Corrective Strategies of Iraqi Learners of Foreign Languages

Abstract

Communications in a foreign language entail knowledge of formal and functional aspects. The formal levels of morphology, syntax and semantics have been focused on whereas the functional one has not usually been given its due concern. As such, learners may resort to their native language reservoir to communicate and convey meanings in the foreign language. This paper endeavors to find out if the Iraqi learners of foreign languages (Turkish and English) are aware of the pragmatic level of linguistic analysis. More specifically, it tries to specify the linguistic realizations of the speech act of correction. It sets for itself the task of answering the following question: what are the corrective strategies those learners may utilize to realize the speech act of correction in terms of power- status differences? Various  strategies are hypothesized to be found whether direct or indirect. To achieve the aim and test the hypothesis, a discourse completion test is delivered to forty learners of each language at the College of Languages, University of Baghdad for the academic year 2019-2020 to elicit these strategies. The analysis manifests explicit and implicit strategies which verifies the set hypothesis. This study is hoped to be valuable for those interested in pragmatic research and teaching foreign languages.