Nghiên cứu các phương tiện rào đón trong các cuộc hội thoại của tác phẩm Cuốn theo chiều gió của nhà văn Margaret Mitchell

Trần Xuân Điệp Năm bảo vệ: 2012 Abstract: The objectives of the research were to investigate the linguistic devices of hedges and major pragmatic functions of identified hedges in the

Nghiên cứu các phương tiện rào đón trong các

cuộc hội thoại của tác phẩm Cuốn theo chiều

gió của nhà văn Margaret Mitchell

Nguyễn Thị Thanh Huyền

Trường Đại học Ngoại ngữ Luận văn ThS ngành: Ngôn ngữ Anh; Mã số: 60 22 015 Người hướng dẫn: Assoc Prof Dr Trần Xuân Điệp

Năm bảo vệ: 2012

Abstract: The objectives of the research were to investigate the linguistic devices of

hedges and major pragmatic functions of identified hedges in the conversations in the novel of Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell Two levels of linguistic descriptions – the quantitative and pragmatic analysis mainly based on taxonomy of hedging devices

by Yu (2009) and polypragmatic paradigm of hedges by Hyland (1998) – revealed that there are four main hedging categories used in the conversations in the novel, namely, modal hedges, performative hedges, quantificational hedges and pragmatic-marker hedges, in which quantificational hedges (43.8%) are employed with the highest frequency, followed by modal hedges (34.8%), performative hedges (8.2%) and other minor types of tag questions, subjunctives, and depersonalization (5.7%) The research findings also pointed out that speaker-orientation, accuracy-orientation and hearer-orientation are three main functions that identified hedging devices fulfill Among these types of function, speaker-oriented hedges (48.1%) emerge to be the most prominent, preceding accuracy-oriented hedges (45.7%) and hearer-oriented hedges (6.2%)

Keywords: Mitchell, Margaret; Tiếng Anh; Hội thoại; Ngôn ngữ

Content

1 Rationale

It is widely accepted that making frictions in human beings’ everyday interaction within a community is almost inevitable In order to reduce such a friction and maintain peace and social harmony, there are certain strategies that should be followed One of these strategies is

“hedging”

Introduced for the first time by Lakoff in 1972, the term of “hedge” was generally understood as

“words whose job is to make thing fuzzier or less fuzzy” Since its appearance, hedges have received a great deal of attention in conversation analysis where such devices are used to create

conviviality, facilitate discussion, or show politeness (Holmes, 1984; 1995) Hedging has also been associated with conveying purposive vagueness (Powell, 1985) and as a means of achieving distance between the speaker and what is said (Skelton, 1997)

Being an interesting linguistic phenomenon, hedges have been concerned by a number of linguists However, as a matter of fact, Yu (2009: 34) indicated that the majority of hedge studies are found to be concerned with academic or scientific writing, including genres such as economics (Pindi and Bloor, 1986; Channell, 1990), science digests (Fahnestock, 1986), medical discourse (Salager-Meyer, 1991; 1993; 1994; Adams-Smith, 1984), molecular genetics articles (Myers, 1989), and news-writing (Zuck & Zuck, 1986; 1987)

The field of spoken discourse, in contrast, seems to receive a comparatively limited number of comprehensive and thorough investigations Hence, with the hope of contributing to enrich the literature of researches on hedging in spoken discourse and to shed some light on the hedging phenomenon in American everyday conversations by investigating linguistic realization of hedging, pragmatic functions and some linguistic features of identified hedges, the author of the

present paper decided to carry out the study entitled “A study of hedging devices in

conversations in Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell” In addition to certain theoretical

contributions, the study is expected to have certain implications in language teaching when various linguistic expressions would be used to serve as valuable examples for hedging demonstration at work

2 Aims of the research and research questions

As mentioned earlier, the present research aimed to investigate linguistic devices of hedging,

their linguistic realization and their major pragmatic functions in conversations in Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

The present study attempts to address the following research questions:

 What are main hedging devices employed in conversations in Gone with the Wind by

Margaret Mitchell?

 What are major functions of identified hedging devices in conversations in Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell?

3 Implications of the research

Both theoretical and practical implications may be offered by the findings of the present study From the theoretical perspective, this study may serve as an additional source of empirical studies on hedges in a way that it indicated different types of hedging devices used in everyday conversations to achieve different pragmatic effects and proved the possibility of utilizing the

combined polypragmatic functions of hedges to investigate hedging phenomenon in spoken discourse

In terms of practical perspective, the present study may serve certain samples as a source of authentic materials in learning and teaching hedging devices and functions of hedges since a text-based approach is believed to be a key dealing with the lack of pragmatic competence of non-native speakers in communication with native ones

4 Scope of the research

First, although communication comes with paralinguistic and extra-linguistic factors, the present study is restricted to the verbal mode of hedging That is to say, the prosodic features (speed, tone, loudness, etc.) and the kinesic mode (facial expressions, eye contact, etc.) are outside the research scope Adjacency pairs, in addition, are also beyond the scope of the investigation Second, though pragmatic functions of hedging in spoken discourses are believed to be realized

through different communicative strategies without using hedging expressions, such as saying sorry, showing regret, expressing interest, and so on, the present paper is restrained to linguistic

realization of hedges, from which the pragmatic effects of hedges are expected to be portrayed

5 Methodology

The research is based on a detailed contextual analysis of conversations in the novel of Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell A comprehensive understanding of hedging devices in Gone with the Wind involves at least two levels of linguistic description: a quantitative analysis

and a pragmatic analysis The process of analysis is described as follows

- Quantitative analysis: The purpose of quantitative surface-level analysis is to generalize the

major forms of hedges in conversations All the indentified items were scrutinized in their context to select those linguistic categories that express hedges At this point, the taxonomy suggested by Yu (2009) was mainly employed to guide the process of identification of hedging devices in the conversations in the novel

- Pragmatic analysis: The research then employed a contextual analysis of authentic

conversations at the second level of analysis to identify the purposes served by identified hedging devices At this point, the pragmatic analysis was adapted from the theories introduced by Hyland (1998)

6 Research design

The study is designed to include three main parts

Part 1: Introduction, presenting the research rationale, aims of the study, research questions,

implications of the research, study scope, methodology and the structure of the paper

Part 2: Development

Chapter1: Theoretical Background, including definitions of hedge, hedging

taxonomies, relationship between hedges and conversational maxims and politeness

strategies, and general information on Gone with the Wind

Chapter 2: Findings and Discussions, describing major hedging devices, their linguistic

realization and pragmatic functions in Gone with the Wind

Part 3: Conclusion, summarizing the major points, limitations, and suggestions for further

studies

PART 2: DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER 1

Theoretical Background

1.1 Definitions of hedge

Lakoff (1972: 195), from the point of view of language philosophy, used the term hedge for the

first time to refer to “words whose job is to make things fuzzier or less fuzzy”

According to Brown & Levinson (1987: 145), hedges are defined as “a particle, word or phrase that modifies the degree of membership of a predicate or a noun phrase in a set; it says of that membership that it is partial or true only in certain respects, or that it is more true and complete than perhaps might be expected”

According to Hyland (1998: 5), hedging is “the means by which writers can present a proposition as an opinion rather than a fact: items are only hedges in their epistemic sense, and only when they mark uncertainty”

1.2 Classification of hedging devices and hedging functions

Concerning the classification of hedging devices, it is widely accepted that “the taxonomy of hedges is rather arbitrary, since there are no unified criteria for the classification of hedges” (Yu, 2009: 55) The following is an overview of some most prominent approaches to classification of hedges and hedging functions available in the literature

 Hyland’s classification

Hyland (1998: 156) argued that because “hedging devices may convey a range of meanings for particular users in particular contexts”, they “do not fit into a neat scheme of discrete categories which allows one meaning to be clearly distinguished from others” and “assigning specific meaning exclusively to particular forms is not always possible” (Hyland, 1996a: 437) Due to the

polypragmatic nature of hedging devices, he developed a fuzzy category model for hedging

device, in which two main categories were mentioned: content-oriented hedges and reader-oriented hedges

Content-oriented hedges, which are further subdivided into accuracy-oriented hedges and writer-oriented hedges, serve to mitigate the relationship between propositional content and a

non-linguistic mental representation of reality

The accuracy-oriented hedges, according to Hyland (1998: 164), refer to writer’s desire to express proposition with greater precision through attribute and reliability hedges While attribute hedges, represented by such adverbs as quite, almost, barely, generally, approximately, etc., help writers to specify more accurately how far their results approximate to an idealized

state, the second subtype, reliability hedges, indicating the amount of writer’s certainty or

uncertainty in a proposition are presented by modal verbs (e.g can, could, may, might), modal adjectives (e.g possible, likely), modal adverbs (e.g probably, possibly, maybe, apparently) and modal nouns (e.g possibility, probability, chance)

As concerns writer-oriented hedges, Hyland (1998: 170) argued that their aim is to shield the

writer from the possible consequences of negatability by limiting personal commitment Writer-oriented function of hedge, therefore, can be realized by employing the absence of writer agentivity, passive constructions, “abstract rhetors”, epistemic lexical verbs with judgmental and evidential meaning, attribution to the source of claim, which “help to minimize writers’ personal involvement and allows them to maintain a distance from a proposition” (Hyland, 1998: 171) Along with accuracy-oriented and writer-oriented hedges, Hyland (1998: 182) also discussed

reader-oriented category of hedges, in which the interpersonal interaction between readers and

writers is mostly dealt with by involving the readers in a dialog and addressing them as a thoughtful individual to respond and judge regarding the truth value of the proposition According to Hyland (1998: 184), personal attribution and reference marked by pronouns such as

I, we, my, our are considered as the main indicators of reader-oriented hedges Besides the use of

personal pronouns, reader-oriented hedge can be realized through the use of questions, appeals to

testability and suggestions of alternatives

 Yu’s classification

Another approach regarding hedging devices and their functions was proposed by Yu in 2009 Considering that it is indeed difficult to offer a satisfactory classification of hedging devices without a careful description of the properties and characteristics of hedging, Yu (2009: 68) developed a different taxonomy of hedging devices that is based on the grammatical, semantic

and pragmatic properties of hedging devices He suggested that from the complex interactions between grammatical, semantic and pragmatic properties of hedging, it can be predicted that certain linguistic areas are more likely to be the sources of hedging than others (Yu, 2009: 77) Based on exhaustive literature overview, Yu distinguished four broad hedging categories, namely modal hedges, performative (mental) hedges, pragmatic-marker hedges, and

quantificational hedges The category of modal hedges includes modal auxiliary verbs (e.g may, might, could, can), modal adjectives (e.g possible, likely, probable), modal adverbs (e.g possibly, perhaps, probably, maybe), modal nouns (e.g possibility, chance) The category of mental hedges is generally represented by lexical verbs with epistemic meaning (e.g think, suppose, guess, believe, etc) Quantificational hedges encompass those devices that indicate quantity, frequency and degree (e.g some, about, nearly, approximately, almost, quite, sort of, kind of, etc.) Pragmatic-marker hedges (implicit hedges), which are “apparently a feature of oral rather than written discourse” (Yu, 2009: 93), include such expressions as actually, in fact, generally speaking, in my opinion, for me, in other words, I suppose, I mean, if you like, you know, etc

1.3 About Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell

Gone with the Wind is a romantic drama and the only novel written by Margaret Mitchell It is

set in Jonesboro and Atlanta, Georgia during the American Civil War (1861 – 1865) and Reconstruction, and follows the life of Scarlett O'Hara, from the utmost luxury to absolute starvation and poverty, and from her innocence to her understanding and comprehension of life

Winning the 1937 Pulitzer Prize, Gone with the Wind has been considered to be one of the most

popular books of all time

CHAPTER 2

Findings and Discussions

1.1 Analysis of hedging devices in Gone with the Wind

1.1.1 Analysis of modal hedges

Modal auxiliary verbs are the most important category, which alone takes up 75.7% of the total, leaving the rest only 24.3% Coming next is modal adverbs, covering 17%, modal adjectives (6.4%), and epistemic lexical verbs (0.9%) No modal nouns as hedges were found as in the data,

accounting for 0% of the total

With regards to the first hedging category, modal auxiliary verbs, there is a total of 11 items used

as hedges in the data, in which would contributes 279 (31.1%) of 896 tokens, preceding could

(166 tokens, 18.5%) and wouldn’t/ would not (139 tokens, 15.5%) The prominence of modal verbs would is to be expected, since it expresses the meaning of epistemic possibility as Hyland (1998: 111) states the auxiliary would is recognized as the main hypothetical modal with epistemic meaning, expressing prediction It is also seen from the table that can’t/ cannot (15 tokens, 1.7%), might not (4 tokens, approximately 0.4%), and may not (3 tokens, roughly 0.3%)

were found to less outstanding in the conversations of the novel The followings are examples of

would, could and can extracted from the data

In terms of modal adverbs, the table lists seven items of hedging expressions It shows that maybe, with a frequency of 58 out of 201 tokens, or 28.9% of the total, is the most important device Perhaps (n = 52) ranks as the second most important Probably, certainly, and surely jointly amount to 78 tokens Other types like possibly and obviously make up just 13% Some

examples of adverbs as hedges are illustrated as follows

As concerns modal adjectives, six items with 76 tokens were found in the conversations in the novel, among which sure accounts for the highest contribution (44.7%), followed by afraid (25%) There is no difference in the number of likely, impossible, and obvious (n = 6) The final category identified is possible with 5 tokens, just making up 6.6% of the total

The category of epistemic lexical verbs is the last category of modal hedges discussed in this part A total of two items were recognized, in which seem (n = 10) was found and the rest was appear (n = 1) It should be mentioned that the number of epistemic verbs used as hedges should have been more, but it was decided not to include some verbs like suppose, believe, etc because they are considered to belong to performative hedges, an independent category of hedging in this

study

1.1.2 Analysis of performative hedges

There are 16 linguistic items used as hedging devices in the data, in which I think and its emphasis form I do think were exclusively the most noticeable performative hedges I think/ I do think (n = 87) alone account for 31.2% of the total Ranking at the second position is I suppose (n = 29), covering 11.1% The least prominent categories of performative hedges consist of I feel (1.1%), I feel (1.1%), I say (1.1%), I must tell (0.7%) and I regret (0.7%)

1.1.3 Analysis of quantificational hedges

Four types of quantificational hedges were identified,namely, quantity approximators, frequency approximators, degree approximators, and “negation + intensifier” approximators An pproximate half of quantificational hedges belong to degree approximators (816 tokens, 54.8%)

Another half is quantity approximators (495 tokens, 33.3%), “negation + intensifier” approximators ( 106 tokens, 7.1%), and frequency approximators (71 tokens, 4.8%)

Specifically, in terms of quantity approximators, there are 10 subtypes in which some/ some of is the most frequently used to perform hedging functions, making up 45.9%, followed by one of (11.1%) and many/ many of (10.1%) Abit of and a number of are two final subcategory of

quantificational expressions used as hedges, together covering 1.2% of the total

With respect to frequency approximators, the table demonstrates six items used in the conversations of the novel to convey hedging meaning, turning out 71 tokens Sometimes offers

26 tokens (36.6%) to become the most prominent The next rank comes often (17 tokens, 23.9%), hardly (16 tokens, 22.7%) The most moderate number of tokens belongs to occasionally (2.8%)

As with degree approximators, the subtable gives detailed information of degree approximators,

in which nine items functioned as hedging devices with 816 tokens are presented It can seen that

Just is the most abudant, alone accounting for 51.5%, leaving the rest 49.5% About is the second most prominent when covering 29.8% Partly and sort of were identified to cover only 1% of the

total Some examples of degree approximators are illustrated as follows

Finally, with reagrds to “negation + intensifier” approximators, the subtable shows that there are

five items in total with 106 tokens Not so and its variation contributed 37 tokens, making up 34.9 of the total rate, followed by not much and its variation (20.8%) not too and its variation

offer only 12 items, accounting for 11.3% Some extracts of “negation + intensifier” approximators used as hedging expressions from the data are drawn below

1.1.4 Analysis of pragmatic-marker hedges

In term of interpersonal pragmatic-marker (IPM) hedges which bring about a sense of

cooperation, sharing, intimacy or solidarity between interlocutors and are normally expressed by consultative, modest or humble attitude in a reduced or weakened tone, they boast five types, in

which Do you think (n = 45) is the most frequently used as hedges, and 105 tokens of the total,

accounting for 41.3% Interpersonal pragmatic-marker hedges are exemplified by the follows

In terms of propositional pragmatic-marker (PPM) hedges, the devices, which modify utterance

propositions via correction, elaboration, specification, expansion, or reorientation of propositional content and working on propositional content (Yu, 2009: 97), are roughly divided into six subsets However, it should be mentioned that the division is somewhat random, mainly for convenience in presentation rather than for theoretical significance

The first subset aims to guard against some misconceptions toward the utterance of the speaker and provides a frame for the speaker to clarify such misconceptions Therefore, this subset of

PPM hedges can shield the speaker from some potential false impression and subsequent risks There are four types and 58 tokens of this subset

Subset 2 is a division that signals sort of precondition or prerequisite for the upcoming statement, implying that the speaker is not committed to the statement Fallen in this subset are three types with 30 tokens

Subset 3 is a group used mainly for explanatory or exemplifying purposes in expressing difficult

issues In these cases, speakers normally use just like or something like to approximate the target

or to provide a rough idea or a paraphrase of the idea Three types with 25 tokens were identified for this subset

Subset 4 is a division that both signals the speaker’s ground for evaluation or judgment and indicates the speaker as the source of information By indicating the speaker as the source of information, these pragmatic markers may well save face for others Fallen in this subset are four types and 23 tokens of PPM hedges

Subset 5 indicates that the speaker is not the source of information, which helps the speaker avoid taking responsibility or being proved wrong with his/ her utterances This subset consists

of three types and four tokens

The final subset is a group of pragmatic markers serving the purpose of correcting misconceptions expected of the hearer and providing further explanations for the foregoing discourse They come to be used as hedges because further explanations are usually a weaker version of the foregoing discourse, making it sound more reasonable and substantiated, thus easier to be accepted by the hearer Included in this subset were seven types with 12 tokens

1.1.5 Analysis of tag questions, subjunctives and depersonalization

In terms of subjunctives, there are 10 types used as hedging devices, in which as if (9 tokens, 18.8%), If you were/ weren’t (8 tokens, 16.6%), and as though (8 tokens, 16.6%) were identified

to be the most important expressions serving hedging effect

As concerns tag questions, the table reveals that there are six types with 124 tokens to make tag questions become the most prominent category expressing hedging meaning, making up 64.2%

Tag questions of you such as “didn’t you?”, “have you?” or “are you?” offer 69 tokens, accounting for 55.6% while there is only one tag question of they acting as a hedging device

Finally, with regards to depersonalization, the table presents four subtypes employed to convey

hedging effect There is a total of 21 tokens found in the data, in which the expression It looks/ It looked alone accounts for 62%, followed by No one can (19%), and the rest (11%)

1.2 Functional analysis of hedging devices in Gone with the Wind

1.2.1 Speaker-oriented function of hedges

Speaker-orientation is the most prominent function that hedging devices perform in the conversations of the novel The percentage of 48.1% of the identified hedges was found to be speaker-focused ones, which aim to shield the speakers from possible consequences of error when making utterances The overall prominent position of speaker-oriented hedges in the corpus suggests that the speakers employ hedging devices primarily for the purpose of protecting themselves from being proved wrong by limiting their personal commitment This function of hedged was also identified to be realized by a variety of hedging categories, such as, modal auxiliary verbs, epistemic adverbs, epistemic adjectives, epistemic nouns, epistemic lexical verbs, and depersonalization All contributed a total of 1561 items functioning as speaker-oriented hedges

1.2.2 Accuracy-oriented function of hedges

Ranking at the second important function (45.7%), accuracy-orientation refer to the devices which show the speaker’s concern to propositions with precision as Coetzer (2002: 57) has mentioned “accuracy-oriented hedges try to present information as fully, accurately, and objectively as possible”

In the data of the research, typical linguistic means to realize this hedging function include

approximators of quantity, frequency, and degree such as some, about, nearly, almost, quite, so

on In other words, accuracy-oriented function of hedges in the conversations of the novel Gone with the Wind is fulfilled thanks to quantificational hedges

It can be concluded that speaker-oriented and accuracy-oriented hedges both concern about the precision, definiteness, or certainty of the utterance, but it is the focus of hedging that make them different from each other While accuracy-oriented hedges focus on modification of words or

phrases within a proposition, like He is sort of sad, the focus of speaker-oriented hedges is given

to the truth-value of the whole proposition and speaker’s commitment or attitude to the content,

like I think he is sad

1.2.3 Hearer-oriented function of hedges

Hearer-oriented function of hedges, which mostly fulfills interpersonal interaction between speakers and listeners and “works on syntactic level or utterance level to monitor the interaction/communication process” (Yu’s, 2009: 105), makes up a relatively small rate (6.2%)

in comparison with the speaker-oriented and accuracy-oriented function