ABSTRACT
This chapter illustrates the relationship between prosody and second language (L2) pragmatics. It deals with an overview of well-established theories and conceptual frameworks of prosody. The chapter presents a survey of the current empirical findings on prosody in pragmatics. It provides an appraisal of this literature and concludes with implications for future research and teaching. The chapter highlights general relationships between prosody and pragmatics, providing an overall picture of which prosodic features are commonly associated with what contexts of use. Prosodic aspects of speech are critical in the effective management of interaction in L2 and essentially in pragmatic competence, which involves the ability to convey and interpret meaning accurately and appropriately in social interaction. L2 learners often use fillers in their speech to give listeners a perception of fluent speech. Intervention studies can reveal the extent to which prosody-focused pragmatics instruction can assist L2 learners in recognizing and producing different speech acts.
