This book examines the special nature of English both as a global and a local language
focusing on some of the ongoing changes and on the emerging new structural and discoursal
characteristics of varieties of English. Although it is widely recognised that processes of
language change and contact bear affinities for example to processes observable in
second-language acquisition and lingua franca use the research into these fields has so far
not been sufficiently brought into contact with each other. The articles in this volume set out
to combine all these perspectives in ways that give us a better understanding of the changing
nature of English in the modern world.
