Pragmatic Representations in Iranian High School English Textbooks

Owing to the growing interest in communicative, cultural and pragmatic aspects of second language learning in recent years, the present study tried to investigate representations of pragmatic aspects of English as a foreign language in Iranian high school textbooks. Using Halliday’s (1978), and Searle’s (1976) models, different language functions and speech acts were specifically determined and examined in high school textbooks. The results indicated that there were major insufficiencies in pragmatic representations in these books. These problems were related to inadequate coverage of different speech acts and language functions, lack of authenticity in the dialogues, inappropriate simplifications and reductions, lack of grading, unsystematic presentations, providing no meta-pragmatic information, and presenting English speech acts embedded in dialogues with Iranian culture, religion, and norms. The results indicate that material developers and textbook designers need to consider these aspects to help learners to be able to learn second language more efficiently and appropriately.