Creative writing and iconicity in English as a foreign language

Abstract

Creative writing workshops in high-school English-as-a-foreign-language education have had little attention from researchers so far. Addressing this gap, this paper investigates the creative production of Brazilian high-school students after a workshop unit on iconicity. Their iconic poems are analysed visually, thematically and stylistically. Despite variation in students’ self-identified language proficiency, the results show that the poems presented visual and thematic diversity. The stylistic analysis evidenced the richness of students’ creations notwithstanding their lack of English proficiency. Although some surface language infelicities are identified, these do not limit their expression. Overall, the findings reveal that iconicity was not only an appropriate topic for these students, but it also proved to be a genuine way by means of which they could freely express their individuality, breaking away with conventions, reflecting on a variety of matters, and registering their observation of the world and of themselves.