CHAPTER 1 THE ORIGINS OF ESP

1.The Demands of a Brave New World

The end of the Second World War in 1945 heralded an age of

enormous and unprecedented expansion in scientific, technical and
economic activity on an international scale. This expansion created
a world unified and dominated by two forces (technology and
commerce) which in their relentless progress soon generated a
demand for an international language. For various reasons, most
notably the economic power of the United States in the post-war
world, this role fell to English.

English was the key to the international currencies of

technology and commerce and it became the accepted international
language of technology and commerce. Then it created a new
generation of learners who knew specifically why they were
learning a language. For the example the doctors who needed to
keep up with developments in their field. The development was
accelerated by the OIL Crises of the early 1970s, which resulted in a
massive flow of funds and Western expertise into the oil-rich
countries. Time and money constraints created a need for cost-
effective courses with clearly defined goals. English now became
subject to the wishes, needs and demands of people other than
language teachers

2.       A Revolution in Linguistics (Sudarma)

 At the same time as the use of English which was growing up
for specific needs, it also influenced the study of language itself. In
the past, the purpose of Linguistics was only for the usage of the
language which is well known as grammar. However, as the time
goes by the early studies began to find out that the usage of
language grammatically is actually different from the real life usage,
one of the example is the way we speak and write the language.

It can be explained that in the real life there are some

differences of the usage of language in some parts of life e.g
engineering, hospital, and more. Then it developed that if the use of
language varies from one situation to another, it should be possible
to decide the features of specific situations and make these features
as basis for learning the language. Since then, especially in the late
60’s and 70’s, the research were developed into the varieties of
language. In conclusion, by analyzing linguistic characteristics of
the specialist area of language study, particular group of learners
could be identified. This is as the principle of ESP that “Tell me
what you need English for and I will tell you the English that you
need”.

3.      Focus on the Learner (Novita)

The developments in educational psychology contribute to the

rise of ESP, by emphasizing the central importance of the learners
and their attitudes to learning. Learners were seen to have different
needs and interest, which would have an important influence on
their motivation to learn and therefore on the effectiveness of their
learning.

This lent support to the development of courses in which

relevance to the learners need and interest was paramount. The
assumption underlying this approach was that the clear relevance of
the English course to their needs would improve the learners’
motivation and thereby make learning better and faster. The growth
of ESP was brought about by a combination of three importance
factors.

The expansion of demands for English to suit particular needs

and developments in the fields of linguistics and educational
psychology. All three factors seemed to point towards the need for
increased specialization in language learning.