global-south
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- PaperELT Journal7 Jun 2026
Toward affective linguistic justice in English-medium instruction
Pramod K Sah
Examines the affective dimensions of multilingualism in English-medium instruction (EMI) in the Global South, theorizing how affect is shaped by ideological, historical, and political entanglements of English dominance. Argues that affective experiences are central to understanding emotional economies in EMI, showing how social imaginaries of English as a language of modernity generate emotional attachments while producing affective harms for multilingual learners. Proposes a framework of affective linguistic justice to address linguistic inequality alongside students' emotional lives.
Original abstract
This paper examines the affective dimensions of multilingualism in English-medium instruction (EMI) in the Global South. While existing research increasingly attends to emotions in EMI, little work has theorized how affect is shaped by the ideological, historical, and political entanglements of English dominance and multilingual marginalization. The paper argues that affective experiences are central to understanding the emotional economies of EMI, showing how social imaginaries of English as a language of modernity and success generate powerful emotional attachments while simultaneously producing affective harms for multilingual learners whose linguistic repertoires are undervalued. It conceptualizes affect not as an individual reaction but as a structuring force shaped by linguistic hierarchies, neoliberal ideologies, and postcolonial histories. By foregrounding emotions as socially constructed and politically consequential, the paper proposes a framework of affective linguistic justice and outlines its implications for EMI/ELT policies and practices that seek to address linguistic inequality alongside students’ emotional lives.
- PaperELT Journal11 Apr 2026
Trauma and language learning: ELT classroom practices in Sri Lanka
Suresh Canagarajah, Canista Arthie Hensman
Contrasts Global North and South perspectives on trauma in English language teaching, highlighting Sri Lankan educators' community-oriented approaches that treat trauma as collective neurodiversity rather than individual pathology. English teachers in Northern Sri Lanka have adopted pedagogical strategies that co-construct meaning with survivors using diversified semiotic resources, building on relational and cultural practices developed after decades of civil war.
Original abstract
Scholarship in the Global North has traditionally treated trauma as an individual pathological condition that needs medical intervention. However, Global South communities such as Sri Lanka approach trauma differently. Since the whole community has lived through centuries of colonization and decades of civil war, trauma is collective. For this reason, the community has developed everyday practices for a supportive environment. Such community-sponsored cultural and relational practices do not pathologize trauma. Survivors are treated as exhibiting forms of neurodiversity that come with their own strengths such as resilience, patience, and dependency. Their communication is not treated as fragmented and incoherent, but as meaningful when others co-construct meanings with them, adopting diversified semiotic resources, and going beyond normative assumptions. English language teachers have adopted pedagogical strategies influenced by such relational orientations. This article will discuss the intuitive strategies Northern Sri Lankan educators and students have adopted since the civil war.