AN INVESTIGATION OF REQUEST STRATEGY EMPLOYED BY ESL UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS

Umsa Anwar; Farhan Uddin Raja; Haleema Sadia; Rana Naeem Akhtar

doi:10.58921/jossams.03.02.071

Umsa Anwar Student, Department of M.A. English (Linguistics), University of Karachi
Farhan Uddin Raja Lecturer, SZABIST, Karachi
Haleema Sadia Student, Department of M.A. English (Linguistics), University of Karachi
Rana Naeem Akhtar Assistant Professor, SZABIST, Karachi

DOI: https://doi.org/10.58921/jossams.03.02.071

Keywords: ESL Gender.Pragmatic competence, Request strategy, Undergraduate students

Abstract

The study explored the pragmatic competence of ESL undergraduate students of a public sector university in Karachi in English language in relation to the use of request strategy as a speech act. It also aimed to explore different request strategies male and female ESL undergraduate students of a public sector university employed. The study was conducted using quantitative method. The data was obtained from forty ESL undergraduate students using Written Discourse Completion Task (WDCT). The results showed that the ESL undergraduate students mostly used mood derivable which is a sub type of the most direct request strategy. Gender influence in choosing request strategies was found present in the study. The results indicated that females used more indirect request strategies than males in their speech as men used direct request strategy compared to women.