English as Tyrannosaurus rex

The increasing domination of English as the world’s leading medium of international professional communication has begun to impact English for Academic Purposes programs. Specifically, questions arise as to whether English is becoming too successful. This paper reviews several of the resulting ideological challenges to EAP. Although not all of these challenges are accepted as well‐founded, the paper argues that resistance to the ‘triumphalism’ of English is also a responsibility of EAP teachers. This resistance can be encouraged by further research into the academic registers of languages other than English, by support for local‐language scholarly publications, and by using the current controversies as consciousness‐raising exercises in EAP classes for international graduate students.