Global Englishes language teaching (GELT) advocates for an epistemic reorientation of traditional English language teaching, synthesizing insights from World Englishes, English as a lingua franca, and other sociolinguistically informed paradigms and theories in language education. Focusing on the theoretical overlap between GELT and critical language awareness (CLA), this article demonstrates how GELT can offer explicit awareness‑raising opportunities that address not only linguistic diversity but also the intersections of language and power. It reports on participatory action research in two Japanese high schools, detailing the implementation and outcomes of a reading activity called the ‘CLA‑themed reading marathon’. The reading topics were organized into three interconnected sub‑themes designed to 1) develop a descriptive understanding of linguistic diversity, 2) raise awareness of issues related to prejudices and stereotypes, racism, and language, and 3) critically assess issues related to technologies and linguistic diversity, such as artificial intelligence and World Englishes. We present and discuss students’ voices identified in the post‑activity reflections, which indicate their learning outcomes and their perspectives on the activity and the selected readings. The results highlight the impact of the activity on students’ learning, such as raising awareness of linguistic injustice, disrupting common‑sense assumptions about language and enhancing reading engagement and comprehension, while also indicating challenges. One challenge was that a few students reported a sense of distance toward the CLA topics and social issues discussed in the activity, viewing them as ‘someone else’s problem’. Based on these successes and challenges, we offer implications for future research and practice in GELT.

Global Englishes, and within that the field of English as a lingua franca, is a huge and expanding area of research and pedagogy. This paper provides a sample of our beliefs about productive areas of research. The nine tasks presented suggest the importance of research in the areas of intercultural and digital communication, especially through the adoption of trans theories such as translanguaging, transmodality, and transcultural communication. Furthermore, concepts such as communicative competence will need rethinking to match the multilingual, multimodal, and multicultural resources that appear in such communication. The implications for pedagogy are extensive, including a re-evaluation of models and aims such as the (ir)relevance of the native speaker, global citizenship education, translanguaging, and decolonial perspectives, and approaches to both oral and written communication. Accompanying any changes in pedagogic practices must be changes in how we think about teacher education as well as assessment. Pedagogic research is crucial as there is a need to address the persistent gap between “real-world” translingual, transmodal, and transcultural uses of English and monolingual, Anglophone-orientated English language teaching models and approaches.

The present study investigated Thai speakers’ perceptions of native English accents and Thai-accented English (TaE) in two contexts: language teaching and everyday communication. Using a direct attitudinal approach, data from 125 Thai speakers revealed attitudinal patterns toward native Englishes and TaE. Native accents were viewed as highly desirable in the academic setting and served as models for participants’ aspiration. Unlike Thai teachers with TaE, those with a native-like accent received high levels of acceptance, nearly comparable to native English teachers, despite their non-native speaker status. Thus, having native(-like) accent appears to be a critical factor for suitability as a language teacher to a greater extent than nativeness. In addition, while TaE was generally accepted by most participants, this acceptance did not extend to considering TaE speakers suitable as language teachers. The present study extends the native speaker fallacy by proposing the native accent fallacy which suggests that ideal language teachers are defined by their native(-like) accents. Implications are discussed within the Global Englishes Language Teaching (GELT) paradigm to mitigate native-speakerism and language-based discrimination in teacher recruitment and pedagogy.

Generative AI (GenAI) offers potential for English language teaching (ELT), but it has pedagogical limitations in multilingual contexts, often generating standard English forms rather than reflecting the pluralistic usage that represents diverse sociolinguistic realities. In response to mixed results in existing research, this study examines how ChatGPT, a text-based generative AI tool powered by a large language model (LLM), is used in ELT from a Global Englishes (GE) perspective. Using the Design and Development Research approach, we tested three ChatGPT models: Basic (single-step prompts); Refined 1 (multi-step prompting); and Refined 2 (GE-oriented corpora with advanced prompt engineering). Thematic analysis showed that Refined Model 1 provided limited improvements over Basic Model, while Refined Model 2 demonstrated significant gains, offering additional affordances in GE-informed evaluation and ELF communication, despite some limitations (e.g., defaulting to NES norms and lacking tailored GE feedback). The findings highlight the importance of using authentic data to enhance the contextual relevance of GenAI outputs for GE language teaching (GELT). Pedagogical implications include GenAI–teacher collaboration, teacher professional development, and educators’ agentive role in orchestrating diverse resources alongside GenAI.