MỘT vài yếu tố văn hóa ẢNH HƯỞNG đến VIỆC học nói của SINH VIÊN năm THỨ NHẤT NGÀNH TIẾNG ANH sư PHẠM TRƯỜNG đại học NGOẠI NGỮ đại học QUỐC GIA hà nội

The study of English speaking skill has attracted much attention in recent research of second language acquisition. In details, one of the most concerned topics is the interference of native culture on mastering rhetorical patterns of the target language. Therefore, the research focused on the influences of some Vietnamese cultural dimensions on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill at FELTE, ULIS, VNU. The crucial objective of the study was to investigate factors in Vietnamese culture which put impacts on students’ study of English speaking skill, figure out the levels of influences of those dimensions and suggest some pedagogical implications. The researcher chose first year students at FELTE as participants for the study. Thanks to their supports, survey questionnaire and class observation were applied as research instruments. It can be concluded three significant findings from the data analysis. There are four main influential categories called Subjectivity – Objectivity, Directness – Indirectness, Accuracy – Inaccuracy, Redundancy – Economicality. Of four dimensions, Redundancy – Economicality category is the most influential one revealing through freshmen’s speaking activities in class, whereas, Directness – Indirectness has the least impact. Basing on some major findings, the author points out some implications for teaching and learning English speaking skill to improve the situation. The results, discussion as well as implications are expected to partially contribute to the current research on second spoken language in Vietnam to create favorable condition for learners of English in the process of acquiring L2.

The study of English speaking skill has attracted much attention in recentresearch of second language acquisition In details, one of the most concernedtopics is the interference of native culture on mastering rhetorical patterns of thetarget language Therefore, the research focused on the influences of someVietnamese cultural dimensions on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill atFELTE, ULIS, VNU The crucial objective of the study was to investigate factors inVietnamese culture which put impacts on students’ study of English speaking skill,figure out the levels of influences of those dimensions and suggest somepedagogical implications The researcher chose first - year students at FELTE asparticipants for the study Thanks to their supports, survey questionnaire and classobservation were applied as research instruments It can be concluded threesignificant findings from the data analysis There are four main influentialcategories called Subjectivity – Objectivity, Directness – Indirectness, Accuracy –Inaccuracy, Redundancy – Economicality Of four dimensions, Redundancy –Economicality category is the most influential one revealing through freshmen’sspeaking activities in class, whereas, Directness – Indirectness has the least impact.Basing on some major findings, the author points out some implications forteaching and learning English speaking skill to improve the situation The results,discussion as well as implications are expected to partially contribute to the currentresearch on second spoken language in Vietnam to create favorable condition forlearners of English in the process of acquiring L2

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements i

Abstract ii

List of figures and tables vii

List of abbreviations viii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Statement of the problem and the rationale of the study 1

1.2 Aims and objectives of the study 2

1.2.1 Aims of the study 2

1.2.2 Objectives of the study 2

1.3 Significance of the study 2

1.4 Scope of the study 3

1.5 Organization 3

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

Key concepts 5

2.1 Culture………5

2.1.1 Definition of culture………5

2.1.2 Language and culture……… 6

2.1.2.1 Language and culture in general……….6

2.1.2.2 Language and culture in language acquisitions……… 8

2.2 Communication 9

2.2.1 Definition of communication……… 9

2.2.2 Functions of communication……… 9

2.2.3 Types of communication……….9

2.2.3.1 Verbal communication………11

2.2.3.2 Non – verbal communication……… 11

2.2.4 Cross – cultural communication………12

2.3 Some key categorical dimensions in cross – cultural communication…… 12

2.3.1 Subjectivity – Objectivity……… 13

2.3.1.1 The use of prepositions……… 14

2.3.1.1.1 Prepositions of movement with directional verbs……… 14

2.3.1.1.2 Locative prepositions……… 15

2.3.1.2 The use of passive voice……….16

2.3.2 Directness – Indirectness………17

2.3.3 Accuracy – Inaccuracy……… 19

2.3.3.1 The use of tenses……… 19

2.3.3.2 The use of genitive indicators………20

2.3.4 Redundancy – Economicality……… 21

2.3.4.1 Redundancy………21

2.3.4.2 Economicality……….…23

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY 25

3.1 Participants 25

3.2 Data collection instruments 25

3.2.1 Survey questionnaire………25

3.2.2 Class observation……….25

3.3 Data collection procedure……… 26

3.4 Data analysis procedure ………29

CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 31

4.1 Findings 31

4.1.1 Research question 1 31

4.1.2 Research question 2 42

CHAPTER 5: RECOMMENDATIONS………47

5.1 Second culture acquisition in L2 teaching and learning 47

5.1.1 Second culture acquisition in L2 teaching and learning in general…… 47

5.1.2 Second culture acquisition in second language in speaking learning…….49

process in particular 5.2 Teacher’s role in teaching the target language culture to students………….49

5.3 The teaching of English language speaking in classrooms 50

5.3.1 Reminding students of the differences between L1 and L2 51

5.3.2 Integrating all language skills 51

CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION 53

6.1 Summary of findings 53

6.2 Limitations of the study 53

6.3 Suggestions for further studies 54

REFERENCES

APPENDICES

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1: Nguyen Quang’s diagram of components of communication (Nguyen

Quang, 2001:9)

Figure 2: The analysis of the “ego” position by the Anglicist

Figure 3: The analysis of Vietnamese thought of the “ego” position

Figure 4: Cultural thought patterns by Kaplan

Figure 5: The order of information in Vietnamese and in English

Figure 6: The interference of Vietnamese culture on English spoken language in

terms of genitive indicators

Figure 7: Four main Vietnamese cultural categories influence on freshmen’s study

of English speaking skill

Figure 8: The influence ratio of habitual and insufficient redundancy in

Redundancy category

Figure 9: The influence level of the use of prepositions and the use passive voice in

Objectivity – Subjectivity category

Figure 10: The influence ratio of the use of tenses and the use of genitive indicator

in Accuracy - Inaccuracy category

Table 1: The list of the possessive adjectives and possessive pronouns in English Table 2: Overview of the influence of subtype categories on freshmen’s study of

English speaking skill

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

1 ULIS: University of Languages and International Studies

2 VNU: Vietnam National University

3 L1: The mother tongue/ first language

4 L2: The second language

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1 1 Statement of the problem and rationale of the study

To any nation all over the world, culture and language have always beeninextricably linked According to Nguyen (2009), language is the product of the

culture and is considered “the window to culture” Language is arguably the most

important component of culture because much of the rest of it is normallytransmitted orally It is impossible to understand the subtle nuances and deepmeanings of another culture without knowing its language well On one hand,culture seems so inclusive, it permeates almost every aspect of human life includinglanguages On the other hand, when human need to share a culture, theycommunicate through language Together with approaching the foreign or secondlanguage, learners also steadily adapt to its cultural environment Needless to say,cultural factors have put great impact on not only the mother tongue but also foreignlanguages of people belonging to that culture The interference of native culture hasbeen seen plainly on both spoken and written form of the second language.Moreover, the situation in written discourse shares no similarity with the one inspeaking It seems quite hard to train learners the way of thinking and speaking likenative speakers Nevertheless, it does not mean that learners can speak in any waythey like without paying attention to standards in English speaking In fact, thosewho studying foreign language should be aware of some Vietnamese influentialfactors which have influence on learning English and try to avoid negative culturalinfluences

The above analysis of the close relationship between the native culture and spokensecond language has highly encouraged the researcher to conduct the field work Tosome extent, the interference of Vietnamese culture has still extended theirinfluences on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill In other words, thosedimensions may limit student’s ability to acquire the second languagecomprehensively As a result, the researcher made a decision to work on this study

in the hope of gaining insights into some Vietnamese negative cultural factorswhich have effects on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill.

1.2 Aims and objectives of the study

1.2.1 Aims of the study

It should be noted that the study was conducted with three main aims

In the first place, the analysis of freshmen’s English speaking skill is carried outunder the expectation of finding some Vietnamese cultural dimensions which haveinterferences on their speaking skill In chapter Literature review, the researcherwill present some potential Vietnamese cultural factors, and the predication will belooked into in the process of data analysis

In the second place, the results of the study can be used to investigate the level ofinfluence among those potential cultural factors The finding is extremely importantbecause it can help teachers as well as students recognize what dimensions should

be pay much attention to

In the third place, from the two results above, some pedagogical implications will

be suggested to better students’ English speaking skill

1.2.2 Objectives of the study

Objectives could be summarized into two questions as follows:

1 What are Vietnamese cultural factors which have negative influences onspeaking English as perceived through some types of freshmen speakingpresentation?

2 What are the ratios of influence of those Vietnamese cultural factors

1.3 Significance of the study

Once having been completed, this study would give decent benefits

As for first – year students, identifying which influential factors inVietnamese culture is an effective way to enhance their English speaking skill It isclear that not all Vietnamese cultural dimensions can prevent freshmen fromspeaking English Avoiding making mistakes and errors relating to cultural thought

make use of some suggested implications to practice their English speaking andimprove it.

As for teachers, they stand a golden chance to reevaluate the function ofVietnamese cultural dimensions in spoken English The researcher does hope thatthey can take advantage of some implications in order to enhance student’sspeaking competence in English

1.4 Scope of the study

The study focuses on recognizing some Vietnamese cultural dimensions onfreshmen's study of English speaking skill at Faculty of English Language TeacherEducation at ULIS Four potential factors named Subjectivity – Objectivity,Directness – Indirectness, Accuracy – Inaccuracy, Redundancy – Economicalitywill be carefully explained in this study

In terms of research instrument, the scope of investigation is restricted to first –year students’ speaking activity in class The researcher does not choose oneparticular kind of speaking activity due to the fact that some categories mentioned inthe following Literature Review may extend their influences to all speaking activitiesthat they had learned Therefore, the author decides to cover all class speakingactivities of first-year students

1.5 Organization

The rest of paper includes five chapters as follows:

Chapter 2 (Literature review) provides the background of the study, including

definition of key concepts which are the notion of culture, cross-culturalcommunication in general as well as the relationship between culture and language,the interferences of native culture to L2 speaking Finally, an over view of somepotential influences of Vietnamese cultural dimensions on English speaking skillwill be investigated

Chapter 3 (Methodology) describes the participants and instruments of the

study, as well as the procedure employed to carry out the research

Chapter 4 (Data analysis and discussion) presents, analyzes and discusses

the findings that the researcher found out from the data collected according to tworesearch questions

Chapter 5 (Recommendations) presents the author’s suggestions to resolve

some problems in some dimensions of Vietnamese cultural which have effects onfirst - year students’ study of speaking English

Chapter 6 (Conclusion) summarizes the main issues discussed in the paper,

the limitations of the research as well as some suggestion for further studies.Following this chapter are the References and Appendices

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

This second chapter, as the name says it, sheds light of the study, specificallythe background knowledge and some potential effects of Vietnamese culturalfactors on learners of English To begin with, a detailed presentation of the researchbackground will be provided with key concepts such as the definition of culture,cross-cultural communication in general as well as the relationship between cultureand language, the interferences of native culture to L2 speaking Finally, potentialinfluences of Vietnamese cultural dimensions on English speaking skill will beinvestigated on the basis of Nguyen Quang’s research

Key concepts

2.1 Culture

2.1.1 Definition of culture

The term “culture” is widely used in daily life; however, not many people

can define what exactly it is Many researchers have defined this term in manyways, but once again, it is quite difficult to judge which definition is the most

appropriate Some definitions mention “culture” in terms of its function in society For example, when defining the notion of culture, Goodenough affirms: “Culture is

a sort of knowledge which everyone must possess to function within a society” For

this point of view, Gary Ferrando (1996) also says: “culture is everything that

people have, think and do as a member of a society”.

Besides, Carley (1991) considers culture as the distribution of information(ideas, beliefs, concepts, symbols, technical knowledge, etc.) across the population

In another aspect, Hofstede (1980, pp 21-23) defines culture as “the

collective programming of the mind which distinguishes the members of one group from another”, which is passed from generation to generation, it is changing all the

time because each generation adds something of its own before passing it on It isusual that one’s culture is taken for granted and assumed to be correct because it isthe only one, or at least the first, to be learned

In Vietnam, Nguyen Quang, PhD also mentions this issue From his

perspective, “culture is something which was and has been created through the

history of human development Culture is not statistic and is always changing The beliefs and values we hold now are not completely the same as those held in the pre

- historics of medieval times, or 100 years ago” (Nguyen Quang, 2001)

All in all, the definition that is the most suitable for this scope of study is

cited by Levin and Alderman: “culture is a shared background (for example,

national, ethnic, religious) resulting from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, attitudes, and values” Culture in this context does not refer

to art, music, literature, food, clothing style, and so on In fact, it refers to theinformal and often hidden patterns of human interactions, expressions andviewpoints that people in one culture share The hidden nature of culture has beencompared to an iceberg, most of which is hidden underwater Like the iceberg,much of the influence of culture on an individual cannot be seen The part of culturethat is exposed is not always that which creates cross-cultural difficulties; thehidden aspects of culture have significant effects on behavior and on interactionswith others

2.1.2 Language and culture

2.1.2.1 Language and culture in general

In terms of investigating features of cross-cultural communication as well asacquiring the L2, it is really vital to mention the relationship between language andculture at first

Language and culture are inseparably entwined However, there are somedifferent points of view in such issue First and foremost, language is the principalmeans whereby we conduct our social lives When it is used in contexts ofcommunication, it is bound up with culture in multiple and complex ways.(Kramsch, 1998, p 3)

According to Brown (1994) culture is deeply ingrained part of the very fiber

of our being, but language – the means for communication among members of aculture – is the most visible and available expression of that culture And so aperson’s world view, self – identity, and systems of thinking, acting, feeling, andcommunicating can be disrupted by a change from one culture to another Tang(1999) suggests that to speak a language well, one has to be able to think in thatlanguage, and thought is extremely powerful Language is the soul of the countryand people who speak it Language and culture are inextricably linked, and as such

we might think about moving away from questions about the inclusion or exclusion

of culture in foreign language curriculum, to issues of deliberate immersion versusnon - deliberate exposure to it (Cakir, 2006) Furthermore, Brown (1994:165) also

describes the two as follow “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 short, the

studies that are mentioned above share the common point of view about theinseparability of language and culture

In terms of the role of language to culture, many linguists, anthropologists aswell as language teachers share the same opinions Moran (2001) mentions the role

of language as a tool to “carry out products, name the underlying cultural

perspectives in all the various communities that comprises their culture” The same

idea is clearly shown by Hinkel (1999), Brown (2000), Moran (2001) when they

state that “language is the means of communication among members of a culture”.

As a result, language is the mirror of culture, in the sense that people can see aculture through its language In other words, language is also the main vehicle forcultural expression essential for individual and collective identity That is the reasonwhy language becomes one of the main tools mankind uses to interact and toexpress ideas, emotions, knowledge, memories and values

As can be seen from the above analysis, language and culture cannot existwithout each other It is no use doing research on culture without considering itslanguage These two factors combine to form a living organism If we compare thesociety to a swimming pool, language is a swimming skill and culture is the water.When both are present, people swim well (communicate successfully) They swimconfidently and rapidly when they are familiar with the water (eg within theirnative culture), but cautiously and slowly when it is unfamiliar to them (within aforeign culture)

2.1.2.2 Language and culture in language acquisitions

Linguists and anthropologists have long recognized that the forms and uses

of a given language reflect the cultural values of the society in which the language

is spoken (Krasner, 1999) draws an important conclusion that “linguistic

competence alone is not enough for learners of a language to be competent in that language” In another paper, Robinson – Stuart and Nocon (1996) emphasize the

importance of second culture acquisitions in language learning by claiming thatlanguage learners need to be aware, for example, of the culturally appropriate ways

to address people, express gratitude, make requests, and agree or disagree withsomeone They should know that behaviors and intonation patterns that areappropriate in their own speech community may be perceived differently bymembers of the target language speech community They have to understand that, inorder for communication to be successful, language use must be associated withother culturally appropriate behavior

In many regards, culture is taught implicitly, imbedded in the linguisticforms that students are learning To make students aware of the cultural featuresreflected in the language, teachers can make those cultural features an explicit topic

of discussion in relation to the linguistic forms being studied That viewpoint shares

the same idea with Politzer (1959): “As language teachers we must be interested in

the study of culture not because we necessarily want to teach the culture of the country but because we have to teach it”.

2.2 Communication

2.2.1 Definition of communication

Communication, as defined in Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, is

“the activity or process of expressing ideas and feelings or of giving people information” In other word, communication is actually a two-way process whereby

meaning is sent and received so as to gain shared understanding Furthermore,communication requires a sender, a message and a recipient, although the receiverdoes not need to be present or aware of the sender's intent to communicate at thetime of communication; thus communication can occur across vast distances in timeand space Communication requires that the communicating parties share an area ofcommunicative commonality The communication process is complete once thereceiver has understood the message of the sender

2.2.2 Functions of communication

According to Rudolph and Kathleen (1981), people have to communicate because:

 Communication is the social needs

 Communication helps people “develop and maintain the sense of self”

 Communication creates and develops relationships among people

 Communication helps people exchange information or experience

 Communication can create one’s influence on others

2.2.3 Types of communication

Throughout the research history, the classification of communication hasbeen carried out by many theorists However, with the aim of the thesis’s topic, thefollowing chart on communication which is suggested by Nguyen Quang should beconsidered

(Adapted from Introduction to cross cultural communication (Do Mai Thanh & Dao Thu Trang, 2006)

COMMUNICATION

Verbal Communication

Nonverbal Communication

…

Paralanguage

Object language (Artifacts)

- Vocal characteristics + Pitch

+ Volume + Rate + Vocal quality + Types of vocal flow

Quang, 2001:9)

As described in the chart, two kinds of communication are verbal and verbal communication Whereas verbal communication includes intralaguage, non-verbal communication contains paralanguage and extralanguage It should be notedthat spoken communication is a branch of intralanguage as verbal communication.Indeed, the same idea has been shared by Stewart and Angelo (1980) when theyshowed a simple table about types of communication Nevertheless, spoken wordsalso belong to non – verbal communication in terms of paralanguage

non-In a nutshell, spoken communication, or spoken word, is one of many

“process of sharing meaning through verbal and non – verbal behavior” (Nguyen

Quang, 1998a)

2.2.3.1 Verbal communication

Verbal communication is about language, both written and spoken Verbalcommunication refers to the form of communication in which message istransmitted verbally; communication is done by word of mouth and a piece of

writing Therefore, many people assume that “verbal communication” refers to the term “communicating using words” which inevitably means using a language - a

system which governs the use of agreed sounds or other symbols in order toexchange information

2.2.3.2 Non – verbal communication

Like verbal communication, people use non – verbal to share meaning withothers And there are many ways to define this term In the first place, Knapp andHall (2006) specify the three major components of nonverbal communication, thecommunication environment, the communicators’ paralinguistic characteristicsand the nonverbal behaviors such as body movements and positions Indeed, Burgoon, Buller, and Woodall (1989) point out that nonverbal communication is the

Similarly, DePaulo and Friedman (1998) write that "nonverbal communication is the

dynamic, mostly face-to-face exchange of information through cues other than words" This view is also supported by Applbaum et al (1979), who describes the

role of nonverbal communication as the major resources of meaning people obtain

in communication

2.2.4 Cross – cultural communication

People in the same culture find it not too difficult when communicating witheach other as they share the same common values, beliefs, and reasoning styles oftheir culture Furthermore, each country owns different cultural activities and

cultural rituals For instance, there is a saying in America that, “I don’t care who

you are, I care what you did” This value places every American individual is in the

equal position with others in society; hence, American people tend to treat eachother relatively the same Whereas, in Vietnam there exists the hierarchy and power

so the difference between each person is quite considerable This example revealsthat people from one culture may not interpret meanings in the same way as peoplefrom the other culture, or their behaviors are not appropriate when communicating.They often interpret others’ speech basing on their own cultural convention andtend to use their cultural values to judge others

This kind of communication is called Cross – cultural communication, inwhich people communicate verbally or non – verbally, in person or in writing, and

in various business or social contexts

2.3 Some key categorical dimensions in cross – cultural communication

Nguyen Quang’s work in Foreign Language Journal (1998b) allows him todraw the conclusion that there are fourteen major Anglo – American – Vietnamesecross – cultural categories as follow:

1 Subjectivity – Objectivity

2 Directness – Indirectness

3 Accuracy – Inaccuracy

4 Positive politeness – Negative politeness

5 Self – abasement and self – assertion

11 Group orientation - Individual orientation

12 High context – Low context

13 Redundancy – Economicality

14 Staticality – DynamicalityThese categories exist in every language However, the aim of this study is toinvestigate some Vietnamese cultural dimensions which extend their influences onfreshmen’s study of English speaking skill Therefore, the author will go in details

in some categories as follow:

it is not touched by the speaker’s previous experiences or tastes The second onecalled subjective which is a statement that has been colored by the character of thespeaker or writer It often has a basis in reality, but reflects the perspective throughwith the speaker views reality Furthermore, the understanding of these twoperceptions will be much clearer in the following notions

Subjectivity is the communicative way in which people consider the ego as a subject as a result, we can see the speakers’ or writers’ opinions, position, feelings and attitudes Thus, subjectivity is the way of viewing the world with the “ego” being the only subject in the universe.

Objectivity is the communicative way in which people consider the ego an object as a result, the speakers or the writers’ position, feelings and attitudes are hardly seen unless some intra-linguistic, paralinguistic and extra- linguistic factors are used.

(Do Mai Thanh & Dao Thu Trang, 2006:9)

2.3.1.1 The use of prepositions

The notion preposition is quite an interesting issue There may be so manythings to say when comparing prepositions in English with those in Vietnamese in alarge scale Nonetheless, within this paper, the researcher only makes a contrastbetween English and Vietnamese prepositions in two aspects: prepositions ofmovement with directional verbs and locative prepositions These two cases oftencause problems for Vietnamese people when using English

2.3.1.1.1 Prepositions of movement with directional verbs

The first difference between English and Vietnamese prepositions is related

to directional verbs Learners of English should bear in mind that it is not thespeaker’s position, but the direction that people in English culture pay attention to

In English, directional verbs like “come”, “go” and “arrive” cannot take direct

objects This means they must have a preposition (or a prepositional phrase), bareparticle or deictic verbal (“bare noun phrase adverb”) Here is an example ofdirectional verbs with preposition

 This is the first time I come to Hanoi

Considering again the sentence above, the listener or reader can easily make out the

position of the speaker or writer “Đây là lần đầu tiên tôi đến (arrive)/ ra (go to)/

xuống (go down)/ lên (go up) Hà Nội”

Actually, in Vietnamese, there is no preposition which is similar to preposition

“to” in English The verb “đến” (reach, arrive at) is used instead as the following

examples:

 Tôi không có thời giờ đi (đến) bưu điện

I don’t have time to go to the post-office

2.3.1.1.2 Locative prepositions

According to Do & Dao (2006), the Anglicist are not always conscious about

the position of “ego” when looking at its direction of movement They consider

“ego” an “object” existing in the space and pay more attention to the destination of

movement

Figure 2: The analysis of the “ego” position by the Anglicist

On the contrary, in Vietnam, people tend to consider the position of thespeakers basing on the subjectivity in Vietnamese culture It can be explainedthat the use of prepositions of location in Vietnam is dependent on cultural

factors Preposition “vào” (into) illustrates that the speaker is in a larger and

Down/To

Up/To Out/To

In/To

brighter space and going to get into a smaller and darker one The same thing

can be said about “trong” (in).

We can sum up the use of pairs of these prepositions as follow:

Figure 3: The analysis of Vietnamese thought of the “ego” position

This is the very first matter that learners of English should pay attention to when speaking English It can be suggested that the use of preposition plays an important role in spoken communication

2.3.1.2 The use of passive voice

Another noteworthy influence of objectivity and subjectivity is the use ofpassive voice From Nguyen Quang’s paper, passive voice is often used in case offormal speech or written communication Additionally, the fact is that English areinclined to use passive voice in their speaking and writing more than Vietnamese

do It is not rare when reading such sentences below in academic writing:

 It is said that…

 It is widely believed that…

 She is considered to be…

In these situations, the objectivity is shown plainly Nonetheless, whentranslating those sentences into Vietnamese, to some extends, the active voice can

be more acceptable:

 Người ta nói rằng…

(People say that…)

 Người ta hoàn toàn tin rằng…

(People widely believe that… )

 Mọi người cho rằng cô ta…

(People think that she…)

Those cases above extremely reveal that the ego always plays a dominantrole in Vietnamese In another word, the subjectivity can be recognized withoutdifficulties when communicating with people in Vietnam

Indeed, the passive voice in Vietnamese is often known through the way people use

“bị” and “được” In details, this is the distinction in the speaker or writer’ attitudes

toward the issue mentioned in the utterance While “bị” points out the negative attitudes or the unpleasant events, “được” indicates the good luck or positive attitudes For examples, the sentence “I got mark 8 in Math” can be translated into

Vietnamese in two ways basing on two different attitudes:

 Tôi được điểm 8 môn Toán (over the speaker’s expectation)

 Tôi bị điểm 8 môn Toán (under the speaker’s expectation )

It is another important issue that triggers many obstacles for Vietnameselearners in mastering English as a L2 Hence, learners of English should pay a lotattention to this matter to avoid unexpected consequences

2.3.2 Directness – Indirectness

The second cross – cultural category that may have significant effects onspoken English is Directness – Indirectness In order to communicate effectivelyacross culture, people need to understand the cultural thought pattern behind thelanguage of communication The fact is that these thought patterns influence theway native speakers of a language will express themselves Moreover, they will alsoput impact on how native speakers expect to hear the information presented.Indeed, when the speaker and the listener have different cultural thought patterns,there is an increasing likelihood for miscommunication and cross cultural conflict.However, by mimicking the communication style of the listener, the speaker isaffirming the listener’s values in this area

In Kaplan’s study of 700 essays of foreign students in the United States, heproposes four discourse structures that contrast with English linearity Thesedissimilarities can be seen clearly through the following diagram It should not be

taken as an absolute but as a guide for developing cultural competence in crosscultural communication, as both a speaker and a listener.

Figure 4: Cultural thought patterns by Kaplan J

This diagram illustrates that English users often use direct expressions andthought pattern Communication here is direct, linear and does not digress or go offtopic Meanwhile, the Oriental people in general and the Vietnamese in particularare inclined to use the roundabout and indirect patterns In another word,communication in these nations is indirect; a topic is not addressed head on, but isviewed from various perspectives, working around and around the point Do ThiMai Thanh (1999) also concluded that the Vietnamese seem to prefer indirectstrategies and employ roundabout expression, especially in communication

Another crucial issue that Vietnamese learners should take into consideration isthe order of information Vietnamese are prone to choose the least-to-mostimportant order of information basing on the tendency of being more indirect Incontrast, English prefer the most-to-least important order of information Thisdeference can be indicated in the followings

Figure 5: The order of information in Vietnamese and in English

In Nguyen Quang’s statistics (1997), when he asked 26 Americans and 8Australians to choose one of the two following sentences

1 Next Monday, at about 2 p.m, I’ll be waiting for you at home

2 I’ll be waiting for you at home at about 2 p.m next Monday

Most Americans and Australians chose the second sentence (23/26 and 8/8respectively)

In short, Directness – Indirectness is one of the most important factors whichVietnamese learners should certainly remember when speaking English

2.3.3 Accuracy – Inaccuracy

2.3.3.1 The use of tenses

In English, a finite verb carries both tense and aspect The tense indicates thetime in which an action occurs, present, past, or future For example, the present

tense of the verb to bring is "bring", the past tense is "brought", and the future tense is

"will bring" On the other hand, the aspect shows whether an action happens

habitually, continuously, or repeatedly (Longman Group, 1995) “English has four

aspects: simple (or zero aspect), progressive, perfect, and their combination, perfect progressive” (Celce-Murcia & Larsen-Freeman, 1999, p 110) These four

aspects are illustrated in the following examples:

 He speaks English with his girlfriend every day (simple)

 He is speaking English with his girlfriend at the moment (progressive)

 He has spoken English with his girlfriend very often recently (perfect)

 He has been speaking English with his girlfriend for nearly three hours (perfect progressive)

Nevertheless, the situation is not the same in Vietnamese There are only lexical

indicators such as “đã, rồi (already), từng (ever), vừa (just), sẽ, sắp (will), toan”,

etc to express the past, present and future In another word, the situation seems to besimpler in Vietnamese That is the reason why many English learners get difficulty

in finding out an appropriate tense to translate Vietnamese into English Theexample of “đã” can be explained for this ambiguity

 Nam đã ăn sáng xong

(Nam has finished his breakfast)

 Trước khi đến trường tôi đã làm xong bài tập

(Before going to school, I had done the homework)

 Bạn đã bao giờ tới Paris chưa?

(Have you ever been to Paris?)

“Đã” can be understood as an indicator for past tenses in Vietnamese;

however, when translating into English, the verb tense seems to be various

Furthermore, what determines tenses and aspects in Vietnamese are not auxiliaries,but context clues, especially metalinguistic, intralinguistic and extralinguisticcontexts as illustrated by Nguyen Quang (2002)

 I met him yesterday

(Hôm qua tôi đã gặp anh ta)

 I had met him before he flew home

(Tôi đã gặp nó trước khi nó bay về nước)

 Don’t worry, I’ve met him

(Yên chí, tôi đã gặp ông ấy rồi)

2.3.3.2 The use of genitive indicators

In general, there are four types of genitive indicators in English They are the

“-s” genitive, possessive genitive, pronouns and preposition “of” All of them have

the equivalence in Vietnamese called “của” Accuracy in English indicators of

possession often cannot be used interchangeably Nevertheless, speakers shouldbear in mind the case of “-s” genitive and “-of” genitive According to Quirk.R andGreenbaum.S (2003, p 96 - 97), the “-s” genitive is favored by animate nouns, inparticular persons and animals with personal characteristics For instance, we can

say Ann’s hat, but not the door’s house or the love of John Besides, “-of” genitive

is the link between inanimate nouns such as the destruction of the city or the title of

the book.

Additionally, possessive adjectives and pronouns are two others differentways to show possession in English To be more specific, possessive adjectives go

before the noun (eg This is my car) and possessive pronouns go after the noun (eg The car is mine) The list of the possessive adjectives and possessive pronouns is

revealed clearly by the table below:

Possessive adjectives Possessive pronouns

On the contrary, in Vietnam, the usage of “của” is likely to be more flexible.

Due to the fact that it is the only genitive in Vietnamese, it is widely used for both

animate and inanimate nouns However, in many cases, the Vietnamese omit “của”

like the following examples:

 Tôi đi về quê

(Literal translation: I go to hometown)

(Standard English: I go to my hometown)

 Tôi cầm túi và đi ra ngoài

(Literal translation: I took bag and went out)

(Standard English: I took my bag and went out)

In the process learning English as a L2, Vietnamese learners should pay muchattention to this matter and find the accurate method to resolve the problem

2.3.4 Redundancy – Economicality

2.3.4.1 Redundancy

According to Longman dictionary of English language and culture,

redundancy, in general usage can be defined as “more of anything than is (strictly)

needed, usually resulting from repetition or duplication: pleonasm or tautology”.

contains more information than is needed for it to be understood In another word,redundancy can be described as the difference between the possible and actualinformation in a message This difference may be repetition or other encoding

beyond the real essential information, for instance “Can you rewrite your answer

on the board again?” In this example, “again” is a redundant word because it is a

repetition of “rewrite” More interestingly, some previous studies indicated that

Vietnamese is different from native speakers of English in terms of thoughtpatterns Specifically, when making request, Vietnamese are prone to use muchmore indirect than people from English culture

Noticeably, Nguyen Quang (2002) notes that there are three types of

redundancy “In terms of functions and pragmatics, redundancy can be divided

into: modal redundancies, insufficient redundancies and habitual redundancies”

(p.68)

In the first place, modal redundancy is regarded as the repetition of a word orphrase In fact, it can create rhetorical effectiveness for the text and the speech.Modality redundancy is created in order to emphasize the meaning, create soundimpression or produce the rhythm in literature

For example, in English, “Thousands of innocent people were killed in New

York by bombing that was lead by, was done by, was sponsored, was supported by

Bin Laden”.

In this example, the verb “was” and passive structure are repeated to

emphasize on the devastating effects that Bin Laden’s terrorist attack had broughtabout Similarly, in Vietnamese, especially in poetry, modality redundancy isapplied as a way to produce the rhythm

Mấy chục năm rồi đến tận bây giờ

Bà vẫn giữ thói quen dậy sớm

Nhóm bếp lửa ấp iu nồng đượm Nhóm niềm yêu thương khoai sắn ngọt bùi Nhóm nồi xôi gạo mới sẻ chung vui

Nhóm dậy cả những tâm tình tuổi nhỏ

Ôi ký lạ và thiêng liêng – bếp lửa!

In the second place, insufficient redundancy is produced by the one who find

it hard when expressing himself due to limited understanding or way of thinking.Among three types of redundancy, it is the most confusing and ambiguous and

likely to cause misunderstanding For instance, in Vietnamese “Hôm nay thì thế

này ạ, tôi mời ông bà đến thưa chuyện của cháu”, in English “Oh, well, um, really, I… I am finding, um,… my ring It may, um, be somewhere here, but…but there’s nothing”

Last but not least, habitual redundancy represents the specific features of aculture and becomes principal linguistics elements in people’s daily speeches For

example, English people might say “In my opinion, I think that you are wrong” without realizing that “in my opinion” or “I think” is a kind of habitual redundancy.

Moreover, as a result of redundancy interference, many Vietnamese learners makemistakes in speaking and writing in English For examples:

 Tôi thì tôi cứ nói thẳng ra thế này….

(I frankly say that…)

 Theo tôi, tôi cho rằng

(In my opinion, I think…)

2.3.4.2 Economicality

In contrast to redundancy, economicality is defined by Nguyen Quang as akind of language contradiction, particularly a form of lexico – contraction but stillcan be understood in context For instance, there is a situation between two friendscalled A and B A leaves the classroom without turning off the lights When making

a very economical utterance “lights”, B actually performs an act of requesting to A

to turn off the lights

Like Redundancy, there are three types of economicality, too First of all, modalityeconomicality is seen as the contradiction of words or phrases of least importance inconveying meanings of a message

For instance, in English, “Much have I had lots of dreams and many nice

angels seen” and in Vietnamese “Giá mà cứ thế này mãi thì thích nhỉ”

Besides, habitual economicality refers to non – conventional discourse structures,

for example “(Tôi) nói khí không phải”, “Năm thì mười họa” or “In my opinion”,

“Frankly (Frankly speaking)”

Whereas, insufficient economicality is commonly seen among these whohave poor ability to express ideas or among small children For instance

In English In Vietnamese

I not play football Mẹ ơi, Mai muốn nước

Jack likes listening music Cả nhà đi ông bà ngoại

In conclusion, the Redundancy – Economicality is one of cross-culturalcategories which have much influence on Vietnamese learner’s speaking andwriting style Only when having profound knowledge of England tradition anddoing more practices under teacher’s instructions can learners get through theseobstacles and achieve both linguistic and cultural competence

In a nutshell, Subjectivity – Objectivity, Directness – Indirectness, Accuracy– Inaccuracy and Redundancy – Economicality have been explained so as toidentify some Vietnamese cultural dimensions which extend their influences onfreshmen’s study of English speaking skill This analysis will be a usefulbackground for the researcher in the next part of the study

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY

The previous chapter has given a brief and selected review of the keyconcept and what has been researched related to the topic Having the theoreticalbackground established, in this chapter, the information such as participants,

instruments, data collection procedures and data analysis will be clearly presented.

It is a thorough preparation for the next part, the findings and discussion chapter

3.1 Participants

The study is limited to first – year students in Faculty of English LanguageTeacher Education in ULIS, VNU The reason why the researcher decides to choosethis population of interest is that freshmen have just graduated from high school.They have passed the university entrance exam and still have not known muchabout this new learning environment As a result, they may get difficulties inavoiding mistakes, including Vietnamese culture influences

The participants were all chosen from those who major in English Languageteaching from E3 to E9 The more the groups get involved in the research, the moreobjective the result would be

3.2 Data collection instruments

In order to get the needed information, the researcher uses two followingresearch instruments: questionnaires and observation

3.2.1 Survey questionnaire

For a collection of sufficient reliable and valid data for the research, theauthor decided to apply questionnaires which could meet both quantitative andqualitative requirements It is true that using this kind of instrument to collectinformation would help researchers receive a great amount of answers in a veryshort time Moreover, it is easier to analyze afterwards since the data are written

3.2.2 Class observation

Class observation was employed as a primary as the primary data collectioninstrument to make this research more accessible and practical During 2 week, fourobservation remarks were completed With the aim of increasing the validity for thestudy, the observation was to find out some cultural dimensions which haveinfluenced on first year study of English speaking skill, too The date, period oflesson, profile of students and the main part for taking notes of some cultural factorswere included and transcribed in detail

Calls and emails for the teachers’ permission at four classes were first made,and then the observation would be conducted in their classrooms A briefintroduction about the researcher, the topic and the purpose of the observation wereclearly shown to the teacher and students in each class All these lessons would berecorded for more precise and comprehensive analysis.

In the first semester, freshmen studied four English skills in two categorieswhich are English for social purposes and English for academic purposes In thesetwo courses, there are a lot of new activities related to speaking skill which havejust been designed for freshmen However, the researcher does not choose oneparticular kind of speaking activity due to the fact that some categories mentioned

in the Literature Review may extend their influences to all speaking activities thatthey had learned Therefore, the author decides to cover all class speaking activities

of first-year students

3.3 Data collection procedure

3.1 Survey questionnaire

The procedure of data collection is intended to put into four phases

Stage 1: Designing the questionnaire

In this step, the researcher designs the questionnaires and sets up plans forcollecting data It was consisted of two questions with the aim of collecting dataregarding respectively students’ feeling about some Vietnamese cultural dimensions

on freshmen's study of English speaking skill

In the first question: Students are asked to translate these sentences inEnglish

1 Objectivity – Subjectivity

1 Tôi đi về quê

1 Hằng ngày, Lan đi học bằng xe đạp

2 Tết đến, gia đình tôi hay đi chùa cầu may

The aim of those sentences is to investigate how students use prepositions of movement with directional verbs to translate (“to” or other prepositions).

3 Máy bay ở trên trời

4 Đàn cá đang bơi dưới nước

5 Những chiếc xe hơi chạy ngoài đường

These three sentences are aimed to look into how students use locativeprepositions (“in” or other prepositions)

6 Hôm qua tôi bị thi trượt

7 Người ta tin rằng có cuộc sống ở ngoài hành tinh

8 Mọi người cho rằng ông ấy là một nhà văn vĩ đại

The purpose of these sentences is to check whether Vietnamese students knowthe difference between English and Vietnamese passive voice

2 Accuracy – Inaccuracy

1 Nam đã ăn sáng xong

2 Trước khi đi thi Hoa đã ôn bài cẩn thận

3 Anh đã bao giờ đến Huế chưa?

The aim of these sentences is to investigate how students understand thedifference between English and Vietnamese tenses

4 Chiếc mũ của Peter ở trên bàn

5 Nhan đề của cuốn sách rất hay

6 Mary ghi bài vào vở

Those sentences are aimed to check how students use the genitive indicators

In the second question: Students are asked what to say in the following situations

3 Directness – Indirectness

1 Situation 1: You want to borrow your friend VND 300,000 for some reason

2 Situation 2: You want to refuse your friend’s invitation to her party for some

reason

3 Situation 3: This is a conversation between two friends Put a tick on the answer

you

fell the most suitable.

How about our meeting at the weekend?

(1) Alright, on this Sunday morning, at 8.30, I will pick you up

(2) Alright, I will pick you up at 8.30 on this Sunday morning

(3) Alright, at 8.30 on this Sunday morning, I will pick you up

Those situations are aimed to look into whether Vietnamese students use Direct orIndirect way to communicate

4 Redundancy – Economicality

1.Situation 1: What would you express when you want to give your opinion

2 Situation 2: Imagine that you are first - year student in ULIS, VNU Today isyour

first day at this university and you do not know the way to your university Bychance, you meet a friend (at your same age) and he/she knows the way to ULIS,VNU How do you use the following ways to request a friend to show you the way

to get there?

3 Situation 3: You are on a bus One friend (the same age with you) smokes whichirritates other passengers How do you use the following ways to request him/her to stop this action?

The purpose of these situations is to check whether Vietnamese students use Redundancy – Economically

Stage 2: Piloting

The questionnaire is given to about 5-7 relevant respondents to get feedbackand workability of the questionnaire As a result, the questionnaire is piloted to findout which questions or expressions are not clear or/and lead to ambiguity or/andmisunderstanding to respondents Correction and adjustment have been madeafterwards

Stage 3: Delivering the questionnaire

After choosing classes to conduct the survey, the questionnaires will bedispensed to the students at the beginning of class time The researcher brieflyexplains the purpose and the terms for the students to understand the way to deal

with the questionnaires and be willing to share opinions towards the studied issue.Subsequently, the investigator suggests the classes finish the questionnaires in theirbreak time and then collects all the papers.

Stage 4: Encoding the data

This last stage of finalizing data is of great importance It is time tosynthesize all the documents and analyze in the purpose of investigating what isrelated to the topic

3.4 Data analysis procedure

The collected data was initially classified according to the two researchquestions The first one is what cultural categories have impact on Englishspeaking as perceived from the questionnaires It is vital to examine whether theevidences are compatible with the prediction of some potential categories in theLiterature Review chapter The second one is to evaluate the ratio of influencesamong cultural dimensions in speaking activities in class

First and foremost, it took a great amount of time to study all thequestionnaires and analyze data from class observation Each of them needed acareful analysis to find out Vietnamese cultural dimensions which have influences

on students’ speaking in English Evidences from all the papers and the recordswere carefully noted and categorized into different cases Any examples belonging

to new groups would be taken into consideration

After forming a list of different influencing cultural factors, their level of impact onEnglish speaking would be considered It is not only the ratio of each factor incomparison with the others but also the ratio of sub-types in the relation with the bigone

In the meantime, findings from questionnaire were compared and contrastedwith the findings from class observation to seek the connection between theinfluences of those four main categories on freshmen study of English speakingskill in reality and in student’s perception

By this way, the researcher can point out the major impact of different Vietnamesecultural categories on first – year students in speaking hour in English

Briefly, this chapter has given a deliberate account of the methods employed

to gather and analyze data It can be said that the procedure is not very complicated,however, what the researcher needs here is the corporation from the first - yearstudents

CHAPTER IV: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

In the preceding chapter, the methodology applied in this study had been clarifiedwith detailed descriptions of participants, the instruments and the process of datacollection and analysis In this chapter, all collected data will be analyzed and

discuss to point out the answer to each research question in turn More importantly,the connection between these findings and theoretical background of potentialVietnamese cultural factors which may have influences on English speaking andother related studies will also be carried out

4.1 Findings

4.1.1 Research question 1: What are Vietnamese cultural factors which have negative influences on speaking English as perceived through some types of freshmen speaking presentation?

The aim of this research is to recognize some Vietnamese cultural dimensionswhich put impact on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill The detailedanalysis of 147 survey questionnaires and class observation has resulted insignificant findings of influential factors in Vietnamese culture More importantly,

it should be noted that all potential factors in Vietnamese culture presented in theLiterature Review chapter appeared in the questionnaires and in class observationwith different ratios In the following part, each category is going to be discussedwith sufficient evidence and in – depth examination Hence, firstly, the study isgoing to discussed the manifestation of the negative influences of Vietnamesecultural factors on freshmen’s study of English speaking skill by explaining thecollected data, and then indicates their levels of the influence

4.1.1.1 Subjectivity – Objectivity

In the Literature Review, the distinctions between Vietnamese and English in thiscategory could be divided into two subtypes They were the use of prepositions andthe use of passive voice

To begin with, it is the use of prepositions that was taken into account in theanalysis It can be said that this aspect is one of the indicators which exposed thedifferences between the two cultures most clearly As mentioned in the LiteratureReview, the researcher only made a contrast between English and Vietnameseprepositions in two aspects which were prepositions of movement with directionalverbs and locative prepositions

Firstly, in three sentences in case preposition of movement with directional verbs,88% of students answered correctly They only made mistakes when translating

sentence “Tôi đi về quê” Instead of doing “I come back to my hometown” or “I go

to my hometown”, 12% of students translated like “I come back my hometown”.

This proportion showed that freshmen are aware of avoiding this situation

Secondly, in terms of locative preposition, when collecting the data, the researcherdid not recognize a lot of mistakes basing on the interference of Vietnamesethought The fact is that 87% of students translated correctly three sentences related

to locative prepositions in the survey questionnaire Only 13% of them did those

sentences incorrectly Instead of using “The plane is in the sky”, “A school of fish

swims in the water”, “”Cars runs in the street”, few of them translated such as

 The plane is above the sky

 The plane is up to the sky

 A school of fish swims under the water

 A school of fish swims into water

 Cars run outside the road

 Cars run down the street

In reality, when making class observation, the researcher also found out that year students were not under the influences of Vietnamese thought in terms oflocative prepositions Similarly, very few of freshmen made an utterance like

first- I want to come back Ho Chi Minh mausoleum in a near day

 I like IPH building because it has a lot of trees outside the yard

From the above analysis, it should be noted that first – year students are aware ofthe case locative prepositions and did not make any mistakes related to this subtypeLastly, the use of passive voice in the pair Subjectivity and Objectivity is the sub -category that needs considering In all three sentences showing this sub – category,

while 21% of freshmen answered incorrectly the first sentence “I failed the exam

yesterday”, 79% of freshmen mistranslated the other two sentences It is not rare

when discovering some sentences like:

 They believe that there is life on another planet