Dina R. Yoshimi and Haidan Wang, Editors

This volume presents 10 selected papers from the forum on Pragmatics in the CJK Classroom: The State of the Art held from June 5 to June 7, 2006 at the University of Hawai‘i-Manoa in Honolulu, Hawai‘i. The papers are representative of the many outstanding contributions to the field of L2 pragmatics that were presented at the gathering. The papers are also representative of the diverse range of research interests and pedagogical issues taken up by the conference presenters. Cumulatively, the papers in this volume address current concerns in L2 pragmatics that range from the development of pragmatic competence by children and college-age students in both foreign and second language settings to pragmatics-focused instruction in the foreign language classroom for students at all levels of foreign language learning. The pedagogically-oriented contributions are diverse in their scope: from innovative approaches for teaching true beginners to the specialized curriculum of students receiving post-graduate professional training. Instructional innovations for L2 classroom pragmatics-focused teaching from each of the language groups — Chinese, Japanese, and Korean — are included.

The forum, an energized gathering of some 100 or so pedagogy professionals and researchers from across East Asia, the United States and the United Kingdom, was organized to foster the fruitful interchange of research results and instructional innovations pertaining to the teaching and learning of the pragmatics of these three East Asian Languages at the high school, college/university, and professional levels. The organizers of the forum, Dina R. Yoshimi and Haidan Wang, would like to acknowledge the event's sponsors — The Center for Japanese Studies, The National Resource Center East Asia, and The National Foreign Language Resource Center — and express their appreciation and gratitude for the outstanding support provided by the administrators and staff in conjunction with the conference. We would also like to take this opportunity to recognize the outstanding efforts of our Program Assistant, Kerri Russell, whose technical expertise and well-honed editing skills have made this online publication possible.