Abstract:

English as an additional language is unanimously considered the cornerstone to the globalised world that favours the transnationalization of higher and further education in non-English speaking educational contexts. It is conceived as a cross-curricular skill that helps students approach a wide array of academic and scientific fields. Although most Argentine university curricula aim at training proficient and autonomous readers, only some specialise in providing our future professionals and scientists with the necessary toolkit to become readers capable of addressing scientific and academic texts, particularly, research papers for their professional, academic and scientific development. Ours is this specific case.

However, even if we position a reading comprehension English program as ‘the’ communicative and linguistic tool to be used in the current transnational and multicultural world of technologic, academic, scientific and cultural production, an academic literacy approach, within the framework of a more comprehensive and integrated learning process, could result most empowering. We propose an alternative approach that seeks to enhance the reading-and-writing pendulum framed within academic-scientific literacy. We claim that, far from being a previously acquired competence or a prerequisite for higher education, academic literacy involves a set of knowledge that develops in contact with the different praxes. Moreover, even if we are certain that this kind of literacy should concern the academic community as a whole, including all the specific disciplines, “English”, as a required subject of most curricula, enjoys the golden opportunity to contribute as a leading player in pursuit of this challenge. Thus, this paper aims to present the conceptual framework underpinning a proposal of English at higher level with a critical, integral stance that regards a foreign language class as the ideal context to foster academic-scientific training committed to ethical and democratic values, a stance that departs from the limited economicist conception of “English” as a mere tool for the transmission of professional and labor skills.

Keywords:

English, cross-curricular skill, higher education, academic literacy, reading comprehension.