Cross-cultural pragmatics and foreign language learning

Abstract

Cross-cultural pragmatics involves the use of contrastive linguistic research, supported by a variety of methodologies such as surveys, interviews and discourse completion tests. A key strength of the speech act-centred interactional framework proposed is that it allows the reader to understand difficulties faced by foreign language learners through pragmatic evidence. An important advantage of this approach is that it consistently avoids ideological pre-assumptions and related overgeneralisations.