The use of discourse markers <i>but</i> and <i>so</i> by native English speakers and Chinese speakers of English

Abstract Previous studies have found that but and so occur frequently in native non-native English speakers’ speech they are easy to acquire by speakers. The current study compared ideational pragmatic functions of speakers English. Data for the were gathered using individual sociolinguistic interviews with five ten L1 Chinese results suggest even though acquired as well speakers, underused them. findings indicate there is still a gap between communicative competence use . present also suggests (Mandarin Chinese) overall oral proficiency discourse affect their