ENGLISH FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES

As with most developments in human activity, ESP was not a planned and coherent movement, but rather a phenomenon that grew out of a number of converging trends. These trends have operated in a variety of ways around the world, but we can identify three main reasons common to the emergence of all ESP: the expansion of demand for English to suit particular needs of learners, the developments in the field of linguistics and the tendencies in the field of educational psychology. ESP is not a matter of teaching specialized varieties of English. The fact that language is used for a specific purpose does not imply that it is a special form of the language, different in kind from other forms. There are some features that can be identified as typical of a particular context of use and are more likely to be met in the target situation. But these differences should not be allowed to obscure the far larger area of common ground that underlies all English use. ESP is not a particular kind of language or methodology, nor does it consist of a particular type of teaching material. Understood properly, it is an approach to language learning, which is based on learner need. ESP is an approach to language teaching in which all decisions as to content and method are based on the learner's reason for learning.