English only or more?: Language ideologies of international students in an EMI university in multilingual Hong Kong

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates the language ideologies held by a group of international students in an English medium instruction (EMI) university in multilingual Hong Kong. The findings indicate that the participants’ beliefs about English extend beyond its role as an instructional medium and encompass its use as a lingua franca and as a means of social inclusion. It is also found that the participants hold complex yet sometimes contradictory ideologies about the kinds of English to be used and/or accepted and about the monolingual and multilingual uses of English in the EMI university context. Taken together, the study suggests that the participants’ ideologies with respect to the roles of English and the norms of English use in the EMI university context are much more complex than what language policy from above suggests. The findings also reveal the ideological tensions over the norms of English use in the EMI university context and the closely intertwined relationship between the participants’ language ideologies and the maintenance of their interests, especially in relation to access to learning opportunities in the classroom. The study calls for attention to broader issues pertaining to social inclusion/exclusion, linguistic advantage/disadvantage and educational equality/inequality in the multilingual EMI university context.

KEYWORDS:

• English medium instruction
• higher education
• international student
• language ideology
• Hong Kong

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The declining English standards among local students in Hong Kong, which may have resulted from the laissez-faire attitude of the local government towards the medium of instruction in secondary schools (Poon, 2004, 2010), could have exacerbated the difficulties experienced by international students when communicating with local students through English as a lingua franca.

2 In the academic year 2015/16, 16% of the Hong Kong's HE student population were from outside of Hong Kong, totalling over 15,000 students.

3 English plays an important role in different sectors of Hong Kong society, including higher education, the government and the professional workplace (Li, 2017).

4 Cantonese is also widely spoken in Guangdong and Macau. While Cantonese and Putonghua are considered dialects of Chinese, they are mutually unintelligible.

5 The interview questions were piloted before the interviews were conducted with the participants.

6 Observations were conducted with selected participants both inside and outside the classroom, with particular attention to their language use (such as language choice and language mixing). Field notes were taken during the on-campus observations.

7 Where appropriate, representative extracts from the interview data are used to illustrate the themes under discussion. Unless otherwise indicated, the extracts below are taken directly from the interviews.

Additional information

Funding

The research described in this paper was supported by the Hong Kong Research Grants Council, University Grants Committee [project number 23600416].

Notes on contributors

Chit Cheung Matthew Sung

Chit Cheung Matthew Sung is Assistant Professor in the Department of English at City University of Hong Kong. He holds a PhD from Lancaster University and previously taught at the University of Hong Kong and later at Lingnan University Hong Kong. His current research focuses on the interplay between language, identity and ideology in multilingual contexts. His recent publications have appeared in international journals, including English Today, Lingua, Compare, Applied Linguistics Review, Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, Journal of Gender Studies, Language, Culture and Curriculum, Linguistics and Education, and Journal of Language, Identity and Education.