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This paper is conducted to investigate how Iraqi EFL learners refuse different speech acts across different proficiency levels. It aims to examine the most appropriate strategies used by 2nd year students of English as compared to those of 4th year when refusing their interlocutors' invitation, suggestion, and offer. WDCT questionnaire was used to collect data from 40 Iraqi undergraduate students of English: 20 2nd year and 20 4th year. Adopting Beebe et al.'s (1990) theory of refusal, data collected was analyzed quantitatively using statistical analysis. The findings revealed that the 2nd year students of English were more frequent in using direct refusals than their 4th year counterparts. This means the latter were more aware of using refusals politely than the former. On the other hand, the findings showed that 4th year students more frequent in their use of indirect refusal strategies that the 2nd year students. This indicates that the EFL learners of low proficiency level might not bridge the gap between the pragmalinguistic strategies and the grammatical form of the target language. This means that they were not pragmatically competent of the use of the appropriate pragmalinguistic strategies. This implies that the 2nd year students need to pay more attention to pragmatics and use their refusal strategies appropriately. Thus, the paper recommends conducting further research on the use of refusal speech act in Arabic and English.

The structure and production of persuasive writing are regarded to be significantly influenced by metadiscourse, a new and fascinating area of study that is based on the norms and expectations of those involved. Metadiscourse markers are observed as social activities that encourage contact among writers, readers, speakers, and listeners. In other words, authors must represent their identities in their writings in a way that makes sense to their readers. However, some words are used in writer's identity study in a way that can lead audiences to perceive them incorrectly. The primary goals of this study were to examine the metadiscourse indicators that were used most frequently in Q1 Scopus-index articles. The 10 Q1 Scopus-indexed linguistics articles from the Journal of Pragmatics that were used as study data ranged from (2020 to 2022). On the basis of Hyland's (2005a) model of metadiscourse markers, the data were qualitatively examined. The findings indicate that 2407 metadiscourse markers were employed in the entire dataset. There were 1785/74.1587 % of interactive metadiscourse markers compared to 622/25.8412 % of interactional metadiscourse markers.. Remarkably, it was found that metadiscourse markers were regarded as an essential tool for enhancing effective communication between authors and readers, establishing helpful possibilities for how well readers comprehend the material, and aiding them in differentiating facts from opinions while reading a text. Finally, the study suggests expanded use of metadiscourse-based analysis in academic writing generally and in high rank research articles in particular.

Lying is a controversial issue as it is closely related to one's intended meaning to achieve certain pragmatic functions. The use of lying in literary works is closely related to the characters’ pragmatic functions as in the case of Miller's The Crucible where it is used as a deceptive complex phenomenon that cannot be observed out of context. That is, the use of lying as a deceptive phenomenon represents a violation to Grices's Maxims. Thus, the study aims to qualitatively examine the kinds of maxims being violated, the kinds of violations conducted, the strategies followed in the violations, and the pragmatic functions behind such violations across the different categories of lies. To this end, the (30) extracts found in Miller's The Crucible have been all examined following Grice's (1975/1978) Cooperative Principle and Implicature theories. The analysis has revealed that the quality maxim was breached most of the time with a percentage of (96,6~97%), covert violation occupied (66,6~67%) (the same percentages of both prototypical lies and Intentional Deceptive Lies), fabrication was with (83%) and the pragmatic function ''to avoid punishment'' appears with (46,6~47%). This means that truthfulness was violated beside other maxims, and strategies of  fabrication. Such a violation enhances lying, and false-implicature, and intensifies the tragic end for most of the innocent characters. Minor lies are slightly concerned with plot development and events escalation. Finally, the characters lie in order to achieve certain pragmatic functions. However, the most dominant function adopted when lying was to avoid punishment.

News headlines are key elements in spreading news. They are unique texts written in a special language which enables readers understand the overall nature and importance of the topic. However, this special language causes difficulty for readers in understanding the headline. To illuminate this difficulty, it is argued that a pragmatic analysis from a speech act theory perspective is a plausible tool for a headline analysis. The main objective of the study is to pragmatically analyze the most frequently employed types of speech acts in the news headlines covering COVID-19 in Aljazeera English website. To this end, Bach and Harnish's (1979) Taxonomy of Speech Acts has been adopted to analyze the data. Thirty headlines have been collected from Aljazeera English news website. The findings have shown that constatives and directives occur more frequently than commissives. Other types, like acknowledgments, effectives and verdictives are not employed. The study has concluded that to pay a special emphasis on COVID-19 as an issue that preoccupied and endangered the world, headline writers of Aljazeera website uses specific speech acts, constatives and directives, more frequently than others. This makes it clear that using specific speech acts in writing headlines is an effective way for inspiring readers to easily understand the intended message.