‘It was a bit stressy as well actually'. The pragmatic markers 'actually' and 'in fact' in spoken learner English

Actually and in fact have been described as pragmatic markers of expectation that can be regarded as interchangeable. This study looks into how learners of English with a Dutch and a French mother tongue background make use of these markers in spoken English, and how this compares with native speaker practice. The functional scope of these markers is indeed found to be almost identical, but actually is extremely more frequent among the native speakers and Dutch-speaking learners than in fact. The latter, on the other hand, is extremely more frequent among the French-speaking learners than among the other two groups. These findings to a large extent betray an influence from cognates in the learners’ L1s.

Publication year:2020

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BOF-publication weight:1

CSS-citation score:1

Authors from:Higher Education

Accessibility:Open