4.C. Sociolinguistic competence

Sociolinguistic competence is the ability to use language appropriately in different contexts. Sociolinguistic competence overlaps significantly with discourse competence because it has to do with expressing, interpreting and negotiating meaning according to culturally-derived norms and expectations. Sociolinguistic competence is most obvious to us when the conventions governing language use are somehow violated, as for example when a child innocently uses a "bad" word or when the expectations present in one culture are unsuccessfully translated for another. It is our sociolinguistic competence that allows us to be polite according to the situation we are in and to be able to infer the intentions of others. In our everyday life we vary the kind of language we use according to the levels of formality and familiarity. We express solidarity in groups to which we belong or wish to belong, for example in classroom chat with other students, or at a party. In situations where we may eventually have solidarity with the others present, but do not yet know them well, we express deference, for example at an international meeting of scholars in the same field. In situations where there is an obvious status difference between participants, we are careful to express the right amount of respect.

4.D. Strategic competence

Strategic competence is the ability to compensate for lack of ability in any of the other areas. What do you do when you don4 know a word that you need? How do you manage a social situation when you aren't quite sure about the rules of etiquette? In both cases, you rely on your strategic competence to help you communicate. Everyone has some degree of strategic competence in any language. If you are hungry, but cannot speak the language, you can probably still make your need known through gesture and facial expression because hunger is a universal fact of human life. Language learners who really need to communicate in their adopted language tend to develop a number of strategies for making themselves clear in spite of their incomplete knowledge.

Let us suppose that you are visiting Hungary and suddenly realize that you need to buy some dental floss. You speak some elementary Hungarian but you don't know how to say "dental floss." Having located a likely place to make your purchase, you approach the clerk. Now what?

You can use gesture to convey your message. You can coin a word, perhaps "teethstring." You can use circumlocution: "I would like to buy thing for cleaning mouth parts. Inside. Please." If you can't get your message across, you can give up! Maybe your need for dental floss was not so urgent after all.

Self-check test

1. What are the components of communicative act?

2. Point to and describe the functions of communicative act.

3. What do pragmatic aspects of communication include?

4. What is language competence?

5. Describe the components of language competence.

Recommended Readings

1. Austin J. How to do Tilings with Words.- Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975.

2. Bar-Hillel J. Indexical Expressions / Mind / Vol. 63,1954. - P. 359-379.

3. Chomsky N. Aspects of the Theory of Syntax.- Cambridge: МГГ Press, 1965.

4. Culler J. On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism after Structuralism. - London: Routledge, 1983.

5. Hymes D. The Ethnography of Speaking. / In Gladwin T. & Sturtevant W.C. Anthropology and Human Behavior, 1962. - P. 13-53.

6. Hymes D. Two types of linguistic relativity. / In W. Bright Sociolinguistics. - The Hague: Mouton, 1966. P. 114-158.

7. Hymes D. On communicative competence. - Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971.

8. MacCabe C. Competence and Performance: the Body and Language in Finnegans Wake. - London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.

9. Levinson S. Pragmatics. - Cambridge, England: Cambridge University. 1983.

10. Savignon S. Communicative Competence: Theory and Classroom Practice- New York: McGraw-Hill. 2nd edition, 1997.

11. Sperber D., Wilson D. Relevance: Communication and Cognition. - Basil Blackwell, 1986.