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Deceased Editor 
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vi 
 
Vol. 9 No. 3; 2020 
Table of Contents 
Articles 
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis 
Atekah Abaalkhail 10-Jan 
A Pragmatic Data Based Evaluation of CLT in the EFL Curricula at Higher Secondary Level 
in Bangladesh 
 
Md. Masud Rana, Md. Mahmud Hasan Chowdhury 17-Nov 
Exploring Marxist Perspective Amidst Exploitation and False Consciousness in Hosain’s The 
Old Man 
 
Muhammad Hamzah Masood, Shahzeb Shafi 18-24 
Investigating Digital Apps: Gaming Elements and Learning Context 
Aylar Fallah Vazirabad, Farahman Farrokhi 25-36 
Identity Recognition as a Tragic Flaw in King Lear by William Shakespeare: Application of 
Hegel’s Master-Slave Dialectic 
 
Malik Haroon Afzal, Mohamad Rashidi Mohd Pakri, Nurul Farhana Low Abdullah 37-42 
Strategic Functions in CNN’s Media Discourse An Ideological Strategy To Win People’s 
Support A Critical Discourse Analysis Study 
 
Hanan Al-Radhi 43-54 
Thomas Hardy: A Torchbearer of Feminism Representing Sufferings of Victorian Era Women 
Nadia Saeed, Muhammad Ali Shaikh, Stephen John, Kamal Haider 55-61 
The Influence of Topic Management on the Speaking Ability of Iranian Intermediate EFL 
Learners 
 
Sepideh Shiri, Hassan Abdilah 62-69 
Walls and Sexuality as Trans-cultural Symbols: A Study of Rudyard Kipling’s Short Story ‘On 
the City Wall’ 
 
Muhammad Imran, Shabbir Ahmad, Muhammad Younas, Samina Khaled 70-73 
A Translation into English of KhalilI. Al-Fuzai’s1 “Chivalry of the Village” 
Gassim H. Dohal 74-76 
 
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis
Atekah Abaalkhail*
School of Linguistics and Language Studies, Carleton University, 1125 Colonel by Drive, Ottawa K1S 5B6, Ontario, Canada
Corresponding Author: Atekah Abaalkhail, E-mail: atekahabaalkhail@cmail.carleton.ca
ABSTRACT
Suicide notes are considered important texts used to understand the suicidal act. Most studies 
focused on these notes psychologically to test hypothesis. Less research has been done 
discursively from the perspective of language studies. The purpose of this study is to investigate 
suicide notes, written by English speaking males and females between the years 1945-1954 
and 1983-1984, from the perspective of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) genre approach. 
Specifically, the study examines the communicative purpose(s) and the rhetorical move/step 
structure in a corpus of 86 suicide notes. The findings suggest that suicide notes share common 
communicative purposes and rhetorical structure, and, therefore, constitute a genre from the ESP 
perspective. By examining the rhetorical move structure of suicide notes, this study proposes 
a model of suicide notes structure, the moves writers use and suggests that suicide notes do 
constitute a genre without a visible discourse community. The study adds to the existing body 
of knowledge in genre theory and makes a theoretically based contribution to the fields of genre 
studies, suicidology, and, potentially, forensic linguistics.
Key words: Suicide Notes, ESP, Genre, Move Analysis, Occluded Genre, Communicative 
Purpose
INTRODUCTION
Suicide notes are texts usually written minutes before 
the suicide act (Leenaars, 1988; O’Connor & Leenaars, 
2004) and considered as a source of data that research-
ers use to gain insights into the phenomenon of suicide. 
For that reason, many researchers (e.g., Coster & Lester, 
2013; Leenaars, 1988; Shapero, 2011) have analysed sui-
cide notes to better understand the final thoughts of the 
suicidal individual (Leenaars, 1999). The majority of sui-
cide note studies examined the notes from a psychologi-
cal perspective (e.g., Black, 1993; Leenaars, 1988), with 
the focus of such examinations on testing theories devel-
oped in the field of psychology or on the application of 
predetermined psychological categories to the language 
in suicide notes. Fewer studies analysed the language of 
suicide notes discursively (e.g., Galasiński, 2017; Giles, 
2007; Shapero, 2011).
A handful of more recent studies that examined the 
linguistic expressions in suicide notes (e.g., Prokofyeva, 
2013; Shapero, 2011) suggested that suicide notes might 
be viewed as a genre. The notion of genre in these studies 
is used casually without a clear definition or a theoretical 
perspective described. Only recently have researchers (e.g. 
Samraj & Gawron, 2015) approached the study of suicide 
notes from theoretically informed genre perspectives. Genre 
is considered from a rhetorical perspective, in which genres 
Published by Australian International Academic Centre PTY.LTD. 
Copyright (c) the author(s). This is an open access article under CC BY license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) 
http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.9n.3p.1
are seen as “abstract, socially recognized ways of using lan-
guage” (Hyland, 2002, p.114). Moreover, Shapero (2011) 
referred to Swales (1996) by suggesting that suicide notes 
may constitute an occluded or hidden genre, examples of 
which are not available for individuals who write in it. Even 
though more studies of suicide notes have recently linked 
suicide notes to the concept of genre (e.g., Prokofyeva, 
2013; Samraj & Gawron, 2015; Shapero, 2011), it does not 
appear that, except for Samraj and Gawron’s most recent 
research (2015), there have been investigations if suicide 
notes constitute a genre or if they share a common rhetorical 
structure.
Given the research gap of research indicated above, this 
study aims to investigate suicide notes by applying the ESP 
genre analysis. It examines the communicative purpose(s) 
and the rhetorical structure (if any) of suicide notes, that is, 
the moves and the steps that may be present. The study is 
guided by the following research questions:
1. What are the moves and steps that are present in suicide
notes and how consistent the moves/steps are across the 
selected corpus of suicide notes?
2. Is there a shared communicative purpose (s) in suicide
notes and, consequently, do suicide notes constitute a 
genre as defined within the ESP framework?
3. If suicide notes do constitute a genre, what kind of genre
is it?
International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature
E-ISSN: 2200-3592 & P-ISSN: 2200-3452 
www.ijalel.aiac.org.au
ARTICLE INFO
Article history
Received: February 11, 2020 
Accepted: April 25, 2020 
Published: May 31, 2020 
Volume: 9 Issue: 3 
Advance access: May 2020
Conflicts of interest: None 
Funding: The research is financed by 
a scholarship granted from the 
Ministry of Higher Education, 
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
2 IJALEL 9(3):1-10
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
One of the approaches to genre studies was developed within 
the field of English for Specific Purposes (ESP). The term 
genre in the ESP field refers to “communicative events” 
(Swales, 1990, p. 45) that serve a communicative purpose, 
that is, a function that can be achieved through language 
(Bhatia, 1993; Swales, 1990, 2004). This communicative 
goal is recognized by the discourse community that consists 
of members who use the genre and establish the conventions 
of how generic texts are written or spoken (Paltridge, 2013). 
One of the most influential analytical frameworks for 
genre analysis is the move analysis developed by Swales 
(1990), wherein Swales defines rhetoric as “the use of lan-
guage to accomplish something” (Swales, 1990, p. 6). Texts 
belonging to one specific genre (e.g., research article in-
troduction, abstracts) are characterized by “a sequence of 
moves” (Upton & Cohen, 2009, p. 588) with each move serv-
ing a specific communicative function. Swales (1990) argues 
that texts are divided into units or moves depending on the 
communicative purpose each unit serves. A move is defined 
as “a discoursal or rhetorical unit that performs a coherent 
communicative function in a written or spoken discourse” 
(Swales, 2004, p. 228). Swales also adds that a move in the 
ESP genre analysis is identified by recognizing the functional 
role of the move in a text. The identification of a move does 
not only involve the boundaries of a sentence or a paragraph. 
Each move may consist of several sentences or paragraphs, 
which, considered together, serve a specific communicative 
purpose. The sub-purposes of the moves ultimately shape 
the overall communicative purpose and the rhetorical struc-
ture of the genre (e.g., Kanoksilapatham, 2015; Sadeghi & 
Samuel, 2013). The combination of the moves and steps is 
referred to as rhetorical structure (Kanoksilapatham, 2015; 
Swales, 1990). The structure represents all the possible 
moves and steps that can occur in a specific genre.
Move analysis is one example of a top-down approach 
(Biber, Upton, & Connor, 2007) of genre analysis. A top-
down approach is an analytical approach in which moves 
are first assigned based on content, meaning, and function 
of the parts in a text. This analytical approach is different 
from a bottom-up analysis which refers to identifying seg-
ments of texts based on specific linguistic clues such as using 
to sum up to indicate the goal of providing a conclusion in, 
for example, a research article. The linguistically identified 
segments are grouped together, and then the communicative 
purpose of the linguistically similar segments is determined. 
What differentiates these two analytical approaches is the 
role of the communicative purpose or the functioneach 
segment serves in a text. In a top-down approach, the com-
municative purpose is the first step while in a bottom-up ap-
proach, the function of the linguistic segments is determined 
as a final step in the analysis (Biber et al., 2007).
Swales (1996) also described occluded genres. Such 
genres are “typically hidden, ‘out of sight’ or ‘occluded’ from 
the public gaze” (p. 46) and function to support the research 
process. Swales argues that such genres are not public, writ-
ten for particular individuals, and writers do not often have 
access to examples of the genre, compared to open genres 
such as research articles, textbooks or dissertations (Swales 
& Feak, 2011).
It is worth noting that the ESP genre approach has been 
mainly used to investigate the linguistic features of academ-
ic and professional genres. In addition, some non-academ-
ic genres have been explored using this approach, as it has 
proved useful in investigating the communicative purpose(s) 
and the rhetorical structure of a group of texts. Some ex-
amples are genre analyses of birthmother letters (letters to 
expectant mothers which are written by parents who want to 
adopt a child asking to be considered for adopting the unborn 
child) (e.g., Upton & Cohen, 2009), scam/fraud emails (e.g., 
Freiermuth, 2011), and transcripts of chatroom grooming 
in the field of Forensic Linguistics (e.g., Chiang & Grant, 
2017). The present study also utilizes the ESP genre frame-
work to examine suicide notes, a non-academic genre, to ex-
plore its discourse structure and communicative purpose(s). 
LITERATURE REVIEW 
The importance of suicide notes lies in that they are the texts 
written by individuals who committed (completers) or at-
tempted to commit suicide (attempters) (Black, 1993). The 
notes are considered as a valuable source of information that 
might contribute to understanding the completer’s (or at-
tempter’s) mind and his/her final thoughts (Darbonne, 1969; 
Leenaars, 1999; Shneidman & Farberow, 1957) and some-
times provide information on the motives behind the act (B. 
Chia, A. Chia, & Tai, 2008; Olson, 2005). Suicide notes are 
also crucial pieces of evidence used in investigation of death 
and in courts (Bennell, Jones, & Taylor, 2011; Leenaars, 
1999) to confirm the cause of death, whether it being a true 
suicide or a homicide accompanied by a fake note (i.e., not a 
real suicide note produced by the decedent but rather a note 
produced by another individual). Additionally, analysing and 
understanding suicide notes can be important in decreasing 
suicide attempts through developing appropriate prevention 
programs (Olson, 2005).
Researchers believe that suicide notes offer true motiva-
tions and reasons for the act of suicide (e.g., Ho, Yip, Chiu, 
& Halliday, 1998). However, it is argued that the reasons for 
the act of suicide provided by the suicidal individual in the 
note might not be as simple or as true as they appear (Giles, 
2007; Leenaars, 1999; McClelland, Reicher, & Booth, 
2000). Viewing suicide notes as “acts of communication” 
(McClelland et al., 2000, p. 227; Sanger & Veach, 2008, p. 
356) rather than true accounts of what motivated suicide, 
it is possible to assume that suicide notes function to show 
that the act the individual is about to commit is justifiable. 
McClelland et al. (2000) asserted that the act of suicide, that 
is, annihilating one’s self, is in itself an unacceptable social 
act; therefore, the individuals who leave a suicide note could 
be seen as trying to defend and justify this socially unaccept-
able act they have chosen by providing reasons and explana-
tions that might or might not be true.
The literature on the analysis of suicide notes suggests 
that the notes exhibit similarities. For example, Osgood and 
Walker (1959) examined suicide notes and compared them 
to ordinary letters to relatives. The authors concluded that 
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis 3
suicide notes shared more common language compared to 
ordinary letters; as well, their analysis revealed that suicide 
notes did not exhibit greater disorganization than letters, 
meaning that suicide notes are indeed organized and share 
a rhetorical structure. Moreover, Samraj and Gawron (2015) 
concluded their ESP analysis of a suicide notes corpus by 
stating that similarities were present in suicide notes despite 
the lack of both an apparent discourse community and 100% 
occurrence of the moves in the corpus. In addition, Giles as-
serted that suicide notes share commonalities and are consid-
ered “purposeful written acts” (Giles, 2007, p. 116).
Given the importance of suicide notes, several research-
ers have investigated the linguistic expressions using dif-
ferent approaches and various tools including manual and 
computerized methods. The methods of analysis of suicide 
notes utilized content analysis and theoretical classification 
analysis (e.g., Darbonne, 1969; Leenaars, 1988; Osgood & 
Walker, 1959) to examine the recurrent topics (i.e., themes) 
and use the information to explore the relationship between 
the content in the notes and the act of suicide (Olson, 2005). 
Research was also undertaken to compare between genuine 
and simulated suicide notes (e.g., Ioannou & Debowska, 
2014; Osgood & Walker, 1959; Roubidoux, 2012); suicide 
notes written by completers and those written by attempters 
(e.g., Handelman & Lester, 2007) and suicide notes written 
by different age groups and different genders (e.g., Black & 
Lester, 2003; Darbonne, 1969; Linn & Lester, 1996). Most 
of these studies used suicide notes to validate psychologi-
cal theories or examine emotional themes and did not pay 
much attention to the discourse structure of these notes. This 
study investigates suicide notes from genre perspective and 
aims to explore whether suicide notes could be categorized 
as a distinct genre by applying the move analysis method 
(Swales, 1990).
METHODS
Data
The data comprises 86 real suicide notes: (a) the “classic” 
Shneidman and Farberow (1957) corpus of 33 published sui-
cide notes (referred to as SandF corpus), written between 
1945 and 1954 by white males who were born in the USA 
and whose age ranged between 25 and 59 years old; (b) a 
published corpus of 53 suicide notes (Leenaars, 1988) from 
the archives of the Coroner’s office in Los Angeles County, 
with 33 suicide notes written by males (referred to as LM 
corpus) and 20 suicide notes written by females (referred to 
as LF corpus) between 1983 and 1984. The length of the 
notes varied between 7 to 899 words. Table 1 includes the 
breakdown of the corpus of this study.
Analysis
This study commenced in September 2014 and lasted un-
til April 2015. The unit of analysis in this study is a move 
defined as a meaningful segment of text (Connor, 2000; 
Connor & Mauranen, 1999) which expresses a single com-
municative purpose that contributes to the overall purpose 
of the text (Bhatia, 1993; Sadeghi & Samuel, 2013). Moves 
were coded in this analysis by examining the texts closely 
and asking the following question: what does the move do, 
that is, what is its communicative purpose? Steps, in turn, are 
those smaller units that build a move.
I examined each text in the 86 genuine suicide notes and 
identified the communicative purpose that each move serves. 
For example, Dearest Mary is communicating to whom the 
note is addressed, and the name Bill at the end of the note is 
functioning to close the note. Each stretch that expressed a 
specific communicative function was classified as a move 
and the building elements of each move were identified as 
the steps used to realize its communicative function. I cal-
culated the percentage of occurrence (Swales, 1990) of each 
move across the three corpora (I use percentage of occur-
rence to refer to the number of times a move occurred across 
the corpus). Calculating the percentage of occurrence allows 
forthe identification of obligatory moves that occur in all 
the texts, expected, or quasi-obligatory, moves that occur in 
most of the texts, and optional moves that occur in less than 
half of the texts (Joseph, Lim, & Nor, 2014; Swales, 1990). 
The moves were categorized based on the percentage of oc-
currence in the corpus.
Following Joseph et al. (2014), the percentage of occur-
rence of a move determines if the move is obligatory, qua-
si-obligatory or optional. More specifically, an obligatory 
move would appear in 100% of the examined texts while a 
quasi-obligatory move would appear in the examined texts 
with a percentage of occurrence that ranges between 51% 
and 99%. An optional move occurs in half or less of the ex-
amined texts.
A common reliability check in move analysis is check-
ing the coded moves with other researchers. To calculate in-
ter-coder reliability of assigned moves and steps in suicide 
notes, i.e., the consistency of assigned codes when multi-
ple coders analyse a set of data, randomly selected samples 
of each corpus were coded separately by two coders (14% 
of the whole corpus). An average of pairwise agreement 
(Conger, 1980) was computed using the Statistical Package 
for Social Sciences (SPSS), version 22. The achieved level 
of agreement was (κ = .90).
FINDINGS
Most Frequent Moves in Suicide Notes
Table 2 shows the recurrent moves that were identified in 
more than half of the texts. These moves were identified in 
more than 51% of the texts, which suggests that they are 
quasi-obligatory (Joseph et al., 2014).
Five quasi-obligatory moves, including addressing a re-
cipient, giving instructions to others about what to do after 
the writer’s death, justifying suicide, expressing love, and 
signing off, and 16 steps have been identified. These moves 
and steps are explained below.
Table 3 provides the percentage of occurrence of the five 
quasi-obligatory moves across the three corpora and the to-
tal percentage of occurrence in the 86 suicide notes. It should 
be noted that the order of the moves presented in the findings 
4 IJALEL 9(3):1-10
does not represent the order of occurrence of the moves in 
the texts.
“Addressing a Recipient” Move
The addressing a recipient move is used to indicate the au-
dience for whom the suicide note is written. Suicide notes 
are usually written for an audience of a friend, parents, chil-
dren or a partner to read (McClelland et al., 2000). In the 86 
suicide notes, 70.9% of the notes (see Table 3) included the 
move. The move is manifested by three main steps in suicide 
notes:
1. Providing the name(s) of the recipient
•	 To Mary Johns (#12 SandF)
•	 To Tom, Betty, John (#16 SandF)
2. Providing salutation 
•	 Honey (#5, SandF)
•	 Dearest darling (#11, SandF)
3. Providing the name(s) of the recipient and salutation
•	 Dearest Mary (#3, SandF)
•	 Dear Mom and Dad (#28, LM)
Shneidman and Farberow (1960) and Darbonne (1969) 
included “addressee of suicide note” in their list of content 
categories that they used to investigate suicide notes written 
by individuals from different socio-economic levels.
The identified move addressing a recipient can be com-
pared to the finding of Prokofyeva’s (2013) study, in which she 
indicates that the structure of suicide notes includes a “compo-
nent” of addressee. The addressee can be explicitly identified 
by the writer of the note by providing a name(s) or can be 
implied or generalized, such as to whom it may concern.
“Giving Instructions to Others about What to do after the 
Writer’s Death” Move
The writers of the notes provided different instructions to the 
survivors as to what to do after they die or in the future. The 
move was found to occur in 88.3% of the notes (see Table 3). 
Five steps are used to realize this move:
1. Notifying or calling someone
•	 Notify – Anne M. Jones, 100 Main St., Los Angeles, 
tel. BA 00000 (#1, SandF)
•	 call Sherrif [sic] (#30, LM)
2. Asking to take care of someone or of business matters
•	 Please be good to little Betty, our daughter (#7, 
SandF)
•	 Take Care of Yourself (#5, LF)
3. Asking not to notify someone about the suicide or not to 
allow others to see the decedent’s body after the suicide 
has taken place
Table 1. Breakdown of the suicide notes corpora
Source Notes No. of words Gender Time frame Age range
SandF (1957) 33 3,513 Male 1945-1954 25-59
LM (1988) 33 4,541 Male 1983-1984 25-59
LF (1988) 20 3,607 Female 1983-1984 25-59
Total 86 11,661
Table 2. Definitions and examples of the quasi-obligatory moves in the corpus of 86 suicide notes
Move Definition Examples
Addressing a recipient Indicating the audience of the note Dear Mary
Dearest Darling
Giving instructions to others about what 
to do after the writer’s death
Providing information for others to instruct 
them what to do after the writer is dead
Call police
please take care of my bills
Justifying suicide Giving reasons for the act I can’t find my place in life 
I commit suicide because I want to be with 
my father forever
Expressing love Communicating love and affection I love you very much darling
Signing off Closing/ending the note John W. Smith
Table 3. Percentage and number of occurrences of quasi-obligatory moves across the three corpora and the total 
percentage of occurrence
Move SandF Corpus (n=33) LM Corpus (n=33) LF Corpus (n=20) Total %
% No. % No. % No.
Addressing a recipient 90.9 30 60.6 20 55 11 70.9%
Giving instructions to others about what to do 
after the writer’s death
81.8 28 87.8 29 95 19 88.3%
Justifying suicide 93.9 31 84.8 28 75 15 86%
Expressing love 54.5 18 42.4 14 45 9 47.6%
Signing off 78.7 26 69.6 23 80 16 75.5%
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis 5
•	 Please don’t let my brother know how or why I died. 
To her [sic] it must be an acident [sic] (#4, SandF)
•	 no news papers [sic] (#30, LM)
•	 Don’t let the kids in the bedroom. (#9, LF)
4. Giving instructions concerning the body or funeral 
•	 My last request is not to be put 6ft. under but 
burned and my ashes scattered over the mountains. 
(#4, SandF)
•	 don’t want Sue to attend my funeral (#27, LM)
•	 Cremate me (#13, LF)
5. Assigning belongings to specific individuals
•	 I leave everything which has all been acquired 
since we were married to you (#5, SandF)
•	 give all of my possessions to Mary (#27, LM)
In previous studies, it was found that instructions for sur-
vivors were present in genuine suicide notes. Prokofyeva 
(2013) included instructions for survivors under the com-
ponent “culmination”, which also encompassed other ex-
pressions such as asking for forgiveness or assigning blame. 
Shneidman and Farberow (1960) also pointed out that sui-
cide notes written by less economically advantaged individ-
uals contained instructions to survivors which are mostly 
concerned with notifying others, disposing the body of the 
decedent, or taking care of possessions and finishing busi-
ness matters. Similarly, McClelland et al. (2000) reported 
that some suicide notes contained instructions for survivors 
explaining what to do after the writer’s death. Also, the as-
signing belongings to specific individuals step within the 
move “giving instructions to others about what to do after 
the writer’s death” was usually included under the will or 
instructions category (e.g., Giles, 2007; Samraj & Gawron, 
2015; Sanger & Veach, 2008; Shneidman & Farberow, 1960).
“Justifying Suicide” Move
In justifying suicide move, the writer of the note provides 
some of the reasons for the act. The move was identified in 
86% of the notes (see Table 3). Five steps have been found 
to constitute this move, including:
1. Perceiving suicide as the only/best way out
•	 so I am taking the only way out (#5, SandF)
•	 it seems to be the only way (#26, LM)
2. Being unable to continue living or cope with life
•	 I can’t find my place in life. (#1, SandF)
•	 Can’t Take much more (#18, LM)
3. Presenting relationship failureor problems as reasons 
for suicide
•	 I can’t stand being without her. (#12, SandF)
4. Having health problems/issues
•	 I am so tired of feeling sick (#14, LF)
5. Suggesting that others will be better off after suicide
•	 I think this is best for all concerned (#3, SandF)
Giles (2007) found that some suicide notes contained 
more than one reason (explanation/justification) for suicide. 
Several suicide notes in her corpus used a combination of 
reasons (referred to as steps in the current analysis) to justify 
the suicidal act.
The existence of the justifying suicide move is further 
supported by Shneidman’s (1985) observation that suicide 
is seen as the best solution by the writer of the note. The 
current analysis reveals that one of the steps used to realize 
the justifying suicide move is that suicide is the only/best 
way out. Similarly, Samraj and Gawron (2015) found that 
genuine suicide notes contain explanation of the suicidal act. 
They concluded that the most frequent move, i.e., ‘providing 
explanation’, occurs at a percentage of 81.6.
The step being unable to continue living or cope with 
life has also been found in previous studies on the linguistic 
expressions in suicide notes. For example, Shneidman and 
Farberow (1960) examined the reasons for suicide explicitly 
stated in suicide notes and found that most economically ad-
vantaged individuals stated in their suicide notes the reasons 
for the act such as expressions of the inability to go on or 
being tired of life. 
The presenting relationship failure/problems as reasons 
for suicide step can be best compared to the theme failed 
relationship in Ioannou and Debowska’s (2014) analysis of 
suicide notes. This theme was found to characterize genuine 
suicide notes, in which the reason for suicide is stated as 
having troubles in a relationship.
Several content analyses studies of the language of sui-
cide notes (Olson, 2005; Shneidman & Farberow, 1960) also 
found that suicide notes might contain illness or health prob-
lems expressions stated as reasons for suicide.
McClelland et al. (2000) also confirmed that some of the 
expressions used in suicide notes referred to the reasons for 
the act. The authors observed that the note writers justified 
the suicidal act by perceiving it as the best solution, hav-
ing an illness, being unable to continue living, and losing or 
breaking up a relationship. The themes that have emerged in 
McClelland et al.’s (2000) findings can be clearly linked to 
the steps identified in this analysis as used to constitute the 
justifying suicide move.
“Expressing Love” Move
This move was identified in the first corpus (Shneidman & 
Farberow, 1957) as a quasi-obligatory move with a percent-
age of occurrence of 54.5% (see Table 3). However, it was 
not identified in the other two corpora (Leenaars’s 1988 cor-
pus of males and females suicide notes) as a quasi-obligato-
ry move because the percentage of this occurrence indicated 
that it occurred in less than half of the texts. Therefore, it 
can be considered as an optional move that the writer choos-
es to include in the suicide note. The expressing love move 
was mainly realized through one step: using the expression, I 
love you. This expression was used to realize the move, with 
conveying varying degrees of love such as with all my heart, 
very much, so much, and forever. Some examples are:
•	 I love you very much darling (#3, SandF)
•	 Boys I love you (#8, LM)
•	 I love you so much (#2, LF).
This finding mirrors those of previous studies that have 
examined the linguistic content of suicide notes. For exam-
ple, Ioannou and Debowska (2014), analysing Shneidman 
and Farberow’s (1957) corpus of 33 genuine suicide notes, 
showed that genuine suicide notes are characterized by ex-
pressions of love. As well, McClelland et al. (2000) found 
6 IJALEL 9(3):1-10
that the writers of suicide notes used expressions of love in 
order to negotiate and allocate blame. For example, the ex-
pression I love you showed that the authors of suicide notes 
“have not failed in the fundamental requirements of a rela-
tionship” (McClelland et al., 2000, p. 230). Delgado (2013) 
also found that 89% of the 27 suicide notes collected from 
the coroner’s office in Ohio between the years 2000-2009, 
included love expressions. These findings indicate that the 
expressing love move is frequently used in genuine suicide 
notes.
“Signing Off” Move
The signing off is a move used to end the suicide note. Not 
all the notes in the corpora included this move, but the move 
was present in 75.5 % of suicide notes (see Table 3) and was 
the final move in 60.4% of these. Two steps were identified 
in this move:
1. Providing the name and/or ending salutation of the note 
writer
•	 J. William Smith (#1, SandF)
•	 Bill (#14, SandF)
•	 Dad (#2, LM)
2. Giving love with the name of the note writer
•	 All the love I have, Bill (#6, SandF)
•	 love Bill (#8, LM)
Flexibility of Quasi-Obligatory Moves in Suicide Notes 
Move flexibility refers to the sequence or order of the rhe-
torical moves in texts. It also refers to the moves the writer 
chooses to include from the range of the identified rhetori-
cal moves, that is, the use of some or all of the obligatory, 
quasi-obligatory, or optional moves (Bhatia, 1993). After the 
quasi-obligatory moves had been identified, the moves were 
examined to observe the sequence of the moves and whether 
suicide notes contained all or some of the identified rhetor-
ical quasi-obligatory moves. The sequence of the identified 
moves varied in the examined corpus of suicide notes. The 
addressing a recipient was the first move in 75.5% of the 
suicide notes. The move was sometimes preceded by other 
quasi-obligatory moves such as the justifying suicide move 
(4.6%) or the giving instructions to others about what to do 
after the writer’s death move (3%). In one note, the address-
ing a recipient move occurred in the middle. 
The signing off move was found to be a final move in 
80% of the suicide notes that contained it. In the instances 
where the signing off move was not final; the note would end 
by the giving instructions to others about what to do after the 
writer’s death move (12.3%). The signing off move occurred 
in the middle of one note in the current corpus. 
The sequence of the moves giving instructions to others 
about what to do after the writer’s death and justifying sui-
cide is not fixed. The expressing love move is an optional 
move that can be used based on the communicative purpose 
the writer wants to achieve in the note and it occurred in dif-
ferent locations throughout the examined corpus.
As for the flexibility of using some or all of the identified 
moves in suicide notes, 37.2% (32 notes) of the 86 suicide 
notes contained all the quasi-obligatory moves identified in 
this analysis (sometimes without the optional move, express-
ing love), including moves presented in a cyclical pattern, 
reoccurring more than once in one note.
Less Frequent Moves in Suicide Notes
Some less frequent moves that occurred in less than half of 
the texts are shown in Table 4. 
Twenty less frequent moves were identified in the corpus, 
with percentage of occurrence ranging between 27.9% and 
1.1%. Given the low percentage of occurrence which falls 
below 50%, these moves can be considered optional (Joseph 
et al., 2014). Most of the moves are self-explanatory (the 
move is defined where necessary in the following discus-
sion). Some of the moves in Table 4 were found in the inves-
tigation of the linguistic expressions in suicide notes (e.g., 
Black & Lester, 2003; Chia et al., 2008; Ho et al., 1998; 
Osgood & Walker, 1959; Sanger & Veach, 2008).
The move establishing social relationships in Table 4 re-
fers to expressions used by the writer that point out the joint 
social relationship between him/her and the addressee. The 
move is mostly used to construct a positive imageof the ad-
dressee and refer to issues such as good marriage, being kind 
or wonderful. Some examples are:
•	 No man could have asked for a better wife than you have 
been (#18, SandF)
•	 You have been a good Son (#20, LF). 
This move can be best compared to what Giles (2007) 
refers to as “a gift for recipients” (p. 140) suicide notes in 
which the writer positively constructs his/her relationship 
with the addressee.
The move providing information includes two steps:
•	 Personal information such as the address of the note 
writer, for example, I live at 100 Spring St., Los Angeles 
(#1, SandF)
•	 Information related to the act of suicide such as provid-
ing the date of the note or previous attempts of suicide, 
for example, Given unto my hand this ninth day of June 
in the year of 1943, A.D., in the city of Los Angeles, 
California (#20, SandF)
In accordance with the present results, the move apolo-
gizing to others was also found in previous studies of sui-
cide notes (e.g., Chia et al., 2008; Delgado, 2013; Ioannou 
& Debowska, 2014; Prokofyeva, 2013) as were other moves 
identified in this analysis, including asking for forgiveness 
(e.g., Black & Lester, 2003; Chia et al., 2008; McClelland 
et al., 2000), saying goodbye (e.g., Darbonne, 1969; Ioannou 
& Debowska, 2014; Shapero, 2011), and assigning blame in-
cluding self and others blame (e.g., McClelland et al., 2000; 
Sanger & Veach, 2008). 
DISCUSSION 
Macro-structure of Suicide Notes
The first question of the study sought to determine the moves 
and the steps found in suicide notes. The analysis suggests 
that the core or typical genre of suicide notes includes the 
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis 7
following macro-structure, which consists of all the qua-
si-obligatory moves:
Addressing a recipient > Giving instructions to others 
about what to do after the writer’s death > Justifying suicide 
> Expressing love > Signing off
Other examples of the genre of suicide notes which do 
not contain all the above moves or use different optional 
moves identified in this study (see Table 4) can still qualify 
as examples/instances of the genre as long as they serve the 
communicative purpose(s) of the genre (Biber et al., 2007; 
Paltridge, 1995). Paltridge (1995) emphasizes that categoriz-
ing examples of a genre that are not typical should be based 
on “sufficient similarity” (p. 396). These insights make it 
possible to consider typical suicide notes as containing all 
or some of the quasi-obligatory moves identified in the anal-
ysis, while other atypical suicide notes can be considered 
as examples or instances of the genre based on the shared 
communicative purpose and other similarities with typical 
suicide notes.
Communicative Purpose(s) of Suicide Notes
The second question concerns the existence of a shared 
communicative purpose(s) in suicide notes and whether 
suicide notes constitute a genre. The findings suggest that 
suicide notes share a rhetorical structure presented in the 
five quasi-obligatory moves: addressing a recipient, giving 
instructions to others about what to do after the writer’s 
death, justifying suicide, expressing love, and signing off. 
Although the notes do not represent a genre in the traditional 
Swalesian sense of 100% occurrence of moves. It may be 
concluded that the established rhetorical structure and the 
communicative purposes of suicide notes in this study point 
to the existence of a distinctive genre, that of suicide notes.
One prevalent shared communicative purpose drawn 
from the analysis in this study is that suicide notes aim to 
give instructions concerning several issues such as busi-
ness, body of the decedent, or notification of others about 
the suicide. This finding seems to be consistent with other 
research studies which found instructions to be present in 
suicide notes (e.g., Black, 1993; Galasiński, 2017; Osgood 
& Walker, 1959; Sanger & Veach, 2008; Shneidman & 
Farberow, 1960). In addition, other studies observed that 
suicide notes serve the communicative purpose of provid-
ing the final wishes, requests, directions, and commands to 
survivors (e.g., Ho et al., 1998; Leenaars, 1988; Prokofyeva, 
2013; Roubidoux, 2012).
Another communicative purpose of the rhetorical moves 
found in suicide notes is to justify the act by giving reasons 
such as being unable to continue living, failure, or perceiv-
ing suicide as the best or only solution. It is encouraging 
to compare the finding with previous work that has investi-
gated suicide notes. Shneidman (1985) asserted that suicide 
notes are written to communicate to others that the suicidal 
individual perceives suicide as the best solution for a prob-
lem, which is one of the steps found in the justifying suicide 
move. Other research studies (Olson, 2005; Prokofyeva, 
2013; Roubidoux, 2012) provided further evidence in sup-
port of the communicative purpose of justifying suicide. 
They asserted that the aims, that is, the communicative pur-
pose, of suicide notes can include, but are not limited to, 
one of the following: giving reasons for the act of suicide 
Table 4. List of less frequent moves in suicide notes with the instances and percentage of occurrence 
Move Instances % Example
Establishing social relationships 24 27.9 We had a very good Marriage!
Apologizing to others 23 26.7 I’m sorry honey
Asking for forgiveness 16 18.6 Forgive if you can
Saying goodbye 15 17.4 Bye-bye Mary, Betty, and Helen
Providing information 14 16.2 I work at Ford
Expressing intent to commit suicide 13 15.1 When you read this I will be dead
Thanking 13 15.1 thanks for everything
Assigning blame 6 6.9 I blame no one but myself
Giving blessings 5 5.8 God bless you all
Offering help to others 4 4.6 I might be able to do something for him
Expressing happiness 4 4.6 I was happy
Expressing hope 4 4.6 I hope you eventually will find happiness
Suggesting that suicide will be hard on others 4 4.6 Hurting my family is the worst of it
Giving advice 3 3.4 But if I were you I would Move Back
Expressing good wishes for others 3 3.4 I wish you the best of everything
Asking to understand the decision of suicide 2 2.3 I hope you understand why I have done this
Reporting on suicide as if it already happened 2 2.3 I have committed suicide
Expressing regret 1 1.1 I wish I can turn Back time
Expressing fear 1 1.1 Am terrified
Showing anger towards others 1 1.1 If you ever take a drink I hope you drown yourself with it
8 IJALEL 9(3):1-10
and presenting relationship problems as reasons for suicide. 
More specifically, Roubidoux (2012) identified several pur-
poses of suicide notes such as “apology, blame, explanation” 
(p. 34), whereby explanation she refers to the reasons for the 
act. These overall purposes of suicide notes have been iden-
tified in the current corpus as sub-purposes of the moves. 
The apology and blame purposes of suicide notes suggested 
by Roubidoux (2012) are found to occur in less than half 
of the texts in the current corpus, while explanation (in this 
analysis it is referred to as justifying suicide) is found to oc-
cur as a rhetorical move in suicide notes with a percentage of 
86%. Furthermore, Samraj and Gawron’s (2015) most recent 
analysis of suicide notes shows that the move occurs in 93 
out of 114 notes and conclude that “providing an explanation 
for the act is a key purpose of the text.” (p. 93).
The sub-purposes of the identified moves can be used 
to establish the main communicative purpose(s) of suicide 
notes (Bhatia, 1993; Sadeghi & Samuel, 2013). It can be 
suggested that one of the communicative purposes of suicide 
notes is to justify the act. The purpose is achieved through 
providing reasons (true or not). Some of the suicide notes 
included more than one purpose such as providing some in-
structions to the survivors or asking for forgiveness, (these 
are less frequent moves). As stated by Swales (1990) and 
Askehave and Swales(2001), having sets of communicative 
purposes in one genre is sometimes possible, as the move 
analysis conducted in this study demonstrates.
The Genre of Suicide Notes
Turning to the discussion of what kind of genre suicide notes 
constitute, which answers the third question in the present 
study, it is important to note that Shapero (2011) was the 
first to suggest that suicide notes might constitute an occlud-
ed genre (Swales, 1996) because suicidal individuals writ-
ing notes do not usually have access to samples of texts that 
might help them structure their writing. However, Shapero 
does not develop or reflect on the concept further in her anal-
ysis of suicide notes. Olson (2005) also observes that there 
is a lack of accessible examples to guide the writers of sui-
cide notes. Few people have access to suicide notes left by 
individuals who committed suicide; suicide notes are usually 
accessible to a limited number of readers, such as the po-
lice, coroners’ office, court, and some family members who 
are contacted after the suicidal act or witnesses who found 
the body (Shapero, 2011). Limited access to examples and 
the private nature of the act of suicide suggest that the sui-
cide notes genre is indeed an occluded or “semi-occluded” 
(Samraj & Gawron, 2015, p. 89) genre and not a public or 
an open one.
Because of the nature of the genre, Olson (2005) sug-
gested that there might not be shared norms or conventions 
that suicide note writers rely on when they compose the 
notes. However, writers do not usually deviate from writ-
ing conventions. Individuals leaving a suicide note “… were 
not outside ‘normal’ society and its conventions, at least 
not those who left behind notes. Rather they used existing 
conventions regarding written communication” (Fincham, 
Langer, Scourfield, & Shiner, 2011, p. 93).
An important issue that remains to be addressed in this 
discussion is the issue of discourse community, which is one 
of the key concepts in the ESP genre approach. The origi-
nal concept was proposed by Swales (1990); however, only 
three years later, Swales (1993) observed that “The ‘true’ dis-
course community may be rarer and more esoteric than I once 
thought” (p. 695). Identifying a discourse community of the 
suicide notes genre is problematic. Most often, individuals 
who write suicide notes do not know each other and do not 
communicate with each other. The writers of suicide notes do 
not usually share a set of common texts or established con-
ventions. In addition, a discourse community of suicide notes 
writers, who completed the suicidal act, if it existed, would 
lack experts for obvious reasons. However, as the rhetorical 
move/step analysis conducted here, suicide notes writers do 
share communicative goals. These issues serve as the ratio-
nale for viewing suicide notes as a private and hidden (Swales, 
1996) genre. Unlike other open academic (Swales & Feak, 
2011) and professional genres (Bhatia, 1993), the suicide note 
represents a one-time communication. The note-writers com-
mit suicide after writing the note, which prevents other forms 
of communication to take place in response. For these reasons, 
a visible discourse community according to the criteria sug-
gested by Swales (1990) cannot be identified. However, an al-
ternative view of a community can be adopted. Miller (1994) 
introduced the theoretical construct of a “rhetorical communi-
ty” (p. 62) which is “a virtual entity, a discursive projection, a 
rhetorical construct. It is the community as invoked, represent-
ed, presupposed, or developed in rhetorical discourse” (p. 62). 
Miller asserted that a rhetorical community is not unified and 
homogeneous compared to the Swalesian discourse commu-
nity (1990). The rhetorical community “works in part through 
genre” (p. 62). If we look again at what Miller proposed, the 
writers of suicide notes might constitute a rhetorical commu-
nity in which suicide notes are the way its members “operate 
rhetorically” (p. 62). Thus, a rhetorical community of suicide 
notes might exist through instantiation and engagement and 
not through membership (Swales, 1993).
CONCLUSION
The present study aimed to investigate suicide notes from 
the genre perspective by exploring the moves and the com-
municative purposes of these notes. Although suicide notes 
do not have 100% occurrence of moves, the results suggest 
that they share a common rhetorical moves and communi-
cative purposes. The findings of this study contribute to the 
current literature on genre theory and suicide notes research. 
It adds to a growing body of literature and knowledge of the 
ESP genre approach. By applying rhetorical move analysis 
to non-academic texts, the study developed a model of the 
rhetorical structure of suicide notes in a way similar to the 
CARS model of research articles (Swales, 1990). The study 
also identified the communicative purposes that this genre 
serve and defined the virtual rhetorical community that the 
writers of suicide notes form. We can conclude that the ESP 
genre analysis approach can be applied to both academic and 
professional genres and we can extend it to examine the rhe-
torical structure of non-academic genres.
An Investigation of Suicide Notes: An ESP Genre Analysis 9
This qualitative analysis of suicide notes enriches the 
 suicidology field that mainly focuses on quantitative re-
search of suicide notes (Hjelmeland & Knizek, 2010). It 
complements and balances the quantitative research that has 
been done in the field and can contribute to a better under-
standing of suicide. Most importantly, the findings of this 
study can be utilized by forensic linguists, who deal with 
various texts and need to verify their authenticity (Chaski, 
2001; Cotterill, 2010). The move analysis combined with 
other methods of analysis and complemented with contextu-
al information available, such as interviews (with attempters 
or family members) or suicide files, can provide insights for 
forensic linguists and help determine if a suicide note is real, 
that is, written by the individual who committed suicide, or 
faked by another individual (Chaski, 2001). The move anal-
ysis may be used to examine the macro-structure of a suicide 
note, that is, the organization of the text, to aid in identifying 
its originality.
The corpora investigated in this study belong to the 
times of 1945-1954 and 1983-1984. At the time, there 
were no examples of suicide notes accessible to people on-
line. Nowadays, examples of suicide notes can be obtained 
through a search on the web. Therefore, the suicide notes are 
not completely an occluded genre as once thought, but we 
can rather look at them as a “semi-occluded genre” (Samraj 
& Gawron, 2015, p. 99) or “semi-public documents” 
(Galasiński, 2017, p. 50). Future studies can look at more re-
cent suicide notes drawn from different sources to determine 
the move/step pattern. 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 
I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Natasha Artemeva 
for her continuing support and her valuable insights and 
comments.
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A Pragmatic Data Based Evaluation of CLT in the EFL Curricula at Higher Secondary Level in 
Bangladesh
Md. Masud Rana*, Md. Mahmud Hasan Chowdhury
English Language Institute, Jazan University, Saudi Arabia 
Corresponding Author: Md. Masud Rana, E-mail: masudju2008@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
This paper evaluates the scope and relative unfeasibility of communicative language teaching 
(CLT) that was introduced at higher secondary level in Bangladesh to innovate English language 
teaching (ELT) by replacing grammar translation method (GTM). To substantiate the evaluation, 
a survey intended to determine the feasibility and relative drawbacks of CLT was made. A total 
of 100 teachers and 100 students participated in the survey of 10 different colleges of Dhaka and 
Khulna metropolitan cities of Bangladesh and two different questionnaires were used to collect 
quantitative data from randomly selected teachers and students. The study revealsthat most of 
the EFL students in Bangladesh could not succeed in learning English language through CLT in 
spite of studying it for twelve years at their secondary and higher secondary levels. The paper 
also examines multifaceted problems affecting English language teaching and learning through 
CLT such as most of the classrooms of Bengali medium colleges are not well-furnished with 
modern language teaching equipment, lack of training and teaching materials, student’s lack of 
background knowledge, motivation etc. Therefore, the real outcome of CLT in Bangladesh could 
not meet the initial dream and promise with which it was introduced and eventually became 
inappropriate and ineffective.This article critically evaluates CLT focusing on multiple barriers 
and factors instrumental for the failure of the approach at higher secondary level in Bangladesh. 
Finally, the study concludes with several recommendations to promote English language teaching 
at higher secondary level in Bangladesh.
Key words: EFL Students in Bangladesh, Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC), Communica-
tive Language Teaching (CLT), Grammar Translation Method (GTM), Curriculum
INTRODUCTION
Before the introduction of CLT, English proficiency of a stu-
dent was tested in terms of his knowledge in grammar, trans-
lations, and writing question-answer etc. at higher secondary 
level in Bangladesh. As this system could not bring fruit-
ful results to improve English language proficiency of EFL 
students for ages, it was required to reform the curriculum, 
methodology, course materials, and testing and evaluation 
procedures to enhance the development of English language 
learning and teaching in the country. To ensure English lan-
guage proficiency, the ministry of education (MoE) replaced 
traditional GTM and introduced CLT theories and practices 
in the curricula for EFL students at secondary and higher 
secondary levels in Bangladesh in the mid-nineties with lot 
of promises and expectation. However, after a decade and 
more, it has been found that this new method too could not 
succeed due to a number of factors.
The analysis of recent literature shows that the appropri-
ateness and promotion of CLT for EFL students in non-na-
tive context have been critically questioned (Khan &Wette, 
2013). Bangladesh is a monolingual country of 160 million 
Published by Australian International Academic Centre PTY.LTD. 
Copyright (c) the author(s). This is an open access article under CC BY license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) 
http://dx.doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijalel.v.9n.3p.11
people and of the total population, 98% people use Bangla as 
their first language. This predominately-monolingual iden-
tity of the nation is emphasized in its nationalist discours-
es (Rahman et al., 2019). Hence, it is quite challenging to 
practice CLT exclusively in language teaching classrooms 
as both students and teachers are highly interested in using 
Bangla as their medium of communication, and the overuse 
of their own language means that they will have less chance 
to learn English (Harmer, 1998). On the other hand, the in-
terference of the learner’s first language (L
1
) in the learning 
and teaching process of English as a foreign language plays 
a negative role in some crucial aspects of the target language 
i.e. pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar etc. are affected 
by the learner’s first language (L
1
). Having a psychological 
point of view, Ellis, (1985) says that there is never a peaceful 
co-existence between two language systems in the learner, 
but rather constant warfare, and that warfare is not limited to 
the moment of cognition, but continues during the period of 
storing newly learnt ideas in memory.
The past research also finds various other problems of CLT 
that cause its failure in Bangladeshi context. For example, the 
International Journal of Applied Linguistics & English Literature
E-ISSN: 2200-3592 & P-ISSN: 2200-3452 
www.ijalel.aiac.org.au
ARTICLE INFO
Article history
Received: February 14, 2020 
Accepted: April 19, 2020 
Published: May 31, 2020
Volume: 9 Issue: 3 
Advance access: May 2020
Conflicts of interest: None 
Funding: None
12 IJALEL 9(3):11-17
conflict or difference between the learner’s culture and the 
target language-culture, lack of physical infrastructure and 
logistics required in the classroom for CLT, lack of teacher 
training, appropriate testing system and so on.
Compared with other methods and approaches, CLT ac-
tivities are more difficult to design, and implement, and hence 
it imposes greater burden on EFL teachers. Not only the im-
plementation, but also the assessment of this method seems to 
be difficult for EFL teachers who are usually used to clear-cut 
assessment procedures (Rahman & Karim, 2015).
In spite of having worldwide acceptance of CLT, howev-
er, the question arises here as to the effectiveness and suit-
ability of CLT for EFL learners in the context of Bangladesh 
(Ali and Walker, 2014; Hamid & Baldauf, 2008). Keeping an 
eye to the problems, numerous initiatives have been taken in 
recent years to make CLT a success but the performance so 
far is not at all satisfactory. This paper examines the existing 
status of CLT in the curricula and its problems and limita-
tions during the past years, which gradually turn it into a rel-
ative failure at higher secondary level (HSC) in Bangladesh.
Research Objective
The objective of this study is to investigate the initial goal 
and outcome of CLT, and factors behind its ineffectiveness 
and failure at higher secondary level in Bangladesh.
Research Questions
This paper addresses and analyzes the following key 
questions:
• What was the initial goal of CLT in EFL curricula at 
HSC level in Bangladesh?
• What are the major problems of CLT in Bangladesh?
• Is CLT a relative failure in Bangladesh?
LITERATURE REVIEW
The ministry of Education ( MoE) adopted CLT theories and 
practices at secondary and higher secondary levels ( from 
grade six to grade 12 ) in Bangladesh in 2001 with a view 
to reforming the curriculum, methodology, textbook, and 
testing and evaluation procedures to ensure the development 
of English language learning and teaching in the country 
(Rahman et al. 2019).
The primary aim was to choose CLT theories by replac-
ing long established GTM that has been in the curricula for 
more than 65 years to prioritize communicative competence 
of English language. According to Karim et al. (as cited in 
Rahman et al. 2019), the reform was implemented by the 
English Language Teaching Improvement Project (ELTIP) 
with the support of MoE and British Council. The expecta-
tion was that by the end of grade 12, all students irrespec-
tively would be able to master four-skills of English and 
therefore would be able to communicate in English accu-
rately and fluently. Another justification was that since the 
GTM was based on practicing grammar and translation, 
both teachers and students developed a tendency of gram-
mar based teaching and learning system in the classroom 
that typically put the students in a very difficult and perplex-
ing situation. Despite its beginning with lots of promises, 
CLT has not effectively been implemented as intended in the 
curriculum (Ali &Walker, 2014; Chowdhury &Kabir, 2014; 
Hamid &Baldauf, 2008; Rahman and Pandian, 2018a, 2018b 
cited in Rahman et al. 2019). There are multiple factors and 
issues in reality that have been affecting the implementation 
of CLT in Bangladesh. In Bangladeshi context, Barman, 
Sultana & Basu (as cited in Rahman, 2015) consider eight 
factors which were identified as constraints in implement-
ing CLT: 1) Inefficiency of ELT practitioners, 2) Economic 
constraints, 3) Administrative set-up, 4) Infrastructural lim-
itations, 5) Cultural conflicts, 6) Seating arrangement in the 
classrooms 7) Class size in language teaching and learning 
and 8) Testing.Roy (2016) on the other hand, has identi-
fied five overreaching problems to successful implementa-
tion of CLT in Bangladesh. They are 1) Large classrooms 
2) Mismatch between curriculum and assessment 3) Lack of 
pre-service and in-service training 4) Cultural appropriate-
ness 5) Poor salary and socio-economic condition.
Bangladesh follows top-down system for curriculum de-
velopment and implementation (Rahman, Pandian & Kaur, 
2018a) that allows teachers much less scope to share their 
views in implementing the curricula (Ali & Walker, 2014). 
From this short review, it is evident that CLT has been fac-
ing multiple problems to be successful in Bangladesh and 
eventually becoming ineffective. This paper focuses on the 
root causes affecting the implementation of CLT and the 
limitation of CLT itself to be successful in the context of 
Bangladesh. 
The Grammar Translation Method (GMT)
This method is very widely used. According to Chastain (1988), 
the grammar translation method is also called the classical 
method because it was first used in the teaching of the clas-
sical Latin and Greek. The purpose of this method is to make 
the students familiar with grammar of their native language 
through the study of the grammar of the target language, and in 
the process make them capable of reading and writing both the 
target language and their first language simultaneously.
The role of the teacher in this method is very authorita-
tive and that of the students is very passive in the classroom. 
The students do whatever their teacher instructs in their 
classrooms. Students are taught to translate materials from 
one language into another. For this matter, vocabulary and 
grammar, reading and writing are emphasized and this meth-
od gives much less attention to pronunciation and listening 
(Lasrsen-Freeman, 2004).
The language that is used in the classroom as a medium 
of communication is mostly the student’s native language. 
The students are asked to translate the written text form na-
tive language into the target language or vice versa (Lasrsen-
Freeman, 2004).
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT)
The communicative language teaching (CLT), a recent ap-
proach in teaching a foreign language, started in the late 1960s 
A Pragmatic Data Based Evaluation of CLT in the EFL Curricula at Higher Secondary Level in Bangladesh 13
as a reaction to Situational Language Teaching (Richards & 
Rodgers, 1986).The functional approach of language teach-
ing by Wilkins was used as a basis to develop communi-
cative syllabi for language teaching (Wilkins,1972). It was 
introduced for a multiple reasons in reaction to previous 
theories and practices. According to previous methods, stu-
dents learn the rules of linguistics usages, but cannot use the 
target language (Widdowson, 1978). Along with syntactical 
knowledge, communicative competence is required for stu-
dents to perform certain function such as promising, inviting 
and declining invitations within a social context. The main 
aim of CLT is meaningful communication in real life situ-
ation (Lasrsen-Freeman,2004). CLT has a rich theoretical 
base and the following few characteristics of this method are 
significantly noticeable.
a) Language is a system for expression of meaning. 
b) The primary function of language is to follow interac-
tion and communication. 
c) The structure of language reflects its functional and 
communicative uses.
d) The primary units of language are not merely its gram-
matical and structural features but categories of func-
tional and communicative meaning as exemplified in 
discourse.
The goal of CLT is to enable students to communi-
cate in the target language and to do this students need the 
knowledge of the linguistics forms, meaning and functions. 
Communication is a process, and through this process, a stu-
dent can learn the target language successfully. The role of 
a teacher in this method is that of an adviser who facilitates 
communications in the classroom. Here students are com-
municators and the teachers might be a co-communicator 
engaging in the communicative activity along with students 
(Littlewoods, 1981). On the other hand, the students are ac-
tively engaged in negotiating meaning and understanding 
others regardless of their knowledge and level of proficiency 
of the target language.
 In CLT, the target language should not only be used 
during communicative activities but also for explaining the 
activities to the students or in assigning homework. The stu-
dents learn from these classroom management exchanges 
and realize that the target language is a vehicle for communi-
cation, not just an object to be studied. The role of student’s 
native language is not active and important rather the role of 
target language in the classroom is very important.
Unlike grammatical approach, CLT assume that language 
consists of a finite set of rules that can be learned one by 
one, in an additive fashion (Nunan, 1988 as cited in Yoon). 
CLT prioritizes communication to potentially understand the 
rules as opposed to learning a set of rules to communicate.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Quantitative research approach has been used as the main 
technique to collect data whereas descriptive statistics have 
been used to analyze collected data. For secondary sourc-
es of data, books, journal and different online resources are 
used. 
Target area
Dhaka and Khulna regions were targeted for the study and 
10 different colleges came under the survey. Of the total 
colleges five colleges are chosen from Dhaka city and rest 
of the five colleges are chosen from Khulna city for collect-
ing data. The colleges of Dhaka city are Dhaka Commerce 
College, Dhaka City College, Dhaka Residential Model 
College, SOS Hermann Mainer College, Govt. Science 
College and those of Khulna include Govt. Girls College, 
Azam Khan Commerce College, Khulna Public College, 
Khulna City College and Pioneer College. The study sur-
veyed the teachers and students of eleven and twelve grades 
of the above different colleges in Dhaka and Khulna, 
Bangladesh. 
Participants of the Study
A total of 100 teachers and 100 students participated in the 
survey and expressed their opinion by completing question-
naires designed for both teachers and students. The ages of 
the teachers ranged from 25 to 55 years whereas the students 
were 18 and 19 years old. The teachers who participated in 
this study and completed the questionnaires are affiliated to 
English department of different government and private col-
leges and students came from different sections of the same 
colleges (Tables 1 and 2). 
Table 1. Participant’s demographic characteristics 
(Teachers)
Participant’s individual 
characteristics
Frequency Percentage 
(%)
Gender Male 82 82
Female 18 18
Age (Years) 25 – 40 85 85
40 – 55 15 15
Faculty / Department English 100 100
Education MA 100 100
Table 2. Participant’s demographic characteristics 
(Students)
Participant’s individual 
characteristics
Frequency Percentage 
(%)
Gender Male 62 62
Female 38 18
Age (Years) 18 – 19 100 100
Background / 
Division
Science 65 65
Commerce 35 35
Level Grade 11 & 12 
(Intermediate)
100 100
Data Collection
Data were collected by administering two different written 
questionnaires designed for both teachers and students of 
14 IJALEL 9(3):11-17
higher secondary level respectively. The questionnaires were 
prepared based on the analysis of literature of CLT and its 
intended goal, outcome and appropriateness in the context of 
Bangladesh. In both questionnaires, only yes or no options 
were given and participants were requested to circle the best 
option according to his knowledge of it. A representative on 
behalf of the authors, an English teaching professional work-
ing at higher secondary level in Bangladesh was assigned to 
process data for the survey. A soft copy of questionnaires