Linguistic Change And Second Language Education

Language is human beings' most important means of communication. Every living language is changing. Linguistic changes are embedded in linguistic variants, and are ascribable to internal reasons or / and external ones. The internal reasons refer to linguistic factors while the external reasons refer to non-linguistic / socio-cultural factors. For the purpose of appropriate communication, we have to employ not only the standard forms of a language but also the variant forms.Linguistic changes are so constant in language that we cannot neglect their profound implications for second language education. The purpose of acquiring a second language is to communicate appropriately with this language in real-life situation. Thus, keeping close track of linguistic variants and changes is indispensable, as they mirror and apply to different real-life communicative conditions. However, one particular problem in the second language education in China is that for a long time only the standard forms of the language have been attached great importance to while the variant forms overlooked, resulting in students' high linguistic competence and low communicative competence.To solve this problem, communicative approach is recommended in thisthesis, as it sets communicative competence as a goal of language teaching.Also, it is suggested that language teachers co-operate with social scientistsand educational linguists.