ABSTRACT
English for Academic Purposes (EAP) units, like other parts of the neoliberal university, will be viewed as cost centres and, they will be required to be financially self-sufficient and profit-generating. Some EAP units try to resist the power of the university and raise their status. In EAP, there is a general belief that the role of the EAP teacher is to familiarise the student with relevant communicative conventions needed by apprentice members of the target discourse community. Facilitating access to disciplinary discourse communities requires a high degree of knowledge on the part of EAP teachers. The hard version of critical EAP is perhaps more written about and discussed than actually practised. Most forms of language teaching, including EAP, work with texts, whether written or spoken. Critical discourse analysis aims to make the implicit explicit in language use. It is an approach which can be appropriated by a critical EAP teacher.
