Proceedings of the - British Association for Applied Linguistics

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The Impact of Applied Linguistics: Proceedings of the 44th Annual Meeting of BAAL University of the West of England � that informed and rational dissent from establishment values and establishment discourse should be one of the main roles of academics, rather than meekly falling into step behind a government directive. Nor am I suggesting that applied linguistics (or any applied subject) should withdraw from engagement with the world beyond academia. On the contrary, it must continue as before to seek to influence "real-world problems in which language is a central issue". But that is not the same as having an impact in government terms. Ironically what is described as academic impact is quite the opposite – it denotes academics taking orders from politicians. This political control is a threat to all disciplines. An additional specific issue for applied linguistics is the role of language in this imposition of control. My view is that applied linguistics will lose all credibility if we fail to comment on the use and abuse of language within and by university management. Why do we accept that we should speak like our communications units, rather than that they should speak like us? As applied linguists one of our most important functions and skills should be to expose and resist the means of manipulation and manufacture of consent. But it appears that in our response to government taking over university goals, and the infection of academic discourse by the language in which those goals are expressed, we have failed not only the outside world but ourselves very badly indeed. I do not say this because I am pessimistic but because I believe that the value of academic discourse lies in its difference from political and market discourse. Academics ought to be sceptics and doubters, especially self doubters – that is how the best ideas are tested and proven. At this point in the history of applied linguistics we are both very vulnerable to being taken over by forces beyond our control, and also to betraying our past achievements. There are pitfalls in complacency, and what we need to do is to confront current threats and learn from past mistakes, rather than burying our heads in the ever shifting sands. 54
Notes 55 British Applied Linguistics: impacts of and impacts on Guy Cook 1. Examples here from publicity materials by American Express, Imperial Tobacco, Marks and Spencer, McDonald's, Monsanto, and The Soil Association. 2. The original list is: "service to the state, competition on the market, independent analysis and critique, new social movements". The glosses in inverted commas are from later in the article. Those without inverted commas are my own. Acknowledgements Many thanks to Alison Sealey and Kieran O'Halloran for their constructive criticism and discussion of earlier drafts. References Berlitz London (2011). Berlitz Training and Methodology. www.berlitz.co.uk/upload/pdfs/Berlitz_Instruction_methodology_WEBSITE.pdf (accessed 8 October 2011). V. Bogdanor (2006). 'Don't let a Quango destroy our academic freedoms.' The Observer, November 26th. (accessed 8 October 2011). www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/nov/26/comment.highereducation Richard Bowring (2011). Letters. London Review of Books. 33(9). 28 April. Christopher J. Brumfit (1995). Teacher Professionalism and Research. In Guy Cook and Barbara Seidlhofer (eds.). Principle and Practice in Applied Linguistics. Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK. 27-42. Christopher J. Brumfit & Keith Johnson (eds.) (1979). The Communicative Approach to Language Teaching. Oxford University Press: Oxford, UK. CLIL Consortium (2010). Global Solutions. www.clilviu.es/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=5&Itemid=29 (accessed 8 October 2011). Samuel Taylor Coleridge ([1817] 1834). Biographia Literaria: biographical sketches of my literary life and opinions. Leavitt, Lord and Co: New York, USA. Stefan Collini (2009). Impact on Humanities: researchers must take a stand now or be judged and rewarded as salesmen. The Times Literary Supplement. November 13. Stefan Collini (2011). From Robbins to McKinsey. London Review of Books. 33(16) 25 August 2011. www.lrb.co.uk/v33/n16/stefan-collini/from-robbins-tomckinsey (accessed 8 October 2011). Guy Cook (2004). Genetically Modified Language. Routledge: London, UK. Guy Cook (2007). "This We Have Done". The Different Vagueness of Poetry and PR. In Joan Cutting (ed.). Vague Language Explored. Palgrave: London, UK. 21-40.
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