An Analysis Of Pragmatic Failure And Its Implication For College English Teaching

Cross-cultural pragmatic failure has become one important research subject in the field of pragmatics and applied linguistics. The term "pragmatic failure" is adopted from the article "Cross-cultural Pragmatic Failure" by J. Thomas (1983). She believes that pragmatic failure refers to the inability to understand "what is meant by what is said".According to Thomas, There are two types of pragmatic failure: pragmalinguistic failure and sociopragmatic failure. Pragmalinguistic failure is language-specific, simply a question of highly conventionalized usage. It can be taught as part of grammar and corrected quite straightforwardly. Sociopragmatic failure is a far more delicate matter, which is caused by sociopragmatic mismatches between communicators' different socio-cultural backgrounds.From that time on, many scholars at home and abroad have begun to make a great deal of efforts to the definition of pragmatic failure from different perspectives and analyze the causes of pragmatic failures. However, there are some defects in those researches: 1. Most of the researches, which are based on the Thomas' Terminology (pragmalinguistic failure and sociopragmatic failure), are limited in the study of verbal communication, neglecting the study of nonverbal communication. 2. The current researches on pragmalinguistic failure neglect failures that take place in intonation and discourse level. 3. The current researches on the causes of pragmatic failure have paid less attention to foreigners' tolerance towards Chinese's pragmatic failure. All these above are the important aspects to be analyzed in the thesis.Under the influence of structuralism in the past, English teaching in China paid insufficient attention to pragmatic teaching and attributed pragmatic failure to insufficient knowledge of English language. Consequently, many Chinese learners of English can speak English fluently but can not use it appropriately because of pragmatic failure caused by lack of pragmatic knowledge.For reasons mentioned above, the author, from the perspective of pragmatics, first attempts to review different pragmatic theories and definitions of pragmatic failure, to redefine and reclassify pragmatic failure and delimit the domain of the research. By describing and analyzing the manifestation and causes of pragmatic failures at the level of pragmalinguistic, sociopragmatic and nonverbal communication, the author intends to find out ways of developing Chinese college students' communicative competence, minimizing the possibility of or even avoiding their pragmatic failures, and thus achieving successful cross-cultural communication.This thesis is divided into six chapters.Chapter One is an introduction. It presents the goal and current situation of Chinese college English teaching and learning, the purpose and the outline of the thesis.Chapter Two concentrates on literature review. It reviews some pragmatic theories for guiding this research and the research into pragmatic failure at home and abroad, redefines and reclassifies pragmatic failure, and delimits the domain of the present research.Chapter Three describes and analyzes pragmatic failure from the phonological, lexical, grammatical, discourse, cultural and nonverbal level, etc.Chapter Four is the main chapter of the thesis. The author conducts a study on the causes of pragmatic failure, which include negative pragmatic transfer, different thinking patterns, foreigners' tolerance towards Chinese's pragmatic failure and inappropriate language input.Chapter Five tries to find out the implications for Chinese college English teaching and makes some suggestions.Chapter Six concludes this thesis, points out the limitations and weaknesses of this thesis, and gives some suggestions for further research.