What Do Emotions Have to Do With It?

Abstract

The chapter was an action research intervention carried out at a private Omani higher education institution where 17 female students were exposed to various texts revolving around issues that affected women in the region or in the world. The chosen texts were prone to provoke a varied range of emotional responses and to result in empathy with the actors involved as well as a broader, critical understanding of the issues presented. Participants reported having become aware of multiple perspectives and being able to see things from various points of view in addition to an increased development of all the four language skills as an implicit result of this intervention. The study thus illuminates the importance of emotions in language learning pedagogy and their catalytic value in the process of developing awareness of multiple perspectives.