Abstract: The purpose of this study was to scrutinize factors that hold back female students’ of Oromoo folklore and literature of Mettu University from speaking English in the classroom. To this end, the study employed descriptive survey design, which involves both quantitative and qualitative methods. Accordingly, Oromoo folklore and literature department was selected through purposive sampling. And the data were collected from 30 purposefully selected female students from Oromoo folklore and literature department for questionnaire and from two English teachers who were purposefully selected for interview. Thus, descriptive statistics using frequencies and percentages were employed in analyzing the quantitative data and the qualitative data were analyzed qualitatively. The result of the study revealed that almost all female students of Oromoo Folklore and Literature department at Mettu university were dominantly hold back from speaking English due to psychological, contextual, and linguistically factors. Finally, based on the findings, the researchers agreed to some recommendations that the most important one is to create conducive environment to support and encourage female students to speak and practice English frequently in the class.