PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS OF UNIVERSITY STUDENTS WHEN LEARNING SOCIOLINGUISTICS IN ENGLISH

Abstract

A language teachers’ role is critical in teaching not only a language, but also the
cultures and societies that surround the language. Sociolinguistics looks at the relationship
between language and society and the teachers play an important role in shaping student
perceptions of the language in society. In the university environment, especially the English
students in the final year preparing to graduate, they no longer learn four basic skills such
as listening, speaking, reading, writing, ... but they need to have the ability to communicate
well in society to prepare for their life with the English language they have learned.
Because they had not been taught the knowledge of sociolinguistics until the last year,
considerable difficulties cannot be avoided when they have to accept a series of new
requirements of the subject that they had never been prepared in the previous modules. In
this article, we present the specific difficulties they have encountered when studying
Sociolinguistics in English and some solutions for them to study this subject with interest
and effectiveness.