Interlanguage Pragmatics

Book excerpt: As a field of inquiry, interlanguage pragmatics reflects the growing interest in recent years in understanding the social and pragmatic aspects of second language acquisition. Interlanguage Pragmatics offers an up-to-date synthesis of current research in the field, documenting from diverse perspectives the development, comprehension, and production of pragmatic knowledge in a second language. The book consists of three sections. The first concerns cognitive approaches to interlanguage pragmatic development; the second, interlanguage speech act realization of a variety of speech acts; and the third, discoursal perspectives on interlanguage. Each section is prefaced by an introduction by the editors which provides relevant theoretical and methodological background. The editors' general introduction offers a critical overview of the issues currently debated. This book is the first to exclusively address the pragmatic dimension in second language acquistion, presenting a state-of-the-art view of the field and outlining directions for future research.