SCIENCES POSTGRADUATE STUDENTS’ ATTITUDES TOWARDS MAKING ENGLISH THE LANGUAGE OF INSTRUCTION IN MOROCCAN TERTIARY EDUCATION

Khadija Sekkal, Moulay Abderrahman Sidi Hida

Abstract


The current study investigated the attitudes of Moroccan university students in scientific disciplines towards using English as a language of instruction in tertiary education. Major published articles on English language described the upsurge of its speakers in the expanding circle as phenomenal. Morocco is no exception. Studies have shown that there has been a growing interest in learning English among youth. By the same token, students have been less enthusiastic about French currently used in academic settings and believe that English is more useful for the future of the country. In order to test the validity of the claim, quantitative research in which ninety-eight university students from different master’s program participated was conducted. The aim was to know their attitude towards making English the medium of instruction in higher education and either confirm or disconfirm the claim made by researchers in scholarly journals. After undertaking a survey questionnaire, it was shown that the vast majority of postgraduates specializing in scientific disciplines were in favor of using English in their studies. They definitely wanted English to take over French currently used in academic context in Morocco.

 

Article visualizations:

Hit counter


Keywords


English as a global language, the language of instruction, the language of progress and prosperity, the language of the future

Full Text:

PDF

References


Ayoub, L. and Ayoub, N. (2018). On Language Policy in Morocco: Towards a Prestige Planning Approach. HAL Open Science, p. 4. Retrieved from https://shs.hal.science/halshs-02867658

Belhiah, H. and Abdelatif, A. (2016). English as a Medium of Instruction in Moroccan Higher Education. Arab World English Journal.

Crystal, D. (2003). English as a global Language, (2nd ed). Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 3 – 5

Crystal, D. (2019). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of English Language, (1st ed). Cambridge University Press, p. 115

Errihani, M. (2017). English Education Policy and Practice in Morocco. In book: English Education Policy in the Middle East and North Africa (pp.115-131). Springer.

Ennaji, M. (2005). Multilingualism, Cultural Identity, and Education in Morocco. Springer Science & Business Media, Inc., p.120

Jenkins, J. (2009). “Who Speaks English Today?” World Englishes. A Resource Book for Students, (2nd ed). London: Routledge, pp. 15-24

Kachru, B. (1992). World Englishes: Approaches, Issues and Resources. Language Teaching, 25, 1-14. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1017/S0261444800006583

Nunan, D. (2015). Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. Taylor & Francis, Routledge, New York.

Pennycook, A. (2017). The Cultural Politics of English as an International Language. Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, London and New York.

Sadiqi, F. (2003). Women, Gender and Language in Morocco. Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands, p.50.




DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.46827/ejes.v11i1.5163

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2024 Khadija Sekkal, Moulay Abderrahman Sidi Hida

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Copyright © 2015-2023. European Journal of Education Studies (ISSN 2501 - 1111) is a registered trademark of Open Access Publishing Group. All rights reserved.

This journal is a serial publication uniquely identified by an International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) serial number certificate issued by Romanian National Library (Biblioteca Nationala a Romaniei). All the research works are uniquely identified by a CrossRef DOI digital object identifier supplied by indexing and repository platforms. All authors who send their manuscripts to this journal and whose articles are published on this journal retain full copyright of their articles. All the research works published on this journal are meeting the Open Access Publishing requirements and can be freely accessed, shared, modified, distributed and used in educational, commercial and non-commercial purposes under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).