Language Strategy

Beyond Englishization

Abstract

This paper reviews existing studies on the language strategies of multinational corporations (MNCs)—a subject that has received increasing attention since the late 2000s. In most of these existing studies, both academics and practitioners have tended to focus primarily on Englishization. That is, English as a lingua franca has been taken for granted, and most related studies have discussed organizational problems caused by Englishization and the solutions to those problems. However, English as a lingua franca is only one of various options, and it is incorrect to conclude that MNCs’ available language strategies are limited to Englishization. Instead, existing studies on language strategy take more multi-faceted perspectives and propose bilingual or multilingual strategies, choosing the term “language strategy” because of the increased emphasis on these various options.