ABSTRACT
This chapter sets the stage for this book by reviewing the place of discourse markers in French society and the second language classroom. It briefly reviews how discourse markers are stigmatized in colloquial French despite their frequency, and how this stigmatization has transferred to a lack of attention on discourse markers in pedagogical contexts. Next, the challenges of acquiring discourse markers as a feature of second language pragmatics are discussed. This is followed by a discussion of the motivations for the present study, including the importance of pragmatics instruction in the second language classroom. The chapter concludes with an overview of the organization of this book.
