Die Didaktik der Fachsprachen: pragmatische Aspekte am Beispiel der Medizin- und Wirtschaftssprache

The paper deals with languages for special purposes in a pragmatic perspective focusing on medical and economic language in German. First, specialist vocabulary is analyzed in relation to synonymic variation and techniques of explanation for non-specialist readers. Second, two text genres with wide circulation (package leaflets for medicine and stock recommendations in investment magazines) are studied with reference to the directive speech acts contained. Third, didactic suggestions are made for a successful teaching of languages for special purposes to learners of German as a foreign language. In particular, it is recommended to view terminology and syntactic structures in the light of the overall communicative goal of the text genre in which they occur.