English for Academic Purposes (EAP) connects to research and teaching practices that aim to assist learners who are studying or conducting research in English (Hyland 2006; Flowerdew and Peacock 2001; Jordan 1997). EAP thus refers to “language research and instruction that focuses on the specific communicative needs and practices of particular groups in academic contexts (Hyland & Hamp-Lyons 2002: 2). Due to the tertiary-level academic environment in which it mostly operates, EAP courses are usually specialised to some degree and aim to provide “teaching grounded in the social, cognitive and linguistic demands of academic target situations, providing focused instruction informed by the understanding of texts and the constraints of academic contexts‟ (Hyland 2006: 2). Originally EAP courses were designed for native speakers of English who required further training in academic writing to function properly in an academic community (Fortanet-Gómez & Räisänen 2008). However, in later years, with the influx of
11 Of course, the mere fact that these universities have adopted English as the language of instruction does not mean that this decision is necessarily justified or uncontroversial. For example, a recent survey conducted among isiXhosa speakers at the University of Fort Hare, found that “while English is
recognised as the dominant language in South Africa and, more specifically, in the domain of education, some categories of respondents acknowledge the usefulness of isiXhosa as an additional medium of instruction” (Dalvit 2004; abstract).
12 Again, it is far from clear that an English-orientated approach to matric is a good policy. For one thing, in a South African context, it gives native English speakers a considerable (and self-evident) advantage over ESL learners. Nevertheless, most would agree that English medium education at a (late) high school level is less damaging than foundational English medium education. Seen in this light, an English medium EAP course’s complicity in English medium matric education is less controversial than such a course would be in a foundational phase context.
36 international students in Anglophone universities, it became more standard for EAP courses to aid and equip second-language English speakers with academic writing skills (Hyland, 2006). Seen in this light, EAP is a broad field of enquiry and practice which, according to Hyland (2006: 1) is typically concerned with:
Pre-tertiary, undergraduate and postgraduate teaching (from the design of materials to lectures and classroom tasks) […] Classroom interactions (from teacher feedback to tutorials and seminar discussions) […] Research genres (from journal articles to conference papers and grant proposals) […] Student writing (from essays to exam papers and graduate theses) […] Administrative practice (from course documents to doctoral oral defences).
How, though, does EAP make contributions to these broad educational domains? Hyland (2006: 2) is once again illuminating:
[…] current EAP aims at capturing ‘thicker’ descriptions of language use in the academy at all age and proficiency levels, incorporating and often going beyond immediate communicative contexts to understand the nature of disciplinary knowledge itself. It employs a range of interdisciplinary influences for its research methods, theories and practices to provide insights into the structures and meanings of spoken, written, visual and electronic academic texts, into the demands placed by academic contexts on communicative behaviours, and into the pedagogic practices by which these behaviours can be developed. It is, in short, specialized English- language teaching grounded in the social, cognitive and linguistic demands of academic target situations, providing focused instruction informed by an understanding of texts and the constraints of academic contexts.
Importantly, the EAP course implemented by this study can be fitted into this theoretical paradigm. Specifically, the EAP course designed for this study aimed to generate “disciplinary knowledge” of writing skills and teaching methodologies that would enable Grade 11 learners to gain a greater degree of proficiency in the kinds of writing tasks that feature in matric (and even first-year university). By focusing on bilingual, economically disadvantaged learners, the course also sought to be responsive to the “social, cognitive and linguistic demands” of an “academic target situation”. Seen in this light, it should be clear that this study’s academic writing course, can, with justification, be labelled as an EAP programme.
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2.3.1 The role of EAP in higher education
Despite its broad level of theoretical applicability (as identified by Hyland), in reality EAP programmes are primarily designed for tertiary institutions. In recent years their function in these institutions has become increasingly important due to the manner in which ESL students often struggle with English being the medium of instruction. Examples of this phenomenon abound in many different regional learning contexts. For example, Kirkgoz’s (2009) study of three English medium departments at the Turkish university Cukurova highlight that the students’ attending these departments are often unable to adequately comprehend the language embedded in their assignments. Evans & Green’s (2007) study of English as the medium of instruction at the University of Hong Kong reveals a similar situation. Specifically, out of the 5000 students involved in their survey, Evans & Green found that almost all of the students admitted that – at various points – they struggled with academic speaking and writing in an English medium context. A plethora of studies have demonstrated that this situation obtains in a South African tertiary context as well (Bharuthram & Kies 2013; Mammino 2010, 2013; Pretorius 2002).
Of course, the manner in which ESL learners struggle with English as a medium of instruction is not confined to tertiary contexts. In particular, the situation in many South African schools – in which ESL learners receive an English medium education – has created an equally pressing problem. The scale of this problem is reflected in South Africa’s catastrophically low ranking in global education surveys (see Chapter 1), and the fact that – for many educationalists – this lamentable state of affairs is due (significantly) to a situation in which South African ESL learners do not have the necessary language skills to cope with an enforced English medium curriculum.13
13 Details about South Africa’s educational language policy and its relation to poor academic performance will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter.
38 Seen in this light, it is clear that EAP programmes can possess a similar degree of relevance in both schools and universities. That is, in both educational spheres, they can serve the core function of providing much needed support for ESL students who require more specialised and in-depth training in academic English. This study’s decision to implement an EAP programme at South African ESL schools (which subscribe to an English medium curriculum) is therefore in synergy with the broader EAP agenda that has been pursued at a tertiary level.
2.3.2 EAP and plagiarism
Through improving ESL students’ ability to engage with academic English, EAP courses can also combat another serious problem that can potentially have negative effects on the academic writing of second-language English speakers – plagiarism. Justifiably referred to as an ‘epidemic’ (Lessing 2004), studies have found that 18% of American college students plagiarise at some point, and that as many as 49% of students at upper tier universities like Cambridge admit to cheating (Dee & Jacob 2010; Sugden 2008). Indeed, studies by Coleman & Curry (2010) and Selwyn (2008) have uncovered even higher rates of plagiarism amongst students in British and American universities. Thus while universities like Ohio State have received as many as 174 complaints of plagiarism in a single academic year (Coleman & Curry 2010), some 60% of students attending online courses in the UK regularly plagiarised in a 12-month period (Selwyn 2008).
Importantly, plagiarism is not just a problem that afflicts Anglophone universities. Comparing the paraphrasing and summarising skills of L1 and L2 writers, Keck (2006) discovered that L2 writers copied at a significantly higher rate than L1 writers. Keck’s findings are far from idiosyncratic (see Deckert 1993; Wong 2009). In fact, L2 plagiarism is so common that many authors have put forward a range of reasons to explain it. Decker (1993) argues that L2 plagiarism results from a lack of understanding of intellectual property, while Fox (1994), Scollon (1995), Bloch (2001, 2008) and
39 Pennycook (1996) ascribe its existence to cultural difference and particular cultural and historical developments.
While there are elements of truth to all these explanations, this study shall adopt the view that plagiarism is endemic among both L1 and L2 students for a simple and intuitive reason: learners of all linguistic stripes – whether English is their first or second language – often struggle to comprehend, condense and reword academic texts. In such a situation, plagiarism presents an obvious – if not misguided – solution. Howards et al. (2010) reach such a conclusion in their ‘Citation Project’ when they present data showing that plagiarism arises in contexts in which students encounter difficulties in “understanding and summarizing the source texts they are using in their writing” (Bloch 2012: 11). The following student testimony (provided in Bloch [2012: 11]) provides a nice illustration of this:
Yes, frankly I plagiarized so many times in my former school […] Sometimes I plagiarized by cut and pasted the paper [sometimes] I just turned in somebody’s paper to the professor by changing original name to my name […] sometimes when I did not have any idea about the paper or assignment and I did not have an enough time to finish it, I plagiarized.
Although plagiarism is less spoken about in a school context than a university one, rates of ‘copy-paste’ internet plagiarism are rising alarmingly among high school students (Sisti 2007; Scanlon 2003). Perhaps as pertinently, many examinable aspects of school curricula confront high school learners with situations in which they need to paraphrase (rather than merely copy) in order to effectively answer comprehension style questions. For example, in a South African matric context, English FAL Paper 1 contains comprehension questions which directly specify that learners must re-write (rather than copy) relevant sections of a set text. Thus, as with a tertiary environment – through developing learners’ ability to write academically and comprehend texts – EAP can play an important role in high-school plagiarism avoidance.
Significantly, the EAP course implemented by this study placed a great emphasis upon paraphrasing skills. In light of the previous analysis, such skills are not only integral for
40 text-orientated academic writing, they also clearly provide learners with writing skills that can act as a bulwark against plagiarism.