Linguistic Politeness—A Major Tool for Cross-cultural Requests

In an era of growing internationalization, requesting—a demand made by a requester asking a favor of another person (Nelson et al 2002) -- has played a vital role in cross-cultural interactions. Since making requests involves the speaker’s effort to get assistance from the hearer, it is intrinsically face-threatening (Brown and Levinson 1987). The use of politeness strategies then comes into play to soften the face threats. Moreover, since the notion of politeness is perceived differently across cultures (Blum-Kulka 1987), politeness strategies become helpful only when formulated in a socially and culturally appropriate way. This article explores linguistic politeness in requests based on politeness theories, linguistic politeness across cultures, shortcomings of universal politeness theories, studies of culture-specific politeness, and teaching linguistic politeness to EFL requesters

A Comparative study of Chinese and American address terms

In cross-cultural situations, choices of address terms often reflect cultural differences. Although a good number of studies have discussed address terms in mono-linguistic settings, literature directly related to cross-cultural address terms is scarce. The current study intends to investigate common forms of address terms in Chinese and American cultures. Two hypotheses are examined: 1) Differences between Americans and Chinese in their choices of address terms are governed by cultural norms such as politeness, as well as by contexts or styles, and 2) The Chinese students in the U.S., who are undergoing the process of assimilation and acculturation, tend to accommodate the American culture and be more like the Americans in their choices of address terms. Twenty-seven American and 24 Chinese subjects completed a 12-item survey. Data was analyzed by descriptive statistics and visual presentations and through the Kolmogorov-Smimov tests of population difference. The results indicate that while most American respondents tend to use either first name or no name in most informal settings or status conscious settings, Chinese respondents under the context in China would use more diversified choices. In addition, acculturation plays a role in Chinese respondents’ language change in terms of the choices of address terms. The relationship between age and the choice of address terms is also discussed

Tu/Vous absence in English: teaching compensatory politeness strategies for EFL-ESL learners with various backgrounds

The current MA thesis discusses the importance of teaching intercultural communicative competence in language classrooms with a special emphasis on address pronouns and the lack of tu/vous distinction in the English language. One of its main focuses is the compensatory politeness strategies for EFL and ESL learners with various backgrounds. The topic is important because English is used widely between people from different language backgrounds; thus, miscommunication can easily occur. There are four main target groups who would benefit from the current paper: Estonian students of French and vice versa; the French studying English and vice versa; and Estonians studying English whose first or dominant foreign language is something other than English, as well as Estonians and French communicating in English as a lingua franca. This thesis takes into consideration a number of theoretical and empirical studies on address pronouns, politeness theories, ICC and English as lingua franca. Additionally, fieldwork was carried out in France for the current study during two different time periods. The research done in the current thesis on address pronouns in French contributes to previous research done by other authors on the same topic regarding address pronouns in Estonian and Russian. The paper is divided into five main topics: Intercultural Communicative Competence vs. Intercultural Competence; Teaching Language and ICC; Politeness; The Usage of ‘tu/vous’ Among People from Different Cultural Backgrounds; and Dealing with the ‘Rigidity’ of Address Pronouns in English. All of these topics also include sub-topics

Journal of Applied Learning & Teaching (JALT): Special issue: International Perspectives and interactions in Education

Our special issue presents a plethora of perspectives and innovative practices in education contexts from across the world. Authors from Canada, USA, South America, Europe and China, argue their case on advancements in educational settings and discuss the value of knowledge. Articles published in this issue include papers presented at the International Conference on Education (EDU2019), organized by the Communication Institute of Greece 13-16/5/2019, in Athens, Greece

A Study of Refusal Strategies by American and International Students at an American University

Refusals are delicate speech acts for non-native speakers to negotiate because they require negative responses to an interlocutor\u27s invitation or request. In addition to cultural variation, variables such as gender and modes of communication (e.g., emails) add dimensions to the complexity when performing refusals. The main objective of this study is to investigate the difference in refusal strategies between American and international college students as well as gender variation. Using a written Discourse Completion Task, six situations were developed and grouped in two stimulus types eliciting refusals to an invitation and a request. Each stimulus type involved an email refusal to professors, friends, and a staff member of an academic department. The refusals of sixteen undergraduate American students and thirty-two international students were analyzed in terms of frequency, order, and content of semantic formulas. The results of this study suggest that when using email, all groups demonstrated preference for direct refusal. American females preferred expressions of gratitude and stating positive opinions, whereas American male provided reasons and alternatives. The international students used a greater variety of semantic formulas; however, they lacked positive opinions and providing alternatives. Additionally, the international students tended to use more regret than the American students. The international students (both male and female) also tended to use more specific excuses as compared to more general excuses used by the Americans

Trends in Usage-Based and Pragmatic Language Processing and Learning: A Bibliometric Analysis on Psycholinguistics and Second-Language Acquisition Studies

This chapter provides bibliometric analyses of novel trends in the research toward pragmatic aspects of language processing and learning in the studies of psycholinguistics and second-language acquisition. Growing interests in the relevant themes are shown with the analysis of the co-occurrence of keywords in a common literature and the bibliographic coupling between literatures. The emergence of novel experimental methodologies, including the application of neuroimaging and machine learning approaches to the psycholinguistic research, provides new opportunities of looking into the pragmatic aspects of language acquisition and invites new empirical research to validate the theories and extend the boundaries of second-language acquisition research in the real-world setting

A Study of Refusal Strategies by American and International Students at an American University

Refusals are delicate speech acts for non-native speakers to negotiate because they require negative responses to an interlocutor\u27s invitation or request. In addition to cultural variation, variables such as gender and modes of communication (e.g., emails) add dimensions to the complexity when performing refusals. The main objective of this study is to investigate the difference in refusal strategies between American and international college students as well as gender variation. Using a written Discourse Completion Task, six situations were developed and grouped in two stimulus types eliciting refusals to an invitation and a request. Each stimulus type involved an email refusal to professors, friends, and a staff member of an academic department. The refusals of sixteen undergraduate American students and thirty-two international students were analyzed in terms of frequency, order, and content of semantic formulas. The results of this study suggest that when using email, all groups demonstrated preference for direct refusal. American females preferred expressions of gratitude and stating positive opinions, whereas American male provided reasons and alternatives. The international students used a greater variety of semantic formulas; however, they lacked positive opinions and providing alternatives. Additionally, the international students tended to use more regret than the American students. The international students (both male and female) also tended to use more specific excuses as compared to more general excuses used by the Americans

The Successful Foreign Language Classroom: Affect, Empathy, and Engagement

This portfolio is the culmination of the author’s work in the Master of Second Language Teaching program at Utah State University. Throughout this collection the author shares her personal views and experiences from teaching secondary and postsecondary beginning Spanish courses, supporting her claims with existing research. The portfolio consists of three sections: (1) teaching perspectives, (2) research perspectives, and (3) annotated bibliographies. The objective of this work is to identify hindrances to the progress of foreign language teachers and learners, and best practices to stimulate their success. On the basis that language learning can promote cross-cultural understanding, these findings are valuable to educators and learners who seek to bridge cultural divides and unify their communities—one classroom at a time

Issues in Acquisitional Pragmatics

This paper aims at a comprehensive review of the growing body of research in L2 pragmatic acquisition, including both theoretical discussions and empirical studies to date. To this end, the paper deals with a number of issues which are grouped into four broad categories: the essential constituents of pragmatic competence, models of pragmatic development, major processes of pragmatic competence, and various factors affecting pragmatic development. Throughout the paper, it is shown that cultural knowledge is of central importance in pragmatic competence and that such knowledge can be acquired through language-mediated social interactions. Furthermore, a learner’s unconditional adoption of a new set of cultural beliefs and values is unrealistic due to the unresolved conflict between L2 norms of speaking and the learner’s needs and beliefs about the ways of being in the world. Given these perspectives, this paper points to the need for a holistic approach to L2 pragmatic development, taking into account both the intra-learner, psychological and the inter-learner, sociocultural aspects of learning. The paper concludes with the suggestion that L2 pragmatic competence be discussed in terms of intercultural competence involving the learner’s continuous identity and attitude formation, rather than the acquisition of prescribed behavioral rules of speaking