Introducing English for Specific Purposes

A comprehensive vocabulary review deck covering core terms, definitions, theoretical frameworks, and practical principles in English for Specific Purposes (ESP).

English for Specific Purposes (ESP)

An approach to language teaching that targets the current and/or future academic or occupational needs of learners, focuses on the necessary language, genres, and skills to address these needs, and assists learners in meeting these needs through general and/or discipline-specific teaching materials and methods.

English for Academic Purposes (EAP)

A major branch of ESP focused on targeting the language, genres, and skills needed by learners in academic settings such as schools and universities.

English for Occupational Purposes (EOP)

A major branch of ESP focused on targeting the communication needs of learners in workplace environments such as companies, factories, hospitals, and vocational settings.

Branches and Sub-branches of ESP

A conceptual framework categorizing ESP into EAP (divided into EGAP and ESAP) and EOP (divided into EPP and EVP), extending into specialized fields such as STEM, medicine, business, and tourism.

Language-Content Continuum

A spectrum illustrating language teaching approaches ranging from a primary focus on language (e.g., Grammar-Translation Method) to a primary focus on discipline content (e.g., English-Medium Instruction).

Genre

A spoken or written product of language that comprises a class of communicative events sharing a set of communicative purposes recognized by expert members of a parent discourse community.

Discourse Community

A network of interrelated individuals who share a common set of communicative goals, purposes, and understandings of how language functions within their domain.

Register Analysis

An analytical approach focusing on the quantitative frequency and characteristic patterns of grammatical structures and vocabulary items associated with a particular situation, purpose, or social context.

Rhetorical Analysis

An analytical approach (also called discourse analysis) that investigates why language features occur and how sentences and paragraphs combine to form coherent spoken or written texts.

Data-Driven Learning (DDL)

A learner-centered approach where students directly interact with a corpus of authentic target language texts using software tools to inductively analyze language patterns.

Needs Analysis

The systematic collection and analysis of information regarding learners' necessities, lacks, and wants used to define and validate a defensible curriculum.

Necessities

The specific language items, genres, and skills required for successful performance in a target academic or occupational setting (diagnostic view of needs).

Lacks

The gap or discrepancy between a learner's current language proficiency and the proficiency required in the target setting (discrepancy view of needs).

Wants

The personal desires, expectations, or requests of learners and other stakeholders regarding what should be taught in an ESP course or program (democratic view of needs).

Content-Based Instruction (CBI)

A communicative language teaching approach where language is acquired through engaging with motivating subject topics chosen by or for learners.

English-Medium Instruction (EMI)

An educational framework in which academic content courses are taught in English without explicit language instruction.

Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL)

An educational approach and policy where language instructors serve as coaches for content teachers, and content teachers integrate language support into subject teaching.

Carrier Content

The contextual subject matter or thematic content used as a vehicle to present, explain, and practice target language skills in the classroom.

Four Pillars of ESP

The four foundational elements of ESP curriculum design and execution: needs analysis, learning objectives, materials and methods, and evaluation.

Construct Validity

The degree to which an assessment or evaluation procedure accurately measures the specific target construct or language competency it claims to test.

Reliability

The degree to which an evaluation procedure produces consistent results when administered repeatedly under equivalent conditions.

Practicality

The feasibility of an evaluation or course procedure in terms of available time, financial costs, physical space, human resources, and administrative effort.

Norm-Referenced Evaluation

An evaluation approach in which an individual learner's score is interpreted by comparing it against the performance of a peer group or normative population.

Criterion-Referenced Evaluation

An evaluation approach where learner performance is measured directly against explicit, pre-determined standards or learning outcomes.

Critical ESP

A theoretical movement in ESP research that encourages learners to critically analyze and challenge the social and linguistic norms of target discourse communities rather than passively conforming to them.

Wide-Angled ESP

An ESP course design approach focusing on general, transferable language features, study skills, and learning strategies shared across multiple disciplines or professions.

Narrow-Angled ESP

An ESP course design approach focusing specifically on the highly specialized linguistic structures, genres, and communication conventions of a single specific discipline or profession.