CD var/Includes CD

Includes references(45-49 p.)

Includes appendix(50-56 p.)

ABSTRACT
Pragmatics has a great impact on English Language Teaching and Learning. Most of the existing literature on this subject has paid much attention to diverse pedagogies in the teaching and learning of English and how to integrate pragmatics in an EFL context. This study attempts to examine Libyan EFL students' levels of pragmatic competence level. A Discourse Completion Task (DCT) related to implicature, situational routines, and speech acts was used to collect the data for this study. To achieve the objectives of this study, we collected data from a total number of 180 students from two public Universities in Libya namely Benghazi University (90) and Mukhtar University (90). The proportion of the gender was 100 males and 80 female respondents. This study focuses its attention on finding answers to the following questions; What level of competence does Libyan EFL students possess in pragmatics as learners, does gender have any contribution in Libyan EFL learners' level of pragmatic competence and what role type do schools have in Libyan EFL learners level of pragmatic competence in speech acts, implicature and situational routines. The results revealed that participants have a low pragmatic competence as compared to previous studies on the subject. Again, gender does not have any significant influence in determining the competency level of pragmatic knowledge concerning the university students used for the study. As for institution type, the results show that there is a significant difference regarding implicature and speech acts between the two different universities. The situational routines do not prove any differences in school type.

Keywords: Pragmatic competence, Libyan EFL learners, situational routines, institution type.