ABSTRACT
This chapter presents an overview of the theoretical frameworks and perspectives which inform this book’s stance on the global expansion of capital and its relationship to English. It begins with the premise that the spread and continued reproduction of a normative standard model as the dominant signified for English in the world is dependent upon the global spread of capital and its endless accumulation, by means of which English has become in an almost default manner ‘structured in dominance’ in the world-economy and system. The chapter begins with Marx’s approach to capital and its circulation, and introduces into Marx’s formulation the free riding of English upon that circulation, whereby money invested or loaned in the market and the processing of the profits which accrue are accompanied and facilitated by the use of English as a transactional lingua franca. The chapter gives an account of capital as a dialectical process in which English is revealed as a practical consciousness and constitutive activity. It then presents several key perspectives which account for capital’s historical global spread. These include classical theories of imperialism, world-systems theory, development theory, and theories of structural power in international political economy.
