A characterisation of English for Specific Purposes (Tourism)

Nowadays nobody doubts the importance of English as the lingua franca used in international communication. In addition to the numerous countries where English is the mother tongue, it is also spoken as a second language in other countries belonging to the Commonwealth, and it is studied as a foreign language within school system in almost the whole world. In this context, professionals and academics of any discipline need to learn English in order to obtain information necessary to carry out their jobs and to communicate with colleagues from other countries. This necessity easily explains the blossoming, starting as early as the 1960s (Barber, 1962; Herbert 1965; en Swales, 1988), of the study of Languages for Specific Purposes (LSP), and more specifically, the work of English for Specific Purposes (Dudley y St John, 1998). Within the field of languages for Specific Purposes, English for Business has traditionally been the area studied. However, nowadays it is English for Tourism which is reaching a high level of popularity, due to the economic and social importance that this sector represents in our country. In the present article the main characteristics of this ESP are revised and some methodological trends for teaching it are shown.