Face-Threatening Acts: Conflict between a Teacher and Students in EFL Classroom

As traditional concept of Chinese value and personality, the issue of face plays a vital role in Chinese culture not only in daily life but also in learners’ learning context. This study investigates English teachers’ use of threatening acts in EFL classrooms. One female EFL teacher of the junior high school and her 49 EFL students participated in the present study. With the use of classroom observation, the teacher interview and students’ open-ended questionnaires, 38 threatening acts and 4 main threat types (indirect threats, indirect accusation, direct threats with modified blame, and direct threats with explicit blame) were noted. The factors affecting the teacher’s use of threatening acts and students’ responses and opinions toward the teacher’s use of threats were discussed. The pedagogical implications were provided at the end of the study.