Luận văn a cross cultural study on expressing satisfaction in american english and vietnamese

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, IIANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDY NGUYEN THI THUY LINH A CROSS- CULTURAL STUDY ON EXPRESSING SATISFA

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POS'I-GRADUATE STUDIES

NGUYÊN THỊ THỦY LINH

ACROSS- CULTURAL STLDY ON EXPRESSING SATISFACTION IN AMERICAN ENGLISU AND

VIETNAMESE

(NGITIEN CUU GIAO TITOA VAN TIOA VIRT- MỸ

TRONG CACTI TIN DIEN TẢ SỰ TIATT.ONG)

M.A MINOR TIIESIS

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 60.22.15

Hanoi, 2013

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, IIANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDY

NGUYEN THI THUY LINH

A CROSS- CULTURAL STUDY ON EXPRESSING SATISFACTION IN AMERICAN ENGLISH AND

VIETNAMESE

(NGHIÊN CỨU GIAO THOA VĂN HÓA VIỆT- MỸ

'TRONG CÁCH THỨC DIÊN TẢ SỰ HAI LỎNG)

M.A MINOR THESIS

Field: English Linguistics

Code: 60.22.15

Supervisor: Iluynh Anh Tuan, PhD

Hanoi, 2013

DECLARATION

T certify that this thesis entitled: “A cross- cultural study on expressing satisfaction

in American English and Vietnamese”, which is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts, is the result of my own work I have provided fully documented references to the work of others The material in this thesis has not been submitted for any other formal course of study

Nguyen Thi Thuy Linh

Hanoi, 2013

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First and foremost, I would like to cxpress iy devpest gralilude to Mr Huynh Anh ‘luan, PhD, my supervisor, for his valuable guidance, his instructive comments and his dutiful supervision, without which this thesis would be far from completed

T would also like Lo give my sincere gratitude Lo all of the lecturers at HULIS- VNU,

Hanoi for their scholarly knowledge, experience, and enthusiasm in their lectures During the process of implementing the research, they have created the favorable conditions [or me, not ouily in terms of accessing to ossonlial materials bul also by

the heart-wanning encouragement

T also take this opportunity to express my immense thankfulness to my friends and classmates, who have always stayed by my side, given me constructive comments and perked me np every time T need Particularly T want lo say a special thanks Lo two friends of mine, who are all living and studying in the U.S for their invaluable help in distributing the survey questionnaire They are Le Huong Ly and Nguyen Thi Lien Huong

I cannot forget to acknowledge the important contributions of both Vietnamese and

Amenican trformanla, whose names carmol be mentored in the thesis

Finally, T would like to express my enormous debi to my parents for their continual encouragement and immessurable support

ABSTRACT

Based on the hcorctical background of cross-cultural communication, (his sludy aims at investigating the similarities and differences in expressing satisfaction towards different co- interactants in the Vietnamese and American language and culture It focuses primarily on:

=) The popularity of strategies of expressing satisfaction employed

"The use of directness and indirectness in expressing satisfaction

To succeed in domg such a research, he author of the study takes informants’ social

parameters such as age, sex, marital status, living area, and knowledge of foreign language(s) into consideration Besides, their suvey responses are carefully

analyze to build a frame, a common set of sirategies in Lhe field,

The conclusion is drawn from data analysis and findings are presented and compared in a brief and concise way Some common expressing satisfaction pattems in both Vietnamese and American cultures from the data are also presented and illustrated with the hope of partially helping avoid cultural conflicts or conumunicating breakdowns

iti

LIST OF TABLES ANT FIGURES

Table 1:The five general functions of speech acts (Yule)

Table 2: Nwnber of informants with their status parameters

Table 3:D-ID in the situations under siudy (in Vietnamese)

Table 4: Use of D-ID as seen from Vietnamese communicating partners’ parameters

Table 5:D-LD in the situations under study (in American)

Table 6:Use of D-ID as seen from American communicating partners’ parameters

Table 7-Use of D-ID as seen from Vietnamese informants’ parameters

Table 8:Use of D-ID as seen from American informanis’ parameters

Table 9:Use of strategies as seen from Vietnamese communicating partners’

parameters Table 10:Use of strategies ax seen from American communicating partners’

parameters

Figure 1: Ferrando’s diagram of culture

Figure 2: Nguyen Quang's diagram of components of communicatiom

Figure 3: Areas of language knowledge (Bachman and Palmer, 1996:68)

Figure 4:: Bach and Iarnish’s classification of speech acts (1979)

Higure 5 : Possible strategies for doing MI:As

Higure 6: Nguyen Quang’s schema of possible strategies for doing I’EAs

Figure 7: Kaplan's diagram

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TABLE OF CONTE

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

2 Aims of the sludy

3 Scope of the study

4 Methods of the study

5 Design of the study

1.3 Cullure- communication correlation

1.4, Cross- cultural communication

sification of speech acts

3.3 Expressing satisfaction as a specch acfs

4.2 Posilive polilentess giralegles

4.3 Negativo pOlileoss strafgis co

5 Directness and indirectuess

5.1 Directness and indirectness defined

5.2 Levels of indirectness

§.3 Directness and indirectness in correlation with politeness

5.4 Social factors influencing the use of directness and indircetness in human

Chapter 3: Data analysis: Findings and discussion

1 Data analysis of D- LD in expressing satisfaction

1.1 DAD strategics im expressing salisfaction

1.2 Use of D- ID as seen from communicating partners’ parameters

1.2.1, Vietnamese findings

American findings

1.2.3 Similarities and differences

1.3 Use of D-ID as seen from mformants’ parameters

1.3.1 Vietnamese findings

1.3.2 American findings

1.3.3 Similarities and differences

2 Data analysis of strategies in expressing salis{aclion (SES)

2.1 Strategies in expressing satisfaction

2.2 Realization of SESs in Victname:

parameters

2.2.2 Realization of SUSs in Vietnamese as seen from informants’ parameters

2.3 Realization of SESs in English

2.3.1 Realization of SESs im English as scen from co- interactants’ parameter

2.3.2 Realization of SESs in English as seen from informants’ parameters

2.4, Similarities and differences cssessetscseisuetseinieuntatiiae see

PART C: CONCLUSION

1 Summary of the study

2 Limitations of the study

3 Suggestions for further study

REFERENCES

APPENDICES

vii

PART A: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale

With the great speed of developing and expanding, English has emerged as the most powerful international language all over the world Starting from its use gradually tuming into colossal, plus the characteristics of convenience, English on those days can be said lo be the “golden key to every door”

In the Vietnamese context, as a result of the open policies and a lot of

ancouragement and support [rom society, Ihe needs of learning Fnglish have alsa been magnified However, for the sake of examination, the real purpose of learning

Finglish has been somehow distoried A long lime ago, the method of English

teaching at school was Grammar- Translation Method with the stress on

grammatical points Up till now, thanks to the attentive researches from language

teachers and educators, the pendulum of Enghsh language leaching has swung to

communicative approach, Acquiring a new language means a lot more than the manipulation of syntax and lexicon, Language is not just a system of sounds, words

and grammatical structures in isolation, yet it is seen as a system of communication existing ina comumuuty ‘he goal of language teaching is, therefore assumed to be

leamers’ ability to communicate in the target language

As a matter of fact, to attain the good command of communication, culture learning apparently becomes indispensable Brembeck (1977) noted that, “To know another's

language and not his culture ix a way to make a fluent fool of oneself? 1 is the same in the case of teaching and learning English In order to help leamers achieve

communicative competence, we have to pay close attention to cullure awareness

and acquisition That dialectical connection has always been a concom of researchers and from time to time it has received more and more agreement

Thomas (1983) states that the lack of socio linguistic competenee resulls i

Tudeness, miscommunication or even communication breakdown because non -

native speakers’ inappropriate use of cultural norms and conventions are considered

a3 manifestation of “impoliteness or unfricndlincss” duc to “boorishness or ill will” rather than lack of pragmatic knowledge Accordingly, culture learning no longer yemains humble and unnecessary in the syllabus Tn contrast, it needs to be taker in great consideration and concentration, Succeeding this point of view, Nguyen Quang (1998) came to the conclusion that, “One cannot master a language without profound awareness of its cultural background and in both verbal and non-verbal communication, culture makes itself strongly felt.” A leaner can truly master English only when he is able to hold a good understanding of the intertwined

relationship belween culture and language

Recognizing the intertwmed relationship between culnwe and language, the

researcher would like 1o carry oul a siuall-scale study on Expressing satisfaction as

a speech act, which is viewed in the light of Politeness (Positive politeness-

negative politeness) in English and Vietnamese Due to the limil of the paper, she

would not be able to deal with all aspects but draw some differences and similaritics

in expressing satisfaction in the two languages It 1s hoped that the study may ooniribule some help te carers to avoid culture shock and failures in expressing

satisfaction as well as in mter-cultural communication

2 Aims of the study

The study focuses to achieve the following aims

- To have a thorough examination in the similarities and differences in direotness and indireciness strategies of expressing satisfaction by Vietnamese and English informants, whereby to find out some similasities and differences in politeness strategies of expressing satisfaction in English and Vietnamese

- to find out factors that affects the choice of politeness strategies when

expressing salisfaction in English and Viclramese

= to raise awareness of cross-cultural factors in expressing satisfaction and help leamers of English avoid cultural shock in -cultural communication.

3 Scope pf the study

Tho paper unvestigalcs cxpressiny satisfaction as a speech act in English and Vietnamese Expressing satisfaction will be analyzed in accordance with verbal cues And the study focuses on the dimension of Politeness (Positive Politeness and Negative Politeness), as well as Directness- Indirectness

Due to the linnitalion of Lime and maternal, the study only concentrales on

investigating strategics of cxpressing satisfaction in English and Vietnamese in some certain situations together with some typical socio- cultural factors among various onea governing the choice of politeness stralogics

Besides, the number of informants is limited: 30 mÏoanarls from the 11S and 30

informants trom Victnam (Norther Vietnam)

4 Methods of the study

Within the length of this study, quantitative method will be primarily deployed Qualitative remarks, assumptions and conclusions of the study will be mainly based

on the quantitative contrastive analysis of data

With a view to the data collection methods, the one and only tool that helps the

researcher get hold of the statistics and responses is questionnaires Specifically,

there are iwo questionnaires delivered to Vietnamese and Amnenean informants, one

is Metapragmatic Questionnaire (MPQ) and another is Discourse Completion Task (DCT) One one hand, MPQ is designed to test the validity and reliability of 12 situations in 3 activity arcas: at home, at work and in public places On the other hand, DCI which was logically and emperically valiadated before it is used as a data collection instrument is employed as the tool to analyze negative and positive

strategies as well as the use of directness/ indirectness in some certam situations

5, Design of the study

‘The thesis consists of three main parts:

Part A: Intreduction

The rationale, aims, seope of the study, methods arc presented in this part

Part B: Development

This is the main part of the study which is divided into three chapters

Chapter 1: Theoretical background

Chapter 2: Literatwe review

Chapter 3: Methodology

Chapler 4: Data analysis: Findings and Discussions

Tm the first chapter, in order to lay the basis for the study some definitions and

theories about culturc, communication and speoch acts will be covered Following is the methodology of the research in which the author has in-depth discussions about

the questionnaires and the informarils After thal, the second chapter follows the

thread with the contrastive analysis of data

Part 3: Conclusion

Tn this part, the major findings are summarized, conchisions drawn and suggestions for further study made

PART B: DEVELOPMENT Chapter 1: Theoretical background and literature review

In its simplest meaning, culture is thought to be something non-natural or ordinary-

it is the everyday life, something people think, wear, eat or speak, etc However, the

definition of culture is wider than those above, as seen from the scientific view

Richards (1993: 94) defines culture as “the total set of beliefs, attitudes, customs, behaviors, social habits, ete of the members of a particular society.” Cultare in its broad sense covers all aspeets of human life, It includes both material culture- physical artifacts or objects like “ao dai”, vases, pagodas and nonmaterial culture-

abstract creation like symbols, norms, cusloms or values

Tlowever, it must be noted that “the essence of culture is not its artifacts, tools or other tangible culture elements but how the members of the group interpret, use and perceive them” (Banks, 1999) Therefore, Verraro (1995:16) (cited in lecture notes

by Nguyen Quang) gives the definition: “Culture is everything that people have,

think or do as amember of a society.”

Ideas, values, Eero

beings to interpret their experiences, and guides their actions Culture gives them a

common framework of meaning and, hence, allows them to know what they can

expect of others and what others can expect of them For example, in the Vietnamese culture, when a compliment is given, a denial is expected Meanwhile,

in America, a “thank you” is expected

Within the limitation of the paper, the definition offered by Levine and Adelman

(1993) is chosen to be the most appropriate one

Culture is a shared background (for example, national, ethnic, religious) resulting

from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, attitudes and

values

As condensed and precise it turns out, this definition emphasizes the importance of

language in the way that it is the chief vehicle by which people communicate ideas

among each other and the principal means by which human beings have created

culture and transmit it from generation to generation.

In order to gaim a decper tundorstanding towards culture, it is useful to examine more closely its characteristics

1 Culture is learned

Culture is non- natural; people have to learn lo get il Ta other words, people are noi

‘bom with culture but become culture bearer by leaming it Children lear it from adults: the following generation learns it fram the previous one Through exposure,

observalion and mnilation, Hey take in culture clerents and internalize thew,

2 Culture is transmissible

In all cultures, symbols act as the physical existence of cultural elements and they are the means by which culture is passed along from generation to generation Symbols include objects, words and acts which have come to be socially accepted

as standing for something else, people use symbols to spread culture, and thanks to

‘this, culture is leaned Through day-to-day interaction, people learn and transmit culture ‘the more people acquire knowledge of culture, the more widely and deeply culture is transmitted Herein, it is observable that the first characteristic of culture

leads to Ihe second one

3 Culture is dynamic

All cultures are inherently predisposed to change They never remain static Within

cach cullure, there arc dynamic processes operaling thal encourage (he acceptance

of new things and ideas together with the omission of no-longer-useful ones For example, white complexion used to be considered a criterion of beauty but tan is now admired Women used to be confined to the role of housewives, yet now they can join in various social activities and pursue their own careers

From this point of view, 0” Neilstates: “All culture Inowledge docs not perpetually accumulate At the same time that new cultural traits are added, some old ones are lost because they are no longer useful”

(http.⁄⁄anthro.palomar-edu/culture/culture_2.hùn, Retieved 31 December, 2012) That is, processes leading to change include invention and cultural loss Invention brings new items while cultural loss seems to be an inevitable result of old patterns being replaced by the other new ones

It is noted that new cultural traits are added not only due to the invention or

discovery of absolutely new tools, practices or concepts but also due to the diffusion

of traits Diffusion occurs when the influence of one culture is spread to one

another

4 Culture is selective

According to Clinfford Geertz (1973), culture is a set of standardized orientation to recurrent problems and a mechanism for the normative of behavior That is, each culture selects a configuration of dos and don'ts, rights and wrongs It defines the

limit of behavior patterns and, therefore, distinguishes one human group from

another based on the typical features of each For example, American people

appreciate individualism while Vietnamese people are group- oriented Obviously,

the selectivity of culture makes up the uniqueness in each one

Actually, the selectivity is carried out every time, everyday and throughout the

whole history of culture whenever a certain thing or perception is created, accepted, changed or left behind

5 Facets of culture are interrelated

As culture is a complex whole, cultural elements do not exist separately They are

integrated and interdependent Within a culture, when one thing is touched, everything else is affected For instance, when women in some Muslim countries

are allowed to go out with no veil, they have more chances to contact the outside

world and improve their knowledge They can take part in social activities, thus,

their status in society is improved.

6 Culture is ethnocentric

Fdmocentrism is Ihe viewpoiril thal one’s ethnic group is the centre of everything, against which all other groups are judged More specifically, one group sees it as superior and rates others based on its own measures Ethnocentrism leads people to

reject alien ideas or things as addressed unnatural It is normal that a group

considers its way of life the only right one and somehow unleash scom for the others’ ways Take the following case as an example Asian people find it

unacceptable for Western ones to leave their parents in old- aged imstitutions In

contrast, Westem people regard children upbringing in Asian countries as spoiled and negative because it does not give children much independence to grow

Fthnocenrism therefore is a factor of resistance to change Tl taintams cthoic lines

despite transculturation To some extent, this characteristic seems to be on the contrary to the third one However, conflict propels life and it is their co-existence

that ensures the equilibrium of the development of culture

To sum il up, haman life and culture are inextricably cormected Our ways of life

form culture and culture affords use a kind of map for finding our way about life 1.2 Communication

From the dawn of human civilization till now, communication has been playing the primary role in our lives It takes places in almost every human action and accounts for most of our lifetime Recognizing that phenomenal function of communication

and how broad the term denotes, a lot of researchers hi

altempted (o reason the

definition of it

i\t the first glance, there is the definition from S Hybels and Weaver (1992), which

proposes: “Communication is any process in which people share information, ideas,

and feelings that involve not only the spoken and written words but also body

language, personal mannerism and style, the surrounding and things that add meaning to a message.”

It is understood that communication refers to the process of exchanging information During that process, information is enclosed in a package and is

channeled and imparted by a sender Lo a receiver via a medium Herem, “medium”

covers not only verbal means such as speech, song, tone of voice, ete but also nonverbal means such as body language, sign language, touch, eye contact and even writing Going further, Williams (1989: 10) defines communivation in more details:

“Communication refers io:

(1) The exchange of symbols, common messages, information

(2) The process of exchange between individuals through a common system of symbols

(3) The art of expressing ideas

(4) The science of transmitting information”

Generally, communication can be viewed as “the process of sharing meaning through verbal and nonverbal behavior” (Levine and Adelman, 1993) To attain a closer look al communication and its system, the diagram designed byNguyen

Quang (2002) as stated following may seive a great help

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Figure 2: Nguyen Quang's diagram of components of communication

i

It is undeniable that communication is the prorequisite of our lives thanks to its various functions and implications According to Nguyen Quang, we communicate

to satisfy the nature of double beimgs: the “Social being” and the “Conseious being” It is through conununication that we gain personal identity, which meets the Conscious being’s need In our early years, our parents told us, “You're so pretty”,

“You're really smart”, Laler, we interact with our friends, teachers, colleagues who communicate their views of us ‘Chew messages help us form and enhance ow sense

of self Also, the Social heing’s need to be connected is met by communication because “Communication is a key foundation of relationships We build connections with others by revealing our private identities, asking questions and listening to answers, working out problems, remembering shared history, and planning a future.” (Wood, 1998) Hence, no one can live as a human bemg without communication This has been proved by the case of a child brought up by wolves

in the jungle who lived and behaved as real wolves and hardly had any concept of themselves as a human Tn brief, communication is a vital part of human life Without communication, people would stagnate and our society would not exist anymore,

1.3 Culture- communication correlation

As culture and communication - the two terms has been cracked thoroughly, another issue that comes to light is the relationship between them Needless to say, culture is implivilly and inextricably related to conmumication As Samovar and Jain (1981) insightfully remarks

“Culture and communication are inseparable because culture not only dictates who

talks to whom, about what and how the communication proceeds, it also helps to

determine han people encode messages, the meanings they have for messages, and the conditions and circumstances under which various massages may or may not to

be sent, noticed or interpreted Culture is the foundation of communication.”

Decoding from this comment, culture is meant to determine the way people communicate For instance, when an American sees a bus coming, he always uses the present progressive (“The bus is conring”) while bis Japanese fellow chooses the present perfect tense to express (“he bus has come”) Another example is, westem people tend to start their conversation with the topic of the weather while eastem people, especially the Vietnamese profer to talk about personal life such as marriage, family and so on ‘Thus, the principles of communication are culturally affected or communication practices are largely created, shaped and transmitted by

culture,

However, the relationship between culture and communication is not just one-sided

The reverse is also the case, thal is, cullure is created through communication

Communication, in this light, is the means of human interaction through which

cuHural characleristics- whelher customs, roles, rules, rluals, laws, or other

patterns- are created and shared It is not so much that individuals sct out to create a

culture when they interact in relationships, groups, organizations, or societies, but yathor that culture is # nalural by- produol of social interaction Ia sense, cullure is the “residue” of social communication For example, from early ages, children are

told to say “thank you” by parents when being given present, That is a way children

learn about politeness through carnmmicalion

Overall, culture and communication cannot be separated “for as soon as we start ta

talk about one, we are abnost inevilably talking about the other” (Condon and

Yousef, 1975) They interact and assist each other in any circumstances It is true

that, communication shapes culture and conversely culmre shapes communication 1.4 Cross - cultural communication

As seen from the previous parts, culture shapes communication and ways of inlerpreting communicalion Thus, there is high likelihood thal problems arise wher people from different cultures communicate with each other ‘that is the reason for the terms “cross- cultural communication” comes to life

13,

Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applicd linguistics gives the definition of cross-cultwal communication simply as “an exchange of ideas,

information, eic between people fram different background’ (1992 92)

In a broader sense, Cross- cultural communication is “communication (verbal and non-verbal} between people from different cultures; communication that is influenced by cultural values, attitudes and behavior; the influence of culture on people's reactions and responses to each other” (Levine and Adelman, 1993)

It is understandable that when cross- cultural communication occurs, many

dilficullics, misunderstandings or comununication failures may happen because people of different backgrounds have different communicating styles They often

interpret others’ speech according to their own cultural convention and they tend to use their own culture to value others If the cultural values of the speakers are

widely different, misinterpretations and misunderstandings can arise and even result

in a total breakdown of communication This can also lead to confusion, anger,

disappointment and culture shock as an inevitable consequence

An interesting example is, in a party where there are a lot of guests from different countries in the world A Vietnamese lady wearing such an attractive dress enters

the room, An American man immediately notices her and a3 a pretext to approach

the girl, he comments, “Wow! You look so sexy in thal dress, “Tu his surprise, her

face flushes tomato red and she tries to shun him during the party [his is a typical

example of communication breakdown due to lack of cultural knowledge In

Amenean culture, especially among the young, saying thal someone is sexy is

snerely a compliment However, in Vietnamese culture, it is still a taboo to say so

and people find it hard to accept a compliment relating to sex

Undoubtedly, cultural differences are the source of difficulties and failures in cross- cultural communication Ouly wilh awareness of cultural differences car: peuple keep their communication smooth and easy In other words, knowledge is the key to

effective cross- cultural communication First, it is essential that people understand

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the potontial problems of cross- cultural communication, and make a conscious effort to overcome those problems, Second, it is also important to assume that one’s cfloris will not always suecessful, hence, they need to adjust behaviors

appropriately

Very often, there arc a lot of cascs in which people misuse the two terms

“intercultural communication” and “cross- cultural communication” ‘Thus, it is essential to distinguish and draw a clear line between them,

Everyone in this world is one way or another influenced or affected by culture We

all have different mferpretation of one’s culture due to diversification, racial or ever

physical location We can come up with vatious views, perception or image

regarding one’s culture just by having a glimpse of that particular person This in

tum will affect the communication between cach other ercaling a positive or negative image of a particular person One without the knowledge of intercultural

and cross- cultural communication is like an “irregular-shaped ball”- hard to handle

and understand while playing with it and thus it will lead to barriers to effective

communication According to Samoar and Porter (1991:10), “intercultural

communication accurs whenever a message is produced by a member of one culture for consumption by a member of another culture, a message must be understood”

As a separate notion, it studies situations where people from different cultural

background interact While on the other hand, cross- cultural communication “is a

process of exchanging, negolialing, and mediating one’s cultural dilTercrees through language, nan- verbal gestures, and space relationships” (Clarke and

Sanchez, 2001) Having culture as a common shared word, both terms still stands with a different meanimg Whereby, in a nutshell, “intcreultural communication involves face-to-face communication between people from different cultures while

communication” (Gudykunst and Mody, 2002)

15

To sum it up, in order to communicate with people from different countries successfully, people should enrich their own knowledge of other cultures and have a

reeepaive allilude towards cullural differences Only then, cross- culiural

conumunication will be a joyful experience which provides opportunity for people to broaden their mind to the world

15 Communicative competence

For most people communication is simply talk It is a natural event and happens almost every single minute all aver the world Nevertheless, it is important to note that comuricalion docs not mean to be a morely simple action, for ying beneath every transaction of communication, a goal is attached together When we

communicate, we transmit (as by speech, signals, writing or behavior) information

(thoughis and emotions) so (hal iL is satis{avtorily understood Human beings do not

exchange data- we understand information Communication, therefore, refers to the

process as “sharing meaning” and to some extent, communication is defined as “the

management of messages for the purpose of creating meaning”

In other words, the goal of communication is shared meaning which leads to

effective decision making and problem- solving But how does one determine the

effectiveness and appropriateness of any given interaction? And even more

important, how do we know if communication is competert?

In order to provide an answer to those questions, “communicative competence” was

coined and gradually becomes a common tenn

The idea of communicative compelenee is originally derived rom Chomsky (1965)

’s distinction between competence and performance By competence, Chomsky means the shared knowledge of the ideal speaker- leamer set in a completely homogenous speech community Performance, on the other hand, is concerned with the process of applying the underlying knowledge to the actual language use, commonly stated as encoding and decoding (Hymes, 1972)

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Hymes finds Chomsky’s distinetion of competence and performanes too naiow to describe language behavior as a whole Llymes believes that Chomsky’s view of competence is loo idealized to desoribe solual language behavior, and therclore his view of performance is an incomplete reflection of competence For Hymes, Chomsky’s linguistic theory represents a “Garden of Eden” viewpoint that

dismisses corttral questions of use in (he area of performance

He believes that we should be concerned with performance, which he defines as the

actual use of kmguage im a conerele siluation Hymes deems i necessary lo

distinguish between two kinds of competence: linguistic competence that deals with

producing and understanding grammatically correct sentences, and communicative

competence (hat deals with producing and understanding sentences thal are appropriate and acceptable to a particular situation Thus Ilymes coins a term

“commumicalive competence” and defines it as “a knowledge of the rules for

understanding and producing both the referential and social meaning of language” Without a doubt, Hymes’ viewpoint in communicative competones theory resonates

so well with the need of cross- cultural communication knowledge A good command of English grammar, lexis and phonology is helpful but this along is not enough People should bear in mind that things such as “the place of silence, appropriate topics of conversation, forms of address and expression of speech acts” are different across cultures and for some time, these primarily decide the

effechiveness of cross-cullural communication and tmtcr-cultural communication

Some years later, Bachman (1990) suggested using the term “communicative language ability” instead, claiming that this term combines in itself the meaning of both language proficiency and communicative competence Leaning especially on Hymes, Widdowson and Candlin, Bachman defined communivative language ability as a concept comprised of knowledge or competence and capacity for

appropnate use of knowledge in a cordextual comimumicalive language use.

Inside the indication of communicate competence, there are many components

enclosed In Richard’s opinion, they namely are:

@ Knowledge of the grammar and vocabulary of the language

@ Knowledge of rules of speaking (e.g knowing how to begin and end

conversations, knowing what topics may be talked about in different types of

speech events, knowing which address forms should be used with different

people one speaks to and in different situations

@ Knowing how to use and respond to different types of speech acts, such as

requests, apologies, thanks and invitations,

@ Knowing how to use language appropriately

In a brief and clear- cut form, Saville- Troike (1915:22) proposes three major components of communicative competence as following:

@ Linguistic knowledge

@ Interactional skills

@ Cultural knowledge

This idea emphasizes not only the leamer’s ability to produce grammatically correct

sentences but also the knowledge of what, when and how to produce these

sentences

According to Canale and Swain (1983:4), communicative competence consists of four elements:

Lateron, Celec- Murica & Donrnyei attempted to complement to the comnnunicate competence by adding the final component:

- Actional competence (1995): competence in conveying and understanding communicative intent, that is, matching actional intent with linguistic form

Tn such a new light, Bachman and Paluer’s model calegorises language knowledge into two main components- organisational knowledge and pragmatic knowledge which complement each other in achieving communicatively effective language

use The subcomponents of these two arcas of knowledge arc listed in the [following

vocabulary cobesion ideational functions dialects and lam,

phonology/graphology | sional organisation [eurigic Rmetians nại

imeginative fưnctions L¿uituralreferenecs and natural and idiomatic

figures of speech exaressions

figure:

Figure 3: Areas of language knowledge (Backonan and Palmer, 1996:68)

In conclusion, communicative competence should be a final goal in foreign

language teaching and learning To be a successful cross- cultural communicator one should pay due attention to both correctness and appropriateness

2 Cross- cultural pragmatics

As a Geld of language study, pragntatios is fairly new compared to ober subjects Its origins lie in philosophy of language and the American philosophical school of

pragmatism As a discipline within language science, its roots He im the work of

1¢

(Herbert) Paul Grice on conversational implicature and the cooperative principle, and on the work of Stephen Levinson, Penelope Brown and Geoff Leech on polileness Tn simple sense, pragmatics is a systematic way o! explaining language

in context it seeks to explain aspects of meaning which cannot be found in the plain sense of words or structures, as explained by semantics

Yule (1985:3) claimed that, “Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning, of contextual meaning, of how more gets communicated than is said, and finally, of the expression of relative distance.” As for Yule, im pragmatics, meaning is strongly believed to be in focus, and it is the very linguistic comprehension emplayed in

communication that makes pragmatics appealing Meanwhile, Semantics stresses on

how words literally cormect 10 things and whether the relationship between verbal descriptions and states of affairs in the word is true or not, regardless of

understandirys in (he pros of communication

Sharing the same viewpoint, Kasper (cf Crystal, 1996:309) defined pragmatics as

the study of language from the point of view of users, especially of the choices

they make, the constraints they encounter in using language in social interaction,

and the effects the use of language has on other participants in the act of

communication.”

This way of definition is also clarified in Richard’s study (1992:284)

Pragmatics includes the study of

1 How the interpretation and use of utterances depend on knowledge of the real world

tạ How speakers use and understand speech acts

3 How the structure of sentences is influenced by the relationship between the speaker and the hearer

Speech acts is not the whole of pragmatics but perhaps, is recently the most important established part of the subject As can be seen from the above scope of

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pragunatios, the study of spooch acts grenly plays cause to the success in language use and the relationship between communicating partners poses somewhat impact

on he overall comprehension during lhe conversation

More importantly, as Wierzbicka (1991-25) states, “every culture has its own

yopertoire of characteristic speech acts and speech genre” and “difforent cultures find expression in different systems of speech acts and different speech acts become entrenched, and to some extent, cadified in different languages” The study of speech acts and the interrelationship among speech nels, language, cullure and the study of how various speech acts are employed by different communities across different cultures contribute to a major field in pragmatic analysis, ie cross- cullural pragmatics, Cross- cultural pragmalics has attracted greal concem loi researchers since culturally coloured interaction styles create culturally determined

expectations im qlerprefative slralegies, and can also lead to breakdown in

interethnic and cross- cultural communication

3 Speech acts

First mentioned by John Austin in 1962, the term “Speech acts” has become a topic

of sustained investigation in almost every field of English- speaking world Blum-

Kaulka and Kasper (1989-2) emphasize, “The study of speech acts is ta remain a

central concern of pragmatics, expecially cross- cultural pragmatics”

3.1 The notion of speech acts

In producing utterances, people do not only intend to offer linguistic expressions but

also to perform actions through these ullcrances An utterance like “T am hungry”,

for example, could probably be interpreted under appropriate contexts as a remark

on the speaker's appetite, as a request for money, or, as a request for attention from

a young child This phenomenon inspired the British philosopher John Austin to initiate the speech act theory, which has later been inherited, refined and developed

‘by a number of philosophers and linguists like Ilymes (1964), Searle (1969), Leech

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(1983), Schmidt and Richards (1983), Levinson (1983), Green (1989), Yule (1986) and others

Speech act, in Richards et al.’s words, is “an utterance as a functional unit in

communication” (1992:342) In his three- fold division of speech acts, Austin (1962,

2, Mlocutionary act: the making of a statement, offer, promise, ete in uttering a :

sentence, by virtue of the conventional force associated with it (or with its explicit |

3 Perlocutionary act: the bringing about of effects on the audience by means of '

uttering the sentence, such effects being special to the circumstances of utterance ‘

Of the three dimensions, in Yule’s opinion, “the most essential act that counts is illocutionary force because the same utterance can potentially have quite different

illocutionary forces” and that partly explains why Yule states, “The term ‘speech

act’ is generally interpreted quite narrowly to mean only the illocutionary force of

an utterance”

3.2 Classification of Speech Acts

Different philosophers and linguists have classified speech acts in different ways

Based on performative verbs, Austin (1962) presents taxonomy consisting of five

categories of speech act verbs: verdictives (e.g.: grade, estimate, diagnose ),

exercitives (e.g.: order, advise, warn ), commissives (e.g.: promise, guarantee,

bet ), behabitives (e.g.: apologize, criticize, bless ) and expositives (e.g.: argue,

affirm, concede ),

Raising his criticism against Austin’s taxonomy’s weaknesses, the most serious of

which lies in the lack of consistent principles of classification, Searle (1979:12)

proposes one of the most influential and widely- used classification of speech act

with the focus on the functions performed by speech acts:

re S

Declarations: change states of affairs, comprising pronouncement at

court, naming, firings, appointments, resignations

Representatives: state what the speaker believes to be the case or not,

including assertions, descriptions, reports, statements

Expressive: denote a speaker's psychobgical state or attitude, They can be complaining, apologies, compliments, greetings

Directives: attempt to get the hearer to do something and express what the speaker wants They are requests, suggestions, orders

Commissives: commit a speaker to a course of action, expressing his/ her intention such as promises, pkdges, threats, refusals

Supporting Searle’s classification, Yule (1996:55) later summarizes the five types of

speech acts with their key features as below:

Table 1: The five general functions of speech acts (following Searle 1979)

Bach and Hamish (1979:39) suggest a systematic, comprehensive and explicit

classification with six general categories of illocutionary acts, two of which

effectives and verdictives — are conventionally not communicative The other four

major classes, namely constatives, directives, commissives, and acknowledgement

are communicative speech acts

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Illocutionary act

Figure 4:: Bach and Harnish’s classification of speech acts (1979)

The four main communicative classes accords with those of Austin’s expositives,

exercitives, commissives and behabitives respectively and are somehow closely

associated to Searle’s representatives, directives, commissives and expressives

Another way to classify speech acts is the one based on the relationship between the

structure and the function Yule (1996:4) claims that the three structural forms are

declarative, interrogative, imperative and the three general communicative functions

are statement, question and command/ request There is always an interrelationship

between a form and a function In other words, the relationship can be either direct

or indirect “Whenever there is a direct relationship between a structure and a

function, we have a direct speech act, wherever there is an indirect relationship

between a form and a function, we have an indirect speech act.” (Yule, 1996:55)

Therefore, if a declarative is used not to make a statement but to make a request,

this is an indirect speech act For example, if someone wants the others to close the

door but instead of saying “I hereby request of you that you close the door”, he says

“It’s cold outside”, he performs an indirect speech act

In short, an indirect speech act is one performed by “means of another” (Searle,

1979:60) In an indirect speech act, the speaker actually means more than what he

says

Verdictive |

3.3 Expressing satisfaction as a speech act

In accordance with the classification of Speech acts from Searle, expressing satisfaction belongs to the type of expressives, ie “those kinds of speech act that

state what the speaker feels And in using an expressive, the speaker makes words {fit the world (of feelings)” (Yule, 1996:53) To be more precise, they are based on psychological states and relate to the expression of feelings or emotions to the receiver

In a straightforward way, “satisfaction” found in Oxford Advanced Learner's

Dictionary (7" edition) is the good feeling that you have when you achieved

something or when something you wanted to happen does happen It is often

mistaken among those good feelings as happiness, joy, content or fulfillment

However, when taking a close look, there are some slight distinctions among them

Happiness is a state of mind or feeling characterized by contentment, love,

satisfaction, pleasure, joy, etc It often depicts the good feelings of a person

in general, therefore, “satisfaction” is meant beyond the shade of

“happiness”

Contentment (rather formal) is a feeling of happiness or satisfaction with

what you have

Fulfillment is a feeling of happiness or satisfaction with what you do or have

done

So on so forth, satisfaction should be concisely identified as “the gratification you feel after you have fulfilled a need, wish or expectation.” (From the “Secret society

of happy life” (2002))

Lying on such basis, expressing satisfaction is meant to be an act of showing how

happy and content somebody is when he/she have attained something longing It is

such an amorphous feeling; therefore the expression of it may vary from person to

" a

person To grasp it briefly, there are supposed to be two main strategies when expressing satisfaction, that is:

However, as stated from the beginning, the purpose of this study is to investigate

expressing satisfaction as a speech act Therefore, it is to take the focal point on

verbal strategies and explore the differences between two cultures (Vietnamese and

American) when expressing themselves

others” assumptions that he has taken ding a particular interaction It is an image

of self-described in terms of approved social attributed

However, the best-known definition of face is that by Brown and Levinson (1978:61), which is derived from Goffman's and based on the assumptions that cvery competent adult member of a society has (and know cach other to have) face

In their words, face is “the public self-image that every member wants to claim for himself”, consisting in two related aspects:

Negative face: the basic claim to territories, personal preserves, rights to non-

know that his or her wants are shared by others” (Yule, 1996:60, 61) Tn other words, the former is the desire to be independent, whereas, the latter is the desire to

‘be concermed

He also argues that in actual social interactions, people generally behave in such a way Uwil their expectations concerning their public self-image will be respected This is known as their face wants A polite speaker is expected to preserve face and avoid the loss of face, and to do so, he makes a consistent attempt at reducing the possible threal presented by himscl! to another individual’s expectations regarding self- image ‘The act of saying something interpreted as a threat to another’s fave is called face threatening act (TA), and the act to lessen this potential face threat is callod face saving act (FSA)

4.1.2, Politeness

Politeness has recently emerged as one of the favorite issucs for linguistic scholars

to study on, Therefore, concerning the concept of politeness, there have been many

definitions surrounding Following are several widely known ones

Linguistically, politeness is defined as “the interactional balance achieved between

two needs: the need for pragmatic clarity and the need to avoid coerciveness’(Blum- Kulla, 1987:131) Tn this sense, Gpping the balance in the

favar of either of the needs may lead to impoliteness

Culturally, politeness is viewed as “a fixed concept, as in the idea of “polite social

behavior” or “etiquette, within a culture” (Yule, 1996:60) Yule further states that

such dillerent genoral principles for being polile in social interaction within a particular culture as being tactful, generous, modest, and sympathetic towards others can be specified (ibid:60) And as polite behaviors may be different from one

culture to another, what is considered to be “politeness” varies in different cultures,

Cross- culturally, politeness in communication is seen as “a system of interpersonal

relation designed to facilitate interaction by minimizing the potential for conflict

and confrontation inherent in all human interchange”

As all linguistic actions involve a potential face threat of some kind, it particularly

requires the speaker to choose a proper polileness means so that the other’s face is

respected As there arc negative face and positive face, there arc Negative Politeness (NP) and Positive Politeness (PP), respectively

According to Nguyen Quang, NP is any kind of communicative act which is appropriately intended to show the speaker does not want to impinge on the addressee’s privacy thus, enhancing the sense of distance between them Tt includes face saving acts oriented to the hearer’s negative face and tends to show deference

NE can be best summed up as “a concern not to impose on others or restrict their

freedom, bul to maintain distance” (Benlahila & Davies, 1989)

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Similarly, PP includes face saving acts concerned with the hearer’s positive face and

“tends to show solidarity, emphasize that both speakers want the same thing and

that they have a common goal” (Yule, 1996) Nguyen Quang defines PP as “any

kind of communicative act which is appropriately intended to show the speaker's

concern to the addressee, thus, enhancing the sense of solidarity”

In short, NP is to respect others’ privacy while PP is to show your concem to others

To deal with face threatening acts (FTA), Brown and Levinson (1987:60) suggest

Figure 5 : possible strategies for doing FTAs

The diagram shows that when encountering a FTA, the speaker (S) can choose one

of the five possibilities

example, S may use imperative such as “Pass me the salt”

2 Sgoes on

3 record, performing the act with redresses in terms of positive politeness ie

choosing a positive strategy of making A feel good and feel that A’s value is

shared

4 $ goes on record, performing the act with redresses in terms of negative

politeness ive choosing a negative strategy of hedging, apologizing, offering or

asserting a desire to avoid interfering with A’s freedom of action

Brown and Levinson implicitly consider negative politeness to be “more polite”

than positive politeness This can be seen in the diagram when they number the

former and the latter 2 and 3, respectively Nguyen Quang remarks this is the point

of view of Brown and Levinson that more or less decreases their diagram’s

universal value; hence, he proposes another one:

Positive politeness, according to Brown and Levinson, “is oriented towards the

positive face of H, the positive self-image that he claims for himself’ Yule (1996)

seems to clarify the notion when he defines positive politeness as a face saving act

tending to show solidarity, emphasizing that both S and H want the same thing and

30

that they share the same goal In short, positive politeness shows coneems for others,

Nguyen Quang, well aware of the sense of solidarity between interactants, sees positive politeness as “any communicative act (verbal and/or nonverbal} which is appropriately intended to show the speaker's concern to the addressee, thus, enhancing the sense of solidarity between them” (2005)

In order for a speaker to minimize the facc- threatening aspects of an act, Brown and Levinson specify the super- strategy of going on record with positive politeness

into 15 positive politeness stratogics mployed in communication, What, follows is a

sketch of these strategies, each illustrated with examples),

Notice, attend to H (his interest, wants, needs, goods)

The teacher highly appreciated your last essay May I have through il?

Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H)

You count faster than a computer!

intensify interest to H

1 jump on my bike and off L ride out of the gate, into the road, straight

to school Do you know what happens next? When 1 nearly reach the T- junction, a large dog runs across the road so suddenly that I respond no reactions | crash right into it and land on the ground three meters from the bike Thank God, I am alright but the rim of the front whoel is warped Can you give me a lift home?

Use in- group identify markers Where have you been, darling?

Seek agreement A: V'm so tired of staying day and night!

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