Nativeness Vs. Intelligibility

Have been reading a bit of Jennifer Jenkins work on "English as Lingua Franca" (ELF) of late. Basically, this focuses on English as an International Language (EIL) - communication between a nonnative speaker (NNS) and another NNS. For this kind of communication the focus needs to be on intelligibility - these speakers don't need to have nativeness as a goal...

In an ESL context, however, it is easy to see how nativeness would be a goal for an English language learner (ELL)... most of their communication will be with native speakers (NS).

Which leads me to my teaching situation... here in Taiwan...

I did a quick class survey with my junior high learners regarding their pronunciation. Nearly all of them said they wanted to sound like NS (except for some of the boys who simply didn't care). Now, living in Taiwan, they are never going to achieve that NS standard as their own pronunciation is going to continuously be influenced by the Chinese-influenced pronunciation they hear around them on a daily basis and in the English classroom. Promoting NS-like pronunciation could in fact lead to disillusionment amongst the learners.

Therefore, what are your ideas on pronunciation?

How do you approach it with your groups of learners?

I'd like to hear from you...

Cheers