Interlanguage pragmatics of Egyptian EFL tertiary students: A sociopragmatic and TEFL perspective

Abstract

The study examines the refusal and acceptance strategies of invitation adopted by two different groups of Egyptian EFL tertiary students, majoring in English and ESP. This examination was conducted in terms of participants' L1 culture including social distance and social power. Thirty Egyptian EFL tertiary students participated in the study. They were divided into two groups with fifteen students each. Data were collected using a 12-item discourse completion task (DCT) questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics like frequencies, mean scores and percentages. One way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was conducted as well to judge statistical significance between contextual variables and categories of refusal and acceptance strategies. Findings indicate that Egyptian EFL learners vary in adopting acceptance strategies, however they tend to use similar strategies for refusing invitations. The study emphasizes the needs of teaching pragmatic behavior to Egyptian EFL tertiary students. Social contextual variables are found to have statistically significant influence on the selection of refusal and acceptance strategies adopted by Egyptian EFL students