Using theatre extracts in teaching speech acts to turkish efl students with special reference to apologies and refusals

The development of pragmatic and sociolinguistic rules in language use is important for language learners. It is necessary to understand and use language that is appropriate to the various situations, because failure to do so may cause users to miss key points that are being communicated or to have their messages misunderstood. Worse, yet, is the possibility of a total communication breakdown and the stereotypical labeling of second language users as people who are insensitive, rude, or inept (Thomas,1983). Apologies and refusals are considered to be highly complex speech acts as they differ cross-culturally, thus, these language specific semantic formulas are prone to misunderstandings.This present study concerns with the teaching and learning of the more subtle and complex features of the speech act of apologizing and refusing in English to Turkish Prep-school learners by using theatre extracts as authentic material. Data was collected from 10 American native speakers of English and 40 Turkish Prep-school foreign language learners, 20 of which were experimental and 20 of which were the control group from the same proficiency level. Participants were given a discourse role-play test (DRPT) instrument for elicitation including both apology and refusal strategies via pre- and post-test questionnaire and the classroom treatments were video recorded for ethnographic data. Theatre extracts from English and American playwrights? plays were used as an authentic material with pragmatic instruction throughout one semester. Findings indicated that effective instruction of speech acts through theatre extracts can assist learners in producing native-like utterances in certain situations and affect their sociolinguistic behavior.