Pragmatic Competence and Cross-cultural Pragmatic Failure in EFL Classroom Case Study of first year Master Students at the department of English at the University of Khenchela
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Date
2014
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UNIVERSITY OF ABBES LAGHROUR-KHENCHELA
Abstract
ABSTRACT
EFL learners face difficulties in understanding language in its context. This study
attempts to investigate the reasons behind the poor pragmatic competence of first year
master students and thus the poor communicative competence. We hypothesize that if
pragmatics is given enough time to be taught and accompany theory with practice,
learners will develop full pragmatic competence that will allow them to avoid blocks
in communication. The subjects of our study are first year Master students as well as
the teacher in charge of teaching the module of pragmatics in the department of
English at Khenchela University. In this study, we opt for the descriptive method
because of the time constraint. Data are collected by the means of a questionnaire and
an interview. Data analysis permitted us to come out with the result that the
insufficient time given to teaching pragmatics and the lack of practice inside and
outside the classroom causes the poor pragmatic competence of the learners; in other
words, not having full and complete knowledge of pragmatic aspects (implicative,
speech acts, situational routines and cooperative principles) hinders learners from
carrying successful interactions.
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Baghzou Sabrina