Pragmatic Competence as an Integral Part of EFL Teaching

In many recent studies teachers and other professional educators in EFL circles highlight the importance of teaching pragmatic competence as a vital part of language teaching curriculum. This probably was the result of generations of learners of English language who completed their studies in the foreign language with a relatively good general language proficiency but weaker skills to interpret the messages and intentions that are conveyed in conversations, correctly. This particular competence is referred to as pragmatic competence. This paper aims to overview most widely used techniques to teach pragmatic competence in an EFL classroom as well as provide theoretical background for the concept and closely related notions such as speech acts and politeness strategies