Editorial Issue 16
Geoffrey Nsanja and María García-Florenciano
Welcome to Issue 16 of The Language Scholar.
The three papers in this issue address different aspects of English for Academic Purposes and higher education, yet all share a concern with participation: how students engage with academic study, what may prevent that engagement, and what practitioners can do to create more inclusive opportunities for learning. Each paper draws attention to dimensions of learning that often remain invisible, encouraging practitioners to look beyond observable performance and consider the linguistic, cognitive and affective factors that shape academic engagement.
As universities continue to navigate significant change, the centrality of language in pedagogy and scholarship remains unabated. The papers collected here remind us that, while GenAI and its associated LLMs are increasingly becoming a critical factor in higher education (cf., Jiang and Hyland, 2026), it is important not to lose sight of students themselves and the diverse ways in which they experience learning. In this sense, the contributions in this issue offer an opportunity to re-examine participation, communication and inclusion within higher education, while continuing the project of making different facets of language visible in the academy (Bond, 2020).
In the first paper, Renata Lebioda-Green reflects on how EAP practitioners can meaningfully work with neurodivergent students particularly those who have Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). She also offers an analysis of how such neurodivergence impacts student engagement with academic literacies before offering practical tips practitioners could employ to help this cohort of students make the most of their academic pursuits. In similar vein, Charles Marshall’s paper presents a detailed analysis of how ADHD affects the listening ability and/or competencies of students. In highlighting the uniqueness and/or individuality of students, Marshall poignantly observes that there is a need for academia, not just EAP or language scholars, to readjust “our practices with divergent listeners as learners in mind”. Such a call elucidates how intertwined language is with all academic practices and how academia could also benefit from language practitioner’s pedagogic perspectives. In the final paper, Helen Butt draws on available corpora to highlight the pragmatic aspects that make for a successful turn-taking and holding the floor in spoken interaction further buttressing the need for EAP practitioners to bear in mind that “turn-taking involves speaking and listening” if students are to excel at pragmatic competence.
Collectively, the papers highlight the importance of developing more inclusive understandings of academic participation. They are a timely reminder of the need to rehumanise language pedagogy by refocusing our attention to the embodied nature of our students; an embodiment that “invites identification and empathic connection” (Pelias, 2004). In doing so, the papers reflect The Language Scholar's continuing commitment to scholarship grounded in humility, care, curiosity and inclusiveness (Ding et al., 2018). We hope that such focus will spur our readers to embrace these qualities not just in their scholarship but in their pedagogy as well.
References
Bond, B. 2020. Making language visible in the university: English for academic purposes and internationalisation. Bristol: Multilingual Matters.
Ding, A., Bodin-Galvez, J., Bond, B., Morimoto, K., Ragni, V., Rust, N. and Soliman, R. 2018. A manifesto for the scholarship of language teaching and learning. Language Scholar. [Available at: https://languagescholar.leeds.ac.uk/manifesto-for-the-scholarship-of-language-teaching-and-learning/]
Jiang, F. K. and Hyland, K. 2026. EAP in a changing world: Towards a new research agenda. Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 80, Article 101647 [DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jeap.2026.101647]
Pelias, R. J. 2004. A methodology of the heart: Evoking academic and everyday life. New York: Altamira Press.