Politeness in contemporary Chinese: a postmodernist analysis of generational variation in the use of compliments and compliment responses

There is some evidence from scholarship that politeness norms in China are diversified. I maintain that a study aiming to provide systematic evidence of this would require an approach to politeness phenomena that is able to address such diversity. Drawing upon the insights of recent scholarship on the distinction between the modernist and postmodernist approaches to politeness, I survey relevant literature. I show that many current works on politeness argue that the modernist approach (Lakoff 1973/1975, Brown and Levinson 1987[1978], Leech 1983) generally tends to assume that society is relatively homogeneous with regard to politeness norms. By contrast, I demonstrate that the postmodernist approach to politeness (e.g. Eelen 2001, Mills 2003, Watts 2003) foregrounds the heterogeneity of society and the rich variability of politeness norms within a given culture. I argue that, by using a postmodernist approach to politeness, it is possible to show evidence of differences between groups of the Chinese in their politeness behaviour and the informing norms of politeness. I then explore this issue in depth by focusing on compliments and compliment responses (CRs). I show that studies on these speech acts in Chinese have to date tended to adopt a modernist approach to politeness and often assume a compliment and a CR to be easily identifiable. Moreover, I show that they do not address the heterogeneity of Chinese society and generally assume interactants to be homogeneous in terms of politeness norms that inform compliment and CR behaviours. On this basis, I raise the questions as to whether, by adopting a postmodernist rather than modernist approach, there is empirical evidence that politeness norms informing compliments and CRs vary among the Chinese, and whether these norms correlate with generation. v To this end, by audio-recording both spontaneous naturally occurring conversations and follow-up interviews, I construct a corpus of compliments and CRs generated by two generations of the Chinese brought up before and after the launch of China’s reform. Quantitative and qualitative analyses of these data show that there is variation in compliment and CR behaviours in Chinese and the informing politeness norms. Furthermore, the result shows that this variation is correlated with generation. I then show how, by using a research methodology which emphasizes the interactants’ perceptions obtained through follow-up interviews, my study brings to light problems with previous studies on compliments and CRs which hitherto are not addressed. By showing evidence that compliments and CRs are not as easy to identify as many previous researchers have indicated. I argue that my emic approach to data analysis provides a useful perspective on the complexity of intention in studies on speech acts and perhaps beyond. My study, therefore, makes an interesting contribution to the debate over this notion central to politeness research. Moreover, I argue my methodology which is able to categorize and analyze data according to participants’ self-reported perceptions allows me to draw out differences in the two generations’ compliment and CR behaviours and the informing politeness norms

Asymmetric Total Synthesis of Nannocystin A

Nannocystin A is a novel 21-membered macrolactone isolated from myxobacterium <i>Nanocystis</i> sp. It is a potent elongation factor 1 inhibitor and inhibits cancer cell line growth at nanomolar concentrations. In this work, a concise asymmetric total synthesis of nannocystin A has been developed, which features Sharpless epoxidation, Stille coupling, and final macrolactamization

Construction of Polycyclic Indole Derivatives via Multiple Aryne Reactions with Azaheptafulvenes

An efficient [8 + 2]/aryl–ene tandem reaction between azaheptafulvenes and arynes has been developed, leading to the formation of cyclohepta­[<i>b</i>]­indoles in a single step with good yield. In addition, employment of excess arynes provides a [8 + 2]/aryl–ene /[6 + 2] tandem reaction to synthesize polycyclic oxacyclohepta­[<i>b</i>]­indoles. This is the first time that azaheptafulvenes have been employed in tandem reactions with arynes

Neuraminidase Resistant Sialosides for the Detection of Influenza Viruses

We report the synthesis of influenza virus neuraminidase (NA) resistant sialosides that include different glycoside linkages (<i>C</i>-, <i>S</i>-, and triazole). These unnatural sialosides were printed onto glass slides to generate a small focused microarray. We evaluated the binding affinity of multiple lectins and compared the stability of these sialosides with <i>O</i>-linked sialosides toward influenza virus neuraminidase and intact virus. We demonstrated the ability of these molecules to capture eight different strains of influenza virus at ambient temperature without the addition of NA inhibitors. The glycans capture extremely low, clinically relevant concentrations of viruses and each strain gives rise to a specific “fingerprint” binding pattern, which could potentially be used in rapid diagnostic tests

Robustness test (First-tier city omitted).

Moderate rising of house prices are beneficial to the economic development. However, over high house prices worsen the economic distortions and thus hinder the development of the real economy. We use the stochastic frontier models to calculate the fundamental value in the housing in Chinese large and medium cities, and then obtain indexes which could measure the house prices’ deviations from the fundamental value. With the macroeconomic data in the city-level, this paper empirically investigates the effects of the house prices’ deviations on macro-economic variables like consumption, investment and output. The study reveals that the housing bubble exists in most Chinese cities, and first-tier cities fare the worst. House prices over the fundamental value, which could increase the scale of real estate investment, bring adverse impacts on GDP, as it causes declining civilian consumption and discourages real economy’s investment and production. The encouragement and the discouragement on macroeconomy caused by house prices’ deviation from its basic value take turns to play a key role in the process of China’ eco-nomic growth. In the early stage of China’s economic growth, the encouragement effect predominates. As urbanization and industrialization gradually upgrade to a higher level, the discouragement effect takes charge.</div

Effects of house price’ deviation from the fundamental price on investment and consumption.

Effects of house price’ deviation from the fundamental price on investment and consumption.</p

Impacts of housing price’s deviation from the basic price on investment and consumption.

Impacts of housing price’s deviation from the basic price on investment and consumption.</p

Effects of house prices’ deviation from the fundamental prices on output.

Effects of house prices’ deviation from the fundamental prices on output.</p

Descriptive statistics.

Moderate rising of house prices are beneficial to the economic development. However, over high house prices worsen the economic distortions and thus hinder the development of the real economy. We use the stochastic frontier models to calculate the fundamental value in the housing in Chinese large and medium cities, and then obtain indexes which could measure the house prices’ deviations from the fundamental value. With the macroeconomic data in the city-level, this paper empirically investigates the effects of the house prices’ deviations on macro-economic variables like consumption, investment and output. The study reveals that the housing bubble exists in most Chinese cities, and first-tier cities fare the worst. House prices over the fundamental value, which could increase the scale of real estate investment, bring adverse impacts on GDP, as it causes declining civilian consumption and discourages real economy’s investment and production. The encouragement and the discouragement on macroeconomy caused by house prices’ deviation from its basic value take turns to play a key role in the process of China’ eco-nomic growth. In the early stage of China’s economic growth, the encouragement effect predominates. As urbanization and industrialization gradually upgrade to a higher level, the discouragement effect takes charge.</div

Endogeneity test.

Moderate rising of house prices are beneficial to the economic development. However, over high house prices worsen the economic distortions and thus hinder the development of the real economy. We use the stochastic frontier models to calculate the fundamental value in the housing in Chinese large and medium cities, and then obtain indexes which could measure the house prices’ deviations from the fundamental value. With the macroeconomic data in the city-level, this paper empirically investigates the effects of the house prices’ deviations on macro-economic variables like consumption, investment and output. The study reveals that the housing bubble exists in most Chinese cities, and first-tier cities fare the worst. House prices over the fundamental value, which could increase the scale of real estate investment, bring adverse impacts on GDP, as it causes declining civilian consumption and discourages real economy’s investment and production. The encouragement and the discouragement on macroeconomy caused by house prices’ deviation from its basic value take turns to play a key role in the process of China’ eco-nomic growth. In the early stage of China’s economic growth, the encouragement effect predominates. As urbanization and industrialization gradually upgrade to a higher level, the discouragement effect takes charge.</div