Pragmatic competence is an essential element of communicative competence, which makes it relevant for speakers of all ages, including young language learners (YLLs). Despite the recognized importance of pragmatics, research of textbooks for adult second language (L2) learners to date has found them lacking in their approach to this key aspect of…

One of the underrepresented aspects of pragmatic competence development is perceiving and responding to impoliteness acts. The present study reports on a quantitative and qualitative investigation of two international English language teaching (ELT) textbook series published by Oxford and Cambridge University Press; it focuses on the books highly…

Studies examining culture representation in language textbooks have rarely adopted the semiotic approach, despite its potential for presenting and (re)creating cultural meanings at their various levels (i.e. cultural, intercultural, multicultural, and transcultural) in the co-instantiations of texts, tasks, and images. To address this issue, a…

In light of the growing importance placed by states on the use of authentic materials in foreign language education programs, this study explored the literary content found in the 18 English, French, and German ministry-approved language textbooks used in upper-secondary schools in Russia. The study identified 150 literary texts, following which…

Though reports of pedagogic materials production point to the range of compromises authors make when writing language teaching textbooks, many accounts are retrospective in nature. This study sought to expand the research perspective by interrogating writing episodes via qualitative content analysis to discover how two expert ELT (English language…

This study examines the representation of cultures and communities in the world across five editions of New Headway elementary level textbook (NHE). It conducts a diachronic content analysis to explore how the representation of cultures and communities has evolved in NHE across five editions since its first edition's publication in 1993. Adapting…