The influence of Islamic Background Knowledge on EFL learners' response in reading English literary texts

Abstract

Students from an Islamic educational background would normally employ stored ‎knowledge about Islam in their intellectual skill sets. This cognitive information ‎comes to a Muslim student through gradual acquisition and immersion in the Islamic ‎education system, and in both formal and informal settings in many different degrees ‎and qualities. As a unit of schematic knowledge, we may assume that such an Islamic ‎schema can shape a Muslim’s cognitive process. Employing schema and reader ‎response theories into a theoretical framework, this study examines the use of Islamic ‎Background Knowledge (IBK) by undergraduate Muslim students in their ‎interpretation of Western English literature. This study sheds light on the extent to ‎which such knowledge permeates a student’s cognitive process, and has implications ‎for determining the extent to which Islamic knowledge has been successfully ‎subsumed within a student’s intellect when they encounter critical evaluations and ‎judgments of cultural contents in studying English. Such an assessment approach ‎conducted in an English classroom would be a crucial foundation for investigating ‎the applicability of Islamic knowledge to real world information and situations, and ‎could yield valuable pedagogical data for the revision of Islamic studies courses to be ‎offered within the wider Islamic based curriculum. Data from this study were ‎collected using a case study method from 50 undergraduate students of Fatoni ‎University’s English Department, Thailand, from August 2015 - May 2016. ‎Additional qualitative data were collected from observation of regular in-class ‎activities, a focus group discussion and interviews of individual student responses ‎about the themes presented in the works. Focus was placed on examining both the use ‎and non-use of IBK in the students’ reactions. The data were analyzed by content ‎analysis using both qualitative and quantitative techniques. This study finds that there ‎are different reactions towards the social behavior and cultural practices depicted in ‎the two selected works –William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and Jane Austen’s ‎Pride and Prejudice –and most participants frequently used their IBK in expressing ‎concerns and objections towards the themes presented. This study suggests that ‎reading such works actually contributes to the Muslim students’ intellectual ‎development and analytical skills when being asked to approach these texts in a ‎critical fashion utilizing their Islamic background knowledge. IBK can thus operate ‎as a perceptual filter in the students’ reading, and serve as an important influence on ‎their reasoning process. ‎