Building Teaching & Learning Corpora with the
EThOS
Collection
A collection of 50,000 authentic PhD abstracts
Approximately 12.5 million words
A viable alternative to the BAWE for the study and 
development of academic language
EAP & ESAP
Data Driven Learning
(DDL)
Open Educational Resources
(OERs)
EFL & ESP
Sociolinguistics of academic discourse
Applied Linguistics of academic discourse
Language use and disciplinary 
‘epistemic policy’
Contexts
Chris Mansfield, The Language Centre, School of Languages, 
Linguistics and Film
c.mansfield@qmul.ac.uk 
Alannah Fitzgerald, Concordia University and the University 
of Waikato
alannahfitzgerald@gmail.com 
Developing an EThOS for EAP
Disciplinary specificity promotes learner engagement
Demonstrable authenticity of target language, providing a challenging but achievable 
benchmark for novice academic writers/researchers in English
Demonstrates patterns of academic discourse: SPRE; CCQH; CARS
Enables greater access to the artefacts of the academy and professional domains
Moves away from subjective conclusions about language based on the internalized 
cognitive perception of native speakers and the influence of generic proprietary language 
learning resources
Can conflict with institutional demands for proprietary/branded resources. The diffusion of 
open tools, resources and practices for domain-specific academic English can lead to 
structural discontinuities 
Institutional and social tensions
Concerns over Plagiarism & IP
The apparent complexity of corpus tools can inhibit student uptake. Need for 
considerable teacher mediation/Learner training
Can conflict with established teaching & learning styles and expectations