Communicative Competence

The term communicative competence refers to both the tacit knowledge of a language and the ability to use it effectively. It's also called communication competence.


The concept of communicative competence (a term coined by linguist Dell Hymes in 1972) grew out of resistance to the concept of linguistic competence introduced by Noam Chomsky (1965). Most scholars now consider linguistic competence to be a part of communicative competence.


In "Theoretical Bases of Communicative Approaches to Second Language Teaching and Testing" (Applied Linguistics, 1980), Michael Canale and Merrill Swain identified these four components of communicative compotence.


1.grammatical competence is the knowledge of the language code, i.e. its grammar and vocabulary, and also of the conventions of its written representation (script and orthography).


2.Sociolinguistic competence is the knowledge of sociocultural rules of use, i.e. knowing how to use and respond to language appropriately.


3.Discourse competence is the knowledge of how to produce and comprehend oral or written texts in the modes of speaking/writing and listening/reading respectively.


4.Strategic competence is the ability to recognize and repair communication breakdowns before, during, or after they occur.

These four components of communicative competence should be respected in teaching a foreign language —and they usually are by modern teaching methods employed in second language teaching.