<![CDATA[Classroom interaction in professional English learning is not merely a medium of instruction but a crucial site where learners’ pragmatic competence is shaped, restricted, or expanded. However, previous studies on speech acts in EFL contexts have largely emphasized general classroom discourse, while limited attention has been given to Business Conversation classes in which management students are expected to perform context-sensitive professional functions such as negotiating, offering, agreeing, refusing, and committing. This study investigates the types, distribution, and communicative functions of speech acts in an EFL Business Conversation classroom involving 35 second-semester Management students. Using a descriptive qualitative design, data were collected through classroom observation, audio/video recording, and verbatim transcription of classroom interaction. The utterances were analyzed using Searle’s speech act taxonomy, covering assertive, directive, expressive, commissive, and declarative categories, followed by functional and contextual interpretation. The findings reveal that directive speech acts were dominant, representing 43.8% of the 210 analyzed utterances, followed by assertive (32.4%), expressive (13.3%), commissive (9.5%), and declarative (1%). This pattern indicates that classroom interaction remained strongly lecturer-controlled despite the use of communicative learning activities. The limited occurrence of commissive and expressive acts further suggests that students had insufficient opportunities to practice strategic and relational language functions required in business communication. The originality of this study lies in connecting pragmatic speech-act analysis with ESP-oriented Business Conversation pedagogy, offering empirical evidence for redesigning classroom interaction to support more authentic, student-centered, and professionally ]]>
