Embracing the Mess: Decolonizing English Language Teaching through Plurilingual Realities

Abstract

In this talk I explore the productive messiness of language and cultural understanding in English language teaching, drawing on Global Englishes and decolonial research. I will challenge the dominance of Anglophone norms and native speaker models by foregrounding the fluid, contested, and plurilingual ways English is used across diverse contexts. Through this lens, I will show how multilingual users resist linguistic imperialism (Canagarajah 1999), re-semiotize English, and negotiate complex identities in ways that defy neat categorizations, thus advocating for decolonizing pedagogies that embrace linguistic and cultural complexity, value local knowledges, and disrupt deficit framings of “non-native” speakers. Rather than seeking tidy solutions, I argue for pedagogical approaches that engage with the mess, i.e. acknowledge ambiguity, contradiction, and transformation as central to more equitable and empowering ELT practices.