a study on grammatical features of indirect speech in enghlish with reference to their vietnamese equivalents

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY ============= M.A THESIS A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL FEATURES OF INDIRECT SPEECH IN ENGHLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS ( NGHIÊN CỨU ĐẶC ĐIỂM NGỮ PHÁP CỦA CÂU GIÁN TIẾP TRONG TIẾNG ANH VỚI NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆT) NGUYỄN THANH HUỆ Hanoi, 2016 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY ============= M.A THESIS A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL FEATURES OF INDIRECT SPEECH IN ENGHLISH WITH REFERENCES TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS ( NGHIÊN CỨU ĐẶC ĐIỂM NGỮ PHÁP CỦA CÂU GIÁN TIẾP TRONG TIẾNG ANH VỚI NHỮNG TƯƠNG ĐƯƠNG TRONG TIẾNG VIỆT) NGUYỄN THANH HUỆ Field : English Language Code : 60220201 Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Hoàng Tuyết Minh Hanoi, 2016 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled: “GRAMMATICAL FEATURES OF INDIRECT SPEECH IN ENGHLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS” 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 Hanoi, 2016 Nguyen Thanh Hue Approved by SUPERVISOR Assoc Prof Dr Hoang Tuyet Minh Date:…………………… 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 Assoc Prof Dr Hoang Tuyet Minh, 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 my friends 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 friends for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work ABSTRACT Indirect speech or reported speech is a big area in the English language, it has become the subject of linguistic studies only recently, it arouses a growing interest in numerous linguists and it is defined in various ways However, Vietnamese students meet difficulties when encountering English indirect speech Therefore, this paper aims at investigating the grammatical features of indirect speech in English with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents It is conducted with the hope of finding out the equivalents of indirect speech containing methods of the study, objectives of the study, the results of the study and implications for learning English as a foreign language in Vietnam Data used for analysis in this study were mainly collected from scholar articles and language specified books Data analysis is based on descriptive, qualitative and contrastive methods LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS RV: Reporting Verb IS: Indirect speech Etc: Et cetera E.g.: Exempli gratia (for example) LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 4.1: The similarities of indirect speech in terms of function 45 Table 4.2: The similarities of basic reporting verbs of indirect speech 45 Table 4.3: The similarities of more reporting verbs that are used in indirect speech 46 Table 4.4: The similarities in changing pronouns of indirect speech 47 Table 4.5: The similarities in changing adverbs of time of indirect speech 48 Table 4.6: The differences of indirect speech between English and Vietnamese in the use of tense 49 Table 4.7 : The differences of indirect speech between English and Vietnamese in using word-orders 50 TABLE OF CONTENTS CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ABSTRACT LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Chapter INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale 1.2 Aims of the research 1.3 Objectives of the research 1.4 Scope of the research 1.5 Methods of the study 10 1.6 Design of the research 10 Chapter LITERATURE REVIEW 11 2.1 History of the study 11 2.2 Overview of indirect speech 12 2.2.1 Definitions of indirect speech 12 2.2.2 Classifications of indirect speech in English 13 2.2.2.1 Reporting statements 13 2.2.2.2 Reporting questions 14 2.2.2.3 Requests/ Commands 15 2.2.2.4 Reporting suggestions 15 2.2.2.5 Reporting intentions and hopes 15 2.2.2.6 Reporting uncertain things 16 2.2.3 Other features of indirect speech in English 16 2.2.3.1 Reporting verbs in indirect speech 16 2.2.3.2 Changes in indirect speech in English 17 2.2.3.3 Tense forms of the verbs 17 2.2.3.4 Other time references 17 2.2.3.5 Personal pronouns 18 2.2.3.6 Liking phrases 19 2.2.3.7 Modal verbs 19 2.3 Summary 20 Chapter METHODOLOGYq m 20 3.1 Research orientations 21 3.1.1 Research questions 21 3.1.2 Research approaches 21 3.1.3 Criteria for intended data collection and data analysis 22 3.2 Research methods 22 3.2.1 Data collection techniques 22 3.2.2 Data analysis techniques 23 Chapter FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 24 4.1 Grammatical features of indirect speech in English 24 4.1.1 Classifications of indirect speech in English 25 4.1.2 Other features of indirect speech in English 35 4.1.3 Semantic features of indirect speech in English 40 4.2 Comparison indirect speech in English with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents 44 4.2.1 In terms of grammatical features 45 4.3 Implications in learning English 53 4.4 Summary 58 Chapter CONCLUSION 59 5.1 Recapitulation 59 5.2 Concluding remarks 59 5.3 Limitation of the study 59 5.4 Suggestions for the further study 60 REFERENCES 61 Chapter INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale There are a lot of linguists over the world who researched on indirect speech in the English language and they have their own ideas and definitions about them According to LG Alexander (1988), he mainly studies on grammatical features of indirect speech The indirect speech comes with variety of interesting aspects including classifications and other features Randolph Quirk (1985) stated that there are several modes in which other people’s language may be reported, the most explicit modes are introduced by a reporting clause referring to the speaker and the act of communication in speech or writing (she said, she wrote), and perhaps also to the person or persons spoken to (she told us ), to the manner of speaking ( she said hesitantly) or to the circumstances of speech act ( she replied, she explained)…Collins Cobuild (1973) shows that there are many different ways of reporting what people say or think In grammatical features, he analyzes mainly a number of verbs that are used for speaking as well as in writing On the other hands, in Vietnamese, Nguyen Thien Giap (2000) points indirect speech is to retell something, it can be in positive or negative form but in any circumstances, it always presents the form of a simple sentence which has only a single independent clause In the process of learning English, learners face a lot of difficulties in distinguishing the classifications and other features of IS in English such as; tense changes, changes of personal pronouns, adverbials of time and place, etc Additionally, making comparison grammatical of indirect speech in English with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents appears to be one of the most invited, offered, ordered, promised, replied, suggested and thought Using these reporting verbs properly can make what you say much more interesting and informative Let’s see the following examples: He asked me to go out for dinner ( anh kêu tơi ngồi ăn tối) He invited me to the party.(anh mời tơi ngồi ăn tối) He begged me to go out for dinner ( anh năn nỉ tơi ngồi ăn tối) He ordered me to go out for dinner (anh u cầu tơi ngồi ăn tối) He advised me to go out for dinner.(anh khuyên nên ăn tối) He suggested me to go out for dinner (anh đề nghị tơi ra ngồi ăn tối) (Diệp Quang Ban, 2000) When changing one direct sentence into indirect sentence, we need to change the personal pronouns and possessive adjectives The reason is that two persons who give speeches in two situations are not the same Moreover, the first and second person pronouns are changed to the third person For the third person we don’t make any change in the indirect sentence Table 4.4: The similarities in changing pronouns of indirect speech Pronoun changes English Vietnamese Last week, Nam said to me, “I Lan: “ chơi come from Vung Tau” (The bạn dịp nghỉ person who says this sentence is lễ” Lan nói 47 Nam.) Nam said to me he chơi bạn cô came from Vung Tau (This dịp nghỉ lễ.” sentence was said by me when I and my friends talked about Nam yesterday.) Moreover, the first and second person pronouns are changed to the third person For the third person we don’t make any change in the indirect sentence In both English and Vietnamese, if the reported sentence contains an expression of time or place, we all must change it to fit in with the time or place of reporting Table 4.5: The similarities in changing adverbs of time of indirect speech The change of English adverbs of time This (evening) Vietnamese that Năm trước (evening) This (evening) Tháng trước that (evening) Today Năm tới tháng trước; tháng tới” Cách vài yesterday These (days) năm trước those days cách vài Minh nói: “ Năm ngối tơi Bắc thăm quê nội.” … Minh nói năm ngoái Bắc thăm quê nội (Crystal, 1992) 48 Table 4.6: The differences of indirect speech between English and Vietnamese in the use of tense The English Vietnamese differences The use of Several changes are made Vietnamese has no tenses, when tenses in converting direct to changing direct speech indirect speech The most into indirect speech, they don’t important alteration takes need to consisder anything about place, however, in the verb tense changes phrase: this is the change of tense that is referred to as back – shift When the reporting verb is in the past Hoa than thở với mẹ, “hôm qua làm rơi tiền ăn sáng.” Hoa than thở với mẹ cô tense (said, told, asked…), (đã) làm rơi tiền ăn sáng verbs in the reported vào ngày hôm trước speech are changed as Nam nói lớn, “con ăn follows: Direct speech ổ bánh mì.” Indirect speech ổ bánh mì Simple present Simple past Present continuous Past continuous Present perfect continuous Nam nói lớn ăn Past 49 perfect Simple past Past perfect Future Conditional Future continuous Conditional continuous Conditional Conditional Table 4.7 : The differences of indirect speech between English and Vietnamese in using word-orders WhQuestions for word orders English Vietnamese When people make an indirect speech for questions, they have to put the verb after subject Vietnamese the word order remains the same “How long have you both been living here?” they said Dung hỏi mẹ hoa Dung hỏi mẹ: “Đó hoa vậy?” They inquired how long we had both been living there Notes: When direct speech is reported very soon afterwards, there is often no backshift in any tenses As one might expect, this lack of backshift is characteristic more of the spoken than of the written language, in which it may take some time to “report” 50 “I’m so glad I went to the Sates,” said Susan on her return “I’ll tell you all about it in this evening when I’ve got over my jet lag.” Susan said she’s very glad she went to the States and that she’ll tell us all about it this evening when she has got over her jet lag (Reported verbally and perhaps immediately or in any case before “this evening”.) Sometimes the present tense is used as an alternative to the past tense in reported speech if the verb in question refers to what is (or was) believed to be a regular occurrence or existing fact: Nam said, “Americans are generally very hospitable people.” Nam said that Americans are/ were generally very hospitable people He said, “I will show you how the television works.” He explained how the television works/worked The past tense does not undergo backshift when used to express non-fact and therefore not directly related to time: Christine said, “I’d visit Disneyland if I went to the States.” Christine said that she’d visit Disneyland if she went to the States ‘I wish I knew someone over there,” she sighed She added with a sigh that she wished she knew someone over there The subjunctive “were”, used sometimes instead of “was” for non – fact, does not undergo backshift either: “Ah, if only I were Mary!” cried Susan Susan said with some feeling that she wished she were Mary (Nguyen Thien Giap2000) Possible changes in auxiliary verbs: Kathy said, “Tom will go abroad next week.” Kathy said that tom would go abroad the following week 51 Although He would go is not the past of He will go, it is the back shifted form in indirect speech So too with the other modal auxiliaries: “May I go?” she asked She asked if she might go “I can eat fifty apples” said John John said he could eat fifty apples (Nguyen Thien Giap 2000) If a modal auxiliary in direct speech has no past tense equivalent (this includes auxiliaries which are already past, such as could, might, as well as must, ought to, need and had better), then the same form remains in indirect speech: “I would like some tea,” he said He said that he would like some tea The element of speaker involvement which is often present in the meaning of some modal auxiliaries (e.g may = “permission”) is naturally assigned in indirect speech to the subject of the indirect statement Thus, John said that I might go -> would mean that John was giving me permission to go (corresponding to the direct “you may go”), whereas I might go -> outside indirect speech would mean that I was considering the possibility of going If the reporting verb phrase is modal and perfective, it counts as past for purposes of the backshift rule Compare: He asks what John is doing He has asked what John is doing He may have asked what John was doing (Nguyen Thien Giap 2000) 52 Possible changes in auxiliary verbs Kathy said, “Tom will go abroad next week.” Kathy said that tom would go abroad the following week Although He would go is not the past of He will go, it is the back shifted form in indirect speech So too with the other modal auxiliaries: “May I go?” she asked She asked if she might go “I can eat fifty apples” said John John said he could eat fifty apples If a modal auxiliary in direct speech has no past tense equivalent (this includes auxiliaries which are already past, such as could, might, as well as must, ought to, need and had better), then the same form remains in indirect speech: a “I would like some tea,” he said He said that he would like some tea The element of speaker involvement which is often present in the meaning of some modal auxiliaries (e.g may = “permission”) is naturally assigned in indirect speech to the subject of the indirect statement Thus, John said that I might go -> would mean that John was giving me permission to go (corresponding to the direct “you may go”), whereas I might go -> outside indirect speech would mean that I was considering the possibility of going If the reporting verb phrase is modal and perfective, it counts as past for purposes of the backshift rule Compare: He asks what John is doing 53 He has asked what John is doing He may have asked what John was doing In Vietnamese we have no tenses So when we change from direct speech to indirect speech, we don’t need to consider anything about tense changes Hoa than thở với mẹ, “hôm qua làm rơi tiền ăn sáng.” Hoa than thở với mẹ cô (đã) làm rơi tiền ăn sáng vào ngày hơm trước Nam nói lớn, “con ăn ổ bánh mì.” Nam nói lớn ăn ổ bánh mì 4.4 Implications in learning English Mastering the English language is the aim of every learner However, in the process of studying, marking mistakes is inevitable Because of the differences above, Vietnamese learners who wish to study English as well as English people learn Vietnamese will get some difficulties in grammar structure when they want to express using an indirect speech Although these mistakes often are by passed in spoken language when it comes to written language, can be troublesome These mistakes are made mainly on tense of verbs or the word order such as not changing the tense of verbs into the appreciate form; choosing the wrong tense for the indirect speech or not reversing the word orders and so on In this chapter, some common errors often made by Vietnamese learners are pinpointed, followed by some solutions to correct them Some common errors of changing direct speech into indirect speech in learning English and some suggestions When learners change direct questions into indirect questions they still put question mark at the end of the indirect questions For instance, He asked me “Are you tired? ‟ 54 (1) → He asked me if I was tired? (2) → He asked me if I was tired Easily to find out that the changing in the first sentence is incorrect because of keeping the question mark at the end the indirect question The correct changing is in the second sentence In order to avoid this error, Vietnamese learners should pay more attention to the form of indirect questions and learn by heart the rule of using punctuation marks in indirect questions To avoid this error, Vietnamese learners should pay more attention to the form of indirect questions and learn by heart the rule of using punctuation marks in indirect questions Learners often make these errors because in Vietnamese there is no form of tense changes of verbs So, in this point, learners are always confused when they change the direct speech into indirect speech Thus, in the example above, a lot of learners often back – shift as the first sentence, but the second one is a correct answer She said, „My parents are very well.‟ (1) → She said that her parents are very well (2) → She said that her parents were very well Nguyen Thien Giap, (2000) It is important to note that the form of verb tense will be changed when we back – shift into indirect speech So, learners should learn by heart not only common but also special rules of tense changes As mentioned above, when direct questions are changed into indirect questions, there is a change in word order The inversion in the direct question changes back to statement word order The auxiliaries disappear in indirect questions But in fact many learners make mistakes in this point “Where is my hat?‟ She asked him 55 Incorrect → she asked him where was her hat Correct → she asked him where her hat was ”When will the plane leave? ‟ I wondered Incorrect → I wondered when would the plane leave Correct → I wondered when the plane would leave Learners should take care of the word order when changing from the direct to indirect question, especially should note the position of subject, verb, and auxiliary in the indirect question Errors with changes of pronouns and possessive adjectives, particularly with changes of expressions of time and place in indirect sentence usually occur when learners back – shift Ms Adams just asked, “Will you be here tomorrow?” Instead of changing into she wanted to know I would be there next day, many learners still change to She wanted to know I would be here tomorrow The reason for this error is that learners make mistake or less pay attention to pointer words Learning by heart all changing rules of pointer words should be practiced day by day (cases of changing time and place in indirect speech, changes of pronouns and possessive adjectives, changes of this and these, etc.) When the quotation ends with an exclamation mark or a question mark, a comma is not used as well But sometimes, learners still use the comma by mistake Incorrect → “What a surprise! ‟ John exclaimed Correct → “What a surprise! ‟ John exclaimed Incorrect → “where is Julie?” James asked Correct → “where is Julie?” James asked 56 Especially, many learners still use capital letter to begin the second part of the quotation – sentence in which subject + reporting verb are in the middle That is incorrect because it is not a separate sentence But, capital letter is used only when following the full stop (.) of the first quotation mark Incorrect → “Where, in this wretched town” John asked, “Can I get a taxi?” Correct → “Where, in this wretched town” John asked, “Can I get a taxi?” Correct → “Where, in this wretched town” ” John asked “Can I get a taxi?” With this error, only when distinguishing between punctuation marks used in indirect speech and in direct speech, learning by heart carefully all rules of punctuation marks in direct speech as well, can learners avoid this mistake Especially, when subject + reporting verb are in the middle of sentence, learners should mention to letter to begin the second quotation part for which case capital letter is used The cause of this error happens similarly with ones above He said that he would come to England the next week If learners back – shift into → He said “I will come England the next week” That is wrong answer The correct is → He said, “I will come England next week” Therefore, my suggestion for this problem is that learners also get a good hold of the changing rules of pointer words from indirect to direct speech Here are common errors when learners change from direct to indirect speech, and vice versa Hence, some suggestions are given to solve errors 57 for learners Firstly, learners should pay more attention on the background theories of direct and indirect speech and their forms as well, particularly learn by heart the rules for changing direct into indirect speech because of its importance Secondly, learners should practice more by doing exercises of direct and indirect speech often By that way it is not difficult to avoid those mistakes Besides, teachers of English would give advice as well as guide for learners to change direct into indirect speech effectively Lastly, I hope that, this study will help learners understand and know how to change them well 4.5 Summary In this chapter, grammatical features of indirect speech are presented clearly Basing on types and classifications of English language in general, we can point out the similarities and differences between English and Vietnamese in indirect speech in terms of grammatical features; give some implications for teaching English All the information of this chapter will be an effective source for the Vietnamese learners – contrastive analysis in terms of structures between English and Vietnamese languages 58 Chapter V CONCLUSION 5.1 Recapitulation The research paper is conducted based on valuable reference sources in reference books, works and dictionaries The research on grammatical features of indirect speech under considerations has been taken Especially, a contrastive analysis of indirect speech in English and Vietnamese is made for the sake of finding out similarities and differences in terms of grammatical features between two languages It’s also concerned about using English kinds and mistakes made by students via their English indirect speech so that suggested solutions could be pointed out to help the process of learning English to Vietnamese learners better Hopefully, coming to this topic, the writer helps its readers achieve a better understanding of grammatical features on indirect speech Then, our ultimate aims are achieved and more importantly, it may set good base for the further study on the same topic or the topic of such kind 5.2 Concluding remarks The aim of study is to investigate the grammatical features of indirect speech in English and Vietnamese as well as to find out the similarities and differences between them Based on findings presented in the previous chapter, the following remarks can be drawn Grammatical are variety of structures used in indirect speech in English and Vietnamese More specifically, in English 5.3 Limitation of the study It’s oblivious that the research paper has brought about references material in terms of grammatical features in both English and Vietnamese However, due to limitations of time, references materials, researcher’s knowledge and some other limitations of the researcher make it impossible 59 for the researcher to provide sufficient and intensive focus on all aspects of indirect speech in English and Vietnamese Therefore, mistakes and shortcoming are unavoidable 5.4 Suggestions for the further study This study provides a brief foundation for a look into indirect speech in English and Vietnamese If having conditions to continue this topic, the researchers wishes to investigate indirect speech in more kinds of speech act in real life in order to provide a system more comprehensively For that very purpose, further studies on grammatical features of indirect speech in English in comparison with Vietnamese will be beneficial to learners 60 REFERENCES Alexander, L.G (1993) English grammar, Longman Cobuild, C (2003) Linking words Nxb Giáo dục Hewing, M (2003) Advanced Grammar in Use Nxb Thành phố Hồ Chí Minh Quirk, R., Greenbaum, S (1973) A University Grammar of English Oxford University Press Murphy, R (1994) Grammar in Use New York: Cambridge University Press Gethin, H (1990) Grammar in Context Proficiency Level English London: Collins ET Randolph Quirk & Sidney Greenbaum (1976) A University Grammar of English England: Longman House, Essex Nguyen Thien Giap, (2000) Dụng học Việt ngữ Hanoi National University Press Albertus, T (1996) Reported Speech: Forms and Functions 10 Thomson, A J and Martinet, A V (1985) A Practical English Grammar NXB Da Nang 11 Yule, G (1998) Explaining English Grammar Oxford University Press 12 Quirk, R et al (1985) A Comprehensive Grammar Of The English Language Longman Group Ltd 13 Alexander, L G (1988) Longman English Grammar Longman Group U K Ltd 14 Hewings, M (2002) Advanced Grammar in Use NXB Tre 15 Diệp Quang Ban (2000) T/c Ngôn ngữ, số 9/2000 61 ... changes of personal pronouns, adverbials of time and place, etc Additionally, making comparison grammatical of indirect speech in English with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents appears... Using indirect speech in writing as well as in speaking correctly, A study on grammatical of indirect speech in English with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents is chosen as the topic of. ..MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY ============= M .A THESIS A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL FEATURES OF INDIRECT SPEECH IN ENGHLISH WITH REFERENCES TO THEIR VIETNAMESE EQUIVALENTS