252 / 2018-08-31 10:25:12

Pragmatic Competence of CSE and its Practice—Take intention interpretation as an example

pragmatic competence; intention intepretation; language teaching

全体主题 > 语言能力标准在教学和测试中的应用

Though Leech (1983) categorized pragmatic competence into pragmalinguistic competence and sociolinguistic competence, we combined the two aspects in the CSE out of practical considerations and defined pragmatic competence as the interpretation and interaction of one’s intention in a given context by activating relevant knowledge and using appropriate strategies (Han and Huang, 2018). This definition enables a practical approach towards language teaching because L2 speakers tend to ignore the impact of context and interlocutor variables (Purpura 2004), thus failing to understand illocutionary force or producing inappropriate expressions. The present study focuses on how intention interpretation of L2 speakers can be taught and developed accordingly. Intention interpretation is different across four domains (personal, public, educational, and professional)(CEFR, 2008)and various speech acts(Taguchi, 2012). To develop the interpretation competence, these contextual variables have to be provided in pedagogic settings. The intention of a particular speech act may be interpreted in a complete different way once contextual variables changed. In addition, the interpretation of a direct speech act is likely to be acquired earlier than the speech act with internal and external modifications. Similarly, impoliteness, possibly another way to enhance solidarity, can be acquired as an appropriate behavior later in the learning process. In brief, to facilitate students’ learning, instructors can vary imposition, social distance, power, modifications in a particular speech act.