An Interlanguage Pragmatics Study of Iranian EFL Learners’ Realization of Condolence Speech Act: The Role of L۲ Proficiency

Speech acts, as the make-up of pragmatic competence, are key concepts in the study of L۲ pragmatic knowledge, and interlanguage pragmatics studies are often conducted within the framework of speech acts. Therefore, this study, as an interlanguage pragmatics study, was an attempt to put under scrutiny Iranian EFL learners’ realization of the condolence speech act in English, and to examine how they differ from English native speakers in their realization patterns. This study was also interested in examining whether Iranian EFL learners’ realization of the condolence speech act was correlated with their level of L۲ proficiency. To this end, a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) was administered to ۸۲ undergraduate Iranian EFL students first in English then in Persian. For baseline comparisons, the English DCT was also administered to ۲۰ native speakers (NSs) of American English. The participants were divided into elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels based on their scores on the Oxford Quick Placement Test. The data were analyzed based on Elwood’s (۲۰۰۴) coding scheme. Adopting a quantitative research design, the frequency and percentage of the condolence strategies used by each respondent group were calculated. Also, a chi-square test was run to compare the realization patterns among the three proficiency-level groups. The results indicated that English and Persian NSs and Iranian EFL learners adopted the same condolence strategies, yet they varied in the semantic formulas, content, or forms they utilized in their condolences. Additionally, proficiency level was found to be correlated with Iranian EFL learners’ realization of the condolence speech act.

کلیدواژه ها:

Interlanguage pragmatics ، Speech act realization ، Condolence speech act ، L۲ proficiency level