vietnamese-australian cross-cultural study on hiding feelings at the workplace = nghiên cứu giao thoa văn hóa về cách che gíấu cảm xúc nơi công sở của người úc và người việt

What are the influential factors on the choice of verbal strategies of hiding feelings in Australian English and Vietnamese?. What are the verbal strategies of hiding feelings used by Au

Nguyen NHu Trang

A Vietnamese – Australian cross – cultural study on hiding feelings

at the workplace

(Nghiên cứu giao thoa văn hóa về cách che dấu cảm xúc

nơi công sở của người Úc và người Việt)

M.A minor thesis

Field: Linguistics Code: 602215

Ha noi, 2009

Nguyen NHu Trang

A Vietnamese – Australian cross – cultural study on hiding

feelings at the workplace

(Nghiên cứu giao thoa văn hóa về cách che dấu cảm xúc

nơi công sở của người Úc và người Việt)

M.A minor thesis

Field: Linguistics Code: 602215

Supervisor: Phan Thi Van Quyen, MA

Ha noi, 2009

Acknowledgements ……… ii

Abstract ………iii

Table of content ………iv

List of tables ………v

Abbreviations and Conventions ………vi

part I: introduction ……… 1

1 Rationale of the study ……….……1

2 Aims and objectives of the study ……….….2

3 Scope of the study……….… 3

4 Methodology ……….… 3

5.Significance of the study: ……….3

6 The design of the study: ……….….4

Part II: development ……… 5

Chapter 1: Literature Review ………5

1.1.Culture……… 5

1.2 Communication………5

1.2.1 Communication………6

1.2.2 Factors affecting human communication ……… 8

1.3 Culture and Communication ………9

1.4 Politeness……… 12

1.4.2 Notions of face and facework ………13

1.4.3 Politeness strategies ……… 14

1.5 Hiding feelings in social interaction ……… ……16

Chapter II: Methodology ……… 20

2.1 Data collection instrument………20

2.2 Questionnaire and Participants ……….20

2.3 Administration of the Questionnaires ……… 22

Chapter 3: findings and Discussions………24

3.1 What are the influential factors on the choice of verbal strategies of hiding feelings in Australian English and Vietnamese? ………/………24

3.2 How often do Vietnamese and Australian people hide their feelings at the workplace? ………28

3.3 What are the verbal strategies of hiding feelings used by Australian and Vietnamese people? …………29

3.3.1 Verbal strategies used by Australian and Vietnamese people to hide their feelings ……… 29

3.3.2 Use of strategies by Vietnamese participants in specific situations ……… …32

3.3.3 Use of strategies by Australian participants in specific situations ………35

3.4 Some explanations……… 37

Part III : conclusion and implications ……… 40

1 Major findings………40

2 Implication of the study……….41

2.1 Implications for intercultural communicators ………41

2.2 Implications for EFL teachers ………41

REFERENCES ……… 44

Appendix 1………46 Appendix 2………49

Dct Discourse completion Task FTA Face threatening Act

EFL English as a Foreign Language L2 Second language

S Subject

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Factors governing the choice of strategies in hiding feelings by Vietnamese

people……….23 Table 2: Factors governing the choice of hiding feelings strategies by Australian

people……….24 Table 3: Differences between Australian and Vietnamese participants hiding feelings in specific situations (by percentage) ………26 Table 4: The frequency of hiding feelings by the two groups (by percentage) …………28 Table 5: Differences between Australian and Vietnamese participants hiding feelings in specific situations (by percentage) ……….… 29 Table 6: Strategies used by Australian and Vietnamese people to hide their feelings

(by percentage) ……….31 Table 7: Summary: Use of strategies by Vietnamese participants ………32

Table 8: Summary: Use of strategies by Australian ……….35

part I: introduction

I.1 Rationale of the study

It is undeniable that language is a tool of human communication Various kinds of meanings can be conveyed in language which involves the interaction between the speaker and the hearers However, successful communication requires not only pure linguistic competence but also knowledge of social norms, social values and relations between interactants As language, to some extend, is part of or a manifestation of its culture (Davies, 1989 in Nguyen Van Do, 2007) Culture, language, and society are closely related to each other and interact between themselves Therefore, communication breakdown or culture shock may happen in cross – cultural interaction when interactors are not aware of cultural barrier In other words, the interpretation of

an utterance should be involved both linguistic pattern and the socio – cultural background of the speaker

It is no secret that today‘s workplace is rapidly becoming larger and larger, as the business environment expands to include various geographic locations and span numerous cultures What can be difficult, however, is understanding how to communicate effective with individuals who speak another language or who rely on different means to reach a common goal

The world today is dramatically different from that of twenty or even ten years ago The influence of Multinational Corporation, the technological revolution, the

―information superhighway‖ and the movement of the private and public sectors towards globalization sets the sense New laws, agreements and regional partnership from NAFTA to GATT to the European Union or Asian, have contributed to make this massive change not only possible but also achievable

Vietnam is a country where intercultural contacts are rapidly increasing, following the introduction of the renovation process since 1986 Opened door policy allows more foreign companies and partners to invest in most industries in the country to help boost the economy This process has resulted in increasing interactions between Vietnamese and foreigners, especially from English – speaking countries

We investigate how culture influences the hiding feelings at the workplace by Australian speakers of English and Vietnamese We choose hiding feelings to study as

in our daily life we hide our feelings so often to achieve our purposes that we are sometimes unaware of the fact that we are doing so Hiding feelings is so important in communication Without it communication may be broken-down and our relationships may be broken, as a result Hiding feelings is very various across cultures so misunderstanding can arise if we do not apply pragmatic competence appropriately Taking into consideration the importance of pragmatic competence and the social setting of Vietnam, the study is significant in that it is conducted with the hope of resolving and simplifying cross- cultural misunderstanding

For more details:

I 2 Aims and objectives of the study

As far as we know, there is a gap in our understanding of how Vs and Aus hide their feelings at the workplace and how culture influences their use of language patterns at the workplace So this study aims to find out:

1 How Australian and Vietnamese hide their feelings at the workplace

2 How social-cultural factors such as social status, gender, age, … influence the

choice of hiding feeling strategies of both groups

For more details, this study aims to answer the following questions:

1 What are the influential factors on verbal strategies of hiding feelings in Australian English and Vietnamese?

2 How often do Vietnamese and Australian people hide their feelings at the workplace?

3 What are the verbal strategies of hiding feelings used by Australian and Vietnamese people?

b Some factors such as interlocutor‘s status, age, gender affect the choice of hiding feeling strategies used by Australian and Vietnamese people

I 3 Scope of the study

Hiding feelings is clearly essential in communication And to achieve the best result, speaker usually makes use of both verbal and nonverbal cues However, in fact, there are a few nonverbal cues for hiding feelings: some use eyes contact, some use hands while many verbal cues are available for people to hide their feelings These verbal cues are various and different depending on the cultures of communicators, their backgrounds ect Therefore, in this thesis, we would like to focus mainly on verbal strategies

Hiding feelings takes place everywhere: in the family, at school, at the public places… However, the author choose to study hiding feelings at the workplace because the world is now globalized, the workplace now is a multicultural place Amid today‘s heightened global tensions, success increasingly belongs to people who can work effectively across cultures and languages The author should think that the understanding of how Australian and Vietnamese people hide their feelings may be helpful for those working in multicultural environment

The researcher makes an investigation into how Vietnamese and Australian use the language to hide their true feelings at the workplace

I.4 Methodology

To achieve the aims and objectives mentioned above, the study compare and contrast the verbal strategies of hiding feelings of the two groups basing on the statistical and qualitative data collected from a survey questionnaire modified from the Discourse Completion Task developed by Beebe et al The survey questionnaires are given to 40 Vietnamese people who are working at offices in Hanoi and 40 Australian people who are working in Australia Besides, more information needed for the study are gathered from researcher‘s observation

To process the data, quantitative method, contrastive analysis methods are employed

I 5 Significance of the study

This study may provide insights into the similarities and differences between

Vietnamese and Australian in the frequency as well as the verbal strategies of hiding feelings The author would like to give some cultural explanations for these similarities and differences Hopefully, it may help achieve successful communication in an international working environment

I 6 The design of the study:

The study is divided into three parts: the introduction, the development and the conclusion

The introduction provides the information such as the rationale, the aims, the scope, the method and the significance of the study

The development consists of three chapters Chapter one, Literature Review, presents the concepts relevant to the research topic such as different points of view of culture and communication, politeness

Chapter two deals with specific information of the method, the survey questionnaire and the respondents It also presents analysis of the data collected from the survey questionnaire

The last chapter presents some major findings

The conclusion is a review of the study, the limitation of the study and suggestions for further study

Part II: development

Chapter 1: Literature Review

This chapter reviews the theories and literature within which the research is carried out It consists of 3 main sections The two first sections view the theories of culture and communication The third one deals with the other related issues: politeness in human communication

1.1.Culture

Culture is ‗ubiquitous, complex and all-pervasive‘ (A Samorva, 2007:10) Therefore, it

is very difficult to define this term The term ‗culture‘ has a wide range of meanings today because it has actually changed in meaning overtime In fact, there are many definitions of it ranging from complex and fancy to simple ones

For some it refers to an appreciation of good literature, music, art, and food for

anthropologists and other behavioral scientists, culture is the full range of learned human behavior patterns Edward B Tylor (1871 in Heather Bowe and Kelie Martin,

2007) an anthropologist said that culture is "that complex whole which includes knowledge, belief, art, law, morals, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society‖(p2)

Here the author would like to use the definition of H C Triandis cited in A Samorva, 2007:20 for the reason that this definition contains the theme under investigation in this thesis of how culture and communication are linked ―Culture is a set of human-made objective and subjective elements that in the past have increased the probability

of survival and resulted in satisfaction for the participants in an ecological niche, and thus become shared among those who could communicate with each other because they had a common language and they lived in the same time and place.‖

Subjective elements mentioned in this definition are ―values, attitudes, beliefs, orientations, and underlying assumptions prevalent among people in a society‖ All of them influence your interpretation of the world and interactions in it

1.2 Communication

1.2.1 Communication

People have known that communication is an important part of life, a well-integrated part of day-to-day existence ―Communication is powerful; It brings companions to our sides or scatters our rivals, reassures or alerts children; and forges consensus or battle lines between us‖ (C F Keating, 19794 in Larry A Samorva, 2007: 12) In fact, it is one of those activities that everyone recognizes but few can define it satisfactorily How does one talk so that another person can understand? How does one know if he or she has been heard or understood? These are all points about communication that have been analyzed and explained

Simply, we often define communication as sharing of ideas or feelings with others Communication takes place when one person transmits information and understanding

to another person In other words, there is a communication when you respond or listen

to someone ―Human communication is the process through which symbols are transmitted for the purpose of eliciting a response‖ (A Samorva, 2007: 12)

Fisker (1990 in Heather Bowe and Kelie martin 2007) claims that the most important definition of communication for present purposes is social interaction through messages It is no coincidence that this definition begins with the word ―social‖ Indeed, the social aspect of communication is important for two reasons according to Fisker‘s explanation First, we have recognized that communication takes place in a social context and that context will often have a very significant bearing on the success

of the communication Second, it is important to recognize that communication involves transmitting not only information from one person to another but also in communicating a relationship For example, if a person uses patronizing language in communicating with others, then the use of such demeaning indicates a relationship bases on a lack of respect By contrast, person using forms of language associated with deference will be communicating a relationship based on respecting status and hierarchy

Another key word in Fiske‘s definition is ‗interaction‘ It is an important point to recognize that communication is not only a basic part of our life but an essential one However, communication can be highly problematic at times There can be a

communication breakdown between individuals as communication itself is a dynamic process which is symbolic, systemic and involves making inferences (A Samorva, 2007) The meaning of the message is a complex issue On one hand, we have meaning

in the sense of intention When I mean X, for example, this refers to the fact that I intend X, or I intend to convey X On the other hand, meaning can refer to interpretation A message can be sent or received even if the person communicating had no intention to do so (Larson, Charles U, 1976 ) For example, if my tone of voice and non-verbal cues indicate nervousness, then it is likely that I will be communicating that nervousness even though I may not wish to do so

There is a question of how to interpret what is communicated The response will depend on what the speaker mean and how the listener interpret that response (Larson, Charles U, 1976 ) In addition, all this takes place in a social context which can influence the way communication take place and its outcome

From what have been discussed, we can say that Fiske‘s definition of communication helps us have an overview of communication which we often take for granted

Depending on how culture is defined and which discipline one come from, various terms are used to refer to communication between people who don‘t share the same nationality, social or ethnic origin Today people talk much about cross- cutural communication or intercultural communication So what does this term mean? For us, cross-cultural communication occurs when a member of one culture sends a message to

a member of another culture More precisely, cross-cultural communication ―involves interaction between people whose cultural perceptions and symbol systems are distinct enough to alter the communication event‖ (A Samorva, 2007:10)

Richard et al, (1992:92) shares the same opinion when stating that cross- cultural communication is ―exchange of ideas, information, ect between persons from different cultural backgrounds‖ This term suggests that there is a relationship between communication and culture This relationship will be discussed in the next part

To sum up, simply being a member of society engaging with other people on day to day basis involves communication of various kinds whether we wish those communications take place or not If we are aware of the complex nature of

communication and try to improve our social skills we will have greater influence on what we communicate and what we do not communicate

1.2.2 Factors affecting human communication

There are many factors affecting the choice of communicative strategy in a particular situation Brown and Levinson propose three parameters that may affect this choice They are power, differential between speaker and interlocutor, social distance between

them and the ranking imposition represented by the face

N Quang (1998) proposes 12 factors: Age, Sex, Residence, Mood, Occupation, Personality, Topic, Place, Communicative environment/setting, Social distance, Time pressure and Position

This study is taking hiding feeling at the workplace into consideration, therefore, Age, Sex, Occupation, Social distance, setting and Position are very important factors governing the way people communicating at the workplace and thus being chosen for investigation

The role of position or social status in communication involves the ability to recognize each other‘s social position (Brown and Levinson 1987; Holmes 1995) Holmes (1995) claimed that people with high social status are more prone to receive deferential behaviour, including linguistic deference and negative politeness Thus those with lower social status are inclined to avoid offending those with higher status and show more respect to them

Speech behaviors depend on the gender relationship between interlocutors Gender or sex and speech behavior are also seen as two interwoven, interrelated variables (Lakoff 1975; Holmes 1995 in Heather Bowe and Kelie martin 2007) To generalize, women have traditionally been less direct (i.e more polite and soft) than men in making request, expressing criticism and offering opinions They prefer indirect expression However, when talking about emotional issues and feelings, women tend to be more direct than men In the workplace, women have learnt that in order to compete and communicate with men, they have to be more direct when making suggestion, giving criticism or expressing ideas (Nguyen Quang 1998)

It is impossible to say that everyone in one culture communicates similarly Variation

according to age is most noticeable across the time span As Nguyen Quang explains

the older often communicate according to more traditional norms than young ones

Occupation has some effect on the speech of individuals ―every job has a certain

amount of ‗jargon‘ which those not involved in a similar occupation find it difficult to

understand‖ (Nguyen Van Do,2007: 191) Those who study social sciences tend to use

more indirectness than those who study natural sciences

Discussing about the effect of setting on communication, Nguyen Quang, 1998 states

when in an informal climate, people tend to express themselves in a direct way and

versus In fact, the way we communicate in our home is different from that in public

places, or at the workplace

Social distance is one of the factors that determines politeness behaviours (Leech 1983;

Brown and Levinson 1987) The notion of social distance refers to the consideration of

―the roles people are taking in relation to one another in a particular situation as well as

how well they know each other‖ (p.126), which means the degree of intimacy between

interlocutors Brown and Levinson (1987) claim that politeness increases with social

distance

Above all others, communication is influenced by culture Culture decides the

influences of other factors on communication Why and how it influences

communication will be discussed in the following part

1.3 Culture and Communication

It is undeniable that culture is very important in communication process It is

considered as a factor underpinning communication Bourdieu (2000) claims that

culture is particularly helpful in trying to understand communication because ‗habitus‘

as this author called ‗culture‘ forms a power backdrop to our actions and interactions

Everyone has a unique of communication but cultures determine a general style for

their member The relationship of the individual to his culture is ―analogous to an actor

and his director The actor puts his own personality into his acting but is nevertheless

influenced by the director‖ (Nguyen Quang,1998) In a very real sense, your culture is

part of who you are

So when cultures differ, communication practices also differ as Smith claims: ―In modern society, different people communicate in different ways, as do people in different societies around the world; the way people communicate is the way they live

It is their culture Who talks to whom? How? And about what? These are questions of communication and culture When the elements of communication differ or change, the elements of culture differ or change Communication and culture are inseparable‖ (G.Smith, Ed,1966 in A Samorva, 2007: 17)

Culture shock is a term used to describe the anxiety and the feelings (of surprise, disorientation, confusion, ect ) felt when people have to operate within an entirely different cultural and social environment, such as a foreign country It is ―a common experience for a person learning a second language in a second culture.‖ (H Douglas Brown in J Merrill Valdes, 1986: 33) It grows out of the difficulties in assimilating the new culture, causing difficulties in knowing what is appropriate, what is not So any adequate account of communication processes must take into consideration of culture This is especially important in intercultural communication, the communication between people who don‘t share the same nationality, social or ethnic origin As communication involves deferring perceptions, attitudes, and interpretations Common problems can occur among people who do not have benefits of shared experience Interculturalists have identified numerous differences in communication styles from culture to culture The most important and most studied distinctions are the indirect and direct styles described below:

In direct communication style both parties, the speaker and listener expect explicit verbal expression of intention, wishes, hopes, ect For example, I am hungry or I love you

In indirect communication styles the speaker expresses his/her thought implicitly, or using hints or modifiers such as perhaps, maybe The listener is expected to use contextual cues, or the background knowledge available to read the real meaning Although these styles present in all cultures, and the use of different styles varies depending on the context, one particular style is culturally considered dominant As Nguyen Quang (1998) claims that cultures determine the general style for their

members Why so? Because communication styles have been associated with cultural values Direct style with individualism and indirect style with collectivism

(www.peacecorps.gov/wws/publications/culture/pdf/chapter3.pdf)

Indirect communication is often used in situations where mutual harmony is considered important for maintaining good relationships This is the case in collectivism cultures where people work closely together and know what everyone else knows The overriding goal of the communication exchange is maintaining harmony and saving face

The individualist have evolved a more direct communication style Because in their heterogeneous society, and in their culture, people prefer independence, self-reliance, and a greater emotional distance from each other They cannot depend only on manipulating context or communicating nonverbally to make themselves understood; They must rely more on words, and on those words being interpreted literally Getting

or giving information is the goal of most communication exchanges

(http://books.google.com/books?id=2_LOefevBwQC&pg=PA4&dq=isbn) diagram to highlight the differences between Western, Eastern and Middle eastern cultures as an illustration for what have been discussed

According to Richard D people from western cultures tend to get directly to the

point In face-to-face communication people don't beat around the bush, but get

right to the point

Middle eastern people tend to eventually get to the point - after slowly spiraling in,

having prepared the listener for the message Face-to-face conversations take a long time before delicately getting to the heart of the matter

People from eastern cultures tend to not get to the point at all They will talk

around and around the point, but by constantly circling around it, they will make clear what they're really talking about In face-to-face communication people seem

not to say what they really mean

1.4 Politeness

1.4.1 Notion of politeness

Politeness in linguistic pragmatics and sociolinguistics has been a feature of the study

of languages for millennia Existing models of linguistic politeness have generated a huge amount of empirical research However, evaluations on it are so varied that researchers have preferred to abstract away from kinds of cultures, histories Politeness then becomes an abstract term referring to ‗a wide variety of social strategies for constructing and reproducing co-operative social interaction across cultures‘

Erving Goffman(1967) discusses politeness as the ―appreciation an individual shows to another through avoidance or presentation of rituals‖ Brown and Levinson (1978) view politeness as a complex system for softening face-threatening act That we change our language based on the hearer and thus our strategies for compliance gaining change depending on the audience Politeness consists of attempting to save other‘s face Brown and Levinson begin with the idea of ―model persons‖, rational agents who thinks strategically and are conscious of their language choices Politeness strategies, therefore, are developed in order to formulate messages to save hearer‘s face when face threatening acts are inevitable or desired This means that the speaker avoids embarrassing the listener or making him feel uncomfortable

Leech (1980) defines it as ‗strategic conflict avoidance‘, which ‗can be measured in terms of the degree of effort to put into the avoidance of a conflict situation and the establishment and maintenance of comity‘

Although there are many ideas about the issue among linguists and it can not possibly figure which one is the best model of politeness we can see a common factor that they all claim, explicitly or implicitly, the universality of the principles for linguistic politeness All of them help us have a deep look into this difficultly technical term The general idea is to understand various strategies for interactive behaviors bases on the fact that people engage in reasonable behaviors to achieve their communicative goals

1.4.2 Notions of face and facework

As it is acknowledged, being polite consists of attempting to save face for another So what is ―face‖? Erving Goffman (1963) in his ―On Facework‖ discusses face in reference to how people present themselves in social situations and that our entire reality is constructed through our social interactions He says ―face is a mark that changes depending on the audience and the social interaction‖

Brown and Levinson (1978:66) claim that ―face‖ is ―something that is emotionally invested, and that can be lost, maintained or enhanced and must be constantly attended

to in interaction‖ Face, therefore, is precisely the conceptualization each of us make our―self‖ through interaction It is a highly changeable, almost unstable entirely, located in the flow of events in the encounter and dependent on the interpretation of other participants more than on ourselves

―One‘s own face and the face of others are constructs of the same order; it is the rules

of the group and the definition of the situation which determine how much feeling one

is to have for face and how this feeling is to be distributed among the faces involved‖ (Goffman, cited from Richard Watts:124 )

Brown and Levinson assume that every individual has two types of face: positive and negative Positive face is defined as the individual‘s desire that her/his wants be appreciated and approved of in social interaction, whereas negative face is the desire for freedom of action and freedom from imposition Positive politeness strategies server face wants of positive face And negative politeness strategies server face wants

of negative face

It is clear that we have an obligation to maintain the faces of the other participants in the interaction As Lee Wong (1999) says ―If one loves one‘s face, one should avoid

face loss, attempt to maintain one‘s face this can only be done by looking after alter‘s face‖ (cited from Watt: 120) The term ―facework‖ given by Goffman, therefore, is the actions taken by a person to make whatever he is doing consistent with face In other words, ―the construction of our own concept of self and the work we do in social interaction to enable others to construct, reproduce and maintain their self concept can

be called ―facework‖ (Richard Watt, 130)

In daily communication, people may give a threat to the face of the interlocutor involved or create a ―face – threatening act‖ In an attempt to avoid this kind of speech act, interlocutors may use speech strategies to minimize the threat according to a rational assessment of the face risk to participants These strategies will be discussed later

Generally speaking, the relationship between politeness and indirectness is still controversial It may vary in different cultures and languages Hiding feelings is indirect and how it links with politeness will be considered in the following parts 1.4.3 Politeness strategies

In daily communication, we have to deal with different social situations, different kinds of interactors which requires us to adjust our use of words to fit the situation About politeness strategies, there are many opinions among linguists

As politeness, in Leech‘s opinion, involves minimizing the cost and maximizing the benefit to speaker/hearer, he suggests six maxims for the politeness

+ Tact maxim: Minimize cost to other Maximize benefit to other

+ Generosity maxim: Minimize benefit to self Maximize cost to self

+ Approbation maxim: Minimize dispraise of other Maximize dispraise of self

+ Modesty maxim: Minimize praise of self Maximize praise of other

+ Agreement maxim: Minimize disagreement between self and other Maximize agreement between self and other

+ Sympathy maxim: Minimize antipathy between self and other Maximize sympathy between self and other

We agree with Nguyen Quang that the terms in Leech‘s maxims such as ―cost‖,

―minimize‖, ―maximize‖… seem to be abstract and a little bit ambiguous These

maxims tend to be about positive politeness So it may not govern the politeness as a

whole term

According to Brown and Levinson, politeness strategies are developed in order to save

the hearer‘s "face." Face refers to the respect that an individual has for him or herself,

and maintaining that "self-esteem" in public or in private situations Usually you try to

avoid embarrassing the other person, or making them feel uncomfortable Face

Threatening Acts (FTA's) are acts that infringe on the hearers' need to maintain his/her

self esteem, and be respected Politeness strategies are developed for the main purpose

of dealing with these FTAs

They suggest five strategies to deal with FTAs, which are numbered to indicate that the

greater the face act threat is, the greater numbered- strategy is employed

Figure 1 Brown and Levinson‘s politeness strategies

estimated risk of face-loss addressee

The figure shows that S can decide to do or not to do the FTA However, when

encounting an FTA, S can choose one of the four possibilities:

First, bald on record strategies do not attempt to minimize the threat to the hearer‘s

face This strategy is most often utilized by speakers who closely know their audience

With the bald on record strategies there is a direct possibility that the audience will be

shocked or embarrassed by the strategy In everyday communication, bald on record

Go on record [rational decision 2]

Go off record (4)

Do the AFT [rational decision1]

Don‘t do the FTA (5)

Do the FTA baldly with

no redressive action (1) [rational decision 3]

Choose redressive action

Do the FTA baldly with

no redressive action (1) [rational decision 3] Choose redressive action

behavior would potentially threaten the other‘s face and therefore, should be avoided Avoiding a FTA is accomplished by face saving acts which use positive or negative politeness strategies

The positive politeness attempts to minimize the threat to the hearer's positive face This strategy is most commonly used in situations where the audience knows each other fairly well Quite often hedging and attempts to avoid conflict are used

The third strategy is negative politeness which presumes that the speaker will be imposing on the listener The potential for awkwardness or embarrassment is greater than in bald on record strategies and positive politeness strategies Negative face is the desire to remain autonomous

The final politeness strategy outlined by Brown and Levinson is the indirect strategy; This strategy uses indirect language and removes the speaker from the potential to being imposing

In general, strategies given by Brown and Levinson are clear and universal We can use them for different cultures with different styles of politeness

1.5 Hiding feelings in social interaction

It is hard to say what hiding feeling is and how it is important in communication As, in fact, it is not a literary term, or a ‗stable‘ notion We hardly find any definitions for hiding feeling in any dictionary And it is not an issue studied by many researcher or linguists

Simply, hiding feelings is understood as not expressing or revealing real feelings There are several degrees of hiding feelings: hiding feelings completely, hiding feelings partly Hiding feeling is not only verbal but also nonverbal It involves controlling our facial expressions, hand and body movement, eye contact and more So listener has to deduce what speaker implies by basing on context, and nonverbal cues

When do people hide feelings? We know that feeling is something that is very

complex There are feelings which help us deal with many difficult tasks There are

feelings disturbing our working and our relationship as well In this case, people often hide their feelings In other words, hiding feelings occurs in problematic situations This is an example: you are very annoyed with your boss because he often shouts at

you unreasonably, but for politeness you can not show him directly that you are annoyed

Why do people hide their feelings? In daily communication, we sometimes may have some feelings such as anger, fear, sadness, disappointment ect which hurt a person‘s feelings and threat their face Therefore, we would like to hide them in order to avoid hurting other people‘s feeling, to save the face and to maintain our relationship In other words, The purpose of hiding feelings is to save the other‘s face as well as the speaker‘s own face, from that to maintain good relationship among interlocutors For example, in the above situation, if you show your annoyance to the boss, he may feel that you do not respect him as a boss As a result, he may hate you, cause you difficulty

in work Your relationship may be broken up Generally, we can consider hiding feelings a face saving act

Beside negative feelings, people sometimes hide their positive feelings such as happiness, pride…for modesty, or not making others feel uncomfortable… For example, you have just been promoted, you are up to the air but if you show your feelings immoderately in front of your competitors they will think you are self-important and therefore do not have good impression on you

In general, what is the importance of hiding feelings? Hiding feelings is so important due to its effectiveness in communication, as we have just said above, that we need it in communication Without it our communication would be broken-down, our relationships are not as good as our expectation…For example, if you say directly to your boss that he is wrong you may lose your job Or if you comment on your colleague‘s unfashionable clothing style directly she will be unsatisfied In other words, hiding feelings helps us maintain our relationship, maintain the harmony with others, and sometimes helps us achieve our personal goals In a professional working environment, success depends on the ability to control feelings

However, it is necessary to say that hiding feelings is not always positive In fact, it has

a certain negative points, especially in the offices First, it may make people stressed for not being able to release their feelings Hiding feelings so often may make people

become liars as well In addition, we hide our feelings in order not to displease others, but this may prevent people from knowing their shortcomings to improve

How do people hide feelings by verbal cues? There are some common ways people do

to hide their feelings Firstly, they can say nothing which means they hide their feelings completely (i.e hide in such a way that others cannot recognize) At the workplace, this

is one of the most favorable strategies for the result of safety it brings about

In addition, people can hide feelings in several ways of saying such as Minimizing, listener can notice partly your feelings ―which leads the requester to appeal to a common goal‖ (George Yule,1996: 64) Or they can use vague or neutral utterances so that listener are hard to know exactly what they are thinking such as in the following example:

A: How do you like my new shirt?

B: I don‘t think I‘ve seen any quite like that

In some other cases, speaker can find one aspect of the issue being asked about to compliment For example, you hate your friend‘s shoes, but the color is not too bad: ―I like the color‖ is the sentence you can use Or speaker can find positive aspect of a person to compliment: ―Well, she seems nice, but I have just known her a few days‖ Some excuse is another way instead for saying what you are thinking straightforwardly:

―The salad is nice but I‘m starting to get full‖

Hiding feelings varies under the influence of social status, age , gender …With a particular encounter, people have a particular way to hide their feelings The way and the degree we hide our feelings are different when our communicating partners (e.g mother, boss, friends ) are different

.Moreover, hiding feelings is a term concerning with many aspects of the culture and it also differ across cultures Each culture with its own characteristics creates a communication style and thus, different cultures favor different communication styles,

as we have discussed above Hiding feelings, therefore, is not the same across cultures

In collectivism cultures where the self is overwhelmed by the community and people are in favor of indirect communication style, hiding feelings occurs more often than in individualism cultures where the self is highly appreciated and direct communication is

dominant Beside the frequency, the difference between cultures in hiding feelings presents in strategies employed to hide which are discussed clearly in the next parts

Chapter II: Methodology

2.1 Data collection instrument

For data collection, the study uses a questionnaire in the form of Discourse Completion Task (DCT) based on the Cross-cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP) (Blum-Kulka and Olshtain 1984) which has been widely used in pragmatic research DCT using written questionnaires servers best the purpose of this study because it has some specific advantages First, DCT is an effective means of gathering a large number

of data in a short period Second, with the DCT we can survey a large number of participants more easily than role plays, which makes statistical analysis more feasible Within the time constraints of the present study, this methodology worked well

However, there are some disadvantages when using this type of data It is not natural speech It is not a record of real behavior but a record of what subjects think they would say, or perhaps what they want the researcher to think they would say So the responses may differ from natural speech patterns Moreover, the DCT cannot show ―the depth of the emotion that affects the tone, content, and form of linguistic performance‖ (Beebe and Cummins 1996, p.80) In spite of its shortcomings, the DCT can be a useful tool for the investigation at cultural differences in the performance of hiding feelings

In order to make the data more reliable, the author also make use of some other source

of information such as books, films, internet and self observation

2.2 Questionnaire and Participants

The data were collected from Australian native speakers of English and native speakers

of Vietnamese via written questionnaires which consists of three main part parts

The first part of the questionnaire deals with the respondents‘ background such as age, nationality, gender, occupation The respondents‘ personal information is relevant and useful for the analysis of the data It helps the researcher have better judgment of their linguistic choice

The second part considers what affects the choice of strategies to hide feelings of the respondents Along with two other questions concerning with the frequency of hidings feelings of Australian and Vietnamese and the strategies used by both groups, it helps

the researcher have an overview of the issue which is considered as guidelines for the next analysis

The third part consists of 6 situations in which participants often hide their feelings These situations are very common in daily communication at the workplace and vary in terms of social status with three levels: low, high, and equal; age with three levels: older, the same and younger and gender relationship with two levels: same, and opposite And the data collected via these variables will help us have some knowledge

of the similarities and the differences in the hiding feelings in different cultures

 The first situation: In the office, you are trying to concentrate on some important work However, a few colleagues of opposite sex are laughing and horsing around You are annoyed Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say?

In this situation, the communicating partner is a person of equal status and of opposite sex

 The second situation: You failed in your project At the monthly meeting of the company, many people criticize you Among those, colleagues of the same sex whose professional skill is not as good as yours criticize you most

Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say?

The communicating partner in this situation is a person of equal status and of the same sex

These two situations are given out to check how sex influences the frequency of hiding feelings and the choice of hiding feelings strategies of the two groups

 The third situation: A colleague younger than you often uses office phone for long distance calls Being a person with sense of responsibility, you feel unpleasant You think it is not good thing to do Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say?

In this situation, the communicating partner is a person of equal status and of younger

age

The fourth situation: You are a new comer in the office Other colleagues (older than you) cause you many difficulties They often ask you to do errands in the office such as

making coffee, getting document…You are not comfortable Today when you have lots

of things to do, they, as usual, ask you to do such things Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say?

In the fourth situation, the communicating partner is a person of equal status and of older age

The aim of these two situations is to find out how age affects the hiding feelings of the two groups

 The fifth situation: An employee in your office has started coming to work late everyday and is extremely moody Today when your office is up to the ears in work, she comes late again You feel annoyed Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say ?

The 5th situation deals with communicating partners of lower status

 The sixth situation: In the office, your boss often goes to work showing a lot

of cleavage (too short skirts, sensitive shirts) Today your company has an important meeting with partners she/he comes in as usual with sensitive clothes Do you hide your feeling? If you do, what would you say

In the 6th situation the communicating partner is of higher status

These two situations aim at finding out how social status influences the hiding feelings

of the both Australian people and Vietnamese people

To collect the data, the researcher had processed the responses by 40 Vietnamese native speakers and 40 Australian native speakers of English There were 20 Australian female native speakers of English, 20 Australian male native speakers of English, 20 Vietnamese female native speakers and 20 Vietnamese male native speakers participating in the study All of them are working in offices in Hanoi, Vietnam and in Sydney, Australia

The participants in this study remain anonymous All were volunteers and at least18 years of age

2.3 Administration of the Questionnaires

To identify any weaknesses in the questionnaires, a pilot questionnaire was carried with two Australian female students and two Australian male students at the University