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Literacy in English for Learning and Living
Literacy in English means the ability to read, write, listen, speak, compute, and think strategically in English; the ability to learn across all content areas in English; the ability to communicate learning in multiple forms to others who need to know in English; and the ability to transfer learning to new situations and contexts. Success in school therefore is anchored on the degree of literacy possessed by the learner in English. We shall therefore examine an aspect of literacy in English which is important for learning.
7.1 Academic Language and Academic English Literacy
Among the many functions of language, one of the most demanding and critical is the use of language to learn whether in formal and/or non-formal setting(s). In the formal school system, two literacies are involved – language (English) literacy and content area literacy. While the former focuses on the language literacy required to understand and use the contents of any discourse from a linguistic perspective; the latter focuses on the literacy learning required to make meaning of any text within the domains and confines of a given subject/discipline. In this connection, I will examine what constitutes academic English literacy which is fundamental to academic learning in all content areas and achievement at all grade levels.
7.1.1 Academic English Literacy
Often, we hear our students voice their frustration in these words: “I know what I want to say but I don’t know how to say it”. This utterance is an admission of language and linguistic deficiency; a deficiency more of expression than thought. What the students are simply saying is that they do not have the linguistic repertoire or the appropriate language literacy to express their thoughts or to assimilate what is expressed in a given language. The challenge for learners with this kind of linguistic deficiency is more acute for those who are second language users as is the case with most of those who use English in Nigeria. This is the lot of bilinguals whose capacity in the two linguistic codes at their disposal are subtractive and subordinate rather than balanced and coordinate.
The frustrations occasioned by linguistic or language literacy deficit are poignantly expressed in the words of Fraser (1980) when he asserts that children fail in science, mathematics, history or any other school subject not so much because of the inherent difficulties of these subjects, but simply because these children ‘seem unable to meet the language demands the subjects make on them’ (p.125). If students are unable to meet the language demands specific subjects make on them, how will they comprehend specific content? The linguistic constraints learners face in handling disciplinary content especially science, is because, “Learning science… is seen to be not merely a matter of learning facts, but of learning how language is used to give expression to certain reasoning processes, how it is used to define, classify, generalize, to make hypotheses, draw conclusions and so on” (Allen & Widdowson, 1985, p.74). How language is used to communicate specific subject strands is both the domain of language literacy and content area literacy. It is in recognition of the deficiency in both language and content area literacies among Nigerian English language learners that most of my research endeavours have focused on understanding what these literacies entail and how to provide and deploy appropriate and sufficient knowledge in these two important literacy domains.
For example, in Egbe (2014), I examined the thematic, lexico-grammatical, and syntactic patterns which underlie English for Science and Technology (EST) writing. In that study, I identified seven lexical patterns which give science and technical writing its complexity. These include the use of: simple lexical vocabulary, sub-technical vocabulary, specialized vocabulary, simple noun compounds, complex noun compounds, more complex noun compounds, and very complex noun compounds. What is relevant is that if learners are not aware of these tiers of vocabulary, and how to construct meaning through Academic English Literacy, reading and understanding science and technical texts will demand so much cognitive energy which can be frustrating even for experts in the field. The same frustration follows learners if they do not understand the deployment of verb forms, sentence patterns, and the discourse functions of these patterns in EST writing. In fact, Hyland (1999) reports that there are about 400 reporting verbs in English and even among mature writers who use English as a Second Language, challenges of which tense choice in citation verbs can convey unintended meanings (see Egbe 2003). As Lynch (2014) puts it, “tense choice is not a question of grammatical rules but of appropriacy to academic norms - and to nuances of meaning” (p.21).
Learners generally and especially English Language Learners (ELLs) need to have two levels of language proficiency, general English language skills and specialized English language proficiency to cope with specific disciplinary language and content. These proficiencies are identified by Cummings (1979, 2000) as Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS) and Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency Skills (CALPS). While BICS equips the learner with communication skills for everyday language use, CALPS is what the learner needs to read and write in the academic domains as well as listen to and speak the language of academic discourse. A distinction is made between general English proficiency and Academic English Literacy (AEL). The challenge facing ELLs is not essentially inability to use general English but to make the transition from BICS to CALPS and such a transition is not possible without appropriate instruction on academic English literacy.
Academic English literacy entails having the linguistic abilities in English to use identified competencies to navigate through academic listening, speaking, reading and writing. Since no one is a ‘native speaker’ of academic English and since academic English is a second language to all who use English for academic purposes, academic writing unlike social or personal writing has a definite structure and tone which makes it distinct. Academic writing for instance deals mainly with abstract thoughts and underlying theories and causes as well as alternative accounts which govern the processes and practices of everyday phenomena. Academic writing covers the following features: Structure, Abstract thought, Referencing, Academic audience/tone, Grammar and punctuation covered by the acronym SARAG.
Academic literacy is for learning but ultimately for living because literacy is for life-long learning and that is the ultimate goal of education. Our proficiency in new Englishes and the competencies we have in appropriating the new literacies is a preparation for life. We need to continuously dispose ourselves to acquire new literacies and the language of the new literacies. Our understanding of new Englishes should be extended to account for the English used in the new platforms available in the new media, that is, what Crystal (2003) calls ‘netlish’ and ‘Weblish’ or ‘cyberspeak’ by Taiwo (2018).
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