Collaboratori linguistici in Italian Universities: What light do they shed on English lingua franca?

This section reports on the findings from a nationwide survey of native English speaking teachers working in Italian universities (collaborator linguistici, formerly known as lettori). As with the survey on non native high school teachers, the focus is on awareness of the growing significance of the role of English as the world’s lingua franca. In the first part Sperti analyzes the data from 75 completed surveys, highlighting convergences with – and divergences from - the non native teachers, and constructing a profile of the native speaker in Italy today. In the second part Newbold reflects on the role of the native speaker teacher and how this may develop in a possible future context of an ‘ELF aware’ English language curriuculum