Developing a Model of Iranian ESP Learners’ Communicative Competence

This qualitative study proposed an ESP-oriented communicative competence model in Iranian EFL setting. To this end, a sample of 30 MA-level ESP students were selected based on purpos-ive sampling, from different state and private universities of East and West Azerbaijan provinc-es, Iran. Among them, 17 were female learners, with eight specializing in mechanical engineer-ing and nine in computer engineering. Additionally, we had thirteen male ESP learners, seven of whom were pursuing mechanical engineering and six specializing in computer engineering. A semi-structured interview was conducted in which the participants were required to speak about their perceptions and experience of ESP students in communicative competence. The findings resulted in a proposed model that emphasized some of the competencies including profession-al/genre/textual/inter-textual competences that are placed under one category that is professional competence since in ESP competence as the professional competence, ESP students are ex-pected to have knowledge in a specific genre, to be able to read and write specific textual and inter-textual genres, and finally speak professionally. Furthermore, based on the results, linguis-tic, cultural, discourse and meta-discourse competencies played significant roles in ESP-oriented Communicative Competence. The findings have implications for the stakeholders in the realm of ELT in Iran including policy makers, syllabus designers, practitioners, and learners.