We use the term “aviation English” at Latitude. After all, it’s in our registered company name. It’s useful as it succinctly defines our broad area of activity, and it sets Latitude apart from other areas of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and, dare we say it, “General English”. We are aviation language specialists: we don’t deal with the language of medicine or law. We don’t offer summer school for kids. We don’t prepare students for university degrees in the humanities. Instead, we provide language education and assessment services exclusively to the aviation industry. In this sense, the term “Aviation English” works. And for our customers, learners and test takers, it resonates well. They are reassured by its simplicity and immediate relevance.
The term “Aviation English” is widely used. An internet search returns 636,000,000 results. But what does the term actually mean? In this article, we look at the common interpretation of “Aviation English” and why this is problematic. Then, we explore some of the reasons why the term “Aviation English” can be misleading. Finally, we set out what the term means to us a specialist provider of aviation English services.
“Aviation English” is commonly understood to refer only to the domain of aeronautical radiotelephony communication (RT) between pilots and Air Traffic Controllers (ATCs). The reasons are obvious:
Firstly RT communication is the most obvious deviation from general English and nearly incomprehensible to non aviation professionals due to speed and coded vocabulary. Misunderstandings and errors can contribute to incidents or accidents.
Secondly, RT is the sole focus of the ICAO Language Proficiency Requirements (LPRs), by far the strongest, most well-developed framework for the training and assessment of language proficiency in the industry (and arguably, the most ambitious and far-reaching language policy the world has seen).
Thirdly, of all the aviation language domains, RT has, over the years, received the lion’s share of attention from industry, from applied linguists, and from language education and assessment professionals, all using the term “Aviation English”.
Finally, for anyone remotely interested in language and aviation, RT captures the imagination. A language domain featuring a baseline prescribed standard phraseology with the requirement for proficiency in ‘plain language’(1) spoken via a voice-only channel in a highly regulated and controlled and sometimes incredibly complex, dynamic and international environment is fascinating.
For these reasons, RT and “ICAO English” have become almost synonymous with “Aviation English”. Indeed, the current Wikipedia entry for “Aviation English” would have us believe that aviation English starts and ends with radio transmissions between pilots and ATCs.
This interpretation of the ICAO LPRs as the almost de facto “Aviation English” is problematic. As ICAO definitively states, “the sole object of ICAO language proficiency requirements is aeronautical radiotelephony communications, a specialized subcategory of aviation language corresponding to a limited portion of the language uses of only two aviation professions — controllers and flight crews”(2). In spite of this crystal clear guidance, “ICAO language proficiency” is often mistakenly identified as a target for all sorts of learners and learning and assessment contexts for which the ICAO LPRs were never designed and are ill-suited. ICAO level 3 is not a suitable target for category A aircraft maintenance technicians preparing for type conversion training in the USA. ICAO level 4 is not a suitable target for zero hours student pilots preparing for ab-initio flight training in South Africa. ICAO level 5 is not a suitable target for an airline’s business class cabin crew. In our consultations with industry, we spend considerable time explaining not only what “Aviation English” is, but also what the ICAO LPRs are not.
So, if the ICAO LPRs are not the “Aviation English”, and “Aviation English” is much more than the ICAO LPRs, what, then, does the term actually mean? Let’s now explore some of the reasons why the term “Aviation English” can be misleading.
Firstly, “Aviation English” implies some single variety of English which can be taught and assessed. “Aviation English course” or “Aviation English test” are common labels but they are almost meaningless. It is too simplistic to assume that any “Aviation English course” or any “Aviation English test” will be useful for any group of aviation professionals. These labels tell us precious little about the domain, purpose, content and crucially, the intended audience, in other words, all the things that need to be examined carefully when designing and developing language training and assessment to target the many and varied needs of users of English within the industry.
Secondly, the term “Aviation English” implies that people who work in the aviation industry use English in a way which is somehow different to other people. Of course, there is some truth to this. RT is a good example:
“Toronto arrival, Lufthansa 93 heavy, triple seven, information x-ray, passing Roissy at one one thousand”.
This sort of language is never heard beyond the radio frequency and, unless you are a pilot or an ATC, you are unlikely to have the knowledge and skills to understand this language, let alone to speak it(3). Thus, as ICAO states, RT is just one ‘specialized subcategory of aviation language corresponding to a limited portion of the language uses of only two aviation professions — controllers and flight crews’(4). If RT is a subcategory, then surely there must be others, which means that “Aviation English” cannot be a unitary concept. And if other subcategories exist, are they really so unique, so impenetrable, that some can speak or write or understand it, but others can’t?
To an extent, this is also true. The way language is used is governed not only by the user’s own language knowledge, but by their professional knowledge. Effective use of the radio requires not only proficiency with standard phraseology and plain language, but operational knowledge and experience. Likewise, language-proficient aircraft maintainers can understand and follow aircraft maintenance manuals written in English, not only because they are proficient users of the language but because they know about aircraft maintenance. The domains of RT and aircraft maintenance are both “Aviation English”, but their characteristics vary considerably, and the language skills required to use English in these domains are not readily transferable. In that sense, perhaps “Aviation English” is necessarily defined, at least in part, by who is using it and why. What, then, about the language itself?
Aviation is replete with terminology and jargon which is specific to the sector. The terms MRO, ADSB, ETOPS and SIGMET are definitely “Aviation English” and, unless you are an aviation ‘insider’, they are meaningless. But a language domain is so much more than just a list of words. When we dig deeper, we find that the language of aviation draws heavily from the wider universe of language, employing lexis, grammatical structures and features of discourse that are commonly found in many other domains from science, technology, engineering and maths to computing, law, medicine, business and customer service, inserting its own specialist terminology along the way. If that’s the case, is it possible to say with any precision what language belongs to “Aviation English”?
Linguists have been grappling with this question for decades. Essentially, the question is ‘at what point does ‘general’ English end and ESP begin?’ This distinction is far from clear in aviation. While the industry has its specialist terminology, words frequently appear in aviation-related texts which, out of context, no one would say are “Aviation English” words at all. Here’s an example:
In 2013 ... an Airbus A330 suffered a rejected take-off in Brisbane, Australia, due to an airspeed indication failure which was only detected during the take-off roll. During the subsequent inspection it was found that the Captain’s pitot probe was almost totally obstructed by an insect nest, consistent with mud-dauber wasp nest residue. (5)
The tendency of wasps to build nests on aircraft airframes is the central theme of this airworthiness bulletin issued by a regulatory authority, the purpose of which is to alert, educate, and make recommendations to the aviation community. So, is ‘wasp’ aviation English? In this context, we’d say the answer is ‘yes’. Context is everything.
In this article, we’ve looked briefly at who uses language, what language they use, and the context and purpose for language use. With these things in mind, we propose the following definition of “aviation English”:
Any work-related language, written or spoken, which is exchanged between people who work in aviation and other people who:
Also work in aviation;
Are involved with aviation research and education;
Are training to enter the aviation industry; and/or
Make use of aviation services.
By placing aviation professionals (the ‘who’) at the very centre, this catch-all definition allows us to conceive of “Aviation English” as all instances of the use of English (the ‘what’ and ‘where’) for any and all work-related purposes (the ‘why’). So, for us, all of the following examples could be considered as “Aviation English”:
SPOKEN AVIATION ENGLISH:
A flight attendant speaking with a passenger in the cabin about the stowage of hand luggage
An engineer on the apron talking to a pilot on the flight deck via a plug-in headset about the condition of nose wheel tyres
A pilot talking to a pilot on the flight deck about the approach
An ATC talking to another ATC on the telephone about traffic handover
A professor giving a talk about advanced aerodynamics in a university lecture theatre
A Chief Financial Officer’s quarterly presentation to the airline board
The ICAO Director General’s address to the ICAO assembly
WRITTEN AVIATION ENGLISH:
An aircraft Quick Reference Handbook
A coursebook for student Air Traffic Services Electronics Personnel
An engineer’s email memo to technicians on an aircraft assembly line
A comment about an incident made by an ATC to her followers via Twitter
An incident briefing prepared for an airport safety committee meeting
An airline selling discounted flights to the public in a newspaper
NOTAMS published via an AIS website
For us at Latitude, the way English is used in the many and varied professional roles within a huge global industry all fall under the broad banner of “Aviation English”. And for us, that is where the usefulness of the term “Aviation English” ends. The industry is too broad, the language itself and the purposes and channels of its communication too varied for the term “Aviation English” to have any real descriptive value, at least for a provider of specialist training and assessment services. For any clarity, we have to go deeper.
Footnotes
(1) We will write more on ‘plain language’ in future articles
(2) ICAO Document 9835: Manual on the Implementation of Language Proficiency Requirements, Section 3.2.7
(3) Trippe, J., & Pederson, E. (2017). Aviation English Intelligibility. 19th International Symposium on Aviation Psychology, 281-286.
(4) ICAO Document 9835: Manual on the Implementation of Language Proficiency Requirements, Section 3.2.7
(5) Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority Airworthiness Bulletin 02-052 Issue 4 – 3 May 2018
