Teaching English as a Foreign Language, 1912-1936

This collection focuses on the work of the major pioneers working in the 1920s and 1930s whose research and writings laid the methodological foundations for post-World War II British approaches to English as a foreign language teaching (ELT). These early pioneers included Harold E. Palmer (in Japan), Michael West (in India), and Laurence Faucett (in China). Separately and jointly (at the 1934-5 'Carnegie Conference'), they succeeded in establishing a principled basis for the teaching of English to speakers of other languages, different in significant respects from teaching English as a 'first language' in Britain and the Empire.