Language-content partnership in higher education: development and opportunities

Abstract

Interdisciplinary collaboration, in the sense of partnership between English language teachers and content teachers, is significant for enhancing university students’ English-medium academic success. It has long been advocated, but it has not become a common phenomenon in higher education institutions. The present article aims to synthesize what has been revealed about such collaboration in tertiary contexts in the (English-medium) literature, and to consider implications for practice and research. A systematic approach was adopted in conducting the literature review. The main body of the article focuses on illustrating five themes grounded in the literature: theoretical perspectives on the need for interdisciplinary collaboration; motivations for interdisciplinary collaboration and slow development of the trend; interdisciplinary collaboration on a continuum of partnership; team teaching in interdisciplinary collaboration; and benefits of interdisciplinary collaboration. Implications for practice and research are then discussed.