CABANDING, MONICA R.
World Englishes
Short Paper
Kachru (1997) distinguishes between genetic nativeness and functional nativeness in talking about the acceptance of so-called non-native varieties of Englishes. Where lies the difference between the two notions? Do you agree with the distinction? What are its implications for how we should look at our own variety of English and how we teach it? Or, does it matter, anyway? Give a comprehensive discussion.
English language with the many metaphors attached to it has evolved into a marker of identity among Asian countries in particular, and to the many nations who use it, in general. At length, after several years of its status as an “imperialist language”, it has found its redeeming role as a liberating force among the “once” colonized nations. In his own pronouncement, Wole Soyinka (in Kachru, 1997, 1995) termed the English language as a “new medium of communication, and thus, represents a new organic series of mores, social goals, relationships, universal awareness –all of which go into the creation of a new culture.”
This new perspective on the role of English among its users has put forth the birth of World Englishes that discards the homogenized identity of the “colonial linguistic remnant” (Kachru, 2005, p. 21), that is English.
In the process of using the language to pacify, to influence and to civilize for their own advantage, the American and British English have eventually become embedded in the conscious and subconscious psycho of the colonized Asian as the range and depth of its penetration did not end along with their freedom from the colonizers, rather, it continues in another phase.
Now, English is perceived to be a “turbine for progress” for it has become the “standard of intellectualization”, the lingua franca that connects people from all over the world. Knowledge of correct usage of the language puts the user in the advantage position for books, business and...