A comparative analysis on making polite apologies in english and vietnamese from the cross cultural perspective

ABSTRACT This paper investigates how similarly and differently native speakers of English and Vietnamese use apologies politely in terms of cross-cultural perspective in the light of 3 a

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

I certify that the work presented in this research report has been performed and interpreted solely by myself I confirm that this word is submitted in partial fulfillment

of the requirement of the B.A Degree and has not been submitted elsewhere in any other form for the fulfillment of any other degree or qualification

Dong Thap, April 2012

Nguyen Thi Phuong Dung

to study the thesis

Second, I would like to express my greatest and sincerest appreciation to Mrs Huynh Cam Thao Trang, M.A, and my supervisor, for her precious advices, guidance, and support in the pursuance of this study

Last but not least, I am grateful to my two friends Phan Thanh Tan and Nguyen Van Trong for what they have done to help me finish the study

ABSTRACT

This paper investigates how similarly and differently native speakers of English and Vietnamese use apologies politely in terms of cross-cultural perspective in the light of 3 apology strategies including: getting attention, rejecting a request or

an invitation and admitting guilt with an explanation basing on the previous study of Mrs Huynh Cam Thao Trang (2009) as a foundation for research The data are collected by books, questionnaire and interview The questionnaire is obtained with 20 Vietnamese participants and 20 English participants including American, Australian, Canadian and English The interview is also delivered to

20 English participants and 20 Vietnamese participants The participants for questionnaire and interview are different Their responses then are analyzed separately to identify the types of apology structure and to measure the degree of frequency in giving apologies The study is of a descriptive nature Frequencies, percentages and the means of these percentages are considered The prime findings of the study reveal that Vietnamese and English native speakers are nearly similar in the choice of apology forms appropriate in admitting guilt with

an explanation and different in the degree of using apologizing words The Vietnamese native speakers less give apologies than native speakers of English

It seems that the English native speakers give apologies more politely than Vietnamese people but in Vietnamese culture instead of using apologizing word Vietnamese people have different ways of speaking to show the politeness

TABLE OF CONTENT

Page

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

ABBREVIATIONS iv

TABLE OF CONTENT v

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1

1 Motivation of the study 1

2 Aims of the study 2

3 Research methods 3

4 Scope of the study 3

5 Significance of the study 3

6 Previous study 3

7 Organization of the thesis 4

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW 5

1 Speech acts 5

2 Speech acts and Politeness 6

2.1 Politeness 9

2.1.1 Definition of politeness 9

2.1.2 Politeness across cultures 10

2.1.3 “Politeness- directness- indirectness” in apologizing 11

3 Speech acts of apology 12

3.1 Definitions of apologies 13

3.2 Apologizing forms in English and Vietnamese 16

3.3 Apology strategies 19

3.3.1 Strategy 1: Getting attention 19

3.3.2 Strategy 2: Rejecting a request or an invitation 21

3.3.3 Strategy 3: Admitting guilt with an explanation 22

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY 24

1 Research questions 24

2 Research participants 24

3 Research procedure 25

4 Research instruments 25

4.1 Questionnaire 26

4.2 Interview 26

4.3 Books analysis 27

5 Method of data analysis 27

5.1 Statistic 27

5.2 Compare and contrast 27

CHAPTER 4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 29

1 An overview of results 29

1.1.2 Situation 2 34

1.1.3 Situation 3 35

1.1.4 Situation 4 36

1.1.6 Situation 6 37

1.2 Results of interview 39

1.2.1 Getting attention 39

1.2.2 Rejecting a request or an invitation 43

1.2.3 Admitting guilt with an explanation 45

3.2 Discussion 58

3.2.1 Similarities 58

3.2.2 Differences 60

CHAPTER 5 CONCLUSION 63

1 Summary 63

2 Results 64

3 Suggestions 65

REFERENCES 67

APPENDICES .viii

APENDIX 1 .viii

APENDIX 2 x

APENDIX 3 xii

APENDIX 4 xiv

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1 Motivation of the study

Commonly language is an important part of culture, and a culture is reflected through its language A piece of culture can be referred to, but it is differently interpreted In the broadest sense, language is also the symbolic representation of a person, since it comprises his/her historical and cultural background, as well as his/her approach to life and his/her ways of living and thinking Brown (1994: 165) describes that “a language is a part of a culture and a culture is a part of a language; the two are intricately interwoven so that one cannot separate the two without losing the significance of either language or culture” In a word, culture and language are inseparated, so foreign language learning is foreign culture learning As a result, nowadays learning a foreign language does not only learn syntactic structures or learn new vocabulary and expressions but also incorporate some cultural elements intertwined with language itself As Vietnam is integrating many countries around the world, learning English is getting more and more important and essential English has been used as an international language all over the world and as a means of communication with different purposes However, to succeed in communication is not easy since every society has its own socio-cultural and communicative behaviors The difficulty is that understanding how

to communicate effectively with individuals who speak another language or who rely on different means to reach communicative goal It is, therefore, perhaps the most important for people to realize that a basic understanding of cultural diversity is the key to effective cross-cultural communications

In daily life, people take plenty of actions to communicate with others, for example, thanks, apologies, greetings, invitations, compliments, requests or complaints which can be done both verbally and non-verbally There have been many conflicts of the world are caused as result of the lack of cross –culture knowledge Take speech acts of apology as an example An apology is one of the cultural features that people who learn English need to pay attention to It is an

expressive speech act which is not only a normal utterance but also an issue of great concern Apologizing occurs in every culture to maintain good relations between interlocutors When one apologizes, one may intend not merely to express regret but also to seek forgiveness However, with different social level and ages, people use different ways of apologies In Vietnamese daily life, in many situations Vietnamese people need to say “sorry” but as a habit they rarely

do so A great number of foreign visitors, therefore, complain that they are disappointed and angry when they do not receive any apologies from Vietnamese people when they have fault Because of different culture, when communicating with English native speakers, Vietnamese people often make mistake and misunderstand Apologizing is not an easy matter in Vietnamese language, and having to do it in a second or foreign language is even more complicated The native speakers of English and Vietnamese share differences and similarities in terms of giving apologies in social interaction Thus, mastering how to give apologies politely, effectively and appropriately not to misunderstand, shock and hurt is a need

For the above reasons, finding the similarities and differences in English and Vietnamese in apologies is a must The finding hopefully helps Vietnamese teachers and learners keep the conversation with foreigners going on To achieve

it, the thesis is attempted to answer tree research questions:

1 How do the Vietnamese native speakers and the English native speakers say apologies?

2 What are the similarities and differences in making polite apologies between the Vietnamese native speakers and the English native speakers?

3 Do ages, social positions and relationships influence making polite apologies?

2 Aims of the study

The aims of this study are to compare how similarly and differently the native speakers of English and Vietnamese use apologies in terms of cross-cultural features based on comparing the structures and strategies of apologies The

apology strategies including getting attention, rejecting a request or invitation and admitting guilt with explanation will be investigated

3 Research methods

In the study, the methods used to collect relevant data are statistic, compare and contrast apologizing forms which are extracted from books, questionnaire and interview First, data is mainly collected from English and Vietnamese books They are then analyzed to find out the similarities and differences in making apologies in English and Vietnamese in terms of providing theoretical background for the process of comparative and contrastive analysis in the thesis

Next, questionnaire and interview are employed to investigate the reality of using apologies between the English native speakers and the native speakers of Vietnamese They are delivered to 40 native speakers of Vietnamese and 40 English native speakers in Ho Chi Minh City

4 Scope of the study

The study is a comparative analysis on making polite apologies in English and Vietnamese in terms of cross-cultural perspective performed by the native speakers of English and Vietnamese The thesis is limited to verbal aspects of making apologies based on eight forms and three strategies The study also investigates the factors influence the way of making apology such as social level, age and relationship

5 Significance of the study

Finding out the similarities and differences in English and Vietnamese in polite apologies is expected to make a significant contribution to effective communication As a matter of fact, Vietnamese people can be more confident when communicating or cooperating with the native speakers of English and use apologies exactly in specific situations Hopefully, the study will help learners acquire how to remain relationships and keep conversations going on effectively with foreigners

6 Previous study

Through the research process, two previous studies related to this thesis will be used to compare the findings

One study was carried out in spring 2009 by Huynh Cam Thao Trang Her study focused on seven forms and three apology strategies in English and Vietnamese including getting attention, rejecting a request or invitation and admitting guilt with explanation Her study, however, did not concentrate on comparing how similarly and differently native speakers of English and Vietnamese use polite apologies in terms of cross-cultural features

The other study is made by Mrs Huynh Thi Nhi The paper analyzed similarities and differences in English and Vietnamese in the light of utterances of apology However, her study did not focus on three apology strategies as well as did not compare the degree of frequency in using apologies between Vietnamese native speakers and native speakers of English

This study will combine the results of the two studies above to develop the researcher‟s thesis They are hopefully basic foundations this thesis

7 Organization of the thesis

This study is divided into three parts as follows:

Chapter 1, introduction, presents an overview of the study in which the reason for the research, the aims, the research methods, the scope, the significance of the study, related previous study as well as the organization of the study

Chapter 2 reviews the theoretical background of the study including speech acts

of apologies, politeness, and strategies of apologies

Chapter 3 discusses issues of methodology, research questions, research participants, research procedure, data collection, and method of analysis

Chapter 4 presents an overview of results and discusses the results of questionnaire and interview

Chapter 5, Conclusion, addresses the key issues in the study and summarizes

some shortcomings revealed during the process of completing this thesis

CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW

1 Speech acts

Speech act theory, developed by Searle (1979) following Austin‟s work (1975),

is based on the idea that language is a form of behavior, and it is governed by rules (p 22) Linguistic communication is seen as conventionalized, its minimal unit being the speech act, i.e “an utterance that serves a function in communication” (University of Minnesota: Center for Advance Research on Language Acquisition‟s website) The idea that language is behavior is the key to understand how language functions in a social context Trosborg (1987:147) notes “appropriate social behavior patterns, as they are perceived in Western societies, are built on the norms which constitute polite behavior” It is well known that what is considered polite behavior varies among different socio-cultural groups Therefore, those norms which constitute polite behavior will be different in different societies

Speech acts can be defined as the basic unit of communication and they are part

of linguistic competence As Schmidt and Richards (1980) state speech acts are all the acts that speakers perform through speaking, and all the things that speakers do and the interpretation and negotiation of speech acts depend on discourse of context

Speech acts have also been classified as indirect and direct speech acts According to Searle (1979), one speech act is brought about indirectly by performing another one in indirect speech acts and their interpretation changes according to the situation, the manner of speaking and to whom people speak Fraser (1978) claims that indirect speech acts with illocutionary force are similar across languages but their distribution, function and frequency of occurrence may show differences According to Blum-Kulka and Olshtain (1984), there are inter-cultural, cross-cultural and individual differences in using speech acts Second language learners have been claimed to have disadvantages in using speech acts

to communicate with native speakers of the target language because of the complexity of speech acts since they are conditioned by social, cultural,

situational and personal factors (Cohen and Olshtain, 1985) Second language learners generally try to apply the rules they use in their first language when they speak in the second language Thus, the result is communication breakdown or communication conflict

In general, speech acts are acts of communication Communication is to express a certain attitude, and the type of speech act being performed corresponds to the type of attitude expressed For example, a statement expresses

a belief, a request expresses a desire, and an apology expresses regret As an act

of communication, a speech act succeeds if the audience identifies, in accordance with the speaker's intention, and the attitude expressed

2 Speech acts and Politeness

Speech act theory is also closely related to the concept of politeness The apology speech act is used commonly in daily conversations to show politeness In any context, this speech act shows respect and identity as well as the culture of people who use a specific word choice Early studies on politeness claims that this concept is universal (Brown & Levinson, 1987; Lakoff, 1973) According to Lakoff (1973), there are three main rules of politeness, namely “don‟t impose,”

“give options,” and “make [the hearer] feel good – be friendly” (p 298) Answering objections to the universality of politeness, Lakoff claims that his theory does not contradict the fact that different cultures have different customs

He believes that what creates differences in the interpretation of politeness across cultures is the order these rules take precedence one over the other

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), members of a society tend to keep a certain image of themselves which they call “face.” Brown and Levinson distinguish between two types of face, namely “negative face” and “positive face.” “Negative face” is defined as one‟s desire that nobody impede his or her actions, while “positive face” implies that people expect their needs to be desirable to others For example, “Sorry, would it bother you terribly to close the door?” Addressing negative face supposes a power imbalance between the speaker and the hearer The hearer assumes that he is negatively impacting the

speaker in some way, and tries to rectify this with an apology while if the speaker apologizes to the hearer, the speaker will be threatening his/her own positive face, in that the speaker is acknowledging having imposed on the hearer and asking for his/her acceptance of this (which the hearer may reject)

Thus, those functions of language that are expressed with the help of speech acts are intended either to prevent a threat to the speaker‟s or hearer‟s face – by being polite when requesting something, for example – or to recover, or save face – in the case of apologies, for example (Staab, 1983) Apologies as a face-threatening act reflect how people generally behave as if their expectations concerning their public self-image, or their face wants, will be respected For example, a close friend calls to reject an invitation to a birthday party for keeping the hearer‟s face-wants “I‟m terribly sorry I can‟t come to your birthday party next week I have to go to Nha Trang on business.” As a result, an English saying goes “sorry

is the hardest word” This is not because it is hard to pronounce or spell, but because the speakers have to admit that they have done something wrong Sometimes, apologies are also face saving because if accepted, the apology is supposed to alleviate the offense of the speaker

In the light of such findings, Nwoye (1992) believes that it is necessary to classify the concept of face into “individual face” and “group face.” Individual face refers to “the individual‟s desire to attend to his/her personal needs and to place his/her public-self-image above those of others” (p 313), while group face refers to “the individual‟s desire to behave in conformity with culturally expected norms of behavior that are institutionalized and sanctioned by society” (p 313) Nwoye also shows that in some cultures, in light of this reclassification of the notion of face, speech acts such as requests, offers, thanks, and criticisms are no longer face threatening acts For example, in the culture of the Igbo, people follow a system where the sharing of goods and services is a norm Thus, whereas in some civilizations a certain request may be imposing, in this particular culture it is not, since people are expected to share as a social norm This idea of a “group face” was also put forward by Obeng (1999), who gives the

sub-example of the Akan language, where acts are threatening the face not only of the speakers, but of the entire ethnic group

Another problem that speech acts raise in connection with politeness is the fact that some speech acts seem to be impolite by their nature, such as orders or commands, while others are polite by nature, such as offers or invitations (Leech, 1983) Thus, according to Leech, when people talk about speech acts, they must distinguish between positive politeness, which increases the politeness in the case

of inherently polite speech acts, and negative politeness, which reduces the impoliteness of inherently impolite speech acts He also argues that one has to pay attention to the relative of politeness, as this depends, as it is believed by authors of studies presented above, on the culture of the speakers

The desire to be polite also influences what kind of speech act one decides to use Thus, one may choose an indirect speech act instead of a direct one in order to be more polite (Leech, 1983) Leech calls this the metalinguistic use of politeness in speech acts

The relationship between politeness and speech acts seems, therefore, very much similar to that between direct and indirect speech acts It is very difficult to label

a certain speech act as polite or impolite, and use these labels as rules Whether the meaning a certain speech act conveys is polite or impolite is rather very much dependent on the contextual circumstances in which they are uttered

To sum up this section on speech acts, speech act theory is a widely disputed field and issues such as what speech acts are and how they are classified seem to

be culture specific, and not as universal as some of the studies presented above have described Evidence on speech act perception and realization from different cultures have demonstrated that more research needs to be done in order to provide a theory that has an integrated approach to speech acts Thus, besides carefully defining the term used in the research and creating an appropriate taxonomy, social, cultural, and pragmatic influences on the meaning, perception, and production of speech acts need to be considered

2.1 Politeness

2.1.1 Definition of politeness

Politeness is such an interesting phenomenon that many linguistic experts have done research so far The concept of politeness have expressed by many authors such as Yule (1996), Lakoff (1983), Leech (1983), Richard, J.C.et al (1990) and Brown and Levinson (1987)

Yule (1996:60) states, “Politeness, in an interaction, can then be defined as the means employ to show awareness of another person‟s face.” Leech (1983:80) notes that politeness means to minimize the effect of impolite statement or expression (negative politeness) and maximize the effects of polite illocutions (positive politeness) According to Richard, J.C.et al.(1990), politeness is defined

as “a) how languages express the social distance between speakers and their different role relationships, b) how face work, that is, the attempt to establish, maintain, and save face during conversations is carried out in a speech community.”

Politeness, as shown in Coulmas (1981: 84, 235), is a dimension of linguistic choice and social behaviour, which includes such notions as courtesy, formality, rapport, deference, respect and distance People monitor their speech by linguistic choices Among the choices they make in conversation the politeness level of their utterances is one of the more conspicuous, and it is one where social constraints are most keenly felt

Lakoff (cited in Yule, 1996: 106) states that when one enters a

conversation-indeed, every kind discourse- one has some personal desideratum in mind: perhaps as obvious as a favour or as subtle as the desire to be likeable For some

of those needs, participants can accede to each other, and both gain their desires but with others, one must be lose, however minimally, for the others to win One person must tell another something that the other does not want to hear; one person must refuse another‟s request, one person must end a conversation before the other is quite willing to go In such cases, there is a danger of insult and consequently the breakdown of communication

However, Lakoff (1983) also states that politeness is a tool to minimize conflict

in discourse Human communication serves to establish and maintain not only a comfortable relationship between people but also a social harmony Therefore, in interpersonal communication, in terms of politeness, every participant considers social factors such as age, gender, power and distance among the interlocutors Moreover, politeness may be described as a form of behaviour which is exercised

in order to consolidate relationship between individuals or, at least, to keep it undamaged

2.1.2 Politeness across cultures

While it is certainly true that politeness does not reside within linguistic structures, every language has at its disposal a range of culture-specific routine formulae which carry “politeness default values” (Escandell-Vidal 1996: 643) The culture-specific meanings and politeness functions conventionally associated with certain expressions and grammatical constructions in a given language become apparent through comparison with other languages At the same time, approaching politeness contrastively makes it necessary to establish categories which can be compared across groups

While post-modern theorists shift the focus towards the investigation of how people disagree on what constitutes politeness, cross-cultural research aims to establish how they agree on what is polite and how they do so differently in different cultures Not only is the mutual knowledge necessary to infer an implicature (Grice, 1975) culture-specific but cultural values also determine whether it may be more appropriate to flout conversational maxims or to abide

by the rules of the cooperative principle in a particular situation

There are different kinds of politeness across cultures as well, which ground in different views of what constitutes “polite social behavior” interaction Lakoff (cited in Yule, 1996: 107) gives one example, for a white it was a bane to visiting Easterners, who was confounded by the Californian‟s appearance of good fellowship and deep caring, the immediate first naming, touching, looking deep

into the eyes, and asking truly caring questions; “Are you really happy with your

life?” To the properly brought up Easterner, such behaviour was permissible

only after years of earning it and my not then Easterners fell into one of several

schools of thought about the character of Californian: either that they had the

simplicity children and should be patronized, or that they were rough frontier

sorts, probably raised by wolves or that they were truly wonderful people who

could get to know he/she as well after two seconds as would take most of them a

life time

It is worth noting that within a culture, individual speakers may also vary

somewhat in employing conversational devices to execute politeness strategies

For example “some people believe that interrupting relevant remarks shows

interest in what the other person is talking about other people feel that it shows

utter disregard for the interrupted speakers (Green, 1989: 146)

2.1.3 “Politeness- directness- indirectness” in apologizing

Apologizing is one of the most sensitive arrears of daily communication in term

politeness It plays a crucial role in keeping people happy and friendship going

Although by apologizing, speakers recognize the fact that a violation of the social

norm has been communicated and admits to the fact that he or she at least

partially involve in its cause, apologizing most a social habit Sometimes, the

speakers mean it when they say it without thinking when they bump into

someone by mistake

As a norm of politeness and a social habit, people would definitely get annoyed

when apologizing is not given at the appropriate time, while in Brazil, neither the

teacher nor students always arrive at the appointed hours Arriving late may not

be very important in Brazil, nor is staying late In Brazil, a person who usually

arrives late is probably more successful than a person who is always on time In

fact, Brazilians expect a person with status or prestige to arrive late

Politeness in apologizing is also associated with the notion of indirectness and

directness Directness and indirectness are basic forms of expression that are

universal in all languages; however, they are different from culture to culture

Direct, done via an explicit illocutionary force-indicating device (IFID),

which selects a routines, formula expression of regret ( performative verb) such as: (be) sorry, apologize, regret, excuse (English); xin lỗi, tha thứ, lấy làm tiếc (Vietnamese)

Indirect, people may obtain certain advantages and avoid negative

consequences of face threatening acts by employing indirectness in their social interaction “Indirectness is costly and risky” (Dascal-cited in Thomas, 1995:120) Indirect, performed by any utterance containing:

An explanation or account of the course, which brought about the offence

Ex: The traffic was terrible

An expression of the speaker‟s responsibility for the offence

Ex: I’ve lost your book

An offer of repair

Ex: Can I replace it?

A promise of forbearance:

Ex: That’ll never happen again

3 Speech acts of apology

Apologies as an expressive speech act may be used before a real situation to show a feeling and lead to a good relationship between the speaker and the hearer In all social groups, the act of apologizing is called for when social norms have been violated, whether the offence is real or potential (Olshtain & Cohen, 1983:20) When an action or utterance has resulted in the fact that one or more people perceive themselves as offended, the culpable person(s) needs to apologize The act of apologizing requires an action or an utterance which is intended to “set things right” (Olshtain, 1983:235) Marquez-Reiter (2000: 44) states an apology is a “compensatory action for an offense committed by the speaker which has affected the hearer According to Bataineh (2006:1903) apologies fall under expressive speech acts in which speakers attempt to indicate

their state or attitude They add that in order for an apology to have an effect, it should reflect true feelings One cannot effectively apologize to another and truly reach him/her unless one portrays honest feelings of sorrow and regret for whatever one has done” (Fahmi, R & Fahmi, Rula, 2006: 1903) As Searle (1979) states a person who apologizes for doing A expresses regret at having done A, so the apology act can take place only if the speaker believes that some act A has been performed prior to the time of speaking and that this act A resulted in an infraction which affected another person who is now deserving an apology (Olshtain, ibid., 235) Apology speech acts have been investigated cross-culturally in order to find similarities and differences between the languages In the present study, the focus of analysis is to find out the similarities and differences in Vietnamese and English in the way of native English and Vietnamese speakers using apologies

or herself to some extent and to admit to fault and responsibility for X Hence the act of apologizing is face-saving for the hearer and face-threatening for the speaker This definition has described the apology process more individually (between the speaker and the hearer) which comes as support for the hearer who

was malaffected by a violation However, Leech (1983: 104) gives his definition

is, “apology is a convivial speech act whose goal coincides with the social goal

of maintaining harmony between the speaker and the hearer." Both definitions of Brown and Levison and Leech are convenient and acceptable, because each one describes this process and captured this phenomenon from both sides: 'individually' (the first one), and 'society' (the second one)

Bergman and Kasper (1993) define an apology as a “compensatory action to an offense in the doing of which the speaker was casually involved and which is costly to the hearer” (p 82) The cost can be in terms of losing face or even a severe misunderstanding It is clear that different cultures have different degrees

in perceiving how costly such an offense is, and therefore how necessary an apology is An action, in Bergman and Kasper‟s terminology, that is considered very serious in one culture, may not require an apology at all in another culture Also, the severity of such a face threatening act seems to be in a direct relationship with the type of apology chosen to defend face Brown and Levinson (1987) claim that all speakers choose the same strategy under the same conditions, and tried to demonstrate this by looking at three different languages, namely English, Tzeltal (a Mayan language), and South Indian Tamil However, this theory has been challenged by several researchers who claim that different individual factors are involved in both considering an act as face threatening, and the strategy used in apologizing (Trosborg, 1987) According to Trosborg these factors are determined by one‟s social and cultural patterns, and by the behavioral norms of one‟s culture This leads to the assumption that not only do speakers of different languages perceive the necessity of an apology differently, but also use different ways of apologizing

A definition that limits very much the concept of an apology is the one given by Owen (1983) According to him, apologies are remedial moves that follow what

he called a priming move on the part of the person who expects the apology, which is a move that triggers the apology While such an approach makes sense, the problem with Owen‟s definition is that he restricts the use of the term apology to only those utterances that actually contain the explicit phrases “I‟m

sorry” or “I apologize” and variants of these Such a definition would exclude from the start any indirect ways of apologizing, and would render inexistent many of the types of apologies Owen‟s definition would apply only to explicit apologies Trosborg (1995) distinguishes between apologies and complaints, that

“apologies are expressive illocutionary acts which can be differentiated from complaints, which are also expressive acts, by being convivial in nature” (p 373) However, because apologies are not the only convivial acts, Trosborg narrows down the definition even further by claiming that apologies have a remedial function, and this function is the one that differentiates them from thanking, congratulating, and other convivial acts Thus, she follows Owen‟s (1983) definition of apologies but she broadens it by including other utterances that express apologies, not just the ones that are explicit apologies

Leech (1983) views apologies as an attempt to recreate an imbalance between the speaker and the hearer created by the fact that the speaker committed an offence against the hearer According to him, it is not enough to apologize, this apology needs to be successful in order for the hearer to pardon the speaker, and thus reestablish the balance However, Goffman (1967: 14) refers to an apology as a remedy, the one essential element in a remedial interchange This term nicely highlights the central function of apologies to provide a remedy for an offense and restore social equilibrium or harmony (Edmondson 1981: 280, Leech, 1983: 25) (cited in Holmes, 1990: 159)

Finally, Holmes (1990) defines apologies as “social acts conveying affective meaning” (p 155), and believes they are politeness strategies meant to remedy an offense on the part of the speaker Holmes also makes an interesting and important clarification in defining apologies that has not been considered before Thus, when defining apologies, one must take into consideration the possibility

of a speaker to apologize for somebody else‟s behavior This leads to the conclusion that “the definition refers to the person who takes responsibility for the offense rather than the offender” (p 161)

3.2 Apologizing forms in English and Vietnamese

Making an apology in English often contains apologizing words such as

“apologize”, “excuse”, “pardon”, and “forgive” Sometimes, it can be associated with some pronouns followed preposition “for” to make the structures like

“excuse me for…”, “Pardon me for…”, “Forgive me for…”, “I must apologize for…”,… Choosing an apologizing verbal depends on the serious degree of the faults According to Huynh Cam Thao Trang (2009), there are seven apology structures that have the same meaning and that are used similarly in English and Vietnamese

1 Apologizing word Sorry,

Pardon, Excuse me!

Sorry, Could/Can I get

(Could/Can I get by, please?

Sorry I’m late

I’m sorry I won’t be late again

Sorry I am busy I will never do it

Xin lỗi nếu tôi làm phiền bạn

(Sorry, if I disturb you.)

We apologize for…

Xin tạ lỗi

Thành thật xin lỗi vì tôi

để anh đợi lâu như vậy

Table 3.2: Similarities between apology structures in English and Vietnamese

According to Table 3.2, seven apology structures are listed from the least formal

to the most formal way These ways are considered to be very polite Depending

on particular contexts as well as the identity of the hearers, speakers choose what

is suitable to them In some cases, apologies are used not for apology purposes These are situations in which there is no need for listeners to forgive This is shown in the following examples

(1) Excuse me, is this the way to the sport center? (Liz and Alastair, 2007)

(2) Excuse me, could you tell me where KImbell Hall is? (McGraw Hill, 2007)

(3)Excuse me, can you tell me how to go to the post office? (John and

Liz, 1993)

(4) Excuse me, would I like to ask you a couple questions? (Yule G., 1996,)

(5) Excuse me; I’m doing a survey about shopping habits Can I ask you a

few questions? (Wilson, 2003)

These followed examples are used to ask the hearers‟ forgiveness:

(6) Please forgive the inconvenience (Hoang Truc Anh, 2009)

(7) Begging your pardon, sir Mr Brown is out (Hutchinson, 2001)

(8) We apologize for the cancellation of this service (John and Liz, 1993)

(9) Our flight to Nha Trang is delayed because of bad weather If you need

any help, please contact our agents We too apologize for inconvenience

(Recording at Tan Son Nhat Airport)

(10) Con xin mẹ tha tội cho con Chỉ vì con không nghe lời mẹ (Khải Hưng,

1998)

(11) Xin lỗi, hiện tất cả nhân viên trực tổng đài đều đang bận, tạm thời yêu

cầu của quý khách không được thực hiện, xin qúy khách vui lòng gọi lại sau

(Recording through Viettel telephone net)

3.3 Apology strategies

3.3.1 Strategy 1: Getting attention

In a dissertation of Vietnamese literature philosophy, Nguyen Van Lap (2005:44)

states that the apology used in the attention-getting strategy is applied when A

(speaker) needs/wants to do something or to ask for direction in these cases:

a) A (speaker) sees or knows B (listener) are talking to someone else

b) A (speaker) is not sure B (listener) let him/her do something

c) A (speaker) thinks his/her request may disturb B

d) B (speaker) is doing or thinking about something else

American and Vietnamese people usually begin a relationship, or a conversation

by these structures such as Excuse me!; Excuse me, but…!; Pardon me! Begging your pardon sir/madam!; Allow me sir/madam! … or I‟m sorry,…+ a clause/a question with a downward intonation at the end, while Vietnamese people often start with “Xin lỗi A (listener), làm ơn cho B (speaker) (Sorry/Excuse me, please…)…, or “xin lỗi, + question” There is no need to reply on these apology forms as they are quite formal way to gain communicative protocol These examples will illustrate the similarities between English and Vietnamese in the attention-getting strategy

(12) Mari: Excuse me Could you tell me

where Kimbell Hall is?

Nancy: Oh, you mean Cambell Hall?

(Sorry, are you Mr Hai Cuong?)

(14) Tourist: Excuse me, where’s the bus

station?

Woman: It’s in North Lane, on the right…

(Liz and Alastair, 2007)

(17) Xin lỗi, phiền anh xem hộ tôi mấy giờ?

(Nguyễn Văn Lập 2005:4) (Excuse me, can you tell me the time?)

Table 3.3.1: Examples of apology strategy to get attention in

English and Vietnamese

The intent behind on the attention-getting strategy of apology is mentioned in case the speakers need the hearer‟s help direction, getting information The examples in Table 3.3.1 are between people from different social groups Age

and social status determine the choice of apology types to the conversations

3.3.2 Strategy 2: Rejecting a request or an invitation

(18) Alice: Would you like to go the

cinema? Kate and I are going to see The

Moon Man

Jane: What a pity! Never mind

(John & Liz, 1993)

(21) Vâng, mời cụ ngồi chơi, chúng cháu xin vô phép cơm cụ (Nguyễn

Văn Lập 2005:4)

(Please, sit here We are sorry to have rice.)

(19) Mark: I’m afraid I can’t make our

meeting today I have to finish a report

Can we meet on Wednesday afternoon?

Jenny: No I’m sorry I have to go to the

dentist’s (Hutchinson, 2001:12)

(22) Vậy xin lỗi, cậu để cho khi khác

(Sorry Another time please.)

(20) Jenny: would you like a game of

tennis next Thursday?

Chris: I can’t, I’m afraid I’m going to

Bristol (John & Liz., 1993)

(23) A: Ây, ông ngồi chơi đã Đi bây giờ nắng chết

B: Ông tha phép Tôi phải ra tỉnh ngay cho kịp

(Nguyễn Văn Lập 2005:12) (A: Well, you sit here Go now sunshine

B: Forgive me I have to go downtown in time.)

Table 3.3.2: Examples of apologies rejecting a request or invitation in

English and Vietnamese

According to Table 3.3.2, when apologizing, both the English and Vietnamese aim to please the hearers Requests or invitations are frequently a very polite way

to gain a closer relationship among interlocutors If the hearers do not reply in a polite way, the speakers may not be satisfied and of course the hearer may be never invited again in the future In addition, this also shows whether people are educated or not, whether they are polite or rude, and whether they are in a high social position or not There is no need to forgive because the speakers do not make any mistakes The speakers choose to reject a request or an invitation both

in a direct way like “No Sorry” or “No, I‟m sorry” and in an indirect one like “I

am afraid, I can‟t” or “I love to, but…”

3.3.3 Strategy 3: Admitting guilt with an explanation

(22) Tonia: Max, it’s Tonia I’ve got a

problem I’ve just arrived My plane

was late I’m very sorry, but I don’t

think I’ll be… (line breaks up)

Max: Hello…Hello

(Liz and Alastair., 2007,)

(24) Xin lỗi các ngài Tôi làm cho các anh mất giấc ngủ Vừa rồi tôi bị bóng

đè

(Hữu Mai, 1989.)

(I beg your pardon, sir I make you not

to sleep wells I have just had a nightmare.)

(23) James: Sorry, I’m late Duncan

The traffic was terrible

Duncan: Don’t apologize

(Liz and Alastair., 2007)

(25) Con xin mẹ tha tội cho con Chỉ vì con không nghe lời mẹ

(Khải Hưng, 1998)

(I beg your forgiveness, mother Due to

my disobey your saying.)

Table 3.3.3: Examples of apologies for admitting guilt with an explanation in

English and Vietnamese

In general, apologizers have to give an explanation in order to reduce anger or to show their good faith In these circumstances, it is necessary to observe whether the speakers are found guilty or not, that how much power people have in conversation Their word choice of apology strategy depends on their minor mistake or serious one The following formula shows from the less strong apology than the more one

Apology word + explanation/message= weak form

Explanation/ message + apology word = strong form

In brief, every way of saying apologies show different purposes and effect face differently For example, a person really wants to sorry, they do not care for their face Whereas, in some cases the speakers are afraid that saying apologies will threaten their face, so they rarely make apologies Each apology structure performs a different degree of politeness Therefore, depending on the situation and strategy, the speakers will use an appropriate apology structure for their effective communication In anyway, an apology is very important to minimize conflict in discourse and maintain not only a comfortable relationship between people but also a social harmony

CHAPTER 3 METHODOLOGY

The previous chapter presented theoretical review of literature and research related apologies This chapter focuses on the research methodology of the present study

1 Research questions

The present paper will attempt to answer the following research questions:

1 How do the Vietnamese native speakers and the English native speakers say apologies?

2 What are the similarities and differences in making polite apologies between the Vietnamese native speakers and the English native speakers?

3 Do ages, social positions and relationships influence making polite apologies?

2 Research participants

The data is provided by two groups of participants: a group of native speakers of English and a group of Vietnamese The first group consists of 40 people from Australia, America, Canada and England working or living in Vietnam for at least 2 years The second group includes 40 Vietnamese people working at various offices and universities in Vietnam All of them were born and brought

up in Vietnam They have not been affected much by any other cultures It is, therefore, convenient to compare and discover the similarities and differences of

making apologies between the English and Vietnamese native speakers

In order to ensure compatibility, the number of males and females in both groups are evenly distributed The participants are between 20 and 50 years old All the informants in both groups have high levels of education

The questionnaire is obtained with 20 Vietnamese participants (10 males and 10 females) and 20 English participants (10 males and 10 females) including American, Australian, Canadian and English 20 participants from each group (each group includes 10 male and 10 female) are chosen for interview The participants for interview and questionnaire are different

3 Research procedure

In the early November of 2011, the BA thesis proposal was being begun with a specific topic The theory background was collected to serve for the direction of the thesis From November to December, the thesis proposal was corrected carefully through the instructor‟s advices At the end of December, the thesis proposal was finished In the beginning of January of 2012, the content of the thesis was officially started In this time, questionnaire and interview were delivered to the participants in Ho Chi Minh City After having the results of questionnaires and interview, the results were made statistic, comparison and contrast in order to serve for purposes of the thesis is to find out the similarities and differences of apologies in English and Vietnamese in terms of cross-cultural

perspective In April, the thesis is finished

of legitimate right The situations in the questionnaire are designed to reflect real life situations

4.1 Questionnaire

Questionnaire is used to measure the degree of frequency in giving apologies between English native speakers and native speakers of Vietnamese Each

questionnaire consists of two parts:

Part I: Personal information: is aimed to get demographic data from the

informants, such as age, gender, social level and place of permanent residence because these factors may effect the way of giving apologies

Part II: includes 6 situations In each situation, four options are related to

descending of degree of frequency in giving apologies such as always, often, sometimes and never The participants are asked to choose one of these four options

4.2 Interview

Each interview also includes two parts:

Part I: Personal information: is also aimed to get demographic data

from the informants, such as age, gender, social level and place of permanent residence

Part II: consists of eight hypothesized situations For each situation,

participants are instructed to fill in with what they say in each of the contexts The respondents are asked to put themselves in real situations and to assume that in each situation they will, in fact, say something They are asked to write down what they say Situation (1), (2), (5), (6), (7) are used to get information about what participants say for admitting guilt with their explanation Situation (3), (4) are about getting attention In situation (3), the speaker wants to get attention to an acquaintance but having upper position In situation (4), the speaker gets attention to an old stranger Situation (8) is used to reject an invitation

There are various relationships in these situations such as the student to the professor, the student to the student, the host to the guest, the employee to the boss, the stranger to the stranger This variety is used in order to investigate in

different contexts with different positions and relationships, whether the speakers give apologies in different ways

4.3 Books analysis

In this study, data is mainly collected from English and Vietnamese books such

as Pragmatics, Beyond the Language, Requests and Apologies: A Cross-Cultural Study of Speech Act Realization Patterns (CCSARP), Applied Linguistics, Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage, English Conversation Communicating In Every Situation, and Nghi Thức Lời Nói Tiếng Việt Trên Cơ

Sở Lý Thuyết Hành Vi Ngôn Ngữ (So Sánh Với Tiếng Anh), (Vietnamese utterances based on speech acts theory) The collected data consisting of apology

forms and strategies then is analyzed and is a basis foundation to compare and discover the differences and similarities in making apologies politely in Vietnamese and English in theory Therefore, these books serve for theory background not for comparison and contrast

5 Method of data analysis

In the present study, in order to answer the research questions, two types of analysis carried out on the collected data are statistic, compare and contrast

5.1 Statistic

Statistic method is the basic method used popularly to find database for the thesis After having all responses to the questions in questionnaire and interview, they are listed and classified to count how many native English speakers and Vietnamese people have similar answers and how many of them have different answers From making statistic, it is easier to compare and contrast

5.2 Compare and contrast

Compare and contrast are the main methods to figure out and answer the research questions of this thesis What are the similarities and differences in making polite apologies between the Vietnamese native speakers and the English native speakers? This greatest issue will be revealed through compare and contrast the way Vietnamese people and native English speakers use apologies based on

statistic from questionnaire and interview An English questionnaire is for native speakers of English and a Vietnamese version is for Vietnamese participants After finding out the answer for main matter of this thesis, this result will be compared and contrasted with the results in literature review

CHAPTER 4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

1 An overview of results

The present chapter will present the overall results concerning the degree of frequency in giving apologies and the use of the structures and strategies of apologies in terms of politeness, speech acts and cross cultural perspective This

is necessary in order to find out the similarities and differences in making apologies politely between the Vietnamese native speakers and the native speakers of English

After measuring the degree of frequency in making apologies between Vietnamese and English participants by the questionnaire, the data collected are

as follows:

Situations Vietnamese native speakers English native speakers

Always Often Sometimes Never Always Often Sometimes Never

There are 20 participants answering each situation out of 6 situations, so there are

120 answers for 6 situations As can be seen in the table, an average of six situations, total 98 out of 120 English participants (82%) always say apologies, while 18% of them (n=22) often says No one chooses sometimes or never saying apology in six situations In general, 100% the English native speakers (n=120)

say apologies in all cases On the other hand, the Vietnamese native speakers less say apologies than the native speakers of English do Perhaps, because of Vietnamese culture, people rarely say apologies Among six situations, total 61 out of 120 Vietnamese participants (51%) choose the options always while 34%

of them (n=41) often gives, 12% of them (n=14) chooses sometimes and only 3%

of them (n=4) never says apologies Concretely, in situation 1, 100% English participants (n=20) always says apologies while only 25% of the Vietnamese participants (n=5) chooses this options, 10% of the Vietnamese participants (n=2) even chooses never saying apologies in this case In situation 4, 100% of English participants (n=20) chooses always but 50% of the Vietnamese participants (n=10) chooses this answer In situation 2 and 5, both of the English and Vietnamese participants have the same percentages of choose always saying apologies (50%, n=10 in situation 5 and 75%, n=15 in situation 2) Depending on situations, participants have the degree of frequency of saying apologies

In the interview, 8 situations are equivalent to three strategies: getting attention, rejecting a request or an invitation and admitting guilt with an explanation The table below shows specifically the apology forms that the English and Vietnamese participants use in eight situations with three strategies

Getting attention

Structures

T.N Per T.N Per T.N Per T.N Per

sentence

Non-apologizing

Table 1b: An overview of results of structures of getting attention provided by

Vietnamese native speakers and English native speakers

In the first strategy, there are 20 participants answering each situation out of 2 situations, so there are 40 answers for 2 situations considered 40 participants Among two situations, total 29 out of 40 English participants (73%) use the

structure “Apologizing word + (Addressing form) + question” while about

98% of the Vietnamese participants (n=39) always use greeting words instead

of apologizing words In the situation 4, 100% (n=20) of the Vietnamese participants uses non-apologizing structure while 70% (n=14) of the English participants uses structure containing apologizing word and only 30% (n=6)

of them does not use apologizing structure In 2 situations, only 5% (n=1) of the Vietnamese participants use apologizing sentence, the rest of them use non-apologizing sentence Obviously, the English participants use apologizing structure more frequently than the Vietnamese participants do in getting attention

Rejecting a request or an invitation