Power distance in the correspondence between lecturers and students in australia and vietnam = khoảng cách quyền lực trong trao đổi thư từ giữa giảng viên và sinh viên tại úc và việt nam m a

ABSTRACT This study was carried out to investigate the manifestation of power distance in the email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of spe

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled

POWER DISTANCE IN THE CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN

LECTURERS AND STUDENTS IN AUSTRALIA AND VIETNAM

submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of MA in English Linguistics Except where the reference is indicated, no other person‟s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis

Hanoi, July, 2017

Nguyễn Thành Trung

Approved by SUPERVISOR

Dr Huỳnh Anh Tuấn Date:

A special word of thanks goes to teaching staffs from Faculty of Graduate Studies of ULIS, Hanoi National University, to my colleagues at Haiphong University of Medicine and Pharmacy and my friends at Sydney University of Technology, Australia, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for me to have this thesis accomplished

Post-This thesis cannot avoid limitation, so I wish to receive comments and opinions to make it better

ABSTRACT

This study was carried out to investigate the manifestation of power distance

in the email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features The analysis was based on 120 emails written by Australian and Vietnamese lecturers and students from two universities: Sydney University of Technology, Australia and Haiphong University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Vietnam Two research approaches of quantitative and qualitative are employed in this study After the data are collected and processed, the features of an email in terms speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features are quantitatively described by means of statistic tables and figures to show their distribution and percentage The results are then discussed and interpreted qualitatively to determine the manifestation of power distance Next, contrastive analysis is used to discover the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email communication between the two groups The findings indicated that students in Vietnam, which is a high power distance culture, are more likely to opt for formal alternatives while lecturers tend to use informal alternatives

In addition, Vietnamese lecturers prefer direct request strategies and imperatives

without please In contrast, students and lecturers in Australia, which is a low power

distance culture, are more likely to opt for informal alternatives Australian lecturers also show a preference for direct request strategies but all the imperatives made by

both Australian lecturers and students utilize please Additionally, while most of the

Vietnamese students use formal address terms to address their lecturers, nearly two thirds of the Australian students address their lecturers by their first names without any address terms

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 Classification of illocutionary acts 13 Table 2 Analytical framework for emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 29 Table 3 Analytical framework for emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 30 Table 4 Analytical framework showing power distance in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam 33 Table 5 Types of speech act in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 36 Table 6 The use of request strategies in the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 38 Table 7 The use of request strategies in the emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 38 Table 8 The use of request strategies in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 39 Table 9 The use of imperative strategies in emails written by lecturers and students

in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 43 Table 10 The level of formality of greetings in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 45 Table 11 The use of opening features in emails written by Australian students and

by Vietnamese students 46 Table 12 The level of formality of closings in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 49 Table 13 The use of closing features in emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 50 Table 14 The use of closing features in emails written by Australian lecturers and

by Vietnamese lecturers 51 Table 15 The use of closing features in emails written by lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam according to power distance relationships 52 Table 16 Email features showing power distance in correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam 61

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1 A comparison of cultural dimension index between Vietnam and Australia8 Figure 2 Greetings: formal - informal expressions 21 Figure 3 Complimentary close: formal / conventional - informal / personal expressions 22 Figure 4 Types of speech act in emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 34 Figure 5 Types of speech act in emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 35 Figure 6 The use of request perspectives in the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 40 Figure 7 The use of imperative strategies in the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 41 Figure 8 The use of imperative strategies in the emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 42 Figure 9 The level of formality of greetings in the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 44 Figure 10 The level of formality of greetings in the emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 44 Figure 11 The level of formality of closings in the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students 48 Figure 12 The level of formality of closings in the emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers 49

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

PD Power distance HPD High power distance LPD Low power distance NSs Native speakers NNSs Non-native speakers ESL English as a second language CCSARP Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF TABLES iv

LIST OF FIGURES v

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vi

TABLE OF CONTENTS vii

PART I INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale for the study 1

2 Aims and objectives of the study 2

3 Significance of the study 2

4 Scope of the study 3

5 Research questions 3

6 Structure of the study 3

PART II DEVELOPMENT 5

CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE 5

1.1 Definition of terms 5

1.1.1 Hofstede‟s cultural dimensions 5

1.1.2 Cross-cultural and intercultural communication 9

1.1.3 Correspondence 10

1.1.4 Speech act theory 12

1.1.5 Politeness theory 14

1.1.6 Opening and closing features of emails 20

1.2 Related studies on email communication 23

CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY 25

2.1 Research questions 25

2.2 Research approach 25

2.3 Research method 25

2.3.1 Research data 25

2.3.2 Data collection method 26

2.3.3 Data analysis method 26

2.4 Analytical framework 27

CHAPTER 3 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 34

3.1 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features 34

3.1.1 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts 34

3.1.2 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of politeness strategies in requests and imperatives 37

3.1.2.1 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of request strategies 37

3.1.2.2 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of request perspectives 39

3.1.2.3 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of imperative strategies 41

3.1.3 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of opening and closing features 43

3.1.3.1 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of opening features 43

3.1.3.2 The manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of closing features 48

3.2 The similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam 53 3.2.1 The similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in

email correspondence between Australian students and Vietnamese students 53

3.2.1.1 Similarities 53

3.2.1.2 Differences 53

3.2.2 The similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between Australian lecturers and Vietnamese lecturers 54 3.2.2.1 Similarities 54

3.2.2.2 Differences 55

3.2.3 The similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between Australian lecturers and Australian students 55

3.2.3.1 Similarities 55

3.2.3.2 Differences 55

3.2.4 The similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between Vietnamese lecturers and Vietnamese students56 3.2.4.1 Similarities 56

3.2.4.2 Differences 56

3.3 Answers to the research questions 57

PART III CONCLUSION 62

1 Recapitulation 62

2 Implication of the findings 63

3 Limitations of the research 65

4 Suggestions for further research 65

REFERENCES 67 APPENDICES I APPENDIX 1 - Emails written by Australian students I APPENDIX 2 - Emails written by Australian lecturers X APPENDIX 3 - Emails written by Vietnamese students XVI APPENDIX 4 - Emails written by Vietnamese lecturers XXIV

PART I INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale for the study

Power distance is one of the six cultural dimensions introduced by Hofstede, which focuses on how societies handle unequal distribution of power The fact that power distance exists in every society throughout history is unquestionable As power distance is omnipresent, its manifestation can be observed in every field of life and education is no exception At school or university, power distance is manifested in the way teachers or lecturers communicate with their students, in which students are often expected to show respect to their teachers or lecturers In the modern university environment, emails are an increasingly popular means of communication between lecturers and students Malley (2006) argues that although many of today‟s students have grown up with email and other Computer-mediated communication technologies, socialization into acceptable email interaction is subtle and without much guidance Books on email etiquette provide little help to students who are looking for advice on composing email messages to their professors, with whom they are in a hierarchical relationship

Therefore, the author of this study would like to investigate how power distance in email communication between lecturers and students is manifested in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features as well

as determine the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance

in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam

In the hope of contributing to the literature on the manifestation of power distance and improving the communication between lecturers and students via emails, the

author of the present research has decided to carry out the study entitled “Power distance in the correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam” from the perspective of cross-cultural communication

2 Aims and objectives of the study

The study is carried out:

To explore how power distance is manifested in email communication between lecturers and students in Australia and in Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features

To determine the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam

To provide Vietnamese students who are going to study in Australia and vice versa with the pragmatic knowledge of manifestation of power distance in email communication between lecturers and students to help them avoid culture shock and

to be more successful in intercultural communication

To suggest some possible pedagogical implications and suggestions for future research concerning the manifestation of power distance in email communication from the perspective of cross-cultural communication

3 Significance of the study

There are some reasons that urge this study to be conducted Firstly, in Vietnam, there has been little research and very few articles discussing the manifestation of power distance in email communication between lecturers and students Secondly, the author hopes that this study would be of theoretical and practical significance in the area of pragmatics where power distance should be taken into account when examining speech acts in emails Theoretically, this study would contribute to a better understanding of speech acts in general and the speech acts in emails in particular Practically, the findings of this study would raise Australian and Vietnamese lecturers and students‟ awareness of the manifestation of power distance in email communication As a result, Australian and Vietnamese lecturers and students might adopt appropriate strategies when communicate via emails to better realize their communication goals More importantly, hopefully the study findings would be a reference source for those who are planning to study and work overseas in Australia and in Vietnam

4 Scope of the study

When analyzing emails for the manifestation of power distance, a number of features can be taken into consideration including the level of formality of the vocabulary, the choice of initial greeting and complimentary close, the message length, politeness strategies of request and imperatives, syntactic and lexical politeness devices and some extra-linguistic factors such as the length of time it takes a person to reply to an email In this study, after carefully reviewing the relevant literature, the author has decided to focus on three features including speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features because they can show the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students the most clearly A total of 120 emails from both countries (60 from Australia and 60 from Vietnam) will be chosen for this study Students doing a course in medical/biomedical science from Sydney University of Technology, Australia and students from Haiphong University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Vietnam will provide data for this study

5 Research questions

The present study attempts to address the following research questions:

(i) How is power distance manifested in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features?

(ii) What are the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam?

6 Structure of the study

This study consists of the following parts:

Part I Introduction

This part aims at stating the rationale for the study, the aims and objectives of the study, the significance of the study, the scope of the study and the research questions

Part II Development

Chapter 1: Review of literature

This chapter includes the explanation of key definitions, an overview of Hofstede‟s cultural dimensions, as well as the review on previous works on email communication

Chapter 2: Methodology

This chapter comprises of the description of research data, data collection method, research approach, data analysis method and analytical framework

Chapter 3: Findings and discussion

In this chapter, research findings will be presented and discussed

Part III Conclusion

Summary of the research, implications of the findings, the limitations of the study and suggestions for further research will be presented in this chapter

PART II DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1 REVIEW OF LITERATURE

The present study attempts to address the following research questions: (i) How is power distance manifested in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features?

(ii) What are the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam?

Therefore, in this chapter, power distance - one of the six cultural dimensions introduced by Hofstede, correspondence, speech act theory, politeness theory, opening and closing features and cross-cultural and intercultural communication as well as some related studies on email communication will be presented and discussed

1.1 Definition of terms

1.1.1 Hofstede’s cultural dimensions

According to Hofstede, there are six cultural dimensions include Power Distance, Individualism versus Collectivism, Masculinity versus Femininity, Uncertainty avoidance, Long-term versus Short-term orientation, and Indulgence versus Restraint

Power distance regards the acceptance of less powerful individuals to the fact that power is unequally distributed Hofstede concerns the society‟s inequality handling the most important issue There are a number of adversarial characteristics between Low power distance (LPD) and High power distance (HPD) communities According to this viewpoint, people in HPD societies accept a hierarchical order in which everybody has a place without the need to have explanation, while in

communities with LPD, people try to balance the distribution of power and demand justification for inequalities of power

The second dimension is individualism versus collectivism Individualism can be defined as a preference for a loosely-knit social framework in which individuals are expected to take care of only themselves and their immediate families Its opposite, collectivism, represents a preference for a tightly-knit framework in society in which individuals can expect their relatives or members of

a particular in-group to look after them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty A society‟s position on this dimension is reflected in whether people‟s self-image is defined in terms of “I” or “we.”

The third cultural dimension is called masculinity versus femininity The Masculinity side of this dimension represents a preference in society for achievement, heroism, assertiveness and material rewards for success Society at large is more competitive Its opposite, femininity, stands for a preference for cooperation, modesty, caring for the weak and quality of life Society at large is more consensus-oriented In the business context Masculinity versus Femininity is sometimes also related to as “tough versus tender” cultures

The fourth cultural dimension is the Uncertainty Avoidance This dimension expresses the degree to which the members of a society feel uncomfortable with uncertainty and ambiguity The fundamental issue here is how a society deals with the fact that the future can never be known: should we try to control the future or just let it happen? Countries exhibiting strong UAI maintain rigid codes of belief and behaviour and are intolerant of unorthodox behaviour and ideas Weak UAI societies maintain a more relaxed attitude in which practice counts more than principles

Long-term versus short-term orientation constitutes the fifth dimension For Hofstede (n.d.), “the long-term orientation dimension can be interpreted as dealing with society‟s search for virtue”, while “societies with a short-term orientation generally have a strong concern with establishing the absolute Truth” He called this

cultural value “Confucian dynamism” Every society has to maintain some links with its own past while dealing with the challenges of the present and the future Societies prioritize these two existential goals differently Societies who score low

on this dimension, for example, prefer to maintain time-honoured traditions and norms while viewing societal change with suspicion Those with a culture which scores high, on the other hand, take a more pragmatic approach: they encourage thrift and efforts in modern education as a way to prepare for the future In the business context this dimension is related to as “(short term) normative versus (long term) pragmatic” (PRA) In the academic environment the terminology Monumentalism versus Flexhumility is sometimes also used

Lastly, the pair of indulgence versus restraint is the sixth and introduced dimension In Hofstede‟s opinion, while indulgence stands in society that witnesses quite free complacence of basic and natural human drives that are related to enjoying life and having fun, restraint society prevents gratification of needs and regulates it by means of strict social norms

newest-As this study investigates the manifestation of power distance in the email communication between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam, this dimension will be mainly focused on

Figure 1 compares cultural dimension index between Vietnam and Australia

Figure 1 A comparison of cultural dimension index between Vietnam and

Australia

As can be seen from Figure 1, Vietnam scores 70 for power distance index and Australia scores 36 According to Hofstede, 70 is a high score for power distance index, so Vietnam belongs to the group of HPD countries On the other hand, Australia scores just 36, which, according to Hofstede, is a low power distance country

In Vietnamese setting, Truong and Nguyen (2002) reveal that the HPD characteristic manifests in the daily life as well as in business of Vietnamese people

In family, children need to listen to their parents At work, there is an obvious subordinate-predominant relationship Titles, status, and convention are vital in Vietnamese society Nguyen (2010) includes more points of interest and demonstrates Vietnam‟s unique circumstance The researcher sees that the mix between Communist theory and customary qualities makes up the characteristics of Vietnam Socialism sees everybody to be equivalent, while traditional values, strongly influenced by Confucianism (Hoang and Dung, 2009), demonstrates the inverse Consequently, muddled social connection and correspondence style is shaped Therefore, LPD indication can be found in large scale socio-political circumstances (i.e law), though HPD shows in small scale day by day social circumstances as those in family, school, and working environment Having a

similar feeling, Gudykunst (2001) and Heymer (2008) specify the certain criteria of hierarchy which can be identified, namely gender (male/female), age (older/younger, parents/children), qualification (teachers/students, superior/subordinates), and money status (rich/poor) These criteria are essential, in Heymer‟s opinion, as each position is associated with specific roles, norms and expectation

In Australian setting, the general population‟s view of power distance can be summarized as follows (Bassett, 2004) In theory, the issue is evaluated and talked about with the member of the subordinates, who are given a chance to make recommendations with a view to solving the problems To wrap things up, clashes, which cannot be settled inside amongst association and staffs, will no doubt be settled by the union What‟s more, Taylor (n.d:para.4) sees a few signs of the Australia‟s power distance index: “This is indicative of a greater equality between societal levels, including government, organizations, and even within families This orientation reinforces a cooperative interaction across power levels and creates a more stable cultural environment.” Samovar, Porter and McDaniel (2009) hold that

a low power distance means the power in Australia being spread out to everybody

as opposed to being held to a couple people Accordingly, Australians assume that they are close and ought to have access to power The powerful and the powerless should try to coexist in accordance with each other Last but not least, a hierarchy is

an inequality of roles established for convenience

1.1.2 Cross-cultural and intercultural communication

The communication tends to be described as cross-cultural or intercultural communication because these two terms are often used interchangeably Cross-cultural or intercultural communication is simply defined as “the exchange of information between individuals who are unalike culturally” (Roger and Steifatt 1999: 103) or “whenever a message producer is a member of one culture and a message receiver is a member of another” (Porter and Samovar, 1985: 39)

Gudykunst (2003a), however, states that cross-cultural communication is a subcategory of intercultural communication Gudykunst and Kim (1997: 19) articulate that “the term cross-cultural traditionally implies a comparison of some phenomena across cultures” Gudykunst (2003a) reaffirms that the study of cross-cultural communication focuses on comparison between cultures He argues further that it is essential to understand cross-cultural communication before attempting to understand intercultural communication Understanding cross-cultural communication is to understand what each culture values in terms of interacting with others

There are slightly different definitions of intercultural communication One

is that intercultural communication generally refers to a type of face-to-face communication involving people from different cultures (Gudykunst, 2003a, 2003b, 2003c; Jandt, 2004) Lustig and Koester (1999) did not confine their definition of intercultural communication to face-to-face but they used more general terms of interaction with people from different cultures

In this study, the author will investigate power distance from the perspective

of cross-cultural communication in email communication between Australian students and lecturers and in email communication between Vietnamese students and lecturers

1.1.3 Correspondence

Correspondence is any written or digital communication exchanged by two

or more parties Correspondences may come in the form of letters, emails, text messages, voicemails, notes, or postcards As suggested by the title of the study, this paper will deal with correspondence in the form of emails exchanged between lecturers and students in two universities in Australia and Vietnam

There has been a great deal of research on speech acts in emails, focusing on differences between NSs and NNSs of English when making requests (Blum-Kulka, 1991; Blum-Kulka & House, 1989), apologies (Cohen & Olshtain, 1993), complaints (Murphy & Neu, 1996), compliments and compliment responses

(Billmeyer, 1990), and refusals (Beebe, Takahashi, & Uliss-Weltz, 1990) However, due to privacy and ethical concerns, these studies tended to examine only a small number of messages sent to the researchers themselves

As far as politeness in emails is concerned, a great number of studies have used the well-known Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP) coding framework developed by Blum-Kulka, House and Kasper (1989), as it allows a more thorough analysis of politeness devices at the syntactic and lexical level The CCSARP framework analyzes requests in terms of (1) direct and indirect strategies realized by particular linguistic structures (e.g., imperatives are direct

while could/would you constructions are indirect), (2) request modification realized

by lexical items and syntactic elements, and (3) request perspective (from hearer‟s

or speaker‟s viewpoint) that serve to mitigate the force of the request and ensure greater politeness Research on requests has revealed that NSs and NNSs differ in their use of politeness features BlumKulka and Levenston (1987) observed that

NNSs tended to use please in a way that marked the utterance as having requestive

force rather than as a politeness marker With respect to students‟ email requests,

NNSs have also been found to use please over other modification devices,

presumably both in an attempt at appearing polite when other linguistic means are lacking and at urging the professor‟s response (Biesenbach-Lucas & Weasenforth, 2000; Chen, 2006)

Crystal (1997: 24, 156) refers to the dichotomy of formal vs informal as the appropriateness of language forms with respect to social situation Brown and Gilman (1970) describe interpersonal relationships as symmetrical or asymmetrical They point out that “in face-to-face address we can usually avoid the use of any name or title” (1970: 322) However, this is not an option in written correspondence, where choices concerning features like form of address and complimentary close will reflect how the correspondents see their relationship Norms concerning the level of formality for emails, however, are not settled to the same extent as for business letters Varner and Beamer (2005: 73-4) state that email communication “lends itself to an informal and personal writing style that may turn

off someone with a more formal background” According to business correspondence literature, we should take the following factors into account when choosing the level of formality for greetings and complimentary closes:

 how well you know the recipient (Taylor 2004; Ashley 2003; Whelan 2000)

 whether you have established a working relationship with the recipient (Ashley 2003)

 whether your recipient will dislike emails without a greeting and sign-off (Whelan 2000; Taylor 2004)

 whether your correspondent finds a greeting and sign-off unnecessary (Whelan 2000)

 “your personal style or preferences and those of your recipient” (Whelan 2000: 145)

It would thus appear that in email correspondence, choosing the form of opening and closing features will be decided by how the correspondents perceive their relationship This will also apply to student-lecturer correspondence

Therefore, in the present study, the author would like to analyze the manifestation of power distance in email communication in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features

1.1.4 Speech act theory

The notion of speech acts originates from the British philosopher of language John Austin (1962) In his very influential work “How to do things with words”, Austin defines speech acts as the actions performed in saying something or actions performed using language In fact, when speaking, we perform certain linguistic actions such as giving reports, making statements, asking questions, giving warnings, making promises and so on In other words, speech acts are all the acts

we perform through speaking - all the things we do when we speak Austin (1962) distinguishes between the three kinds of acts: locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary A locutionary act is the act of saying something in the full sense of

“say” An illocutionary act is the one of using the utterance to perform a particular

function; and a perlocutionary act is the one producing some kinds of effects that are produced by means of saying something Among the above three kinds of acts, illocutionary act is the core interest of Austin as well as of other pragmatists (Levinson, 1983)

The following table shows how illocutionary acts are classified by different authors:

Austin (1962) Searle (1979) Bach and Harnish (1979) Exposives Assertives/ Representatives Assertives

Verdictives Declaratives Verdictives

Effectives

Table 1 Classification of illocutionary acts

Among them Searle‟s classification (1969) is known as the most widely used and influential one According to Searle there are five types of speech acts based on the speaker‟s intentions:

1 Assertives/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

2 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 a pledge

3 Expressives: are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker

feels They express psychological states and can be statement of pleasure, pain, likes, dislikes, joy or sorrow

4 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

5 Declaratives: are those kinds of speech acts that change the world via

their utterances

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)

Sifianou (1999) notes that social factors, age, gender, social status, intimacy, the spatiotemporal setting determine the sort of politeness strategies that will be utilized in order to perform the speech acts The importance of above-mentioned components depend upon all the others, and collectively they represent any social awareness every member of a culture has Similarly, Wierzbicka (1994) contends that speech acts can vary considerably across cultures and languages, considering the diverse cultural values

1.1.5 Politeness theory

Brown and Levinson (1987) Politeness Theory is the most eminent theory on linguistic politeness The theory of Brown and Levinson (1987) builds on three notions: face, face threatening acts (FTAs) and politeness strategies To begin with, everyone has a „face‟, “the public self-image” that want to preserve (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p 61) The concept of „face‟ can be either „positive‟ or „negative‟ The positive face is reflected in a need to be liked and appreciated by others or to quote them is “the positive consistent self-image or “personality” (crucially including the desire that this self-image be appreciated and approved of) claimed by interactants” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p 61) In general, positive politeness moves are delineated as expressions of informality and familiarity On the other hand, the negative face is “the basic claim to territories, personal preserves, rights to non-distraction - i.e., to freedom of action and freedom from imposition” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p 61), in essence, the desire not to be obscured and to preserve one‟s own freedom

In everyday life, communication is the common activity of human beings Many messages are conveyed through communication Verbal acts convey a lot of different purposes of the speakers They are utilized for passing information, expressing personal opinions or making comments, greetings, invitations, compliments, apology, complaints, or requests Speakers/Writers want hearers/readers to do their intended actions Indeed, the hearers‟/readers‟ willingness to follow or not follow the speakers‟/writers‟ wants relies on the speakers‟/ writers‟ authority and politeness to ask them to perform the actions In this study, the politeness is considered an important aspect to evaluate how it affects the effectiveness of communication Because people always try their best to be successful communicators, politeness can be seen as an important communicative strategy to maintain good relationships between speakers/writers and hearers/readers and keep the conversations flowing There have been many researchers trying to define politeness to apply in communication so that communicative goal can be most successfully reached Lakoff (1977) tries to account for politeness phenomenon She suggests that politeness is developed by society so as to reduce friction in personal interaction and comprises three rules of politeness:

1 Don‟t impose

2 Give options

3 Make the receiver feel good

The first rule, “Don‟t impose”, is linked with distance and formality The speaker/writer shows politeness by asking for permission or apologizing in advance

to reduce the imposition on the hearer/reader when requiring the hearer/reader to perform an action The second rule, “Give options”, is associated with deference and accounts for cases in which the linguistic manifestations of politeness appear to leave the choice of confirming or not to the addressee Her third rule, “Make the receiver feel good”, accounts for the case in which the speaker employs devices

which will make the addressee feel liked and wanted The decrease in imposition will be obviously examined in the examples

1 Turn the light on ( imposition)

2 Could you turn the light on? (less imposition)

3 I wonder if you could turn the light on (option)

4 Darling, turn the light on

(1) indicates speakers‟ want with great force as a demand in case where the speaker and the hearer are not in equal position The speaker seems to have greater power than the hearer However, the imposition nature of the last three examples is minimized by using “Could you”, “darling” or “I wonder if you could” In (2),

“Could you” is used to examine the hearer‟s willingness to do the action The force

on the hearer seems to be less serious Similarly in (3) and (4), the hearer feels comfortable with his/her choice to do the action

According to Sifianou (1992), most scholars, basing on the investigation of English, have argued that the degree of indirectness determines the degree of politeness to a great extent The main reason for this argument reasonably originates from the concept of Western individualism It is widely accepted that most English speaking societies place a higher value on privacy and individualism (i.e., the negative aspect of face), so individual‟s freedom and independence is highly respected In other words, to Western societies in general and to most English speaking societies in particular, the principle of distance and non-imposition plays a crucial role in social interactions Although there are some ideas that indirectness and politeness are not the same (Kasper, 1998; Holtgraves, 1986), most scholars have argued that overall, in English, indirectness and politeness are closely related, especially in request - a kind of directive speech acts While the scale of indirectness seems to be universal, the assertion between indirectness and politeness differ across cultures Contrary to most English societies where the display of non-imposition and concerns for distancing in speech acts are believed to help avoid face threatening acts and hence to be more polite, a number of cultures such as Vietnam prefer a show of solidarity and sincerity by directly deliver them Sifianou

(1992) has proved that Greeks request, advise and suggest structurally more directly than English because they see those acts as their duty to help and support each other without any idea about imposition or non-imposition In another study which examines the politeness perceptions of speakers of Israeli Hebrew, Blum-Kulka (1987) finds that speakers of Hebrew favor directness rather than indirectness Generally speaking, speakers from those mentioned cultures either seem to pay much attention to involvement and solidarity relation, i.e the positive aspect of face, or belong to a kind of societies such as Vietnam where people depend on each other more and therefore individuals are less emphasized than interdependent social relations like English speaking societies In other words, most of them probably correspond to positive politeness societies where indirectness will not necessarily be related to politeness Dau (2007) says that indirectness with the concept of non-imposition is not necessarily politeness in Vietnamese culture Because politeness in requesting in Vietnamese does not only completely depend on the levels of directness-indirectness or imposition-optionality but also on other factors such as how illocutionary meaning is understood, and socio-cultural factors

Although Vietnamese and English have different conceptions of politeness in relation to indirectness, both are highly aware of the advantages of politeness and appreciate it in making speech acts in general and request in particular Politeness is useful to help speakers/writers convey utterance, intentions effectively; increase the possibility of the action implementation then and avoid the force on the hearers/readers As a result, both hearers/readers and speakers/writers are comfortable This study bases on the classification of requests in some cross-cultural interlingual studies of speech acts by Brown & Levinson (1987), they classify requests into nine sub-ones

Move your car

force

2 Perfomatives

utterances in which the illocutionary force is explicitly named

I’m asking you to move your car

3 Hedged

performatives

utterances in which the naming of the illocutionary force is modified by hedging expressions force

I would like to ask you to move your car

4 Obligation

statement

utterances which state the obligation of the hearer to carry out the act

You’ll have to move your car

5 Want statement

utterances which state the speaker‟s desire that the hearer carries out the act

I want you to move your car

conventionalized in any specific language

Could you move your car?

direct 8 Strong hints

utterances containing partial references to object or element needed for the implementation of the act

We don’t want any crowding in

entrance

As mentioned above, directness and indirectness exist in speech acts in general and the speech act of request in particular Requests can be divided into direct and indirect ones Both direct and indirect requests are described as types above The first five ones belong to direct strategy and the last four ones belong to indirect strategy Also, indirect requests are divided into two subtypes: conventional and unconventional ones It is argued that more indirect illocutions have a higher degree of politeness: “(a) because they increase the degree of optionality, and (b) because the more indirect an illocution is, the more diminished and tentative its force tends to be” (Leech, 1983: 131-32) In contrast, BlumKulka (1987) contend that directness and politeness of request should be treated as different concepts In her research of native speakers‟ perception of politeness and directness in Hebrew and English request, the author notes that while the most direct strategy (Mood derivable) is considered the least polite, the most indirect strategy (Hints) is not perceived as the most polite Both English and Hebrew native speakers ranked conventionally indirect strategies as the most polite Blum-Kulka (1987) says such tendency has to do with the need of the speaker to make the request pragmatically clear and at the same time reduce the threat to the hearer‟s negative face Both needs are satisfied in conventionally indirect strategies where the interpretation of the sentence meaning is still unambiguous (pragmatically clear), and the hearer negative face is not threatened

In addition, the request can be speaker oriented, focused on the role of the speaker („Can I have it?‟), or hearer oriented, focused on the role of the hearer („Can you do it?‟) It can also be inclusive, including both the speaker and the hearer, („Can we close the window?‟) or impersonal, including neither the speaker nor the hearer („The window needs to be closed.‟) According to Blum-Kulka and

Levenston (1987), the use of the hearer oriented perspective makes requests more imposing than the use of the speaker oriented perspective, because when the speaker avoids naming the hearer as the performer of the requested act, it minimizes the imposition of the request on the hearer negative face Since speaker oriented

requests also imply that the speaker asks for permission, this means that the recipient of the request has control over the speaker Blum-Kulka & Olshtain (1984) sate that speaker oriented requests are perceived as more polite than hearer oriented ones since they avoid the appearance of trying to control or impose on the hearer

1.1.6 Opening and closing features of emails

Gains (1999) refers to Hi as informal and the greeting Dear as an example of

a more formal letter style Likewise, Chen (2006: 40) states that greetings like Hi signal informality, while Dear + Title + Surname is formal Gimenez (2000) ranges greetings on a scale from no salutation to Dear Sir (2000: 245), with Dear Mr +

Surname and Dear + First Name falling in between the two The Longman

Dictionary of Contemporary English (2005: 978-9) recommends using formal

variants for formal emails, viz Dear + Honorific/Title + Surname, or Dear

Sir/Madam; it states further that Hi (+ First Name), First Name only, and no

greeting are considered informal, while Dear + First Name is “neutral”

Bjørge (2007) established two broad categories of greetings, labelled

„formal‟ and „informal‟ The informal category also includes “neutral” variants as mentioned above In her study, the group of 110 students from 34 nations showed considerable individual variation in their use of email greetings, which are subsumed under the generalised entries presented in Figure 2, along with percentages based on all 344 emails In the present study, for emails written by

Vietnamese students, Dear teacher or Dear my teacher are also considered as

formal greeting expressions

Figure 2 Greetings: formal - informal expressions

Chen (2001) distinguishes two types of general email features: openings and closings According to her, there are four features of email openings:

1 Salutations: standard words or phrases used in a letter to greet the person

being written to (e.g dear, hello)

2 Address terms: words or phrases used for addressing (e.g Professor,

sir/madam)

3 Self-introductions: utterances that state student‟s name and/or his her

background information (e.g „This is …‟)

4 Phatic communication: utterances that are used by the speaker to establish

or maintain social relationships with the hearer (e.g „How are you?‟, „Merry Christmas‟)

According to the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (2005: 9), formal emails may use the same complimentary closes as formal letters, viz

978-Yours truly/sincerely/faithfully, while the informal variants cited include See you soon, Regards, Cheers as well as no complimentary close The same source also

states that Kind/Best regards is “used to end a letter in a friendly but rather formal

way” (2005: 1380) Collins Cobuild (2001: xxiii, 1296) labels expressions which

include Regards as formulae used in letters to express friendly feelings Chen (2006: 40) refers to Best regards and Sincerely as “epistolary conventions” used to show deference in a student-tutor relationship, while expressions like Talk to you

later and phonetic spellings (e.g CU for „see you‟) reflect an informal,

conversational style The Cambridge Advanced Learner‟s Dictionary (2003: 108)

describes Best wishes as “a polite way of finishing a letter to someone you know

quite well” While Gains (1999) points to the great diversity found in the complimentary close, he is not explicit about how he sees individual representations with respect to a formal/informal dichotomy

It appears that expressions associated with formal letter writing and phonetic spellings will be at opposite ends of a continuum from formal to informal Bjørge (2007) labels the continuum set out in Figure 3 as ranging from formal/conventional

to informal/personal Since Best/Kind/Warm regards may be categorised as set

expressions, she places them at the formal/conventional end of the continuum, with

Kind/Warm regards closer to the informal/personal end due to the meaning of the

modifying adjective Figure 3 sets out the distribution of complimentary closes along this continuum, based on 299 tokens from her data For emails written by

Vietnamese students, thanking expressions and I look forward to hearing from you

are also considered as formal closing expressions

Figure 3 Complimentary close: formal / conventional - informal /

personal expressions

Chen (2001) distinguishes two closing features types:

1 Thank: closing expressions that show the speaker‟s gratitude to the hearer in

advance (e.g „Thank you for your attention‟)

2 Complementary closing: expressions that the speaker uses to finish his/her

email (e.g sincerely, regards)

1.2 Related studies on email communication

There has been various research examining email discourse (e.g Bloch, 2002; Biasenbach-Lucas, 2005, 2007; Bjørge, 2007; Chen, 2006; Duthler, 2006; Li, 2000; Liaw 1998; Liu and Salder, 2003; Wall, 2007) One of the studies examining the utilization of email as a medium of correspondence is the one led by Hartford and Bardovi-Harlig in 1996 (Chen, 2006) Surveying the impacts of email requests sent by Native Speakers (NSs) and Non-Native Speakers (NNSs), Hartford and Bardovi-Harlig (1996) found that NNSs‟ requests varied from those of NSs in the utilization of politeness features and extra-linguistic aspects, such as the emphasis

on personal needs and unreasonable time frames rather than institutional requests

In a comparable review, Biesenbach-Lucas (2007) inspected email requests sent by NSs and NNSs students to faculty members at an American university over several semesters Biesenbach-Lucas used Blum-Kulka, House, and Kasper‟s (1989) speech act analysis framework to analyze email requests from pragmatic and lexicosyntactic point of view The outcomes demonstrated that more requests are acknowledged through direct techniques and also implies than through conventionally indirect strategies which are typically found in comparative speech act studies The author remarked that “politeness conventions in email appear to be

a work in progress, and native speakers demonstrate greater resources in creating polite messages to their professors than non-native speakers” (p.59) Different studies have revealed that second language (L2) students usually employ fewer modals in their emails than do American students L2 students do not often use negotiation or supportive moves such as reasons and apologies in their emails (Biesenbach-Lucas & Weasenforth 2001) Biesenbach-Lucas (2005) found that while American students use email communication for facilitative, substantive, and relational purposes, NNS‟s do not display a tendency to use email for interpersonal and relational purposes These studies demonstrate that second language learners need to develop effective negotiation skills for effective email communication

Nonetheless, non-comparative studies have not yielded similar outcomes For example, Bloch (2002) analyzed how students in a graduate course in ESL

utilized emails to communicate with their instructors He put the messages into four classifications, namely: (1) phatic communion, (2) asking for help, (3) making excuses, and (4) making formal requests Bloch analyzed the kinds of rhetorical strategies used to obtain their purposes for sending emails in relation to the category

of emails Assuming the significance of email for students as a vehicle for collaborating with their lecturers, Bloch supported that the students utilize an extensive variety of rhetorical strategies and demonstrate a good ability to switch between formal and informal register depending upon the context of the emails Chen (2006) detailed the advancement of an ESL students‟ email correspondence Drawing on a critical discourse analysis approach, Chen explored the participants‟ struggles for politeness and appropriateness in communicating with her classmates and professors The results demonstrated that email literacy of the participants developed as they gained a more profound comprehension of the social relations, the understanding of student/professor interaction and the acknowledgment of culture- specific politeness in the target language

Considering the issue of power distance, Bjørge (2007) researched the level

of formality in 110 international students‟ emails sent to academic staff in an international university in Norway Basing on Hofstede‟s cultural dimension of power distance (PD) to distinguish between the students with high and low PD cultural backgrounds (Hofstede, 2001), Bjørge observed the use of greeting and closing by students from various cultural backgrounds The discoveries of her research demonstrated that students from relatively high PD cultures are more likely

to opt for formal choice and that national culture is an aspect to be considered when examining messages

This study attempts to find out the similarities or differences between Vietnamese and Australian graduate students in using email for communicating with their lecturers It is hoped that examining the contents of emails that these two groups of email users compose can provide a comparative account of the features of email communication in two different contexts

CHAPTER 2 METHODOLOGY 2.1 Research questions

The present study attempts to address the following research questions: (i) How is power distance manifested in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features?

(ii) What are the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam?

2.2 Research approach

In this study, power distance manifestation in email communication between lecturers and students will be examined from the perspective of cross-cultural communication because the author would like to see how people from two differing cultural backgrounds, namely Australia and Vietnam, communicate via emails Additionally, the author would also like to determine similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email communication in the university environment between the two cultures

2.3 Research method

2.3.1 Research data

The data used for the present study consists of emails received from students

at Sydney University of Technology, Australia Most of the students are doing a course in medical/biomedical science The recipients of the emails are lecturers at Sydney University of Technology Similarly, emails between students and lecturers

at Haiphong University of Medicine and Pharmacy are collected for the study

The data consists of a total of 120 emails, of which:

2.3.2 Data collection method

The main purpose of this study is to determine how power distance is manifested in email correspondence between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features Thus, the emails have been selected and classified according to this aim to ensure the reliability of the statistical frequency After being processed, these emails will be arranged in the overall distribution so that they can be easily analyzed and discussed

2.3.3 Data analysis method

Two research approaches of quantitative and qualitative are employed in this study After the data are collected and processed, the features of an email in terms speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features are quantitatively described by means of statistic tables and figures to show their distribution and percentage The results are then discussed and interpreted qualitatively to determine the manifestation of power distance Next, contrastive analysis is used to discover

the similarities and differences in the manifestation of power distance in email communication between lecturers and students in Australia and Vietnam

2.4 Analytical framework

The analytical frameworks for this study are based on the three features of an email, namely speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features In terms of speech acts, in this study, emails written by Australian and Vietnamese students and lecturers are coded according to speech act functions made by Waldvogel (2005), adopted from Searle‟s taxonomy of speech acts (1979) with some modifications, i.e (1) Providing information, e.g “The class this afternoon has been cancelled.”, (2) Seeking information, e.g “Could you tell me the deadline for this week‟s assignment?”, (3) Directives, e.g “Please hand in your assignment

by March 11.”, (4) Commissives, e.g “I will try my best to make up for the lessons I‟ve skipped.”, (5) Expressives, e.g “I‟m sorry I can‟t attend the class on Friday.” and (6) Invitations, e.g “Can I see you after school on Tuesday?”

In terms of politeness strategies, this study is based on the classification of requests in some cross-cultural interlingual studies of speech acts by Brown & Levinson (1987), in which they classify requests into nine types as mentioned in the review of literature, i.e (1) Mood derivable, (2) Perfomatives, (3) Hedged performatives, (4) Obligation statement, (5) Want statement, (6) Suggestory formulae, (7) Query preparatory, (8) Strong hints and (9) Mild hints In terms of request perspectives, emails written by Australian students and Vietnamese students will be categorized into (1) Speaker oriented, (2) Hearer oriented, (3) Inclusive and (4) Impersonal In terms of imperative strategies, imperatives observed will be

divided into (1) Imperative with please and (2) Imperative without please

Regarding opening and closing features, as mentioned in the review of literature, the opening and closing features in the emails written by Australian and Vietnamese students and lecturers will be categorized as formal and informal basing

on the two broad categories by Bjørge (2007) Next, opening features in emails written by Australian and Vietnamese students will be divided into four sub-groups

according to Chen (2001), including (1) Salutations, (2) Address terms, (3) introductions and (4) Phatic communication Closing features in emails written by Australian and Vietnamese students will be further divided into (1) Thank, (2) Complementary closing, (3) Thank + Complementary closing and (4) No closing

Self-The features of the emails written by Australian students and by Vietnamese students in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features will be analyzed according to Table 2 The features of the emails written by Australian lecturers and by Vietnamese lecturers in terms of speech acts, politeness strategies and opening and closing features will be analyzed according to Table 3 Next, all the features of the emails written by lecturers and by students in Australia and Vietnam showing the manifestation of high power distance and low power distance in will be presented in Table 4

Invitations Could / Can you/I meet/see ?

Impersonal including neither the speaker nor the

hearer

Imperative

Strategies

Imperative with please

Imperative without please

No Salutation

Address Term

Professor / Teacher

Mr / Mrs + Name Sir / Madam

No address term

Self-introduction

Name Background Information Name + Background Information

No Self-introduction Phatic Communication How are you?, Merry Christmas! …

Closing

Features

Formal Yours faithfully, Yours sincerely, Best

regards … Informal Best wishes, Cheers, See you later …

Complementary Closing Thank + Complementary

Table 2 Analytical framework for emails written by Australian students and

by Vietnamese students