Speaking in their Language: An Overview of the Major Difficulties Faced by the Libyan EFL Learners in Speaking Skill

Of the four major language skills, speaking is regarded as the most crucial and central one as it enables the learner to establish successful communication in that language, which is often the main aim of learning any foreign language. That is why it forms the focus of attention in any foreign language teaching and learning as failure to master this crucial language skill leads to the failure to establish successful communication. However, mastering this language skill does not go so easily with the EFL learners and particularly for the Arab EFL learners as many factors, including the mother tongue interference, hinder and influence the process of learning and mastering this crucial foreign language skill. The consequent result is that the EFL learners, especially Arab learners, encounter various difficulties while communicating in English and speak the language in their own way with the flavour of their mother tongue, Arabic. This problem of the Libyan EFL learners, encountered while speaking in English, is the subject of investigation in this paper. Various other problems, nature of these problems, sources of these problems and some pedagogical suggestion to overcome these problems are also some of the central topics of discussion in the paper.