Biography

I began my teaching appointment as an English Language lecturer at the School of Preparatory Education, Universiti Teknologi MARA Malaysia in July 1994 and since then I had progressed through my Masters degree in Teaching English as a Second Language, which I obtained from University Malaya, Malaysia in 1999.with the main focus being on English for  Specific Purposes (ESP). Having been granted a government scholarship from my home institution in Malaysia, I am currently working on my PhD research project on varieties of English, focusing on the type of English used among educated Malaysians.

Research Interests

There has been a growing interest in the varieties of the English language spoken and written among non-native English users outside the British Isles. Many of these varieties have gained recognition as “New Englishes”, varieties that are seemingly different from the norms of a native English user by having its own grammar, morphology and pronunciation and yet are intelligible among members of that specific non-native speech communities concerned. Some of these notable varieties of English are Indian English, West African English and Singapore English. The question remains as to whether the English used by educated Malaysians fulfils the criteria of an English variety or a developmental learner language. This research project employs the criteria proposed by Sandra Mollin (2007) in describing varieties of English as well as Platt &Weber’s (1984) earlier works on Singapore and Malaysian English to further explore the characteristics that shape and describe the English in Malaysia today. The results of the research project would hope to offer a clearer insight in the description of the English used in Malaysia which in turn, would also bear pedagogical implications in the teaching and learning environment in the classroom as well.

Conferences and Seminars

Attendance at BACL Colloquium (British Association of Clinical Linguistics)
University of Reading (15-16 December 2008)

A Corpus-based Analysis on Language Variation: Past Tense Markings in Malay Learner English (paper)
Annual PhD Conference, University of Reading, Department of Languages & European Studies (23 March 2009)

Stating the Obvious – Knowing Your Tenses (poster presentation)
University of Reading, School of Arts & Humanities 1st year Poster Competition (11 June 2009)

Attendance at Centre for Translation Studies Postgraduate Research Day, Department of Languages & Translation Studies, University of Surrey (25 September 2010)