New Insights into Teaching Pragmatics in the ESL/EFL Classroom

Andrew D. Cohen, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis

adcohen@umn.edu / www.tc.umn.edu/~adcohen/

&

Noriko Ishihara, Hosei University, Tokyo

ishi0029@umn.edu, n-ishihara@hosei.ac.jp

Abstract

This paper makes the point that it is not enough these days for teachers simply to teach the
language forms; that it is imperative that they also teach their learners strategies for interpreting the
language used by others and for saying what they mean to say in the given situation. Too frequently
learners memorize words and phrases, and then find that they do not really know where to use them and
how to use them effectively. In recent years there has been an upsurge of interest in enhancing learners’
control over the pragmatics of the language. The paper starts by briefly reviewing strides being made to
provide instruction in pragmatics to L2 learners. Attention is given both to classroom lessons and to
websites specializing in pragmatics, with a special interest in material based on empirical investigations
rather than the intuition of materials writers. The primary characteristics of pragmatics instruction are
described and illustrated, drawing both on published literature and on strategies-based internet sites for
L2 learner self-access. Since the successful integration of pragmatics instruction into the curriculum
depends in no small part on the knowledge, understanding, and skill of the teacher, the paper also deals
with obstacles faced and the implications for teacher education.

1. The Case for Teacher Development in Pragmatics

A key need for teacher educators is to enhance new and more experienced
teachers’ ability to recognize, interpret, and explain to learners the often subtle
sociocultural meanings associated with oral, written, and nonverbal communication.
These teacher educators are, in fact, performing an invaluable function when they
provide practical insights as to how teachers can incorporate a pragmatics component
into their second or foreign-language (L2) instruction. Despite the fact that at times
divergence from the norm in L2 interactions may result in pragmatic failure, current
teacher education programs still do not necessarily pay adequate attention to these
issues. Instead, if they deal with pragmatics at all, they may look only at the theory,
rather than at how to teach pragmatics in the classroom. Too frequently learners
memorize words and phrases, and then find that they do not really know where to use
them and how to use them effectively. All the more reason, then, to provide these
teachers educators with books and other materials that provide pre- and in-service
teachers with hands-on pragmatics activities. Ideally, such materials cover instructional
approaches, examples of classroom practice, and suggested means for assessing
pragmatic performance.

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 We see it as imperative to make strides to narrow the gap between what
research looking at pragmatic use in a variety of first (L1) and L2 languages has
revealed, and how language is generally taught today. This focus on empirically-
validated pragmatics in teacher development programs would ideally result in greater
emphasis on it in the ESL/EFL classroom.

2. The Focus on L2 Pragmatics Instruction in the Literature

Fortunately, in recent years there has been an upsurge of interest in enhancing

learners’ control over the pragmatics of the language at a practical level, though
curiously there has been very little on how to build pragmatics into a teacher
development program. Interestingly, most of the writings about pragmatics instruction
stop at the level of theoretical background (Vasquez & Sharpless, in press) and perhaps
reports of research studies, rather than dealing with specifics of instruction and
assessment that the classroom often demands. Rather the focus is on the effect of
teaching pragmatics to learners. The following is an illustrative, and not comprehensive
review of available literature.

2.1 Reviews of Issues in the Teaching of Pragmatics

One kind of publication deals broadly with issues involved in pragmatics

instruction. For example, Judd (1999) indicated three areas of skill development for
learners: cognitive awareness, receptive skill development, and productive use. He
presented and analyzed each in terms of its benefits and shortcoming for both ESL and
EFL language learners. He then raised a series of legitimate questions regarding the
teaching of speech acts – that providing detailed information on speech acts can be
time-consuming and take time away from studying other features of the language.
Another issue was that teachers may not have adequate pragmatics information (which
would be justification then for including pragmatics in teacher development programs).
A decade ago when the chapter was written, Judd also noted that materials might not
be available that allow students to be exposed to the range of occurrences of a given
speech act. Fortunately, a decade later there are now more pragmatics materials
available. Judd provided a framework for teaching pragmatics in the classroom:

1) teacher analysis of the speech act,

2) cognitive awareness skills,
3) determining if students have the receptive skills to recognize the speech act,
4) controlled productive skills (cloze-type conversation with speech acts deleted;
situation-based role- play), and
5) free integrated practice.

2.2 Summaries of Research on the Teaching of Pragmatics

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 There are also numerous publications that have emerged which provide
summaries of research on the teaching of pragmatics. Kasper and Rose (2002), for
example, looked at the contribution of classroom instruction on pragmatic performance,
and found research suggesting that over time learners can become more adept at
pragmatic functions like marking transitions and turn-taking in German without much
instruction. They attributed this both to the students' universal interactional competence
and to teacher input as well – that these enabled them to identify transition-relevant
places and start turns.

2.2.1 Learning of ESL Pragmatics by Immigrants

An Australian study set about to investigate the impact of explicit instruction in an

area where exposure alone does not seem to work, namely, with the mitigation of
requests (Wigglesworth & Yates, 2007). The researchers pointed out that this issue
was rarely addressed explicitly in instruction programs, and that relatively little was
known about how speakers negotiate and soften more complex, multi-turn requests.
Nonnative speakers (NNSs) were found to sound blunt in their requests, and even to
have their errors be construed as a matter of character. They report on a study in which
complex role-play requests made by native speakers (NSs) were analyzed for various
kinds of mitigating devices, and compared with similar data from NNS role plays. Five
experienced ESL teachers working with the Australian Adult Migrant English Program
(AMEP) recorded themselves and another NS role-playing the curriculum task for which
there were already NNS data. The situation was having 4 weeks of leave for the year
and wanting to take 3 now although it is busy at your workplace. The 4 teachers
collected 54 NS-NS role plays. These results were compared with those from 16 NNS-
NS (teacher role) role plays. With regard to the level of directness in the principal
request, NS used a far greater range of structures than the NNS, and the latter failed to
mitigate their requests, but rather kept them abrupt. With regard to syntactic mitigation,
25% of the NSs used embedding mitigated by the continuous "I was wondering if..." and
used the past imperfect tense extensively to situate wants and desires, which the NNS
did not.
With regard to the results, at the pragmalinguistic level, NSs were found to use
more devices more flexibly. At the sociopragmatic level, they worked on developing
rapport and a sense of shared responsibility for the consequences of their requests,
rather than seeking a favor. With regard to lexical mitigation, the NSs used downtoners
like "just." With regard to propositional mitigation, which was considered a part of
sociopragmatic control, NSs used more disarmers, such as minimizing the distance
between boss and employee and de-emphasizing the hierarchy, and sympathy with the
boss' situation. Regarding the use of greetings, NSs were more likely to start their
request with a greeting than were NNSs, though neither group used them extensively.
With regard to the structure of the request sequence, NNSs tended to signal a problem
more while the NSs used a "let's talk" routine more, which served as a positive
politeness strategy to create solidarity. So both groups used direct requests, but the
NSs softened them more with mitigators. The NSs expressed their request compellingly
and reduce the threat to their interlocutor's face, using greetings, and reasons for the

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request, along with disarmers and syntactic modifications. They found that NSs did not
use traditional requests like "Can I...?" or "Would I...?" Their requests tended to be
assertive, rather than "apparently advisory" or "apparently negotiable" or "negotiable."
No NNSs used the imperfect progressive, "I was wondering if..." NNSs used the past
and modals but not defocalization, continuous, and just a little embedding. The NNSs
didn't use hedging as NSs did. They did use a bit of understating ("a couple of" weeks).
So NSs greeted 77% of the time, NNSs 50%. NSs used many more disarmers, and if
NNSs used them, they tended to be bold. The results were seen to suggest areas for
instruction at both the sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic level.

2.2.2 Learning of Pragmatics through Study Abroad

The literature would suggest that in study-abroad contexts, learners are able to
achieve some untutored gains in pragmatics (Kasper & Rose, 2002). Marriott (1996),
for example, provided some evidence of language gain among Australian HS students
in Japan for a year, for instance. In this study, the learners’ politeness formulas
(opening and closing conversational routines) improved in oral proficiency interviews.
They also increased their use of plain forms. A more negative set of findings emerged
from Hoffman-Hicks’ (1999) studied the development of pragmatic skills among fourteen
study abroad students from Indiana University in France. The study focused on
greetings and leave-takings and on compliments, using a production questionnaire
administered on three occasions over a period of sixteen months. The analysis
revealed that the learners did exhibit pragmatic development over time but that this
development was often slight and limited in scope. Among her conclusions were that
spending time in the target community was no panacea and that length of residence
was not a reliable predictor.
A more recent study (Cohen & Shively, 2007) found that study abroad students
improved their request and apology performance over the course of one semester, as
rated by the Spanish and French native speakers. In addition, whereas there were no
statistically significant differences between the experimental group and the control
group in their rated speech act performance overall, 1 a qualitative analysis of speech act
development among learners of Spanish (N = 67) helped to identify areas in which their
performance on requests and apologies either resembled that of native speakers or
diverged from it. Although fewer students than native speakers used the “query
preparatory with verbal downgrading” in their requests (e.g., sería posible que ‘would it
be possible’), there appeared to be some increase in the use of this strategy by study-
abroad students from pre- to posttest, especially among the experimental group
students, perhaps suggesting that for some of these students awareness about
mitigating requests was enhanced by the treatment.
Based on a review of the study abroad literature, Kasper and Rose (2002)
identified numerous factors relevant to language learning while studying abroad. Here
are some of them:

1
The experimental group received a brief pre-departure orientation on speech acts in general and on
requests and apologies in particular. They also received a study abroad guide with a brief section on
requests and apologies, without mention of speech acts in either Spanish or French.

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  Not just the quantity, but also the quality of input are crucial determiners of
success in the target community, beyond the length-of-stay factor.
 Pragmatic salience and input frequency contribute to acquisition, which can
explain why even on short trips some pragmatic development can take place.
 The role of “foreigner” may actually make it difficult to get input that would
help in developing pragmatic control (Iino, 1996; LoCastro, 1998).
 Feedback from those other than teachers may be on grammar, and not on
pragmatics – so that learners cannot assume that interactions with competent
speakers will lead to increased pragmatics ability,
 The pragmatics of different social domains and activity types may be learned
in different ways; hence, it is important to know about the learners’ access to
sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic input in the target culture 2 with specific
attention to the interactional organization of different activity types,
 Prior to their students’ study-abroad experience, teachers could explicitly
model for them certain features of the target language, engage them in
awareness-raising activities involving L2 pragmatics, and provide them
feedback on their production.
 During study abroad, students could benefit from language courses or
courses related to L2 culture and society that encourage them to discuss and
reflect on their L2 interactions.
 Learners may have differential exposure to the input, and aspects of L2
pragmatics vary in the learning difficulty that they pose for learners from
different backgrounds.

2.2.3 The Nature of the Instructional Intervention

With regard to the actual nature of the instruction, Rose and Kasper (2001)
reviewed studies contrasting inductive/implicit and deductive/explicit pragmatics
instruction. They found most of the evidence to favor explicit over implicit instruction,
and deductive over inductive. Based on a review of current literature on the effects of
instruction in L2 pragmatics, Rose (2005) reiterated that although some implicit
techniques (such as input enhancement) may be helpful, explicit instruction is seen as
even more beneficial. In addition, studies including metapragmatic information seemed
to have made more of a contribution with regard to learners’ control of sociopragmatics
than instruction lacking a metapragmatic component.
With regard to the curricular materials for pragmatics instruction, Tatsuki (2005,
2006) has looked rigorously at just what the so-called “authenticity” of pragmatics
materials might mean, and arrived at the realization that teachers need to deal with
“degrees of authenticity” from genuinely authentic input to altered, adapted, or simulated
authenticity to inauthentic input. She offered a set of questions that classroom teachers
might wish to ask themselves in order to determine whether a given set of materials are
authentic enough for their purposes:

2
Sociopragmatics centers on what is socioculturally acceptable and pragmalinguistics primarily concerns
the language forms that are appropriate for the given situation.

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  Whose language?
 In which contexts and for what purposes?
 By what means is the material conveyed – i.e., by phone, by written memos,
by email?

Ultimately, she felt that it is up to teachers to select materials and to frame them
appropriately for their students.
Brock and Nagasaka (2005) recommend using the acronym SURE, to have their
students see, use, review, and experience pragmatics in the EFL classroom. So
students should first see the language in context, become more conscious of the role of
pragmatics and its function in specific communicative events. Then teacher-led
activities can get students to use English in contexts (simulated and real) where
interaction is based on an understanding of the situation. Then follows a stage which
incorporates review, reinforcement, and recycling of material that has been presented
and practiced. Finally, teachers arrange for students to experience and observe the
role of pragmatics in communication (using videos, native-speaking guests in the
classroom, etc.).
LoCastro (2003) dealt with pragmatics issues that were not necessarily covered
by others dealing with pragmatics, such as reanalyzing just what politeness means and
a consideration of learner subjectivity and how it influences language learning. In other
words, it may be an actualization of a learner’s self-identify for the person to resist
communicating in a pragmatically appropriate way, particularly if it means adhering to
normative behavior that is inconsistent with their sense of self. For example, a learner
may know to use honorific verbs in Japanese but resists doing so out of a sense that
they unnecessarily distinguish people by status. Empirical investigation of this
pragmatic resistance can be found in Siegal (1996), Davis (2007), and Ishihara and
Tarone (in press), among others.
Several volumes have appeared which offer model lessons for conducting
pragmatics instruction. The first of this kind was edited by Bardovi-Harlig and Mahan-
Taylor (2003) and explored the teaching of pragmatics through lessons and activities
created by teachers of English as a second and foreign language. This book was
written for teachers by teachers. The 30 teacher-contributors were teaching in seven
different countries and were both native-speakers and nonnative speakers of English.
Activities for both ESL and EFL classroom settings were included. The activities
purposely reflected a variety of approaches so that teachers could get a sense of how
pragmatics could be integrated into both the more traditional or the more
communicatively-oriented classroom. Each chapter has five main sections:

 description of the activity,

 procedure,
 rationale,
 alternatives or caveats, and
 additional pedagogical resources.

The chapters specified the level of the learners for whom the lesson was designed, the
time required to conduct the lesson, resources needed, and the goal of the activity. The

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chapters open with a description of the activity, followed by the step-by-step procedure
for implementing it with language learners.
The Bardovi-Harlig and Mahan-Taylor book is organized into five main sections.
The chapters in each section are ordered according to the level of the learners for
whom the lesson was designed, beginning with activities for the lowest level learners
and progressing to advanced learners. The first section, “Awareness,” presents
teaching activities that focus on raising learners' awareness of pragmatic differences
between languages. The sections following Awareness offer production activities, as
well as those involving pragmatic awareness-raising. The activities that focus on
production are organized by the area of pragmatics that they address: conversational
management, conversational openings and closings, requests, and daily life.
“Conversational Management” includes activities that address the mechanics of
conversation, such as turn-taking, active listening, relevant short responses, and using
hesitation markers. “Conversational Openings and Closings” deals with the boundaries
of conversations: how to begin and end conversations both in person and on the
telephone. “Requests” deals with the specific speech act of asking someone to do
something. Finally, “Assorted Speech Acts” presents a variety of speech acts, including
complaining during service encounters, turning down invitations, complimenting, and
responding to compliments.
A new two-volume collection for teachers of pragmatics along the lines of that
one is edited by Tatsuki and Houck (in press) for the TESOL classroom practice series.

2.3 The Role of English as a Lingua Franca

House (2003, 2008) called attention to the need to teach the pragmatics of
English as a lingua franca (ELF), noting the benefits of contrastive studies, and
recognizing the likelihood of negative transfer into the target language. She noted that
ELF talk has been largely ignored in the research literature. She ended with
suggestions for the classroom:

 Teach a broad ELF, not based just on American, British, or Canadian norms.
 Re-thinking norms to include bilingual or multilingual speakers and to see ELF
as a hybrid variety of English where successful NNS-NNS communication
may not be based on native norms.
 Successful EFL communication can entail drawing on other languages that
the speakers know through code-switching or borrowing.
 Speakers need to stay true to their own personalities and individual discourse
styles, so pragmatics instruction must be sensitive to this and work with
learners on practical discourse strategies like producing gambits, routines for
initiating topics and changing them, strategies for sustaining a conversation,
signaling uptake in conversation when appropriate, and responding behavior
(anticipation of end of turns via latching and overlapping; appropriate rate of
speech, types of filled and unfilled pauses, frequency and function of repairs).
 Learners need to practice relevant routines with explicit focus on the forms
and functions of these routines.

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  Teachers are encouraged to engage the learners in collaborative talk
because it encourages learners to notice the gaps.
 Despite the fact that learners may well be able to manage in ELF interactions
without pragmatic competence, instruction in interactional phenomena Is
recommended so that learners are better at turn-taking, at lubricating and
modifying discourse with gambits and discourse strategies, at being polite,
and at having more metapragmatic awareness in general.

2.4 Pragmatics Instruction for Specialized Fields

With regard to pragmatics in specialized fields, Trosborg (2003) looked at the

handling of customer complaints by business language students. She explained why it
can be tricky for an ESL learner to handle a complaint even if the learner has a sense of
the L2 genre for the interaction. She provided an elaborate figure for how to respond to
everyday complaints: opting out, evasive strategies (minimizing, querying pre-condition,
blaming someone else), apology (direct or indirect – acknowledging responsibility and
explanation), and remedial acts (offer of repair, concern for hearer, promise of
forbearance). She also gave a recipe for how to respond to a customer's complaint (p.
259), and provided a figure with possibilities (ritual acts – thanking and explaining, or
apologizing; attending to the complaint – promise of immediate attention/correction &
asking for information; remedial acts – offer of repair, check customer satisfaction,
prevent future mistakes). Trosberg then described a study carried out by Shaw and
Trosborg (2000), where learners acquired new pragmatic routines through both explicit
and implicit teaching. In a study involving both a deductive and an inductive group
(N=15), the researchers found a slight advantage to deductive/explicit instruction over
inductive/implicit instruction. The researchers found dramatic changes in the way the
complaints were handled after very little teaching over a short time. Trosborg’s
conclusion was that pragmatic behavior is much more open to conscious modification
than syntax or phonology. She felt that these routines were easier to learn because
they had a clear purpose which was meaningful within the learners' own cultural
repertoire. Also the values such as "the customer is always right" helped in giving clear
guidelines.

2.5 Pragmatics through Websites

One way to obtain material on pragmatics is through websites specializing in

pragmatics, with a special interest in material based on empirical investigations rather
than the intuition of materials writers. With funding from the Office of International
Education to the Language Resource Center at the University of Minnesota’s Center for
Advanced Research on Language Acquisition (CARLA), a project was initiated to
provide self-access Internet sites for the learning and performance of L2 pragmatics.
The first project involved the construction of a pragmatics website for teachers,
curriculum writers, and learners with detailed information about the six speech acts for
which there were sufficient empirical studies available to facilitate such descriptions
(requests, refusals, apologies, complaints, compliments, and thanking) in as

8
many as ten different languages (see <http://www.carla.umn.edu/speechacts/>)3.
Suggested strategies for teaching the particular speech acts and sample teaching
materials are provided, along with an extensive annotated bibliography which includes
information on other areas of pragmatics as well.
After the construction of the general website, a project was undertaken to
construction a Japanese website, Strategies for Learning Speech Acts in Japanese,
(http://www.carla.umn.edu/speechacts/japanese/introtospeechacts/index.htm)4. It is
composed of an introductory module with five additional modules, each dedicated to the
learning of specific speech acts in Japanese. These include apologies, compliments,
requests, refusals, and expressing gratitude. As part of each module, learners interact
with audio clips of native-speaker (NS) dialogues and complete approximately ten
activities specifically designed to assist learners in developing appropriate strategies for
learning and using Japanese pragmatics: comparisons of L1and L2 norms, examination
of contextual factors influencing each speech act, self-evaluation of linguistic behavior,
and focus on the semantic formulae which characterize each speech act – that is, the
speech act-specific strategies which alone or in combination with other strategies serve
to constitute the speech act, such as an offer of repair when apologizing. The website
was intended to be used either on a stand-alone basis or as a supplement to an
intermediate course in Japanese (for more on the website, see Cohen & Ishihara, 2005;
Ishihara, 2007; Ishihara & Cohen, in press).
Subsequent to the construction of the Japanese pragmatics website, a Spanish
website was constructed, Dancing with Words: Strategies for Learning Pragmatics in
Spanish (http://www.carla.umn.edu/speechacts/sp_pragmatics/home.html) 5. Its
construction drew on lessons learned from the development of the Japanese website,
as well as advances in web technology. It was launched in August of 2006. The site
consists of an introductory unit and eight additional modules: (1) compliments, (2)
gratitude and leave taking, (3) requests, (4) apologies, (5) invitations, (6) service
encounters, (7) advice, suggestions, disagreements, complaints, and reprimands, and
(8) considerations for pragmatic performance. Each module includes unscripted video
interchanges between native speakers of various regional varieties of Spanish, and
utilizes activities with varying levels of difficulty for the purpose of addressing the
learners' varying levels of language/pragmatic ability. All instructional material is in
English with the examples, transcripts, and activities being completed in Spanish (for
more on the website, see Sykes & Cohen, 2008) .

3. Principles of Pragmatics Instruction for Teachers

The main characteristics of pragmatics instruction can be found these days in the
published literature and in internet sites for L2 learner self-access. In our opinion, a
beneficial teacher development program in pragmatics would engage the developing
teachers in classroom-oriented tasks that are designed to help them become able to do
the following:

3
Accessed March 20, 2009.
4
Accessed March 20, 2009.
5
Accessed March 20, 2009.

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  identify research-based information about pragmatics,
 identify possible causes of learner errors and choices in cross-cultural
communication,
 understand second language acquisition theories that support their classroom
practices,
 develop a pragmatics component to their instruction utilizing research-based
information,
 design classroom-based assessments,
 better support learners in being more strategic about their learning and
performance of speech acts,
 incorporate technology into their instructional offerings for the learning of
pragmatics, and
 develop a pragmatics-focused curriculum.

Since the successful integration of pragmatics instruction into the curriculum

depends in part on the knowledge, understanding, and skill of the ESL/EFL teacher,
there may be challenges along the way. For example, you may not feel so sure about
your knowledge of pragmatics, other than through your intuitions. Consequently, you
may look for support in the literature, but then you may have difficulty locating empirical
literature backing certain pragmatics material that you wish to teach. In addition, you
may not be sure as to when to integrate pragmatics into your instruction since you
already have so much to teach.

4. A Guide to Pragmatics for Teachers

Given our sense that no such publication currently existed, in an effort to narrow
the gap we have written a book focusing primarily on teachers who are interested in
immediate classroom procedures for instruction and assessment of learners’ second
language pragmatic abilities (Ishihara & Cohen, in press). The book offers a practical
course for teacher development in these areas. Earlier versions of this book have been
pilot-tested in language teachers’ summer institutes on the teaching pragmatics offered
through at CARLA (2006-2008). The teacher participants have found this book of high
value to them, and their feedback has been incorporated into the revisions of this book.
The book is primarily focused on classroom practice, and we see this research-
informed, pedagogically-oriented approach to pragmatics as a relatively new
contribution to the field. Special attention is afforded to instructional approaches and
classroom processes, as well as to modes of assessment in this context. We are also
concerned with curriculum writing and the incorporation of online pragmatics material.
At the same time the book addresses issues of language learning and teaching in terms
of discourse and interaction. Although speech acts are given major attention in the
guide, we neither equate them with pragmatics nor suggest that speech acts should
dominate the L2 curriculum that incorporates pragmatics. 6

6
Speech acts are only one component of pragmatics, and much of our discussion applies to the
pragmatics of written language as well to spoken discourse. Because speech acts have been well-
studied, research findings about them are readily applicable to instruction. Indeed it is our intention to call

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 In the guide, the learning of pragmatics is viewed not only as a cognitive process
but also as a social phenomenon, in alignment with a current understanding of language
learning/teaching. Consequently, we highlight the social aspects in the learning of
pragmatics and invite readers to consider how learners’ social being relates to the
instructional and evaluative practices of teachers. The book encourages teacher
readers to implement reflective teaching and conduct formal or informal classroom
research as part of their regular teaching routine. The hands-on tasks included in every
chapter are intended to facilitate this process. Our volume focuses primarily on
teachers who are interested in immediate classroom procedures for instruction and
assessment of learners’ second language pragmatic abilities.
In the first section of the book, we provide some grounding in the teaching and
learning of L2 pragmatics. In Chapter 1, we discuss terminology in L2 pragmatics and
related fields, including a discussion of what we mean by "culture" and how that
interfaces with pragmatics. In Chapter 2, we consider teachers’ reflections on language
learning and teaching, especially with regard to how they experience pragmatic
development and how that, along with their professional development, influences their
knowledge, beliefs, and practices. Chapter 3 looks at various methods for obtaining
language samples to be used for pragmatics-focused instruction and at the advantages
and disadvantages of each method. Chapter 4 describes and promotes the
development of a link between classroom practice and research-established information
by introducing an online database for L2 pragmatics. Chapter 5 identifies potential
sources of learners’ pragmatic divergence, provides numerous examples of this
divergence, and offers explanation for the divergence, which can be both unintentional
and intentional.
The second section constitutes the “nuts and bolts” of pragmatics-focused
instruction. The common thread that weaves through this section is the idea that
pragmatic norms vary across languages, cultures, and various other social contexts, as
well as across individuals. Thus, we argue that pragmatics would be best taught in
(sometimes imagined) interactional social contexts. Chapter 6 gives brief theoretical
underpinnings for current instructional approaches to L2 pragmatics. We discuss the
learning of pragmatics not only from a cognitive point of view but also from social,
cultural, psychological, and emotional perspectives, and consider their implications on
classroom practices. Chapter 7 offers guidelines for how to observe instruction that
focuses on a pragmatics component, as well as simulated demonstrations for teaching
L2 speech acts. Chapter 8 deals with the assessment of textbook materials and
possible ways to adapt these materials or to design instruction for the purpose of
teaching pragmatics to complement them. Chapter 9 considers the contributions of
both discourse analysis and language corpora in understanding L2 pragmatics, and
looks at the potential contribution that these insights can lend to language instruction.
Chapter 10 offers some guidelines for constructing pragmatics-focused lesson plans, as
well as inviting teacher readers to engage in reflective activities for learning and
teaching L2 pragmatics. Finally, Chapter 11 draws on an L2 pragmatics-focused
curriculum that is both web-based and classroom-based to offer principles for
curriculum development and examples that illustrate these principles.

for further research and instruction in other areas of pragmatics.

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 The third section of the book considers further issues in the learning, teaching,
and assessing of L2 pragmatics. Chapter 12 looks at what might constitute successful
strategies in speech act performance and offers a proposed taxonomy of learner
strategies for acquiring pragmatics. Chapter 13 deals with the application of
instructional technology to the teaching and learning of pragmatics. Chapter 14
engages the reader in the issue of how to approach the assessment of learners'
pragmatic ability, and offers suggested strategies for assessing pragmatics. Chapter 15
takes a more close-up view of classroom-based assessment of pragmatics, and
provides samples of assessment materials, learner language, and teacher feedback.
The concluding chapter first reviews key issues covered in the book, and then asks
readers to reflect on these topics and to set goals for future instruction related to
pragmatics instruction.
The chapters are for the most part relatively short in order to keep them
accessible to teacher readers. Each chapter includes hands-on activities designed to
provide an experiential connection with the material in the chapter, as well as to offer
models for activities that teachers could be using with their own students. Because
interaction among participants would effectively enhance teacher learning, activities are
written for a group audience.

4.1 Sampling of pragmatics-focused instruction

In the following, we present a small sampling of pragmatics-focused instruction

as provided in our in-press volume. The first section (4.1.1) shows objectives of
pragmatic-focused instruction with a particular focus on the teaching of giving and
responding to compliments in an ESL setting. The second section (4.1.2) models the
way the instruction in this area may be initiated. Finally, learners’ reflections are
introduced to demonstrate their level of pragmatic awareness after the pragmatics-
focused instruction (4.1.3).

4.1.1 Sample objectives in teaching giving and responding to compliments

Giving and responding to compliments is culturally-bound communicative

behavior, largely reflecting the values of the society and the conversational partners.
Due to the cultural differences in norms of behavior, ESL learners sometimes
experience embarrassment, dismay, and may accidentally offend someone by the way
that they give or respond to compliments in English (Dunham, 1992; Holmes & Brown,
1987). In the U.S., compliments are often used as a “social lubricant,” establishing ties
of solidarity between conversational partners (Billmyer, 1990; Dunham, 1992). In
academic settings, compliments from teachers and peers can boost students’
confidence and contribute to the development of a cooperative learning environment.
How to compliment can be modeled and practiced even at an elementary level and can
be used in teacher-student classroom meetings, during peer editing of writing, and

12
when students meet in literature circles.7 Below are the objectives of instruction for
university ESL:

1) Learners will be able to identify differing norms of behavior across cultures with
regard to giving and responding to compliments.
2) Learners will be able to assess appropriateness, sincerity, and spontaneity of
compliments and responses to compliments, considering the relative social
status of the conversation partners, their familiarity with each other, and
suitability of the topic of compliments.
3) Learners will be able to express their intentions by producing 1) compliments
using various adjectives, topics, and grammatical structures, and 2) a range of
responses to compliments according to the context.

4.1.2 Sample introduction to teaching giving and responding to

compliments

The introduction is designed to assess learners’ initial pragmatic awareness and

ability to give and respond to compliments, and to motivate them to learn pragmatic use
of language. Initially, learners are asked to discuss some of the most challenging
aspects of learning English. This discussion is to introduce the importance of pragmatic
aspects (using language appropriately formally, informally, politely, convincingly,
aggressively, and the like in the given context). Examples of appropriate (and
inappropriate) compliments and responses are modeled, and such concepts and
vocabulary as compliment, response, flatter, brown nose, apple polish, and butter up
are taught at this initial stage, using an introductory worksheet.
The discussion prompts on the worksheet for ESL learners can include the
following:

1) How would you compare how often you give, receive, or overhear
compliments in English and in your L1?
2) What do people say in giving and responding to compliments in English?
Write a few dialogues illustrating giving and responding to compliments.
3) What do people say in giving and responding to compliments in your L1
community? Write a few dialogues in that language and provide a literal
translation into English.
4) What do people compliment others on? (What are some topics of
compliments?)
5) Who is giving and responding to the following compliments in English? Pay
attention to what they say, and imagine who they are and what their
relationship may be.
a. “Nice game!” – “Thanks!”
b. “That’s a nice tie you’re wearing.” – “Really? I just grabbed it off the
rack without thinking about it this morning.”
7
See Estrada, Gates, & Ramsland’s (2006) lesson plan for an intermediate 4 th grade ESL course
developed in the summer institute on teaching pragmatics at the CARLA. Although pragmatics-focused
analysis may need to be rather simple for young learners, an enhanced awareness of context and
language can be developed through interactional practice.

13
 c. “I learned a lot in your class.” – “Oh, it’s nice of you to say that. Glad
you profited from my class.”
d. “Hey, sweetie, I like the color of your lipstick.” – “Gee, thanks. I’ll wear
it more often.”
6) Are you comfortable and confident in giving and responding to compliments in
English? What issues, if any, do you have? What do you want to know about
complimenting and responding in English?

Prompt 1 addresses the issue of frequency of complimenting interactions across

cultures. In some cultures, compliments tend to be given much less frequently than in
the U.S.,8 while in other cultures the tendency might be reversed. Prompts 2–6 serve as
a diagnosis of learners’ current pragmatic awareness and productive skills. The prompts
help teachers to assess their needs at this initial instructional phase. An alternative to
Prompt 2 is a few scenarios that elicit learners’ compliments or responses to
compliments in more controlled settings. Especially in the case of learners from diverse
cultures, Prompt 3 can elicit various ways to respond to compliments that are usually
not common in American English (e.g., You can have it/It’s presented to you (lit.),9 and
No, I’m older and uglier10). These cross-cultural examples raise learners’ awareness,
prompting them to notice that literal translations do not always communicate the same
pragmatic meaning in the L2. Prompts 4 and 5 direct learners’ attention to contextual
factors (such as status and distance between conversation partners, and possible
referents of compliments) that influence the language. Some cultural differences may
arise in the assessment of these factors, such as Spanish piropos (flirtatious remarks)
that tend to be more socially accepted (Campo & Zuluaga, 2000) in some cultures and
sub-cultures. Some research findings on gender differences in giving and responding to
compliments are shared with learners, and cross-cultural comparison of pragmatic
norms is made with them.
After this discussion, the multiple functions of compliments, adjectives commonly
appearing in them, and grammatical structures usually associated with them are
introduced. This phase of instruction is followed by student research and analysis of
language and contextual factors designed based on Schmidt’s notion of noticing
(Kasper & Schmidt, 1996; Schmidt, 2001), interactional practice, and assessment of
learners’ pragmatic language use and awareness (see Chapter 7 of Ishihara & Cohen
for more details about the instructional procedure and the background).

4.1.3 Learner voices after instruction

Learners’ level of pragmatic awareness can be observed through reflective

writing on the pragmatics-focused instruction. To illustrate, after the instruction sampled
above on the giving and responding to compliments, an ESL learner from Colombia
wrote:
8
In Barnlund & Araki’s (1985) research, American participants reported to have given a compliment in the
previous 1.6 days whereas Japanese had only done so in the previous 13 days.
9
An example of Syrian responses to compliments from Nelson, El-Bakary, & Al-Batal, 1993.
10
An example of Chinese responses to compliments from Chen, 1993. Yu (2008) has a similar example
from a Taiwanese learner of English who appeared to adopt her L1 norm in English: No, I don’t [look
great]. Don’t make fun at me. I know I’m just plain-looking (p. 42).

14
 Alfonso: I feel more comfortable to give compliments because now I know how I
can give compliments and to which people I can give it. Americans with lower
status don’t give compliments to people with higher status that is normal in my
country and for me. This is one of the many things that I learned. (Ishihara,
2004)

More generally, another learner, who received web-based instruction on speech

acts in Japanese stated:

Martin: We focus on grammar the most in courses so we can produce proper

sentences, but we seldom get a chance to practice the practical use of such
phrases. Having a variety of situations with a detailed description of what
elements are important and relevant to the speech used helps a lot. It helps to
know what to take into consideration, such as the age of the person, the
situation, and the level of formality. (Ishihara, 2007)

These learners’ voices appear to demonstrate that the learners value pragmatic control
of the L2 as they become able to identify differing norms of behavior across cultures.
Learners also appear to become highly aware of the relationship between the use of
language and context, which presumably assists them in producing the L2 in its
sociocultural context.

5. Discussion and Conclusions

The theme of interlanguage pragmatics and in particular the link between

language and culture has gained wide appeal internationally, and has enjoyed attention
in the field of language education for the last thirty years at least. As suggested in this
paper, the result has been a growth in applied linguistics publications. It is probably fair
to say that pragmatics has increasingly become mainstream in L2 teaching and
learning. As noted at the outset, we have perceived a gap between what research in
pragmatics has found and how language is generally taught today. As of the present
time, research in cross-cultural and interlanguage pragmatics has delved into a number
of topics with direct relevance to language instruction. For example, there are now
numerous studies available exploring speech acts such as requesting, refusing,
apologizing, complimenting, greeting, criticizing, giving suggestions, and complaining in
various languages. There are also many studies on how L2 speakers of those
languages comprehend and behave pragmatically in their first language (L1) and in their
L2. On the other hand, not much of this empirical work has as yet been systematically
applied to the L2 classroom and few commercially-available textbooks offer research-
informed instruction. In addition, few teacher education programs seem to deal with the
practical application of pragmatics theories. We would like to see this gap filled by
making readily available examples of ways in which empirically-validated pragmatics
material can become a mainstream part of teacher development and can assume a

15
more prominent place in L2 instruction. So, our primarily interesting is in support of
instructional pragmatics.

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