Speaker's Abstract

Title:
EAP Practitioners as Collaborative Partners in the Disciplines: Facilitating a Sustainable Model of Academic Literacy Instruction"
 

The rapid expansion of English Medium Instruction (EMI) in universities worldwide has been accompanied by a deficit discourse of students lacking the necessary language proficiency. This perspective obscures the more fundamental challenge faced by all students entering university, namely developing academic literacy, understood as competence in the communicative practices of their chosen disciplines. This competence cannot be acquired through remedial English language courses; rather, it requires the embedding of language and literacy instruction within disciplinary curricula. A sustainable and inclusive model therefore depends on content lecturers integrating academic literacy into their regular teaching and assessment, supported by structured collaborations with English for Academic Purposes (EAP) specialists. However, this provision remains patchy and is constrained by both institutional structures and persistent perceptual barriers.

My talk explores how EAP specialists can make a dual contribution in providing discipline-specific academic literacy support for students and also fostering the professional development of content lecturers. Their expertise in language analysis, pedagogy and materials development enables EAP practitioners to access the discourse conventions of unfamiliar disciplines and to analyse assignment genres as a basis for designing targeted learning resources and student workshops. This expertise is equally valuable in collaboration with content lecturers, as it sharpens their awareness of the specific demands of disciplinary genres, students’ learning needs, and effective strategies for delivering formative feedback. 

Following a discussion of examples of successful collaborations from EMI contexts, the talk will conclude by advocating greater institutional investment in embedded, collaborative approaches. Systematically gathering and disseminating evidence of effective practice across contexts is essential to persuading university leaders to move beyond remedial models towards sustainable, institution-wide academic literacy development that enhances teaching quality and benefits all students.