Investigating the Reasons behind EFL University Teachers’ Use of the Language Avoidance Strategy
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25007/ajnu.v12n4a1529Abstract
In the context of teaching English as a foreign language, teachers, though primarily competent and equipped with varying levels of knowledge, abilities, and skills, resort to language avoidance for one reason or another. Language avoidance is a communication strategy that foreign language teacher and/or learners use when encountering a communicative problem or difficulty managing communication and imparting information to the required level. It forms an integral part of everyday communication at large and in foreign language classes in particular. The current paper aims at investigating the reasons behind English as a foreign language teachers’ use of language avoidance. To bring about this aim, it is hypothesized that different personal, educational, and social reasons play a role in teachers’ language avoidance. To validate the preceding hypothesis, a sample of 39 university teachers of English were interviewed and given a questionnaire to state their responses concerning the role of the factors mentioned above in their use of language avoidance. It has been found out that language avoidance by university teachers of English as a foreign language is differently impacted by the personal, educational, and social factors under study.
Downloads
References
Adams, V. (1973). An introduction to modern English word-formation (Special education series). Longman Publishing Group. Retrieved July 28, 2022, from
https://www. academia .edu/ 19097105/Introduction_to_modern_English_word_formation.
Ahmed, H. A., & Isma'eel, H. F. (2011). Avoidance in language production. Adab AL Rafidayn, 60. Retrieved July, 28, 2022 from https://www. academia .edu/ 19097105/ Introduction_to_modern_English_word_formation
Brown, H.D. (2007). Principles of language learning and teaching. (4th ed.). NY: Longman. Retrieved July, 28, 2022 from http://angol.uni-miskolc.hu/wp-content/media/2016/10/ Principles_of_language_learning.pdf
Corder, S. P. 1983. Strategies of communication. In C. Faerch, G. Kasper, (eds.), Strategies in interlanguage communication (pp. 15-19). New York: Longman
Dornyei, Z. (1995). On the teachability of communication strategies. TESOL Quarterly, pp. 55-85. Retrieved July, 28, 2022 from https://www.jstor.org/stable/3587805
Dušková, L. (1969). On sources of errors in foreign language learning. IRAL - International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 7(1). https://doi.org/10.1515/iral. 1969.7.1.11.
Fraser, B. (1981). Insulting problem in a second language. TESOL quarterly, 15(4), pp.435-441.
Irujo, S. (1993). Steering clear: Avoidance in the production of idioms. IRAL - International Review of Applied Linguistics
in Language Teaching, 31(3). https://doi.org/10.1515/ iral.1993.31.3.205
Jordens, P. (1977). Rules, grammatical intuitions and strategies in foreign language learning. Interlanguage Studies Bulletin,
pp.5-76.
Kasper, G., & Færch, C. (Eds.). (1983). Strategies in interlanguage communication. Longman Publishing Group.
Kleinmann, H. (1977). Avoidance behaviour in adult second language acquisition. Language Learning 27: pp. 93-107.
Kano, S. (2006). Investigation of L1 influence on avoidance or relative clauses by Japanese learners of English: Do the
learners transfer the use of Japanese relative clauses into English? Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Hamline University,
Minnesota.
Kellerman, E., Ammerlaan, T., Bongaerts, T., & Poulisse, N. (1990). System and hierarchy in L2 compensatory
strategies. Developing communicative competence in a second language, 163-178.
Kleinmann, H. H. (1977). Avoidance behavior in adult second language acquisition. Language Learning, 27(1), pp. 93–107. [15] Laufer, B. (2000). Avoidance of idioms in a second language: The effect of L1-L2 degree of similarity. Studia Linguistica,
(2), pp. 186–196.
Levenston, E. A. (1971). Over-indulgence and under-representation: Aspects of mother-tongue interference. In G. Nickel
(Ed.), Papers in contrastive linguistics (pp. 115–121). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
Liao, Y., & Fukuya, Y. J. (2004). Avoidance of phrasal verbs: The case of Chinese learners of English. Language Learning,
(2), pp. 193–226.
Littlemore, J. (2003). The communicative effectiveness of different types of communication strategy. System, 31(3), pp. 331–
McDonough, S. H. (1995). Strategy and skill in learning a foreign language. Oxford University Press.
Moghimizade, R. P., & Pandian, A. (2007). Teaching vocabulary in an EFL environment: Problems and prospects.
In Southern Thailand English Language Teaching/Cultural Change Conference.
Nakatani, Y. (2005). The Effects of awareness-raising training on oral communication strategy use. The Modern Language
Journal, 89(1), pp. 76–91. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0026-7902.2005 .00266.x
Paribakht, T. (1985). Strategic competence and language proficiency. Applied Linguistics, 6(2), pp. 132–146.
Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S., Leech, G. N., & Svartvik, J. (1972). A grammar of contemporary English (Vol. 1985). London:
Longman.
Raupach, M. 1983. Analysis and evaluation of communication strategies. In C. Faerch, G. Kasper, (eds.), Strategies in
interlanguage communication, New York, Longman, pp. 175-196.
Richards, J. C., & Schmidt, R. W. (2010). Longman dictionary of language teaching and applied linguistics (4th ed.). New
York: Routledge.
Sakita, T. I. (1995). Sexism in Japanese English education: A survey of EFL texts. Women and Language, 18(2).
Schachter, J. (1974). An Error in error analysis. Language Learning, 24(2),205-214. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467- 1770.1974.tb00502.x
Tarone, E. (1977). Conscious communication strategies in interlanguage: A progress report. on TESOL.
Tarone, E. (1980). Communication strategies, foreigner talk, and repair in interlanguage 1. Language learning, 30(2).
Tarone, E. (1981). Decoding a primary language: the crucial role of strategic competence. In Conference on Interpretative Strategies in Language Learning. University of Lancaster.
Uzan, Y. (2019). Avoidance and compensatory strategies used by Turkish preparatory students In speaking. Retrieved
July, 6, 2022 from Hacettepe University: http://www.openaccess.hacettepe.edu.tr:8080/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11655/8081/10260643.pdf?sequence=1&isAll owed=y
Váradi, T. (1980). Strategies of target language learner communication: Message-adjustment. IRAL: International Review of Applied Linguistics in Language Teaching, 18(1), p. 59.
Willems, G. M. (1987). Communication strategies and their significance in foreign language teaching. System, 15(3), pp. 351-364.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2023 Academic Journal of Nawroz University

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Authors retain copyright
The use of a Creative Commons License enables authors/editors to retain copyright to their work. Publications can be reused and redistributed as long as the original author is correctly attributed.
- Copyright
- The researcher(s), whether a single or joint research paper, must sell and transfer to the publisher (the Academic Journal of Nawroz University) through all the duration of the publication which starts from the date of entering this Agreement into force, the exclusive rights of the research paper/article. These rights include the translation, reuse of papers/articles, transmit or distribute, or use the material or parts(s) contained therein to be published in scientific, academic, technical, professional journals or any other periodicals including any other works derived from them, all over the world, in English and Arabic, whether in print or in electronic edition of such journals and periodicals in all types of media or formats now or that may exist in the future. Rights also include giving license (or granting permission) to a third party to use the materials and any other works derived from them and publish them in such journals and periodicals all over the world. Transfer right under this Agreement includes the right to modify such materials to be used with computer systems and software, or to reproduce or publish it in e-formats and also to incorporate them into retrieval systems.
- Reproduction, reference, transmission, distribution or any other use of the content, or any parts of the subjects included in that content in any manner permitted by this Agreement, must be accompanied by mentioning the source which is (the Academic Journal of Nawroz University) and the publisher in addition to the title of the article, the name of the author (or co-authors), journal’s name, volume or issue, publisher's copyright, and publication year.
- The Academic Journal of Nawroz University reserves all rights to publish research papers/articles issued under a “Creative Commons License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction of the paper/article by any means, provided that the original work is correctly cited.
- Reservation of Rights
The researcher(s) preserves all intellectual property rights (except for the one transferred to the publisher under this Agreement).
- Researcher’s guarantee
The researcher(s) hereby guarantees that the content of the paper/article is original. It has been submitted only to the Academic Journal of Nawroz University and has not been previously published by any other party.
In the event that the paper/article is written jointly with other researchers, the researcher guarantees that he/she has informed the other co-authors about the terms of this agreement, as well as obtaining their signature or written permission to sign on their behalf.
The author further guarantees:
- The research paper/article does not contain any defamatory statements or illegal comments.
- The research paper/article does not violate other's rights (including but not limited to copyright, patent, and trademark rights).
This research paper/article does not contain any facts or instructions that could cause damages or harm to others, and publishing it does not lead to disclosure of any confidential information.