer to be a self-evident truth. Ken Hyland, however, in a recent book (Hyland, 2015) and an article titled ‘Academic publishing and the myth of linguistic injustice’ (Hyland, 2016a), has taken it upon himself to argue that such an assumption is ill-founded. Hyland argues that native-speakers (NSs) of English encounter the same difficulties as non-native speakers (NNSs) when it comes to academic writing, that ‘academic English is no one's first language’, and that it requires ‘deliberate learning’ by both NSs and NSs (p. 57). Native and non-native writers, Hyland implies, are on a level playing field when it comes to writing for publication, both groups having to jump the same hurdles.

Preliminary evidence of linguistic bias in academic reviewing

“…In the years since this series of papers issued this challenge to the field, several more papers have put forth conceptual arguments for or against the existence of linguistic injustice. For example, Flowerdew (2019) and Yen and Hung (2019) argued that linguistic injustice in academic publishing does exist and is worth attention. Conversely, Hultgren (2019) agreed with Hyland (2016a , b ) that the idea of linguistic injustice detracts from more important injustices in academic publishing and, at worst, borders on language policing or “verbal hygiene”.…”

Linguistic recycling and its relationship to academic conflict

“…This he did (Hyland, 2016b) in a paper published in the same journal later that same year. Flowerdew, Casanave, and Hyland have continued to address the 'linguistic disadvantage' issue in publications that have appeared over the last 12 months (Casanave, 2019;Flowerdew, 2019;Hyland, 2019). Flowerdew's (2008) paper had been cited 250 times at the time of writing, on many occasions by EAL scholarly writers who either explicitly support his views or remain neutral.…”

Addressing the “Bias Gap”: A Research-Driven Argument for Critical Support of Plurilingual Scientists’ Research Writing

“…Despite bibliometric data suggesting an increasing number of research articles published by plurilingual EALs (Hultgren, 2019; Hyland, 2019), this disadvantage appears particularly acute for plurilingual EALs working from outside centers of knowledge production in the global “periphery” or “semiperiphery” due to lack of access to research writing resources, networks, and support (Bennett, 2014; Canagarajah, 2002; Corcoran, Englander, & Muresan, 2019; Flowerdew, 2019; Lillis & Curry, 2010). It is worth noting that locally responsive initiatives to the challenges faced by plurilingual EALs writing from more peripheral locales have begun to emerge (Arnbjörnsdóttir, 2019; Burgess, Martín, & Balasanyan, 2019; Janssen & Restrepo, 2019; Li & Cargill, 2019), though empirical work supporting the efficacy of these interventions is still scant (Cargill, 2019; Corcoran et al, 2019; Curry & Lillis, 2019; Flowerdew, 2015).…”

“…There is little consensus on the validity of plurilingual EAL scientists’ claims of such bias in adjudication (Flowerdew, 2001, 2008, 2019; Hyland, 2019; Politzer-Ahles et al, 2016; Starfield & Paltridge, 2019; van Parijs, 2007). Indeed, there are a growing number of voices—predominantly from the fields of sociolinguistics and applied linguistics—who have cast doubt on those attempting to position plurilingual scientists’ additional burden as a “language” issue (Blommaert, 2010; Hultgren, 2019; Hyland, 2016, 2017; Salo, 2017), suggesting the scholarly writing for publication challenges for scholars are similar regardless of L1.…”

“…Indeed, there are a growing number of voices—predominantly from the fields of sociolinguistics and applied linguistics—who have cast doubt on those attempting to position plurilingual scientists’ additional burden as a “language” issue (Blommaert, 2010; Hultgren, 2019; Hyland, 2016, 2017; Salo, 2017), suggesting the scholarly writing for publication challenges for scholars are similar regardless of L1. In particular, Hyland (2016, 2017, 2019) argues that because novice L1 scholars often have difficulty getting their papers published and because there are increasing numbers of L2 scientists achieving publication of their work, there is no specific “privilege” accrued to having English as one’s L1 (for another critique of this position, see Flowerdew, 2019). In response to Hyland, Politzer-Ahles et al (2016) argued that “privilege does not entail that everything is easy for a member of the privileged group, nor that nothing a privileged individual accomplishes is earned” and that “privilege does not mean that a person from an underprivileged group cannot achieve success in spite of her challenge” (p. 4).…”