Appropriating Literature in Foreign Language Classrooms  

This paper suggests that second language classrooms need to account 
for the discourse processes involved in learning a second language as 
well as in the fostering of an interactive reading of literature 
(Liaw, 2001). Implications for classroom teaching and curriculum 
planning are further discussed in terms of allowing students to 
appropriate the literature being studied (Kramsch,1985) in relation 
to reading from a cognitive perspective (Beach,1993; Hynds,1992) of 
second language learning. This investigation proposes a new stance on 
literature in the foreign language classroom based on the 
Defamiliarization Theory (Shyklovsky,1965), and also incorporates 
the importance of discourse in developing language proficiency.