“Are you afraid of Virginia Woolf?” Perceptions and responses of third year EFL university students of gender roles in three short stories by Virginia Woolf
Authors
Erika De La Barra Van Treek
Universidad Chileno Británica de Cultura
The linguistic impact of the use of literature in an EFL context has been widely studied by different researchers (Quirk and Widdowson 1985; Chapman 1982; Maley 1989). However, a new line of research has emerged recently on the grounds of the theory of reception applied to EFL situations (Carlisle, 2000; Liaw, 2001; Larson, 2009; Khatib, 2011; Shin & Riazantzeva, 2015; Bjelland, 2016).
Although this theory was not originally intended for EFL students but for native speakers and competent readers able to take an active role in the reading process, the applications have yielded interesting evidence about the reader who is also a student of English. This paper explores the perceptions of gender roles in three of Virginia Woolf’s stories as well as the students’ expectations in the reading process. The findings also suggest pedagogical implications for EFL learning at advanced
levels given the complexity and sophistication of the language generated by students.
Keywords:
theory of reception, gender roles, patriarchal society, feminism
De La Barra Van Treek, E. (2018). “Are you afraid of Virginia Woolf?” Perceptions and responses of third year EFL university students of gender roles in three short stories by Virginia Woolf. Lenguas Modernas, (51), Pág. 29 – 46. Retrieved from https://revistas.uchile.cl/index.php/LM/article/view/51883
