The Role of Grammatical Competence in Shaping Pragmatic Performance: A Study of L2 Learners’ Requests in English

Abstract

This study was a comparative analysis of data collected from two participants: a native speaker of English and a second language (L2) learner of English. The L2 learner was a female Arab student learning English at level 3 in an intensive English program at an American university. The native speaker was a female undergraduate student majoring in International Studies in her second year. The data consisted of responses to various situations in which participants made written requests to fictional interlocutors. The situations featured different contexts and degrees of imposition, and the statuses of the interlocutors were alternated in each situation to elicit different responses. The purpose of the study was to compare the L2 learner's responses to those of a native English speaker in terms of form and function and to assess whether these aspects play a role in making and perceiving requests. Another aim of the analysis was to investigate the contribution of the L2 learner’s level of linguistic and grammatical competence to her level of interlanguage pragmatics in making requests. The results revealed that the learner’s level of linguistic competence influenced her interlanguage pragmatics in both form and function. In conclusion, it is recommended that more interlanguage analyses should be conducted to examine the different proficiency levels of L2 learners and how these contribute to their development of interlanguage pragmatics. Also, the study provides implications for second language acquisition and English language teaching.