'Her name is - uh dat weet ik niet' Authenticity in the L2 classroom

This is a study of the interactions that occur in classroom situations. More in particular it will examine features of those interactions that are salient to the foreign language classroom. Theories and recommendations as to what should be going on in those situations are many, both in the general sense of 'how learning goes' (learning paradigms) and in the more specific one of how target language (L2) knowledge and skills are best learned or acquired. Psycholinguistic and sociolinguistic research programs have resulted in a number of claims about what are 'authentic' materials, 'good' teaching methods and proper ways to organize the learning environment. These have found their way into textbooks, curriculum content and organization, and in-service courses, but proposals for change have rarely been adopted on a large scale in the classroom itself. For that reason this study will not be directly concerned with those claims. Instead, I have set myself the task to investigate what could be the reason for this lack of implementation. It could be the case that teachers are inert or ignorant or dismissive of all this research and its recommendations. But it is possible also that teachers know things about classroom situations that researchers do not know and that have been overlooked or underanalyzed. What are the characteristic features of classroom situations that involve a great number of participants in task-oriented interactions? Are they relevant in some way to our observation that the recommendations of educational experts and applied linguists are rarely effectuated on a daily basis? What are the social dimensions and constraints of teaching a foreign language in an institutional setting?