Metapragmatics of Metalanguage: Poetic Emergence of Object Language and Its Socialization Effect in an EFL Classroom

Abstract

This paper attempts to anatomize the repeat-after-the-teacher activity and subsequent activities often observed in EFL (English as a Foreign Language) classrooms in Japan. Drawing on linguistic anthropology of education, this study regards the above-mentioned activities as “metalinguistic use of language”. By paying particular attention to the “poetic” aspects of such language use, this paper reveals the ways in which the metalinguistic practice of EFL sets focus on and reifies “English” as its object language. Also, the study depicts the “creativity” of the English language classroom through identifying other metapragmatic regimentation processes relevant to the pragmatics of metalanguage from the viewpoint of metacommunication, thereby pointing to the metalanguage socialization effect which poetic emergence of object language can bring about.