The impact of Second Language on First Language in terms of Speech Act of Complaining in an EFL Context: A Pragmatic Study

Establishing a socially and culturally-oriented communication requires speakers to carry out both linguistic and sociocultural competence. Therefore, this study attempts to find out the effect of second language on the learners’ first language in terms of speech act of complaining. Three groups of learners including bilingual, rather proficient and less proficient each with 6 members from an English Institute in Gachsaran have been chosen as the sample of the study. An open-ended questionnaire in the form of discourse completion test (DCT) was used as the instrument and a coding scheme of complaint strategies was recruited to help determine the degree of directness or indirectness of the complaints. According to acceptability rating, the results showed that the mostly used strategies were conveyance of sense of dissatisfaction, establishing context for support (50%) and warning (44%). General findings have indicated that learners from all the three groups rather attempt to preserve their first language sociocultural norms even if it comes to violating their own rights.