Language Attitudes toward Varieties of English Among University Students in China
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UNIVERSITI MALAYSIA SARAWAK
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In an era where English serves as a lingua franca, it is essential to investigate the attitudes of Chinese English learners towards English varieties to shed light on whether non-native English varieties should be taught in educational institutions. This study investigates Chinese university students’ implicit and explicit attitudes toward British RP-accented English (BRE), General American English (GAE), Hong Kong English (HKE), and China Mandarin-accent English (CME) from a sociolinguistic perspective using Verbal-guise technique (VGT) and questionnaires. The theoretical framework of this study is based on Ryan’s (1973) model of implicit language attitudes which encompasses the dimensions of status and solidarity, Baker’s (1992) categorization of explicit language attitudes, and Cargile et al.’s (1994) social process model of language attitudes. The objectives of this research were: 1) To investigate Chinese university students’ implicit attitudes towards four varieties of English; 2) To examine Chinese university students’ explicit attitudes towards English language and four varieties of English; 3) To compare their implicit and explicit attitudes to identify dimensions of language attitudes that differ in the participants’ evaluative judgements; and 4) To analyse the influence of different demographic variables on their language attitudes. Five hundred university students from four universities in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Fuzhou, China listened to audio recordings of BRE, GAE, HKE and CME recorded by eight male and female speakers, scored them on a bipolar semantic scale. Then, they completed a questionnaire comprising 123 items that investigated evaluative reactions towards BRE, GAE, HKE and CME speakers, attitudes toward English attitudes, attitudes towards four English varieties, attitudes towards learning English, and attitudes towards the use of English. The results showed that for implicit attitudes, CME received the highest rating, followed by GAE, BRE, and HKE. For explicit attitudes, CME iv received the highest rating, followed by BRE, GAE, and HKE. The instrumental value of English is valued, but BRE, GAE and HKE are not considered to have a high status. Participants were mildly eager to learn and use English, but not to learn CME. The status and solidarity dimensions in the VGT showed positive correlation, as did the questionnaire. The status dimension of the VGT and the questionnaire showed weak positive correlation, as did the solidarity dimension. Their implicit attitudes were affected by gender, age, grade, university, dialect area, and major. The explicit attitudes were influenced by gender, mother’s education level, and self-perceived English proficiency. The participants have ambivalent explicit attitudes towards CME in that while they give explicit positive evaluations to CME, they refuse to learn it. Participants do not perceive Inner Circle English (BRE, GAE) as having a prominent status, which implies an awakening of Chinese university students’ awareness of World Englishes or English as a Lingua Franca (ELF).