Meng Huat Chau
Universiti Malaya, English Language, Faculty Member
- Meng Huat Chau teaches and mentors Masters and PhD students conducting research in applied linguistics and language e... moreMeng Huat Chau teaches and mentors Masters and PhD students conducting research in applied linguistics and language education at Universiti Malaya (UM). He holds/has held Visiting Scholar or Professorships at Jeonbuk National University in the Republic of Korea, the University of Cambridge in the UK, and Yogyakarta State University in Indonesia. Before joining UM in 2010, he spent over ten happy years working with students and teachers from primary and secondary schools, and from other institutions of higher education.edit
This paper considers potential contributions applied linguists can make towards important real-world issues which demand social engagement and action. One case in point is how applied linguists can contribute towards the achievement of... more
This paper considers potential contributions applied linguists can make towards important real-world issues which demand social engagement and action. One case in point is how applied linguists can contribute towards the achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. We provide an illustrative study in which we utilized computer tools to investigate media reporting as a way to promote awareness of basic human needs. The study examined the relative coverage of issues of basic human needs (particularly extreme scarcity of food, clean water and sanitation), and of the COVID-19 outbreak, in four major newspapers from Malaysia, Singapore, the UK and the US. Findings were reported and reasons explored with insights from the literature and professionals working in the media and related sectors. The distribution of media coverage, we argue, reflects not a mere crisis of numbers but a crisis of responsibility and values. This paper, we hope, serves to highlight how applied linguists and language educators can be more socially engaged; they can make a contribution to the wider discussion concerning, among other important issues, the role and responsibility of media in shaping the public’s views and actions on issues that are at the heart of human sustainable development.
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This preface to an ecolinguistics book from Springer on children's drawings includes a contemporary take on the United Nations' six environmental education objectives formulated in the 1970s.
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Until very recently, much of the educational and applied linguistics discourse about students and their learning was based on a deficit view (e.g., “low proficiency,” “they should know this,” “they need to improve their command of... more
Until very recently, much of the educational and applied linguistics discourse about students and their learning was based on a deficit view (e.g., “low proficiency,” “they should know this,” “they need to improve their command of English”). Such a view justifies the traditional role of teachers imparting knowledge and students passively absorbing it. In fact, John Dewey, writing over a century ago, highlighted this sad state of affairs in education: Why is it, in spite of the fact that teaching by pouring in, learning by a passive absorption, are universally condemned, that they are still so entrenched in practice? That education is not an affair of “telling” and being told but an active and constructive process, is a principle almost as generally violated in practice as conceded in theory. (Dewey, 1916/2001, pp. 43-44) In this short contribution, we share our views on how inclusive language education may be promoted based on Global Englishes and translanguaging through a reconceptu...
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Abstract The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework has been extensively studied. While prior research has investigated the development and validity of the CoI theoretical construct, few studies have focused on the interdependent Cognitive,... more
Abstract The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework has been extensively studied. While prior research has investigated the development and validity of the CoI theoretical construct, few studies have focused on the interdependent Cognitive, Social and Teaching Presences of the framework and none have been conducted based on a positive framing of Global Englishes (GE) which directly challenges a monolingual ideology. This mixed methods study considers how GE users in a Second Language Acquisition postgraduate course at a research university in Malaysia experienced these three Presences in their course, and how knowledge was collaboratively constructed in relation to their experience with these Presences. Data sources consisted of the CoI surveys and discussion board posts. Analysis of these posts focused on the relationship between CoI Presences, GE user participation and knowledge construction. Findings suggest that the GE users actively constructed knowledge collaboratively in the CoI, and that they took on varied roles which demonstrated the three Presences. This study makes an empirical contribution to the body of research on GE users and a functioning CoI in asynchronous discussion boards. Additionally, it highlights the importance and potential value of a conscious, empowering framing of students as GE users in transforming research possibilities and outcomes in Applied Linguistics.
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To promote a more open and more self‐aware Applied Linguistics, we can consider how the many current and developing initiatives and resources in the field can be instruments for achieving a better world. For instance, applied linguists... more
To promote a more open and more self‐aware Applied Linguistics, we can consider how the many current and developing initiatives and resources in the field can be instruments for achieving a better world. For instance, applied linguists have examined such issues as inclusiveness (e.g., avoiding generic he) and the interface between language and environmental destruction. The purpose of this article, based on the same spirit of inclusiveness and addressing global concerns, is to highlight an observation about the instruction on the restrictive use of “who” with human beings in the recent seventh edition of the Publication manual of the American Psychological Association (2020), as a case in point to contribute to the wider discussion on inclusive language use and a respect for nonhuman animals. We invite fellow applied linguists to reflect on this issue together.
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Recent years have seen increased attention to the need for promoting diversity and inclusion in language education. A recent special issue of ELT Journal, for example, was devoted to an exploration of the importance of creating... more
Recent years have seen increased attention to the need for promoting diversity and inclusion in language education. A recent special issue of ELT Journal, for example, was devoted to an exploration of the importance of creating educational environments that are inclusive of different identities that relate to gender and sexuality (Banegas & Evripidou, 2021). Around the same time, a special issue of the Forum of another leading journal of the field, TESOL Quarterly, focused on the notion of ableism. In the words of the guest editor Subtirelu (2021, p. 670), the issue was “intended to explore how concepts of what ‘normal’ abilities are or should be make English language teaching inaccessible, ineffective, or oppressive for many students”. In this special issue of TESL-EJ, we focus on Global Englishes and translanguaging, two areas that have attracted much recent interest and efforts as ways to advance the agenda of diversity and inclusion in language education. As expressed in the ini...
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This article has one theme and two parts. The theme is that we humans can do more and do it more enjoyably when we cooperate. The first part of the article explains eight principles from cooperative learning, a methodology that... more
This article has one theme and two parts. The theme is that we humans can do more and do it more enjoyably when we cooperate. The first part of the article explains eight principles from cooperative learning, a methodology that facilitates students learning in groups of two-four members, along with the learning they do with teachers and by studying on their own. The second part describes four cooperative learning techniques, as a way to bring to life the eight principles from the first part, and also to provide readers of the article with ready-made ideas for using cooperative learning in their own teaching. This article suggests that shorter cooperative learning activities can prepare students for doing projects, and that students can do shorter cooperative learning activities as part of the work they do on projects.
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This article considers potential impacts the study of language, including ecolinguistics, can have on important real-world issues, and how linguists and others can involve themselves in addressing these issues for a sustainable future.... more
This article considers potential impacts the study of language, including ecolinguistics, can have on important real-world issues, and how linguists and others can involve themselves in addressing these issues for a sustainable future. The article is divided into two parts. The first part provides an illustrative study in which computer tools were utilized to investigate media reporting. The study examined the relative coverage of issues of basic human needs (food, clean water, and sanitation), which are part of the focus of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, and of the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, in four major newspapers from Malaysia, Singapore, the UK and the US. Data were collected between November 1, 2019 to March 31, 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic was in its early days in terms of worldwide attention. During that time period, the pandemic received far more coverage in those newspapers than did the other issues, even though basic human needs greatly outweighed the COVID-19 ...
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The past 20 years have witnessed major shifts in language and education policy in Malaysia. This reflects a range of social, economic, and political forces that influence and shape the policymaking in this multi-ethnic and multicultural... more
The past 20 years have witnessed major shifts in language and education policy in Malaysia. This reflects a range of social, economic, and political forces that influence and shape the policymaking in this multi-ethnic and multicultural country. Past research has suggested that language and education policies in Malaysia tend to have two main stances and are generally related to Malay (the national language), English, Mandarin, and Tamil. One stance is related to issues of globalization and employability, and the other is related to national and ethnic identities. In view of these stances, this paper seeks to contribute to the discussion and debates on these issues by empirically investigating inherent ideological positions in official statements published in two newspapers in the past 20 years. Specifically, it adopts concepts from critical discourse studies, and uses methods from computational linguistics to examine official statements from a total of 30,508 Malaysian newspaper ar...
Research Interests: Education, Multilingualism, Southeast Asia, Malaysia, Education Policy, and 13 moreLanguage, Indigenous Peoples, Language Policy, Mehrsprachigkeit, Minority, Minderheit, Sprache, Sprachenpolitik, Bildungspolitik, Erziehung Und Bildung, Indigenous and Minority Languages, Educational Policy, and Indigene Völker
In this article, we explore teacher agency through the notion of teacher as changemaker by drawing upon our experiences in both school and university contexts. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, we present a personal account... more
In this article, we explore teacher agency through the notion of teacher as changemaker by drawing upon our experiences in both school and university contexts. The purpose of this article is twofold. First, we present a personal account of our combined professional experiences of over half a century with how agency is exercised and achieved in our classroom and beyond. This consists of a series of reflections from the classes we have taught and individual students we have mentored, to our response to research and curriculum development. In these reflections, wherever relevant, we highlight what informs our decision-making and motivates our action from merely ‘getting our job done’ to a more humanistic engagement with teaching, mentoring and other professional activities. Second, we evaluate our earlier discussion against the backdrop of the notion of teacher as changemaker. We conclude by highlighting that teachers as changemakers are individuals concerned with personal transformati...
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Despite the recent interest in student feedback literacy, few studies have considered how students can be guided to develop this literacy in language learning. This article reports on a study that aims to develop student feedback literacy... more
Despite the recent interest in student feedback literacy, few studies have considered how students can be guided to develop this literacy in language learning. This article reports on a study that aims to develop student feedback literacy through a series of training activities. These activities were introduced to a cohort of students to explore their potential usefulness in helping students to give feedback. Four focal participants shared their experience and reflections, which suggest five components of feedback literacy: (1) appreciating the role of peer feedback; (2) knowing more about peer review; (3) being proactive in the feedback process; (4) learning from giving peer feedback; and (5) managing emotions related to peer feedback. These findings show that the undertaken activities have the potential to develop student feedback literacy. The study also suggests how students made use of cultural artifacts and social others through the activities, and initiated informal conversat...
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This thesis considers how language development takes place over time by a group of 124 secondary school students of English. A series of five studies were conducted for this purpose using the tools and methods from corpus linguistics and... more
This thesis considers how language development takes place over time by a group of 124 secondary school students of English. A series of five studies were conducted for this purpose using the tools and methods from corpus linguistics and written discourse analysis. Specifically, the thesis presents a detailed analysis of (1) how a set of function words (that, to and of) were used by these students over a 24-month period, and (2) how narrating practices concerning the structure of selected individual texts changed over time. The two distinct strands of investigation, both of which based on an inductive methodology, highlight, on the one hand, the extent to which there are common as well as unique aspects of language use observed across time and space (Francis et al., 1996, 1998) and, on the other, the role of human agency and meaning making practices in using linguistic resources over time and in shaping and constructing texts within and across individuals. Taken together, the overal...
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This commentary argues that the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association should okay the use of the relative pronoun "who" with nonhuman animals.
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Part 1: Introduction Introduction Ken Hyland, Chau Meng Huat and Michael Handford Part 2: Corpora and Institutional Uses of Language 2. Professional Communication and Corpus Linguistics Michael Handford 3. Corpora and Academic Discourse... more
Part 1: Introduction Introduction Ken Hyland, Chau Meng Huat and Michael Handford Part 2: Corpora and Institutional Uses of Language 2. Professional Communication and Corpus Linguistics Michael Handford 3. Corpora and Academic Discourse Ken Hyland 4. Corpora and Workplace Discourse Almut Koester Part 3: Corpora in Applied Linguistics Domains 5. Corpora and Translation Studies Sara Laviosa 6. Some Aspects of the Use of Corpora in Forensic Linguistics John Olsson 7. Corpora and Gender Studies Paul Baker 8. Corpora and Media Studies Anne O'Keeffe Part 4: Corpora in New Spheres of Study 9. Corpora and ELF Barbara Seidlhofer 10. Texting and Corpora Caroline Tagg 11. A Conceptual Model for Segmenting and Annotating a Documentary Photograph Corpus Gu Yueguo Part 5. Corpora, Language Learning and Pedagogy 12. Learner Corpora and Second Language Acquisition Chau Meng Huat 13. Corpora in the Classroom: An Applied Linguistic Perspective Lynne Flowerdew 14. Corpora and Materials Design Michael McCarthy and Jeanne McCarten Afterword Susan Hunston Bibliography Index
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This article links two approaches to promoting less competitive, more positive, and more student centered learning environments for language learners: cooperative learning and positive psychology. The article begins by explaining each of... more
This article links two approaches to promoting less competitive, more positive, and more student centered learning environments for language learners: cooperative learning and positive psychology. The article begins by explaining each of these two approaches. First, the article provides background, including research support, for cooperative learning and explains eight cooperative learning principles: maximum peer interactions, equal opportunities to participate, individual accountability, positive interdependence, group autonomy, heterogeneous grouping, teaching collaborative skills, and cooperation as a value. Second, the article supplies similar background, including research support, for positive psychology, including seven principles: relationships with others, responsibility, gratitude, positivity, strengths, kindness, and meaning. The article’s next section explores links between cooperative learning and positive psychology in language education and explains that the use of p...
The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework has been extensively studied. While prior research has investigated the development and validity of the CoI theoretical construct, few studies have focused on the interdependent Cognitive, Social... more
The Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework has been extensively studied. While prior research has investigated the development and validity of the CoI theoretical construct, few studies have focused on the interdependent Cognitive, Social and Teaching Presences of the framework and none have been conducted based on a positive framing of Global Englishes (GE) which directly challenges a monolingual ideology. This mixed methods study considers how GE users in a Second Language Acquisition postgraduate course at a research university in Malaysia experienced these three Presences in their course, and how knowledge was collaboratively constructed in relation to their experience with these Presences. Data sources consisted of the CoI surveys and discussion board posts. Analysis of these posts focused on the relationship between CoI Presences, GE user participation and knowledge construction. Findings suggest that the GE users actively constructed knowledge collaboratively in the CoI, and th...
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Abstract Teacher feedback is of little use without student engagement. Few studies have, however, empirically considered how direct interventions may enhance student engagement with feedback. This study explored whether and to what extent... more
Abstract Teacher feedback is of little use without student engagement. Few studies have, however, empirically considered how direct interventions may enhance student engagement with feedback. This study explored whether and to what extent the use of a rebuttal-writing task can serve as a learning tool to promote student engagement with teacher feedback. Data were collected from 118 undergraduates through multiple sources, including a structured questionnaire, students’ first drafts and revised essays, and a retrospective interview. The results showed that although the students did not really enjoy devoting more time and effort to writing rebuttals while making revisions, they seemed to welcome the rebuttal task, especially when they became more familiar with it, or when they began to see the value of having the task. We discuss these results, suggesting how writing rebuttals promotes student engagement, and argue that students have a key role to play in making teacher feedback work.
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This commentary argues that the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association should okay the use of the relative pronoun "who" with nonhuman animals.
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This article reflects on how we as global citizens and applied linguists might more effectively advocate for addressing issues of injustice to nonhuman animals, particularly a move toward alternative protein diets. It begins by recounting... more
This article reflects on how we as global citizens and applied linguists might more effectively advocate for addressing issues of injustice to nonhuman animals, particularly a move toward alternative protein diets. It begins by recounting the journey of one activist for nonhuman animals, Paul Shapiro. As can be seen in a series of TED Talks he gave, Paul's stance evolved. Initially, he focused on ethical arguments for why humans should move toward alternatives to traditionally produced animal-based foods, such as meat, seafood, milk, and eggs. Then, Paul changed his approach to focus on the development and marketing of alternative protein foods, hoping that the public would no longer need to harm our fellow animals, while still enjoying the appeal of traditional animalbased foods. Instead, humans could satisfy their craving via alternative protein foods, such as plant-based burgers and cell-cultivated chicken. The article also examines criticisms of alternative protein foods and differences between animal welfare and animal rights perspectives. Finally, the article looks at the journeys of the two authors of the current article with examples of projects we have embarked on in our roles as applied linguists.
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The advent of technology has facilitated the study of language development and writing development in the form of learner corpora. While learner corpus studies have flourished in recent years, few consider evaluative language development.... more
The advent of technology has facilitated the study of language development and writing development in the form of learner corpora. While learner corpus studies have flourished in recent years, few consider evaluative language development. This paper reports on a study which examines the use of evaluative that-clauses, a linguistic structure that is regularly used to express evaluation in academic writing, in a longitudinal corpus of 304 argumentative essays written by a group of undergraduate students at a university in Brunei. Results suggest students' dynamic use of language resources over time, and support the findings of previous research on the use of evaluative that-clauses by undergraduate students in other contexts of learning. This study, based on an approach to treating learner language in its own right, contributes to the understanding of the nature of language development. Implications for language teaching, including a revised role for teacher feedback and the use o...
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6.1 Differences between heterogeneous grouping and homogeneous grouping 106 7.1 Categories of intended and implemented values observed 122 7.2 Rank orders and mean ranks for Questionnaire item 3 128 7.3 Rank orders and mean ranks for... more
6.1 Differences between heterogeneous grouping and homogeneous grouping 106 7.1 Categories of intended and implemented values observed 122 7.2 Rank orders and mean ranks for Questionnaire item 3 128 7.3 Rank orders and mean ranks for Questionnaire ...
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This article links two approaches to promoting less competitive, more positive, and more student centered learning environments for language learners: cooperative learning and positive psychology. The article begins by explaining each of... more
This article links two approaches to promoting less competitive, more positive, and more student centered learning environments for language learners: cooperative learning and positive psychology. The article begins by explaining each of these two approaches. First, the article provides background, including research support, for cooperative learning and explains eight cooperative learning principles: maximum peer interactions, equal opportunities to participate, individual accountability, positive interdependence, group autonomy, heterogeneous grouping, teaching collaborative skills, and cooperation as a value. Second, the article supplies similar background, including research support, for positive psychology (also known as positive education), including seven principles: relationships with others, Many adults and children see the world as a place dominated by competition, a place in which this competition often leads people to have negative feelings toward others and even toward themselves (Bregman, 2020). Fortunately, alternatives exist to competition and the resulting negativity. Two of these alternatives are cooperative learning (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec, 2013) and positive psychology (Seligman & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). Cooperative learning encourages students and others to work together toward common goals, and positive psychology encourages people to look for and build upon what is good in people and situations. This article begins by explaining cooperative learning and positive psychology, and how they overlap. The article then discusses how cooperative learning and positive psychology can be combined in language education, and illustrates this combination with two sample lessons.