Native vs. non-native teacher acceptance of intelligibility-focused ELF pronunciation models

Abstract

English as a lingua franca, or ELF, is an approach to teaching English that prioritizes the needs of learners who plan to use the language primarily as a means of international communication. While this prioritization has particularly interesting implications for pronunciation instruction, little research exists about how teachers perceive ELF pronunciation teaching methods. To remedy this, the current study quantitatively investigates the relationship between teachers’ status as native or non-native speakers of English and their willingness to accept and utilize ELF pronunciation teaching methods. The study (unexpectedly) finds that native teachers agree more with the use of these methods and would be more willing to implement them than would non-native teachers. I thus theorize that this is due to differences in perspective stemming from the prestige that native varieties of English carry in the greater global context. I also suggest varied implications of the findings, especially how they could be used to implement ELF pronunciation pedagogy into teacher training programs.