AUTHENTIC MATERIALS AND AUTHENTICITY IN

FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING

Alex Gilmore (2015)

2. Defining authenticity

a) Authenticity relates to the language produced by native speakers for natives speakers in a
particular language community (Porter & Roberts 1981; Little et al.
1989).
b) Authenticity relates to the language produced by a real speaker/writer for a real audience,
conveying a real message (Morrow 1977; Porter & Roberts 1981; Swaffar 1985; Nunan
1988/9; Benson & Voller 1997).

From these brief outlines we can see that the concept of authenticity can be situated
in either the text itself, in the participants, in the social or cultural situation and purposes of
the communicative act, or some combination of these.
I define authenticity in the same way as Morrow (1977: 13): An authentic text is a
stretch of real language, produced by a real speaker or writer for a real audience and designed
to convey a real message of some sort.
The key issue then becomes What are we trying to ACHIEVE with classroom
materials? A logical response to this would be that the goal is to produce learners who are
able to communicate effectively in the target language of a particular speech community, that
is to say, learners who are COMMUNICATIVELY COMPETENT. To reach this goal, I
would suggest that teachers are entitled to use any means at their disposal, regardless of the
provenance of the materials or tasks and their relative authenticity or contrivance.

3. The gap between authentic language and textbook language