An american – vietnamese cross – cultural study of asking for permission in the workplace

ABSTRACT This paper is carried out at endeavor of exploring the linguistic politeness strategies utilized by the Vietnamese and the American people in asking for permission in the workpl

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

************************

HOÀNG THỊ KIM THOA

AN AMERICAN –VIETNAMESE CROSS –CULTURAL STUDY OF

ASKING FOR PERMISSION IN THE WORKPLACE

(Nghiên cứu giao văn hóa Việt-Mỹ về cách thức xin phép nơi công sở)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

HANOI – 2016

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

************************

HOÀNG THỊ KIM THOA

AN AMERICAN –VIETNAMESE CROSS –CULTURAL STUDY OF

ASKING FOR PERMISSION IN THE WORKPLACE

(Nghiên cứu giao văn hóa Việt-Mỹ về cách thức xin phép nơi công sở)

M.A MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS

Field: English Linguistics Code: 60220201

Supervisor: Prof NGUYỄN QUANG, Ph.D

HANOI - 2016

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This M.A thesis would not have been possible to do without the invaluable guidance, encouragement and support that I received from many people who I would like to show my sincerest gratitude and appreciation

First and foremost, I would like to offer my greatest and deepest thankfulness and gratitude to Prof Nguyen Quang, my supervisor, for his enthusiastic and precious guideline and advice throughout the duration of my thesis Without his instruction and supervision, this thesis could not have reached the accomplishment

Additionally, a very special thanks goes out to Mr Vu The Anh and Mrs Bui Thi Yen who aided me to contact American and Vietnamese officers to ask for their participation in my study From the bottom of my heart, I must acknowledge some American and Vietnamese officers for their energetic contribution in DCT and MCQ

Last but not least, I am also very grateful to my family and relatives particularly my father, mother and sister who have always supported me and supplied the best conditions for me to complete this thesis

ABSTRACT

This paper is carried out at endeavor of exploring the linguistic politeness strategies utilized by the Vietnamese and the American people in asking for permission in the workplace From that, major similarities and differences between the two languages

in this regard are revealed

On the basis of quantitative method, discourse completion task (DCT) is employed

to collect data from participants including thirty Vietnamese native speakers and American ones who are currently working in the workplace The result reveals that the positive politeness strategy namely ―being conventionally indirect‖ is the most common strategy used by American businesspeople while their Vietnamese counterparts prefer ―being optimistic‖ & ―giving deference‖ Moreover, some factors including ages, genders have great influence on the choice of politeness strategy for Vietnamese clerks whereas no significant influence of those one are made on the American counterpartners

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS vii

LIST OF TABLES viii

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1

1 Rationale of the study 1

2 Aim and objectives of the study 2

2.1 Aim of the study 2

2.2 Objectives of the study 2

3 Scope of the study 2

4 Significance of the study 2

5 Research Methodology 2

5.1 Research Questions 2

5.2 Research Approach 3

5.3 Research Methods 3

5.4 Data Analysis 3

6 Design of the study 4

CHAPTER II: 5

LITERATURE REVIEW & THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 5

1 Key concepts defined and discussed 5

1.1 Communication 5

1.2 Cross-cultural communication 5

1.3 Collectivism & Individualism 6

1.4 Confucious value 7

2 Speech acts 8

2.1 What is speech act? 8

2.2 Classification of speech act: 9

2.3 Asking for permission as speech act 11

3 Politeness and politeness strategies 12

3.1 Politeness 12

3.2 Politeness strategies 12

3.3 Politeness strategies in asking for permission 14

4 Previous studies on asking for permission 15

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 17

1 Research questions 17

2 Research participants 17

3 Data collection instrument 18

4 Data collection procedure 19

5 Data analysis procedure 20

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 21

1 Introduction 21

2 Findings and discussion 21

2.1 What are the major similarities and differences in American and Vietnamese perception of asking for permission in the workplace? 21

2.1.1 With boss 21

2.1.1.1 American findings 21

2.1.1.2 Vietnamese findings 22

2.1.2 With colleagues 23

2.1.2.1 American findings 23

2.1.2.2 Vietnamese findings 24

2.2 How do the Vietnamese and Americans ask for permission in the workplace? 24

2.2.1 In some unimportant events 24

2.2.1.1 With colleagues 24

2.2.1.1.1 Vietnamese findings 24

2.2.1.1.2 American findings 26

2.2.1.2 With boss 28

2.2.1.2.1 Vietnamese findings 28

2.2.1.2.2 American findings 29

2.2.2 In some important events 30

2.2.2.1 With colleagues 30

2.2.2.1.1 Vietnamese findings 30

2.2.2.1.2 American findings 31

2.2.2.2 With boss 32

2.2.2.2.1 Vietnamese findings 32

2.2.2.2.2 American findings 33

2.3 What are the similarities and differences in the ways the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace? 34

2.3.1 Similarities 34

2.3.2 Differences 35

2.3.2.1 Differences in asking colleagues for permission 35

2.3.2.2 Differences in asking boss for permission 37

CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION 39

1.Summary of main findings 39

2.Limitations 40

3.Suggestions for further study 40

REFERENCES 41 APPENDIXES I

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

DCT: Discourse completion task

FTA: Face threatening act

H: Hearer

MCQ: Multiple choice questionnaire

NPS: Negative politeness strategy

PPS: Positive politeness strategy

S: Speaker

Table IV.5 Politeness strategies with colleagues in some unimportant events as

seen from Vietnamese respondents

Table IV.6 Politeness strategies with colleagues in some unimportant events as

seen from American respondents

Table IV.7 Politeness strategies with boss in some unimportant events as seen

from Vietnamese respondents

Table IV.8 Politeness strategies with boss in some unimportant events as seen

from American respondents

Table IV.9 Politeness strategies with colleagues in some important events as seen

from Vietnamese respondents

Table IV.10 Politeness strategies with colleagues in some important events as seen

from American respondents

Table IV.11 Politeness strategies with boss in some important events as seen from

Vietnamese respondents

Table IV.12 Politeness strategies with boss in some important events as seen from

American respondents

Table IV.13 Vietnamese businesspeople versus their American counterparts in the

use of politeness strategies with colleagues in some unimportant and important events

Table IV.14 Vietnamese businesspeople versus their American counterparts in the

use of politeness strategies with boss in some unimportant and important events

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

1 Rationale of the study

Language plays an essential role in our life We use language to inform people of how we feel, what we desire, and understand the world around us Communication drives our lives However, not only is language for communication but it is also for cultural exchange among nations To support this point of view, Durant (1997: 332)

claims that “to have a culture means to have communication and to have

communication means to have access to a language.‖ Language serves as an

expression of culture without being entirely synonymous with it In most cases, a language forms a basis for ethnic, regional, national or international identity

According to Brown (1994:65), ―a language is a part of a culture and a culture is a

part of a language; the two are intricately interwoven so that one cannot separate the two without losing the significance of either language or culture‖ Nguyen

Quang (1998:2) states that ―One can not master a language without profound

awareness of its cultural background and in both verbal and non-verbal communication, culture makes itself strongly felt.‖

In addition, the fact is that many Vietnamese wish to learn a foreign language towards a communicative end but are still largely concerned about grammar and vocabulary Consequently, although the utterances and expressions are well-formed, they may experience culture shock when entering into actual cross-cultural interactions It can be easily realized that different languages and cultures have different expressions as well as different realizations of speech acts by language users This results in a variety of research on cross-cultural study of communication such as complementing, thanking, requesting, making a bargain, promising However, little attention has been put into asking for permission which is expected

to be where appropriate politeness is found, and as a result, the chance of permission will increase

Therefore, a desire to have a further insight into major similarities and differences

in asking for permission by native speakers of Vietnamese and American has

inspired the researcher to develop a study entitled “A Vietnamese-American

cross-cultural study of asking for permission in the workplace‖

2 Aim and objectives of the study

2.1 Aim of the study

The aim of this study is to find out major similarities and differences in the way the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace

2.2 Objectives of the study

* To analyze the ways the Vietnamese ask for permission in the workplace

* To analyze the ways the American ask for permission in the workplace

* To discuss major similarities and differences in the ways the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace

3 Scope of the study

To some extent, with playing an important role in interpersonal communication, paralinguistic (speed, loudness, pitch, …) and extralinguistic (facial expression, postures, gestures, proximity…) factors are beyond the scope of this study The study is limited within the verbal-nonvocal aspects of the speech act of asking for permission in view of positive politeness & negative politeness

4 Significance of the study

The thesis will contribute to the knowledge and understanding of how to ask for permission in the workplace in two different cultures: Vietnam and America, thus, avoidance of culture shock and communication breakdown for success in inter-cultural communication

5 Research Methodology

5.1 Research Questions

The main purpose of the study is to answer the following questions:

- What are the major similarities and differences in American and Vietnamese perception of asking for permission in the workplace?

- How do the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace?

- What are the major similarities and differences in the ways the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace in terms of politeness strategies?

5.2 Research Approach

To study how to ask for permission in the workplace in Vietnamese and American cultures, a contrastive analysis is applied Firstly, strategies of asking for permission are collected in Vietnamese and American workplace from questionnaires

Secondly, the collected data are classified in the light of positive politeness and

negative politeness

The third step is to comparatively and contrastively analyze the collected data

5.3 Research Methods

In order to reach the goal of this thesis, the research was conducted with combination

of several methods as follows:

 Descriptive method: this method is used to give a detailed explanation for the act

of asking for permission in American and Vietnamese workplace through questionnaires

 Analytic method: the analytic method points out some specific strategies of asking for permission in the workplace in two different cultures through the collected data

 Contrastive method: this method is used in order to show the similarities and differences in the ways of asking for permission in the workplace in Vietnamese and American cultures

 Inductive method: it helps researchers and readers to draw out the generalizations from the findings

Among them, the analytic and contrastive methods are the dominant ones which are most frequently used in the thesis

5.4 Data Analysis

The collected data will be analyzed according to the informants‘ status parameters (age, gender) and participants‘ role relationships

The findings are compared and contrasted to find out major similarities and differences in the act of asking for permission in the workplace in Vietnamese and American cultures

6 Design of the study

Chapter I: Introduction

This part includes the rationale, aims and objectives, scope, research questions, significance as well as organization of the study

Chapter II: Literature Review and Theoretical Background

This chapter reviews the previous studies related to the problem under investigation

It provides the theoretical background including theory of culture, cross-culture, culture shock, relation between language and culture; definition, classification of speech acts, asking for permission as a speech act; basic knowledge of politeness strategies

Chapter III: Research Methodology

This chapter consists of the research methods, data collection

Chapter IV: Findings & Discussions

This chapter concerns with the findings and discussion It presents the ways of asking for permission in the workplace and shows the differences and similarities of the polite strategies in expressing the permission request in the workplace between

American and Vietnamese culture

Chapter V: Conclusion

This chapter summarizes the major findings of the investigation, puts forward the implications for learning and teaching, and points out the limitations of the study Some suggestions are also raised for further studies

CHAPTER II:

LITERATURE REVIEW & THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1 Key concepts defined and discussed

1.1 Communication

Based on Oxford Advanced Learners‘ Dictionary, “Communication‖ means the

activity or process of expressing ideas and feelings or of giving people information With a view to deepening and broadening the definition, Hybels and Weaver (2008)

defined communication as any process in which people share information, ideas,

and feelings that involve not only the spoken and written words but also body language, personal mannerism and style, the surrounding and things that add meaning to a message It can be easily realized that two above researchers

mentioned some different factors in the process of exchanging the information In order to generalize some above factors, Levine and Adelman (1993) confirmed that

communication is a process of sharing meaning through verbal and nonverbal behavior Not only is communication categorized into verbal and non-

verbalcommunication but Nguyen Quang also made a detailed desciption about

intralanguage in verbal communication as well as pararlanguage and extralanguage in non-verbal communication To sum up, it can be understood that

there are some effective ways to share information, to express ideas, feelings in communication as well as some different factors which contribute to a successful communication

1.2 Cross-cultural communication

According to Oxford Advanced Learners‘ Dictionary, cross-culture is defined as

ideas from two or more different countries or cultures In Nguyen Quang‘s Lecture Note, cross-culture is described as the interaction within some social groups, sub-cultures, ethnic cultures as well as some different cultures

Based on the above definition, some scholars expanded their concerns for culture When two strangers from different countries communicate so as to let

cross-others understand their culture, customs, religions, values, norms and beliefs, they are doing the cross-cultural communication According to Levine and Adelman

(1993), cross-cultural communication is communication (verbal and non-verbal)

between people from different cultures; communication that is influenced by cultural values, attitudes and behavior; the influence of culture on people’s

reactions and responses to each other A specific example is that Tina (originally

from Malaysia) has worked with a number of Fijians and sometimes she would touch their curly hair and tell them how nice and soft it feels However, some Fijians feel very uncomfortable with her doing so because in their culture, you‘re not supposed to touch people on the head—only the chief can do that Through it, it highlights cultural differences in both non-verbal communication and the social codes of conduct Sometimes, some misunderstandings in cross-cultural communication can happen due to cultural differences In general, it is essential to build up common ground and profound knowledge of different cultures in order to avoid unexpected misunderstadings

1.3 Collectivism & Individualism

Individualism is defined as a situation in which people are concerned with themselves and close family members only (Hofstede & Bond,1984) Similar to Hofstede & Bond, Darwish and Huber (2003) confirmed that individualistic cultures include those people who ―are concerned with themselves and family members only‖ Concerned about people‘s characteristics in culture, Varner and Beamer (2005) showed that individualistic cultures include those people who show many individual characteristics The individual‘s wishes, wants, and needs are the driving force behind any action taken at work, home, and/or school Individualists are comfortable earning personal credit for successful projects as well as taking the blame for failure to meet project goals More clearly, Trampenaars (2011) best describes individualism as societies that:

frequent use of ―I‖, decision are made on the spot by representatives,

people ideally achieve alone and assume personal responsibility, vacations taken in pairs or even alone vs group orientation

On the other hand, collectivism is a situation where people feel they belong to larger collectives that care for them in exchange for their loyalty, and in return those same people remain loyal to the group (Hofstede & Bond, 1984) An important value in a collectivist culture is that of saving ―face‖ (Varner & Beamer, 2005) Ting-Toomey and Oetzel (2002) explain that face is associated with ―identity respect, disrespect, dignity, honor, shame, guilt, status, and competence issues‖ (p 145) Many collectivist cultures will not deliver bad news or give criticism for fear of losing face An example of losing face is when an employee makes an error that loses money for the company The company loses face because the error is often attributed not to the individual but to the group More obviously, collectivism is characterized by Trampanaars (2011) as follows:

frequent use of ―we‖

decisions referred back by the delegates to the organization people ideally achieve objectives in groups and assume joint responsibility

vacations are taken in organized groups of with extended family All things considered, the difference between individualism and collectivismcan be expressed by the range of social ―concern‖, which refers to bonds and links with others (Hui & Triamdis, 1986)

1.4 Confucious value

Confucianism is not a religion; instead it is a set of guidelines for proper behaviour, and an ideology that underlies, pervades, and guides Chinese culture (Hofstede, 1991; Tu, 1998a; Yan & Sorenson, 2006)

The Confucian values form the core of the Chinese culture They penetrate all levels

of social life, and also set standards for family, community and political behaviors Within the present study, Confucianism is defined as a philosophy which is the

basic starting point for 53 every individual to arrive at the state of perfect morality and is a teaching based on a moral code for human relations

The fundamental principles of Confucianism are grounded in the observance of the five virtues (also known as the ‗Five Constant Regulations‘) namely, Ren (love and benevolence), Yi (righteousness), Li (propriety or rites), Zhi (wisdom) and Xin (sincerity or trustworthiness) (Chan, Ko, & Yu, 2000; Lu, 1983; Tamney & Chiang, 2002; Yao, 2000)

2 Speech acts

2.1 What is speech act?

J Austin (1962) is considered to be a pioneer in confirming the theory of speech acts According to him, a speech act is an act that a speaker performs when making

an utterance A speech act, then, is described as ―in saying something, we DO

something.‖ For example, when someone says ―I am hungry‖, he or she can express

his hunger or ask something to eat A speech act is part of a speech event The speech act performed by producing an utterance, consists of three related acts, namely locutionary act, illocutionary act and perlocutionary act

• Locutionary act is the basic act of producing a meaningful linguistic expression.The

locutionary act is performed with some purposes or functions in mind

• Illocutionary act: is an act performed via the communicative force of an utterance

In

engaging in locutionary acts we generally also perform illocutionary acts such as informing, advising, offer, promise, etc In uttering a sentence by virtue of conversational force associated with it

• Perlocutionary act is what we bring about or achieve by saying something, such

as convincing, persuading, deterring perlocutionary acts are performed only on the assumption that the hearer will recognize the effect you intended

Searle (1969) states that speaking a language is performing speech acts, acts such as making statements, giving commands, asking questions, making promises and so

on; and more abstractly, acts such as referring and predicting; and secondly, that these acts are in general made possible by and are performed in accordance with certain rules for the use of linguistic elements More obviously, Searle (1972: 136) points out that the minimal unit of linguistic communication is the production of speech acts, not the symbol or word or sentence

In agreement with Searle, Levelt (1989) defines that an utterance with this communicative intention is called a speech act; it is an intentional action performed

by means of an utterance

The definition of speech acts was developed by some another American language

philosophers Yule (1996:47) defines that ―in attempting to express themselves,

people do not only produce utterances containing grammatical structures and words, they perform actions via those utterances.‖ According to him, actions

performed via utterances are generally called speech acts, and in English, are commonly given more specific labels, such as apology, complaint, compliment, invitation, promise or request

For example, you work in a situation where a boss has a great deal of power, then

the boss says: ―You’re fired” The utterance of the expression is more than just a

statement The utterance can be used to perform the act of ending your employment Also, Yule points out another utterance: ―This tea is really cold!‖ On a wintry day, the speaker makes a cup of tea and believes that it has been freshly made, takes a sip and produces this utterance It is likely to be interpreted as a complaint However, changing the circumstances to a really hot summer‘s day with the speaker being given a glass of iced tea by the hearer, taking a sip and producing this utterance, it is likely to be interpreted as praise It can be confirmed that the same utterance can be interpreted as two different kinds of speech act

2.2 Classification of speech act:

Some different classification of speech acts can be presented by some different linguistics and researchers

Based on Austin (1962), there are five types of speech acts as follows:

o Verdictives: typified by the giving of a verdict by a jury, umpire, arbitrator

such as acquit, grade, estimate, diagnose

o Exercitives: which are the exercising of powers, rights or influence such as

appoint, order, advise, warn

o Commisives: which commit the speaker to doing something, but also include

declarations or announcements of intention such as promise, guarantee, bet,

oppose

o Behabitives: a miscellaneous groups concerned with attitudes and social

behaviors such as apologies, criticize, bless, challenge

o Expositives: which clarify how utterances fit into ongoing discourse, or how

they are being used – argue, postulate, affirm, concede

One of Austin‘s followers is Searle‘s, whose classification has become more popular Nguyen Hoa (2004:32) confirmed that the key point about Searle‘s system

is that he recognize ―constatives‖ as a kind of speech acts Searle‘s system (1979) includes six types of speech acts as follows:

o Commissive: a speech act that commits the speaker to doing something in

the future, such as a promise, or a threat

 If you don‘t stop fighting, I‘ll call the police

 I‘ll take you to the movies tomorrow

o Directive: a speech act that has the function of getting the listener to do

something, such as a suggestion, a request, permission or a command

 Please, sit down

 Why don‘t you close the window

o Declarative: a speech act which changes the state of affairs in the world

 I now pronounce you man and wife

o Expressive: a speech act in which the speaker expresses feelings and

attitudes about something, such as an apology, a complaint, to thank someone, to congratulate someone

 The meal was delicious

o Representative: a speech act which describes states or events in the word,

such as an assertion, a claim, a report

 This is a German car

o Phatic act: a speech act whose function is to establish rapport between

people:

 Nice to meet you

2.3 Asking for permission as speech act

In accordance with Oxford Advanced Learners‘ Dictionary, ―permission‖ means the

act of allowing somebody to do something, especially when this is done by

somebody in a position of authority; therefore, ―asking for permission‖ is defined as

an acting of requiring the others‘ allowance to do something performed through utterances in interaction

Based on Searle‘s classification of speech acts, asking for permission belongs to directive speech act whose direction of fit is to make the world fit the word (Yule, 1996)

In the book ―Meaning and Expression” (1979:22), Searle points out that permission

has the syntax of directives In addition to the emphasis on the simple meaning of

―giving permission‖- trying to get somebody to do something, he states that it consists in removing antecedently existing restrictions on his doing it Consequently, ―permission‖ is considered to be illocutionary negation of a directive with a negative propositional content and its logical form is ~(~p)

In agreement with Searle, Edda Weigand confirms that ―to permit‖ something presupposes that something is forbidden which must not explicitly expressed but is known to the community and the speaker asks for the ban to be lifted (2010:190) In other words, the speech act of ―permitting‖ arises from the specific propositional features of something forbidden

With Brown and Levinson (1978), asking for permission is face-threatening speech act and is risky for the speaker in losing his/ her face In other words, such requests are towards speaker rather than hearer as well as activate speaker not hearer

However, it might be expected that asking for permission, since by definition they occur between unequals, will tend to be less direct than requests for action (cited by Shoshana Blum-Kulka and Elite Olshtain) According to the ethnographic study on the language of requesting in Israel, requests for action is the most direct and asking for permission is the most indirect, with requests for goods and for information clustering in between the two extremes (Blum-Kulka, Danet and Gerson, 1983)

3 Politeness and politeness strategies

3.1 Politeness

Hill et al (1986: 349) define politeness as “one of the constraints on human

interaction, whose purpose is to consider other’s feelings establish levels of mutual comfort, and promote rapport‖ Leech (1983: 104) interprets politeness as forms of behavior aimed at creating and maintaining harmonious interactions According to

Nguyen Quang (2005: 185), “Politeness refers to any communicative act (verbal

and/ or non-verbal) which is intentionally and appropriately meant to make others feel better‖

3.2 Politeness strategies

Positive politeness strategies

Based on Brown and Levinson‘s theory (1987), positive politeness “is oriented

toward the positive face of H, the positive self-image that he claims for himself It expresses solidarity and attend to the H’s positive face wants.” In other words, it

confirms that the relationship is friendly and expresses group reciprocity With Yule (1996), he highlights positive politeness as a face saving act concerned with the person‘s positive face It will tend to show solidarity, emphasize that both speakers want the same thing and have a common goal Through the analysis of cross-culture communication, Nguyen Quang (2003) categorises into some sub-types as follows:

Strategy 1: Notice/attend to H (interest, wants, needs…)

Strategy 2: Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H)

Strategy 3: Intensify interest to H

Strategy 4: Use in-group identity markers

Strategy 5: Seek agreement

Strategy 6: Avoid disagreement

Strategy 7: Presuppose, raise, assert common ground

Strategy 8: Joke

Strategy 9: Assert or presuppose knowledge of and concern for H’s want

Strategy 10: Offer, promise

Strategy 11: Be optimistic

Strategy 12: Include both S and H in the activity

Strategy 13: Give or ask for reasons

Strategy 14: Assert reciprocal exchange

Strategy 15: Give gifts to H (goods, sympathy, understanding, cooperation) Strategy 16: Condole, encourage

Strategy 17: Ask personal questions

Negative politeness strategies

Brown and Levinson (1987) states that negative politeness is oriented toward

partially satisfying (redressing) H’s negative face, his basic want to maintain claims of territory and self- determination When negative politeness is used, the

speech strategies emphasize the deference or respect for the hearer Negative politeness is defined as a face saving act oriented to a person’s negative face which

tends to show deference, emphasizes the importance of the other’s time or concerns and may include an apology for the imposition by Yule (1996) In agreement with

two above researchers, Nguyen Quang (2003) emphasizes that the speaker does not want to impigne on the addressee‘s privacy, thus, maintain the sense of distance between them through using the negative politeness With the basis of negative politeness, he gives more detailed description of 11 negative politeness strategies as

follows:

Strategy 1: Be conventionally indirect

Strategy 2: Question, hedge

Strategy 3: Be pessimistic

Strategy 4: Minimizing the imposition

Strategy 5: Give deference

Strategy 6: Apologize

Strategy 7: Impersonalize S and H Avoid the pronoun I and You

Strategy 8: State the FTA as an instance of a general rule

Strategy 9: Nominalize to distance the actor and add formality

Strategy 10: Go on record as incurring a debt or as not indebting H

Strategy 11: Avoid asking personal questions

However, in a real utterance, some ovelaps and borderlines between positive politeness and negative politeness can happen Some people sometimes use both of them in a sentence as follows:

Kevin, could I possibly use your computer for a short while? (Kevin: in-group

identity marker [Positive politeness] + for a short while: minimise the imposition [Negative politeness])

3.3 Politeness strategies in asking for permission

As usual, some modal verbs such as: can, could, may, might can be used in asking for permission In addition, ―please”,“would you mind”,“could/ can you mind‖ can

be considered tobe markers for asking for permission Each specific circumstance will be equipvalent to some suitable asking for permission markers Therefore, this section aims to categorize politeness strategies used to ask for permission in the workplace Based on the politeness theory of Nguyen Quang (2003), some politeness strategies for asking for permission are classified into:

a Positive politeness strategies (PPS)

- Be optimistic

Ex: Let me borow your pen for a while

Bạn cho tớ mượn cái bút nhé

- Give or ask for reasons

Ex: I forgot my pen Can I use yours for the day?

Tôi bỏ quên cái bút Ông/bà/anh/chị/bạn có thể cho tôi mượn bút được không?

b Negative politeness strategies (NPS)

- Be conventionally indirect

Ex: Can I have a couple weeks off for vacation?

Tôi có thể xin phép nghỉ 1 đôi tuần cho kì nghỉ?

- Give deference

Ex: Do you mind exchange our shift today?

Anh/chị/bạn vui lòng đổi ca cho mình hôm nay được không?

- Minimize the imposition

Ex: I just want to ask you if I can swap shifts with you

Anh ơi, cho em mượn cái bút một chút được không?

4 Previous studies on asking for permission

The field of asking for permission is quite common in daily life, therefore, it can be widely seen in some researches In the light of cross-cultural pragmatics, Mr Tran

Ba Tien (2004) attempts to investigate the similarities and differences in the way Vietnamese and Canadian English speakers ask for permission Its focal points are politeness strategies which result is that Vietnamese speakers combine positive and negative politeness (in other words, it is called overlap strategies) much more than Canadian English counterparts, from twice to three times as much

Jimmy Dwi Purnawan (2007) do a study of asking for permission produced by Javanese and Chinese couples in Surabaya, which analyses language function in asking for permission expressions Through the analysis, the author finds out that the predominant is not seeking permission and the outstanding function is inquiring about approval/ disapproval function so as to ask for permission from their spouses with having more authority

Similar to Jimmy, a contrastive analysis about asking and giving permission in Vietnamese and English is carried out by Ms Le Thi Thu Le (2010) with focusing

on the similarities and differences in syntactic and semantic formulas The findings

point out that the structure ―if‖ is more common in English than that one in Vietnamese and the choice of the modal verbs in English is preferable whereas some pharses like ―xin phép‖ ―có thể‖ are widely used in Vietnamese Sometimes, power relations and relationship between interlocuters are referred to, however they are used to emphasize the differences in semantic formulas

To sum up, some studies on asking for permission are nearly based on linguistic theory such as: language function, syntactic, semantic formuals The similaries and differences in three issues are obviously shown with some specific evidences, especially, there is a variety of the countries which are used to compare including: Vietnamese, English, Chinese, Javanese, Canadian With reference to cross-culture,

in spite of some detailed statistics, Tran Ba Tien (2004) only gives some general strategies about several situations in daily life and the concentration on a specific situations has not been concerned thoroughly Consequently, in my study, I focus

on finding out some specific politeness strategies including some sub-types of positive politeness strategies and negative politeness strategies in order to clarify and specify how to ask for permission in the workplace more than in some previous studies

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter focuses on introducing the methodology of the thesis; in other words, the methods of collecting the data for analysis This second chapter consists of five smaller parts: (1) research questions; (2) research participants; (3) data collection

instrument; (4) data collection procedure; (5) data analysis procedure

1 Research questions

With the aims of finding out major similarities and differences in the way the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace, the thesis is hoped

to answer the following questions:

- What are the major similarities and differences in American and Vietnamese perception of asking for permission in the workplace?

- How do the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace?

- What are the major similarities and differences in the ways the Vietnamese and American ask for permission in the workplace in terms of politeness strategies?

2 Research participants

As mentioned above, asking for permission in the workplace in Vietnamese culture was investigated in this study; therefore, those who work in some different offices from both countries were chosen to participate in research In order to ensure the reliability of the research, research participants coming from American offices or those who are working in Vietnam are American-European native speakers In Vietnam, the researcher chose some Vietnamese native speakers

American-in not only state companies but also private enterprises to be research participants However, there is a variety of factors which affect asking for permission style A large and growing body of literature suggests that gender status beliefs can systematically affect women‘s ability to effectively exert influence and authority in the workplace Ridgeway in a wealth of social psychological research documents how sex categorization and the gender labeling of jobs affect expectations and

behaviors Specifically, she argues that, once individuals categorize a worker as either male or female, gender stereotypes are likely to become infused into occupational roles and responsibilities, thereby affecting the way the job is done, understood, and represented to others (cited in L.Doering &S.Thesbaud‘s artice, 2015) Therefore, a range of choosing research participants will be quite wide as follows.

A total of 60 participants from both countries were randomly selected with the age ranged from 22 to 59 In terms of gender, both male and female participate in this survey With regard to nationality, there are 30 American people and 30 Vietnamese people carrying out this questionnaire

In addition, the researcher had a tendency towards a variety of given occupations, from businessmen, accountants to bank clerks with a view to enhancing the validity

of the collected data

3 Data collection instrument

The main instrument of the research is survey questionnaire Questionnaire is the important way to collect data for analysis Leary (1995) said that survey questionnaires are less expensive, easier to group administration Additionally, thanks to the researchers‘ acquaintance, survey questionnaires sent through emails can reduce their expense and also assist the participants to providing information in

a short time or whenever they are free On the other hand, with questionnaire, some natural speech patterns can not be exactly collected because the participants will have much time to think about what he says, especially, the tone, attitudes, emotions

of the performance will not deeply shown However, it is considered to be useful to use the survey questionnaire for primary investigation in asking for permission in the workplace

Questionnaire is obviously divided into three parts and comprised of some situations necessarily responded At the beginning of the questionnaire, there was an essential part including the participants‘ personal information such as age, genders and which have a significant effect on their alternatives of politeness strategies

when asking for permission in given situations The next part was designed to find out the similarities and differences in the attitude towards asking for permission in normal situations in the workplace In this part, 8 alternative situations were raised and the participants would be required to choose 5-point Likert Scale to decide whether it is necessary or not to ask for permission for some certain situations in the workplace 8 situations were categorized into two sub-parts with the first one being

the situations in which the participants are in lower status than the requestees (ask

the boss for permission) and the second part including in the situations in which the

participants have equal status with the requestees (ask the colleague for

permission)

The third part of the questionnaire was designed to investigate the linguistic form of asking for permission in some certain situations in the workplace 4 given situations which are common problems in working environment are shortly described with specific contexts and the relationship between the interactants For each particular situation, the participants were asked to accomplish what he/she would say in natural speech

4 Data collection procedure

First of all, a pilot survey will be carried out with some Americans and Vietnamese

in order to ask them if they often ask for permission in some daily situations From the pilot survey, 8 common situations will be chosen to build the alternative questions to find out the similarities and differences in the necessity of asking for permission in the workplace perceived by American and Vietnamese After having finished the questionnaire, the researcher will contact with the participants

For American participants, the researcher asked the acquaintances who are working

in America for a help to present the questionnaire with their colleagues, neighbor or acquaintance If their friends accepted, a link to questionnaire would be sent to their emails or facebooks After having finished all of the questions, the participants click the button ―submit‖ to send it back For Vietnamese participants, questionnaires were delivered either in person or via emails

5 Data analysis procedure

In order to reach the goal of this thesis, the research was conducted with combination

of several methods as follows:

 Descriptive method: this method is used to give a detailed explanation for the act

of asking for permission in American and Vietnamese workplace through questionnaires

 Analytic method: the analytic method points out some specific strategies of asking for permission in the workplace in two different cultures through the collected data

 Contrastive method: this method is used in order to show the similarities and differences in the ways of asking for permission in the workplace in Vietnamese and American cultures

 Inductive method: it helps researchers and readers to draw out the generalizations from the findings

Among them, the analytic and contrastive methods are the dominant ones which are most frequently used in the thesis

Particularly, with the first part of the questionnaire being some alternative questions, the first step is to gather information about American and Vietnamese attitudes towards asking for permission in normal situations in the workplace The collected data would be summarized, analyzed and compared in tables, pie charts Based on some strategies by Nguyen Quang, the answers would be generalized and categorized into the appropriate strategies From that, the researchers had some discussions and explanations about the similarities as well as differences of asking for permission in the workplace in America and Vietnam To find out major similarities and differences in the way people in the two cultures ask for permission under the influence of power, gender and age, SPSS software 11.5 will be employed with the main concentration on the application of cross tabulation