Framed on the bakhtinian notion of speech genres as relatively stable type of utterances developed by each sphere in which language is used (BAKHTIN, 1953 [1986]) and on Bazerman's proposition that genres are typified formats of discursive uses that orient human actions (Bazerman, 2005), my main purpose in this paper is to advocate the argument that language games typically used in EFL teaching-learning processes can be comprehended as typical speech genres from this educational sphere. After an outline of the concepts of games, language games, format (BRUNER, 1975, ELKONIN, (1978 [1998]), VYGOTSKY, 1930, WITTGENSTEIN, 1953) and genres that have oriented my reflection on the usage of games as instruments to construct specific linguistic-discursive components in a foreign language (SZUNDY, 2001, 2005), the paper focuses on the analysis of interaction excerpts from language games used in an EFL course to young learners aged 7-9. This analysis revisits the corpus of my master degree research (SZUNDY, 2001) with the main purpose of showing that language games (linguistic-discursive components) that takes place in the interior of determined games (activities) own a relative stability of content, format and style and create formats of standardized actions that guide the EFL knowledge construction process. Thus, these language games can be understood as speech genres.
games; language games; genres
