The Conceptualizations of English and English Education of Japanese University Students

This paper tries to examine how Japanese university students conceptualize English and Japanese ELT by analyzing their interview texts. As an analytical approach, I used Critical Discourse Analysis in order to identify how the students’ conceptualizations of English and Japanese ELT were established in the discursive structures constituting Japanese ELT discourse, such as power relationships between teachers, students, other institutions (schools and universities) and systems (educational system and examination system) by linguistically analyzing their language use in the interview texts. Two characteristics of the students’ conceptualizations have surfaced: (a) students’ passive and receptive attitudes towards English and Japanese ELT; and (b) students’ inferiority complex towards their English speaking ability along with the former characteristic of their idea of English. The Japanese university students’ conceptualizations seem to oppose the Ministry of Education’s aim of English education “to foster a positive attitude towards communication, and to develop the foundation of practical abilities of communication” (cited in Shibata, 2003). Rather, the student interviewees appear to claim that their passive and receptive learning attitudes were constituted through the examination and the Japanese ELT systems, and their English teachers.