抽象的な

Pragmalinguistic Failure of Iraqi EFL Fourth-year University Students in Interpreting Some Political Proverbs

Abdulridha Sholi Al-Furaiji

Interpreting proverbs (including political proverbs) requires knowledge about linguistic, cultural and social information related to L2. What is more important is that such types of knowledge seem to be a burden placed on Iraqi EFL fourthyear university students when using these proverbs, particularly, when used in various situations. So, the problem lies in the fact that learners are unaware of the pragmatic knowledge that a proverb has because they do not recognize the purpose of the communicative act that a proverb has socio-pragmatically. In other words, they do not recognize if the proverb conveys, for example, warning, advice, command and so on. In addition, misinterpreting proverbs may be the result of lack of linguistic knowledge including syntax and semantics.