PhD Dissertation






  

PhD Dissertation - Abstract


An investigation into the strategic competence of Arab learners of English at Jordanian Universities (By Ghaleb Rabab'ah - Supervisors: Dr. Paul Seedhouse & Dr. Jan Leeke)

This thesis is a qualitative study of the strategic competence of Arab English majors at Yarmouk University in Jordan. Its aim is to fill the gap found in communication strategy (CS) research, which has at present little relevance to the Jordanian situation. Its main aim is to determine which communication strategies (CSs) are used by English majors while communicating in L1 Arabic and L2 English. Furthermore, since meaning is very important in language teaching, it aims to examine whether the messages transmitted by the learners are successful and comprehensible or not. This will increase our knowledge of how and by means of which strategies Arab English majors overcome their communication problems, and which strategies they use in communicating in their native language. The subjects of the study are 30 English majors at Yarmouk University, a typical Jordanian university, put into three proficiency levels according to an adapted TOEFL test. The sample represents a full range of English majors' ability at the English Department of the same university. Their ages range from 19-23.


The data collected are based on their performance in three communicative tasks especially designed for the study. They represent typical CLT classroom tasks. The subjects' communication strategies were identified from features of their performance such as hesitation, pauses and repeats, and classified according to the adopted taxonomy which is based on previous CS taxonomies and the pilot study. For the sake of reliability, three independent judges were asked to check the researcher's taxonomy of CSs and his classification of the CSs used by the subjects into the different categories. The researcher and two English colleagues assessed message transmission success on the basis of whether the transmitted messages were comprehensible or not. Then the CSs found in the data were analysed and discussed.

The main finding of the research is that English majors make wide use of CSs. These strategies are mostly L2- English based strategies. Another finding is that in spite of their limited linguistic knowledge, English majors manage to communicate their intended meaning by making use of CSs. It is also found that the learners' use of CSs is related to their proficiency level, in that L1-Arabic based strategies decrease as proficiency improves. One of the most interesting additional findings is the effect of the mother tongue/Arabic which increases the variety of strategy use. For example, literal translation and word coinage are widely influenced by mother tongue interference. It is found that Arabic speakers use many communication strategies when compared with speakers of other languages in CS research. The subjects' use of CSs is also related to the type of task they are performing. Finally, Arab learners use CSs in their native language, but when compared to the CSs used in their target language, these are fewer in terms of frequency and vary in terms of type.

University of Newcastle upon Tyne - United Kingdom

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