INTEGRATING CREATIVITY AND COMMUNICATION IN ESP CONTEXTS
Abstract
English for Specific Purposes (ESP) instruction is fundamentally oriented toward developing learners’ ability to communicate effectively in professional and academic contexts. While existing ESP frameworks emphasize needs analysis, discourse conventions, and functional language use, they often underrepresent the role of creativity in shaping adaptive and strategic communication. This study aims to theoretically examine the integration of creativity and communication in ESP contexts and to propose a conceptual framework for creative communicative competence development. Adopting a qualitative, theoretical research design, the study synthesizes foundational ESP theory, recent empirical studies on ESP communication, and cognitive perspectives on creativity. The analysis reveals that creativity functions as a core communicative mechanism enabling learners to respond flexibly to dynamic professional situations. Interactive speaking tasks, affective strategies, and technology-mediated environments implicitly foster creative language use by supporting associative thinking, learner engagement, and communicative risk-taking. Based on the findings, the study proposes a conceptual model in which creativity mediates between professional communicative demands and learners’ cognitive and affective resources. The article contributes to ESP research by reconceptualizing creativity as an integral component of communicative competence rather than a supplementary pedagogical feature. The proposed framework offers theoretical implications for more adaptive, learner-centered, and innovative ESP pedagogy and suggests directions for future empirical research.
Keywords
English for Specific Purposes; communicative competence; creativity; creative communication; professional discourse; ESP pedagogy.How to Cite
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