President, Singapore Association for Applied Linguistics, Dr Anitha Devi Pillai,

SAAL Patron, Dr Anne Pakir,

Professor Shameem Rafik-Galea, President, Malaysian Association of Applied Linguistics - MAAL ,

Emeritus Professor Azirah Hashim, AILA Immediate Past President,

Dean, Heads & Deputy Heads of Applied Linguistics Departments in Singapore,

Applied Linguists,

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Welcome to SAAL’s 40th anniversary dinner. Tonight, we gather to celebrate a significant milestone in our journey together: the 40th anniversary of SAAL. It is a moment of pride, reflection, and anticipation for what lies ahead.

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As we commemorate our past, I would like to take this opportunity to highlight some key milestones for SAAL including the contributions of the past presidents of the association.

 

SAAL was registered as a professional association on 13 August 1985 with the goal of promoting research and development in applied linguistics.

 

SAAL’s Key Objectives are:

1. Promoting Research: To foster research in applied linguistics and provide a platform for professionals to share knowledge and expertise.

2. Professional Development in the form of activities, including talks, lectures, seminars, and workshops, to enhance the professional competence of its members.

3. Networking: To provide opportunities for members to establish and maintain contact with one another, facilitating collaboration and exchange of ideas.

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Our inaugural SAAL President was Dr Mary Tay, whose work on the phonology of Singapore English has shaped the scholarship of many of us, myself included.

 

Following Dr Mary Tay’s leadership, Associate Professor Anne Pakir took over the helm from 1990-2004 and was pivotal in bringing SAAL to the global stage not least through the successful bid in Finland in 1996 that brought AILA Singapore in 2002 when we were all wee young things.

 

To share a personal anecdote, it was a flagship year for me personally as I got married in November 2002 to fellow Applied Linguist Lim Beng Soon who bused his way to Singapore from Penang and a month later, we were both key members of the then young robust working team responsible for helping to host AILA 2002 at the then new Suntec City Convention Centre for 1200 international delegates.

 

For her phenomenal leadership and success in bringing AILA to Asia for the first time ever, Associate Professor Anne Pakir was awarded the AILA Honorary Lifelong Membership in 2017 in Rio. Associate Professor Chng Huang Hoon took over Presidency for 4 years from 2004-2008 as she waited for the rest of us to mature both in our leadership and scholarship. For her dedication and commitment to leading SAAL to the next peak of excellence, she was awarded SAAL honorary lifelong membership at SAAL’s 30th anniversary lunch and awards ceremony.

 

In tandem, SAAL also recognized the contributions Dr Teng Su Ching, whose financial prowess helped ensure that Prof Pakir and her personal assets were not in jeopardy though they risked everything to host AILA at a premier venue in Singapore. For keeping us on a tight fiscal rope, Dr Teng Su Ching was awarded the SAAL honorary lifelong membership in 2015.

 

I took over SAAL Presidency in 2008 and helmed it for 12 years to 2020 before I managed to persuade Assoc Prof Ludwig Tan, who was then Dean of the School of Humanities and Behavioural Sciences at SUSS to take over the helm as the next generation were being prepared to lead SAAL. In 2022 to the present, we are happy and proud to witness SAAL’s growth and several new initiatives which I will leave for her to recount in her closing speech later, under the presidency of Dr Anitha Devi Pillai, an anthropological linguist, who is also an acclaimed local poet and short story novelist.

 

Over the years, we have witnessed remarkable growth, not only in our membership but also in the influence and recognition of SAAL within the global applied linguistics community. Our commitment to fostering a vibrant community of scholars and practitioners has resulted in a diverse membership, currently standing at 307 members, including esteemed honorary members and dedicated students. At this juncture I would also like to pay tribute to the late Dr Ho Wah Kam, past patron and past-Dean of NIE’s School of Education, who was responsible for forging closer professional collaborations between SAAL and the Singapore Teachers Union, resulting the hosting of several colloquia and the first SAAL publications.

 

One of the proudest moments of my tenure as President has been our successful organization of numerous impactful events. The 20th English in Southeast Asia (ESEA) Conference, co-organized with the English Language and Literature Academic Group of NIE in 2019, showcased the breadth of research and practice in our field, attracting participants from around the globe. These interactions have enriched our understanding and inspired innovative approaches to applied linguistics. Again, we were saved from bankruptcy because it was literally 2 months before COVID struck the world and caused international borders to close in 2020.

 

Our partnership with Routledge in publishing the "SAAL-Routledge Studies in World Englishes" series has positioned SAAL as being in the global league of what our universities call Tier 1+ publishers. It is vital that we continue to expand our high-quality publication avenues, ensuring that we remain at the forefront of applied linguistics scholarship.

 

The honouring of our mentors is also something that I truly believe in because only with strong mentorship can we collectively grow the next generation of Applied Linguists to continue the work we have begun.

 

Finally, I was also proud to have witnessed the birth of our sister MAAL, alongside our Malaysian sisters, founding President Emeritus Professor Azirah Hashim and current President Professor Shameem Rafik-Galea. A year ago, we will never ever forget how proud they both made us feel as AILA2024 brought close to 2000 international delegates to Malaysia, Truly Asia, with a first ever Asian AILA President and our MAAL President as the Congress Chair.

 

As SAAL matures into middle-age beyond 40 years, I urge SAAL to focus on the following aspirational areas of focus:

 

S for Singapore and our impact on Applied Linguistics locally and internationally. Tonight, seated in our midst are many promising young scholars, lecturers, Assistant & Associate Professors already making waves professionally in their areas of expertise.

 

In a 2025 publication entitled “Trends and Future Directions of Research on Applied Linguistics in Southeast Asia” Most publications from the period studied i.e. 2014-2024 fell under the category of Language Education and Acquisition, a trend also independently observed among other scholars of AL research. Given the field’s long-association with language teaching and learning, it is unsurprising that classroom-based issues in language teaching and learning, including multimodalities, multiliteracies and digital literacy are still the most widely published research area. What is interesting, however, is the gradually increasing amount and widening scope of research under the ‘Language in Use’ category. There appears to be a broadening of focus from the primary context of the language classroom to socio-cultural dimensions of language in use that impact societies and individuals, including issues of language policy, planning on multiple aspects of local and global societies.

 

As the esteemed company of Applied Linguists in Singapore and the region are seated here at dinner tonight, we need to collectively ask ourselves “What will be our collective claim to fame in Applied Linguistics in the next decade or so?” and “How do we create this collective future together as a community”?

 

Next, A for AI and its impact on Applied Linguistics: AI has now become a mainstay and a popular area of linguistic research and research in other disciplines. GAI’s intersection with AL is an area with many unexplored avenues. One possible avenue is to explore the difference between natural language learning and learning language through LLMs. Learning English through LLMs may have some interesting – both positive and detrimental – effects on the learner and these are questions that urgently need more investigative research to be done. There is also a need to examine attitudes and perceptions towards GAI in the region and how these affect language acquisition and education both on a personal and societal level.

 

The influence and effects of GAI in the classroom is another potential avenue for research in line with the generally popular AL theme of language education and acquisition. Chapelle et al. (2024, pp. 265, 267) suggest a few potential research areas which can be appropriated for AL research in Southeast Asia. Research can investigate the process and appropriateness of using GAI for education, including structuring GAI-sound prompts, the formal development of tools for assessing GAI output, and assessing the suitability of language assessment tools subsequently developed using GAI. For example, as the English varieties in Southeast Asia are diverse (e.g., Malaysian English, Indonesian English, Singapore English, Philippine English), GAI assistant tools in teaching and learning need to be able to identify each variety automatically, respond to prompts from these English varieties accurately. In using GAI for assessment purposes, the AI examiner needs to norm the English used against each specific country in SEA rather than assessing only with reference to an international standard of English.

 

The next A is for Advocacy: We should leverage our collective expertise to not only conduct research but also to advocate for language education policies that support multilingualism and inclusivity in our communities. As I ended my AILA2024 Keynote with the following questions: How can we:

 

1. develop language education for diverse, equal and inclusive ways?

2. sustain such education for the challenges of the uncertain future?

3. prevent "linguistic death" for resource-poor languages?*

4. develop more accurate and relevant language models for social and educational betterment?

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Finally, L stands for our Legacy: As a community of Applied Linguists, we need to ask ourselves what will be our collective legacy? Of the many available definitions of Applied Linguistics, one that resonates with me is that of AL is an interdisciplinary academic field that solves practical, language-related problems. Its focus is on the connection between language theory and real-world situations. Ultimately, as Language is essentially a human endeavour.

 

A language without speakers is dead, our role as Applied Linguists & Language Educators is to keep Languages alive so that the humans who use it can flourish with its use and apply its use to solve the complex and wicked problems that we face in our lifetime.

 

In conclusion, as we celebrate our 40th anniversary, let us take pride in our achievements and the strong foundation we have built together. The future holds immense potential for SAAL, and I am excited to see us evolve and thrive in the coming years. Together, let’s continue to advance the field of applied linguistics, nurture future scholars, in order to make a lasting impact on our society. Thank you and enjoy the evening ahead!