Teaching and/or Learning according to Language Action Types?

Language-action-oriented second-language teaching is discussed with special reference to the training of foreign German as a second language teachers at East German pedagogical colleges. The presentation of linguistic-theoretical knowledge about various communicative & language-action types is stressed as an important ingredient of teacher training & professional upgrading. Such knowledge must include not only a typology of communicative types & their characterization but also information about the goals the various language actions are aiming at, the specific conditions in which they can be conducted & which have to be met if the communicative goal is to be achieved, & the social consequences of language actions in various communicative domains. Z. Dubiel