The Role of ESP

Rosiana
Intan Pertiwi
Lathifah Rahmawati
 1. The Lack of Orthodoxy
• A first stage of ESP there was no question of using authentic texts.

• According to A. J. Herbert (r965) he created his own texts to high light language features much in the same way
as was done in General English, therefore continued in the era of discourse analysis.

• Phillips and Shettlesworth (1978) on the other hand support the use of the authentic text 'as a repository of
natural language use and the stimulus for a variety of communication skills'.

• Authenticity is not a characteristic of a text in itself: it is a feature of a text in a particular context. A text can
only be truly authentic, in other words, in the context for which it was originally written.

• in ESP any text is automatically removed from its original context, there can be no such thing as an authentic
text in ESP.
 1. The Lack of Orthodoxy
• The importance of a text is not intrinsic to the text, but devices from the rule the text has to play in the
teaching/ learning process.

• ESP teacher will often have to orientate themselves to difficult problems with little or no guidance.

• There are no easy solutions to this situation, but some methods that might be useful are:

a. Surveys of the history and present state of ESP in your own or neighbor countries:
b. Formations of groups of ESP teacher, perhaps allied to any existing national organization for the promotion of
ELT, to further the support and development of ESP:
c. Establishment of newsletters and other form of publication, for exchanging information and views about ESP in
your country:
d. Provision of pre-and in-service teacher training focusing on ESP issues. Such provision can take a variety of
form: workshops, seminars, short courses etc.
 1. The Lack of Orthodoxy
• In short, ESP teachers cannot turn to linguistics and psychology in the hope of finding ready-made,
straight forward answers to the problems that they will meet. Rather, they need to distil and
synthesize, from the range of options available. All ESP teachers are ineffect pioneers who are helping
to shape the world of ESP.
 2. New Realms of Knowledge

• Teachers who have been trained for General English teaching or for the teaching of Literature may suddenly
find themselves having to teach with texts whose content they know little or nothing about.

• In this case, there are 3 questions that can use for ESP teacher to ask their self.
1. Does the content of ESP materials need to be highly specialized?
2. Why do so many ESP teachers find it difficult to comprehend ESP subject matter?
3. What kind of knowledge is required of the ESP teacher?
 2. New Realms of Knowledge
1. Does the content of ESP materials need to be highly specialized?

In specialized texts the discourse structure may be denser and more formalized but not different in kind from
that of less specialized material. There may well be a heavier load of specialist vocabulary, bur this need not
make it more difficult to understand. Indeed it may make it easier, because many such terms are internationally
used. In shoot, the linguistic knowledge need to comprehend the specialist text is little different from that
rammed comprehend the general text. The difference in comprehension on lies ill the subject knowledge, not
the language knowledge
 2. New Realms of Knowledge

2.Why do so many ESP teachers find it difficult to comprehend ESP subject matter?

This problem arises from 4 causes:

a) There is a tradition in education of separating the Humanities and the Sciences. English teachers often
receive little or no education in the Science.
b) Many ESP teachers are reluctant settlers in the new territory
c) Considering the scale of ESP revolution it must be admitted that little effort has been made to retrain
teachers or to at least allay their fears.
d) The general attitude in ESP seems to be except teachers to conform to requirements of the target situation.
 2. New Realms of Knowledge
3. What kind of knowledge is required of the ESP teacher?

ESP teacher doesn’t need to learn specialist subject knowledge. They require three things only:
a) a positive attitude towards the ESP content
b) a knowledge of the fundamental principles of the subject area
c) an awareness of how much they probably already know

In other words, the ESP teacher should not become a teacher of the subject matter, but rather an interested
student of the subject matter. Many ESP teachers are surprised at how much knowledge of the subject matter
they “pick up” by teaching the materials or talking to students. the important thing is the ESP teacher must know
something about the subject matter of the ESP material.
 3. Change In The Status of English
Teaching
• One of the characteristic of ESP in relation to general English is English changes becoming a subject to a
service industry for other specialism. It would a lowering of status for the teacher, or at least this seems to be
the ESP teachers' view.

• The justification becomes even less significant when we take into account underlying skills and strategies.

• The reasons for having a subject-specific approach rest almost entirely on two affective factors generated by
the learners themselves:
1. Face validity. Subject-specific materials look relevant.
2. Familiarity. If learners have got used to working with a particular kind of text in the ESP classroom they will
be less apprehensive about tackling it in the target situation.
 3. Change In The Status of English
Teaching
Strategy for dealing with the problem.

1. The first step is to try and establish groupings along broad subject lines: commerce and economics, physical
sciences, medical and biological sciences etc. This should be within the reach of almost all institutions.
2. Avoid highly specific materials and try to give everyone's specialism some chance. In this way you may not
please everyone all the time, but at least you won't displease anyone all the time.
3. Look for topics which give access to a number of different specialist areas.
4. Make learners aware of the lack of specificity of their needs. You will not achieve this by simply telling them
that they do not need subject specific materials. Get them to discover it by themselves by doing their own
language analysis.
5. If people are having fun, they are far less likely to complain. Making the methodology more interactive and
enjoyable can be a valuable weapon in countering demands for subject-specific ESP.
 3. Change In The Status of English
Teaching
• There is little justification for having very specific materials. But if the learners
still demand the materials, then the ESP teacher can try to negotiate a
compromise: making learners more aware of their real needs and using an
enjoyable methodology to divert attention from areas of possible conflict.
Then, the teacher becomes accountable to other parties - sponsors, subject
specialists, learners and as such takes on the additional role of negotiator.
Friday 28th May 2021

Thank you for listening