This article analyzes a recent initiative of Japan's Ministry of Education, which aims to internationalize higher education in Japan. The large-investment project "Top Global University Project" (TGUP) has emerged to create globally oriented universities, to increase the role of foreign languages in higher education, and to foster global human resources. The TGUP identifies 37 universities: 13 as "top global universities" intended to compete in the top 100 university world rankings and 24 "global traction universities" intended to lead the internationalization of higher education in Japan. Despite the substantial funding behind this initiative, little research has been conducted to evaluate the potential impact of this policy on language planning in higher education in Japan. This paper addresses this gap in its exploration of the TGUP, including key changes from previous internationalization policies. It then presents an analysis of publicly available documents regarding the policy, collected from all 37 of the participant universities. Findings indicate a positive departure from older policy trends and the emergence of flexible, unique forms of English language education in Japan's universities.

This article makes the argument that we need to situate student's academic writing as socially constructed pieces of writing that embody a writer's cultural identity and critical argument. In support, I present and describe a comprehensive model of an original EFL writing analytical framework. This article explains the interrelationship between the elements of cultural practices in academic discourse, writer identity, and critical thinking, and argues how this is influenced by the sociocultural values of academic discourse. This interrelationship is realized by viewing EFL writing through a social constructivist lens, showing how critical thinking processes are shaped by awareness of the sociocultural conventions of academic discourse, and how critical thinking arises from a writer identity aligned with the culture of English academic writing.

The rise of English as a global language has led scholars to call for a paradigm shift in the field of English language teaching (ELT) to match the new sociolinguistic landscape of the twenty-first century. In recent years a considerable amount of classroom-based research and language teacher education (LTE) research has emerged to investigate these proposals in practice. This paper outlines key proposals for change in language teaching from the related fields of World Englishes (WE), English as a lingua franca (ELF), English as an international language (EIL), and Global Englishes, and critically reviews the growing body of pedagogical research conducted within these domains. Adopting the methodology of a systematic review, 58 empirical articles published between 2010 and 2020 were shortlisted, of which 38 were given an in-depth critical review and contextualized within a wider body of literature. Synthesis of classroom research suggests a current lack of longitudinal designs, an underuse of direct measures to explore the effects of classroom interventions, and under-representation of contexts outside of university language classrooms. Synthesis of teacher education research suggests future studies need to adopt more robust methodological designs which measure the effects of Global Englishes content on teacher beliefs and pedagogical practices both before and throughout the programme, and after teachers return to the classroom.

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