EFL students' performance on the deictic use of person deictics : a case study of the faculty of education-hantoub, university of Gezira, Sudan (October, 2018)‎

Abstract EN

Mastering person deictics is essential for successful communication.

This study, therefore, aimed to reflect the extent to which students majoring in English could use person deictics deictically in oral communication.

A test was administered to (50)university students (chosen randomly) majoring in English in the seventh semester.

This study described the students' performance in terms of their ability to use 'we' for addressing someone, emphatic reflexive pronouns(emphasizing a performer) and 'by+ emphatic reflexive'(stressing without help) and independent possessive pronouns as prepositional complement.

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The study has shown the following: Nearly all of the students (98% ) were unable to use 'we' for addressing someone.

This was mainly due to the ignorance that 'we' is a possible choice.

Most of the students (70% ) could not differentiate between the two emphatic uses of reflexive pronouns semantically; most of the incorrect responses were due to the unawareness of the type of emphasis that each use implies.

The majority(80% ) were unable to use independent possessive pronouns as prepositional complement.

This was mainly attributed to the overgeneralization of 'possessive pronoun+noun' and unawareness of the indefinite meaning of these pronouns when used in post genitive constructions.