Appraising Iranian L2 Classroom Discourse Contents From the Critical Pedagogy Perspective

Critical pedagogy (CP) empowers L2 learners to have a voice in the classroom and in the society. This study was an attempt to investigate whether the current classroom discourse in Iran can endow the L2 learners with a critical awareness to actively transform their learning processes and creatively engage in collaborative dialogues to construct new knowledge. To this end, the discourse contents of 10 L2 classrooms in Shahrekord, Iran, were randomly observed, recorded, and examined to explore whether the turn-taking architecture was designed in a dialogical way to empower the L2 learners with critical awareness to transform their roles of passive learners into critical thinkers and coparticipants. Chi-squares were, then, run on the transcribed and coded data related to the occurrence and distribution of the initiation, elicitation, and follow-up moves, and a complementary interpretive approach was adopted to the analysis of classroom interactional episodes. The results indicated that the teachers were the initiators of most exchanges in the classrooms, and their initiations were mostly in the form of display (i.e., product) questions. The teachers predetermined the contents of the L2 learners’ turns, leaving no space for the L2 learners to have their own voices. Therefore, the L2 learners’ roles were restricted to giving preselected, short answers. The teachers did not use their follow-up moves to encourage critical talk, dialogue, or collaboration among the L2 learners in class. It is finally argued that a critical, transformative approach to L2 pedagogy and classroom discourse de-silences the L2 learners and empowers them to constantly reflect upon their knowledge-construction and learning experiences.