of discourse in such a way that hearers or readers can understand what is going on and see what is important. Likewise it involves being able to relate information in a way that is coherent to the readers and hearers.the following short discourse in English:
Once upon a time there was an old woman named Mother Hubbard, who had a dearly-loved dog named Bowser. Mother Hubbard was very poor and didn t _racti have enough food for herself and her pet.day Bowser came running up and barked hopefully to show his mistress how hungry he was. Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard to get her poor doggie a bone, because she felt sorry for him. But when she got to the cupboard it was bare, and so poor Bowser went hungry.
This story starts with the phrase Once upon a time , which tells us that it is a fairy tale. The first paragraph goes on to introduce the two characters: Mother Hubbard and Bowser. It also tells us the background information we need to know about Mother Hubbard. Even though this is such a short story we need to keep track of the two participants and the props: the cupboard and the bone. Note the words used to refer to Mother Hubbard: an old woman, herself, his mistress, she and those used to refer to Bowser: a dearly-loved dog, her pet, her poor doggie, him, poor Bowser .second paragraph starts with the words One day , which introduce an event we expect to be important. (In fact, it is the only episode in our story!) This episode has three main events:
· Bowser ran up and barked hopefully
· Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard
· The cupboard was bare
There is also some further information in subordinate clauses, which are linked to the main clauses by words that show the relationship between them:
· to show his mistress how hungry he was tells us the purpose for which Bowser barked.
· because she felt sorry for him tells us the reason why Mother Hubbard went to the cupboard.
· to get her poor doggie a bone tells us the purpose of going to the cupboard.
· and so poor Bowser went hungry tells us the result of the cupboard being bare.
The words But when she got there introduce the climax of the story: She expected the bone to be there, but it wasn t so poor Bowser went hungry., even in a short story such as this, we can identify cohesive and prominence elements in an English narrative text. Children learn intuitively as they are learning English, but adult learners may be helped by conscious attention to such elements.
Pragmatic aspects
The pragmatic aspects of communicative competence are those that have to do with how language is used in communication situations to achieve the speaker s purposes.
Functional aspect of communicative competence refers to the ability to accomplish communication purposes in a language. Language fulfils the interactional function. It serves to ensure social maintenance, referring to the communicative contact between and among human beings that simply allows them to establish social contact and to keep channels of communication open. Successful interactional communication requires knowledge of slang, jargon, jokes, folklore, cultural mores, politeness and formality expectations and other keys to social exchange [22; 142]. There are a number of different kinds of purposes for which people commonly use language, e. g. g
reeting people is one purpose for which we use language. What we actually say in English could be Good morning, Hi, How ya doin, or Yo, depending on who we are and who we are talking to.
Sociolinguistic aspect of the communicative competence is the ability to interpret the social meaning of the choice of linguistic varieties and to use language with the appropriate social meaning for the communication situation, e. g. when greeting someone in a very formal situation an American might say, Hello, how are you? Or Nice to see you again , but if he were meeting a friend in an informal situation it would be much more appropriate to say Hi , or Hey, whatcha been doing ?
Interactional competence involves knowing and using the mostly-unwritten rules for interaction in various co...
