The chapters in Part II explore a variety of issues in the classroom learning of different aspects of L2 pragmatics. Rather than examining directly the effects of particular approaches to instruction (discussed in Part III), the focus here is on the incidental acquisition (or nonacquisition) of pragmatics that results from classroom language learning. Chapters 4 and 5 (Niezgoda and Röver, Cook) explore learners' interlanguage pragmatic knowledge as the result of L2 (classroom) learning, but without examining empirically how these learning outcomes relate to classroom processes or specific instructional measures. These studies are thus classroom-oriented rather than classroom-based (Nunan, 1991). Kimberly Niezgoda and Carsten Röver replicated Bardovi- Harlig and Dörnyei's (1998) study on the effects of learning environment and proficiency on learners' awareness of pragmatic and grammatical errors in the target language. The previous study had found that learners in the second language setting had stronger awareness of pragmatic than of grammatical errors, whereas learners in the foreign language setting were more aware of grammatical than of pragmatic errors. For their study, Niezgoda and Röver used the same videoprompted task requiring participants to distinguish grammatical from pragmatics errors, and to rate both for seriousness. Although their ESL sample was generally comparable to that in the original study, their EFL group was markedly different in that it consisted of a highly select group of learners who had gained entrance to an English-language teacher-training program at a prestigious Czech university.

Introduction

Pragmatics has played a considerable role in first and second language classroom research, but classroom research has played only a minor role in interlanguage pragmatics thus far. Virtually all of the instruments designed for L2 classroom observation include, or are even entirely based on, pragmatic and discourse categories, for instance, the FLint (Foreign Language Interaction) system (Moskowitz, 1971), the FOCUS (Foci for Observing Communications Used in Settings) system (Fanselow, 1977), the Embryonic Category System (Long, Adams, McLean, & Castaños, 1976), or the COLT (Communicative Orientation in Language Teaching) system (Fröhlich, Spada, & Allen, 1985) (see illustration and discussion of instruments and procedures for classroom research by Allwright, 1988; Chaudron, 1988; van Lier, 1988; Allwright & Bailey, 1991). As a case in point, an early observation schedule such as Moskowitz's FLint (1971) system included such speech-act categories for examining teacher talk as accepting, discussing, referring to, praising, complimenting, confirming, joking, clarifying, summarizing, repeating, asking questions, giving information, lecturing, correcting, giving directions, requesting, criticizing. Perhaps the most well known scheme for the analysis of classroom discourse is Sinclair and Coulthard's (1975), a hierarchically structured model based on Hallidayan systemic linguistics. Less well known in the English speaking world but much used in northern Europe is Ehlich and Rehbein's (1979) model, based on their pattern theory of action. Although the theoretical origin of Ehlich and Rehbein's model and its formal and functional properties differ considerably from Sinclair and Coulthard's, each represents a distinct discourse-pragmatic approach to classroom interaction.

Despite the fact that communicative language teaching has now been with us for more than 3 decades, and a considerable amount of attention has been focused on developing ways to teach learners to use language for communication, far less effort has been expended in developing methods for assessing learners' ability to communicate in a second language. This has begun to change, particularly with work on the assessment of interlanguage pragmatics being carried out by established researchers in language testing.

One of the most frequently used formats for assessing oral proficiency is the oral proficiency interview or the simulated oral proficiency interview (SOPI). In the SOPI, candidates have to address a variety of communicative acts to interlocutors in different constellations of social relationships. Whether or not the SOPI elicits samples of candidates' performance that allow valid interpretations of their L2 sociolinguistic and pragmatic abilities is a central problem of construct validity. John Norris examines this issue in Chapter 12 by analyzing the use of address terms by American high school and university learners of German as a foreign language on the German Speaking Test (GST). For English-speaking learners of German, developing control over the address system involves the acquisition of complex interactions between sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic aspects of the L2. Six tasks from the GST were identified (asking questions, giving directions, explaining a process, apologizing, requesting, and giving advice) which elicited substantial use of direct address forms and shared similar contextual constraints which likely encouraged the use of direct address.

Compared to areas such as grammar, lexis, or phonology, the effects of instruction on interlanguage pragmatic development have been explored far less. As Kasper (this volume) points out, the research that has been done to date does indicate that pragmatic development, though observed to occur in second language classrooms without instruction, can be facilitated by instruction, particularly when that instruction is of an explicit nature. Part III consists of five chapters examining the effect of different instructional approaches on specific aspects of L2 pragmatics. In Chapter 7, Anthony Liddicoat and Chantal Crozet investigate the effects of instruction given to Australian university students of French as a foreign language on the acquisition of one target interactional practice, namely, responding to a question about the weekend. Previous research indicates that although the question “Did you have a good weekend?” is a phatic, ritualized greeting which requires little or no elaboration in the response for Australians, for French speakers the question is not phatic and often elicits a lengthy response replete with lively descriptions to which the listener is expected to carefully attend. The potential for misunderstanding, frustration, and negative stereotyping that these differences present has been well attested. In their study, Liddicoat and Crozet used role-plays in a pretest/posttest design with an intervening four-phase instructional treatment consisting of awareness raising, narrative reconstruction, production, and feedback. They found that after instruction, learners did more closely approximate French norms, in terms of both particular language features and content.

The chapters in Part I provide the theoretical and empirical background to the data-based studies which follow. In Chapter 2, Kathleen Bardovi-Harlig discusses how native speakers (NSs) and nonnative speakers (NNSs) differ in their use of pragmatic knowledge in production and comprehension. The production section of her chapter is organized around the four-way distinction utilized in Bardovi-Harlig (1996), namely, culture-specific speech act use, use of semantic formulas, use of linguistic devices, and utterance content. After providing ample evidence from the research literature that NNSs' understanding and use of the pragmatics of the target language often differ considerably from those of NSs, she discusses how these differences have been explained, including input factors, learner expectations, teaching materials, level of proficiency, and washback. The chapter concludes with a summary of evidence of the need for instruction, but Bardovi-Harlig is careful to note that although the evidence indicates divergence of interlanguage pragmatics from target-language pragmatic practices, such differences per se do not constitute a mandate to teach (or facilitate the acquisition of) target-language pragmatics – many other factors need to be considered in determining what, if any, areas need to be targeted for instruction, or how instruction is to be implemented.

Gabriele Kasper begins in Chapter 3 by noting that although pragmatics has played a considerable role in approaches to first and second language classroom research, classroom research has played only a minor role in interlanguage pragmatics thus far.

To our knowledge, this is the first edited volume devoted solely to classroom research on interlanguage pragmatics, and as such is situated at the interface of second language acquisition, pragmatics, and educational research. The chapters in this collection address a range of issues in the learning of pragmatics and discourse in classroom contexts – both second and foreign language – from a diversity of approaches to teaching and research. Coverage is provided not only for various options in instruction but also for the assessment of pragmatic proficiency, a heretofore largely neglected area. It is our hope that the work reported in this collection will inspire others to further explore issues raised here in their own research, thus guaranteeing that this will not be the last book on this topic.

We would like to extend our sincere appreciation first and foremost to our contributors for undertaking the research reported here, agreeing to include it in our collection, and following through in such a timely and professional manner at each stage of the process. Thanks also to the series editors for their support, two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments, as well as everyone else we had the pleasure of working with at Cambridge University Press, including Olive Collen, production editor. And a special thanks to David Thorstad, whose expert handling of our multilingual manuscript was nothing short of amazing.

Introduction

By such milestones as the appearance of the Threshold Level for English (Van Ek, 1975) and Wilkins's Notional Syllabus (1976), communicative language teaching (CLT) has been with us for nearly three decades. A strong theoretical impetus for the development of CLT came from the social sciences and humanities outside language pedagogy. Different notions of communicative competence, proposed by Hymes from the perspective of linguistic anthropology (1971) and by Habermas (1984) from the vantage point of social philosophy, served as guiding constructs for the design of communicative competence as the overall goal of language teaching and assessment. An influential and comprehensive review of communicative competence and related notions was offered by Canale and Swain (1980), who also proposed a widely cited framework of communicative competence for language instruction and testing. While pragmatics does not figure as a term among their three components of communicative competence (grammatical, sociolinguistic, and strategic competence), pragmatic ability is included under “sociolinguistic competence,” called “rules of use.” Canale (1983) expanded the earlier version of the framework by adding discourse competence as a fourth component. A decade after the original framework had been published, Bachman (1990, pp. 87ff.) suggested a model of communicative ability that not only includes pragmatic competence as one of the two main components of “language competence,” parallel to “organizational competence,” but subsumes “sociolinguistic competence” and “illocutionary competence” under pragmatic competence. The prominence of pragmatic ability has been maintained in a revision of this model by Bachman and Palmer (1996, pp. 66ff.).

Compared with phonology, morphology, and syntax, second language pragmatics, like second language vocabulary, was a relatively neglected area of second language acquisition and applied linguistics until about 15 years ago, but it has seen a veritable explosion of work of late. That work has been both theoretical and empirical, and sometimes difficult even for educated outsiders to come to grips with, in part because it has frequently crossed traditional boundaries of second language acquisition and use. Some researchers have concentrated on unearthing what Hymes once referred to as those “rules of use without which rules of grammar would be useless,” some (rather fewer) have focused on how those rules are acquired (or not), and some have attempted to address both aspects. Recently, as this volume demonstrates, the domain has grown to include both the teaching and the testing of second language pragmatics, and has involved additional research cultures and knowledge bases.

Two pioneers and internationally acknowledged experts in this field are Kenneth Rose and Gabriele Kasper. Each has published extensive original empirical research on interlanguage and crosscultural pragmatics, each has written authoritative reviews of the pragmatics literature, each has helped focus the research agenda, each has contributed to our understanding of appropriate qualitative and quantitative research methods for the work at hand, each has taught numerous courses and seminars and supervised graduate student research on pragmatics, and each has lectured on these subjects around the world.