LESSON 1

INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH FOR

SPECIFIC PURPOSES
Subject content
•  Natural Sciences
•  Social Sciences
•  Music
•  Physical Education
•  Arts
•  Mathematics
•  ICTs
•  When you teach these subjects, is the language (English) you are
going to use different or the same?
•  If the kind of English is different, where would the difference lie?
How can ESP help us understand…
•  In this exercise, I want you to compare 1) ‘Destrezas’ with
2)‘Adquisición’/ ’CLIL’/…
•  How are they different in terms of…?
•  Tasks
•  Materials
•  Content
•  Feedback from the teacher
•  Language
Some differences
‘DESTREZAS’ OTHER SUBJECTS
TASKS Practicing Writing small texts:
Filling the gaps Comparing; Reasoning
Rehearsing
MATERIALS Textbook The web
Exercises from the web Introductory textbook
Research articles
CONTENT Language Acquisition/

FEEDBACK Focussed on language Focussed on content

use
LANGUAGE Academic language Academic language
What does ESP stand for?
•  E= English
•  P= Purposes

But… S= special or specific?

ESP: DEFINITION
Specific or special?
•  ‘Special’ ‘Special language’
•  ‘Special languages’?
•  Business English is different from General English: different
systems
•  The only difference between BE and GE lies in their vocabulary
•  There is really no difference between BE and GE

•  ‘Specific’: the language needed is determined by the

‘specific’ situation/context/purpose
The general context: Applied Linguistics
•  Real world language based problems:
•  Language Teaching & Language Learning
•  Language Assessment
•  Language policy and language planning
•  Machine translation
•  Corpus Linguistics
•  Language use in particular settings
ESP: Definition
English language instruction:
1.  Devised to meet the learner’s particular needs
2.  Goal directed: little interest in the English language as
such (or its culture) but because SS need English for
study or work
3.  Mostly adults
4.  Limited time period
5.  Use of underlying methodology and activities of the
discipline
6.  Centred on the language, skills, discourse appropriate
for these activities
General English vs Specific English

•  ”In theory nothing, in practice a great deal”

Hutchinson et al. (1987:53)
When General English is not enough…
•  A long time ago an old teacher told me ironically that General English
is simply 'English for no particular purpose'. Also, just this afternoon,
an old student [of mine]… has found a job in a coffee marketing
company and tells me that she may have to go travelling all around
the world. …
•  I asked her if she knew what to to say at an airport (airport English?!),
in hotels (hotel English?), on buses and so forth. She replied 'Yes'
'Yes, of course' and so on. What about at work? She said she didn't
know...
•  I suggested that it would be regular and may become routine, just like
work does. She asked me if she would be using the same kind of
English all the time at work. I suggested not all the time, but probably
some English and some communication functions would become a lot
more common than others. (Howard Doyle)
•  http://www.researchgate.net/post/
What_is_the_main_difference_between_general_English_language_
and_English_for_specific_purposes
Specific English
Perhaps she would be writing emails more than speaking to
customers on the phone or face to face. Who knows?
Discipline-specific purposes I could not predict, but text-types
and communicative functions and purposes common enough
and were there fore possible to plan for. However, if there could
have been some collaboration or consultation with my student's
future employer….
So, to answer the question, clarifying purposes - discipline-
specific, context-specific, genre-specific, medium-specific, or
what. In other words, English for what? English for whom? Or
even what English? (Howard Doyle)

http://www.researchgate.net/post/
What_is_the_main_difference_between_general_English_langu
age_and_English_for_specific_purposes
 Refining the definition:
Absolute Characteristic of ESP
•  designed to meet specific needs of the learner;

•  related in content (i.e. in themes and topics) to particular

disciplines, occupations and activities;

•  centred on language appropriate to those activities in

syntax, lexis, register, discourse and genres etc. and
analysis of discourse;

•  In contrast with General English.

(Dudley-Evans & St John1997)

 Variable Characteristics
•  may be restricted to specific skills (for example oral skills for
those only interested in making business presentations)
•  related to or designed for specific disciplines;
•  use in specific teaching situations, a different methodology
from that of general English;
•  designed for adult learners, secondary school level or
professional work situation;
•  Generally designed for intermediate or advance students;
•  Assume some basic knowledge of language system, but it
can be used with beginners.
Task 1
ESP and CLIL: connections
ESP CLIL
Devised  to  meet  the  learner’s  particular  needs    ✔  

Goal  directed:  little  interest  in  the  English  language    ✔  

as  such  (or  its  culture)  but  because  SS  need  English  
for  study  or  work  
Mostly  adults   ✗  
Limited  time  period   ✗  
Use  of  underlying  methodology  and  activities  of  the    ✔  
discipline  
Centred  on  the  language,  skills,  discourse       ✔  
appropriate  for  these  activities  
CLASSIFICATION
Classification: the language tree

Hutchinson and Waters, 1987

 English for
Occupational Pre-study
English for Purposes (EOP)
Specific
Purposes (ESP) English for
Academic In-study
Purposes (EAP)

Post-study

Robinson, 1991 cit. in Dudley-Evans & St. John, 1998

Classification of ESP (Dudley-Evans & St
John, 1998) ENGLISH FOR
ACADEMIC
SCIENCE AND
TECHONOLOGY

ENGLISH FOR
ACADEMIC
MEDICAL
ENGLISH FOR PURPOSES
ACADEMIC
PURPOSES (EAP)
ENGLISH FOR
LEGAL PURPOSES

ENGLISH FOR
MANAGEMENT
FINANCE AND
ECONOMICS
ESP
ENGLISH FOR
MEDICAL
PURPOSES
ENGLISH FOR
PROFESSIONAL
PURPOSES
ENGLISH FOR
BUSINESS
PURPOSES
ENGLISH FOR
OCCUPATIONAL
PURPOSES (EOP)
PRE-VOCATIONAL
ENGLISH
ENGLISH FOR
VOCATIONAL
PURPOSES
VOCATIONAL
ENGLISH
The ESP continuum
General 2 Specific
1 3 4 5

Common core Course for

Intermediate to academic broad
One-to-one for
English for advanced EGP language skills disciplinary
business
beginners with focus on a areas (Writing
people
skill for scietists
and engineers)
A SHORT HISTORY OF
ESP
History of ESP

Register analysis
(e.g.: A course in Basic Scientific English)

Discourse analysis
(The Nucleus Series: General Science)

Skills
(Reading and Thinking in English)

Learning Needs
(Interface)
Register analysis (‘60s)
•  Vocabulary and grammar of Scientific and Technical
English (lexicostatistics):
•  Main difference frequency:
•  Passive voice
•  Simple present
•  Semi or sub-technical vocabulary
•  Most important textbook: A.J. Herbert The Structure of
Technical English (1965)
•  Typical structure: Beginning with a long reading passage
Example
Example
Modern register analysis (Biber et al.,1998: 148)
*  nouns
*  Dimension 1: Informational production *  word length
*  prepositions
*  type/token ratio
*  attributive adjectives
*  place adverbials
*  agentless passives
*  past participial postnominal clauses
*  present tense verbs
*  Dimension 2: non-narrative discourse
*  wh-relative clauses on object positions
*  Dimension 3: elaborated reference *  pied-piping constructions
*  wh-relative clauses on subject positions
*  phrasal coordination
*  nominalizations
*  infinitives
*  Dimension 4: Overt expression of *  prediction modals
argumentation *  suasive verbs
*  conditional subordination
*  necessity modals
*  split auxiliaries
*  conjuncts
*  Dimension 5: Impersonal Style *  past participial adverbial clauses
*  by passives
Genres
INVOLVED PRODUCTION
telephone conversations
35 – face to face conversations
30 –
25 –
20 – personal letters
public conversations
15 –
10 –
5 –
prepared speeches
0 – general fiction
-5 –
-10 – press editorial
-15 – academic prose
official documents
INFORMATIONAL PRODUCTION
Rhetorical and Discourse analysis (’70s)
•  Lexico-statistics offered little explanation as to why certain
patterns are favoured
•  Rhetorical patterns are behind the choices made by a
writer or speaker.
•  Rhetoric is defined as ‘the process a writer uses to
produce a desired piece of text’ (Trimble, 1985)
•  Widowson links language form with language use
Rhetorical levels according to Trimble
(1985)
•  Level A: the objectives of the total discourse
1.  Detailing an experiment
2.  Presenting new hypotheses or theories
•  Level B: the general rhetorical functions that develop the level A
objectives
1.  Stating purpose
2.  Presenting Information on experimental procedures
3.  Stating the problem
•  Level C: the specific rhetorical functions that develop the general
ones.
1.  Description
2.  Definition
3.  Classification
4.  Instructions
5.  Visual-verbal relationships
•  Level D: rhetorical techniques
1.  I. Orders: space/ causality and result
2.  II. Patterrns: Causality and result/ Comparison and contrast/ Analogy
Examples of the rhetorical stage
•  The Focus Series by Allen and Widowson
•  The Nucleus Series:
•  General Science:
•  -real content
•  -semi-technical language
•  No particular attention to any of the four skills
Bates, M. and T. Dudley-Evans (1976): Nucleus General Science. Longman
Analysis of study skills
•  Growth of Needs analysis
•  Focus on specific skills: eg. reading In Latin America
•  Teaching language is not enough: thought processes
underpinning language are addressed
•  Textbook: Skills for Learning. The University of Malaya
ESP Project. Context: Malayan Universities wanted to
retain English as a ‘library’ language.
•  Examples of subskills:
•  ‘getting to know the main parts of a book’
•  ‘getting familiar with non-linear texts’
•  ‘learning to accept difficult words’
•  ‘reading for relevant information’
•  ‘using contextual clues’
Scanned by CamScanner
Analysis of Learning needs (’80s)
Hutchinson and Waters’ (1987) new ideas about ESP:
•  ESP is not a matter of teaching ‘specialised varieties’ of
English
•  ESP is not a matter of science words and grammar for
Scientists…
•  ESP is not different in kind from any other form of
language teaching in that it should be based in the first
instance on principles of effective and efficient learning…
Learning-centred approach
•  ESP concentrated too much on the end product (linguistic
analyses of lectures, textbooks, articles) and too little on
the skills needed.
•  There is a need to pay attention to the ‘underlying
competence’:
•  Standard visual modes of representation
•  semi-technical and colloquial language
•  familiarity with that world, eg. typical metaphors
•  Even if only the skills of ‘reading a textbook’ is required for
students, students may benefit from ‘being read’ by the
teaching (listening): main ideas can be emphasized
Example of a unit (Interface)
Genre analysis (’90s)
•  John Swales emphasized the need to study the structure
of genres.
Task-based syllabus (21st cent.)
1.  Primary focus on meaning
2.  A task has some kind of ‘gap’.
3.  to complete the task, the participants choose the
linguistic resources needed.
4.  A task has a clearly defined outcome.
Why do TBLT
1. Tasks can be easily related to students’ real-life language
needs (i.e. ‘pedagogic tasks’ can be designed to reflect
‘target tasks’).
2. Tasks create contexts that facilitate second language
acquisition (i.e. an L2 is best learned through
communicating).
3. Tasks create opportunities for focusing on form.
4. Students are more likely to develop intrinsic motivation
in a task-based approach.
5. A task-based approach enables teachers to see if
students are developing the ability to communicate in an
L2.
Classification of tasks

Pedagogic Real
Pedagogic task: example
1.  Four students – each has one picture and
describes it to the rest of the class.
2.  Students from the rest of the class ask the four
students questions about their pictures.
3.  One student from the class tries to tell the
story.
4.  If necessary, Steps 2 and 3 are repeated.
Typical pedagogic tasks
1.  ‘Information-gap’ (eg: similar or different)
2.  ‘Opinion-gap’
3.  ‘reasoning-gap’ (eg: given certain clues, find out the
murderer)
Real tasks
Look at the e-mail message below. Listen to Mr.
Pointer’s instructions on the tape. Make notes if you want
to. Then write a suitable reply to Lesieur.

Dear Mr. Pointer

Please send flight number, date and time of arrival
and I will arrange for someone to meet you at the
airport.
Lesieur.
Advantages of tasks (Ellis, 2002)

Exercises
•  Attention to form Tasks
•  Language learners
•  Explicit learning •  Attention to meaning
•  Language users
•  Implicit learning
Using tasks in language teaching
1. Task-supported language teaching
i.e. the syllabus is a structural one and the approach is
‘focus on forms’. Tasks (really ‘situational exercises’)
are used in the final stage of a PPP methodology
2. Task-based language teaching
i.e. the syllabus is task-based and the approach is ‘focus
on form’. The methodology centres around students
performing a series of tasks.
Pedagogical problems Solutions

1. Students lack Devise activities that

proficiency to develop ability to
communicate in the L2 communicate
gradually.
2. Students unwilling Use small group work;
to speak English in allow planning time;
class. learner training
3. Students develop Select tasks that
pidginized language demand fully
system grammaticalized
language
Educational problems Solutions

1. Emphasis on Review philosophy of

‘knowledge’ learning education.

2. Examination Develop new more

system communicative exams

3. Large classes Use small group work;

develop tasks suited to
large classes.
NEEDS ANALYSIS AND
COURSE DESIGN
Needs analysis
Needs analysis in ESP
•  “Tell me what you need English for and I will tell you what
English you need” Hutchinson and Waters (1987: 8)
Is this still true?
•  “For much of its history, language teaching has been
obsessed with a search for the ‘right’ method. It was felt
that somewhere or other there was a method which would
work for all learners in all contexts, and that once such a
method had been found the language teaching ‘problem’
would be solved once and for all” (Nunan, 1998: 228)
The importance of Needs Analysis
•  “LSP is based on the idea that it is desirable and feasible
to match the design of a language teaching course with
the needs of the course participants” (H & W, 1997)
•  “Needs analysis is the cornerstone of ESP and leads to a
very focused course” (Dudley-Evans & St John, 1998)
Approaches to Needs Analysis
•  Target Situation Analysis: Munby (1978): Communicative
Syllabus Design.
•  Participant/Purposive domain/setting/interaction/instrumentality
medium, mode and channel/dialect/target level/ communicative
event
•  Present Situation Analysis (Richterich & Chancerel, 1980)
•  Lacks or Deficiency Analysis = TSA minus PSA
•  Learning Needs = how do our students learn?
Example of Needs Analysis
Needs Analysis (3)