New Chinglish and the Post-Multilingualism challenge: Translanguaging ELF in China

Abstract

Abstract Building on the extensive ELF research that aims to reconceptualise English as a resource that can be appropriated and exploited without allegiance to its historically native speakers, this article explores the issue of English in China by examining New Chinglish that has been created and shared by a new generation of Chinese speakers of English in China and spread through the new media. This new form of English has distinctive Chinese characteristics and serves a variety of communicative, social and political purposes in response to the Post-Multilingualism challenges in China and beyond. I approach New Chinglish from a Translanguaging perspective, a theoretical perspective that is intended to raise fundamental questions about the validity of conventional views of language and communication and to contribute to the understanding of the Post-Multilingualism challenges that we face in the twenty-first century.