Sociolinguistic Competence and Second Language Acquisition

Second language acquisition
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1. The inclusion of sociolinguistic competence into the discussion of learner competence is important. What are your thoughts on its value? Why do you think we see less mastery of the sociolinguistic norms? Is sociolinguistic competence, in your opinion, as important as the development of target language forms (e.g. grammar)?
Sociolinguistic competence is important in language learning, as the settings and activities where learning takes place influence learning outcomes. Sociolinguistic competence highlights how the meaning of utterances occurs and is understood appropriately in the sociolinguistic contexts (Ellis, 2015).  In L2 acquisition, the error source may depend on sociolinguistic conditions like social factors, while sociolinguistic competence makes it easier to identify the target-language variability. Sociolinguistic competence is also important as speakers’ produce appropriate speeches in specific contexts and situations like native speakers. Second language users can communicate like native speakers when there is sociolinguistic competence as they can identify both formal and informal speech patterns. It is likely that language learners have less mastery of the sociolinguistic norms since there is no emphasis on sociolinguistic competence, and few learners are exposed to different situations when they...