| As a branch of second language acquisition and a subset of pragmatics, the study of interlanguage pragmatics is increasingly coming into people's notice, focusing on three areas: cognitive approach to interlanguage pragmatic development, speech act realization and discourse perspective. This thesis only deals with a specific speech act, that is, apology-making. The purpose of this study is to answer the question whether L2 learners' linguistic proficiency is related to the choice of strategies in their speech act performance. If so, in what way? The study was conducted both quantitatively and qualitatively with the purpose of identifying and analyzing the relevant variables affecting L2 learners' speech act realization so as to improve the second language learning and teaching.The subjects involved in this study were 40 sophomores of English majors from Yangzhou University and 10 native English speakers (NS) from USA. The former were divided into two groups, Group 1 and Group 2. Those in Group 1 were 20 low-proficiency English learners (LPE), and those in Group 2, 20 high-proficiency English learners (HPE). Data collection was realized in the form of Discourse Completion Test (DCT) and An Assessment Questionnaire. Throughout the process, all the subjects were very cooperative and finished the questionnaires in the allotted time, which guarantees the success of the study and the reliability of the study results.The major findings of the study are as follows:(l)An L2 learner's linguistic proficiency has an effect on his speech act performances. Generally, an HPE outperforms an LPE, especially in terms of diction, sentence structure, logical coherence and construction of discourses.(2)Appropriacy is also important in successful speech act performance. An HPE usually has a better awareness about the style of his apology-making speech act. In other words, he can suit his style of speaking to the specific situations. The more formal thecircumstance is, the more elaborate his relevant speech act discourses. The studies show that both LPE and HPE tend to use explicit strategies. But the number of LPE who use explicit ones is larger than that of LPE. An HPE expresses himself more indirectly, providing more details to excuse himself for his wrongdoing and remedying the mutual relationship in a more effective way. Therefore, he is more likely to be accepted by the audience offended. In contrast, an LPE usually resorts to formulaic expressions; the word sorry being the most commonly used. His expressions tend to be more direct and explicit, lacking in interpersonal implications.(3) The studies also show that cultural differences affect the choice of pragmatic strategies. In Chinese culture, the strategy of apology-making is often affected by the social status of the people involved or their mutual relationship and Chinese L2 learners are likely to transfer this strategy to their L2 communication. By contrast, that's not the case with native English speakers, who usually decide on their apology-making strategies without considering social status so much, as is shown in the responses to the questionnaires distributed among them.The above-mentioned findings may be suggestive for our L2 learning and teaching. First, L2 learners' successful speech act realization depends not only on their linguistic proficiency but also on their sociolinguistic abilities and cultural acculturation. In other words, in our syllabuses, greater importance should be attached to the improvement of L2 learners' cultural awareness and sociolinguistic abilities. Second, to achieve the goal mentioned above, student-centered or task-based teaching approach should be introduced and encouraged into our teaching program so that our learners will have a more authentic environment to learn indirectly or to acquire L2 automatically. Only in this way can they successfully combine language forms with their functions or meanings and develop their communicative competence effectively.
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