Teacher in charge Ms.

SAHRAOUI Groups
3rd Year- 5&6
Module: Englisg for Specific Purpose ESP
Lecture 4: The Basic Conceptions/Principles of ESP
Swale (1990) uses the term “enduring conceptions” to refer to them. These five
conceptions are: authenticity, researchbase, language/text, need and learning/methodology.
These five conceptions originate from both the real world (the “target situation” of the ESP)
and ESP pedagogy. It is therefore crucial to discuss each of them in an attempt to survey the
development and directions of ESP. As a matter of fact, each of the conceptions will identify
a focus-based approach to ESP and serves as a contribution to the concept of ESP itself.
1. Authenticity
The earliest concept to emerge from the development of ESP was that of authenticity.
The first generation of ESP materials that appeared in the mid-1960s took skills as their
principal means of selection (Close, 1992). The underlying concept is that ESP teachers
would need to establish the skills priorities of students in order to develop appropriate ESP
teaching materials. As earlier discussed, the main objective of ESP is usually developing
communicative competence. This could only be achieved through an adoption of authentic
materials that serve the needs of learners in different fields such as aviation, business,
technology, etc. Some courses prepare learners for various academic programs. Others
prepare learners for work in the fields such as law, medicine, engineering, etc. The problem
that frequently arises with such ESP courses is the teachers' dependence on published
textbooks available. These textbooks rarely include authentic materials in their design. A
trained teacher should, therefore, resort to supplementary material that compensate for the
lack of authenticity in textbooks.
2. Research Base
Halliday, McIntosh and Strevens (1964) were the first scholars who point to the
importance of and the need for a research base for ESP set out in one of the earliest
discussions of ESP. This was a call for a programme of research into ESP registers which was
taken up by several early ESP materials writers such as Herbert (1965) or Ewer and Latorre
(1969), who analyzed large corpora of specialist texts in order to establish the statistical
contours of different registers. The principal limitation of this approach was not its research
base but its conception of text as register, restricting the analysis to the word and sentence
levels as register was invariably defined in these terms. The procedure adopted for the
analysis was twofold. The main structural words and non-structural vocabulary were
identified by visual scanning. For the main sentence patterns, a small representative-sample
count was made.
3.Language/Text
In the 1990s, there were a number of ESP projects which were triggered by concerns
over international safety and security. The first of these was SEASPEAK. It was a practical
project in applied linguistics and language of engineering. According to Strevens and
Johnson (1983), SEASPEAK, which was published in 1987-1988, was the establishment, for
the first time, of international maritime English. They explain that other ESP projects were
published later as a result of the success of the first project. These projects included
AIRSPEAK (1988) and POLICESPEAK (1994). Each of these projects involved a substantial
research phase with linguists and technical specialists cooperating. The NEWSPEAK research
shared the large-scale base of the register-analysis approach Although register analysis
remains small-scale and restricted to native-speaker encounters, later research
demonstrated the gap between ESP materials designers' intuitions about language and the
language actually used in ESP situations (Williams, 1988; Mason, 1989; Lynch & Anderson,
1991; Jones, 1990).
The reaction against register analysis in the early 1970s concentrated on the
communicative values of discourse rather than the lexical and grammatical properties of
register. In practice, however, the discourse-analysis approach tended to concentrate on
how sentences are used in the performance of acts of communication and to generate
materials based on functions. As an offspring of discourse analysis, the genre-analysis
approach seeks to see text as a whole rather than as a collection of isolated units. The major
difference between discourse analysis and genre analysis is that, while discourse analysis
identifies the functional components of text, genre analysis enables the material writer to
sequence these functions into a series to capture the overall structure of such texts. The
limitation of genre analysis has been a disappointing lack of application of research to
pedagogy. There are few examples of teaching materials based on genre-analysis research.
 Specialized Aims Vs Special Language
In 1974, Perren noted that there is a confusion that arises between two notions:
Special Language (SL) and Specialized Aims, which are two entirely different terms. Indeed,
Mackay and Mountford (1978: 4) state: The only particular way in which we can understand
the notion of special language is a restricted repertoire of words and expressions selected
from the whole language because that restricted repertoire covers every requirement within
a welldefined context, task or vocation.
On the other hand, “a specialized aim refers to the purpose for which learners learn a
language, not the nature of the language they learn” (Mackay and Mountford; 1978). That
means that ESP focuses more on the purpose for which learners learn a language and not
the specific register they learn.
 Samples of Restricted Language
 SEASPEAK
SEASPEAK, also English for maritime communications. The English of merchant shipping,
adopted in 1988 by the International Maritime Organization (IMO) of the United Nations for
use in ship-to-ship and ship-to-shore communications as a necessary consequence of
A typical exchange, in which a ship called Sun Dragon calls up Land's End Coastguard, to inform them of
a change of plan:

 Ship: Land's End Coastguard, Land's End Coastguard. This is Sun Dragon, Sun
Dragon. Over.
 Coastguard: Sun Dragon. This is Land's End Coastguard. Switch to VHF
channel one-one. Over.
 Ship: Land's End Coastguard. This is Sun Dragon. Agree VHF channel one-
one. Over.
 AIRSPEAK
Also Air Traffic Control English, Aviation English. The English of international civil
aviation, a restricted language established after the Second World War by the International
Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). Although in some conditions aircraft may use a local
language, commercial flying is universally conducted in English. An aircraft descending from
cruise height towards its destination airport:
• Control. BA six zero six Alfa: squawk indent.
• Pilot. Indenting, BA six zero six Alfa.
• Control. BA six zero six Alfa, radar contact. Descend to flight level three one zero.
• Pilot. Leaving flight level three nine zero. Descending to level three one zero. BA six
zero six Alfa
4. Learning Needs

Another basic conception of ESP and one that has been addressed frequently is learning needs.
This should not be a surprise for each and every specific domain would impose its own needs,
and it goes without saying that the needs required for a specific field and the methodology for
serving these needs on the ground do not work with another field which would defiantly dictate
its own requirements. All language teaching must be designed for the "specific learning and
language use purposes of identified groups of students" (Mackay & Mountford, 1978, p. 6). Thus,
a systematic analysis of these specific learning needs and language-use purposes (communication
needs) is a pre-requisite for making the content of a language programme relevant to the learners'
needs.

5. Learning/Methodology
A new generation of materials is based on conceptions of language or conception of
need. The concern was with language learning rather than language use. It was no longer
simply assumed that describing and exemplifying what people do with language would
enable someone to learn it. A truly valid approach to ESP would be based on an
understanding of the processes of language learning. Hutchinson and Waters (1987) refer to
this approach as the learning-centred approach and stress the importance of a lively,
interesting and relevant teaching/learning style in ESP materials. In the context of a
language programme that emphasizes the needs of the learners, anything but a
learner/learning-centred syllabus and methodology is bound to create contradictions that
will negatively affect students' perceptions of the programme. The content and teaching-
learning procedures must take into account the interests and concerns of the learners, as
well as the socio-economic and cultural context in which the language programme is to be
implemented.
"Learner-learning centred", "task-based", "activity-based" and "problem-solving" are all
attributes which are generally associated with an effective communicative-oriented
approach. Such an approach aims, among other things, at helping learners develop the skills
associated with language learning, as well as skills related to their own discipline of study.
Finally, an ESP programme that aims to meet the ever-changing needs of the learners
will include an on-going system of evaluation, aiming to provide information on how the
programme itself can be improved through the introduction of changes that are deemed
necessary.

References
1. Mr. Lamine Benhamlaoui Engilsh for Specific Purposes A course elaborated for the
first semester of the third year LMD classes’ requirements. University of Oum El-Bouaghi
2020-2021 Department of English.
2. Hutchison, T. & Waters, A. (1987). English for Specific Purposes: a learner-centred2.
approach. England: Cambridge University Press.
3. Hutchinson, T. & Waters, A. (1987 & 1992). English for specific purposes: A
learning-centered approach. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
4. Robinson, P (1980) English for Specific Purposes.Oxford: Pergamon Press.
5. Umera-Okeke, N. P. (2005). An introduction to English for Specific Purposes (ESP).
Awka, Nigeria: Fab Educational Books.