Directives in the movie green book

The results unfold typical structural and functional features of directives and level of frequency they are used in the movie “Green Book”, which could provide a profound insight into st

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

QUY NHON UNIVERSITY

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

The thesis is accomplished by my own work and due acknowledgement is produced whenever information is derived from other sources No part of this thesis has or is being simultaneously submitted for any other qualification at any university

Quy Nhon, 2020

DO VU HOANG TAM

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude to Assoc Prof Nguyen Quang Ngoan, my supervisor, who kindly provides me with appropriate direction, useful suggestions and critical comments so that I can accomplish this thesis in time

Secondly, I would like to owe the completion of this thesis to all the lecturers of the Department of Foreign Languages in specific and to Quy Nhon University in general who have provided precious materials and support for me not only in English major but also in other fields of knowledge

Last but not least, my big thank is credited to my family, my friends and my colleagues who have provided me a host of favorable conditions and materials during this period so that I can successfully finish the thesis

ABSTRACT

This thesis demonstrates the results of a research into structural and functional features of directives produced by the two main characters in the movie “Green Book” on the basis of prominent characteristics on each type A combination of analytic, synthetic, descriptive, and contrastive methods is employed for data analysis The theoretical framework is adapted from the those from three leading linguistics For structural features of directives, the researcher has her thesis based

on theoretical framework of Ervin – Tripp (1976) Similarly, for functional features

of directives, Bach and Harnish’s (1979) framework is considered as the most fundamental basis for data analysis In terms of the direct/ indirect analysis, the researcher mainly focuses on the George Yule’s (1996) basis The data source of this study is the transcript of the movie “Green Book” with 398 samples of directives selected in the conversations of the two main characters The results unfold typical structural and functional features of directives and level of frequency they are used in the movie “Green Book”, which could provide a profound insight into structures and functions of directives The results of the study are expected to contribute to the teaching and learning of speech acts in English in particular and the success of communication in English conversations in general

TABLE OF CONTENTS

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF TABLES vii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale 1

1.2 Research Aim and Objectives 2

1.2.1 Research Aim 2

1.2.2 Research Objectives 2

1.3 Research Questions 3

1.4 Scope of the Study 3

1.5 Significance of the Study 3

1.6 The Organization of the thesis 4

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

2.1 An Overview of the Speech Act theory 5

2.1.1 Definition of Speech Act 5

2.1.2 Levels of Speech Act 6

2.1.3 Classification of speech acts 7

2.2 An Overview of English directives 12

2.2.1 Structural features of English directives 12

2.2.2 Functional features of English directives 18

2.3 Indirect Speech Acts 20

2.3.1 Definition of indirect speech acts 20

2.3.2 Characteristics of indirect speech acts 20

2.3.3 Indirect Directives 23

2.4 A Review of Previous Relevant Studies 23

CHAPTER 3: METHODS AND PROCEDURES 26

3.1 Research Design 26

3.2 Research Methods 26

3.3 Data Collection 27

3.4 Data Analysis 28

3.4.1 Analytical Framework 28

3.4.2 Analytical Methods 30

3.5 Reliability and Validity 30

3.6 Summary 30

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 31

4.1 Structural features of Directives in “Green Book” 31

4.1.1 Structural features of Directives uttered by Tony Lip 31

4.1.2 Structural features of directives uttered by Dr Donald Shirley42 4.1.3 Similarities and differences in structural features of directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr Shirley 52

4.2 Functional features of Directives in “Green Book” 54

4.2.1 Functional features of directives uttered by Tony Lip 55

4.2.2 Functional features of directives uttered by Dr Shirley 62

4.2.3 Similarities and differences in functional features of directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr Shirley 68

4.3 Direct and indirect directives in “Green Book” 70

4.3.1 Distribution of direct directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr

Shirley 70

4.3.2 Distribution of indirect directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr Shirley 75

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS 80

5.1 Conclusions 80

5.1.1 Conclusions concerning structural features of directives uttered by the two main characters 80

5.1.2 Conclusions concerning functional features of directives uttered by the two main characters 81

5.1.3 Conclusions concerning direct/indirect directives uttered by the two main characters 82

5.2 Implications 83

5.3 Limitations of the study 84

5.4 Suggestions for Further Research 85

REFERENCES 86

APPENDIX 89

speech acts

29

Table 4.1 Distribution of structural features of

directives uttered by Tony Lip

31

Table 4.2 Distribution of structural features of

directives uttered by Dr Shirley

42

Table 4.3 Comparison of structural features of

directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr

Shirley

52

Table 4.4 Distribution of functional features of

directives uttered by Tony Lip

55

Table 4.5 Distribution of functional features of

directives uttered by Dr Shirley

63

Table 4.6 Comparison of functional features of

directives uttered by Tony Lip and Dr

Shirley

69

Table 4.7 Distribution of direct directives uttered by

Tony Lip and Dr Shirley

71

Table 4.8 Distribution of indirect directives uttered

by Tony Lip and Dr Shirley

75

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

This chapter is to present all the preliminaries of the thesis It starts with the rationale, followed by the aims of the study, research questions, scope of the study, significance of the study, and the organization of the thesis

1.1 Rationale

It is widely-held that speech acts have always assured a leading place in the study of pragmatics in particular and in the field of language in use in general That is to say, speech acts are believed to be one

prominent-and-of the most representative features regarding pragmatics aspect, which are prominent-and-of great importance during the process of communication in daily contexts as well as the procedure of language teaching and learning

Indeed, among the five types of speech acts by Searle (1976), it is directives that emerge as one of the most strikingly typical pragmatics characteristics, especially gaining their popularity in real-life social contexts However, despite the fact that directives have occupied an importantly irreplaceable position in terms of speech act studies, there has been a lack of research putting much emphasis on such directive-related issues under the umbrella of pragmatics perspective

As regards the movie “Green book”, which is the main source of data for the study, it is noteworthy for research To illustrate, it is indisputable that this Oscar award-winning film has proven its extraordinarily conspicuous success with an incredible plot criticizing racism as well as the mastery of the linguistic feature utilization of the two main characters, resulting in the overall excellence in acting accompanied with conveying emotions

Last but not least, one of the most research-provoking motivations which evoke a high level of interests is the main characters’ ways of linguistic manipulations Indeed, the fact that the two main characters’ backgrounds can

be traced back to the discrepancies in socio-cultural origin and living environment is claimed to be the paramount factor leading to the skillful divergence in the characters’ linguistic strategies and politeness markers

In addition, as far as I know, there has been no research on directives in the movie “Green book” so this thesis is hopefully a more complete and relevant source of indirect speech acts, especially directives for teaching, learning as well as daily communicating The research will also help people comprehend directives and be proficient in applying them in the real-life context according

to corresponding status and living environment

All these factors have triggered a great extent of tremendous motivation for

me to conduct this research

1.2 Research Aim and Objectives

1 To examine structural features in directives in the movie “Green Book”

2 To examine functional features in directives in the movie “Green Book”

3 To examine the direct and indirect directives in the movie “Green Book”

3 How often are indirect and direct directives used and how are they realized

in the conversations in the Movie “Green Book”?

1.4 Scope of the Study

This study is expected to identify and analyze directives in the Movie “Green Book” which is considered to be the main source of research data Specifically, it focuses on the directives produced by the two main characters’ directives in the movie The study involves identifying and analyzing the main character’s directives on the basis of structural features, functional features and directness/indirectness This is to uncover the mastery of linguistic features and prominent discrepancies between socio-cultural backgrounds of the two main characters in this resound film

1.5 Significance of the Study

Theoretically, the study is expected to contribute to the field of pragmatics studies, especially directives in speech act research which still receives little attention from researchers in the field Besides, with results from analyses on how to identify and investigate the prominence of directives as a speech act type, it is proven to acclaim its noteworthiness in pragmatics field in particular as well as language in use in general

Practically, the manipulation of directive types in the movie into real-life contexts to reinforce the effectiveness and efficiency of communication and language teaching-learning process is worth considering

1.6 The Organization of the thesis

The thesis is divided into five chapters as follows:

Chapter one, introduction, is the first chapter of the study where the rationale, aims and objectives, research questions, scope of the study, and significance

of the study are all clarified

Chapter two, literature review and theoretical background, is where previous relevant studies and basic theoretical aspects are presented and discussed with the author’s critical comments

Chapter three, research methodology, reveals the research methods, data collection, data analysis, research procedures, and clarification of validity and reliability

Chapter four, findings and discussion, is the major part in which the research findings are presented with illustration, interpretation, and comment, based on the theoretical background and frameworks presented in chapter two and chapter three

Chapter five, conclusions and implications, is the final part of the main text where the major study results are summarized implications are suggested, limitations are discussed and suggestions for further research are made

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter is to present an overview of speech act theory including definitions, levels, and classification of speech acts, followed by a brief introduction of English directives in terms of structural and functional features as well as direct and indirect speech acts, especially directives

2.1 An Overview of the Speech Act theory

2.1.1 Definition of Speech Act

The issue of speech acts, as stated, was pioneered by Austin (1962) According to him, all utterances should be viewed as actions of the speakers

He pointed out that the declarative sentences are used not only to say things or describe states of affairs but also to do things Austin (1962) defined speech acts as the actions performed in saying something When people produce utterances, they often perform actions via those utterances These actions are called speech acts such as apology, complaint, compliment, invitation, promise or request

Yule (1997) defined that "in attempting to express themselves, people do not

only produce utterances containing grammatical structures and words, they perform actions via those utterances" According to him, actions performed

via utterances are speech acts

To a certain extent, both well-known linguists agreed that speech acts are actions intended to do by a speaker through utterances he performs in conversations with others

2.1.2 Levels of Speech Act

Suggested by Austin (1962), clarified by Searle (1976), Richards et al (1992), Geis (1995) and Yule (1997), a speech act consists of three related acts

including locutionary act, illocutionary act and perlocutionary act

The first level of speech act is locution, which is the act of uttering something having a complete meaning To be more specific, when a speaker produces a meaningful utterance regarding lexis, grammar, and pronunciation, he/she performs a locutionary act In other words, it is concerned with what is made

by a speaker

Illocutionary act is defined as the second level, lying in what is intended by the speaker, or specifically, the intended meaning of the utterance Therefore, one utterance can be resorted to convey different illocutionary forces

Consequently, the result of the words is expected to be the last level of analysis This is widely acclaimed as the perlocutionary act, clarifying what is done by uttering words In detail, it is the effect of an utterance on the hearer

or the hearer’s reaction to an utterance

The three above-mentioned levels of speech act are closely related because

according to Bach & Harnish, 1979: 3, “S says something to H; in saying

something to H, S does something; and by doing something, S affects H”

It is totally agreed with the critical comment made by Clyne (1996: 11) that locution, illocution, and perlocution act are defined as the actual form of an utterance, the communicative force of the utterance, and the communicative effect of the utterance successively

Of the three dimensions, as stated by Yule (1996: 52), the most fundamental act that matters is the illocutionary act due to the fact that the same utterance

can potentially have quite different illocutionary forces For instance, the

utterance, “I’ll go to the US soon” can count as a prediction, a promise, a

statement, or a warning in different contexts At the same time, the same illocutionary force can be performed with various utterances Take directives for example If you want to ask somebody to open a door, you may say

“Open the door, please!”, “Could you please open the door?”, “Would you mind opening the door?”, and so on Therefore, Yule (1997: 52) stated that

the term “speech act” is “generally interpreted quite narrowly to mean only

the illocutionary force of an utterance”

2.1.3 Classification of speech acts

2.1.3.1 Classification of speech acts as speech act types

One general classification system lists five types of general functions performed

by speech acts They are: declarations, representatives, expressives, directives,

and commissives (Searle, 1976: 1-15, Levinson, 1983: 240)

• Declarations are those kinds of speech acts that change the world via their

utterance and via words They affect immediate changes in the institutional

state of affairs and tend to rely on elaborate extra-linguistic institutions (declaring war, firing from employment) (Levinson 1983: 240) The given examples below illustrate that the speaker has to have a special institutional role, in a specific context, in order to perform a declaration appropriately:

(1) Priest: I now pronounce you husband and wife

(2) Referee: You’re out!

(3) Jury Foreman: We find the defendant guilty

• Representatives are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker believes to be the state or not Statements of fact, assertions, conclusions, and

descriptions are all examples of the speaker representing the world as he or

she believes it is Typical functions of this category are describing, claiming,

hypothesizing, insisting and disagreeing The following examples illustrate

what are mentioned above

(5) The earth is flat

(6) Chomsky didn’t write about peanuts

(7) It was a warm sunny day

• Commissives are those kinds of speech acts that speakers use to commit themselves to doing something with words They express what the speaker

intends Representatives of this group include promising, offering,

threatening, refusing, vowing and volunteering They can be performed by the

speaker alone, or by the speaker as a member of a group, e g “I’ll be back”,

“I’m going to get it right next time”, “We will not do that”

• Directives are those kinds of speech acts that speakers use to get someone else to do something They express what the speaker wants Typical functions

of this group are commanding, ordering, requesting, suggesting, inviting,

advising, and questioning They can be positive or negative, as illustrated in

these examples:

(8) Give me a cup of coffee Make it black

(9) Could you lend me a pen, please?

(10) Don’t touch that

• Expressives are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker feels They express psychological states and can be statements of pleasure, pain,

likes, dislikes, joy or sorrow Typical ones are: complimenting,

congratulating, thanking, and welcoming As illustrated in the examples

below, they can be caused by something the speaker does or the hearer does,

but they are about the speaker’s experience

(11) I’m really sorry

(12) Congratulations!

(13) Oh, yes, great, mmmm, ssahh!

This above classification is viewed as one of the most influential and accepted of speech acts

widely-Bach and Harnish (1979: 41) proved to be more specific when they classify

illocutionary acts into six categories Two of them, the effectives and

verdictives, are conventional, not communicative The four communicative

ones are constatives, directives, commisives, and acknowledgements which are more or less similar to Austin’s expositives, exercitives, commissives, and

behabitives, and closely related to Searle’s representatives, directives, commissives, and expressives, respectively However, their classification

system is a bit different from Searle’s For instance, while suggestions belong

to the constatives in Bach and Harnish, they are classified as directives in

Searle’s

According to Bach and Harnish (1979: 41), classification of communicative

illocutionary acts is divided into four prominent types including constatives,

directives, commissives and acknowledgements In detail, it is directives that

are the fundamentally primary emphasis of this thesis

To be more specific, directives are acclaimed to perform six leading

communicative illocutionary acts consisting of requestives, questions,

requirements, prohibitives, permissives, and advisories (Bach and Harnish,

1979: 41)

In this studyr, the researcher employed Searle’s and Bach and Harnish’s classifications for the theoretical framework of the analysis of speech act types, with Bach’s being the main one amended to meet the variety of speech

act types, especially for directives functions in the movie “Green Book”

2.1.3.2 Classification of speech acts by the level of indirectness

Speech acts may be either direct or indirect speech acts depending on the

direct and indirect relationships between their structures and functions Discussing the aspect of direct and indirect speech act, Searle (1975) stated that the simplest cases of meaning are those in which the speaker utters a sentence and means exactly and literally what he says and defined indirect speech acts as cases where an illocutionary act is performed indirectly by way

of performing another

More simply, direct speech acts occur when the speaker says what he means, while in indirect speech acts, the speaker means more than what is

communicated Yule (1997) suggested the three structural forms (declarative,

interrogative and imperative) and the three corresponding communicative

functions (statement, question and command/request) to classify speech acts

as being direct or indirect He stated: “Wherever there is a direct relationship

between a structure and a function, we have direct speech act Whenever there is an indirect relationship between a structure and a function, we have

an indirect speech act”

To make a direct speech act, there has to be a direct relationship between a

structure and a function For example, the sentence “Fasten the seat belt!” is

an imperative sentence because the word used in this sentence begins with verb and ends with exclamation mark The function of the sentence is

command/request because the speaker attempts the addressee to wear a seat belt So, there is a direct relationship between the sentence form and function

2.1.3.3 Necessity of context in speech act studies

When one analyzes speech acts and their role in conversations, it is crucial essence that the role of context is undoubted The same utterance can be employed to express different illocutionary acts in different contexts Therefore, context must be carefully considered whenever speech acts are interpreted

It is a universally prevailing notion that context plays a salient role in the

performance and interpretation of speech acts because it can determine the

meanings of utterances in three ways First, context makes clear what a sentence is uttered for Second, context presents what proposition has been exactly expressed Finally, context offers us evidence for what kind of

illocutionary force has been intended by the speaker Moreover, it is believed

that context is an integral part of speech act studies due to the fact that the same utterance can be employed to express variant illocutionary acts in

different contexts

As stated by Yule (1996: 21), context is referred to the physical environment

of a speech event including the participants, location, time, and other physical

respects He also claimed that “our ability to identify intended referents has

actually depended on more than our understanding of the referring expression It has been aided by the linguistic material, or co-text, accompanying the referring expression.” This means that co-text is a

linguistic part of the environment in which a referring expression is utilized, according to Yule (1996: 21) However, Thomas (1996) stated that the socio-cultural background, the physical environment and the linguistic parts

surrounding an utterance being investigated are three levels used to analyze

context

As proved above, these views are expected to show an agreement with the

fact that context is deemed as a significantly pragmatic contribution to the

performance and interpretation of speech acts in particular as well as speech act studies in general

2.2 An Overview of English directives

2.2.1 Structural features of English directives

It is claimed that directives to hearers could be conveyed in a wide range of syntactic forms The social distribution of such forms shows them to occur systematically, according to the social distance, relative power, and ranking of imposition, among others

(14) May I please speak with John?

(15) Is John there?

(16) John, please!

These above examples are all directives in spite of their various syntactic forms The formal diversity provided by languages has recently been the focus of attention among linguists It is the question that how the central intent of the speaker can be conveyed when form is so varied How can the

listener know that “Is John there?” is intended as a directive, when its

wording is the same as an information question?

It is observed that variations in expressions are systematically related to social features (Brown & Gilman 1960; Ervin-Tripp 1968; Friedrich 1972; Geohegan 1973; Gumperz 1971; Hymes 1971; Labov 1972; Soskin & John

1963; Tyler 1972) Directives are expected to be explored as the focus of this paper due to three main reasons: they are frequent for all ages; they are likely

to be relatively sensitive to addressee features because they inquire work of the hearer; and they often lead to action and might therefore be relatively easy

to identify

According to Ervin – Tripp (1976), it was claimed there are six different types

of directives basing on their forms

2.2.1.1 Need statements

Need statements occurred between persons differing in rank The social distribution in is expected to be distinctly different from imperatives Need statements are claimed to exist in two kinds of settings, which are the transactional work setting, where duty is set clearly and statement of need by

a superior implied an obligation on the subordinate one

(19) [customer to waitress] Give me a coffee

In situations where the necessary action is obvious, it is commonplace to produce elliptical forms which specify the new information only It is framed that there are four more important structural variants:

a “You + imperative”

(20) [Passenger to Driver] You should turn right here, then you go straight

b Attention-getters (preposed greetings)

Attention-getters are defined under the forms of “hey”, “excuse me”, names, honorific address terms, and “please” These kinds of signals are considered

to play the functions calling attention to a gesture or to what will follow up, as can be seen in examples (21) and (22)

(21) [A man in an elevator] Excuse me, Floor 19

(22) [Professor to colleague] Carry some books, will you?

c Post-posed tags

Post-posed modals, or “OK”, and post-posed or medial address terms and

“please” were of great importance, as illustrated in example (23)

(23) [Student to another] Give me that book, OK?

d Rising pitch

Rising pitch is claimed to play as an upturn on a name post-posed to a

statement, or on a “please”, as shown in example (24)

(24) [Wife to husband] Hand me the dish, John?

2.2.1.3 Imbedded imperatives

Imbedded imperatives are expected to occur in instances in which the agent and object are explicit, so that the forms preceding them are a kind of formal addition, as illustrated in example (25)

(25) - Why don’t you open the window?

- Would you mind opening the window?

- Could I trouble you to open the window?

- Can you open the window?

- Will you open the window?

- Would you care to open the window?

In addition, it is claimed that, in adult speech, direct imperatives and imbedded imperatives have a distinctly different social distribution For example, the disparity in beneficiary changes the directive form

(26) [Student to another]

- Try this cake

- Have some cake, June?

(27) [Student to teacher] Would you like a piece of cake, Teacher?

2.2.1.4 Permission directives

Permission directives are claimed to the form of directive which consists of

“Modal + beneficiary + have/verb +?” The modals include can, could, and

their negatives, and may The difference between permission directives and

imbedded directives is the shift of focus to the beneficiary or recipient’s activity, rather than the donor-addressee’s activity, as shown in examples (28), (29), and (30)

(28) [Brother to sister] Can I have my records back?

(29) [Employee to the elder employee] May I have the salt?

(30) [Student to teacher] May I open the window?

2.2.1.5 Non-explicit question directives

With the discussion of question directives, it is claimed that question directives constitute a more difficult challenge than imbedded imperatives This is due to the fact that question directives are expected to offer the listener, who does not want to comply the action, an escape option Typical examples are (31) and (34)

(31) [Husband to wife]

- You ready? (implying asking to leave)

According to Ervin-Tripp (1976), it is claimed that there are three kinds of social circumstances in which hints occurred

First, children tend to use hints frequently due to their lack of a articulated sense of relieving discomfort, and the reliance on their caretakers

well-to find well-to solutions, as shown in (33) and (34)

(33) My nose is running

(34) I’m hungry

Second, if a service is special, and the speaker is reluctant to be explicit, the interpretation is left to the listener’s solicitude, as seen in (35)

(35) [Sister to brother, as she reaches into cupboard]

- Oh dear, I wish I were taller!

- Here, Can I get something for you?

- Yes, please, some of those green dishes up there

Third, in settings where the necessary acts are very clear, statements of time

or condition may be sufficient, since everyone knows what must be done and

by whom In office settings, these condition directives tend to be to a different age or rank, as illustrated in (36)

(36) [Laboratory director to secretary] We’re waiting for Dr Janger from Texas I’ll be gone until 2 o’clock (i.e., tell him to arrive before 2….)

Hints are supposed to be prime examples of the kind of communicative abbreviation which appears in high solidarity, closed networks of communication such as in families and compatible living groups in which the personal relationships are central values

2.2.1.7 Social meanings in English directives

It is commonly assumed that the variation in the forms for speech acts is due

to level of politeness (Lakoff, 1973) This theory was justified by James (1975) by setting out a list of various ways of saying the same thing for the gathering of judgments on the scale of politeness level

However, according to Ervin-Tripp (1976), a distribution of forms across social situations are claimed to garner semantic features Speakers are believed to select the appropriate politeness value according to the rank and age of the addressee, the difficulty of task, social distancing, territoriality, familiarity, normality…

In addition, another pre-eminent aspect is that the social interpretation or making derives from the existence of norms which can be compared: the form which was expected and the social features appropriate to the expressions used It is required that to allow a smooth flowing process, participants of the conversations are insisted to share norms; if not, these could lead to communicative misunderstandings For example,

(37) [New secretary to the chairman as she locks the office door]

-I’m going to lunch, now

[Chairman replies]

a) Would you mail this package to my mother, please? or

b) Are you going to go by the Post Office by any chance?

(38) [Young clerks who have worked together for four months]

I got the files done finally

a) Could you take these back to Emma, please? Or

b) Take these with you

In example (37), the expected form is a question-directive because of the high probability that the service would be out of the secretary’s way and the fact that it is outside her normal tasks In example (38), the expected form for a routine easy task between peers at work is expected to be the direct imperative

To conclude, it is acclaimed that the social norms of distribution have to be learned from exposure This is on account of the fact that the deviance from a norm is given a social interpretation that ingratiation can be as insulting as deviance through rudeness Without a theory of context, familiarity, rank, social distancing, speakers cannot perceive either for meaning reversals or qualitative changes in social meaning Therefore, a skilled language user is claimed to rely on the contrast between what is expected and what occurs as a resource for implying meanings His ability is supposed to rest on knowledge

of what the listener is expected to hear, and what social features cue that expectation

2.2.2 Functional features of English directives

According to Bach and Harnish’s (1979) framework, English directives are expected to express the speaker's attitude towards some prospective action by the hearer However, they also express the speaker's intention (desire, wish) that his utterance or the attitude it expresses can be taken as (a) reason for the

hearer to act Bach and Harnish’s (1979) employed Searle's term "directive"

to cover the six kinds of acts that belong in this category

2.2.2.1 Requestives

Requestives (ask, beg, beseech, implore, insist, invite, petition, plead, pray,

request, solicit, summon, supplicate, tell, urge) express the speaker's desire that the hearer do something

2.2.2.2 Questions

Questions (ask, inquire, interrogate, query, question, quiz) are special cases of

requests to the extent that what is requested is the hearer provides the speaker with certain information Questions have two distinctive funtions One function is in the notion of asking a question and the second is in the notion of

asking someone to do something Questions are always directives, for they are

attempts to get the hearer to perform a speech act

2.2.2.3 Requirements

Requirements (bid, charge, command, demand, dictate, direct, enjoin, instruct,

order, prescribe, require) are directives in which the speaker requires the

hearer to act Requirements, such as ordering or dictating, should not be confused with requests, even strong ones In requirements, the speaker is

presuming that he/she has the authority over the hearer (physical, psychological, or institutional) that gives such weight to his utterance

2.2.2.4 Prohibitives

Prohibitives (enjoin, forbid, prohibit, proscribe, restrict) are directives in

which the speaker prohibits the hearer from acting Prohibitives, such as

forbidding or proscribing, are essentially requirements that the hearer not do a certain thing To prohibit someone from smoking is to require him not to smoke

2.2.2.5 Permissives

Permissives (agree to, allow, authorize, bless, consent to, dismiss, excuse,

exempt, forgive, grant, license, pardon, release, sanction) are directives in which the speaker permits the hearer to act Permissives, which are similar to requirements and prohibitives, presume the speaker's authority

2.2.2.6 Advisories

Advisories (admonish, advise, caution, counsel, propose, recommend,

suggest, urge, warn) are directives in which the speaker advises the hearer to act As for advisories, what the speaker expresses is not the desire that the hearer do a certain action but the belief that doing it is a good idea and that it

is in the hearer's interest

2.3 Indirect Speech Acts

2.3.1 Definition of indirect speech acts

In the theory of speech acts, Searle (1976) introduced the notion of an

‘indirect speech act’, which in his account is meant to be, more particularly,

an indirect 'illocutionary' act Applying a conception of such illocutionary acts according to which they are (roughly) acts of saying something with the

intention of communicating with an audience, he stated: "In indirect speech

acts the speaker communicates to the hearer more than he actually says by way of relying on their mutually shared background information, both linguistic and nonlinguistic, together with the general powers of rationality and inference on the part of the hearer"

2.3.2 Characteristics of indirect speech acts

The relationship between structure and function is the criterion to determine indirect speech acts As Yule (1997) argued, whenever there is an

indirect relationship between a structure and a function, we have an indirect speech act and the secondary meaning derived from indirect speech acts requires the participation from both the speaker and the hearer

In other words, when a speaker uses an interrogative sentence, and his intention is to satirize, it is an indirect relationship between the function and

structure For example, if a father says, “Why you still haven’t done your

homework? Do you want me to do it for you?”, the father does not really wish

to come to help On the contrary, he is ironic, and the utterance is an indirect speech act

In indirect speech acts, the form differs from the function Usually in these cases, the indirect speech acts carries the meaning in the utterance, but the intended force in the speech act has a secondary meaning also The classic

example “Can you pass the salt?” is clearly a case for indirect speech

acts The literal meaning of this utterance refers to the ability of the hearer to pass the salt physically, while the intended meaning or perlocutionary effect of the utterance is for the hearer to pass the salt

Searle (1975) described the indirect speech acts as “cases where one

illocutionary act is performed indirectly by way of performing another”

Saville-Troike (1982: 36) also stated: “direct acts are those where surface

form matches interactional function” It can be drawn that indirect speech acts

are those whose surface form does not match interactional function Nevertheless, sometimes the structure matches the function well but it is not a

direct speech act but an indirect one For example, when being asked “Do you

have a house?” one can answer by saying “I live with my uncle” The

response should be interpreted as “I don’t have a house”, so it is viewed as an

indirect speech act rather than a direct one, though the structure matches its function

In Clark (1979), six properties of indirect speech acts are described based on the work of many researchers These six properties summarize how indirect speech acts function They are:

1) Indirect speech acts have multiple meanings There are literal and implied meanings;

2) Indirect speech acts follow logical priority of meanings Since multiple meanings are available in the utterance, the most logical and salient one will

be selected based on the given context;

3) Indirect speech acts are rational Based on the cooperative principles in Grice (1975), speakers and hearers assume that the utterances are rational and according to the maxims set for conversation;

4) Indirect speech acts have conventionality Speakers tend to speak idiomatically rather than directly This idiomatic usage has become

conventional, so in “Can you reach the salt?” the ability is not questioned,

but rather serves as an indirect speech act for passing the salt;

5) Indirect speech acts are polite Indirectness is a widely used conversational strategy People tend to use indirect speech acts mainly in connection with politeness because sometimes direct addresses may even appear impolite as in

“Would you lend me some money?” and “Lend me some money!” The latter variant would be absolutely unacceptable in some contexts;

6) Indirect speech acts are purposeful Based on the notion of linguistic politeness, the indirect speech acts are used to fulfill a certain societal norm of indirectness and serve the purpose for meeting the speaker’s intentions

2.3.3 Indirect Directives

With reference to speech act classification, directives are defined as “speech

acts that speakers use to get someone else to do something” They express the

speaker’s desires Directives are commands, orders, requests, and suggestions which can be positive or negative (Searle, 1976)

As defined in speech act theory, direct directives are those where surface form

matches interactional function, as “Keep silence!” used as a command, versus

an indirect “It’s getting noisy here” or “I can’t hear myself think”

To sum up, a direct directive is supposed to occur when the surface form

imperative matches with the intended meaning functioning as

command/request that the speaker would like to convey On the contrary,

when the contextual meaning as command/request implied by the speaker is displayed by different literal meanings via declarative, interrogative and

exclamative forms, indirect directives are realized

2.4 A Review of Previous Relevant Studies

The first two previous speech-act relevant studies are “A study of Speech Acts

in Conversations in the New Interchange Series” by Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dung

(2014) and “A Study of Linguistic Features of Indirect Speech Acts in Modern

Short Stories in English and Vietnamese” by Đoàn Thị Hương Hiền (2015)

Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dung (2014) carried out the study with the aim to investigate various linguistic features of speech acts including speech act types, speech act structures and indirect speech acts in the conversations in New Interchange 1, 2, and 3 designed for students so that people can understand, teach, and learn much better when using the textbook series In her study, both the quantitative and qualitative approaches are used with descriptive, contrastive, analytic, and synthetic methods in the New

Interchange 1, 2, and 3 series However, there are several major limitations of this research For instance, she cannot examine linguistic aspects relating to prosodic features, politeness strategies, and so on

Besides, Đoàn Thị Hương Hiền (2015) conducted “A Study of Linguistic

Features of Indirect Speech Acts in Modern Short Stories in English and Vietnamese” to study characteristics of indirect speech acts in the

conversations of English and Vietnamese modern short stories She employed

both quantitative and qualitative approaches with descriptive, contrastive, analytic, and synthetic methods like Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dung (2014) to find out the interesting results concerning indirect speech act structures, indirect speech act functions, and major similarities and differences in structures and functions of the investigated speech acts between the two languages Also, similar to Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dung (2014)’s research, there are some main limitations in the study The first limitation is that the results are not adapted for the real communication purposes because data were just collected from modern short stories Another one is that she could not realize and explain all

of the examples as well as examine linguistic aspects concerning politeness strategies and adjacency pairs

“A Study of Speech Acts in Hospitality” by Trần Thị Cẩm Giang (2016) is the

third one The study was conducted to investigate various linguistic features

of speech acts in English conversations in hospitality in an English textbook

"Hotel & Hospitality English - Communicate Confidently with Guests" by

Mike Seymour To achieve the aim, she assigned to use both quantitative approach and qualitative approach

Last but not least, the undergraduate study “A Contrastive Study of Indirect

Speech Acts in “Spotlight” versus “Sai Gon, Anh Yeu Em” conducted by Lê

Thị Mỹ Nhớ (2018) must be mentioned She successfully examined the

structures and functions of indirect speech acts in the two films: “Spotlight” and “Sai Gon, Anh Yeu Em” to figure out the question of how similar and

different indirect speech acts are utilized in the two movies

With the host of speech act experiences and great extent of knowledge provided by the previous studies, the structures and functions of directives

speech acts in the film “Green Book” have not been investigated, and there have been no researchers sufficiently resolving the question of how structures

and functions of directives correspond with social meaning and level of politeness in the real-life settings Therefore, it is crucially important that there should be more research on directives on the daily basis for real-life communicative situations

CHAPTER 3: METHODS AND PROCEDURES

In this chapter, methods and procedures of the study are presented It starts with an introduction of the research design Next come the research methods and research procedures Then, data collection and data analysis are provided before the chapter ends with the confirmation of the validity and reliability of the study

3.1 Research Design

Both qualitative and quantitative approaches are employed in this study The

qualitative approach not only helps us to investigate structures and functions

of directives and their indirectness in the film but also supports us in finding out general characteristics of directives

Thanks to the quantitative approach, the data are analyzed in order to give the

level of frequencies of directive structures and functions In addition, the

quantitative approach was used in this study to avoid an over-reliance on our

intuition

3.2 Research Methods

Synthetic, analytic, descriptive, and contrastive methods were also utilized

as the assistance to achieve the set goal

Examined features are identified and isolated by means of analytic method

Synthetic method helps us to view how the parts of the study work together A

detailed description of data is given by employing descriptive method

Contrastive method is to compare and contrast the similarities and differences

in structural and functional features of directives produced between the two main characters in “Green Book”

3.3 Data Collection

The data source for this study is the transcript of the movie “Green Book”

The data including 398 samples of directives were selected in the conversations of the two main characters That is to say, there are 214 samples taken from the speaking turns of Tony Lip (including 162 samples with Dr Donald Shirley and 52 samples with the other characters) in the movie As regards Dr Donald Shirley, he produced 184 samples of directives (including 170 samples to Tony Lip, and 14 samples with the other

characters)

The movie, which won the prize for Best Picture at the 91st Academy Awards,

as well as honors for Mahershala Ali as Best Supporting Actor and Nick Vallelonga, Brian Currie and Peter Farrelly for Best Original Screenplay, depicts the burgeoning friendship between an world-class African-American classical pianist and his Italian-American driver as they travel the 1960s segregated South on a concert tour

In fact, Green Book is about the relationship between two real-life people:

Donald Shirley and Tony “Lip” Vallelonga Shirley was born in 1927 and grew up in a well-off black family in Florida, where he emerged as a classical piano prodigy He possessed virtuosic technique and a firm grasp of both classical and pop repertoire He went on to perform regularly at Carnegie Hall—right below his regal apartment—and worked with many prestigious orchestras, like the Chicago Symphony and the New York Philharmonic But

at a time when prominent black classical musicians were few and far between