Report on Communicative Competence

Jocelyn B. Camero
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Communicative Competence (coined by Dell Hymes)
-is that aspect of our competence that enables us to convey and interprete messages and
to negotiate meanings interpersonally within specific contexts.
- SAVIGNON noted that communicative competence is relative, not absolute, and
depends on the cooperative of all the participants involved.
-it is a dynamic interpersonal construct that can be examined only by means of the overt
performance of two or more individuals in the process of communication.
RESEARCHES ON COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
1. HYMES -1967; PAULSTON 1974
LINGUISTIC AND COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE (1970s)
-knowledge between language form and the knowledge that enables a a person to communicate
functionally and interactively.
2. JAMES CUMMINS
- proposed a distinction between Cognitive/Academic Language proficiency (CALPS)
and BASIC INTERPERSONAL COMMUNICATIVE SKILLS (BICS)
CALPS- is that dimension of proficiency in which the learner manipulates or reflects upon the
surface features of language outside of the immediate interpersonal context.
-it is what learners often use in classroom exercises and tests that focus on form.
-it is context reduced communication (Cummins)
BICS- is the communicative capacity that all children acquire in order to be able to function in
daily exchanges.
-is a context embedded communication (Cummins)
FOUR DIFFERENT COMPONENTS OF COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE
(Michael Canale and Merrill Swain)
A.GRAMMATICAL COMPETENCE is the aspect of communicative competence that
encompasses knowledge of lexical items and of rules of morphology, syntax, sentence-grammar,
semantics and phonology.
B.DISCOURSE COMPETENCE-is the ability we have to connect sentences in stretches of
discourse and to form a meaningful whole out of a series of utterances.
C. SOCIOLINGUISTIC COMPETENCE knowledge of the sociocultural rules of language and of
discourse. This type of competence requires an understanding of the social context in which
language is used: the roles of the participants, the information they share, and the function of
the interaction.
D.STRATEGIC COMPETENCE- a construct that is exceedingly complex.
Canale and Swain described it as the verbal and nonverbal communication strategies that may
be called to action to compensate for the breakdown in communication due to performance
variables or due to insufficient competence.
Savignon describes it as the strategies that one uses for imperfect knowledge of rules or limiting
factors in their application such as fatigue, distraction and inattention.
It is the competence underlying our ability to make repairs, to cope with imperfect
knowledge, and to sustain communication through paraphrase, circumlocution, repetition,
hesitation, avoidance, and guessing as well shifts in register and style.
STRATEGIC COMPETENCE
It is the way we manipulate language in order to meet communicative goals.

LYLE BACHMAN

COMPONENTS OF LANGUAGE COMPETENCE

I. Organizational Competence
A. Grammatical Competence
-vocabulary
-morphology
B. Textual Competence
-cohesion
-rhetorical organization
II. Pragmatic Competence
A. Illocutionary Competence
- Ideational functions
-Manipulative functions
B. Sociolinguistic Competence
-Sensitivity to dialect or language variety
-sensitivity to register

-syntax
-phonology/graphology

- Heuristic Functions
- Imaginative Functions
-sensitivity to naturalness
-cultural references and figures of speech

COMPONENTS OF COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE ABILITY IN COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE

USE
Knowledge
Language Competence
Structures
Knowledge of the language
Knowledge of the
word

Strategic
Competence

Psychophysiological
mechanisms

Context of
situation

ORGANIZATIONAL COMPETENCE
-all those rules and systems that dictate what we can do with the forms of language,
whether they be sentence-level rules (grammar) or rules that govern how we string sentences
together(discourse)
PRAGMATIC COMPETENCE (Canale and Swains Sociolinguistic Competence)
-has 2 separate pragmatic categories
1. Functional aspects of language (illocutionary competence) - pertains to sending and
receiving intended meanings.
2. Sociolinguistic Competence- deals with such considerations as politeness, formality,
metaphor, register and culturally related aspects of language.
A.LANGUAGE FUNCTIONS
-illocutionary competence
- are the purposes that we accomplish with language.
Example: stating, requesting responding, greeting, parting, etc.
B. FORMS OF LANGUAGE
-are used to accomplish language functions
Example: morphemes words, grammar rules, and other organizational competencies
Forms are the outward manifestation of language, functions are the realization of those
forms.
COMMUNICATION
-is functional, purposive and designed to bring about some effect on the environment of
hearers and speakers
ACCORDING TO JOHN AUSTIN (1962)
-communication is a series of communicative acts or speech acts which are used systematically
to accomplish particular purposes.
-he stressed the importance of the consequences ( perlocutionary force) of linguistic
communication or the effect that utterances achieve.
2 implications for both the production and comprehension of an utterance
1. Both mode of performance serve to bring the communicative act to its ultimate purpose

2. Language learners need to understand the purpose of communication, developing an

awareness of what the purpose
of communication act is and how to achieve that purpose in linguistic forms.
FUNCTIONAL APPROACH TO LANGUAGE
J.R.FIRTH is a British linguist who viewed language as interactive and interpersonal, a way of
behaving and making others behave.
MICHAEL HALLIDAY provided one of the expositions of language functions (purposive nature of
communication)
SEVEN DIFFERENT FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGGE
1. INSTRUMENTAL FUNCTIONS serves to manipulate the environment, to cause certain events
to happen.
2 .REGULATORY FUNCTION of language is the control of events
3. REPRESENTATIONAL FUNCTION is the use of language to make statements convey facts
and knowledge, explain or report- that is to represent reality as one sees it.
4. INTERACTIONAL FUNCTION serves to ensure social maintenance.
PHATIC COMMUNION (Malinowski) refers to the communicative contact between and
among human beings that simply allows them to establish social contact and to keep channels of
communication open.
5. PERSONAL FUNCTION allows a speaker to express feelings, emotions, personality, gutlevel reactions. A persons individuality is usually characterized by his or her use of the personal
function of communication. In the personal nature of language, cognition, affect and culture all
interact.
6. HEURISTIC FUNCTION involves language used to acquire knowledge to learn about the
environment. Heuristic functions are often conveyed in the form of questions that will lead to
answers.
7. IMAGINATIVE FUNCTION serves to create imaginary systems or ideas. Through the
imaginative dimensions of language we are free to go beyond the real world to soar to the
heights of the beauty of language itself, and through that language to create impossible dreams
if we so desire.
FUNCTIONAL SYLLABUSES
-Their developments were the most apparent practical application of functional
descriptions of language. They are also known notional functional syllabuses.
- attended to functions as organizing elements of a foreign language curriculum
Syllabus- curriculum
Notions- referred to both the abstract concepts such as existence, space, time, quantity,
and quality and to what we call contexts or situations, such as travel, health,
education, shopping and free time.
Functional-corresponded to language functions.
Curricula were organized around such functions as identifying, reporting, denying, declining an
invitation, asking permission, apologizing, etc.
Controversies on their effectiveness
1. Textbooks that claim to have a functional base may be sorely inadequate and, maybe
misleading in their representation of language ass interaction.
2. Context is the real key to giving meaning to both form and function and therefore just because
a function is
covered does not mean that learners have internalized it for authentic,
unrehearsed use in the real world.
3. Communication is qualitative and infinite; a syllabus is quantitative and finite.
DISCOURSE ANALYSIS
-It is the analysis of the relationship between forms and functions of language.
-Language is more than just a sentence level phenomenon.
- the production and comprehension of language are a factor of our ability to perceive and
process stretches of discourse, to formulate representations of meaning not just from a single
sentence but from references from previous sentences and following sentences .
INTERSENTENTIAL RELATIONS IN DISCOURSE a single sentence sometimes contains
certain presuppositions or entailments that are not overtly manifested in surrounding
sentence-level surface structure, but that are clear from the total context. In written

language, it is when the writer builds a network of ideas or feelings and the reader
interprets them.
In the classroom approaches that emphasized only the aspects of learner language
overlooked important discourse functions.
In second language learning the basic assumption has been that one first learns
how to manipulate language structures, that one gradually builds up a repertoire of
structures and then, somehow, learns how to put up the structures to use in discourse.
But, there is a possibility that just the reverse happens. One learns how to do a
conversation, one learns to interact verbally, and out of this interaction syntactic
structures are developed.
In the discourse of the written word and the process of acquiring reading and
writing skills, traditional techniques in teaching reading skills have gone from the
traditional passage, comprehension questions and vocabulary exercises to text attack
skills which include sophisticated techniques for recognizing and interpreting cohesive
devices, discourse markers, rhetorical organization, and other textual discourse features.
(Nuttall 1996) Cohesion and coherence are common terms that need to be considered in
teaching reading. Likewise the analysis of the writing skills has progressed to recognition
of the pragmatic and the organizational competence that is necessary to write effectively
in the second language.

CONVERSATION ANALYSIS
-is one of the most salient features and significant modes of discourse.
Conversations
- are excellent examples of the interactive and interpersonal nature of communication
- are cooperative ventures (Hatch & Long 1980)
WHAT ARE THE RULES THAT GOVERN OUR CONVERSATION?
1. Attention getting-have the attention of your audience
2. Topic nomination-involves verbal and nonverbal cues and are highly contextually
constrained
3. Topic development- maintenance of a conversation
- uses conventions of turn-taking to accomplish various functions of
language
Turn-taking-is another culturally oriented set of rules that require finely tuned
perceptions in order to communicate effectively.
Clarification- manifests itself in various forms of heuristic functions
-often involves seeking or giving repair of linguistic forms that contain
errors.
REPAIR- involves a continuum of possibilities ranging from indirect signals to outright
correction.
-strategic competence (Canale and Swain)
Topic shifting and avoidance- affected through verbal and nonverbal signs
Interruptions-form of attention getting; its rules vary widely across cultures and
languages.
4. Topic termination is an art; each language has verbal and nonverbal signals for
termination
H.P. Grice (1967) - Conversational maxims that enable the speaker to nominate and
maintain a topic of conversation
1. QUANTITY: Say only as much as necessary for understanding the communication.
2. QUALITY: Say only what is true.
3. RELEVANCE: Say only what is relevant.
4. MANNER: Be clear.
PRAGMATICS
Pragmatic constraints on language comprehension and production may be loosely
thought of as the effect of context on strings of linguistic events.
Learning the organizational rules of a second language are almost simple when
compared to the complexity of catching on to a seemingly never-ending list of
pragmatic constraints for a second language learner.

Pragmatic conventions from a learners first language can transfer both positively
and negatively
Apologizing, complimenting, thanking,, face-saving conversational cooperation
strategies (Turner 1995 ) often prove to be difficult for second language learners to
acquire
LANGUAGE AND GENDER
Differences in the way males and females speak
1. Among American English speakers
a. girls have been found to produce more standard language than boys, a pattern that
continues on through adulthood.
b. women appear to use language that express uncertainty than men suggesting less
confidence on what they say
-tag questions, rising intonation on declaratives, hedges
c. men have reported to interrupt than women, and to use stronger expletives, while the
latter use more polite forms
d. males place more value in conversational interaction, on status and report talk,
competing for the floor, while females value connection and rapport fulfilling their role as
more cooperative and facilitative conversationalists, concerned for their partners positive
face needs
2. Carib Indians in Lesser Antilles
a .males and females must use entirely different markings for abstract nouns
b. males and females use different syntactic and phonological variants.
3. Japanese
a. womens and mens language is differentiated by formal ( syntactic) variants,
intonation patterns , and non
verbal expression.
4. English
a. sexist language- language that either calls unnecessary attention to gender or is
demeaning to one gender
example: the generic he
STYLES AND REGISTER
STYLES - complicate the study of language.
-formal or informal speaking governed by circumstances
FACTORS
1. subject matter
2. audience
3.occasion
4. shared experience
5. purpose of communication
LEVELS OF FORMALITY BY MARTIN JOOS (1967)
1. Oratorical style is used in public speaking before a larger audience; wording is advance,
intonation is somewhat exaggerated and numerous rhetorical devices are appropriate
2. Deliberative style is also used in addressing audiences which are too large to permit effective
interchange between speakers and hearers, although the forms are not polished as those in
oratorical style
3. Consultative style is typically a dialogue, though formal enough that words are chosen with
some care
4. Casual conversations are between friends and colleagues or sometimes members of a family,
in this context words need not be guarded and social barriers are moderately low.
5. Intimate style is one characterized by complete absence of social inhibitions

Written style is usually more deliberative, with carefully chosen words and relatively few
performance variables
Verbal aspects of styles are difficult enough to learn
-syntax
-lexical items vary

REGISTERS
- are sets of language associated with discrete occupational or socioeconomic groups.
-sometimes enable people to identify with a particular group and maintain solidarity
FERGUSSON (1994)
-people participating in recurrent communication situations tend to develop similar
vocabularies, similar features of intonation, characteristic bits of syntax and phonology that they
use in these situations.

The acquisition of both styles and registers combines a linguistic and culture learning
process for the second language learner. Cross-cultural variation (understanding
cognitively and affectively what levels of formality are appropriate or inappropriate) is a
primary barrier.
NONVERBAL CONNUNICATION
- is the silent language (Edward Hull 1959)
- interactive language functions in which social contact is of key importance
- it is not what you say that counts but how you say it- what you convey with body language,
gestures, eye contact, physical distance and other nonverbal messages.
- the expression of culture is so bound up in nonverbal communication that the barriers to
culture learning are more nonverbal than verbal.
KINESICS
-body language
-there are tremendous cross-culturally and cross- linguistically in the specific interpretations of
gestures.
EYE CONTACT
-eyes can signal interest, boredom, empathy, hostility, attraction, understanding,
misunderstanding and other messages. Gestures (eye movement) are in some instances keys to
communication.
a. Is eye contact appropriate between two participants in a conversation?
b. When is it permissible not to maintain eye contact?
c. What does eye contact or the absence thereof signal?
PROXEMICS
-is also a meaningful communicative category where cultures vary widely in acceptable distances
for conversation.
Edward Hall (1966)
-calculated acceptable distances for public, social consultative, personal, and intimate discourse
Example: Americans- stranger violates a certain personal space bubble if he/she stands
closer than twenty to twenty-four inches away unless space is restricted such as in a subway or
elevator but this space is too great for Latin a
Americans.
ARTIFACTS
-the nonverbal aspects of clothing and ornamentation are also important aspects of
communication.
Clothes often signal a persons sense of self-esteem, socio-economic class, and general
character. Jewelry also conveys certain messages.
Artifacts , along with nonverbal signals, can be a significant factor in lifting barriers,
identifying certain personality characteristics, and setting a general mood.
KINESTHETICS
-is another culturally loaded aspect of nonverbal communication.
- how we touch others and where we touch them is sometimes the most misunderstood aspect
of nonverbal communication
-touching in some cultures signals a very personal or intimate register , while in other cultures
extensive touching is commonplace.

OLFACTORY DIMENSIONS
-our noses also receive sensory nonverbal messages.
-different cultures have established dimensions of olfactory communication
Example: 20th century- perfumes, lotions, creams, and powders as acceptable and even
necessary
In the Classroom: Communicative Language Teaching
Characteristics:
1. Classroom goals are focused on all of the components communicative competence and not
restricted on grammatical or linguistic competence
2. Language techniques are designed to engage learners in the pragmatic, authentic, functional
use of language for meaningful purposes. Organizational language forms are not the central
focus but rather the aspects of language that enable the learner to accomplish those purposes.
3. Fluency and accuracy are seen as complimentary principles underlying communicative
techniques. Sometimes fluency has to take on more importance than accuracy in order to keep
the learners meaningfully engaged in language use.
4. In the communicative classroom, students ultimately have to use the language, productively
and receptively in unrehearsed contexts.