BGE at EHP

When discussing the idea of a European municipal project on the connotations of words, contacts of the Europäisches Haus Pappenheim showed much interest in the concept of Basic Global English. It seems that among the “middle” and “elder” generation, English is much less known that the EHP had expected. Therefore, an additional preparatory phase has now been implemented in the project plan.

Joachim Grzega

Eurolinguistic Clip on Politeness

If you are familiar with German, you might be interested in my latest Eurolinguistic clip, this time I’m talking about politeness strategies.  It is meant to be an appetizer for my book Europas Sprachen und Kulturen im Wandel der Zeit.

If you are also interested in my earlier Eurolinguistic clips, just insert „Eurolinguistischer Clip“ into YouTube’s search line.

 

Joachim Grzega

International Mother Language Day

Today is UNESCO’s International Mother Language Day. If you are familiar with German, see the contribution on my German blog.

 

Joachim Grzega

New book on European languages and cultures

If you are familiar with German, you may be interested in my latest book Europas Sprachen und Kulturen im Wandel der Zeit, available at amazon.de.

Joachim Grzega

Treuchtlinger Kurier on BGE

The Treuchtlinger Kurier (a local daily) has published a very nice article on Basic Global English today.

 

Joachim Grzega

BGE nominated for award for innovation in adult teaching

ASEcoLi was honored for BGE by getting nominated for the Innovationspreis of the Deutsches Institut für Erwachsenenbildung (DIE). Nominated were 19 out of 60 projects from all over Germany. (Here is the German DIE press release.)

Joachim Grzega

BGE partner school awarded with the „Europe Certificate“

Last Friday my BGE partner school, Alexander-von-Humboldt-Schule in Goldkronach, was bestowed with the „Europaurkunde“ („Europe Certificate“) by Emilia Müller, the Bavarian minister for European Affairs. – for international school projects incl. the use of Basic Global English in Classes 1 and 2 and the use of the internet communication plattform eTwinning. The event was hosted by myself (assisted by Bea Klüsener). Here is the link to a press release (in German).

Joachim Grzega

The Socioeconomic Power of Language Policies

My latest work on the field of socioeconomic linguistics has now appeared in the International Journal for the Sociology of Languages. The empirical study is entitled “On the correlation between socioeconomics and policies of languages in official contexts”. The article deals with the question of how the socioeconomic performance of countries is correlated with the kind and number of languages for official contexts.

A New Language Teaching Method on the Occasion of the European Day of Languages

September 26 is the European Day of Languages. It aims at celebrating the multilingualism of Europe, thus encouraging the multilingualism of Europeans. As the creator of Basic Global English, I would like to take the opportunity to remind readers that BGE is not a concept—in contrast to what some believe—that is conceived as making other languages dispensable. Just on the contrary, BGE is an element in my concept of global triglossia: Everyone should be competent in his mother tongue, Global English (successful global communication being the model), and at least one more language (a native variety of that language being the model). As a matter of fact, I have also said that it could be Europeans’ goal to be competent in even more languages. Since I could prove BGE to be an effective way to reach competence in global communication up to an intermediate level, I have tried to focus more on improving teaching other languages.

Based on my previous experiences in teaching and learning language I am suggesting a new language teaching method for beginners here, which I would like to call “language workout method”.

Introduction to Linguistics by Joachim Grzega

My materials for the introduction to linguistics have now been published as a book at LINCOM. If students order it directly at LINCOM, they will get it at a special discount clearly below the prices for other introductions of smaller size.  The book’s full title is Introduction to Linguistics from a Global Perspective: An Alternative Approach to Language and Languages. It is based on a 10-plus-year-long teaching experience. 10 chapters