A study of politeness strategies in the conversational activities of the course book new headway – elementary

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ******************** NGUYỄN THỊ HƯỜNG A STUDY OF POLITENESS STR

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

********************

NGUYỄN THỊ HƯỜNG

A STUDY OF POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN THE

CONVERSATION ACTIVITIES OF THE COURSE BOOK

NEW HEADWAY – ELEMENTARY

(NGHIÊN CỨU CHIẾN LƯỢC LỊCH SỰ TRONG HOẠT ĐỘNG

GIAO TIẾP CỦA GIÁO TRÌNH NEW HEADWAY - ELEMENTARY)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

HA NOI - 2017

Số thứ tự:……

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY - HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

********************

NGUYỄN THỊ HƯỜNG

A STUDY OF POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN THE

CONVERSATION ACTIVITIES OF THE COURSE BOOK

NEW HEADWAY – ELEMENTARY

(NGHIÊN CỨU CHIẾN LƯỢC LỊCH SỰ TRONG HOẠT ĐỘNG

GIAO TIẾP CỦA GIÁO TRÌNH NEW HEADWAY - ELEMENTARY)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60140111

Supervisor: Prof Dr Nguyễn Quang

Số thứ tự:……

DECLARATION

for the degree of Master of Arts (MA), accept the requirements of the university rel ting to the retention nd use of M ster‘s Gr du tion P per deposited in the library

In terms of these conditions, I agree that the origin of my paper deposited in the library should be accessible for the purposes of study and research, in accordance with the normal conditions established by the librarian for the care, loan and reproduction of the paper

October, 1 st 2017

N ễ H

up my thesis to the best of my ability and opened my knowledge of literature It was very lucky for me to be under his guidance

My heartfelt thanks and blessings also go to my family, especially my parents who are always by my side and support me during the time I did my thesis Their well-being is of great spiritual motivation for me all the time

Last but not least, I want to offer special thanks to all of my friends who always supported and stood by me during the completion of the graduation paper

To them all I dedicate this thesis

ABSTRACT

English has been an indepensible means of communnication in daily life However, in fact, a large number of English learners find it hard to communicate fluently and confidently Therefore, it is essential to find out ways to interact well in daily communication which are partly presented in the politeness strategies used during the process of interaction As a result, this study is carried to find out politeness strategies and how they work in communication All converational ctivities in the course ook ―New He dw y – Element ry‖ are examined Then the data is analyzed according to two types of strategies, the positive and negative ones The research results reveal that positive politeness strategies are used much more than negative politeness strategies found in most of conversations in the book Furthermore, twelve positive politeness strategies and six nagative posliteness strategies are used in the book Finally, implications are offered for teaching and learning English with consideration to politeness strategies in communication

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION ……… i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .……… ii

ABSTRACT ……… iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ……… iv

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES … ……… vi

LIST OF APPENDICES ……… vi

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ……… vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Statement of research problem and the rationale for the study 1

1.2 Aim and significance of the study 2

1.3 Objectives of study 2

1.4 Scope of study 2

1.5 Design of the study 3

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Culture and Communication 4

2.1.1 Definition of culture 4

2.1.2 Definition of communication 4

2.1.3 The relationship between culture and communication 5

2.2 Politeness 5

2.2.1 What is politeness? 5

2.2.2 Previous studies on politeness 8

2.2.3 Positive politeness and positive politeness strategies 9

2.2.4 Negative politeness and negative politeness strategies 14

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

3.1 Data source 18

3.2 Methods 18

3.2.1 Techniques for data collection 19

3.2.2 Techniques for data analysis 19

3.2.3 Process of data analysis 19

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 4.1 Frequency of positive and negative politeness strategies in the conversational activities 20

4.2 Positive politeness strategies in the conversational activities 21

4.3 Negative politeness strategies in the conversational 26

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 5.1 Summary of the findings 30

5.2 Implications to English teaching and learning 31

5.3 Limitation of the study and Reccomendations for further research 31

REFERENCES 33 APPENDICES I

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Circumstances determining choice of strategy (Brown and Levinson,

1978, 60)

Figure 2: Strategies to minimize risk of losing face (Nguyen Quang, 2001)

Figure 3: The frequency of positive politeness strategies

Figure 4: The frequency of negative politeness strategies

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 The statistics of positive and negative politeness strategies

Table 2 The statistics of positive politeness strategies

Table 3 The statistics of negative politeness strategies

LIST OF APPENDICES

APPENDIX: Summary of positive and negative politeness strategies in the course ook ―new he dw y – element ry‖

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

S: Speaker

H: Hearer

FTA: Face Threatening Act

PPS: Positive Politeness Strategies

NPS: Negative Politeness Strategies

T: Track

P: Page

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Statement of research problem and rationale for the study

People are probably unable to communicate well in their daily life, without language which is regarded as the most popular means of communication to exchange information among people at work or in study Although there have been over 10,000 languages available in the world, some of them have been used as the common languages and only few have been spoken widely around the world English is a language which many countries use as a first language and many have considered it as the common language for teaching in schools and universities People have studied English for different purposes such as getting job, studying abroard, promotion or travelling

In Vietnam, English has been taught as a foreign language for serveral decades and recently, English has become a compulsory subject in most schools, colleges and universities Although teaching speaking skill as well as other skills have been put in all the textbooks from primary school to high school for several years, most Vietnamese teachers have still focused on teaching grammar like structural rules and forms of tenses rather than speaking skill This accidentally makes a large number of students learning English but unable able to make everyday conversations well when they meet foreigners who speak English Besides, many Vietnamese are afraid of talking in English because they do not know how to appear polite in English Therefore, this study is conducted with the hope to point out how positive and negative politeness strategies are used in the conversational activities under investigation, thus helping to improve the teaching

nd le rning of ―Everyd y English‖ in the course book New Headway – Elementary, by Liz & John Soars

1.2 Aim and significance of the study

This research aims to r ise Vietn mese le rner‘s w reness of how to use politeness strategies appropriately in order to achieve successful communication Moreover, the study expects to put forward some suggestions for the teaching of positive and negative polite strategies to language teachers Hence, as this thesis completed, it can be beneficial for both theoretical and practical contributions In terms of theoretical significance, this study contributes to making explicit the important role of politeness strategies in verbal communication, especially in cross- cultural communication For practical significance: This study helps gain an insight into the method employable for teaching politeness strategies in the course book

―New He dw y - Element ry‖ s well s in djustment nd pplic tion of te ching techniques

1.3 Objectives of the study

This thesis is conducted with two main objectives Firstly, the author comes to investigate positive and negative politeness in most typical contextual environments

in ―Everyd y English‖ of the course ook New He dw y – Elementary In addition, the second purpose is to collect and analyze the extent to what politeness strategies are recruited and distributed in the coursebook In brief, these objectives can be achieved through finding tentative answers to the following research questions:

1 How are positive politeness strategies used in the “Everyday English activities”of the course book “ New Headway – Elementary”?

2 How are negative politeness strategies used in the “Everyday English activities”of the course book “ New Headway – Elementary”?

1.4 Scope of the study

The study investigates the use of positive and negative politeness strategies only

in the conversational activities of ―Everyd y English‖ in 14 units presented in the course book New Headway – Elementary written by Liz & John Soars

1.5 Design of the study

The study consists of five chapters Chapter 1 (Introduction) presents the rationale, the objectives, significance and the scope of the study Literature of culture, communication, politeness and politeness strategies are reviewed in chapter 2 Chapter 3 disscusses methodology of the study with research questions, the participants, the method for data collection and data analysis In chapter 4, data are analyzed and findings are discussed towards research questions 2 and 3 Finally, chapter 5 summarizes the main finding of the study, pointing out some limitations of the research, offering implications for English teaching and learning, and giving recommemdations for further research

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Culture and Communication

2.1.1 Definition of culture

Levine nd Adelm n (cited in Nguy n Qu ng, 2002: 30-31) hold that

―culture is a share background (for example, national, ethnic, religious) resulting

from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, attitudes, and values‖ ―Culture‖ in this study does not refer to art, music, literature, food, clothing

styles, and so on It refers to the informal and often hidden patterns of human interactions, expressions, and viewpoints that people in one culture share The hidden nature of culture has been compared to an iceberg, most of which is hidden underwater! Like the iceberg most of the influence of the culture on an individual cannot be seen The part of culture that is exposed is not always that which creates cross-cultural difficulties; the hidden aspects of the culture have significant effects

on behaviour and on interactions with others

According to Phillip K Bock (cited in Nguyen Thi Tuyet, 2005: 3), culture is

considered ―in its broadest sense, as what makes you a stranger when you are away

from home It includes all those beliefs and expectations about how people should speak and act, which have become a kind of second nature to one as a result of social learning When you are with members of a group who share your culture, you do not have think about it, for you are all viewing the world in pretty muach the same way and you all know, in general terms, what to expect of one another‖

Banks (1989: 8) also shares a very remarkable notion of culture in which

he claims that “the essence of culture is not its artifacts, tools or other tangible culture elements but how the members of the group interpret, use and perceive.‖

not only the spoken and written words but also language, personal mannerism and style, the surrounding and things that add meaning to a message.‖

Nguyen Quang (1998: 3) states that ―Communnication is the process of

sharing meaning through verbal and nonverbal behaviour.‖

2.1.3 The relationship between culture and communication

There has always existed the close relationship between culture and communication; that means, culture creates communication and communication in its turns reflects culture Without communication, it would not be possible to see and interpret how culture manifests itself intraculturally and interculturally

Samovar (1981: 20) points out the close-knit relationship between these two

factors in inter ction ―Culture and communication are inseparable because culture not only dictates who talks to whom, about what and how the communication proceeds, it also helps to determine how people encode messages, the meanings they have for messages, and the conditions and circumstances under which various messages may or may not be sent, noticed or interpreted Culture is the foundation of communication‖ It is revealed from

S mov r‘s opinion th t culture and communication got are reciprocally supportive in which culture is the cradle to nourish communication and communication comes back to be the paddle for the development and maintenance of culture

2.2 Politeness

2.2.1 What is politeness?

Politeness is an important construct in the studies of communication and pragmatics, especially in cross – cultural communication Hence, it is obvious that there have been lots of definitions and conceptualisations of politeness extended by many scholars

According to Blum-Kulla (1983: 131), politeness linguistically refers to ―the

interactional balance achieved between two needs: the need for pragmatic clarity and the need to avoid coerciveness”,

Thomas (1995: 157) gives another opinion of politeness, politeness is

understood as “strategies (or series of strategies) employed by a speaker to achieve

a variety of goals, such as promoting or maintaining harmonious relation”

Holmes (1992: 296) points out in her book An Introduction to

Sociolinguistics th t politeness includes t king ccount of other people‘s feeling in

order to make himself comfortable

Nguy n Qu ng (2004: 11) functionally claims that “Politeness is any

communicative act (verbal and/or nonverbal) which is intentionally and appropriately meant to make other(s) feel better or less bad”

Generally, most of the scholars share the view that politeness is any behaviour in communication that the is resorted to the im to s tisfy the he rer‘s or

at to make the hearers feel better or less bad

 Face

It is undeniable that the realisation of politeness in communication partly relates to the public self-image of the participants Brown and Levinson (1987)

mention this image in their research which is referred to s ―f ce‖ ―Face is the

public-self image that every member wants to claim for himself‖ (Brown and

Levinson, 1987: 61) In addition, these authors classify face into two types: negative face and positive face Negative face focuses on the basic claim to territories, personal preserves, rights to non-distraction while positive face concerns with the positive consistent self-image or ‗person lity‘(cruci lly including the desire that this self-image be appreciated and approved of) claimed by interactants

In daily communication, it is possible to exist both dimensions: one is respect for face as norms or values subscribed to by members of a society which is called face as want, the other dimension runs contrary to the face wants of the addressee and/or of the speaker which is defined as Face-Threatening Act (FTA) Brown and Levinson (1987: 60) suggest five common strategies to deal with FTA, these

stratetegies are illustrated in Figure 1 below:

Lesser risk

Greater risk

Figure 1: Circumstances determining choice of strategy

(Brown and Levinson, 1978, 60)

Nguyen Quang (2002) comments that this view by Brown and Levinson is more or less eurocentric and thus decreasing their di gr m‘s univers l v lue Therefore, he proposes the following figure:

Figure 2: Strategies to minimize risk of losing face (Nguyen Quang, 2001)

5 Don’t

do the FTA

On record

4 Off record

1 Without redressive action, badly

With redressive action

2

Positive Politenes

s

3

Negative Politenes

Positive politeness Negative politeness

1 Without redressive action/ On record

2.2.2 Previous studies on politeness

There has been a variety of studies conducted to investigate politeness by various scholars through out the years That could list Lakoff (1973, 1990), Leech (1983), Watts (1989), Frazer (1990), Cruse (2000), Eelen (2001, Watts (2003)…

Lakoff (1973: 296) is one of the pioneers to adopt Grice's construct

of Conversational Principles in an effort to account for politeness She explicitly extends the notion of grammatical rule to the domain of politeness and considers the form of sentences

Leech (1983: 82) introduces the politeness principle whose function is to maintain the social equilibrium and the friendly relations and to assume that our interlocutors are being cooperative in the first place

Watts (1989: 19) identifies politeness as linguistic behaviour which

is perceived to be beyond what is expectable Politeness is viewed as explicitly marked, conventionally interpretable subset of 'politic' responsible for the smooth functioning of socio-communicative interaction and the consequent production of well-formed discourse within open social groups characterized by elaborated speech codes

Lakoff (1990: 34) sees politeness as "a system of interpersonal relations

designed to facilitate interaction by minimizing the potential for conflict and confrontation inherent in all human interchange‖

Fraser (1990: 232) presents the notion of politeness as a Conversational Contract

Cruse (2000: 362) states that the purpose of politeness is the maintenance of harmonious and smooth social relations in the face of the necessity to convey belittling messages

Eelen (2001: 240) argues for an alternative conceptualization of 'politeness' with the characteristics of variability, evaluativity, argumentativity and

discursiveness

Watts (2003: 20) refers to 'Politic behaviour' in which the participants construct

as being appropriate to the ongoing social interaction The construction may have been made prior to entering the interaction, but is always negotiable during the interaction, despite the expectations that participants might bring to

it

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), politeness strategies are developed in order to save the hearers' "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 We can see it as a way to do the Face Threaten Acts (FTAs) or don‘t do the FTAs

2.2.3 Positive politeness and positive politeness strategies

2.2.3.1 What is positive politeness?

In the research on politeness in language usage, Brown and Levinson (1987)

note th t ―Positive politeness is redress directed to the addressee‟s positive face,

perennial desire that his wants (or the actions/ acquisitions/ values resulting from them) should be thought of as desirable” (Brown and Levinson, 1987: 101)

According to Nguy n Qu ng (2004), ‗Positive politeness is any

communicative act (verbal and/or nonverbal) which is intentionally and appropriately meant to show the speaker‟s concern to the addressee, thus, enhancing the sense of solidarity between them‟ (2004: 24)

In this thesis, the researcher focuses her analysis on the positive strategies found in the conversations of the course book

2.2.3.2 Positive politeness strategies

Positive politeness stratedy, as seen by Yule (1996: 64), ―leads the requester

to inquire for a common goal, and even friendship‖ Positive politeness is to focus

on proximity etween spe kers nd he rers which c n e shown s ―solidarity

strategy‖ People use this str tegy in order to indic te common ground and

solid rity in which spe kers sh re he rers‘ w nts Thus, positive politeleness is used not only to redress the FTA, but also to indicate that speakers want to come closer

to hearers

Brown and Levinson (1987) specify the super-strategy on record with positive politeness into fifteen positive politeness strategies realised in communication, while Nguyen Quang (2002) emerged seventeen positive politeness strategies to help speakers minimize the FTA Those seventeen strategies are presented below:

Strategy 1: Notice, attend to H (his/ her interest, wants, needs, goods, etc ) This

str tegy suggests th t S should t ke notice of spects of H‘s conditions with compliments to create the harmony in interpersonal relations and to achieve communicative point

Eg: A: Thank goodness! It‟s Friday!

B: Yeah Have a nice weekend!

A: Same to you (T7.11)

Or: It‟s a lovely day! What shall we do?

It‟s raining again! What shall we do? (T12.7)

Or: Goodness, you cut your hair! ( ) By the way, 1 came to borrow some flour

You must be hungry, it‟s a long time since breakfast How about some lunch? (Brown and Levison, 1987, p.103)

Strategy 2: Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H) This is often done

with exaggerated intonation, stress, and other aspects of prosodic

Eg Every place I go, I‟ll think of you

Every song I sing, I‟ll sing for you (T14.5)

Strategy 3: Intensify interest to H

S intensifies the interest of his or her own contri ution, y ―m king good story‖‖ nd draws H as a participant into the conversation with direct questions and

expressions like you know, see what

Eg: And I have never met a famous person –oh, just a minute, well not met but I‟ve seen er I saw a famous politician at the airport once – Oh, who was it? I can‟t remember his name Er I‟ve only seen one Shakespeare play, when I was at school, we saw Romeo and Juliet (T14.3)

Strategy 4: Use in-group identity markers

Using any of the numberable ways to convey in-group membership: address forms, language or dialect, jargon or slang and ellipses

Eg: (1) I couldn‟t hear I think it said 4

Look! There it is on the departure board It is gate 4

OK Come on! Let‟s go (T14.7)

(2) Mind if I smoke?

Got any spare cash?

How about a drink? (Brown and Levison, 1987, p.112)

Strategy 5: Seek agreement in safe topics S seeks ways in which it is posibble to

agree with H

Eg: A: I don‟t sell apples

B: You don‟t sell apples That‟s strange What about cheese Can I have some cheese?

A: I don‟t sell cheese, either

B: You don‟t sell cheese! That‟s amazing Nơ, I want some pizza, but I‟m sure you don‟t sell pizza, do you?(T9.6)

Strategy 6: Avoid disagreement

The desire to agree or appear with H leads also to mechanisms for pretending to agree such as white lies and hedges

Eg: A: Oh, sorry I forgot Usually, I have pizza but not on Thursdays Today‟s Thursday, isn‟t it?

B: Yes, it is Mmm OK, er OK Forget the pizza What about bread? I don‟t suppose you have any bread?

A: Yes, you are right (T9.6)

A: Have you got friends?

B: I have friends So-called friends I had friends Let me put it that way (Brown and Levison, 1987, p.114)

Strategy 7: Presuppose, raise, assert common ground

The v lue of S‘s spending time nd effort on eing with H, s m rk of friendship

or interest in him, by talking for a while about unrelated topics

Eg: Isn‟t it a beautiful day?

I had a really hard time learning to drive, didn‟t I?

Strategy 8: Joke to put H at ease Jokes are based on mutual shared background and

v lues nd putting H ― t e se‖

Eg: Four fine fresh fish for you

I‟m looking back, to see if she‟s looking back, to see if I‟m looking back, too see if she‟s looking back at me!(T11.7)

Strategy 9: Assert or presuppose S‟s knowledge of and concern for H‟s wants

Asserting or implying knowledge of H‘s w nts nd willingness to one‘s own w nts

in with them

Eg: A: Ugh! Work again! I hate Monday mornings!

B: Me, too Did you have a nice weekend?

A:Yes It was brilliant.(T7.11)

Strategy 10: Offers, promises

In order to redress the potential threat of some FTAs, S may choose to stress his cooperation with H in another way He may, that is, claim that (within a certain sphere of relevance) whatever H wants, S wants for him and will help to obtain Offers and promises are the natural outcome of choosing this strategy

Eg: I‟ll ring back again or I‟ll just get her (Unit 6, pg 51)

Strategy 11: Be optimistic that the H wants what the speaker wants

In this strategy, S to assume that H wants S‘s w nts for S (or for S and H) and will

help him to obtain them That is, for S to be so presumptuous as to assume H will cooperate with him may carry a tacit commitment for S to cooperate with H as well,

or at least a tacit claim that H will cooperate with S because it will be in their

mutual shared interest

Eg: I know you‟re always glad to get a tip or two on gardening

- Wait a minute, you haven‟t brushed your hair! (as husband goes out

of the door)

The wife wants the husband to brush his hair before appearing in public; by expressing this want in terms that assume he (H) wants it too (even though he may well not care), she puts pressure on him to cooperate, with her wants

Strategy 12: Include both S and H in the activity

By using n inclusive ‗we‘ form, when S re lly me ns ‗you‘ or ‗me‘, he c n

call upon the cooperative assumptions and thereby redress FTAs Noting that let‟s

in English is n inclusive ‗we‘ form, common ex mples re:

Eg: Let‟s stay at home and watch a video Or Let‟s go to the cinema (T12.8) Let‟s get on with dinner, eh? (i.e you)

Let‟s stop for a bite (i.e / want a bite, so let‟s stop)

Give us a break, (i.e me) (Brown and Levison, 1987, p.127)

Strategy 13: Give or ask for reasons

S gives reason as to why he wants, what he wants and assumes (via optimism) that if there are no good reasons, why hearer shouldn‘t or c n‘t cooperate

Eg: Why not lend me your cottage for the weekend?

Why don‟t we go to the seashore!

Why don‟t I help you with that suitcase

Strategy 14: Assume or assert reciprocity

S may indicate that he believes reciprocity to be prevailed between H and himself, thus that they are somehow locked into a state of mutual helping

Eg: Dad, if you help me with my maths homework, I‟ll mow the lawn after school tomorrow

If you help me do washing up, I will lend you my new notebook

Strategy 15: Give gifts to H (goods, sympathy, understading, cooperation)

S may satisfy H‘s positive-face w nt y ctu lly s tisfying some of H‘s wants (action of gift-giving, not only tangible)

Eg: A: A glass of wine before bed, my dear?

B: Oh, yes please (Unit 3, pg 25)

Strategy 16: Encourage

S wants to comfort as well as encourage H when he gets some bad news or in trouble This can be considered as redness action or face saving act

Eg: A:Oh I‟m so sorry My cat broke your vase

B: Don‟t worry It‟s not your fault Take it easy

Strategy 17: Ask personal questions

Personal questions are considered to be curious and sometimes impolite However, when S wants to show his concern or interest, this strategy also works

Eg: Are you married?(Unit 2, pg 13)

2.2.4 Negative politeness and negative politeness strategies

2.2.4.1 What is negative politeness?

Neg tive politeness is ―redressive action addressed to the addressee‟s

negative face: his want to have his freedom of action unhindered and his attention unimpeded‖ (Brown nd Levinson, 1987: 129) The tendency to use negative

politeness forms emphasizes the hearer‘s right to freedom That is why negative politeness strategies are called deference strategies While positive politeness narrows the distance between interlocutors, negative politeness keeps a distance between them or avoids interfering with other‘s person l ff irs

Professor Nguy n Qu ng (2004) seems to share the same opinion as he

supposes that „Negative politeness is any communicative act (verbal and/or

nonverbal) which is intentionally and appropriately meant to show that the speaker does not want to impinge on the addressee‟s privacy, thus, maitaining the sense of distance between them‟ (2004: 88)

2.2.4.2 Negative politeness strategies

The main focus on using this strategy is to assume that speakers may be imposing on the hearer, and intruding on their space Therefore, these automatically assume that there might be some social distance or awkwardness in the situation

According to Nguyen Quang (2003), there are eleven negative politeness

strategies, of which the initial ten ones are proposed originally by Brown and

Levison (1987) Following are these negative politeness strategies:

Strategy 1: Be conventionally indirect

In this strategy, a speaker is faced with opposing tensions: the desire to

give he rer n ―out‖ by being indirect, and the desire to go on record These

situations could be solved by the compromise of conventional indirectness, the

use of phrases and sentences that have contextually unambiguous meanings

which re different from their liter l me ning, such s ―could you”, “can you”,

“why for God‟s sake?”, etc

E.g: Could you pass me the salt, please.?

Yes, of course Here you are (T9.8)

Strategy 2: Question/ hedge

This strategy derives from the want not to presume or coerce H In

liter ture, ―hedge‖ is p rticle, word or phrase that modifies the degree of

membership of a predicate or noun phrase in a set, such as “sort of”, “rather”,

“kind of”,”think” etc

E.g: A: It‟s very hot in here Can I open the window?

B: Really? I‟m quite cold

A: OK It doesn‟t matter (T4.7) -I don‟t suppose you have any bread? (T 9.6)

Strategy 3: Be pessimistic

This str tegy gives redress to he rer‘s neg tive f ce y explicitly

expressing dou t th t the conditions for the ppropri teness of spe ker‘s speech

act obtain This strategy can be done through doing indirect requests with

Could you do X?”, “by any chance”

E.g: Could you come and pick me this weekend?

You don‟t have any manila envelopes, do you by any chance?

Strategy 4: Minimize the imposition

This strategy indirectly may pay hearer defense It will let H understand that there is no imposition even whether H could do something for S or not

E.g: A: Hi, Liz It‟s Tom Listen! There‟s a party at my home on Saturday Can you come?

B: Oh, sorry, Tom I can‟t.It‟s my sister‟s wedding

A: Oh, never mind Perhaps next time Bye!

B: bye! (T.6.8)

Strategy 5: Give deference

S humbles himself, his capacities, and possessions, namely that which satisfies H‘s wants to be treated as superior This strategy occurs between S and

H who have different social status, and normally S is at a lower position Giving

deference c n e re lized with the use of such phr ses: ―excuse me”, “sir”,

“sorry to bother you but… ”, “please accept my apology”, ect

E.g: A: Excuse me

B: Yes?

A: Do you have a dictionary?

B: I‟m sorry I don‟t It‟s at home

A: That‟s OK (T4.7)

Strategy 6: Apologize

By apologizing for doing an FTA, the speaker can indicate his reluctance to impinge on he rer‘s neg tive f ce nd there y p rti lly redress th t impingement S

can use this strategy with some phrases, such as: “I‟m sorry…”, “I apologize…”,

“I‟m sure you….but… ”, “I wouldn‟t normally ask you but….”, “I hope this doesn‟t bother you too much”

E.g: A: I‟m sorry I‟m late The traffic is bad today

B: Don‟t worry Come and sit down We‟re on page 25 (T4.7)

Strategy 7: Impersonalize S and H

When using this strategy, S means he does not want to put any imposition

on H Therefore, the spe ker voids using the pronouns ―I‖ nd ―you‖ In this strategy, it is realized by the use of performative verbs and impersonal verbs

E.g: It seems that

- There appear some errors in the report submitted

Strategy 8: State the FTA as a general rule

One way of dissociating S and H from the particular imposition in the FTA, and hence a way of communicating that S does not want to impinge but is merely forced to by circumstances, is to state the FTA as an instance of some general social rule, regulation, or obligation

E.g: I‟m sorry, but late-comers cannot be seated till the next interval

Strategy 9: Nominalize

In English, people tend to use more nouns to be negatively polite The more

S normalizes an expression, the more he dissociates from it

E.g: A: Do you want any help with the washing-up?

B: No, of course not We have a dishwasher (T9.8)

Strategy 10: Go on record as incurring a debt or as not indebting H

S can redress an FTA by explicitly claiming his indebtedness to H, or by disclaiming any indebtedness of H, by means of expressions such as for requests and for offers

E.g: - Can I borrow your dictionary, pleaase? (for request)

- Yes, if I can find it I think it‟s in my bag (T9.9)

Strategy 11: Avoid asking personal questions

This strategy is regarded as a good negative politeness strategy in

communication to avoid impingement on H and to create distance between S and H

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

This chapter provides information of research methods, research questions, research techniques as well as the related issues of data collection and analysis

3.1 Data source

The prim ry d t source is from the course ook ―New Headway -

elementary‖ written y Liz So r nd pu lished y Oxford University Press It is a

book in the six-volume series of the book as a second language for learners The book contributes to improve learners‘ ability in all four language skills: listening, speaking, reading and writing, especially communicative activities daily conversations The book includes 14 units with many simple small talks in

―Listening‖ nd ―Everyd y English‖; so it is a good opportunity for beginning learners to practice speaking English easily

The research focuses on the utterances in conversations in each unit, especially in listening t sks nd―Everyday English‖ Then ll st tistics needed for this study are calculated and grouped into different categories which are to be presented in the next chapter of the research

The data from the contents of the course book are reported and described to ensure the reliabity and validity of the study

3.2 Methods

In this research, the author applies both qualitative and quantitative method since the study concentrates on the practical aspects of communication with reference to politeness strategies The qualitative method recruited in this research includes textual analysis and, to a certain extent, observation The application of quantitative method is to present the extent and the differences that the politeness strategies are used The quantitative method are likely to be recruited much more than the qualitative one since it helps to explain how politeness strategies are distributed and used in the whole textbook: which ones are used more and how they are distributed

3.2.1 Techniques for data collection

To collect data, the author observes all the conversational activities in the categorized according to the classification proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987) and revised by Nguyen Quang (2002)

3.2.2 Techniques for data analysis

After collection, utterances are examined and classified into types of politeness strategies Results are then presented and findings are critically discussed for the answer to the research questions posed for this study

Categorizing data: All utterances that are collected from the course book

are categorized into different types and sub-typess with graphs and tables

Describing data: Different politeness strategies are described with their

typical features and markers and in specific communicative events

3.2.3 Process of data analysis

The following steps are taken for data analysis

(1) Checking the course book carefully The researcher examined the course book, the conversation in the communicative activities Then, all phrases and sentences appearing in the units, especi lly in the listening t sks nd ―Every English‖activities, are picked up

(2) Classifying the politeness strategies based on the framework proposed

by Brown and Levinson (1987) and Nguyen Quang (2002)

(3) Illustrating the data by summary in figures and table

(4) Interpreting the data

CHAPTER 4 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

In this chapter, the author will investigate conversational activities and analyse politeness strategies to find answers to the research questions

4.1 Frequency of positive and negative politeness strategies in the conversational activities

In the analysis of the politeness strategies collected in the course ook ―New Headway – Element ry‖, the author mainly apply the theory by Brown and Levison (1987) and Nguyen Quang (2002) which refers to politeness as any communicative act (verbal and/or non-verbal) which is intentionally and appropriately meant to make another/ others feel better or less bad In this part, the researcher investigates the occurrence of positive and negative politeness strategies to see how politeness strategies are presented in the coursebook

The coursebook consists of 14 units After examination, it is found that there are 137 politeness strategies operating in the conversational activities The detailed presentation of these strategies are shown in the Appendix Summary of

the statistics is given in Table 1

Table 1: The statistics of positive and negative politeness strategies

Politeness strategies Sum Percentage

people tend to show their concern or notice to others to narrow the social distance and create harmony in interpersonal relations

It is important to note that the mixed politeness strategies are also presented

in the course book although the frequency is quite low with 0.7% Let‘s examine the following example:

Tara: Why did you leave London? You had a good job

Mel: Yes, but I‟ve got a better job here

Tara: And you had a big flat in London

Mel: Well, I‟ve got a bigger flat here

Tara: Really? How many bedrooms has it got?

Mel: Three And it‟s got a garden It‟s nicer than my flat in London and it‟s

cheaper

Tara: But you haven‟t got any friends!

Mel: I‟ve got a lot of friends here People are much friendlier than in London Tara: But the country is so boring

Mel: No, it isn‟t It‟s much more exciting than London Seacombe has got

shops, a cinema, a theater, and a park And the air is cleaner and the streets are safer

(New Head way – Elementary Unit 10, Track 10.3/ p.120)

In this conversation, the mixed strategy is made of Strategies 3 and 5 Firstly,

the speaker (Tara) shows her interest in the he rer‘s (Mel) life and work in London,

especially in what the hearer is experiencing In addition, the speaker is trying to argue and discuss with the hearer about the life in London, especially the differences from their current city As responding to spe ker‘s preceding s ying, the

hearer often repeats part or all of what the preceding speaker has said in the conversation when talking about the ―flat”, “friends” and “country” in London

4.2 Positive politeness strategies in conversational activities

According to Brown and Levinson (1987: 70), positive politeness is redress toward the positive face of H, the positive self-image that he claims for himself