Abstract
I came across my first copy of RELC Journal – the inaugural issue – when I was a PhD student at Université Laval in Quebec City in 1970. I was curious to learn about what was then known as the Regional English Language Centre – a centre hosted by Singapore as part of its membership of SEAMEO (the South East Asian Ministers of Education Organization) – and its role in the region and made my first visit to the Regional English Language Centre when I was passing through Singapore on my way to teach in Indonesia in 1972. I met the gracious Madame Tai Yu Lin, the first director of RELC, on that occasion and she invited me to consider joining the staff of RELC on completion of my year in Indonesia, an appointment that was made possible through the auspices of the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs. On joining RELC, one of my assignments was to help edit and promote the journal, a task that I was asked to resume at times when I have served as the journal’s editor. This issue marks the 48th year of the journal so I thought it would be interesting to look back at the development of the journal since its inception.
The first issue of RELC Journal appeared in June 1970, two years after RELC was established, and contained a selection from among 14 ‘theoretical’ and 18 ‘applied’ articles presented at a regional seminar held in 1969 on ‘New Developments in the Theory and Methods of Teaching and Learning English’. The journal was described as a ‘Journal of English Language Teaching in Southeast Asia’. In 1977, RELC changed its name from Regional English Language Centre, to Regional Language Centre, reflecting its focus on languages in the region and not simply English. With its June 1977 issue, the name of the journal was extended to include ‘A Journal of Language Teaching and Research in South East Asia’. The addition of ‘Research’ to the title of the journal reflected a recognition of the growing need for research into the complex issues involved in second language teaching in the region.
Many regional as well as internationally-renowned scholars appear throughout the journal from its earliest day, such as Peter Strevens, Andrew Gonzales, Henry Widdowson, Paul Nation, Braj Kachru, Ted Llamzon, John Swales, Amy Tsui, J.D. Brown, Martha Pennington, S. Pit Corder, Merrill Swain, Lim Kiat Boey, H.V. George, Eddie Kuo, Achara Wangsotorn, and David Nunan. In its early days, articles in the journal were often written by request, or if submissions were received they were reviewed primarily by RELC staff. Many of the articles published in the first ten years of the journal were opinion pieces or descriptions of current practice related to teaching methods, teaching materials and assessment (e.g. teaching or assessing the four skills). English was the primary focus of the articles published during this period, with occasional reference to languages other than English.
A recurring topic in the early issues was the nature of the discipline of language teaching itself and the role of linguistics within it, with descriptions of problematic aspects of English grammar and phonology. Chomsky is fairly frequently referenced. The journal also reflected the emergence of new trends and issues in language teaching such as English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and the status of English in the region. Initially there were few research or data-based articles, reflecting the fact that ‘applied linguistics’ was still an emerging field within language teaching. The first articles to report an experimental study appeared in the mid 1970s, but by the end of the first decade of the journal, articles with a true experimental design became more frequent. However, neither the role of technology nor second language teacher education were issues of interest at that time.
The next 10 years of the journal (1970 to 1980) reflect to some extent a ‘coming of age’ both of the field of language teaching as well as of the RELC Journal. By the end of the decade, few opinion pieces or position articles were seen in the journal and few prescriptions for practice unless supported by evidence, data, and examples. Increasingly the articles published were research and data-based, including descriptions and analysis of language use and language learning as well as a growing number of research-based studies using quantitative approaches. There were no studies up to this time using qualitative or mixed methods designs. However, the range of issues contributors wrote about had expanded significantly beyond the focus on teaching methods that was often a focus in earlier issues. Articles now appeared on issues such as learner strategies, self-assessment, local Englishes, language policy, curriculum development, teaching of languages other than English, and alternative assessment, while the linguistic approaches reflected in articles increasingly drew on spoken and written discourse analysis, pragmatics, text analysis, and conversational analysis. Teacher education and the role of technology, however, were still hardly featured.
By the decade of the 1990s, the journal had settled into its current mode, publishing mainly research-based articles. However, those using qualitative methods started to appear. The influence of second language acquisition theory is seen in articles addressing issues such as the role of interaction, feedback, strategies, attitudes and motivation. A greater use of qualitative research is evident and both the role of technology, particularly the internet, as well as teacher cognition and teacher education recur as topics for theory and research-based articles.
A significant change occurred in 2003 when publication of the journal was moved from RELC to a commercial publisher – Continuum. At the same time, the frequency of publication was increased from two issues to three per year and the journal received a new cover design and format. The mission of the journal was now described as ‘to promote an approach to research on language and language-related concerns with particular reference to education, especially, though not exclusively, in Southeast Asia’. In 2004, Sage Publications assumed the role of publisher, and with a greatly increased rate of submissions, a more rigorous approach to reviewing submissions was needed as well as an expansion in the number of reviewers.
Since then, RELC Journal has gone from strength to strength and is increasingly recognized as a valuable place for researchers to publish their work as well as serving as a source of current theory, research and practice. Other changes that have been introduced in order to broaden the journal’s relevance to its readers include thematic issues edited by guest editors. These have included special issues on vocabulary, teacher education in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), language proficiency for language teachers, and World Englishes. In 2016, a new section called ‘Innovations in Practice’ was introduced, which provides for the publication of evidence-based innovations in teaching.
In planning for this special anniversary issue of RELC Journal, we turned to the approach used at the conception of the journal: we asked a number of distinguished scholars to provide state-of-the-art surveys of key issues that are central to the mission of SEAMEO and to RELC in particular. We also invited two teacher-researchers to carry out questionnaire studies for this issue. In addition, we invited a regional scholar to answer questions about her work, and asked four teachers and teacher educators to provide a book report for the issue.
In this issue readers will thus find five outstanding survey articles by Low Ee Ling and Ao Ran, Ruanni Tupas, Nicky Hockly and Gavin Dudeney, Phillip Towndrow and Andrew Pereira, and Simon Borg; the results of two important questionnaire studies by Aek Phakiti and Luke Plonsky and John Macalister; an interview with Icy Lee; and book reports by Marilyn Lewis, Miller Perez, Tay May Yin and Marie Yeo.
We are grateful to each of the scholars and teachers above who accepted our invitation to write for this Special Issue and whose contributions have helped make this issue both memorable and outstanding.
In closing, I would like to acknowledge both those who have served as directors of RELC since it was first established, as well as those colleagues who have served as editors of RELC Journal since its inception.
The RELC Directors: Mrs Tai Yu-lin (July 1967–February 1985); Mr Earnest Lau (February 1985–February 1991); Mr Edwin Goh (February 1991–February 1999); Mrs Goh Chi Lan (March 1999–February 2003); Mrs Maureen Ng Boey Lin (March 2003–March 2006); Mrs Tay Sor Har (March 2006–December 2015); and Ms Susan Leong (January 2016–Present).
The RELC Journal Editors: Alan Moller, Cesar Hidalgo, Raymond Tongue, Madge Claxton, Teodoro A. Llamzon, Jack C. Richards, Helena I.R. Augustien, Makhan Lal Tickoo, Chan Yue Weng, Joyce James, Joseph Foley, Alexander Arguelles, Graeme Cane, Alvin Pang and Marie Yeo and the current Editors-in-Chief, Marie Yeo and Jack C. Richards.