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Needs Analysis in ESP Setting
In this decade, as Rahman (2015) states, the term of Analysis of needs appeared in West Bengal, India in order to refer to what learners will be required to do to master the target language over the course. -
After the Second World War (1937-1946)
According to Hutchinson and Waters (1987), the teaching of English for Specific Purposes after World War II was mainly addressed to meet the needs of learners of language for science, technology and business rather than from an academic context. -
Authenticity in materials
As West (1995) mentions, in the mid-1960s the first generation of ESP materials appeared with the purpose of taking skills as their principal means of selection. -
English for Specific Purposes appearance
At the beginning of the 1960s, the Commonwealth Education Committee introduced in 1961 the term ‘English for Specific Purposes’ at the Makerere Conference. -
The Early years of ESP (1962- 1981)
During this time, Swales (1988) began the 'Episodes of ESP' by considering the grammatical features across genres such as textbooks and journal articles in order to determine general sentence - level characteristics of English for science and technology (EST) in academic contexts since it became important. -
The register analysis phase (1965-1974)
This approach was prompted by Halliday, Mclntosh, and Strevens through The Linguistic Sciences and Language Teaching in 1964. Here was stated the language’s variation according to the speakers and the context. Therefore, one language can have diverse varieties which are divided by its users (dialects) and its different uses (registers). This is what Widdowson (1979) called types of text. -
The discourse analysis phase (1974-1980)
As Dudley-Evans (2001) highlights, Rhetorical or discourse analysis introduced the idea of relating language form to language use which facilitates the selection of appropriate teaching materials.
Moreover, the development of study skills was becoming English for Academic Purposes’ focus in the late 1970s since the discourse analysis of ESP was only concerned with language. -
The concept of authenticity - The skills and strategies approach
During this decade, skills and strategies-based approaches to ESP enlarged the conception of authenticity in two principal ways that still remain nowadays.
First, the authenticity of text was narrowed to differentiate between different types of text generated by each skill. For instance, reading could be sub-divided into reading reports, technical journals, instruction manuals, etc.
Secondly, the conception of authenticity was enlarged to embrace the authenticity of task. -
Period: to
The concept of need-The target situation analysis (1980-1987)
In this approach, the existing knowledge was driven to a more scientific basis by establishing procedures for relating language analysis more closely to the learner's reasons for learning. Therefore, it was recognized that an ESP course aims to enable learners to successfully achieve the language by improving the target situation and afterward assuming a rigorous analysis
of the linguistic features of that situation. -
Broadening the Scope of ESP (1981-1990)
This second historical period was characterized by John Swales’s work in ‘Aspects of Article Introductions’ which defined an approximation to Genre Analysis (1990). This attempt to strengthen ESP’s scope by John Swales and Ann Johns’ contribution throughout English for Specific Purposes Journal, reinforced a period seeking for published research and pedagogical practice. -
Latest trends within ESP: A learning-centered approach
‘English for Specific Purposes: A learning-centred approach’, Hutchinson and Waters' (1987) book, was a key to reinstating the psychological/educational bases of ESP since it depicts the primacy of learning processes. Overall, the authors portrayed their concern with language learning and not with language use because according to them, a feasible approach to ESP must be committed to entail the understanding of language learning processes. -
The Modern Age - New journals (1990-2011)
The Modern Age of ESP (Importance of new international journals)
During this period, ESP-related articles were being involved in more inclusive applied linguistics journals. This can be reflected in the Journal of English for Academic Purposes ( JEAP), which was established by Liz Hamp - Lyons and Ken Hyland in 2001 in order to become a tool to improve academic texts for different contexts. -
References
García Mayo, M. (1998). The development of ESP: Language description and its influence on pedagogical materials. Revista de Lenguas para Fines Específicos, (5), 205-228. Paltridge, B., & Starfield, S. (2013). The Handbook of English for Specific Purposes. UK: Wiley-Blackwell. Rahman, M. (2015). English for Specific Purposes (ESP): A Holistic Review. Universal Journal of Educational Research, 3(1), 24-31.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1053934.pdf