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Contexts of language use 21

social and physical contexts and have become so used to adapting our language to
the situation that we find it impossible to conceive of using language for no purpose
at all, in no context at all. Yet, very often that is what we are expected to do in lan-
guage tests! We are told to read a passage and answer the questions that follow it.
Why? We are told to write a description of a stapler. For what audience, and why
would they wish to read a description of a stapler? We are told to listen to a conversa-
tion between two people discussing a homework assignment, disregarding the fact
that eavesdropping is a rather rude thing to do in real life. O f course, we know that
there is in fact a purpose to these language use activities: to display our language
knowledge so that someone can observe our performance and judge our level of
ability. As I suggested above, that is the essence of language testing. Yet, from the
test taker’s point of view, language use for sheer display is at best unnatural and at
worst a distortion. If the performance we elicit is in some way abnormal, the infer-
ences we make about the ability that produced the performance will stand a good
chance of being wrong.
We have also, of course, encountered language tests that do provide contextual
information and a reason for carrying out a language task other than mere display of
knowledge. In this sample task from the Test of Spoken English (Educational Testing
Service 2008), the test taker might be prompted as follows:

Now you will be asked to respond to a co-worker. Imagine that you happen to
meet a colleague who has recently received a promotion. Greet your colleague
and be sure to
• mention the recent promotion,
• express your positive reaction to the promotion, and
• extend appropriate wishes to the colleague.

In this example, there is implied reference to a workplace context; the audience is


a colleague, not a close friend; the purpose is greeting and congratulation. The test
taker must draw not only upon knowledge of vocabulary and grammar but also
upon social knowledge about appropriate ways to congratulate. The lesson for us
is that if the test purpose is to make inferences about a learner’s language ability
in some communicative context, then the test should provide relevant contextual
information. But what are the features of context that might be provided to give test
takers non-test reasons for carrying out the required task?

2.3.1 Contextual features


In 1974, the sociolinguist Dell Hymes suggested a number of contextual features rele-
vant to language use that together spell the acronym SPEAKING: Setting, Participants,
Ends, Act sequence, Key, Instrumentation, Norms of interaction, and G enre. The
acronym provides a helpful mnemonic for remembering what elements of context
we might want to include in our tests and I will elaborate on each of them below. Note
that although the acronym suggests to us spoken language, the elements of context
are applicable to situations involving listening, reading, and writing as well.

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