Challenges of Teaching English as a Second Language in India and the Role of Literature: Problems and Perspectives

Abstract

Understanding language through literature is a very complex phenomenon in the Indian context with such intricate diversification of languages. The executive use of these diverse languages make it more engrossing to learn and classify the same into multiple morphological, phonological and syntactical levels. Language learning is difficult at the lower level of educational chain because it compromises the process of learning through the extensive use of the first language rather than using English language; and in such a scenario, the theories developed by ELT serve the purpose of helping learners understand the basic concepts. In addition to the understanding of language, ELT also helps to improve and understand the theory in an expanded way and contributes to the lower level with an improved learning and understanding base. However, the goals and target of ELT are not very clearly defined in the teaching- learning arena as the needs, objectives and pre- requisite skills of the learners to understand meaning is often ignored. Although learning from a literary perspective has a wide-ranging role in English studies, but it still needs deeper exploration in all relevant dimensions and more research-oriented teaching strategies need to be employed. So, this paper makes an attempt to explore and suggest solutions to the problems that the students face, being non- native speakers of English in India. It also tries to probe into newer prospects of incorporating language in literature, the controversy between teaching and learning and the functions of language within a literary text.