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G R O U N D I N G I N T H E T E A C H I N G A N D L E A R N I N G O F L 2 P R A G M A T I C S
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An example from Campo and Zuluaga (2000). The acceptability and interpretation
of piropos much depends on various factors like the listener’s regional variety of
Spanish, age, occupation, and education. A more socially acceptable example of a
piropo is: La flor por ser flor no necesita mil colores un hombre para ser hombre no necesita
mil amores. “A flower, to be a flower, doesn’t need a thousand colors; a man, to be a
man, doesn’t need a thousand lovers.”
12 A beginning learner of English requests that a clerk in a repair shop fix an item,
with “Do this for me now” because the learner has not yet learned how to be more
indirect and consequently sound more polite (E.g., “I was wondering how soon
you might be able to repair this for me”).
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
13 A Korean visitor to the US heard that Americans tend to be friendly, so she is
surprised when the middle-aged man next to her on the bus seems unwilling to
have a conversation with her. In response to her question, “What can I see in this
town?” he just responds with, “Oh, lots of things”, and goes back to reading his
novel. The visitor is put off by this response.
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
14 An American learner of Japanese is taught to fill a pause with eeto (more informal)
or ano (more formal) in his Japanese class, and so does his best to fill as many
pauses as he can that way, only to be told by a Japanese teacher that he is filling
his pauses too much – that they prefer to use silence or non-verbal cues more.
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
15 An American learner of Italian heard that Italians talk with their hands a lot, 
so he made an effort to use a lot of hand gestures to make his points in Italian
while studying in Rome. An Italian friend took him aside and told him that he 
was gesturing too much, and also that some of his gestures meant something
different from what he intended.
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
16 An Israeli asks an American colleague how much she makes a month, assuming
that it is fine to ask this question because it would indeed be reasonable in his
home community. The American colleague is put off by the question since she
takes it as unacceptable prying.
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
17 A male Spanish learner of English gives an inappropriate compliment ( piropo) to a
female English speaker (e.g., “My god! So many curves and me without brakes!” –
a literal translation from the Spanish: ¡Dios mio, tantas curvas y yo sin frenos!
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)
This Spanish speaker isn’t aware that such piropos, which are likely to be socially

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L E A R N E R S ’ P R A G M A T I C S : P O T E N T I A L C A U S E S O F D I V E R G E N C E
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acceptable in a certain subculture of Spanish speakers, are much less so in
English-speaking culture. In this case, the female English speaker in fact
interpreted his utterance as rude and chauvinistic.
Potential reasons for pragmatic divergence: ______________________________
Possible answers (List 3)
Note that for each of the scenarios above, there may be more than one source of
learners’ pragmatic divergence. The causes of divergent pragmatic behavior may
result from multiple sources that are intertwined with each other. It may be difficult
to determine a single cause, especially just by observing learners’ pragmatic beha-
vior. However, it is still valuable for language teachers to raise the issue as to the
possible combination of reasons that might have caused learners to diverge from
pragmatic language use. You can also ask the learners themselves for their explana-
tions since they may be the best judge of whether a particular divergence was 
a result of negative transfer or overgeneralization, for example. Such analysis 
of learners’ pragmatic use can lead to better informed language instruction. In
addition, teachers and learners can make it a joint goal to support the learners 
in avoiding pragmatic divergence when they do not want it and to deal with it
gracefully when they do.
1 Overgeneralization; possibly instruction or instructional materials, if the
learner’s source of belief is classroom instruction or instructional materials.
2 Resistance.
3 Instruction or instructional materials; overgeneralization, if instruction or
instructional material is seen as a sub-category of over-generalization.
4 Negative transfer.
5 Negative transfer.
6 Negative transfer.
7 Resistance.
8 Negative transfer; possibly instruction or instructional materials, if 
the learner’s language was misguided through instruction; possibly
overgeneralization, if the learner assumed the polite expression to be
appropriate based on the stereotype of the culture being polite.
9 Resistance.
10 Limited grammatical ability.
11 Negative transfer.

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