Contextualizing Vietnamese Students' Willingness to Communicate in L2 English Inside the Classroom

Abstract

Willingness to communicate (WTC) has increasingly received the attention of second language researchers and practitioners in the past decades. WTC in a second/foreign language (L2) refers to L2 students' willingness to involve in conversation with a certain person or people at a specified time using a second language. Although students' communicative competence in the second language may be predicted by WTC, the role of WTC in L2 acquisition in Vietnamese situations is understudied. This chapter argues for the importance of relating aspects of L2 WTC to Vietnamese cultures, motivated by the author's wish to add to the literature on WTC. First, the chapter reviews the literature on WTC in a second language. Then, the roles of culture on WTC are discussed. Finally, the chapter presents suggestions for tackling elements of students' WTC in Vietnamese EFL classes.