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THE LINGUISTICS STUDENT’S HANDBOOK 80
term should simply be abandoned or that the notion behind the term should
be discarded. There are plenty of instances where the term ‘native speaker’ can
act as a perfectly informative and useful label, communicating an appropriate
idea economically. But it is a term which needs to be used with appropriate care
because a precise definition is, if not impossible, at least difficult, and precisely
who is covered by the label may not be clear in individual cases. For much fuller
discussion, see Coulmas (1981), Paikeday (1985) and Davies (2003).
References
Coulmas, Florian (ed.) (1981). A Festschrift for Native Speaker. The Hague: Mouton.
Davies, Alan (2003). The Native Speaker: Myth and Reality. Clevedon: Multilingual
Matters.
Lim, Lisa & Joseph A. Foley (2004). English in Singapore and Singapore English. In
Lisa Lim (ed.), Singapore English. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: Benjamins, 1–18.
Paikeday, Thomas M. (1985). The Native Speaker is Dead! Toronto and New York: PPI.