The current study explored teachers' perceptions of the impact of technological and cultural modernization on politeness among Iranian EFL students. The study followed a qualitative design in the form of semi-structured interviews to gather the necessary data from the language teachers. The participants in this study were 30 teachers in TEFL. They were chosen based on convenience sampling. The main instrument used in this study was a semi-structured interview to gather the necessary data from the language teachers. In this study, the necessary data were evaluated through thematic analysis and thick description by two coders. The results were presented in the form of the main themes emergent in the study. The study ended in several conclusions; initially it was concluded that the new generations of Iranian students are immensely influenced by modernization and the spread of Western culture; therefore, they have different views and ways of handling generational and cultural differences in English language education. Secondly, it was found that communication between teachers and new-generation students in Iran would reveal politeness problems. Moreover, it was concluded that the experiences and views of Iranian teachers, based on their interactions with different generations in English language education, would give helpful information. It was suggested that since the new generation has its own needs and priorities and even jargon that may not be fully understandable to the previous generation of teachers and instructors, it is better to think and research more about this generation and their needs.
Hadi et al. (Wed,) studied this question.