Conjunctions in some English and Vietnamese Newsletters A contrastive analysis

Through the study, readers not only understand deeply about conjunctions in general but also, more importantly, Vietnamese learners have clearer knowledge about the similarities and diff

Conjunctions in some English and Vietnamese

Newsletters: A contrastive analysis

Nguyễn Thị Hoàng Huế

Trường Đại học Ngoại ngữ Luận văn Thạc sĩ ngành: Ngôn ngữ tiếng Anh; Mã số: 60 22 15

Người hướng dẫn: TS Phạm Thị Thanh Thùy

Năm bảo vệ: 2012

Abstract: It is a fact that English has entirely become an international language on

account of its highest effectiveness in communication In effect, a prevalent phenomenon has been occurring in a great number of countries in the world where millions of people are attempting to use the language as native speakers Nevertheless,

it is inadequate to take care of the choice of words (adjectives, nouns, verbs, and articles…), grammar rules (voice, aspect, and tense…) alone for fruitful communication; using conjunctions is highly appreciated Without conjunctions, it is rather hard to understand the content of a meandering speech In addition, the given ideas are completely by no means cohesive, logical and unified It is undeniable that conjunction is so complex a category that foreigners cannot help having trouble in use Also, for its complexity, the writer has no ambition to present all aspects of conjunctions The researcher merely focuses on contrastive analysis of the use of conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Newsletters Through the study, readers not only understand deeply about conjunctions in general but also, more importantly, Vietnamese learners have clearer knowledge about the similarities and differences in conjunction usages between English and Vietnamese in particular so that difficulties

can be dealt with by some suggestions

Keywords: Liên từ; Tiếng Anh; Kỹ năng viết

Content

PART 1: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the study

English is said to have played a very important role in the development of commerce, trade, education, technology, economics, etc Therefore, having good knowledge of English grammar is of great importance, for one can express his/her ideas, feelings or emotions not only by separated words but also by meaningful sentences

The second reason the writer chooses conjunctions to study is that conjunctions, functioning as connectors and transition signals, actually play an important role in linking sentences, paragraphs, or clauses each other Thanks to conjunctions, various kinds of grammatical sentences are formed such as compound sentences and complex sentences

One more reason is that the researcher’s interest in English Commerce, especially in newsletters Newsletters are also known as consultant letters, so they need to have the logic and coherence to attract customers And conjunctions are seen as an essential means of linking so as to increase the persuasion in newsletters Therefore, studying and finding the similarities and differences in using conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Newsletters will

be of great help to the writer in teaching economic students at Hoa Lu University where the author is working

2 Aims of the study

The research firstly aims to study conjunctions used in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters and then explore the similarities and differences based on the syntactic and semantic features between them At the end of the study, some implications for teaching, learning and translation will be covered as useful resources To fully achieve these aims, the study should answer the following questions:

1 How frequent are conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Newsletters?

2 What are the similarities and differences in conjunction usages in English and Vietnamese Newsletters?

3 Scope of the study

Many topics relating to conjunctions as well as lots of types of newsletters in different fields need to be exploited For the feasibility of a minor M.A thesis, the writer narrowed the scope of the paper The main focus is on the descriptive and contrastive analysis of conjunction usages in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters with respect to the syntactic and semantic features

4 Methods of the study

The author has taken 40 samples of both English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters (20 English and 20 Vietnamese ones) to compare and contrast The study has been carried out based on a combination of different methods, among which the main method is

contrastive analysis This method involves two steps: describing the syntactic and semantic

features of conjunctions in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters, then comparing and contrasting to point out the similarities and differences between these two languages Together with this method, the writer also uses the quantitative method that is based on data

to examine conjunctions used in both English and Vietnamese Supporting techniques such as reference to the publication, consultation with the supervisor, discussion with colleagues, and personal observations are also of great significance

5 Design of the study

The study consists of three main parts organized as follows:

Part 1: “INTRODUCTION” giving a brief account of relevant information such as

rationale, aims, scope, methods, and designs of the study

Part 2: “DEVELOPMENT” is subdivided into two chapters Chapter 1 – Theoretical background Chapter 2 - “Contrastive analysis of conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Marketing Newsletters”

Part 3: “CONCLUSION” - summarizes what has been done, what has not been

covered, accompanied by suggestions for further study

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1.1 An overview of Newsletters

1.1.1 Definitions of Newsletters

According to Edward A Hamilton (1996) in the book “Newsletters Design”, a

newsletter is an ambiguous term It is defined as a condensed periodical used to communicate

specialized editorial information He explains briefly that “condensed” means it is shorter than

the average newspaper or magazine and provides lots of information in limited space;

“periodical” means it is published regularly; “specialized” means it focuses not on a broad

subject area such as finance, but on a subject-within-a-subject such as real estate finance, not

on organizations in general, but a specific organization

1.1.2 Types of Newsletters

In his book “Design it Yourself Newsletters” written by Chuck Green (2002), he describes three basic types of Newsletters or models of newsletters including Marketing

Newsletters, Relationship Newsletters, and Expert Newsletters

The first type is Marketing Newsletters They are commonly used by businesses to

promote a product or a kind of service It is also known as a company newsletter The marketing newsletter tries to turn prospective customers into patrons

The second type is Relationship Newsletters Some examples about this type are club

newsletters, employee newsletters, church newsletters, and school newsletters They focus on the shared interests of the target audience or reinforcing a relationship

The last type is Expert Newsletters This type can be very exclusive or be paid These

newsletters generally focus on a specific topic and the recipient is someone who has specifically requested the information in the newsletters and is willing to pay for the information

1.1.3 Formats of Newsletters

According to Janice Byer in the article “Newsletters are smart marketing” published

on August 12th, 2010, newsletters can be produced in several formats For businesses, the most economical and most readily acceptable newsletter formats are plain text emails, HTML emails, and HTML page on the website, PDF, and print

In comparison with English newsletters formats, the writer realizes that HTML and PDF are the widely used formats in Vietnamese newsletters

1.1.4 English and Vietnamese Marketing Newsletters

According to Nadeem Hussain (2008), marketing newsletter is a form of advertising that is sent periodically It is a document that notifies, reminds, advises, communicates and advertises about a business to its target audiences and customers In addition, it is also a good way to build an effective connection with clients Companies can motivate customers to buy

their products through informative marketing newsletters

Both English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters are being widely used by many companies with a view to promoting their businesses However, there is still a slight difference that English marketing newsletters content is often longer than that in Vietnamese

1.2 English and Vietnamese Conjunctions

1.2.1 English conjunctions

1.2.1.1 Definitions of English conjunctions

Conjunction is a word rooted from two Latin oniunctio or coniunctions meaning “to join together”

1.2.1.2 Classification of English conjunctions

According to Mallery (1967), conjunctions can be arranged into three principal groups: coordinating, correlative and subordinating conjunctions

(i) Coordinating conjunctions

 Definitions and functions of coordinators

 Kinds of coordinators

Collin Cobuild (1990) lists the most common coordinators: and, nor, but, or, then, for According to Oshima Alice and Hogue Ann, for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so are called

FANBOYS in order to help learners easier to remember

(ii) Subordinating conjunctions

 Definitions and functions of subordinators

 Kinds of subordinators

a Simple subordinators

b Compound subordinators

c Correlative subordinators

(iii) Correlative conjunctions

1.2.2 Vietnamese Conjunctions

1.2.2.1 Definitions of Vietnamese conjunctions

According to Hoàng Trung Thông (1998), conjunctions are words expressing the

grammatical relations used to join the components in sentences or in phrases Conjunctions do not make sense in terms of vocabulary and grammar, especially they never keep functions as subject or predicate in a sentence

1.2.2.2 Classifications of Vietnamese conjunctions

From the view of Diệp Quang Ban (1993), Vietnamese conjunctions are arranged into two principal groups: subordinating and coordinating conjunctions

1.3 Related studies

As shown above, opinions about conjunctions, newsletters in general and English and Vietnamese ones in particular are given by many different researchers Closely related to this

thesis, there are some researches In the Graduation Paper named “A contrastive analysis of

English coordinators “and/or/but” and Vietnamese equivalents” Le Thi Bich (2000) merely

contrasted the typical coordinating conjunctions “and/ or/ but” in English and Vietnamese

equivalents At the end of the study, the author came to a conclusion that there are similarities

and differences of using the conjunctions “and/ or/ but” in English and in Vietnamese

equivalents based on semantic and syntactic perspective Another research concerning conjunctions by Nguyen Thanh Huong (2002) in her graduation paper, she provided an overview of all kinds of English conjunctions More importantly, in this paper, the author listed some difficulties faced by Vietnamese learners in understanding and using conjunctions At the end of the graduation paper, some suggested solutions to Vietnamese learners’ difficulties in learning conjunctions were given as an effective source for learners

1.4 Summary

CHAPTER 2: CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF CONJUNCTIONS

IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE MARKETING NEWSLETTERS

2.1 Introduction

2.2 Contrastive analysis of conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Marketing Newsletters

2.2.1 Frequency of using conjunctions in English and Vietnamese Marketing Newsletters

The first thing that the researcher would like to mention in the study is the frequency

of occurrence of conjunctions in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters

words

conjunctions

Percentage (%)

6 "In the Black" Newsletter 1520 60 3.7%

12 "Keeping the Best" Newsletter 829 24 2.9%

Table 2.1: English conjunctions in English marketing newsletters

N0 Vietnamese Newsletters No of

words

conjunctions

Percentage (%)

1 Thai Son Tien Phong Company’s

Newsletter

3 Bourjois Company’s Newsletter 393 13 3.3%

5 Seabird Tours Company’s Newsletter 306 12 3.9%

6 Vina-Giay Company’s Newsletter 411 9 2.1%

7 Vinalands Company’s Newsletter 577 26 4.5%

9 Hong Ngoc Advertising’s Newsletter 315 8 2.5%

10 Lan Anh Computer Company’s

Newsletter

12 Trung Thuc Trade and Services

Limited Company's Newsletter

13 Sac Mau Printing and Advertising

Limited Company's Newsletter

14 Trung Son Cement Newsletter 497 19 3.8%

15 Bao Tin Construction Company's

Newsletter

16 T&C International Travel Newsletter 388 14 3.6%

17 Anh Son Freight Services Newsletter 588 31 5.2%

18 Khang Nghi Package Printing

Limited Company's Newsletter

19 Trung Chinh Audio Devices Limited

Company's Newsletter

20 Telecommunications Joint - Stock

Company

Table 2.2: Vietnamese conjunctions in Vietnamese marketing newsletters

From the above results, it can be said that the frequency of occurrence of conjunctions

in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters is equivalent

Based on the frequency of conjunctions used in both languages, the writer gives an account of the conjunctions which are of greater occurrence frequency than the others in both English and Vietnamese

N 0 English conjunctions No of conjunctions Percentage (%)

Table 2.3: English conjunctions in English marketing newsletters

conjunctions Percentage (%)

4 Vì vậy, chính vì vậy, chính vì lẽ đó

(so/ hence/ therefore)

5 Hơn thế nữa (What’s more/

moreover)

7 Không chỉ … mà còn (not only … but

also)

8 Vì, bởi vì, bởi lẽ (because) 7 2.0%

Table 2.4: Vietnamese conjunctions in Vietnamese marketing newsletters

It can be seen from Tables 2.3 and 2.4 that the most frequent occurrence of English

conjunctions in marketing newsletters are “and”, “or”, “but”, the Vietnamese equivalents most in use are “và, hoặc, nhưng” The reason why these conjunctions are popular in both

English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters is that they are widely used in daily communication Moreover, using the simple sentences can help customers fully understand the writer’s purposes in such a fast way

2.2.2 Similarities and Differences in conjunction usages in English and Vietnamese Marketing Newsletters

2.2.2.1 Similarities

 Syntactic features: Concerning syntactic features, it goes without saying that

conjunctions used in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters have the function

as connectors or linking devices

Another similar syntactic feature is that conjunctions in English as well as Vietnamese are used as transition signals of ideas and sentences in order to create the coherence in a paragraph

One more similar thing lies in the classifications of conjunctions Through comparison, the researcher agrees that both English and Vietnamese conjunctions can be divided into: coordinating conjunctions and subordinating conjunctions

Interestingly, it is easy for the writer to recognize that the position of conjunctions used in English and Vietnamese marketing newsletters are very alike They are highly flexible

and can occur in different positions: initial, medial or final

 Semantic features

Regarding semantic features, it is undoubtful that all conjunctions in English and Vietnamese have the same literal senses In other words, their meanings are equivalent More interestingly, conjunctions in both languages are used as the means of expressing meanings

such as alternative, contrast, reason, concession, purpose, and condition – consequence

Another similarity is concerned with the means of expressing meanings There exist many conjunctions representing the same semantic relationship in both English and Vietnamese For example, in English when expressing the concession relation, it is possible to

use the conjunctions such as “though/ although/ even though”

Furthermore, through comparison, it can be seen that the order expressing of meaning

in cause-effect relation and concessive relation (conjunctions expressing cause-effect,

concession) in both languages are similar

2.2.2.2 Differences

 Syntactic features

The first striking difference lies in the way of using conjunctions In fact, in English, there are conjunctions whose structures are quite different from those in Vietnamese From our own observations, English newsletters writers are likely to use one conjunction as a linking word in a sentence rather than two as in the Vietnamese ones For example, in

Vietnamese, “nhưng” can also combine with tuy/ mặc dù/ dù to form pairs of subordinate conjunction tuy … nhưng/ mặc dù … nhưng/ dù … nhưng And “nếu” often comes together with “thì” to form double conjunction “nếu … thì” Nevertheless, it is impossible in English

to have although … but/ though … but, if … so In other words, the pairs never exist in

English

The second difference can be found in the classifications of conjunctions As in English, conjunctions are divided into three main types: coordinators, subordinators, and correlatives while Vietnamese conjunctions only have two main types including coordinating and subordinating conjunctions Correlative conjunctions belong to subordinators

Another different point is concerned with functions of conjunctions In English, there exist some words whose functions are both conjunctions and prepositions, for example,

“since, for”

 Semantic features

With regard to semantic features, in the first place, it appears that Vietnamese conjunction meanings tend to be more flexible than those in English For instance, English

has conjunctions “moreover, furthermore” and they are translated into “hơn nữa, vả lại”, but

in Vietnamese, these conjunctions can be variously interpreted as “hơn thế nữa, hơn vậy nữa,

với lại/ vả lại …” This flexible usage is hardly seen in the English language which possesses a

range of fixed conjunctions because English pays much attention to grammar while Vietnamese people often focus on semantic form

The second noticeable difference is that in English there appear conjunctions expressing positive meanings or negative meanings because looking at English conjunctions readers can guess their functions and expressive nuances For example, some conjunctions

express positive meanings such as “and, in addition, what’s more,” and those express negative meanings such as “neither … nor”