A VIETNAMESE AMERICAN CROSS CULTURAL STUDY OF GIVING COMMENTS ON CONTESTANTS’ PERFORMANCE BY JUDGES IN VIETNAM IDOL AND AMERICAN IDOL

1 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HA NOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES -  - A VIETNAMESE-AMERICAN CROSS CULTURAL STUDY OF GIVING COMMENTS ON CONTESTANTS’ PERFORMANCE BY PERFORMANCE BY JUDGES IN VIETNAM IDOL AND AMERICAN IDOL NGHIÊN CỨU GIAO VĂN HÓA VIỆT – MỸ TRONG CÁCH THỨC BAN GIÁM KHẢO ĐƯA RA LỜI BÌNH LUẬN VỀ PHẦN TRÌNH DIỄN CỦA THÍ SINH TRONG HAI CUỘC THI VIETNAM IDOL VÀ AMERICAN IDOL M.A MINOR THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60.22.15 PART A: INTRODUCTION I RATIONALE It is of little doubt that language plays a very important role in human’s life Then, English, nowadays, has become an international means of communication in our modern life However, almost all of people learning English find very difficult to understand or to convey English native speakers’ ideas or thinking, maybe, because of the cultural difference between Vietnam and English speaking countries Besides, the lack of the learners’ awareness of the target language culture and the cultural differences is also the source of culture shock in every aspect of cross-cultural communication It is the reason why those days, the study of communication and cross-cultural communication has become an urgent need thanks to the popularity of mass media and the increasing demand of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) Doing research on communicative acts has, therefore, been of great significance With the development of society, the need of entertainment has been increasing more rapidly People seek many ways to relax their mind such as go for holiday, go camping and so on However, the simplest way of entertainment is music Many music shows and games have been broadcasted on TV attracting the interest of most of people Vietnam Idol and American Idol are very famous shows of music nowadays Besides selecting an excellent contestant to become the idol of music, the audience also concern the manner the judges give comments on the performance of contestants Thus, Vietnamese – American cross-cultural studies appear useful and vital in this way Commenting is common in many languages and cultures It is realized by comforting, showing concern or expressing likes or dislike or reaction, etc with the hearer Cross-cultural study on judges’ commenting on contestants’ performance has not received much concern form linguistics and researchers Then, how Vietnamese and American judges give comments on contestants’ performance? How are the two manners different? Which manner is a positive way? This leads the author to the decision to conduct a research into “A Vietnamese-American crosscultural study of giving comments on contestants’ performance by judges in Vietnam and American Idol” to find out the similarities and differences in the manner of giving comments of Vietnamese and American judges on contestants’ performance The findings from the study hopefully would be a source of assistance in understanding between the two cultures American and Vietnamese II AIMS OF THE STUDY The aims of the study are: - To convey ways which judges give verbal comments on contestants’ performance in Vietnam Idol 2010 and American Idol 2011 - To point out the similarities and differences in the manner American and Vietnamese judges commenting in their target language and culture - To answer the two research questions: + Which politeness strategies are used by Vietnamese judges and which ones are chosen by American judges? + Who employs more politeness strategies in verbal communication: Vietnamese judges and American ones? - To contribute to raise cross-cultural awareness in using verbal cues for foreign language teachers and learners as well as other potential interactants of international communication III SCOPE OF THE STUDY The study is focused on the verbal aspect of the act of giving comments by judges on contestants’ performance after live show in the two latest shows: Vietnam Idol 2010 and American Idol 2011 basing on the politeness theory by Brown and Levinson and other linguistics researchers Because of some limitations, the author only focuses on the final round: top and top perform IV METHODOLOGY This part is focused on a detailed depiction of the methodology applied in the research paper More specially, the size and characteristics of the research subject altogether with research instruments, data collection procedure as well as data analysis procedure are put into description and justification IV.1 Selection of subjects In order to conduct this study, the researcher has employed top and top performs of Vietnam Idol 2010 and also two ones of American Idol 2011 the research subjects in this study have been chosen under the procedure of information-oriented sampling, as opposed to random sampling In these two performs of American Idol 2011, the researcher has obtained 51 utterances of commenting; meanwhile, she has got 36 commenting utterances of Vietnam version, which makes a total of 87 utterances This size of the samples could somehow be considered eligible enough for the researcher to carry out a reliable study IV.2 Research methods To conduct the study, the researcher has employed two methods namely quantitative and qualitative ones The combination of these two methods has offered the researcher valid data for later analysis Regarding the aim of the study, the researcher has found that quantitative is the most feasible method to deal with the research problems It is because in the social sciences, quantitative research refers to the systematic empirical investigation of quantitative properties and phenomena and their relationships The objective of quantitative research is to develop and employ mathematical models, theories and/ or hypotheses pertaining to phenomena The process of measurement is central to quantitative research because it provides the fundamental connection between empirical observation and mathematical expression of quantitative relationships Besides, qualitative research is a method of inquiry employed in many different academic disciplines, traditionally in the social sciences, but also in market research and further contexts Qualitative researcher aims to gather an in-depth understanding of human behavior and the reasons that govern such behavior The qualitative method investigates the why and how of decision-making, not just what, where, when Hence, smaller but focused samples are more often needed, rather than large samples IV.3 Data collection procedures The data collection procedure has been divided into two successive phases Phase 1: This phase has concentrated mainly on collecting shows of American Idol and another shows of Vietnam Idol To be more specific, the researcher has spent a lot of time finding then watching 12 Vietnamese episodes and 12 American ones then collected episodes of each version Phase 2: The researcher has watched then taken notes all the transcripts of the commenting parts of totally American and Vietnamese shows Afterwards, she has identified the strategies of politeness used in every commenting utterance transcripted Simultaneously, prominent examples of each strategy have been noted down to exemplify the researcher’s later analysis IV.4 Data analysis procedures First, the verbal data have been interpreted into subtypes of politeness strategies As observed, there are seven strategies that are most commonly used by both Vietnamese and American judges After that, the researcher has calculated the frequency of commentators’ using the above politeness strategies This step has been followed by her converting the frequency into the percentile forms for comparison Finally, the researcher has compared the frequencies of politeness strategies used by Vietnamese judges and American ones V COMMENTS ON THE INFORMANTS In the two shows Vietnam Idol and American Idol, there are two groups of informants The Vietnamese group consists of informants (one female and two males), but in the final round, one informant is added The second group was judges (also one female and two males) Details of the informants’ parameters are: - Vietnamese group: + Two females: singer (Siu Black) and editor (Diem Quynh) + Two males: director (Quang Dung) and composer (Quoc Trung) - American group: + One female: singer/actress and record producer Jennifer Lopez + Two males: singer-songwriter Steven Tyler and music manager Randy Jackson VI DESIGN OF THE STUDY The thesis consists of three parts Part A: INTRODUCTION This part includes the rationale, aims, scope of the study, methodology and design of the study Part B: DEVELOPMENT This part is divided into two chapters: Chapter I: THEORETICAL PRELIMINARIES In this chapter, theories of culture, cross-culture, culture–shock, language-culture interrelationship, speech act, and classifications of speech acts, politeness, politeness principles and politeness strategies, definition of the two shows are critically discussed Chapter II: DATA ANALYSIS AND FINDINGS In this chapter, the author focuses on analyzing the manner of giving comments of judges through the two shows with the illustration of video clips (if necessary) The similarities and differences in the way of giving comments by Vietnamese and American judges are drawn from detailed and critical analysis of data Part C: CONCLUSION Summary of the major findings and suggestions for further research are mentioned in this part PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL PRELIMINARIES I.1 CULTURE I.1.1 Definition of culture Culture is often thought of as shared behavior and beliefs, but in any society, all individuals never think and act exactly the same Each author has different definitions of culture Levine and Aleman (1993) think culture as “a shared background (for example national, ethnic, religious) resulting from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, art, music and all the other products of human thought made by a particular group of people at a particular time It also refers to the informal and often hidden patterns of human interactions, expressions and view points that people in one culture share.” Here, it means that culture consists of everything that happens in our daily life Most people in a country have same habits or same patterns of thinking or behave similarly, these are called culture Wardhaugh (1992: 217) states that: “A society’s culture consists of whatever it is one has to know or believe in order to operate in a manner acceptable to its members, and to so in any role that they accept for any one of themselves.” Language and culture always keep changing, consequently, people’s behaviors and attitudes seem to vary due in time and space According to Bock (1970:1), “Culture, in its broadest sense, is what makes you a stranger when you are away from home It includes all beliefs and expectations about how people should speak and act which have become a kind of second nature to you as a result of social learning When you are with members of a group who share your culture, we or you not have think about it, for you are all viewing the world in pretty much the same way and you all know, in general terms, what to expect of one another.” Culture is always the result of human intervention in the biological processes of nature It is the product of socially and historically situated discourse communities, created and shaped by language Culture is always changing because culture consists of learned patterns of behavior and belief More clearly, language can not occur alone and is never separated from social activities and its culture I.1.2 Language-culture interrelationship Otto Jespersen (1921) says that “Human language originated while humans were actually enjoying themselves.” (cited in Karen Risager (2006:3) - Language and Culture: Global Flows and Local Complexity) It means that language was created naturally in our daily life, for example when we work; we have to use language to exchange our ideas or important information According to Kramsch (1998:4), “language is the principle means whereby we conduct our social lives When it is used in contexts of communication, it is bound up with culture in multiple and complex ways.” Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication In the “Oxford advanced learner’s Dictionary” (Encyclopedic edition, 1992:506), a language is considered to be a “system of communicating with other people using sounds, symbols and words in expressing a meaning, idea or thought.” This language can be used in many forms, primarily through oral and written communications as well as using expressions through body language Sapir (1921:207) defines that, “Language does not exist apart from culture, that is, from the socially inherited assemblage of practices and beliefs that determines the texture of our lives.”(cited in Karen Risager (2006:3) - Language and Culture: Global Flows and Local Complexity) He considers culture as “what society does and thinks” and language is “a particular how of thought” Language and culture always keep changing, consequently, people’s behaviors and attitudes seem to vary due in time and space Culture is the result of human intervention in the biological processes of nature So culture is always changing as culture consists of learned patterns of behavior and belief Meanwhile language can not occur alone and is never separated from social activities and its culture It is widely recognized that the correlation between language and culture is undeniable I.1.3 COMMUNICATION AND CROSS CULTURAL COMMUNICATION Communication is a broad-ranging topic Everyday we communicate with others in many ways Communication can be understood as the exchange and flow of information and ideas from one person to another; it involves a sender transmitting an idea, information, or feeling to a receiver (U.S Army, 1983 cited at http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/leader/leadcom.html) Effective communication occurs only if the receiver understands the exact information or idea that the sender intended to transmit According to many linguists like Saville Troike (1982:25), speakers must have to communicate effectively and appropriately They have to have linguistic knowledge, interaction skills and cultural knowledge Lustig (1996:28) states that: “Communication is a symbolic process in which people create shared meanings.” To him, symbols play a key role in communication process because they represent the shared and specific meanings that are communicated Language and communication are always changing along with the change of society because communication is considered as a process in which meanings are created and shared by groups of people as they participate in the ordinary and everyday activities that form the context of common interpretations Cross-cultural communication referred to as intercultural communication is defined as “an exchange of ideas, information between persons from different cultural backgrounds There are more problems in cross cultural communication than in communication between people of the same cultural background Each participant may interpret the other’s speech according to his or her own cultural conventions and expectations If the cultural conventions and misunderstandings can easily arise, even resulting in a total break down of communication This has been shown by research into real life situations, such 10 as job interviews, doctor-patient encounters and legal communication.” Richards (1983:92) This is understood that cross-cultural communication is the exchange and negotiation of information ideas, feelings and attitudes between individuals who come from different language and cultures It is clear that with the process of globalization, especially the increasing of global trade, different cultures will meet, conflict, and blend together People from different culture find it is hard to communicate not only due to language barrier but also affected by culture styles As a result, if the cultural conventions and norms of the interlocutors are widely different, culture shock or breakdown of communication can easily arise because of misunderstandings or misinterpretations In brief, people of different cultures and countries have different ways of viewing or interpreting the intention of communication Therefore, speakers are unable to understand other’s ideas not because of their limited competence of translation but due to cultural barriers Understanding the differences of cultures, communication and cross-cultural communication enables participants to discover their own culture and to avoid misinterpretations and then to behave themselves in a different new world I.1.4 CULTURE SHOCK Culture shock is a term used to describe an anxious feeling when people move to a strange place and meet with many unexpected situations Many linguists give the definitions of this topic To Foster, “culture shock is mental illness, and is true of much mental illness, the victim usually does not know he is affected He finds that he is irritable, depressed, and probably annoyed by the lack of attention shown him.”(cited in Understanding Culture Shock at http://www.rotary5080ye.org/understanding_culture_shock.htm) It means that when one affects culture shock, he himself is not able to realize this situation As culture shock is mental illness, it makes our mind always anxious, nervous and so on Valdes (1995:35) assumes that “culture shock is a common experience for a person learning a second language in a second culture Culture shock refers to a ... similarities and differences in the way of giving comments by Vietnamese and American judges are drawn from detailed and critical analysis of data Part C: CONCLUSION Summary of the major findings and. .. in Vietnam and American Idol? ?? to find out the similarities and differences in the manner of giving comments of Vietnamese and American judges on contestants’ performance The findings from the study. .. contestants’ performance in Vietnam Idol 2010 and American Idol 2011 - To point out the similarities and differences in the manner American and Vietnamese judges commenting in their target language