UTEL
[ History of English
| English Composition
| Literary Authors
| Literary Works
| Literary Criticism
]
|
Glossary of Literary Theory |
Competence:
The first part of Noam Chomsky's distinction between "what the
speaker of a language knows implicitly . . . his competence and
what he does . . . his performance." Linguistic competence
refers to native speakers' tacit mastery or internalized knowledge of rules
and norms which govern their language and make possible the generation
of meaningful utterances. Literary competence refers to an analogous mastery
and knowledge of the rules and norms of literary discourse. (See also Linguistics
and literary theory.)
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University of Toronto English Library Director: Ian Lancashire. Last modified: |