Sample of Working Bibliography for a Research Paper (excerpt)

Reference: http://www.slideshare.net/yuying/slideshows

Topic: Linguistic nativism, national identity, and English language policy in Taiwan
Title: My Tongue, Your Tongue: English as a Taiwanese Language
Main thesis: Taiwan’s democratic reforms require that a new definition of what it means to be “Taiwanese” serve as the basis of a new language policy with a Taiwanese variety of English at its center, which erases the artificial distinction between “native speaker” and “nonnative speaker.”
Key words: language policy, multiculturalism, national identity, nativism

Working bibliography
1. Coulmas, F. (Ed.). (1981). A festschrift for native speaker. The Hague: Mouton.
The most relevant articles in this anthology are the ones that cast suspicion on the theoreti­cal assumption that the native speaker is a reliable guide to linguistic per­form­ance in a sec­ond language. Jacob Mey’s article (“Right or wrong, my na­tive speaker”) sati­rizes this assump­tion, saying that the “Native Speaker is the fi­nal crite­rion of mat­ters lin­guistic: his ver­dict settles all linguistic dis­putes.... He is above all laws: he is the Law himself” (p. 70). In his introduction, Florian Coulmas gives a critical histori­cal survey of the “universal accep­tance of the na­tive speaker” in theoretical and ap­plied linguistics research (p. 2).

2. Figueroa, E. (1984). Language policy in Taiwan: The politics of Guoyu. Unpublished mas­ter’s the­sis, University of Hawaii, Honolulu.
Although written prior to the official formation of the DPP, this thesis provides rele­vant histori­cal information about the ideological forces that shaped the Mandarin-only lan­guage pol­icy that was in effect in the Republic of China and whose effect is still felt in Taiwan to­day. Figueroa perceptively anticipated many of the current problems in relation to national iden­tity and ethnicity in Taiwan, as is evident when she ob­serves that almost half of the origi­nal KMT leader­ship, including Chiang Kai-shek, “came from Southern di­alectal re­gions where the [non-Mandarin] vernacular predomi­nated and ‘guoyu’ wasn’t likely to make much of a dent” (p. 14).

3. Kowal, K. (2002, November). English spoken here. Taipei Review, 52, 30–35.
This somewhat optimistic article discusses current language attitudes, language pol­icy, and na­tional identity in the wake of the DPP’s 2000 victory and efforts to pro­mote English in Taiwan. It argues that “[i]n many respects, Mandarin is a leg­acy of Tai­wan’s Republican past” (p. 31). Elsewhere, it says that “English and Mandarin are both ‘Taiwanized’ and have be­come ‘Taiwanese’ languages” (p. 33), and that the English used in Taiwan “need not be re­garded primarily as a foreign language” (p. 35). This language can serve as “an ideologi­cal buffer” as Taiwan defines itself as a sover­eign state independent from China (p. 35).
Wachman, A. (1994). Taiwan: National identity and democratization. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.
This comprehensive analysis of Taiwan’s national identity question was pre­pared in the pe­riod between the lifting of martial law in 1987 and the DPP’s vic­tory in the 2000 presiden­tial election. Wachman argues that “[t]o consider mat­ters of identity, one must depart the world of facts and enter a realm of sentiment and beliefs” (p. 28). This is relevant because it calls attention to the com­plex of emotions that is often irra­tional and susceptible to biases to­ward “for­eigners” in Taiwan: “the convictions peo­ple have about their own identity are not necessarily consistent with reason. Identities are driven by emotion…” (p. 28).

4. Wu, C. S. (2003, November 22). Quality English teachers [Letter to the editor]. Taipei Times, p. 8.
This short letter, written by a local academic and published in a widely read daily English news­paper in Taiwan, is relevant be­cause it illustrates the popular old confla­tion of nativ­ism, nationality and “foreignness.” The author argues that “re­verse discrimina­tion” is tak­ing place in “foreign language education” in Taiwan today. “Native speakers of English are hired, regardless of their profes­sional training” while “[t]alented and well-trained local teach­ers don’t even get interviewed.” Wu’s stereo­type of one particular group of “native speak­ers” is evi­dent in the statement, “[m]any American teachers know that and take advan­tage of it.” I italicize Wu’s assumption-laden terms here.

(Author: Dr. Kowal, K.)