A contrastive study on interjections in english and vietnamese

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled A contrastive study on interjections in English and Vietnamese submitted

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯỢNG

A CONTRASTIVE STUDY ON INTERJECTIONS IN ENGLISH AND

VIETNAMESE

NGHIÊN CỨU SO SÁNH ĐỐI CHIẾU THÁN TỪ

TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT

M.A THESIS

Field: English Language Code: 60220201

Hanoi, 2015

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING

HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

NGUYỄN THỊ PHƯỢNG

A CONTRASTIVE STUDY ON INTERJECTIONS IN ENGLISH AND

VIETNAMESE

NGHIÊN CỨU SO SÁNH ĐỐI CHIẾU THÁN TỪ

TRONG TIẾNG ANH VÀ TIẾNG VIỆT

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

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

entitled A contrastive study on interjections in English and Vietnamese

submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master

in English Language Except where the reference is indicated, no other person‘s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This thesis could not have been completed without the help and

support from a number of people

First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to

Dr Hồ Ngọc Trung, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired

me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher

A special word of thanks goes to the teachers at Faculty of Post Graduate, Hanoi Open University and many others, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for

me to have this thesis accomplished

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my family, my husband, for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work

ABSTRACT

This study sets out to focus on finding out the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of English and Vietnamese interjections and discussing the similarities and differences of interjections in English and Vietnamese To achieve this end, descriptive method and contrastive analysis are employed as the major methods In addition to that, experimental method, error analysis and statistical technique are applied as the supporting ones to carry out the research efficiently Basing on the qualitative and quantitative approaches, the study has pointing out the various features of English and Vietnamese interjections Morphologically, both English and Vietnamese interjections can be reduplicative, onomatopoeic, and even they are loan words Syntactically, this special means of expression in the two languages can be in the form of single words, a group of words Also, interjections can combine with another interjection or other word classes to form complete and incomplete sentence In terms of pragmatics, interjections have different functions to convey various states of emotion such as joy, anger, sympathy, surprise, doubts, fears, pity, pain, and the like Furthermore, the cultural aspect is also embeled

in interjections of the two languages The above features of interjections and their similarities and dissimilarities are discussed

in details in the following chapters

LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

Figure 2.1 Vietnamese parts of speech classification according to

Diệp Quang Ban and Hoàng Văn Thung

9

Table 2.1 Speech Acts‟ classification by Austin and Searle 10

Table 4.1 Interjections as complete reduplication in English 26

Table 4.2 Interjections as partial reduplication in English 27

Table 4.3 Interjections as loan words in English 28

Table 4.4 Interjections as onomatopoeia in English 30

Table 4.5 Interjections as complete reduplication in Vietnamese 32

Table 4.6 Interjections as partial reduplication in Vietnamese 32

Table 4.7 Interjections as loan words in Vietnamese 35

Table 4.8 Interjections as onomatopoeia in Vietnamese 36

Table 4.9 Interjections as word groups in English 38

Table 4.10 Interjections as complete sentences in English 39

Table 4.11 Interjections as incomplete sentences in English 39

Table 4.12 Interjections as single words in Vietnamese 41

Table 4.13 Interjections as group of words in Vietnamese 42

Table 4.14 Interjections as incomplete sentences in Vietnamese 44

Table 4.15 Summary of cultural features of English and Vietnamese

interjections

68

4.1 Grammatical features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

4.1.1 Morphological features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

4.1.1.1 Morphological features of interjections in English

4.1.1.2 Morphological features of interjections in Vietnamese

4.1.2 Syntactic features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

4.1.2.1 Syntactic features of interjections in English

4.1.2.2 Syntactic features of interjections in Vietnamese

4.1.3 Grammatical similarities and differences of interjections in English

and Vietnamese

4.2 Pragmatic features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

4.2.1 Pragmatic features of interjections in English

4.2.2 Pragmatic features of interjections in Vietnamese

4.2.3 Pragmatic similarities and differences of interjections in English and

Vietnamese

4.3 Cultural features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

4.3.1 Cultural features of English interjections

4.3.2 Cultural features of Vietnamese interjections

4.3.3 Cultural similarities and differences of English and Vietnamese

interjections

4.3.4 Summary

4.4 Implications of the research for the teaching, learning and translating

of English interjections at HUBT

4.4.1 Questionnaire reports

4.4.2 Implications of the research for the teaching, learning and translating

of English interjections at HUBT

4.4.2.1 Implications of the research for the teaching and learning of

English interjections at HUBT

4.4.2.2 Implications of the research for HUBT students to translate

5.4 Recommendations for a further research 78

In my teaching of English language as well as my research for teaching, a great number of interjections have been found both in literature books and other documents like newspapers, movies and the like However, the teaching of interjections has long been ignored by language teachers in

my university in particular and in Vietnam in general In speaking lessons, language teachers fail to provide students with grammatical and pragmatic knowledge of English interjections, which, unfortunately, gives rise to students‘ being unable to establish a successful oral communication when interacting with both native and non-native speakers

In addition to that, for nearly ten years of teaching English at Hanoi University of Business & Technology (HUBT), I have experienced that the majority of my students encounter problems in using English interjections

Especially, when having interjections in textbooks and relevant materials, they find it difficult to translate these forms into Vietnamese

For all the reasons above, I have the desire to do research into the

field With the study entitled A Contrastive Study of Interjections in

English and Vietnamese, I do hope the research can help my students in

HUBT use and translate English interjections appropriately in every single context

1.2 Aims of the research

The study is aimed at finding out the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of English and Vietnamese interjections and discussing the similarities and differences of interjections in English and Vietnamese in order that Vietnamese students in general and HUBT students in particular could have a better understanding of interjections and translate them properly according to contexts given

1.3 Objectives of the research

The study is intended to:

- describe the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of interjections in English and Vietnamese

- point out the similarities and dissimilarities between English and Vietnamese interjections in terms of grammar, pragmatics and culture

- propose the implications of the research to the teaching, learning and translating of English interjections into Vietnamese at HUBT

1.4 Scope of the research

1.4.1 Academic scope

Within the academic scope of the study, interjections examined in the thesis will be in both English and Vietnamese A great number of interjections and their given contexts are collected from such various sources like English and Vietnamese textbooks, novels by different writers, films and even songs In addition to that, internet is also a great source of information for English and Vietnamese interjections Moreover, interjections studied in the research will be mainly in written texts and little

in spoken discourse

1.4.2 Social scope

The study collects data regarding features, the use and the translation

of English and Vietnamese interjections from books, novels, films, websites and survey questionnaires The survey questionnaires designed in this research focus primarily on the use of English and Vietnamese interjections and on the translation of English interjections into Vietnamese ones in the scope of family and society The participants of the research would be 100 English-major students in their second academic year at HUBT They are in their early twenties and the number of females participating in the research

is equal to the number of males

1.5 Significance of the research

Theoretically, apart from completing my M.A course, the research

helps my colleagues and my students use and translate English interjections more accurately; it might also help adjust the curriculum in my faculty

Practically, through the research, I can have extensive knowledge

about English interjections to help my students use and translate English interjections properly in the relevant context

1.6 Structural organization of the thesis

This thesis shall be presented in five chapters, starting with Introduction and ending with Conclusion The second chapter, named Literature Review, gives a critical review of the previous studies relating to the research problem under investigation and presents the theoretical background employed as tools for conducting the whole research The Methodology chapter provides the information by which the research is conducted with a method section answering two main questions: how the data was collected or generated; and how it was analyzed The forth chapter includes all the findings and a thorough evaluation of the investigation, which logically lead to inferences and conclusions

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Review of Previous Studies

2.1.1 Review of Previous Studies Overseas

Over years, various studies have been done on the area of interjections One of them relates to Wierzbicka‘s (1992) research in which

a number of interjections from English, Polish, Russian, and Yiddish rigorous semantic formulae are proposed which can explain both the similarities and the differences in their use For example, the English

interjection yuk! is compared with its nearest Polish and Russian counterparts fu!, fe!, and tfu! The author concluded that while the meaning

of interjections cannot be adequately captured in terms of emotion words

such as disgust, it can be captured in terms of more fine-grained

components, closer to the level of universal semantic primitives

Other scholars, Meng and Schrabback (1999), conducted a study relating

to the acquisition of forms, interactive functions, and discourse type

constraints of German interjections, in particular ha and na The data consist

of two sets of child-adult conversations—picture book interactions in family and psychodiagnostic settings By comparing the adults and the children‘s use of interjections, it was revealed that children had managed to acquire interjectional forms and functions as well as discourse type constraints

According to Ameka (1992), a semanticist, there are two types of interjections: primary and secondary interjections The primary ones are words or non-words that can stand alone as an utterance and do not come into other word classes Secondary interjections ―are those words which have an independent semantic value but which can be used

conventionally as utterances by themselves to express a mental attitude or state‖ (Ameka, 1992: 111)

Goffman (1981: 99), the sociolinguist, proposes that an interjection

―doesn‘t seem to be a statement in the linguistic sense.‖ He discusses interjections according to socio-communicative roles they play rather than according to any linguistic content they may have

Wharton (2000, 2001, 2003) proposes that interjections do not have conceptual meaning, but a procedural meaning that helps the hearer recover the higher-level explicatures of the utterance they accompany

As a consequence, interjections have no contribution to the conditions of the utterance which they accompany In his own words, interjections encode an instruction which ―merely encourages the hearer to embed the proposition expressed under speech-act or propositional-attitude description by constructing higher-level explicatures‖ (2001: 148) Therefore, he regards interjections as ―indicators of higher-level explicatures containing speech-act, or propositional-attitude information‖ (2003: 54)

truth-Lin (2006) studied the language of emotion in Kavalan and found that the four primary interjections in Kavalan, one of many aboriginal languages

in Taiwan, signal different attitudes of the speaker

Chao (2009) investigated exclamations in Southern Min, the predominant language spoken by Taiwanese She classified interjections

in Southern Min into three types according to their pragmatic functions First, the majority of interjections in Southern Min express the presumption

of the speaker and signal feelings of surprise or confusion Second, some interjections express the emotion of the speaker Third, some interjections

play the role of structuring discursive turn-taking in conversation Chao (2009) also noted that the intonation of the interjection can influence the function of that interjection

2.1.2 Review of Previous Vietnamese Studies

Diệp Quang Ban and Hoàng Văn Thung (1998: 150) listed such words

as a, ôi, ối, ái, ồ, chà, ái chà, ô hay, ôi dào, ôi chao, ối giời ơi, chết, chết

thật, bỏ mẹ, hứ, hé…as interjection or exclamatory words

According to Nguyễn Thị Kim Dung et al (2005), interjections are

words used to express emotion, feelings and attitude of the speaker or they can be used as addressing terms Interjections are normally positioned at the beginning of a sentence or it can act as a special sentence

Other Vietnamese linguists, Nguyễn Khắc Phi et al (2004), classify

Vietnamese interjections into two major types: emotional interjections like

a, ái, ơ, ối, ô hay, than ôi,… and addressing ones like này, ơi, vâng, dạ, ừ,…

In “Từ điển tiếng Việt Phổ Thông” (2004:97), interjections are defined

as separate words having no grammartical relations with other words in the utterance and expressing emotion, they are used to express delights, complaints, swears… and they are also used as addressing terms

From the review of all previous studies above, it is obvious that researchers in Vietnam as well as in other countries have gained deep insights and made significant findings in this field However, the contrastive study of Interjections in English and Vietnamese still awaits deeper investigation, which is why the present study hopes to fill in the gap to make significant contribution to the teaching, learning and translating English Interjections in Vietnam in general and at HUBT in particular

2.2 Review of Theoretical Background

2.2.1 English and Vietnamese parts of speech

According to Quirk et al (1972, 1985), parts of speech are usually

grouped into two categories: the major and minor word classes The major word classes - nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs - are termed "major" because they carry most of the content or meaning of a sentence Such classes are also "open" in that new words are added as they are coined The other category, the minor word classes, plays a more structural role in a sentence and each of its classes is more "closed," in that normally no new words are added Classes in this category include, but are not limited to, auxiliary verbs, prepositions, pronouns, determiners, conjunctions and interjections

The open–closed distinction is related to the distinction between lexical and functional categories, and to that between content words and function words Open classes are generally lexical categories in the stricter sense, containing words with greater semantic content, while closed classes are normally functional categories, consisting of words that perform essentially grammatical functions In inflecting languages, it is chiefly open-class words (content words) that inflect, although some closed-class words, such as pronouns, determiners and verbal auxiliaries, may do

so as well

In the book “Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt”, Diệp Quang Ban and Hoàng

Văn Thung have divided Vietnamese parts of speech into two major groups:

Thực từ (content words) and hư từ (functional words), in which thực từ

consists of danh từ, động từ, tính từ, đại từ, số từ whereas hư từ covers phụ

từ (định từ, phó từ), kết từ, tiểu từ (trợ từ, tình thái từ).

Figure 2.1 Vietnamese Parts of Speech classification according to Diệp

Quang Ban and Hoàng Văn Thung

According to another Vietnamese linguist, Đinh Văn Đức,

Vietnamese parts of speech can be devided into three major groups: Thực

từ: danh từ, động từ, tính từ, số từ, đại từ; Hư từ: từ phụ, từ nối; and Tình thái từ: tiểu từ, trợ từ (1986: 100-186)

2.2.2 Speech Acts Theory

Speech acts are generally defined as the actions that are involved when one says something

According to Searle (1965), language is part of theories of action, and speech acts are such verbal acts as promising, threatening and requesting that one performs in speaking

There have been various classifications of speech acts by different linguists However, the thesis will focus on speech act types proposed by Austin (1962) and Searles (1975)

The theory of speech acts is developed mainly by Austin (1962) and Searle (1969, 1979) The central assumption in the theory of speech act is that the minimal unit of communication is not a sentence or other expressions but rather language act In another term, human language can be

viewed as actions Individuals perform things by saying different kinds of language acts such as refusals, requests, promises, and the like Austin (1962, p 67) studied speech acts from the following perspective: ―to consider from the ground up how many senses there are in which to say something is to do something, or in saying something we do something and even by saying something we do something.‖ According to his view, any utterance is composed of the following acts: the locutionary act (the actual words the speaker is saying), the illocutionary act (the intention of the speaker) and the perlocutionary act (the effect of utterance on the hearer)

According to Ho Ngoc Trung (2013), Austin and Searle respectively grouped speech acts into five classes as in the table below

Table 2.1 Speech Acts Classification by Austin and Searle

2.2.3 Interjection Theory

2.2.3.1 Definition of Interjections

The term interjection, as it is stated in the Oxford English Dictionary

2 on CD-ROM (1992), version 1.01, OUP, Oxford, entered the English

language probably in the 13 th or 14th century from Latin interjicere

(-jacere) with the meaning to throw or cast between, from inter between +

jacere to throw

Traditionally, interjections have often been regarded as peripheral

to language Latin grammarians characterized them as non-words,

unrelated to syntax, expressing only feelings or states of mind The linguists in the 19th century viewed them as para-linguistic, even non-linguistic occurrences (Benfey 1869:295) Sapir (1970:7) categorized interjections as ―never more, at best, than a decorative edging to the ample, complex fabric of language"

Such views can still be encountered in contemporary literature:

Quirk et al (1985:853) describe interjections as "purely emotive words

which do not enter into syntactic relations"; Trask (1993:144) describes

an interjection as "a lexical item or phrase which serves to express emotion and which typically fails to enter into any syntactic structures at all"; Crystal (1995:207) defines an interjection as "a word or sound thrown into a sentence to express some feeling of the mind"

Biber (1999) noted that interjections have many functions including

the followings: greetings and farewells, e.g good morning, goodbye, discourse markers, e.g well, right, attention signals, e.g alright, okay, responses, e.g yeah, alright, hesitators, e.g er, various speech act formulae, e.g thank you, please, sorry and expletives, e.g Jesus

One definition of interjection given by Bruti and Pavesi (2008) is:

―an outcry to express pain, surprise, anger, pleasure or some other emotion, interjections belong to the oldest forms of speech and represent the most primitive type of sentence‖ (p.104) or ―Interjections are generally uninflected function words and have sometimes been seen as sentence-words, since they can replace or be replaced by a whole sentence (they are holophrastic)‖ (p 105)

Cuenca (2000:332) defines interjections as ―communicative units (utterances) which can be syntactically autonomous, and intonationaly and semantically complete‖

Ameka (1992:111) defines primary interjections as "words that cannot be used in any other sense than as an interjection." He further states that "these items are non-productive in the sense that they do not inflect and are not movable between word-classes."

Wharton (2003:58) sees interjections as context-restrictors that ― guide the comprehension process by narrowing the hearer‘s search space and

‗indicating‘ the general direction in which the intended meaning is to be sought‖ They contribute to optimal relevance by decreasing the hearer‘s processing effort in his interpretation Interjections encode computational instructions regarding the type of assumptions that a hearer should activate,

or the cognitive effects that he may expect in a particular situation (Wharton 2003: 59) Those instructions prompt the hearer to activate different attitudinal concepts or types of concepts (Wharton 2003: 60) Accordingly,

an interjection such as Wow! activates attitudinal descriptions comprising delight, surprise or excitement, yuk! activates an attitudinal description of

disgust Interjections may activate a wide range of possible attitude descriptions, but the precise one the hearer may operate with depends on the context he selects and his inferential abilities When interjections are used alone, they may communicate at an implicit level (Wharton 2003: 62)

propositional-Diệp Quang Ban, a famous Vietnamese linguist, gives a pretty detailed

definition of interjections: “Thán từ là từ- tín hiệu phản ánh các trạng thái

tâm – sinh lý, chúng gần với tiếng kêu tự phát nhiều hơn Thán từ có nét

riêng về cú pháp là nó có thể một mình làm thành câu riêng, hoặc là một vế câu cùng với vế câu khác chỉ sự việc làm thành một câu ghép (2009:347)

(Interjections are words – signals reflecting the psychological – physiological state, they are similar to spontaneous sounds The unique syntactic feature of interjections is that they themselves can form a simple sentence, or a clause combined with another clause to make a compound sentence.)

According to Lê Biên (1999:173), interjections are words or phrases like

ái, ối, ôi, ồ, chà, vâng, dạ, than ôi, ối trời ơi, and the like

2.2.3.2 Classification of interjections

Ameka (1992) categorised interjections in terms of functions into three types They are:

(i) Expressive interjections

(ii) Conative interjections

(iii) Phatic interjections

David Cram (2008) considers interjections as a peripheral part of speech,

as minor sentence type, and a unit on the margins of language

Diệp Quang Ban (2009) classifies interjections in terms of their formation into three groups:

(i) Thán từ gần nguyên dạng

(ii) Thán từ không nguyên dạng

(iii) Từ gọi – đáp

2.2.3.3 Interjections and reduplication

In linguistic terms, reduplication is when a word, an element of a word, or a phrase is repeated This can often result in the change of meaning

or tone It happens in many languages, not just English, and there are many

types of reduplication There‘s rhyming reduplication (razzle-dazzle,

hoity-toity), exact reduplication (bye-bye, din-din), ablaut reduplication dong, zig-zag), and shm-reduplication (baby-shmaby, fancy-schmancy)

(ding-http://blog.dictionary.com/reduplication/

Concerning the relationship between interjections and reduplicatives,

interjections and reduplicatives are said to have a partial relationship to each other An interjection can be a reduplicative and a reduplicative may act as

an interjection However, only a small number of reduplicatives are interjections When an interjection is formed by a partial or complete reduplicative, its value can be greater This can be said that reduplicatives play a role in the practical value of interjections

2.2.3.4 Interjections and onomatopoeia

The term onomatopoeia is originated from Latin roots, „onoma‟ and

„poiein‟ As its Greek suggests, onomatopoeia is the making ‗poiein‘ of a

name or word ‗onoma‘ from natural sounds Tonge (2005) mentions that onomatopoeia is a word whose sound imitates the actual sound to which it

refers, such as pop, sizzle, and crash Onomatopoeia is also defined as the

meaning of thing or action by a vocal imitation of the sound associated with

it (Whitman: 2001) However, onomatopoeia can be defined as formation of word or words whose sounds are like the action or thing they name or refer

to Linguists suggest that onomatopoeia included in sound-symbolic which refers to a direct correlation between the sounds and the senses of language Therefore, they argue that onomatopoeia may reverse the theory of arbitrariness because of the direct link between the form and the meaning

Regarding the relationship between interjections and onomatopoeia, interjections may relate to onomatopoeia in some ways As interjections express our emotional world, it can be words or group of words resembling

a sound Accordingly, some onomatopoeia may be interjections like ẹc, ha

ha However, onomatopoeic words are various, only some of this type can

play the role of an interjection

2.2.3.5 Politeness Principles and Interjections

The phenomenon of politeness has been defined and interpreted from various perspectives So far, many other scholars have made significant

contribution in theorising the concept of politeness

Leech (1983) defines it as ―strategic conflict avoidance, which can be

measured in terms of the degree of effort put into the avoidance of a conflict situation, the establishment and the maintenance of comity‖

Leech (1983) classifies politeness in four different categories according to the inherent functions of communication acts The convivial function of politeness manifests in cases when illocutionary and social communication aim coincide, as in when interactants are greeting, congratulating, offering, inviting, and so on The collaborative function refers to contexts in which the illocutionary and the social aim are independent of one another, when speakers declare, assert, report or announce The competitive function of politeness is realised in situations where the illocutionary goal competes with the social goal and the speakers order, ask, demand or beg The conflicting function entails a conflict between the illocutionary and the social goal and occurs when speakers threaten, accuse and, in general, express negative feelings and reactions

As for the relationship between interjections and politeness

principles, interjections have the important role in politeness principles

Interjections are added into the utterance to show the speaker‘s emotion and also to make the utterance more polite Without interjections, sentences and utterances may not achieve the complete goal in communication It is in communication that both speakers and listeners wish to obtain the politeness principles, and they can reach their goal partly by using interjections

2.2.3.6 Face Threatening Act (FTA) and Interjections

Goffman (1967: 5) describes the concept of face as ―the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself by the line others assume he has taken during a particular contact‖, but its conclusive defining

is as challenging as that of politeness Non-Western scholars frequently criticise this definition, pointing out that it is essentially individualistic and, therefore, cannot be applied to prevailingly collectivistic cultures Chinese scholars suggest that face is a public and positive category, situationally constructed and framed by the interlocutors‘ interpersonal relations (Lim 1994; Ho 1994) Furthermore, Japanese notion of face, apart from the relation to others, delineates speakers‘ individual rights, whereas African and Islamic researchers emphasise the group rather than individual face interests (Villki 2006) However, there is a consensus on its dynamism; face

can be enhanced, preserved, damaged or even lost

Face-threatening acts are acts which in some way threaten the 'face' or self-esteem of another person Some people think that all communicative acts are potentially threatening In fact, the potential does exist to threaten 'face' with every act of communication Whether the act is actually a threat depends not so much on the intent of the speaker but on the perception of the listener

Face-threatening acts include acts rather than spoken or written language Very often we can threaten others' face by a look, an expression

or some other non-verbal communication

Everyday communication involves the use of face-threatening acts (FTA), ―that by their nature run contrary to the face wants of the addressee and/or of the speaker‖ (Brown and Levinson, 1987: 65) FTAs can threaten both the speaker‘s and the hearer‘s face Also, they can obstruct both positive and negative aspect of one‘s face

Negative FTAs obstruct the speaker‘s or the hearer‘s freedom of action and freedom from imposition FTAs which threaten the speaker‘s negative face are those that pose an offence to one‘s face, for instance, expressing thanks, accepting the hearer‘s thanks, apology or offers, excuses, responses to hearer‘s faux pas, unwilling promises and offers

Positive FTAs inflict damage to one‘s face by denoting the interlocutor‘s lack of appreciation and/or approval for one‘s feelings, wants, desires, and the like The speaker‘s positive face is threatened by acts which indicate that one has made a transgression or lost control over the situation, for example, apologies, confessions, admissions of guilt or responsibility, acceptance of compliments, self-humiliation, selfcontradiction, and emotion leakage

As far as the relationship between FTA and interjections is

concerned, in everyday communication, politeness is regarded pretty

important Therefore, when using interjections, speakers are advised to be careful in order not to lose face of both speakers and listeners By employing interjections, speakers can please their partners with a polite

behavior, like in this example:

[1] Well done! You‟ve do a good job

On the other hand, a negative interjecion may give an unpleasant

feeling to the listener, like "Oh, hell!", "God damn it!", this is likely one

type of FTA

Therefore, in order to achieve the goal in communication, speakers should avoid using offensive interjections to avoid causing FTA

2.2.3.7 Cultural features of interjections

Culture is embodied quite clearly in interjections Each culture has its own identity and their way of using interjections show their cultural identity For the English people, since God is considered the highest and the

most important, their most commonly used interjections are Oh my God or

my God On the contrary, Vietnamese people respect trời or giời the most

This explains why the Vietnamese use such interjections as Trời ơi!, Giời

ơi! or Trời! very often

2.3 Summary

Chapter two focuses on the review of previous studies and the review

of theoretical background of English and Vietnamese interjections The chapter has reviewed various research works of various scholars both in English and Vietnamese Besides, the theoretical background has been discussed thoroughly in this chapter, from speech act theory, to interjection theory, to the relationship of different concepts with interjections The details of the theoretical background in this chapter would be helpful to the following chapters

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research governing orientations

3.1.1 Research approaches

The quantitative approach will be employed to collect and analyze data Over 100 examples of English and Vietnamese interjections will be carefully examined and analyzed Since the study wishes to describe the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of interjections in English and Vietnamese, the qualitative approach will be employed to conduct the research This combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches will help accomplish the aims of the research since they seem to be the most appropriate ones used to describe the features of English and Vietnamese interjections and then to find out the similarities and dissimilarities between them

Another aim of the study is to propose the implications of the research for the teaching, learning and translating English interjections at HUBT Accordingly, questionnaire survey is also employed to find out whether Vietnamese students in general and HUBT students in particular use and translate English interjections properly

3.1.2 Research questions

In order to achieve the objectives of the research, chapter four of this thesis would be conducted to find answers to the following questions

(i) What are the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of

Interjections in English and Vietnamese?

(ii) What are the similarities and dissimilarities between English and

Vietnamese interjections in terms of grammar, pragmatics and culture?

(iii) What are the implications of the research for the teaching, learning

and translating English interjections at HUBT?

3.1.3 Research setting

The data and examples are collected from research, literature and course books, newspapers, websites and libraries Survey questionnaires are conducted to collect opinions from 100 English-major students in their second academic year The survey will be carried out at the beginning of the first semester of the academic year at HUBT

3.1.4 Criteria for intended data collection and data analysis

The criteria for data collection and data analysis are described thoroughly regarding the objectives of the research In the study, English and Vietnamese interjections will be investigated from syntactic, pragmatic and cultural perspectives

The data types will be both qualitative and quantitative firstly to collect and analyze the data Then, it is to describe the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features of English and Vietnamese interjections and

to find out the similarities and dissimilarities between English and Vietnamese interjections

In the thesis, both primary and secondary data will be employed so that I can have more sources of information to complete my thesis These data are collected from a variety of sources, from grammar books, course books, novels and even songs, both in English and Vietnamese In addition

to that, it will also be collected via internet through Google searching technique by using following key words: interjections, grammatical, pragmatic, cultural, features

In addition to the data and examples collected from different sources, the survey questionnaire will also be employed since I wish to know whether my students have mastered the knowledge about interjections and whether they could use and translate interjections properly in different contexts It will be carried out on 100 English-major students in their second academic year at HUBT These 100 students are in the age ranging from 20

to 22 They will represent all students at the Faculty of English, HUBT

Description of students at Faculty of English, HUBT

Students at Faculty of English, HUBT are majored in Business English However, their English score in the entrance exams is on average

or above During their academic years at HUBT, their English has improved remarkably and they have become more fluent in both spoken and written English At school, they learn Reading, Writing, Speaking, Listening and Translation skills English Phonetics and Grammar are also introduced to students, however, the credits for these two aspects are limited Therefore,

my students are only provided basic knowledge about phonetics and grammar In terms of parts of speech, English interjections seem to be quite unfamiliar to students at HUBT The teaching curriculumn at faculty of English at HUBT also seems to pay no attention to this very special part of speech

Regarding personality, the students are said to be dynamic, enthusiastic, energetic and open They are eager to learn new things and always do their best to complete the teacher‘s requirements

Description of the curriculumn at English faculty, HUBT

Since HUBT specializes in business and technology, teaching English

as a major subject at this university may be a big concern that needs a lot of consideration from the management board and from the teachers So far, the

English faculty has been in operation for years, however, its curriculumn needs improving a lot Besides four skills (Reading, Writing, Listening, Speaking), the other major subjects include Translation, Business Correspondence, Vietnamese Culture, and the like Working as a teacher, I realize that my students have weaknesses at grammar, and limited knowledge about English culture They need a lot of help from teachers to improve these very important aspects of a language

I decide to choose 100-second-year students in my university as participants of my research for the reason that after one year majoring in English, they have remarkably mastered the knowledge about English In addition to that, English interjections seem to be a rather unfamiliar and difficult language aspect to students in my university Therefore, the second-year students with certain knowledge about English language and culture will be the ideal participants for my research

3.2 Research methods

3.2.1 Major methods and supporting methods

Descriptive method and contrastive analysis are considered two major methods of the research to describe the features of interjections in English and Vietnamese and to do a contrastive study on the subject matter

Besides, since survey questionnaires are also used in the study,

experimental method is applied as a supporting one Error analysis and statistical technique are also employed to help deal with the questionnaires and analyze the mistakes students make when translating English interjections into Vietnamese

3.2.2 Data collection techniques

The materials related to the topic are collected from research works, course books, dictionaries, survey questionnaire and websites Then the

most suitable ones are choosen for the theoretical background of the study Moreover, the paper is carried out by over 100 examples of English and Vietnamese interjections collected by the writer from different English and Vietnamese books, research works and internet sources These examples are most common-used interjections in English and Vietnamese Accordingly, the data are likely to provide a detailed description of how interjections are used in different contexts

3.2.3 Data analysis techniques

Once data have been collected, they are classified and analyzed basing on their meanings and functions in different contexts and dividing the data by type across all cases investigated

From over 100 samples collected in English and Vietnamese, I choose the most interesting, popular ones to illustrate points under the study investigation In this process, all samples are sorted out and grouped into different categories by their functions expressed in different contexts Then the data are classified under their grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features Since the thesis is conducted by a descriptive and contrastive analysis, English is considered the target language and Vietnamese is the source one The data collected are qualitatively processed to investigate the similarities and differences of interjections in English and Vietnamese in terms of grammar, pragmatics and culture

The specific steps used in the study would be as follows

Firstly, interjections of various utterances in both languages from different sources are collected Secondly, the data are categorized into groups based on the linguistic features of interjections in each language Thirdly, we analyse the grammatical, pragmatic and cultural features in both

languages Fourthly, the similarities and differences of interjections in English and their equivalents in Vietnamese are identified and then summarized Finally, some implications for the teaching, learning and translating of English interjections for HUBT learners and further studies are suggested after the conclusion

3.3 Summary

In general, the thesis will be accomplished by applying both qualitative and quantitative approaches Descriptive method and contrastive analysis will be used to describe the features of English and Vietnamese interjections and to do a constrative study on the subject matter In addition

to that, experimental method, error analysis and statistical technique will also be employed to carry out the questionnaire survey so that I can propose the propper implications for the learning of English interjections The survey will be done on 100-second-year students at HUBT The data are collected from research works, course books, novels, both in English and in Vietnamese Moreover, Google search techniques and the internet are also the great source for gathering data for the thesis

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS

4.1 Grammatical features of Interjections in English and Vietnamese 4.1.1 Morphological features of interjections in English and

Vietnamese

4.1.1.1 Morphological features of interjections in English

(i) Interjections as reduplication in English

One of the most outstanding features of English and interjections is that they act as reduplication This feature is believed to contribute to great value, it helps interjections perform their communicative function smoothly There are two types of reduplication: (i) complete and (ii) partial reduplication

 Interjections as complete reduplication in English

As stated in the theoretical background, complete or full reduplication involves the exact repetition of a sound or word In English, interjections as complete reduplication can be considered as the minority one Maybe because of this repetitive feature, interjections of this type would be used to

provide emphasis For instance, hee-hee is a mischievous laugh, while its variants heh and heh-heh can have a more derisive connotation while ho-

ho is expressive of mirth, or (along with its variant oh-ho) can indicate

triumph of discovery

Complete reduplication interjections are hardly found in English There seems to be only some cases and they are not commonly used interjections This type of interjections is mainly formed by noun-noun

combination or adjective-adjective combination Ha-ha is an example of a

noun-noun combination conveying laughter or derision while a compound

adjective can be found in such interjection as goody-goody, usually

expressing childish delight Below is the table showing list of complete reduplication interjections

Table 4.1 Interjections as complete reduplication in English

n-n combination adj-adj

combination

Ha-ha laughter or derision

Hee-hee a mischievous laugh

Hamana-hamana implying speechless embarrassment

Ho-ho expressive of mirth, indicating triumph

of discovery

Hubba-hubba the vocal equivalent of a leer

Neener-neener showing a taunt

Oh-oh a warning response to something that

will have negative repercussions

Tsk-tsk condemnations or scoldings

Uh-uh the sound of negation or refusal

Bye-bye Partings

Goody-goody expressing childish delight

 Interjections as partial reduplication in English

In English, interjections as partial reduplication are likely to be more common than the complete ones This type of interjections also provides emphasis to the utterance, however, it is of lower level compared to interjections as complete reduplication In addition to that, it can be found in words with the change in the initial consonants or in the vowel letters The followings table is the list of interjections as partial reduplication in English

Table 4.2: Interjections as partial reduplication in English

Aha signaling triumph or surprise, or perhaps derision

Boo-hoo imitative of crying and derisive

Ho-hum signaling indifference or boredom

Lah-de-dah denoting nonchalance or dismissal, or derision about

pretension

Mm-hmm An affirmative or corroborating response

Ooh-la-la a response to an attempt to impress or gently mocks pretension

or finery

holy moly Surprise

Va-va-voom an old-fashioned exclamation denoting admiration of physical

attractiveness

woo-hoo indicating excitement

Yo-ho-ho The traditional pirates‘ refrain

Yoo-hoo attracting attention

Uh- oh showing dismay

Woohoo expressing happiness or excitement

Tee-hee representing the sound of a quiet laugh

(ii) Interjections as loan words in English

Although English has been considered an international language which plays a pretty important role in every aspect, from education, to culture, to business, to politics… all over the world, this language also borrows a great deal of words from other languages Typical examples of

these loan words are entrepreneur which comes from French, curricumlum

vitae from Portuguese Even with interjections, there also have been some

cases

The English interjection “whoa” is said to originate from South

Africa It is believed to be a command to a horse to stop or standstill or request to a person to slow down speaking or acting However, in the

following example, “whoa” introduces a new meaning:

[2] Hey, Terry! Come over here I‟d like you to meet… Whoa! What‟s

that smell? Miles Craven (2011: 218)

Loan words from other languages help enrich English interjections Remarkably, English interjections, especially American ones, are likely to

borrow from French and Spanish “Et voilà” is a French interjection which means “there it is” and now this has been used popularly in the US

Besides, Spanish is also another source for English loan interjections

“Olé” is an interjection borrowed from this language which is a vocal

flourish to celebrate a deft or adroit maneuver In addition to that,

Hallelujah is also a borrowed one orginated from Spanish which is likely to

mean ―praise the Lord‖:

[3] - Hallelujah, I love her so Hallelujah, I love her so - by Ray Charles

To be more detailed, loan interjections in English are demonstrated in the following table:

Table 4.3 Interjections as loan words in English

Language of

Origin

French et voilà there it is

blah communicating boredom or

oyez (from French)

Anglo-a cry uttered to cAnglo-all Anglo-attention

Spanish hallelujah meaning ―praise the Lord‖

olé a vocal flourish to celebrate a deft or

adroit maneuver

German ouch (or ow,

extended as needed)

signaling pain or is a response to a harsh word or action

(iii) Interjections as onomatopoeia in English

In English, it is common to see words basing on echoism or onomatopoeia In case of interjections, onomatopoeia also helps to form to

make this type of part of speech various “Shh” is an indication for silence

imitating the sound produced by human beings when a silence moment is required:

[4] Shh! The show is about to start

In the above example, interjection “shh” is employed as a sound to

command the other people to keep silence as the show is about to start

In other situation, interjection “Mmm” is employed:

[5] - We‟d like to start the programme in June if possible

- Mmm, to be honest, that‟s a bit early for us

David Cotton et al (2012:155)

In the above context, interjection “Mmm”, coming from human‘s

sound, is used to indicate the speaker‘s polite disagreement in the delivery negotiation

The table below shows the common English interjections as onomatopoeia:

Table 4.4: Interjections as onomatopoeia in English

boo-ya (with several spelling variants) a cry of triumph

ha-ha (with possible redoubling) laughter or derision

Shh an indication for silence

Mmm indicating hesitation

bam suggesting the sound of sudden, hard impact

boing reflecting the noise made when a compress spring is suddenly

released

boo! boo imitating the lowing of oxen

boohoo referring to the sound of noisy weeping or laughter, also

expressing contempt

Bow- wow imitating the parking of a dog

hem the sound made in clearing the throat

piff imitating the sound made by swiftly going bullet through the

air

plump representing the sound made by a heavy object or body falling

into water

swash! Swash imitating the sound of splashing into water, resounding a blow

tee-tee representing the sound of titter or snicker

tra-ra imitating the sound of a horn, or some similar sound

tu-whit imitating the call of an owl

tut-tut referring to alveolar click functioning as a sort of rejection

4.1.1.2 Morphological features of interjections in Vietnamese

(i) Interjections in reduplication in Vietnamese

 Interjections as complete reduplication in Vietnamese

In Vietnamese, the majority of complete reduplicatives are originated from the onomatopoeia:

[6] …Dần cười tủm tỉm Thằng em lớn, tì một tay lên đùi cha, múa may

tay kia và nhún nhảy người, giễu chị:

- Lêu lêu! Lêu lêu! Có người sắp được đi lấy chồng… lêu lêu!

Nam Cao (2005: 107)

In the above example, the younger brother used the onomatopoeia

―lêu lêu” to tease his sister when she was about to get married ―Lêu lêu” is

repeated three times which makes the listener recognize the speaker‘s intention even clearer

Also, the onomatopoeia “ha ha” has the sound of a laughter, an

indication of excitement and joy

Besides onomatopoeia, an intensifier can also contribute to

reduplication “Kia kìa” is an interjection denoting direction By using this

interjection, speakers wish to show something or would like hearers to pay attention to the thing that they are referring to:

[7] Anh cu cười đắc chí Anh bảo vợ:

- Kia kìa! Nó lại trèo lên “đầu lâu” kia kìa… Không muốn đuổi nó đi

thì cứ để cho nó ăn cả đầu lâu, hoa cái nhà mày đi

Nam Cao (2005: 81)

In another case, the interjection “hằm hằm” expresses the feeling of

extreme anger combined with face expression Consider the following example:

[8] Hằm hằm! Lý trưởng, làm biên bản, ngày mai cho đòi Lý trưởng và

thị Đào lên hầu trên phủ

In the above example, by using interjection “hằm hằm”, the feeling

of anger has successfully been conveyed without the help of face expression Interjections as complete reduplication in Vietnamese are shown

in table 4.5 below:

Table 4.5 Interjections as complete reduplication in Vietnamese

Lêu lêu mocking somebody

Kia kìa giving direction

Hằm hằm showing anger

Ha ha an indication of laughter

Ái ái an indication of pain

Này này drawing attention

 Interjections as partial reduplicatives in Vietnamese

Partial reduplicatives in Vietnamese tend to be the change in the vowel sound or in the first syllable of two-word interjections The vowel alternation or vowel ablaut is the repetition of the first syllable, and the distinction lies in the rhyme:

[9] Hoan hô! Hoan hô! Mẹ đã về!

In this example, the repetition of the first syllable “h” in “hoan hô”

makes this interjecion partial reduplicative, expressing the delight or joy when the child find out that his mother has come home after a hard-working day

Consider another example:

[10] A ha! Bu đây rồi! Con hỏi bu đâu mà nhà con nhất định không chịu

(Nam Cao, 137, 2005)

In the above example, the repetition of letter ―a‖ in interjection “a

ha” produces the meaning of surprise and delight when the speaker realizes

that his mother has come The partial reduplication interjections are listed as below:

Table 4.6 Interjections as partial reduplication in Vietnamese

hoan hô expressing delight