A study on different politeness strategies used in english conversations in the power base course books

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNVERSITY TÔ THỊ LỆ A STUDY ON DIFFERENT POLITENESS STRATEGIES USED IN ENGLISH CONVERSATIONS IN THE “POWER BASE” COURSE BOOKS (CÁC CHIẾN LƯỢC LỊCH SỰ KHÁC NHAU DÙNG TRONG HỘI THOẠI TIẾNG ANH TRÍCH TỪ GIÁO TRÌNH “POWER BASE”) M.A THESIS Field: English Language Code: 60220201 Supervisor: Pham Thi Tuyet Huong, Ph.D Hanoi, 2015 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled A Study On Different Politeness Strategies Used In English Conversations In The “Power Base” Course Books Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in English Linguistics Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis Hanoi, 2015 Tô Thị Lệ Approved by SUPERVISOR PHẠM THỊ TUYẾT HƯƠNG, PhD Date: …………………… i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis could not have been completed without the help and support from a number of people First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr Pham Thi Tuyet Huong, 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 gratefully through my growth as an academic researcher A special word of thanks goes to all my lecturers and officers of Faculty of Graduate Study, Hanoi Open University, and many others, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for me to have this thesis accomplished Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my family, my mother and my three brothers for the sacrifice they have always encouraged and devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work Tô Thị Lệ ii ABSTRACT The thesis is entitled “A study on different politeness strategies used in English conversations in the Power Base course books” It aims at finding out the different politeness strategies used in English conversations in the Power Base course books, thus enabling Vietnamese learners of English to use them properly when taking part in English conversations The researcher used a qualitive research since the data engaged are displayed in the form of strings of words The data were collected from the course books “Powerbase”, which were published by David Evans in 2003 This thesis focuses on politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson with reference to both English and Vietnamese The different politeness strategies in the conversational activities of the course books “Power base” are based on what has been theoretically and critically discussed in Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory The result shows that there are strategies of positive politeness strategies found from the course books “Power base”; strategies of negative politeness strategies found in the data; and strategies of off record The thesis also suggests some possible exercises for Vietnamese learners of English and teachers of English to help them have an overview of the politeness strategies in the conversational activities iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS (In Alphabetical Order) C.i Conversationally implicates e.i that is (to say) EFL English as a Foreign Language ELT English Language Teaching e.g for example FTA face - threating act H Hearer, addressee P Polite S Speaker, addressor T Second – person singular pronoun (Latin: T.U) V Second – person plural honorific pronoun (Latin: VOS) iv LIST OF TABLES Table Feature of speech act types 12 Table 2: Frequencies of different positive politeness strategies 48 Table 3: Frequencies of different negative politeness strategies 56 Table 4: Frequencies of different off –record 62 Table 5: The total of different politeness strategies in the course books “Power Base” 67 v TABLE OF CONTENTS CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv LIST OF TABLES v TABLE OF CONTENTS vi Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the research 1.2 Aims of the research 1.3 Objectives of the research 1.4 Scope of the research 1.5 Significance of the research 1.6 Structural organization of the thesis Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Review of previous studies 2.2 Review of theoretical background 2.2.1 Theoretical framework 2.2.1.1 Theory of Speech Act 2.2.1.2 Cooperative Principle 12 2.2.2 Theoretical background 13 2.2.2.1 Positive politeness strategies in English 14 2.2.2.2 Negative politeness strategies in English 20 2.2.2.3 Off – record in English 26 2.2.2.4 Positive politeness strategies in Vietnamese ….……………… 32 2.2.2.5 Negative politeness strategies in Vietnamese ………………… 34 2.2.2.6 Off - record in Vietnamese …………………………………… 36 2.3 Summary 39 Chapter 3: METHODOLOGY 41 vi 3.1 Research – governing orientations 41 3.1.1 Research questions 41 3.1.2 Research setting ……………………………………………………41 3.1.3 Research approach 42 3.1.4 Principles for intended data collection and data analysis……….….42 3.2 Research methods 43 3.2.1 Major methods and supporting methods 43 3.2.2 Data collection techniques 44 3.2.3 Data analysis techniques 44 3.3 Summary 46 CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 47 4.1 Positive politeness strategies used in English conversations in the course books “Power base” 48 4.2 Negative politeness strategies used in English conversations in the course books “Power base” 56 4.3 Off - record used in English conversations in the course books “Power base” 62 4.4 The implications for teaching and learning the politeness strategies used in English conversations in the course books “Power Base” 67 4.5 Summary 68 Chapter 5: CONCLUSION 70 5.1 Recapitulation 70 5.2 Concluding remarks 71 5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for future research 73 5.3.1 Limitations 73 5.3.2 Suggestions for future research 73 REFERENCES 75 APPENDIX vii Chapter INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale of the research Learning a foreign language is a great significance today It is the bridge connecting in many fields The mastery of a foreign language enables us to communicate with people from other countries, achieve mutual understandings, and our further trade contacts, economic co - operations, and cultural and academic exchanges with other countries In everyday conversation, there are many ways to talk or to order about getting things we want, but it depends on different social situations For example, when we are with a group of friends, we can say to them, “Go get me that plate!” or “shut - up!” However, when we are surrounded by a group of adults at a formal function in which our parents are attending, we must say, “would you please pass me that plate, if you don’t mind?” and “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt, but I am not able to hear the speaker in the front of the room” Thus, we are obliged to adjust our use of language to fit the occasion It would seem socially unacceptable if you were to speak the same way to adults as you would to your friends There are many things to write about but I choose to study the different politeness strategies used in English conversations in the “Power Base” course books This is because of some reasons First of all, there are a lot of course books using politeness strategies in English conversations, but the Power Base course books, which make me feel really interested in researching that is firstly reasonable for my study On the other hand, although English has been taught in Vietnam for many years, only until recently, has emphasis been laid on form - based instruction, which means that students are mainly taught the phonological, grammatical, and lexical components of English They are not provided with enough cultural factors to ensure a successful cross - cultural communication Many Vietnamese teachers of English still appreciate pure linguistic competence in the achievement of successful communication rather than knowledge of social norms and values, roles and relations between individuals Therefore, learners not know what to say in order to have contextual, situational and cultural appropriateness in communication They focus on the learning of as much grammar and vocabulary as possible Consequently, they have a limited ability to communicate orally in an appropriate way, although they can read considerably well Learners have almost no chance to expose themselves to native speaking environment As a result, most Vietnamese learners tend to use English in accordance with the norms of the Vietnamese culture, and thus, causing negative - effects In order to communicate well across cultures, learners must be aware of the hidden parts of culture: values, beliefs, perceptions, communication style, and politeness strategies For all the above mentioned reasons, “A study on different politeness strategies used in English conversations in the “Power Base” course books” has been chosen for my graduation thesis It is hoped that the study will help Vietnamese EFL students have a better understanding of politeness strategies used in the conversation of Power Base course books and use them properly while communicating 1.2 Aims of the research This research is conducted to aim at pointing out the different Chapter CONCLUSION 5.1 Recapitulation In order to maintain conversations, the first thing is that people should notice is that they must adjust the politeness in their conversations to make sure it abides the Cooperative principle (George, 1996) This last chapter deals with the results of the discussion and analysis in the previous chapter constitutes the employment of the different politeness strategies in English conversation in “Power base” course books based on Brown and Levinson’s theory (1987) and some findings obtained from all the data analyzed The politeness strategies used in the conversational activities if the course books “Power Based” fall in to three main types: a) Positive politeness, which is mainly used to narrow the distance between S and H and enhance their solidarity Positive politeness strategies used are: - Avoiding disagreement - Offers, promises - Being optimistic - Both S and H included in the activity - Giving (or asking for) reasons b) Negative politeness, which is mainly used to create the distance 70 between S and H to show deference and formal air to H, thus freeing H from imposition Negative politeness is employed more in social situations that potentially cause FTAs Negative politeness strategies used are: - Questions, hedges - Giving deference - Apologizing c) Off – record, which is used when S wants to a FTA, but want to avoid the responsibility for doing it Off – record used in the conversational activities are: - Being vague - Being incomplete, using ellipsis The thesis also provides some exercises ad implications in order to help teachers of English and learners of English to teach and study politeness strategies more effectively to help people pay attentions to the culture while communication 5.2 Concluding remarks In order to complete the research thesis, there are three major objectives that have been achieved: i) Describing the features of positive politeness strategies used in English conversations in the course books “Power Base”; ii) Describing the features of negative politeness strategies used in English conversations in the course books “Power Base”; iii) Describing the features of off – record used in English conversations in the course books 71 “Power Base”; iv) Giving some possible implications for teaching and learning the politeness strategies used in English conversations in the Power Base course books Through the examples collected in the materials, we can see that students of English can use different ways to communicate politely such as they can use the positive politeness, negative politeness or off – record in order to make a successful conversation Moreover, when teaching English, especially business English teachers should explain to their students that to be successful in doing business, business people should use politeness strategies, politeness principle, such as positive politeness strategies: avoiding disagreement, offers/ promises, being optimistic, both S and H included in the activity, and other politeness strategies For Example, to avoid disagreement, they should avoid saying a blatant “no”, or when they ask their employees, their colleagues or their customers to something, they should use interrogatives with “can you something …?”, “could you…” or hedges such as: “I’m afraid …”, “I think …”, “I’m not sure …”, etc in order to show their specific purpose in a polite way In addition, English learners should know that in most English speaking countries, people are more in favor of using negative politeness For example, in order to show that he/she is reluctant to impinge on H with the use of hedges or by means of expressions, the S has used the structure “I’m sorry to disturb you, but …” or “I’m sorry to interrupt, but …” to make a successful conversation 72 5.3 Limitations and Suggestions for future research 5.3.1 Limitations While this work has provided some valuable insights of politeness strategies and some findings which are collected from the course books “Power Base” (designed by David Evans – introduced and noted by Thanh Hai and published by Transport and Communications Publishing House, 2003) After conducting this study, we discovered some limitations remained Firstly, the data did not have enough typical examples to use for analysis because they are only taken from the course books “Power Base” and some literature books Moreover, during the data analysis, we have found that some politeness strategies are used in business conversation Secondly, we only concentrate on researching the different politeness strategies in the course books “Power base”, in spite of having tried much, the author can not help making mistakes However, due to the scope of the study, the other problems would be taken consideration in another study Therefore, the author wishes to study more about the politeness strategies as well as the influence culture of language usage in order to avoid culture – shock and some mistakes while communicating 5.3.2 Suggestions for future research This study gives an analysis and classification of politeness strategies in the English conversational activities of the course book “Power Base” The author is fully conscious that the study would be of more academic value if it studied the politeness strategies in real – life conversations by native speakers 73 With the hope of helping English learners improve their English so that they can use it for further study, author of thesis would like to give some suggestions for anyone who cares about the politeness strategies in further research in the future: - An analysis of positive politeness Strategy in the American and Vietnamese films - The differences of politeness strategies used by male and female in communication - An investigation into Politeness strategies in interview questions - A study on politeness strategies in interview questions - A study on the politeness and impoliteness used in the courtroom 74 REFERENCES In English Austin, J L (1962) How to Do things with Words, CUP, London – Oxford New York Brown, G and Yule, G (1989) Discourse Analysis CUP Blum – Kulla, S (1987) Indirectness and Politeness in Requests it or Difference? Jounal of Pragmatics II – 1987 Brown P and Levinson, S (1987) Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage CUP Clark, H.H and Schunk, D H (1980) Politeness response to Polite Requests Lognition, Cottrill, L (1991) Face Politeness and Directness University of Can Berra Lakoff, R (1975) Language and Woman’s Place New York Harper and Row Leech, G (1983) Principle of Pragmatics Longman; London and New York Matsumoto, Y (1988) Re – examination of the Universality of Face: Politeness Phenomena in Japanese Journal of Pragmatic, 12 10 Piia Kuntsi (April 2012) Politeness and impoliteness strategies used by lawyers in the ‘dover trial’ - a case study English Language Pro Gradu -thesis English Department 75 11 Searle, J.R (1969) Speech Acts CUP, 1971 12 Smith, L.E (1981) Discourse across Cultures Strategies for World Englishes Aprentice Hall, 1987 13 Thomas, (1995) Meaning in Interaction; An Introduction to Pragmatics Longman USA – England 14 Yule, G (1996) Pragmatics OUP 15 Wright, A (1987) How to communicate Successfully CUP In Vietnamese 16 Nguyễn Quang, 1998 Một số phạm trù giao thoa văn hóa Việt – Mỹ hoạt động giao tiếp, Tập san ngoại ngữ 4/96 17 Nguyễn Quang, 1998 Trực tiếp gián tiếp dụng học giao thoa văn hóa Việt Mỹ, Tập san ngoại ngữ 4/98 18 Vũ Thanh Hương, 1999 Gián tiếp lịch lời cầu khẩn tiếng Việt Tạp chí Ngơn ngữ 1/99 English Materials for examples 19 Elementary Power base, designed by David Evans – introduced and noted by Thanh Hai and published by Transport and Communications Publishing House, 2003 20 Pre-intermediate Power base, designed by David Evans – introduced and noted by Thanh Hai and published by Transport and Communications Publishing House, 2003 76 Sources from Internet 21 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politeness_theory 22 http://grammar.about.com/od/pq/g/Politeness-Strategies.htm 23 http://awinlanguage.blogspot.com/2013/06/positive-politenessstrategies-brown.html 77 Appendix SUGGESTED SOME EXERCISES MAKING REQUEST Aim: To increase students’ awareness of the polite way to making requests Time: 20 minutes A.Rewrite these requests using one of the patterns below Examples: Sentence 1: Pass me that book => Can/could/would you pass me that book? Sentence 2: Don’t smoke in the classroom => Would you mind passing me that book? / Would you mind not smoking in the classroom? a Take this form to the office ……………………………………………………………………………… b Close the cupboard ……………………………………………………………………………… c Don’t leave the door open ……………………………………………………………………………… d Let me share your newspaper ……………………………………………………………………………… e Bring me a cup of tea ……………………………………………………………………………… f Lend me $50 ……………………………………………………………………………… B Work in pair and put the following request in order of politeness? Give me a cup of coffee, please A cup of coffee please I’d like some coffee Can you take me a cup of coffee? Could/ would you give me a cup of coffee? * After finishing work in pair, let’s translate them into Vietnamese and discuss factors that decide politeness in English and Vietnamese MATCHING Aim: To raise students’ awareness of the polite way of making and responding to requests Time: 20 minutes A Write formal and informal requests using verbs from column A and noun phrases from column B A B Pick up The video tapes Take off Your sunglasses Cut up The library books Take back Some milk Turn down The music Put away The onions The dishes The magazines B Match each request with a suitable response Would you mind getting me a cup a Here you are, sir of coffee? I’d like two pounds of rice, b Sure, no problem! please Could you turn off the light? c All right Excuse me Could you take your d OK, let me it feet off my chair? Would you pass the salt, please? e Sorry, I didn’t know it was bothering you Would you lend me a dollar? f Please Do you mind if I sit here? g Oh, I’m sorry I’ll go outside Would you mind not smocking h Alright Let me check my pocket here? I wonder if you could help me to i Let me see I make it about ten move this table? pass eight 10 Could you tell me the time, j Yes, here you are please? C Discuss in – groups for the answers of the following questions Do we make requests in the same way in Vietnamese? Which of the following requests is more polite? Why? a Pass me the salt, please b Would you mind passing me the salt? STIMULUS – RESPONSE IN SITUATION Aim: To increase awareness of the way of making, accepting or declining requests in an appropriate and polite way Time: 30 minutes A Work in pairs: Student A: You are staying at your friend’s house for the weekend At various times you make the requests below Choose the most appropriate way of asking from the expressions in the box Could you …? I don’t suppose you could … could you? Would you …? Do you think you could possibly …? … Could you? … Would you? Would you mind … ing …? Do you think you could …? Student B: Reply to each request in any way you like If you refuse, give a reason For examples: - I wish I could, but … - I doubt if I can because … - I’d like/ love to, but … A wants B to: Lend him his bike Bring him breakfast in bed Wake him up in the morning Pass him the newspaper Give him a spare front door key Lend him his best suit Switch on the water heater Put an extra blanket on his bed Give him a lift to the station 10 Land him his favorite car B Answering the following questions Do you think you are polite enough when using the above patterns for requests? Why? Why not? If you want to make polite requests in Vietnamese, what patterns are you going to use? INTERPRETER Aim: To develop the ability to speak, to interpret Time: 20 minutes Work in groups of One students acts as an interpreter, the second – and an Englishman, the third – a Vietnamese The English and Vietnamese students make requests and accept or decline them politely The interpreter has to interpret these requests into English and Vietnamese with politeness makers SUGGESTED ANSWER KEY MAKING REQUEST A – Could you take this form to the office – Would you take this form to the office? etc B Less polite: The salt, please Pass me the salt, please Can you pass me the salt? Could you pass me the salt? Would you pass me the salt? Most polite: I’d like you to pass me the salt MATCHING A Answers are varied - Pick up the magazines - Could you pick up the magazines - Would you mind picking up the magazines? ect B 1-b 2- a 3- c 4-e 5-j 6-h 7-f 8-g 9-d 10-i C No b is more polite B use imperative form STIMULUS – RESPONSE IN SITUATION A Answers are varied B Could you …? / would you …? / … Could you?/ … Would you?: are casual Would you mind … in …?/ Do you think you could …?: are fairly polite I don’t suppose you could …, could you?/ Do you think you could probably …?: are very careful and polite INTERPRETER Answers are varied For examples: Englishman: Hello, How can I help you, sir? Interpreter: Xin chào, tơi giúp cho ơng? Vietnamese: Cảm phiền anh lấy cho tơi chút đồ ăn đồ uống? Interpreter: World you mind bringing some foods and drinks for me please? Englishman: Of course, sir Just a moment, please Would you like chicken with some prawn and some beer, sir? Interpreter: thưa ơng Xin ơng chờ chút Ơng có muốn dùng gà với sốt chút bia khơng? Vietnamese: Tơi thực thích Phiền anh mang lên cho Interpreter: Oh… I’m really love it Please pass to me Englishman: My pleasure Please wait for a moment, sir Interpreter: Đó vinh hạnh tơi Xin ơng chờ giây lát Vietnamese: Cảm ơn anh nhiều Interpreter: Thank you so much ... described and analyzed All the conversations extracted from the ? ?Power Base? ?? course books are considered the fundamental data for the investigation relating the main politeness strategies used in English. .. records used in English conversations in ? ?Power base? ?? course book? - What are the implications for teaching and learning the politeness strategies used in English conversations in ? ?Power base? ?? course. .. positive politeness strategies used in English conversations in ? ?Power base? ?? course book? - What are negative politeness strategies used in English conversations in ? ?Power base? ?? course book? - What are