THE ROLE OF LITERATURE IN LANGUAGE LEARNING: DEVELOPING LEARNERS’ LEXICAL BAGGAGE

Abstract

 Literature has long been recognized as a powerful pedagogical tool in second and foreign language education. While its role in enhancing cultural awareness and communicative competence has been widely discussed, recent studies highlight its crucial contribution to the development of learners’ lexical baggage defined as the totality of vocabulary, collocations, idioms, phraseological units, and lexical patterns that learners accumulate and internalize. This article explores the theoretical foundations and practical applications of literature as a means of enriching vocabulary acquisition, analyzing the cognitive, linguistic, cultural, and affective dimensions of this process. The paper further examines how literary texts contribute to lexical depth, lexical breadth, contextualized vocabulary learning, lexical retention, and semantic flexibility. Finally, it discusses pedagogical implications and effective strategies for integrating literature into modern language classrooms.