Australian Review of Applied Linguistics - Volume 49, Issue 1, 2026

Abstract

The only Urdu-speaking community in Bangladesh, known as the Bihari community, is a historically unique group that has experienced two consecutive dislocations within years. The community and their language have a troubled history in the country. This study sought to qualitatively understand some Bangladeshi Urdu speakers’ Urdu-related experiences and perceptions from the perspective of minority language rights. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews and were then analyzed using a thematic analysis . Findings show that the research participants were aware of Urdu’s illegitimacy in public perceptions. This stigma attached to Urdu affected their adherence to and motivated them to prioritize learning Bangla for greater social and economic integration. The study identified a critical necessity for legal protections to strengthen the link between Urdu and Urdu speakers. This study significantly contributes to the extant literature on minority language rights by unveiling how the historical past, nation-building discourses, and media representations can potentially shape and reshape the language choice of a speech minority.

Abstract

Studies on English teachers’ identities are abundant, but those on English for specific purposes (ESP) teachers in diverse workplaces are scarce. Since workplaces significantly shape teacher identity Pennington, 2014, this study explored how non-English and English departments construct ESP teachers’ identity at four Indonesian universities. Using narrative inquiry via semi-structured interviews based on the adapted TESOL teacher framework Tao & Gao, 2018, data were analysed with Miles et al.’s (2014) phases of qualitative data analysis: (1) data collection, (2) data condensation, (3) data display, and (4) conclusion drawing and verification. Findings revealed that ESP teachers from non-English departments were more deeply engaged with their roles than those from English departments, indicating the importance of institutional backgrounds in constructing ESP teacher identity. The findings emphasize the need for institutional support, workplace social interactions, and activities specially planned to enhance ESP teachers’ professional development, especially for those from non-English departments. Understanding these dynamics can inform teaching policies and practices.

Abstract

This paper addresses issues related to the design and compilation of the first spoken corpus of youth talk in an under-represented language in corpus linguistics, Turkish. Designed to offer a maximally representative sample of Turkish youth talk, the Corpus of Turkish Youth Language (CoTY) is a 168,748-token specialised corpus within the single register of informal, naturally occurring and spontaneous interaction exclusively among friends. The speakers are Turkish-speaking youth aged 14 to 18 from diverse socio-economic backgrounds in Türkiye. In this paper, the issues that surfaced during corpus design and construction are presented, with a discussion and justification of the methodological choices in relation to the long-term project objectives. The corpus contributes to the field as a valuable resource and tool for cross-linguistic youth language research. As an overarching fundamental goal, the project also aims to expand on the cumulative linguistic and methodological knowledge in spoken corpus design and construction.

Abstract

Assessment of a language is about the evaluation of its vitality. To understand the vitality of a language, a language community should be assessed every few decades, so that the success of any revitalization program can be evaluated according to its vitality index. Based on language vitality, we can formulate specific revitalization methods/programs to help nurture individual languages. In this paper, we critically examine two assessment tools, UNESCO and EGIDS, and explore their effectiveness and problems by applying them to assessing the vitality of Kuwi, an Indigenous language spoken in the Indian states of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha. In the process, we investigate the meaning of the term “Indigenous” by discussing the issues related to language endangerment and its causes in the context of multilingual and pluricultural India.

Abstract

Verb forms are indispensable time-reference expressions in academic citations. While they are often exploited for rhetorical functions, they are observed to be contextualized by citational and linguistic features (henceforth, citation-internal features). This study examines the association between citation-internal features and verb forms, identifying which features contextualize the use of reporting and reported verb forms. It also investigates the relationship between reporting and reported verb forms. Data were drawn from 3,694 citations from a corpus of 852 journal articles in language and linguistics and subjected to chi-square tests and residual analyses. The results indicate the association between citation-internal features and citation verb forms in reporting and reported clauses. Multiple sources, non-integral citations, general and non-human subjects, and non-research verbs contextualize the simple present, present perfect, and modal forms, while single sources, integral citations, definite and human subjects, and research verbs contextualize the simple past. The results also show that the simple past in the reporting clause is associated with the simple past in the reported clause, whereas the simple present and present perfect in the reporting clause, competing time-reference forms, are associated with the simple present and modal forms in the reported clause. The study highlights the importance of considering citation-internal contexts and the temporal relationship between reporting and reported clauses when teaching academic citations.

This article reviews Deleuze, Guattari, and Global Ecologies of Language Learning