Reflecting Critical Pedagogy: Its Application to EFL Contexts and Criticism

The primary goal of this paper was to develop a critical point of view to critical pedagogy when applied to EFL contexts. Critical pedagogy is more concerned about how language can affect personal and social change of teachers and students than it is with how to teach language effectively or in ways that encourage critical thinking on the part of teacher and students. For this goal, this paper introduces the definition, emergence and major constructs of critical pedagogy in a broad way at first. Then, this paper presents how critical pedagogy has an impact on ELT, focusing on how critical pedagogy is applied in ELT contexts and why the application of critical pedagogy in EFL can be criticized, through the review of empirical studies. Reflection of Korean English teaching situation and applicational difficulties of critical pedagogy in Korean ELT are followed.