A study on politeness strategies in requests by the characters in the novel twilight by stephenie meyer m a thesis linguistics 60 2

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES TRẦN THỊ PHƯƠNG LINH A STUDY ON POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN REQUESTS BY THE CHARACTERS IN THE NOVEL “TWILIGHT” BY STEPHENIE MEYER (Nghiên cứu chiến lược lịch lời thỉ nh cầu nhân vật tiểu thuyết “Chạng vạng” Stephenie Meyer) MA MINOR THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60.22.15 Supervisor: Dr Hà Cẩm Tâm Hanoi- 2012 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES TRẦN THỊ PHƯƠNG LINH A STUDY ON POLITENESS STRATEGIES IN REQUESTS BY THE CHARACTERS IN THE NOVEL “TWILIGHT” BY STEPHENIE MEYER (Nghiên cứu chiến lược lịch lời thỉ nh cầu nhân vật tiểu thuyết “Chạng vạng” Stephenie Meyer) MA MINOR THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60.22.15 Hanoi- 2012 TABLE OF CONTENTS Declaration ………………………………………………………… ….…… i Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………….ii Table of contents………………………………………………………… … iii Abbreviations………………………………………………………… ….… vi List of tables …………………………………………………………… … vii List of figures…………………………………………………………… … viii Abstract……………………………………………………………………… ix PART A: INTRODUCTION …………………………………………….… 1 Rationale of the study…………………………………………… … Aims of the study……………………………………………… … … Objectives of the study………………………………………… …… Research questions……………………………………………… …… Scope of the study……………………………………………… … Significance of the study…………………………………….…………3 Methods of the study…………………………………………… … Organization of the study……………………………………… …… PART B: DEVELOPMENT…………………………………… ……… CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW………………………………… 1.1 The speech act theory…………………………………………….… 1.1.1 Speech acts…………………………………… ………….… 1.1.2 The speech act of request……………………………………… 1.2 Politeness………………………………… …………………….… 1.2.1 Politeness theory…………………………………………….… 1.2.2 Social variables affecting politeness…………………………… 1.2.3 Politeness and indirectness …………………………………… 1.2.4 Politeness and indirectness in requests………………………… 1.2.5 Modification…………………………………………… ….… 1.3 Previous studies on requests…………………………………….… v CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGY………………………………………… 16 2.1 Research questions ……………………………………………….… 2.2 Data collection ………………………………………………….…… 2.3 Data analysis ………………………………………………………… 2.4 Analytical framework…………………………………….……… … 2.4.1 Alerters…………………………………………….…………… 2.4.2 Perspective……………………………………………………… 2.4.3 Request strategies…………………………………….………… 2.4.3.1 Direct requests- Category 1…………………….……… 2.4.3.2 Conventionally indirect requests- Category 2…… …… 2.4.3.3 Non- conventionally indirect requests- Category 3…… 2.4.4 Internal modifications…………………………………………… 2.4.4.1 Syntactic downgraders………………………………… 2.4.4.2 Lexical/phrasal downgraders………………………… 2.4.4.3 Upgraders……………………………………………… 2.4.5 External modification…………………………………………… CHAPTER 3: DATA ANALYSIS…………………….…………………… 3.1 Overview of “Twilight” …………………….………………………… 3.2 Politeness strategies in request by the characters in “Twilight”………… 23 3.2.1 The utilization of strategies …… …………………………………… 3.2.2 The utilization of internal and external modifications…………… …… 3.3.3 Politeness strategies in requests in “Twilight”, seen from S-H relationships………………………………………………………………… PART C: CONCLUSION…………………………… …………….……… 40 Major findings and concluding remarks………………………………… 40 Implications …………….……………………………………………… 41 Suggestions for further study………………………………….……….… REFERENCES……………………………………… …………….……… vi APPENDIX A: The coding system………………………………… ……… APPENDIX B: Sample of the coding procedure…………………….……… APPENDIX C: The use of internal modifications by types in “Twilight” APPENDIX D: The polite request strategies in each group of speakers in “Twilight” ………………………………………………… APPENDIX E: The use of internal modification in each group of speakers in “Twilight” ……………………………………… ………… APPENDIX F: Figures for illustrations………… vii ABBREVIATIONS FTA : Face- Threatening Act IFDI : Illocutionary Force Indicating Device H : The Hearer S : The Speaker D : Distance P : Relative Power R : Absolute ranking of imposition ( : omitted words, phrases, or sentences n : Number of Appearance DR : Direct (Strategy) CI : Conventionally Indirect (Strategy) NCI : Non- Conventionally Indirect (Strategy) SD : Syntactic Downgrader LPD : Lexical/Phrasal Downdgrader UD : Upgrader : viii Table 1: The balance of d conventionally ind Table 2: Polite request strat Table 3: The use of internal Table 4: The use of externa Table 5: The use of dire conventionally ind from the character Table 6: The use of internal relationship Table 7: The use of suppo relationship ix Figure 1: The balance o conventionally Figure 2: Polite request strategies by types in “Twilight” Figure 3: The use of internal modifications in “Twilight” Figure 4: The use of external modifications in “Twilight” Figure 5: The use of conventionally from the charac Figure 6: The use of internal modification in “Twilight” seen from S-H relationship x ABSTRACT The speech act of request is a face-threatening act in human‟s communication because it challenges the mutual face of both the speaker and the hearer The current study aims to uncover how politeness strategies in requests are employed in the novel “Twilight” by Stephenie Meyer All the requests carrying the illocutionary force of getting somebody to something serve as the data source The coding system is based on Blum-Kulka et al (1989) and Trosborg (1995)‟s coding manual The findings show that the characters in “Twilight” overwhelmingly chose the Direct Strategies in formulating their requests, in which the Imperative Strategy or Mood Derivable was the most preferable strategy On the choice of Internal Modifications, the speakers in “Twilight” used a wide range of mitigating devices within the Head Act to reduce the requestive force, mostly the Question forms, Downtoners, and Past tense With reference to External Modifications, the speakers mostly chose Grounders to give reasons for their requests The findings also show that the choice of request strategies and mitigating devices was influenced by the relationships between the characters xi PART A: INTRODUCTION Rationale of the study Language, as stated by Crystal (1992:212), is “the systematic, conventional use of sounds, signs, or written symbols in a human society for communication and selfexpression” If communication is to be effective, both the speaker and the hearer need to have shared knowledge; i.e., the same perception of what they are talking about In other words, people need to have communicative competence Hymes (1967, cited in Tam, 2005) asserts that communicative competence includes not only knowledge of the linguistic forms of a language but also knowledge of when, how and to whom it is appropriate to use these forms In other words, linguistic components; i.e grammatical, lexical, phonologicalare not enough for a language learner to avoid cultural shock, miscommunication or even communication breakdown Language learners thereforeshould acquire pragmatic competence, i.e., the ability to perform language functions appropriately in social contexts Being aware of the importance of pragmatic ability, a lot of researchers have drawn their attention to its crucial role, highlighted the significance of social context, and made suggestions for appropriateness in communication The teaching and learning of foreign languages, including English has shifted from linguistic forms of the target language to the communicative approach with more emphasis on communicative competence in order to meet the demand of global development In line with this, the teaching and learning of English in Vietnam has witnessed a great effort in improving learners‟ communicative competence More attention has been paid to oral skills and practice which stress on the pragmatic meanings of utterances in contexts Nevertheless, the traditional ways of teaching and learning, which mainly focused on the development of linguistic competence seem to hold its position as the prominent method This leads to the fact that Vietnamese learners appear to fail to communicate naturally and appropriately in English These learners may possess relatively good linguistic knowledge to understand the structures and the words literally, but they fail to achieve communicative goals because they may not be aware of the hidden or unsaid meanings of utterances under certain settings, and lack social appropriateness and linguisticrealization rulesfor performing and REFERENCES Austin, J L (1962) How to things with words New York: Oxford University Press Blum-Kulka, S & Olshtain, E (1984) Requests and apologies: A Cross- Cultural Study of Speech Act Realization Patterns (CCSARP) Applied Linguistics, 5, 196-213 Blum-Kulka, S., House, J., Kasper, G (Eds) (1989) Cross-cultural pragmatics: Requests and apologies Norwood, New Jersey: Ablex Blum-Kulka, S (1987) Indirectness and politeness in requests: Same or different? Journal of Pragmatics 11, 131-146 Blum-Kulka, S., Danet, B., & Gerson, G (1985) The language of requesting in Israeli society I J (Ed.), Language and social situation New York: Springer Verlag Brown, P and Levinson, S (1987) Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage Cambridge University Press Brown, P and Levinson, S (1978) Universals in language usage: Politeness Phenomena In E.N Goody (Ed.), Questions and politeness: Strategies in social interaction (pp 256-289) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Cenoz, J., & Valencia, J.F (1996) Cross- cultural communication and interlanguage pragmatics: Ameican vs European requests In L Bouton (Ed.), Pragmatics and language learning (pp 41-54) Urbana-Champaign Cohen, R (1987) Problems in intercultural communication in Egyptian- American dipplomatic relations International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 11, 29-47 10 Crystal, D (1992) An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language and Languages England: Blackwell 11 Faerch, C & Kasper, G (1989) (1989) Internal and external modification in interlanguage request realization In S Blum-Kulka, J House, & G Kasper (Eds), Cross- Cultural pragmatics: Requests and apologies (pp 221-247) Norwood, N.J: Ablex 43 12 Farahat, H (2009) Politeness phenomena in Palestinian Arabic and Australian English: A cross- cultural study of selected contemporary plays.Unpublished PhD thesis Australian Catholic University 13 Forgas, J (1985) Language and social situation New York: Springer Verlag 14 Fukushima, S (1990) Offers and Requests: Performance by Japanese learners of English World Englishes9, 317-325 15 Fukushima, S (1996) Request strategies in British English and Japanese Language Science 18 , 671-688 16 Gu, Y (1990) Politeness Phenomena in modern Chinese Journal of Pragmatics 14 , 237-257 17 Grice, H (1957) Meaning Philosophical Review 78 , 377-388 18 Grice, H (1975) Logic and Conversation In P Cole and J Morgan (Eds.), Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech Acts (pp 41-58) New York: Academic Press 19 Hassall, T (1999) Request strategies in Indonesian Pragmatics (4), 585-606 20 Ha Cam Tam (2005) Requests by Vietnamese learners of English.Unpublished PhD Thesis VNU-CFL 21 Hassall, T (2003) Requests by Australian learners of Indonesian Journal of Pragmatics 35, 1903-1928 22 Hendriks, B (2002) More on Dutch English please? A study of request performance by Dutch native speakers, English native speakers, and Dutch learners of English Nijmegen University Press 23 House, J & Kasper, G (1981) “Politeness markers in English and German” In F.Coulmas (Ed), Conversational routine (pp 157-185).Mouton: The Hague 24 House, J and Kasper, G (1987) Interlanguage Pragmatics: Requesting in a foreign language In W Lorscher & R Schulze (Eds), Perspectives on language in performance Festchrift for Werner Hullen (pp 1250-1288) Tubingen: Narr 25 Leech, G (1983) Principle of pragmatics London: Longman 26 Levinson, S (1983) Pragmatics Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 27 Nguyen Thi Phuong Thao (2010) Politeness strategies in requests in “The Thorn Birds”.Unpublished MA Thesis VNU- ULIS, Hanoi 28 Quaraisi, S (2009) The acquisition of politeness strategies by Afghan learners of English as a foreign language.Unpublished MA Thesis Kansas State University 44 29 Scollon, R & Scollon, S.W (2001) Intercultural Communication: A discourse approach (2nd edition) Malden, MA: Blacwell 30 Searle, J (1979) Expression and meaning: Studies in the Theory of Speech Acts Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 31 Searle, J (1975) Indirect speech acts In P Cole & J Morgan (Eds) , Syntax and Semantics, 3: Speech acts (pp 59-82) New York: Academic Press 32 Searle, J (1969) Speech Acts Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 33 Searle, J (1976) The classification of illocutionary acts Language In Society, 5, 1-23 34 Sifianou, M (1992) Politeness Phenomena in England and Greece: A Cross- Cultural Perspective New York: Oxford University Press 35 Tawahbeh, A & Al-Oqaily, E (2012) Indirectness and Politeness in American English and Saudi Arabic requests: A cross- cultural comparison Asian Social Science, (10), 85-98 36 Thomas, J (1995) Meaning in interaction: An introduction to pragmatics USA, England: Longman 37 Trosborg, A (1995) Interlanguage pragmatics: Requests, complaints, and apologies Berlin, New York: Mouton De Gruyter 38 Watts, R J (2003) Politeness Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 39 Weizman, E (1989) Requestive hints In S Blum-Kulka, J House & G Kasper (Eds.), Cross- cultural pragmatics: Requests and Apologies (pp 7195) Norwood, N.J: Ablex 40 Weizman, E (1993) Interlanguage requestive hints In G Kasper & S Blum- Kulka (Eds.), Interlanguage Pragmatics New York: Oxford University Press 41 Yule, G (1996) Pragmatics Oxford University Press 45 APPENDIX A: CODING SYSTEM Items Alerters Title/role Surname Perspectives Speaker- Hearer- oriented Oriented Strategies Imperative Performative Syntactic Questions Negation Lexical/Phrasal Politeness Consultative downgraders marker devices Upgraders Adverbial Do- Intensifiers construction Preparators Grounders downgraders Supportive moves I APPENDIX B: SAMPLE OF THE CODING PROCEDURE SETTING Edward, after trying to stay away from Bella and ignore her, gets tired and gives up At lunchtime in the cafeteria they talk again to each other This is an extract of their conversation (p.91) where Bella asks Edward to warn her beforehand when he decides to ignore her (…) means that some narrative sentences are left out “Can you me a favor?” (…) “That depends on what you want.” “It‟s not much,” (…) “I just wondered… if you could warn me beforehand the next time you decide to ignore me for my own good Just so I‟m prepared.” Head Act: I just wondered… if you could warn me beforehand the next time you decide to ignore me for my own good Strategy: Ability Perspective: Hearer- oriented Syntactic Downgraders: Embedding: I just wondered if… Past tense: wondered, could Conditional clause: if you could warn me beforehand the next time you decide to ignore me for my own good Modal: could (instead of “can”) Lexical/Phrasal Downtoner: just Downgraders: Supportive moves: Preparators: Can you me a favor? and It's not much Grounders: Just so I‟m prepared SETTING In Biology lesson at school, Bella faints at the sight of blood Edward takes her to the nurse‟s room Ms Cope, the school nurse takes care of her: “Just lie down for a minute, honey; it‟ll pass.” (p.98) II Head Act: Just lie down for a minute, honey Strategy: Imperative Perspective: Hearer- oriented Alerters: Kin term: honey Lexical/Phrasal Downgraders: Downtoner: just Understatement: a minute Supportive moves: Grounder: it‟ll pass SETTING A coven of human blood drinking vampires travels across the small town of Forks On their way to leave Forks for the north, they hear the Cullens (with Bella watching) play baseball in a stormy night and return because of curiosity In the meeting between the Cullens and these Head Act: uninvited guests, Dr Cullen politely asks them not to hunt/ kill people in Forks where his family is living: “Please don‟t Strategy: take offense, but we‟d appreciate it if Perspective: you‟d refrain from hunting in this Syntactic Downgraders: immediate area We have to stay inconspicuous, you understand.”(p.378) P l Lexical/Phrasal Downgraders: e a Supportive moves: s e d o n ‟t take Dis arm ers: Ple ase don ‟t tak e offe nse, but offense, but we‟d appreciat e it if you‟d refrain from hunting in Gro und ers: We hav e to stay inc ons pic uou s, this immediat e area Willingnes s Heareroriented Past tense: (would), in both clauses Condition al clause: if you‟d refrain from hunting in this immediat e area Modal: ‟d (would) Politeness marker: please Interperso nal marker: you understan d you und erst and ” III APPENDIX C: THE USE OF INTERNAL MODIFICATIONS BY TYPES IN “TWILIGHT” Table 3: The use of internal modifications by types in "Twilight" Categories Syntactic downgraders Lexical/Phrasal downgraders Upgraders Total IV APPENDIX D: THE POLITE REQUEST STRATEGIES BY GROUPS OF SPEAKERS IN “TWILIGHT” Category Strategy Imperative Direct Performative Obligation Needs Desires Conventionally Sugestory formulae indirect Ability Willingness Permission requests Non Grouders conventionally Feasibility indirect Availability n= Number of appearance V APPENDIX E: THE USE OF INTERNAL MODIFICATIONS IN REQUESTS BY GROUPS OF SPEAKERS IN “TWILIGHT” Cat Modifications Questions Negation Past tense Syntactic Conditional clauses downgraders Embedding Modals Non-conventional structures Aspect (progressive) Poli Consult Lexical/Phrasal Downt downgraders Underst Hes Interp Upgraders Upg Total VI APPENDIX F: FIGURES Figure 1: Balance of categories of request strategies used in “Twilight” Figure 4: The use of external modifications in “Twilight” Grd = Grounders Dis = Disarmers Prom = Promise of a reward Prep = Preparators Swtn = Sweeteners Cos = Cost minimizing VII Figure 6: The use of internal modifications in “Twilight” seen from S-H relationship Lov = Lovers T/N-S: = Teachers/School nurses- Students Fam.= Family members Strang = Strangers Frie.= FriendsT Enem.= Enemies Acq = Acquaintainces Syn = Syntactic downgraders Lex.= Lexical/Phrasal downgraders Upg.= Upgraders VIII ... (4) Modesty Maxim: minimize praise and maximize dispraise of self, (5) Agreement Maxim: minimize disagreement and maximize agreement between self and other, and (6) Sympathy Maxim: minimize antipathy... Tact Maxim: minimize cost and maximize benefit to other, (2) Generosity Maxim: minimize benefit and maximize cost to self, (3) Approbation Maxim: minimize dispraise and maximize praise of other,... by American and European learners of Spanish The third study to be mentioned was conducted by Farahat (20 09), examining the concept of politeness in Australian and Palestinian Arabic plays based