Some Problems and Caveats in 'Communicative' Discourse: Toward a Conceptualization of the Foreign Language Classroom

ABSTRACT This article argues for a conceptualization of the foreign language classroom that matches descriptions of real functional language for communication within a cultural group. Teaching and learning are conceptualized as linguistic or communicative processes and the classroom is conceptualized as an emerging culture, that is, as a “linguistic community” within which students are learning both academic and social dimensions of language and language use. The social interaction that takes place in the classroom serves to shape and maintain both the classroom community and the goals of foreign language instruction. The article ends with suggestions for needed kinds of classroom‐based research from a social interaction perspective to help us better understand what actually goes on in the foreign language learning environment.