The study of World Englishes has seen a revolutionary shift during the last twenty years. Before 1980, there was a general assumption within Britain, the United States and many other societies where English was taught, that the primary target was the 'Standard English' of Britain. However, during the 1980s interest grew in the identification and description of global varieties of English, marking a shift in focus from 'English' to 'Englishes'.
This collection covers the full range of differing academic traditions within the subject and also addresses current theoretical approaches to the field. It provides students and researchers with instant access to the key articles and theories on the subject, and is completed by a new introduction from the editors.

Multilingual China explores the dynamics of multilingualism in one of the most multilingual countries in the world. This edited collection comprises frontline empirical research into a range of important issues that arise from the presence of 55 official ethnic minority groups, plus China's search to modernize and strengthen the nation's place in the world order. Topics focus on the dynamics of national, ethnic minority and foreign languages in use, policy making and education, inside China and beyond. Micro-studies of language contact and variation are included, as are chapters dealing with multilingual media and linguistic landscapes. The book highlights tensions such as threats to the sustainability of weak languages and dialects, the role and status of foreign languages (especially English) and how Chinese can be presented as a viable regional or international language. Multilingual China will appeal to academics and researchers working in multilingualism and multilingual education, as well as sinologists keen to examine the interplay of languages in this complex multilingual context.

This collection of essays developed out of a conference held in Hong Kong in 1988. The aim was to provide a forum for an exchange of views between academics working within the field of sociolinguistics, in particular between those working in the West and those working in the East. Sociolinguistics Today has taken this aim a step further to produce an overview of contemporary research into sociolinguistics worldwide. The book contains articles by acknowledged leaders in the study of language and society, and the presence of sociolinguists working in Asia provides a new and exciting challenge to the hitherto western-dominated field. The comprehensive study of Asian sociolinguistics is unique and engages with the non-Asian contributions to great effect. The range of contributors reinforces the international emphasis of the book.

This collection of essays developed out of a conference held in Hong Kong in 1988. The aim was to provide a forum for an exchange of views between academics working within the field of sociolinguistics, in particular between those working in the West and those working in the East. Sociolinguistics Today has taken this aim a step further to produce an overview of contemporary research into sociolinguistics worldwide. The book contains articles by acknowledged leaders in the study of language and society, and the presence of sociolinguists working in Asia provides a new and exciting challenge to the hitherto western-dominated field. The comprehensive study of Asian sociolinguistics is unique and engages with the non-Asian contributions to great effect. The range of contributors reinforces the international emphasis of the book.

This book explores the history of the English language in China from the arrival of the first English-speaking traders in the early seventeenth century to the present. Kingsley Bolton brings together and examines a substantial body of historical, linguistic and sociolinguistic research on the description and analysis of English in Hong Kong and China. He uses early wordlists, satirical cartoons and data from journals and memoirs, as well as more conventional sources, to uncover the forgotten history of English in China and to show how contemporary Hong Kong English has its historical roots in Chinese pidgin English. The book also considers the varying status of English in mainland China over time, and recent developments since 1997. With its interdisciplinary perspective, the book will appeal not only to linguists, but to all those working in the fields of Asian studies and English studies, including those concerned with cultural and literary studies.

In recent decades, the cultural and linguistic legacies of the colonial era have been superseded by the globalization of English through the international mass media, particularly via satellite television and the Internet. In many societies that were previously the colonies of Anglophone powers, 'new Englishes' have appeared, visible most dramatically in the 'new literatures' of India, Singapore, the Philippines etc. However, many of these new Englishes are much older in provenance than many linguists have previously recognized. The process of British and American imperial expansion in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries took the English language to many parts of the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, China and Japan. Indeed, it is typically in these initial stages of political, historical and cultural contact that we can identify the dynamics of 'languages in contact', and the origins of 'World Englishes', in a range of settings, including South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia. This Major Work from Routledge, a new title in the History and Development of World Englishes series, is a unique reference collection. It brings together a range of sources, reprinted in facsimile, charting the spread of English throughout Asia and the development of 'Asian Englishes' from the eighteenth century through to the 1960s.