Who owns English?

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

This collection brings together views about the nature of "English" and its users. Within the United Kingdom - and in some other countries - there is a feeling of unease that language and literacy are in decline and that their central role in developing a sense of national unity and heritage is weakening. Governmental response to this perception is to move towards centralized, state-imposed curricula and assessment, seeking to guarantee standards through legislation.

At the same time that the original source of English feels insecure, other countries and cultures become increasingly confident about taking over its use and ownership on their own terms and within their own cultures. Several of the authors here celebrate the diverse ways in which people across the world are developing their own distinctive varieties of English.

In exploring these contradictory, defensive and optimistic attitudes towards the inevitability of linguistic and cultural change, the volume's contributors demonstrate the current liveliness and intensity of discussion about this perennial, and increasingly debated, topic.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• English, the government and the curriculum standard
• Englishes in teaching and learning
• English - caught in the crossfire
• "Art made tongue-tied by authority"
• Mother tongue teaching in Israel and Britain whose Spanish?
• English as a multiform medium teaching
• American English as a foreign language owning
• English in teacher training reclaiming the canon - the case for adolescent
• Literature whose voice is my voice when I write in Academe?
• English in its place which English - or English which?