Final answer:
Competence is the implicit knowledge of language rules, allowing for understanding and creation of sentences, while performance is the actual usage of language where factors such as stress can affect communication. Grammaticality is about adherence to syntactic rules, whereas acceptability is about the judgement by the language community on whether a sentence is appropriate.
Step-by-step explanation:
Distinguishing Competence from Performance
In the realm of linguistics, competence and performance are two concepts introduced by Noam Chomsky. Competence refers to a speaker's implicit knowledge of the rules of their language, the mental representation of linguistic rules that enables a person to produce and understand an infinite number of sentences, including those that are novel. On the other hand, performance is about the actual use of language in concrete situations, where various factors can affect linguistic output, such as memory limitations, distractions, and emotional state. For example, one may have the competence to produce grammatically correct sentences (knowledge of grammar) but might make errors in spoken language due to nervousness, which is a performance issue.
Grammaticality versus Acceptability
Grammaticality concerns whether a sentence follows the syntactic rules of a language. A sentence like "The cat sat on the mat." is grammatical because it conforms to the rules of English syntax. Acceptability, in contrast, is about whether a sentence feels appropriate or is judged to be correct by a language community. This is a more subjective measure, and can vary based on usage, context, and cultural standards. For instance, a sentence like "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously," while grammatical, may be deemed unacceptable in everyday communication because it lacks semantic coherence.