© 1995 by Oxford University Press
Articles |
Problems in the presentation of speech acts in ELT materials: the case of complaints
Assistant Professor of Linguistics and Academic Co-ordinator of the English Language Institute at the University of Florida, where she is involved in ESL/EFL teachers training. She teaches courses in TESL methods, second language acquisition, and sociolinguistics. This article derives from her recent book Complaining and Commiserating: A Speech Act View of Solidarity in Spoken American English.
Graduate student in Linguistics, and an instructor at the English Language Institute of the University of Florida. She has taught ESL/EFL in Britain and Eastern Europe.
This article surveys seven ELT texts that are organized around the teaching of functions in order to explicate several problems evident in their presentation of speech acts. A specific speech act sequence, that of complaint/commiseration, is the focus of the analysis. This speech behaviour is highlighted in order to demonstrate the mismatch between data from spontaneous speech, and data that is contrived through the native speaker intuitions of textbook developers. A first problem is that intuition about speech act realization often differs greatly from the way in which naturalistic speech patterns out. Second, it is demonstrated that important information on underlying social strategies of speech acts is often overlooked entirely. A sample lesson on complaining/commiserating based on spontaneous speech is offered, to draw a contrast with the lessons on complaining presented in the texts surveyed.