1.

0 Introduction

At the international level, English language has become by far the most prominent
and relevant language in the world. In almost every kind of situation, English serves
as the intermediary means of communication between persons not sharing a mother
tongue, no matter what their vernacular languages are. Therefore, it can rightfully be
called the lingua franca1 of the modern world and is systematically used in
practically every aspect of life (Muysken, 2008). Unlike with any other language in
the world, non-native speakers of English outnumber almost 400 millions of native
speakers, which only proves how widespread English has become today and how
important it is for human interaction on the global scale (Firth, 1996). Throughout the
twentieth century technological inventions and developments such as the telephone,
fax, and most importantly computers and the Internet, have brought closer people
from every continent and helped spread English as the convenient communicational
tool, (Godwin Coury, 2001). As a consequence, English enjoys the prestige among
other languages, which can easily be seen from the number of people of all ages
studying English compared to those studying and taking interest in other languages,
(Walters, 2002). It is overwhelmingly dominant in scientific and technological
communication with all relevant and ground-breaking information being primarily
published, distributed and stored in English. Modern communications, videos,
journals and newspapers on the internet use English and have made ‘knowing
English’ indispensable. (Crystal, 1997).
At the intra-national level, interest in the teaching of English as a global
language has been growing throughout the Arab world, and most Arab governments
began to introduce the teaching of English as compulsory subject into the school
curriculum. This trend has become so popular that there have even been curriculum
changes in some parts of the Arab world where languages other than English,
particularly French, were traditionally taught in the public system. A case in point is
Morocco, where teaching and learning in English has increased, i.e. French has been
retreating and loosing a lot of ground to English. (Zaki & Najbi, 2001). The prevailing
view seems to be that unless the students learn English, they can only work in limited
jobs. Those who do not have basic knowledge of English cannot obtain good quality
jobs. Men and women, who cannot comprehend and interpret instructions in English,
even if educated, are unemployable. As far as Arab students is concerned, English as
a major skill is needed for further studies or for professional career; they are, as early
as Lambert (1968) and Hamdallah (1988) put it, instrumentally motivated to acquire
English as means of attaining instrumental goals, furthering a career, reading
technical material, translation and so forth. A working knowledge of English can be a
key that unlocks a myriad of employment opportunities. If a student wishes ensure a
well-paying position, one of the best things s/he can do is learn English. Recently,
Rababah, has supported Lambert and Hamdalllah’s view saying that ‘attitudinal
studies conducted on Arab students, consistently shown that Arab students are
instrumentally motivated to learn English and that they are well aware of the utility of
knowing English, the main stimulus for learning English is instrumental, i.e. to
achieve a goal, e.g. a career (ibid, 2003). Furthert, at the social level Knowledge of
English remains a prerequisite for the better jobs especially in the private sector, and
you can hardly come across a leading government official who does not know
English. The use of English is being so entrenched in some Arab countries to the point
where you feel that Arabic is relegated to a secondary status.
In Jordan, the overwhelming majority of the population of Jordan speaks Arabic as
their mother tongue, whereas English by both historical accident and present-day
consensus is learned as the principal foreign language. Although its importance is
well recognized by many individuals, its strongest support comes from the
government. To sum up the present status of English, in the age of globalization, in
the Arab world, Zughoul rightly states: ‘despite the hegemonic and imperialistic
nature of English, it is still badly needed in the Arab world for the purposes of
communicating with the world, education, acquisition of technology and development
at large. Teaching still needs more efforts to be exerted to raise the quality and
standard of English of the Arab learners at all levels’ (Zughoul, 2003:1).

Lambert, Wallace E. and Otto Kleinberg. (1967) Children’s Views of Foreign People. New
York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Crystal, D., (1997), The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English

Language.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Godwin Coury, J., (2001), English as a Lingua Franca in the Brazilian

academic
World. At http://www3.telus.net/linguisticsissues/linguafranca.htm
.

Firth, A., (1996), The Discursive Accomplishment of Normality: On 'Lingua Franca

English and Conversation Analysis. Journal of Pragmatics, 26:237 – 259.
Walters, J., (2002), Why Is English the International Lingua Franca? At
http://www.translationdirectory.com/article171/htm.

Muysken, P., (2008), "The problem of the Caucasian Sprachbund" in Muysken, P.,
ed., From Linguistic Areas to Areal Linguistics. Amsterdam:
Benjamins.

Hamdallah,R.W. (1988). Syntactic errors in written English: study of the

errors made by Arab students of English, Unpublished PhD thesis,
University of Lancaster,
UK.

Rababah, G. (2003). Communication problems facing Arab learners of English:

a personal perspective . TEFL Web Journal, 2(1): 15-30.

Zughoul, M. R. (2003). Globalization and EFL/ ESL pedagogy in the Arab World.
Language and Learning, 1(2). Online, accessed on 23/9/2008. Available at
:file:///F:/zughoul.html .
Lambert, W., Gardner, R., Otton, R. and Tunstall, K. (1968). A Study of the roles of
attitudes and motivation in second language learning. In Fishman,J. A. (ed.),
Reading in the sociology of language. pp. 473-491. The Hague: Mouton..

Zaki, A. & Najbi, M. (Eds.) (2001). ESP and the challenges of globalization. In
MATE Proceedings. Publications of the Moroccan association of teachers of
English (MATE). Rabat: Morocco. Accessed on 21/7/2008.Available at:
http://matemorocco.ifrance.com/