The students' perceptions of literary texts in university level reading courses

The main aim of this study is to show how effective and useful the literary texts may be in reading classes at universities. Above all, this study tries to reveal the advantages of literary texts over non-literary texts. In order to reach these aims, a qualitative and a quantitative methodology was followed, which makes the study more valid. The lessons were conducted at Toros University with 60 students. The qualitative part of the methodology includes an interview which has 4 open-ended questions. On the other hand, the quantitative part consists of two questionnaires, which include 20 items in total. A convenient short story was selected to represent literary texts. As a result of this study, when compared with the non-literary texts, it has been found out that literary texts may be more effective and useful in English as Foreign Language Teaching. Key words: Literature, Using Literature in EFL, Literary Texts in ELT, Reading at University