A pragmatic study on apology in english and vietnamese

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 1.1: The five general classifications of speech acts ...11 Table 3.1: Degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English and Table 3.6: Structu

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

PHAM THI HONG NINH

A PRAGMATIC STUDY ON APOLOGY

IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

NGHIÊN CỨU NGỮ DỤNG HỌC VỀ HÀNH ĐỘNG XIN LỖI

CỦA NGƯỜI ANH VÀ NGƯỜI VIỆT

M.A THESIS

Hanoi, 2013

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

PHAM THI HONG NINH

A PRAGMATIC STUDY ON APOLOGY

IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

NGHIÊN CỨU NGỮ DỤNG HỌC VỀ HÀNH ĐỘNG XIN LỖI

CỦA NGƯỜI ANH VÀ NGƯỜI VIỆT

Field: English Language

Code: 60220201

Supervior: Assoc Prof Dr Phan Van Que

Hanoi, 2013

DECLARATION

I hereby declare that no part of the enclosed Master Thesis has been copied or reproduced from any other’s work without acknowledgment and that the thesis is originally written by me under strict guidance of my supervisor

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am gratefully indebted to my supervisor, Assoc Prof Dr Phan Van Que for his valuable suggestions, advice and corrections during the course of

my writing

I also wish to express my sincere thanks to all my lecturers at the Faculty

of Postgraduate Studies, Hanoi Open University, for their useful lectures, supports, encouragements and for inspiring in me the love for English -

foreign language teaching and doing research

I also take this opportunity to send my thanks to all my colleagues in Chu Van An University in Hung Yen province for their supports and encouragements during the thesis preparation

Finally, I would like to show my deep gratitude to members of my family, especially my husband, for their great supports, encouragement, love and unshakeable trust without which my thesis would not have been accomplished

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Table 1.1: The five general classifications of speech acts 11 Table 3.1: Degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English and

Table 3.6: Structure of opting out strategy provided by the English and

Vietnamese speakers: Situation 2 43

Table 3.7: Structure of opting out strategy provided by the English and

Vietnamese speakers: Situation 4 44

Table 3.8: Structure of admitting guilt with explanation strategy provided by the English and Vietnamese speakers: Situation 1 47 Table 3.9: Structure of offering a repair strategy provided by the English and

Vietnamese speakers: Situation 1 49

Figure 3.1: The degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English

and Vietnamese speakers in situation 1 33

Figure 3.2: The degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English

and Vietnamese speakers in situation 2 34

Figure 3.3: The degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English

and Vietnamese speakers in situation 3 35

Figure 3.4: The degree of frequency in saying apologies provided by English

and Vietnamese speakers in situation 4 36

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iii

ABBREVIATIONS iv

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES v

TABLE OF CONTENTS vii

PART I: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Research questions 2

4 Scope of the study 2

5 Methods of the study 3

6 Significance of the study 3

7 Design of the study 4

PART II: DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1.1 Literature review 5

1.1.1 Previous studies oversea 5

1.1.2 Previous studies in Vietnam 8

1.2 Theories on speech acts 9

1.2.1 Definition 9

1.2.2 Type of speech acts 10

1.3 Speech act and politeness 12

1.3.1 Politeness 14

1.3.1.1 Definition of politeness 14

1.3.1.2 Politeness across cultures 15

1.3.1.3 “Politeness- directness- indirectness” in apologizing 16

1.4 Speech acts of apology 16

1.4.1 Definitions of apologies 17

1.4.2 Apologizing forms in English and Vietnamese 19

1.5 Apology strategies used in the researcher’s study 22

1.5.1 Strategy 1: Illocutionary Force Indicating Device ( IFID) 22

1.5.2 Strategy 2: Opting out 22

1.5.3 Strategy 3: Admitting guilt with an explanation 23

1.5.4 Strategy 4: Offering of repair 25

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY 26

2.1 Subjects of the study 26

2.2 Research procedure 26

2.3 Research instruments 27

2.3.1 Questionnaire 28

2.3.2 Interview 28

2.4 Method of data analysis 29

2.4.1 Statistic 29

2.4.2 Compare and contrast 29

CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 31

3.1 Results of questionnaire 31

3.1.1 Situation 1 33

3.1.2 Situation 2 33

3.1.3 Situation 3 34

3.1.4 Situation 4 35

3.2 Results of interview 36

3.2.1 Strategy 1: Illocutionary Force Indicating Device (IFID) 36

3.2.2 Strategy 2: Opting out 43

3.2.3 Strategy 3: Admitting guilt with an explanation 46

3.2.4 Strategy 4: Offering of repair 49

3.3 Discussion 51

3.3.1 Similarities 51

3.3.2 Differences 53

PART 3: CONCLUSION 56

1 Recapitulation 56

2 Limitations of the study 57

3 Suggestions for further studies 57

REFERENCES I APPENDICES IV

PART I: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

The main reasons making English become one of the most important languages in the world are the speedy globalization of the world and the consequent need for effective communication language As the result, learning English has become a basic and urgent need for those who wish to be professionals

in various fields and who are preparing to join an increasingly competitive labor market However, it is not enough to teach and learn the grammar and vocabulary Learning pragmatic and cultural competence is also very necessary so that learners can use the target language in a socially and culturally appropriate way

Speech acts are of importance in daily life in all languages In language acquisition, speech acts in a target language have been demonstrated in the field

of inter-language pragmatics The performance of speech acts is indicated to differ considerably from cultures to cultures, which leads to communication difficulties in cross-culture In this study, the speech act is the apology which belongs to expressive speech acts, in which speakers try to indicate their attitudes

Using apologies is a particular way of politeness in social situations However, each society has a special set of social norms consisting of more or less explicit rules that prescribe the certain behavior, a state of the affair, or ways

of thinking in the context Thus, apologizing is not an easy matter in anyone’s own language, and making it in a second or foreign language more complicated That is why studying the way people apologize in different languages is important in order to understand the intricacies of language Furthermore,

comparative studies on languages taught as second or foreign language are essential in order to improve teaching methods and techniques which could raise more learners' awareness of differences between not only their native language and the target language but also between the two cultures

For these above reasons, the paper entitled “A pragmatic study on apology

in English and Vietnamese” is intended to help the Vietnamese learners of

English get access to the deeper understanding of English culture

2 Aims of the study

− Presenting some theoretical background on speech acts and apologies

− Examining types of strategies that Vietnamese use to apologize in 4 situations

− Comparing how similarly and differently the English and Vietnamese speakers use apologies in terms of cross-cultural features based on comparing strategies of apologies

− Gaining an insightful look at and strongly recommend effective techniques significantly improve translation and language teaching

4 Scope of the study

The study is a comparative analysis on making polite apologies in English and Vietnamese in terms of cross-cultural perspective performed by the speakers

of English and Vietnamese The thesis is limited to verbal aspects of making apologies based on seven forms and four strategies

5 Research methods

The study has been carried out on the basis of a combination of different methods as Compare and Contrast and Statistics

The procedures of the study are as follows:

− Collect apologizing forms which are extracted from English and Vietnamese books

− Analyze the data collected from the books to find out the similarities and differences in making apologies in English and Vietnamese so as to provide theoretical background

− Deliver questionnaire and interview the participants of the study

− Collect the data from questionnaire and interview

− Analyze the data of the previous step to investigate the similarities and differences of using apologies between the English and Vietnamese speakers

in reality

− Draw the conclusion

6 Significance of the study

The need for the paper entitled “A pragmatic study on apology in English

and Vietnamese” is imperative as there are few studies on apologies in English

and Vietnamese, so it is aimed to study the apology strategies in depth with the

hope of making certain contributions to existing knowledge of the same field and the results presented can be used in a future comparative study

7 Design of the study

The thesis is composed of three parts including four chapters as follows:

Part I: ‘Introduction’, which gives in brief relevant information of the study

such as the Rationale, Aims, Research Questions, Scope, Methods and Design of the study

Part II: ‘Development’, which is subdivided into 3 chapters

Chapter 1 reviews the theoretical background of the study including speech acts

of apologies, politeness, and strategies of apologies

Chapter 2 discusses issues of methodology, research questions, research

participants, research procedure, research instruments, data collection, and

method of analysis

Chapter 3 presents an overview of results and discusses the results of

questionnaire and interview

Part III: entitled the ‘Conclusion’ which includes the recapitulation of main

ideas, the implications, the limitations of the study, and suggestions for further

studies

PART II: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW

1 1 Literature review

1.1.1 Previous studies oversea

In the history of the linguistics, there have been a number of studies on the speech act of apology Almost all of these studies focused on English, both with native and non-native speakers, but there are also other studies that investigated apologies in different languages Recently, more studies examine the way learners of foreign and second languages use and perceive apologies in both their native and target language

The following sections presents some of these studies to give an overview

of different theories of speech act of apology

Diversity in definitions of apologies also brings about variety in classification of apology strategies Bergman and Kasper (1993) distinguished seven different apology strategies The first one which is the most commonly

used is called the Illocutionary Force Indicating Device (IFID) such as in “I’m

sorry.” The second strategies are intensified IFID (“I’m terribly sorry”) The

third one is taking responsibility (“I haven’t graded it yet”) The fourth one is

giving an account of the reasons that led to the action that requires an apology

(“I was suddenly called to a meeting”) The fifth one is minimizing the effects and severity of the action (“I’m only 10 minutes late”) The sixth one is offering repair or compensation (“I’ll pay for the damage”), and the last one is verbal

redress (“It won’t happen again”)

Olshtain and Cohen’s (1983:167) taxonomy was also modified by Holmes (1990), who divided apologies into four main strategies, each category having sub-classifications The first one is “an explicit expression of apology” and contains the substrategies “offer apology/IFID,” “express regret,” “request forgiveness.” The second main category is represented by “an explanation or account, an excuse or justification.” The largest group, “an acknowledgment of responsibility,” contains “accept blame,” “express self-deficiency,” “recognize H

as entitled to an apology,” “express lack of intent,” “offer repair/redress.” Finally, the last category is “a promise of forbearance”

A slightly different taxonomy was proposed by Trosborg (1995), who distinguished five strategies She found that apologetic strategies can be divided according to whether the speaker considers that an action that requires an apology occurred or not The first two strategies come from the speaker’s not accepting that an apology is necessary, and are “explicit denial” and “implicit denial” The remaining three strategies are the result of the speaker accepting the fact that there is a need for an apology They are “giving a justification”,

“blaming someone else”, and “attacking the complainer”

Owen (1983:169) incorporated apologies in the broader context of primary remedial moves Thus, there are seven strategies for primary remedial moves:

“assert imbalance or show deference,” “assert that an offence has occurred,”

“express attitude towards offence,” “ request restoration of balance,” “give an

account,” “repair the damage,” and “provide compensation” The first four are grouped under non-substantive strategies, giving an account is considered a semi-substantive strategy, while the last two are substantive strategies

Similarly, Fraser (1981:263) designed a categorization of apologies based

on the intent of the speaker He distinguished nine strategies, namely

“announcing that you are apologizing,” “stating one’s obligation to apologize,”

“offering to apologize,” “requesting the hearer accept an apology,” “expressing regret for the offense,” “ acknowledging responsibility for the offending act,”

“promising forbearance from a similar offending act,” and “offering redress” Some of the strategies above are appear in several studies on apologies, which makes Fraser’s taxonomy different is that he distinguishes several strategies that other scholars would place under the category illocutionary force indicating device (IFID)

Finally, a completely different approach to creating a taxonomy of apologies has been attempted by Deutschmann (2003) After analyzing The British National Corpus he proposed three main strategies of apologies according

to the function they express They are “real apologies” which are the most frequent ones such as “I apologize for this”, “formulaic apologies”, which consist of simple IFIDs as in “I’m sorry”; and “face attack” apologies, which were intended to “disarm” the hearer as in “Excuse me David, I’m talking to Chris” (p 75)

In a nutshell, there are many different categorizations of apologies

However, not all the strategies in these taxonomies would work for all the cultures for the reason that speech act is culture specific as mentioned in earlier part As the consequence, when creating the taxonomy for a study one should not only choose those strategies that are used in the respective culture but also account both for explicit and implicit apologies Furthermore, strategies such as avoiding and postponing apologies should also be a part of the taxonomy because choosing not to apologize or apologize is also a strategy used when an apology is required

1.1.2 Previous studies in Vietnamese

Through the research process, three previous studies related to this thesis will be used to compare the findings The first study was carried out by Huynh Cam Thao Trang (2009) Her study focused on seven forms and three apology strategies in English and Vietnamese including “getting attention”, “rejecting a request or invitation” and “admitting guilt with explanation” Her study, however, did not concentrate on comparing how similarly and differently native speakers of English and Vietnamese use polite apologies in terms of cross-cultural features The second study is made by Huynh Thi Nhi The paper analyzed similarities and differences in English and Vietnamese in the light of utterances of apology However, her study did not focus on three apology strategies as well as did not compare the degree of frequency in using apologies between Vietnamese native speakers and native speakers of English The third study was conducted by Nguyen Thi Phuong Dung which combined the results

of the two studies above

1.2 Theories on speech acts

1.2.1 Definition of speech acts

Searle (1969:24) claims that “Language is part of a theory of action, and speech acts are those verbal acts such as promising, requesting and complimenting that one performs in speaking On this view, minimal units of human communication are not linguistic expressions, but rather the performance

of certain kinds of acts, such as making statements, asking questions, giving direction, apologizing, thanking, complimenting and so on These acts are called illocutionary acts.” In this sense, we share the definition that those actions performed via utterances for the purposes of communicating are called speech acts

Searle (1969:23) claims that the term “an illocutionary act refers to an utterance with a communicative force” For example, when one says:“you look

so beautiful today.” This is an act of complimenting Thus, a speaker performs illocutionary acts by expressing his/ her intention to compliment someone, to promise someone, etc., in such a way, the listener can understand the speaker’s intention

The concept of illocutionary point is related to the notion of illocutionary acts Illocutionary point refers to the point or purpose of illocution (Searle, 1980:351) In speech act theory, direct speech acts and indirect speech acts are

distinguished from each other The later is defined as “Those cases in which one illocutionary act is performed indirectly by the way of performing another” (Searle, 1975:60) Therefore, in direct speech acts the speaker says what she/he means, while in indirect speech acts the speaker means more than she/he says (Searle 1980) For example, a speaker may say “you look like a million dollars” instead of compliment someone about good appearance

1.2.2 Type of speech acts

Austin (1962) introduced a classification of acts performed when a person

speaks The first is a locutionary act producing a meaningful expression For

instance, if we make a simple sentence like: “your dress is so beautiful”, we are

likely to produce a locutionary act The second is illocutionary acts, we mostly

do not make utterances without having any purpose in them These acts are

performed for communicative function The third is perlocutionary acts “In

communicating, we do not simply create an utterance without intending to have

an effect” (Yule, 1996) For the sentence, we all wish the act of complimenting the listener’s dress to be done, or in other words, the perlocutionary force is performed

Searle (1969:70) listed five types of speech acts based on the speaker’s

intentions: Declarations: are those kinds of speech acts that change the world via their utterances Representatives: are those kinds of speech acts that state

what the speaker believes to be the case or not, for example, statement of fact,

assertions, conclusions and descriptions Expressives: are those kinds of speech

acts that state what the speaker feels They express psychological states and can

be statements of pleasure, pain, likes, dislikes, joy or sorrow Directives: are

those kinds of speech acts that speakers use to get someone else to do something They express what the speaker wants They are commands, orders, requests,

suggestions, compliments, etc Commissives: are those kinds of speech acts that

speakers use to commit themselves some future action They express what the speaker intends They are promises, threats, refusals an pledges

Yule (1996: 55) presents a table showing speech act classification similarly:

Speech act types Direction of fit X=Situation S= Speaker/

Table 1.1 The five general classifications of speech acts

Another approach to distinguish different types of speech acts is based on relationship between the structure and functions As Yule (1996) claims, three structural forms (declarative, interrogative, imperative) and three communicative

function (statement, question, command/ request) can be combined to create two

kinds of speech acts: direct (there is a direct relationship between a structure function, we have a direct speech act) and indirect speech acts (there is an

indirect relationship between a structure and a function, we have indirect speech act)

1.3 Speech acts and Politeness

Speech act theory is also closely related to the concept of politeness The apology speech act is used commonly in daily conversations to show politeness

In any context, this speech act shows respect and identity as well as the culture

of people who use a specific word choice Early studies on politeness claims that this concept is universal (Brown & Levinson, 1987; Lakoff, 1973) According to Lakoff (1973), there are three main rules of politeness, namely “don’t impose,”

“give options,” and “make the hearer feel good – be friendly” (p 298) According to Brown and Levinson (1987), members of a society tend to keep a certain image of themselves which they call “face.” Brown and Levinson distinguish between two types of face, namely “negative face” and “positive face.” “Negative face” is defined as one’s desire that nobody impedes his or her actions, while “positive face” implies that people expect their needs to be desirable to others

Thus, those functions of language that are expressed with the help of speech acts are intended either to prevent a threat to the speaker’s or hearer’s face – by being polite when requesting something, for example – or to recover,

or save face – in the case of apologies, for example (Staab, 1983) Apologies as a

face-threatening act reflect how people generally behave as if their expectations concerning their public self-image, or their face wants, will be respected

In the light of such findings, Nwoye (1992:313) believes that it is necessary to sub-classify the concept of face into “individual face” and “group face.” Individual face refers to “the individual’s desire to attend to his/her personal needs and to place his/her public-self-image above those of others” while group face refers to “the individual’s desire to behave in conformity with culturally expected norms of behavior that are institutionalized and sanctioned

by society”

Another problem that speech acts raise in connection with politeness is the fact that some speech acts seem to be impolite by their nature, such as orders or commands, while others are polite by nature, such as offers or invitations (Leech, 1983) Thus, according to Leech, when people talk about speech acts, they must distinguish between positive politeness, which increases the politeness in the case of inherently polite speech acts, and negative politeness, which reduces the impoliteness of inherently impolite speech acts He also argues that one has to pay attention to the relative of politeness, as this depends, as it is believed by authors of studies presented above, on the culture of the speakers

To sum up, this section mentions theory of speech acts including what speech acts are and how they are classified Evidence on speech act perception and realization from different cultures have demonstrated that more research should be done so as to provide a theory that has an integrated approach to speech acts Therefore, besides a careful definition of the term used in the

research and an appropriate taxonomy, it is necessary to take a deep consideration into social, cultural, and pragmatic influences on the meaning, perception, and production of speech acts

1.3.1 Politeness

1.3.1.1 Definition of politeness

Politeness is such an interesting phenomenon that many linguistic experts have done research so far The concept of politeness have expressed by many authors such as Yule (1996), Lakoff (1983), Leech (1983), Richard, J.C.et al (1990) and Brown and Levinson (1987) Yule (1996:60) states, “Politeness, in an interaction, can then be defined as the means employ to show awareness of another person’s face.” Leech (1983:80) notes that politeness means to minimize the effect of impolite statement or expression (negative politeness) and maximize the effects of polite illocutions (positive politeness) According to Richard, J.C.et al.(1990), politeness is defined as “a) how languages express the social distance between speakers and their different role relationships, b) how face work, that is, the attempt to establish, maintain, and save face during conversations is carried out in a speech community.” Politeness, as shown in Coulmas (1981: 84, 235), is

a dimension of linguistic choice and social behaviour, which includes such notions as courtesy, formality, rapport, deference, respect and distance

Therefore, in interpersonal communication, in terms of politeness, every participant considers social factors such as age, gender, power and distance among the interlocutors Moreover, politeness may be described as a form of behaviour which is exercised in order to consolidate relationship between

individuals or, at least, to keep it undamaged

1.3.1.2 Politeness across cultures

Politeness is different from cultures to cultures For example, if I were to bow to either friend or stranger in Australia, my action could only be interpreted as satirical or humorous It could easily cause offence by appearing to laugh at the other person's pomposity On the other hand, the absence of a bow between Korean males would probably carry significant meaning Bowing is so normal in Korea that the action itself may well have lost its force of signaling genuine respect or politeness In addition, it is worth noting that within a culture, individual speakers may also vary somewhat in employing conversational devices to execute politeness strategies For example “some people believe that interruption shows one’s interest in what the other person is talking about but other people assume that it shows utter disregard for the interrupted speakers (Green, 1989: 146) Apologizing is one of the most sensitive area of daily communication in the term “politeness” It plays a crucial role in keeping people happy and friendship going Although by apologizing, speakers recognize the fact that a violation of the social norm has been communicated and admits to the fact that he or she at least partially involve in its causes For example, In Vietnam, a person says sorry without thinking when he/she bumps into someone

by mistake As a norm of politeness and a social habit, they would definitely get annoyed if his/her apology is not given at the appropriate time However, in Brazil, neither the teacher nor students always arrive at the appointed hours Arriving late may not be very important in Brazil, nor is staying late In Brazil, a

person who usually arrives late is probably more successful than a person who is always on time In fact, Brazilians expect a person with status or prestige to arrive late Politeness in apologizing is also associated with the notion of indirectness and directness Directness and indirectness are basic forms of expression that are universal in all languages; however, they are different from culture to culture

1.3.1.3 “Politeness- directness- indirectness” in apologizing

Direct, done via an explicit illocutionary force-indicating device (IFID), which selects a routines, formula expression of regret (performative verb) such as: (be) sorry, apologize, regret, excuse (English); xin lỗi, tha thứ, lấy làm tiếc (Vietnamese)

Indirect, people may obtain certain advantages and avoid negative consequences of face threatening acts by employing indirectness in their social interaction “Indirectness is costly and risky” (Dascal-cited in Thomas, 1995:120) Indirect, performed by any utterance containing ‘an explanation or

account of the course, which brought about the offence’ for example I got the

traffic jam this morning ; ‘an expression of the speaker’s responsibility for the

offence’ for example I’ve lost your favorite scarf ; ‘an offer of repair’ for example Can I buy a new one for you? and ‘a promise of forbearance’ for example I’ll never do it again

1.4 Speech acts of apology

Apologies as an expressive speech act may be used before a real situation

to show a feeling and lead to a good relationship between the speaker and the

hearer In all social groups, the act of apologizing is called for when social norms have been violated, whether the offence is real or potential (Olshtain & Cohen, 1983:20) When an action or utterance has resulted in the fact that one or more people perceive themselves as offended, the culpable person(s) needs to apologize The act of apologizing requires an action or an utterance which is intended to “set things right” (Olshtain, 1983:235) Marquez-Reiter (2000: 44) states an apology is a “compensatory action for an offense committed by the speaker which has affected the hearer According to Bataineh (2006:1903), apologies fall under expressive speech acts in which speakers attempt to indicate their states or attitudes An apology has effects if it reflects true feelings One cannot effectively apologize to another and truly reach him/her unless one portrays honest feelings of sorrow and regret for whatever one has done” (Fahmi,

R & Fahmi, Rula, 2006: 1903) Apology speech acts have been investigated cross-culturally so as to find similarities and differences between the languages

In the present study, the researcher focuses on finding out the similarities and differences in Vietnamese and English in the way of native English and Vietnamese speakers using apologies

1.4.1 Definitions of apologies

An apology is a word or statement saying for something has been done wrong or that causes problem (Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, 8th edition: 57)

Bergman and Kasper (1993:82) define an apology as a “compensatory action to an offense in the doing of which the speaker was casually involved and

which is costly to the hearer” The cost can be in terms of losing face or even a severe misunderstanding It is clear that different cultures have different degrees

in perceiving how costly such an offense is, and therefore how necessary an apology is In Bergman and Kasper’s terminology, an action is considered very serious in one culture, may not require an apology in another culture

A definition that limits very much the concept of an apology is given by Owen (1983) According to him, apologies are remedial moves that follow what

he called a priming move on the part of the person who expects the apology, which is a move that triggers the apology While such an approach makes sense, the problem with Owen’s definition is that he restricts the use of the term

apology to only those utterances that actually contain the explicit phrases “I’m

sorry” or “I apologize” and variants of these Such a definition would exclude

from the start any indirect ways of apologizing, and would render inexistent any

of the types of apologies Owen’s definition would apply only to explicit apologies

Goffman (1967: 14) refers an apology to a remedy, the one essential element in a remedial interchange This term nicely highlights the central function of apologies to provide a remedy for an offense and restore social equilibrium or harmony (Edmondson 1981: 280, Leech, 1983: 25) (cited in Holmes, 1990: 159)

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), apologies are politeness strategies An apology is a fundamental speech act which is a part of human communication occurs in every culture to maintain good relations between

interlocutors It can also be expression of contribution and remorse for something wrong They present the definition of apology as: "basically a speech act which is intended to provide support for the hearer who was actually or potentially affected by a violation X." They have continued, that in the decision

to carry out the verbal apology, the speaker is willing humiliate himself for herself to some extent and to admit to fault and responsibility for X Hence the act of apologizing is face-saving for the hearer and face-threatening for the speaker This definition has described the apology process more individually (between the speaker and the hearer) which comes as support for the hearer who was malaffected by a violation

In this research, the researcher adopts the definitions given by Brown and Levison because they are convenient and acceptable, each one describes this process and captured this phenomenon from both sides: 'individually' (the first one), and 'society' (the second one)

1.4.2 Apologizing forms in English and Vietnamese

Making an apology in English often contains apologizing words such as

“apologize”, “excuse”, “pardon”, and “forgive” Sometimes, it can be

associated with some pronouns followed preposition “for” to make the structures

like “excuse me for…”, “Pardon me for…”, “Forgive me for…”, “I must

apologize for…”,… Choosing an apologizing verbal depends on the serious

degree of the faults According to Huynh Cam Thao Trang (2009), there are seven apology structures that have the same meaning and that are used similarly

in English and Vietnamese

The first apology structure is ‘apologizing words’ for examples sorry,

pardon, excuse me! Forgive in English and xin lỗi, tha lỗi, tha thứ, lượng thứ in

Vietnames

The second apology structures is ‘apologizing word + addressing form’ for

examples sorry, sir/madam, sorry, Mr./Mrs Thomas in English and Xin lỗi, ngài,

quý bà , Xin lỗi, ông/ bà Thomas in Vietnamese

The third apology structure is ‘apologizing word + question’ for examples

Excuse me! Could/Can you please show me the way to…? In English and Xin lỗi! Vui lòng chỉ cho tôi đường đến….? Vui lòng chỉ cho tôi đường đến….? Xin lỗi, tôi có thể đi qua không? Tôi có thể đi qua không? in Vietnamese

The forth apology structure is ‘apologizing word + addressing form+ extra question’ For examples: "Sorry, Sir What can I do for you?" in English and

"Xin lỗi ngài Tôi có thể giúp ǵì cho ngài ạ?" in Vietnamese

sentence/clause’ for examples sorry if I’ve disturbed you in English and Xin lỗi

nếu tôi làm phiền bạn in Vietnamese

The sixth apology structure is ‘apologizing question’ for examples "Are

you willing to forgive me? Will you accept my apology?" in English and "Bạn có sẵn lòng tha thứ/thứ lỗi/tha lỗi cho tôi không?" in Vietnamese

The last apology structure is ‘apologizing sentence’ for examples I beg

your pardon I am terribly sorry to leave you waiting such a long time We apologize for… in English and "Xin tạ lỗi Thành thật xin lỗi vì tôi để anh đợi lâu như vậy" in Vietnamese

The seven apology structures are listed from the least formal to the most formal way These ways are considered to be very polite Depending on particular contexts as well as the identity of the hearers, speakers choose what is suitable to them In some cases, apologies are used not for apology purposes These are situations in which there is no need for listeners to forgive This is shown in the following examples

- Excuse me, is this the way to the sport center? (Liz and Alastair, 2007)

- Excuse me, could you tell me where KImbell Hall is? (McGraw Hill, 2007)

- Excuse me, can you tell me how to go to the post office? (John and Liz, 1993)

- Excuse me, would I like to ask you a couple questions? (Yule G., 1996,)

- Excuse me; I’m doing a survey about shopping habits Can I ask you a few

questions? (Wilson, 2003)

These followed examples are used to ask the hearers’ forgiveness:

- Please forgive the inconvenience (Hoang Truc Anh, 2009)

- Begging your pardon, sir Mr Brown is out (Hutchinson, 2001)

- We apologize for the cancellation of this service (John and Liz, 1993)

- Our flight to Nha Trang is delayed because of bad weather If you need any

help, please contact our agents We too apologize for inconvenience

(Recording at Tan Son Nhat Airport)

- Con xin mẹ tha tội cho con Chỉ vì con không nghe lời mẹ (Khải Hưng, 1998)

- Xin lỗi, hiện tất cả nhân viên trực tổng đài đều đang bận, tạm thời yêu cầu của

quý khách không được thực hiện, xin qúy khách vui lòng gọi lại sau

(Recording through Viettel telephone net)

1.5 Apology strategies used in the researcher’s study

1.5.1 Strategy 1: Illocutionary Force Indicating Device (IFID)

IFIDs (Illocutionary Force Indicating Devices) is the most central strategy for an apology in various languages Olshtain and Cohen (1983, pp 22–23) refer this strategy to ‘‘an expression of apology’’ This is the first formula in apology

as a speech act set It consists of a number of sub-formulas: an expression of

regret, as ‘‘I’m sorry’’, an offer of apology as ‘‘I apologise’’, a request for forgiveness, as ‘‘excuse me”, “forgive me’’

Vietnamese people often say “xin lỗi”, “làm ơn”, “tha thứ” These

examples will illustrate the similarities between English and Vietnamese in IFID- strategy

Mari: Excuse me Could you tell me

where Kimbell Hall is?

Nancy: Oh, you mean Cambell

Mark: I’m afraid I can’t make our

meeting today I have to finish a

report

Vậy xin lỗi cậu, để khi khác

1.5.2 Strategy 2: Opting Out

This strategy is used if the complainee or an apologizer denies the responsibility because that person feels not guilty (Trosborg, 1985: 377 )

Explicit denial of responsibility: Speakers openly deny being responsible for

the violation occurred They may be emphasizing the ignorance of the matter

Implicit denial of responsibility: The complainer may try to evade responsibility by ignoring the complainer’s statements

Justifying oneself: Speakers provide arguments that could affect the hearer not

to blame the speaker

Blaming someone else: Speakers avoid responsibility by blaming others They

blame a third party or the hearer as the cause of further violation

Attacking the complainer: Speakers attacked the hearer in a much ruder

manner compared to the previous one Speakers generally avoid responsibility by ignoring complaints or talking about something else Instances for this strategy are shown in the following table

- I know nothing about it

- You know I would never do a thing

like that

- I don’t think that’s my fault (Holmes,

1990:181)

- It wasn’t me, may be you do it by

yourself in purpose (Trosborg,

1985:387)

- I’m warning you! You can’t blame

me for this trouble (ibid.)

- Tôi chẳng biết gì về vấn đề đấy cả

- Anh biết là tôi không bao giờ làm cái việc như thế bao giờ mà

- Tôi không nghĩ đó là lỗi của tôi đâu

- Không phải tôi, chính anh làm mà

- Tôi cảnh báo anh, đừng có mà đổ lỗi cho tôi trong chuyện này

1.5.3 Strategy 3: Admitting guilt with an explanation

Trosborg (1987) assumes that apologizer resorts this semantic formula to

mitigate his / her guilt A distinction is made between an implicit and explicit explanation or account The offender gives an explanation or account because he/she admits that what he has done was undesirable so he/she tries to lessen his/her fault by referring to mitigating circumstances that may excuse his/her behavior Thus an explanation or an account serves as an ‘‘excuse’’ for committed offence The following table shows examples for this apologizing strategy

I’m sorry I’m late but my alarm didn’t

go off this morning ( John and Linh

show, 2013)

Tôi xin lỗi vì đã đến trễ vì đồng hồ của tôi không kêu vào buổi sáng này( John and Linh show, 2013)

I’m so sorry there’s nothing here you

can eat, I didn’t realize you were a

vegetarian ( John and Linh show,

2013)

Tôi thật xin lỗi, không có gì cho bạn

ăn được Tôi không biết bạn là người

ăn chay ( John and Linh show, 2013)

In general, in order to reduce anger or to show faithfulness, apologizers have to give an explanation In these cases, it is necessary to observe whether the speakers are found guilty or not Their word choice of apology strategy depends

on their minor mistake or major one The following formula shows from the less strong apology than the more one

Apology word + explanation/message= weak form

Explanation/ message + apology word = strong form

1.5.4 Strategy 4: Offering of repair

The apology strategy of compensation gives the apologizer an opportunity

to repair the situation by offering some type of compensation Examples for this apologizing strategy are shown in the following table

- I’m sorry I lost your book, please let

me get you a new one

- Xin lỗi đã làm mất sách của cậu, tớ

sẽ đền cậu quyển khác

Forgive me, I’ll stay up late and write

another one as well as I can, or I’ll

help you if you accept that ( Gustav

Demeter, 2000)

- Xin lỗi đã làm cậu khó ngủ nhé, tớ tắt đèn đi đây!

CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY

2.1 Subjects of the study

The subjects of this study are a group of native speakers of English and a group of Vietnamese The first group consists of 40 people from English speaking countries working or living in Vietnam for at least 2 years The second group includes 40 Vietnamese people working at various offices and universities

in Vietnam All of them were born and brought up in Vietnam They have not been affected much by any other cultures It is, therefore, convenient to compare and discover the similarities and differences of making apologies between the English and Vietnamese speakers

In order to ensure compatibility, the number of males and females in both groups are evenly distributed The participants are between 20 and 50 years old All the informants in both groups have high levels of education

The questionnaire is obtained with 20 Vietnamese participants (10 males and 10 females) and 20 English speaking contries participants (10 males and 10 females) 20 participants from each group (each group includes 10 male and 10 female) are chosen for interview The participants for interview and questionnaire are different

2.2 Research procedure

In the early March of 2013, the M.A thesis proposal was being begun with

a specific topic The theory background was collected to serve for the direction

of the thesis From April to May, the thesis proposal was corrected carefully

under the instructor’s advices At the end of June, the thesis proposal was finished In the beginning of July of 2013, the content of the thesis was officially started In this time, questionnaire and interview were delivered to the participants in Hanoi After having the results of questionnaires and interview, the results were made statistic, comparison and contrast in order to serve for purposes of the thesis is to find out the similarities and differences of apologies

in English and Vietnamese in terms of cross-cultural perspective In November

2013, the thesis is finished

• Situation 1: Losing friend’s book

In the situation, a girl borrowed her friend’s novel, Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, which has author’s signature However, some months later, when her

friend asks her to return the book, she cannot find it

• Situation 2: Being late at a restaurant

On the anniversary of ten year marriage, the little brother was late for the party given by his parents at a restaurant Everyone was nervous because they could not start the program until all the family’s members were there

• Situation 3: Smoking

In an addicted smoking club, one of members followed the class for 1 month However, he started to smoke again and his wife found out and confronted him

• Situation 4: Missing best friend’s wedding

The situation was taken place at a wedding, the groom’s best friend, the groomsman, missed the wedding ceremony and only arrived afterwards

2.3.1 Questionnaire

Questionnaire is used to measure the degree of frequency in giving apologies between English native speakers and native speakers of Vietnamese Each questionnaire consists of two parts: part I is aimed to get demographic data from the informants, such as age, gender, social level and place of permanent residence while part II includes 4 situations In each situation, four options are related to descending of degree of frequency in giving apologies such as always, often, sometimes and never The participants are asked to choose one of these four options

3.2 Interview

Each interview also includes two parts, part I is also aimed to get

demographic data from the informants, such as age, gender, social level and