Literature in Foreign Language Education Programs: A New Perspective

Many of the studies on the subject of literature as an essential part of the English education programs in Arab universities has concentrated on only professors’ views and attitudes to these courses. By contrast, the following article describes a qualitative investigation on how former students and presently in-service English teachers felt about studying English literature during their university years. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with six English-major graduates who teach EFL at high and secondary schools in Misurata. Libya. The study has revealed that participants were not positive about literature courses as they maintain that these courses have contributed little to their language development and teaching careers. They have narrated several factors which limited benefiting from these courses. Some of these factors are the teaching and learning practices in the language classroom, the difficulty and oddness of vocabulary and structures of literature texts and the lack of skills in English. Based on the interviews, reflections and implications of these barriers are made.