“Ownership” of English in the Outer Circle: An Alternative to the NS‐NNS Dichotomy *

The linguistic classification of English speakers from outer‐circle countries, such as India, Malaysia, and Singapore, is often ambiguous because the Englishes they speak are considered different from inter‐languages yet are not considered native varieties. This study investigates whether outer‐circle speakers can be viewed as equivalent to speakers of mother‐tongue varieties in terms of their ownership of English (Norton, 1997), that is, the degree to which they project themselves as legitimate speakers with authority over the language. An Acceptability Judgment Task was used to elicit and record talk among pairs from inner‐ and outer‐circle countries while they judged 24 sentences. Drawing upon Zimmerman's (1998) concepts of discourse identities and situated identities , Goffman's (1981) concept of footing , and Scollon's (1998) distinctions among the receptor roles , the analysis demonstrates the linguistic cues that indexed expressions of ownership through (a) references to the speakers' own English usage, (b) human subject pronouns, and (c) the modal can . The results reveal variation in degrees of ownership among both groups, but similarities across outer‐ and inner‐circle groups.