A Comparative Study of the Value Orientations of Foreign Language Education Policies in China and the United States in the 21st Century

Since the 21 st century, both Chinese Mainland and the United States have formulated foreign language education policiesbased on their national needs. This paper makes a comparative study of the value orientations of foreign language education poli-cies in Chinese Mainland and the United States in the 21 st century and finds that both China and the United States have regardedtheir national interests as the essential value orientation of their foreign language education policies. To be specific,the core valueorientation of foreign language education policies in China is to enhance its cultural soft power.In contrast,the core value orienta-tion of foreign language education policies in the United States is to safeguard its national security. Through the comparison of thedifferent value orientations of foreign language education policies of the two countries, the paper provides some reference for the for-eign language education policy-making in Chinese Mainland.

The Effect of Globalization on the Language Policy in a Multi-Cultural Kazakhstan

This paper focuses on the language policy of the Republic of Kazakhstan. It is intended to invite the readers for the broadening of the debate on the issues raised. The 20th century, for Kazakhs, became a century of tragic events which transformed them into the minority on their own native land. In spite of many collisions in history Kazakhs have not lost their language, the main wealth. At the beginning of the 21st century, Kazakhstan has tackled a lot of problems, connected with national and ethnic issues, social structure, and foreign and home policy. The influence of globalization is felt in every sphere of life in Kazakhstan. Serious ethno-demographic changes have occurred after gaining independence. Kazakhstan from the state with two dominating Kazakh and Russian diasporas has turned to the state with dominating one, the Kazakh ethnos. State language of the Republic of Kazakhstan now is Kazakh due to implementation of language policy

Appraisal of the Production-Oriented Approach： An Introduction

The production-oriented approach （POA） has been developed over a decade. It is driven by the need to improve English classroom instruction for university students in China （Wen, 2016）. It is also motivated by the aspiration to enhance the quality of foreign language education in other similar pedagogical contexts outside China. A volume of research has been done by Wen Qiufang and her research team, to formulate the theory of POA and to test its effectiveness in classroom pedagogy （e.g. Wen, 2016, 2015; Yang, 2015; Zhang, 2015）. At the moment, the POA is still at an early stage of theory building and almost all empirical research is done in the Chinese context. In order to improve the quality of this theory and to make it intelligible to the international academic community, a one-day symposium was held in Beijing Foreign Studies University on May 15, 2017. The symposium was entitled ＇The first international forum on innovative foreign language education in China： Appraisal of the POA＇. In the forum, leading experts in applied linguistics were invited to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the POA and the directions for its future development. The symposium was the first attempt for the POA research team to discuss its latest work with international scholars. This Viewpoint section collects the responses of four experts who participated in the symposium, listed in alphabetical order. The collection of articles covers three topics related to the POA： its pedagogical application, its use for teacher training, and its research. Alister Cumming is Professor Emeritus and the former Head of the Centre for Educational Research on Languages and Literacies, University of Toronto, Canada. His article focuses primarily on POA research as an exemplary case of design-based research. Rod Ellis is Research Professor in the School of Education at Curtin University, Australia. He discusses POA in terms of pedagogy, teacher training and research, with both critiques and constructive suggestions. Paul Kei Matsuda is Professor of English and Director of Second Language Writing at Arizona State University, the writed states. He responds to POA from the perspective of an expert researcher and teacher of L2 writing. Charlene Polio is Professor and Associate Chair in the Department of Linguistics ＆ Germanic, Slavic, Asian ＆ African Languages atMichigan State University, the writed states. She conceptualises POA as a useful method to address some issues in pre-service teacher development. Overall, the articles in this section are insightful and reader-friendly. They are not only useful for the development of POA in particular, but may also be valuable to a broad range of researchers as they touch upon pertaining issues, as well as emerging topics, in the field of applied linguistics. We therefore find it necessary to make them accessible to a wide readership.