Note: This post refers to a call for papers that was circulated in 2014. The content of the post is no longer current, but the post is retained here for archival reasons. For more up-to-date publication opportunities, consider subscribing to this blog.
Update: The book described below was published in 2016 as Language, Identity and Education on the Arabian Peninsula: Bilingual Policies in a Multilingual Context (Louisa Buckingham, ed.).
Contributions are invited for an edited collection entitled The Place of English in Societies of the Arabian Gulf, Language, Identity and Education on the Arabian Peninsula, which is currently under consideration by Multilingual Matters.
The book
In the words of the editor, Louisa Buckingham (Bilkent University, Turkey):
This book will provide an overview of language issues relating to the use of English and local languages in countries of the Arabian Gulf. English […] is used in public, educational, professional and domestic contexts and thus is a language which is used on a daily basis in socially prestigious settings and utilitarian, transactional interactions. […] English has influenced the Arabic dialects of the region and, in turn, local English use has developed particular characteristics through the influence of Arabic and South Asian languages to the extent that some scholars speculate the gradual evolution of a local Gulf English dialect. Although the relationship between the use English and the use Arabic in Gulf countries may conceivably shift in future decades, English appears likely to retain a prominent, though perhaps not uncontested, place in most Gulf societies.
Call for chapters
The editor has suggested that topics of interest for inclusion in the collection include (but are not limited to) the following:
- Linguistic focus (e.g., English and Arabic, Language contact, English as a lingua franca)
- Public use of English (e.g., English in the media, public spaces, professional and academic contexts, the workplace, and education)
- Sociolinguistic focus (e.g., social aspects of English in Gulf Arab societies, the place of English in Gulf Arab families, English and Gulf Arab identity)
Proposals (300 words max.) should contain an outline of the topic, describe what data will be used, discuss the relevance or importance of the topic, and provide an overview of the literature to be consulted. Proposals should be mailed to louisabuckingham [at] bilkent.edu [dot] tr by 15 May 2014.
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About me
Achilleas Kostoulas is an applied linguist and language teacher educator at the Department of Primary Education, University of Thessaly, Greece. He holds a PhD and an MA in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from the University of Manchester, UK and a BA in English Studies from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
His research explores a wide range of issues connected with language (teacher) education, including language contact and plurilingualism, linguistic identities and ideologies, language policy and didactics, often using a Complex Dynamic Systems Theory to tease out connections between them. Some of his publications in the field include the research monograph The Intentional Dynamics of TESOL (2021, De Gruyter; with Juup Stelma) and the edited volume Doctoral Study and Getting Published (2025, Emerald; with Richard Fay), as well as numerous other publications.
Achilleas currently contributes to several projects that bring together his long-standing interests in language education, teacher development, and the social dimensions of language learning. As the coordinator of the expert team of AI Lang (Artificial Intelligence in Language Education), an initiative of the European Centre for Modern Languages of the Council of Europe, he works on developing principles and resources to help educators make informed, pedagogically grounded use of AI in their teaching. He also leads the University of Thessaly team of ReaLiTea (Research Literacy of Teachers), a project that supports language teachers in developing the capacity to engage with, and contribute to, educational research. Alongside these, he contributes to LocalLing, a Horizon-funded initiative to preserve and strengthen heritage and minority languages globally.
In addition to the above, Achilleas is the (co)editor-in-chief of the newly established European Journal of Education and Language Review, and welcomes contributions that explore the dynamic intersections between language, education, and society.
About this post
This post was originally published in 2014 in order to disseminate the call for papers for what eventually became the edited volume ‘Language, Identity and Education on the Arabian Peninsula’ (Buckingham, 2016). The content of the post is no longer relevant, but I have decided to retain the post here for archival purposes. Updates since 2016 have focused on aesthetics and functionality, but not substantive content changes.
The content of the post does not reflect the views of the book editor, Multilingual matters, my employers or other entities with whom I am affiliated.
The featured image is a photograph of the cover page of the book (own work).
Image Credit: eye/see @ Flickr CC BY-NC-ND
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