VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST — GRADUATE STUDIES: NGUYÊN THỊ TÔ LOAN A CROSS-CULTURAL STUDY ON PRAGMATIC TRANSFER IN COMPLIMENT RESPONSES BY LEARNERS OF ENGLISII AT HUNG YUONG UNIVERSITY (Nghiên cứu giao văn hoá về chuyển di ngữ dựng học trong cách đáp lại lời khen của sinh viên học tiếng Anh ở trường Đại học Hùng Vương) NLA. Minor Thesis Field: English Linguistics Code: 60.15 TIANOT-— 2010 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOT UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST — GRADUATE STUDIES: NGUYEN TI] TO LOAN A CROSS-CULTURAL STUDY ON PRAGMATIC TRANSFER IN COMPLIMENT RESPONSES BY LEARNERS OF ENGLISII AT HUNG VUONG UNIVERSITY (Nghiên cứu giao văn hoá về chuyển di ngữ dụng học trong cách đáp lại lời khen của sinh viên học tiếng Anh ỏ' rường Đại hoc Ilang Vương) Eicld: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS Code: 60.15 Supervisor: BO THT MAL THANH, M.A HANOL 2010 TABLE OF CONTENTS Deckiration, Acknowledgemeutf. Table pf cuntenis. List of abbreviations.
List of tables, figures and appendices PART A: INTRODUCTOM. Background of the study Significance of the study. new DS Aim of the SENWY,. nhọn nhúng nga tarirrrrrie Www Scope of the stutly.
Design of the study aoe ố. on CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW. Pragmafics and speech act.2, Theories af politeness.3, Interlanguage pragmatics and communicative conipcfenee. The speech acts of compliment and responding to compliments 1.
The s0ecch aels 0Ÿ c0iipliilenEL. tot nh n0 net. Previous studizs of pragrmaiie transfer in responding to compliments, CHAPTER 2: THE STUDY 2.2, Instruments and procedures. scenes co sư 1 PART A: INTRODUCTION This initiat part outlines the research problem and background of the stuty as well as its scope und significanes.
More imporlanlly, the aims and objectives aro highlighted with two research questions to provide guidelines for the whole research. Background of the study In the Gulf war, two ladies, an American and a Kuwaiti, met, The American expressed her admiration of the Knwaiti’s necklace. and being polite, the Knwaiti lady responded to this admiration with a conmon response, “If is yours”. The American took this response literally and accepted the necklace as a gift.
She believed that the Kuwaiti lady was sincere in her offer and did not. understand thal this was only a customary response and should not be taken literally. What the Kuwaiti lady said was only a sign of politeness, generosity and hospitality. ‘The appropriate response would have been to say, “hank you”; not to take the jowelry, of course.
This misinterprtalion happened beamuse thess Indica belonged to ditferent cultures with difterent traditions, thus have different frames of reference, Communicating with speakers of other languages is a complex behavior that requires both linguistic and pragmatic competence. Whether we speak in a first or second language, we are influenced Ly sacio-cullural norms and constraints thal affect the way we communicate, In practice, many language leamers have experienced the loss of how to do in actual intercultural communication though they know perfectly well the phonological, morphological, syntactic rules, and the semantic meaning of every word and sentence. Looking back on the history of Engtish Icuching in Hung Vuong University (HVT), Phu Tho, Vietnam, teachers’ attention tends to focus on linguistic knowledge, while pragmatic information is not usually stressed. Therefore, most students here are good at reading and waiting with sufficient knowledge of English grammar and vocabulary and abls to score high in tests, but they fail in communicating with foreigners.
In these cases, the mistakes they commit are nol verbal or grammatical, instead, Uhese mistakes occur because certain social conventions or rules of inlcrpersoral retalionshig have been violated. These kinds of mistakes ave defined as pragmatic failure. Pragmatic failure may cause misunderstanding, and thus sels up bariers to successful cross-cultural communication. Some of the foreign vohinteer teachers at ITVU said to me that sometimes they might consider the way the students respond to compliments offtnding or bizarre, because they 10 the IIVUL, XE and NV groups (based on the number of CRs conlaininyg cach strategy in cach group) Appendices Appendix | Discourse Completion Tests (English version) I Appendix 2 Discourse Complslion Tests (Vietnamese: version) " 12 understood only the wards without the cultural rules that govern them ‘The problem hers is that HVU tearners of English do not produce targel-like compliment responses.
Henec, this study aims at finding out how HVU learners of English produce compliment responses in English and whether pragmatic transfer can occur My interest in the issue of responses to compliments derives mainly ftom my teaching and supervising oxpcricnees. Ta my knowledge, so fir, there has becn wa systematic tescarctt camed out on the pragmatic failures made by HVU students in the process of Enghsh learning and cross-cultural comumwnieation Tence, an elaborate study should be implemented in order to develop students’ pragmatic compstenec as well as teachers’ capability in cultivating students’ communicative competence. Significance of the study It is hoped that this study might be of theoretical and pedagogical importance Thoorclically, it might shed light on (he communicative slratogics imhorenl in compliment responses among HVU EFL learners. Most of previous studies focused their research on compliments and compliment-responses in general but rarely on EKL students’ complimenting behaviors.
What is more, this study mnight be included within the body of fileralure thal has shown the extension of research of progmatic competence and its relationship to foreign language learning and teaching. It might support the assumption that ignorance of cross-cultural differences might cause potential breakdown in communication. Suh research might enable teachers to show points of simitarily and difference io students in ordzr 19 use positive bul avoid negative transfer which might lead to pragmatic failure On the practical side, this study might provide practical insights into whether there is need for further podagagical training of keamers of English so that thoy may acquire pragrmatic compelence in resparuting to compliments in Engtish. 1 the Tesuils of the stady indicate such a need, learners might be given specific instructions to help them respond to compliments appropriately.
The findings of this study could be of great help in the teaching and learning of forcign languages in relation to culture, like teaching Victnamese to speakers of other languages or teaching English to Vietnamese at HVU as well as in developing a syllabus for courses. 12 understood only the wards without the cultural rules that govern them ‘The problem hers is that HVU tearners of English do not produce targel-like compliment responses. Henec, this study aims at finding out how HVU learners of English produce compliment responses in English and whether pragmatic transfer can occur My interest in the issue of responses to compliments derives mainly ftom my teaching and supervising oxpcricnees. Ta my knowledge, so fir, there has becn wa systematic tescarctt camed out on the pragmatic failures made by HVU students in the process of Enghsh learning and cross-cultural comumwnieation Tence, an elaborate study should be implemented in order to develop students’ pragmatic compstenec as well as teachers’ capability in cultivating students’ communicative competence.
Significance of the study It is hoped that this study might be of theoretical and pedagogical importance Thoorclically, it might shed light on (he communicative slratogics imhorenl in compliment responses among HVU EFL learners. Most of previous studies focused their research on compliments and compliment-responses in general but rarely on EKL students’ complimenting behaviors. What is more, this study mnight be included within the body of fileralure thal has shown the extension of research of progmatic competence and its relationship to foreign language learning and teaching. It might support the assumption that ignorance of cross-cultural differences might cause potential breakdown in communication.
Suh research might enable teachers to show points of simitarily and difference io students in ordzr 19 use positive bul avoid negative transfer which might lead to pragmatic failure On the practical side, this study might provide practical insights into whether there is need for further podagagical training of keamers of English so that thoy may acquire pragrmatic compelence in resparuting to compliments in Engtish. 1 the Tesuils of the stady indicate such a need, learners might be given specific instructions to help them respond to compliments appropriately. The findings of this study could be of great help in the teaching and learning of forcign languages in relation to culture, like teaching Victnamese to speakers of other languages or teaching English to Vietnamese at HVU as well as in developing a syllabus for courses. LIST OF TABLES, FIGURES AND APENDICES Tables Table 1.1 Compliment response strategies (Herbert, 1986) Table 1.2 Summary of interlanguage pragmatics studies of CRs Table 2.1 Compliment topic & content Table 3.1 Frequency of pragmatic strategies used in responding to compliments by all groups Table 3.2 Statistical comparison of frequency of CR strategy usc belween the 26 HVUE and NV groups (based on the number of students who used’did not use a specific CR strategy in each group) Table 3.3 Statistical comparison of frequency of CR stratogy usc helweon the 28 HVUE and NE groups (based on the number of students who used/did not use a specific CR strategy in each group) Figures Figure 1.1 Possible strategics for doing FTAs (Brown & Levinson, 1987) Figure 3.1 Frequency of use of CR strategies on the acceptance to denial continuum by the TVUR and NV groops (based on the muriber of students who used a specific CR strategy in each group) Figure 3.2 Frequency of use of CR strategies on the avoidance continuum by the TIVUR, and NV groups (based on the number af students who used a specific CR strategy in each group) Figue 33 Frequency of use of CR strategies on the acceptance 10 denial 29 continuum by ths JIVUL and NE groups (based on the number of students who used a specific CR strategy in cach group) Figure 3.4 Frequency of use of CR strategies on the avoidance continuum by 29 the ITVUE and NV groups (based ơn the number of students who used a specific CR strategy in cach group) Figure 3.5 Variation in the use of CR strategies on the acceptance to denial 31 continuum by ths TEVUT, NE and NV greups (based on the number of ORs containing cach strategy in cach group) Figue 3.6 Variation in the use of CR strategies on the avoidance continuum by 31 13 ‘To sum up, gaining knowledge of native Vietnamese and English speakers" response strategic ta complimenis may enhance onr abitily to communicate effect cultural setting without facing any communication breakdowns.
Aimsofthe study ‘The present research is an effort 1) to investigate what typical response strategies to compliments are used; and 2) to compare the response strategies to compliments as used by English native speakers (NF), Vietnamese nalive speakers (NV), and HVU Bnglish Ioarners (H'VUF) in terns of the frequency of use of the pragmatic strategies. The possibilities of pragmatic transfer affecting of the cross-cultural competency in the responses of IIVU LL leamers to baseline responses by English and Vietnamese natives are also zxarnined, Move specifically, the study is designed lo answer the following twa questions: 1. Are there any similarities and differences in strategy use of compliment responses among those groups? 2. Is there pragmatic transfer in the communicative act of responding to compliments in English by ITVUT leamets of English? If there is a transfer, what is transferred? The csscarch quastions are answered through the investigation of the following lwo assumptions \.
There are significant differences and sirnilailies in siralegy use in responding to compliments by HVU learners of Enghsh as a foreign language and NE and NV speakers. There is pragmatic transfer in the communicative act of responding to compliments in English by HVU learners of English.
