Thumboo Edwin. "Foreword" in The Three Circles of English: Language specialists talk about the English language. Singapore: CFA, UniPress, 2001

FOREWORD

After Kachru …..

Behind the papers gathered in The Three Circles of English is a still unfolding success story of mapping diasporic, non-native, national varieties of English. They come after Braj B. Kachru, who initiated, and sustained this field, and to whom they pay tribute, celebrate and honour.

Behind the success story of English lie the history, politics, power and genius of a people as they expanded, refined and pursued their permanent interests. Elizabethan England laid the foundations for what, through exploration, freebooting, founding of colonies, growth in trade, successful wars, early industrial revolution, better manufactures, developed into an empire that girded the world. While its subjects had many languages - ranging from Sanskrit and Chinese to Igbo and Hausa - they were firmly ruled by one, English.

It is remarkable that an empire of such extent, with a tremendous mix of cultures, was governed by a comparatively small number of mzungu, supported later by locally trained, hardworking, middle level manpower. Thus the non-Anglo-Saxon areas required an English-based educational system. First introduced in India where colleges and universities emerged by the mid-nineteenth century, it was extended empire- wide as circumstances allowed. By the nineteen fifties, when they were expecting independence, virtually all colonies, even those modestly endowed, had tertiary institutions. They provided a core of English-educated elites who were to play a critical part in the development of nation-states.

For a number of reasons, not least of which being its value as a bridge language in plural societies, English is vital in major areas such as administration, business management, science and technology, mass media, finance, leisure industries, global communication, and education, thus underpinning the overall modernisation that new nations seek. The two-part question is what English? whose English? She had stayed behind, a colonial legacy, possessed, her parts of speech rubbing, and rubbed by, those of other languages. She served other cultures, re-orientating, evolving varieties while settling into new habitations, acquiring new names of which Indian English, Filipino English, South African English, Nigerian English, and Australian English are examples. She has been taught; she is taught; she has been studied; she is studied. The major difference between past and present is, surely, that now we are responsible for its shape and destiny in our bandar dan negri. What model to adopt, how to cope with a vastly expanded teaching programme, how to maintain standards, how to ensure intelligibility, the implications for pedagogy, and other key issues, required a strong sense of local, national conditions. The theology and its permutations, the specialists and their methods, generated in metropolitan universities and institutes, were exported. At one point we were fed on KELP (key English language posts). The results were mixed.

Approaches more fully informed on socio-linguistic contexts, political, economic and educational priorities, and other defining realities affecting language, were essential both for the analysis of issues, and the framing of prospective answers. For these to be seen steadily, and seen whole, required a fundamental shift through a paradigm worked out from within, with the necessary vigour equal to what was, especially in retrospect, a mission-movement in need of a founding guru. It demanded fresh thinking, new initiatives, better-informed perspectives, to resolve old issues. Hence Braj B. Kachru, who was already doing this in "The Indianness of Indian English" which appeared in 1965.

Kachru is the pre-eminent authority on non-native-Englishes. His wide and profound influence rests on work as scholar and teacher, drawing on rich, seminal ideas, astutely-argued theory and paradigm, all tested and disseminated through publications, contributions to conferences and symposia and a growing number of influential postgraduate students. Many have courage equal to desire; not many in the past had the means equal to that desire. Kachru was the first to provide the means, the theory and practice. They continue his work, applying its perspectives and insights, adapting them, adding their own to the growing body of significant scholarship on the growing number of non-native varieties brought under scrutiny. His early, pioneering research on Indian English looked at its phonetics, phonology, morphology, lexis, syntax, and semantics. There is a similar dine of usage, allowing a theoretical perspective that equally emphasises both non-native and native varieties.
This was another important development in a series covering the theory and practice of studying English. The pedagogic and other implications of the happenings in Indian and the other non-native-Englishes, took him into that whole network of issues concerning language in society, language in action. It generated a remarkable range of key topics: bilingual language contact, bilingualism and creativity, code- switching, code-mixing, English for special purposes, language policy, language planning, language identity, non-native English speech communities, second language acquisition, second language teaching, and the nature of the bilingual's discourse. These often required fresh concepts, notions and definitions, a Kachru lexicon. They include his three circles (which help locate varieties, usages, functions and relationships), context of situation contextualisation, diaspora, hybridization, indiginisation, nativisation, language as power, speech fellowship and others the reader will discover in this volume.

Braj, as his many friends, colleagues and students call him is that rare person; and rare in both senses of the word. He inspires and gives and shares, aided and abetted by Yamuna, herself an outstanding scholar and teacher, who adds considerably o the warmth and charm of the Kachrus. Any tribute to him is a tribute to her.

The Conference would not have been the happy, scholarly gathering it was without presence the work, the co-operation of many, to each of whom grateful thanks are due. To the Kachrus for being with us, adding much to the spirit and substance of the occasion. To the contributors for their papers, lively discussion and their camaraderie to Larry Smith and S. N. Sridhar their neat Introduction to Kachru; James E. Alatis and Peter Lowenburg a judicious Afterword to a challenging Conference and collection of papers. For editorial, organizational and other help thanks are due to Nallamma Winslow, Chew V'Ming, Carolyn Chiam, Susan Frenck, Julia Goh, Sheila Loke, Maureen Oliveiro, Poon Swan Ping and Stanley Yunick.

To know Braj, and Yamuna, is to be rich in more ways than I can count. It is a sentiment, a truth, a privilege shared by many.