VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
NGUYỄN VÂN ANH
APOLOGY STRATEGIES IN ENGLISH BY
YOUNG VIETNAMESE EFL LEARNERS AND
YOUNG AMERICANS
(Chiến lược xin lỗi bằng tiếng Anh của người Việt học
tiếng Anh và người Mỹ)
M.A. MINOR THESIS
Field: English Linguistics
Code: 8220201.02
HANOI – 2021
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES
NGUYỄN VÂN ANH
APOLOGY STRATEGIES IN ENGLISH BY
YOUNG VIETNAMESE EFL LEARNERS AND
YOUNG AMERICANS
(Chiến lược xin lỗi bằng tiếng Anh của người Việt học
tiếng Anh và người Mỹ)
M.A. MINOR THESIS
Field: English Linguistics
Code: 8220201.02
Supervisor: Dr. Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa
HANOI – 2021
DECLARATION
I certify that the work in this dissertation has been carried out by me
to the best of my knowledge. No part of this thesis was previously
presented for another degree or diploma at this or any other institution.
Hanoi, November 2020
Signature
Nguyễn Vân Anh
i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First and foremost, I would like to express my deepest gratitude to
my supervisor – Dr. Hoang Thi Xuan Hoa. I am grateful to have been
accepted as your student in this MA coursework program. If it had not
been for your precious guidance and continuous motivation, I might not
accomplish this thesis.
I wholeheartedly appreciate and wish to thank all the American and
Vietnamese respondents for their willingness to complete the data in the
questionnaire, as long as attending the interview for the present study.
I from the bottom of my heart also would like to express my thanks
to my family and friends for their devoted encouragement without which I
would not be able to complete this study.
Hanoi, November 2020
Nguyễn Vân Anh
ii
ABSTRACT
The present study “Apology strategies in English by young
Vietnamese EFL learners and young Americans” investigates differences
in the use of apology strategies between young Vietnamese EFL Learners
and young American via a Discourse Completion Task questionnaire. The
questionnaire consists of fifteen situations with the contribution of forty
informants whose age range is from 22 to 30 years old. The exhaustive
frameworks of apology strategies proposed by Holmes (1990) and
Trosborg (1995) were the foundation for this study. Findings reveal little
disparity is seen between the two groups, as they used very similar apology
strategies in the same contexts. Among the strategies employed by the
informants, giving an expression of apology was highly preferred to use along
with other strategies. Furthermore, a further interview with the attendance
of three Vietnamese EFL learners and three Americans was conducted to
dig in interviewees‟ comments about the questionnaire. All interviewed
Americans agree that to be more genuine, when giving apology, the nonnative speakers should explain for their offence. The accomplishment of the
thesis is hoped to serve as a useful source of reference for researchers in
related fields, Vietnamese teachers and learners of English. It is cemented by
the important findings that incorporating culture into the teaching of English
is inevitable. The Vietnamese EFL learners, as a result, should be provided
with both linguistic and cultural input.
iii
LIST OF ABRREVIATIONS
A
Americans
Ack
An acknowledgement of responsibility
Apo
An offer of apology
Bla
Accepting the blame
Con
Concern for the hearer
DCT
Discourse Completion Task
Des.Apo
Recognizing hearer as deserving apology
Ex.Apo
Explicit expression of apology
Exp
An explanation or account
For
A request for forgiveness
Lac.Int
Expressing lack of intent
Pro
A promise of forbearance
Reg
An expression of regret
Rep
An offer of repair/redress
Sel-Def
Expressing self-deficiency
Sit
Situation
Str.
Strategy
V
Vietnamese EFL Learners
iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION ......................................................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ..................................................................................... ii
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................iii
LIST OF ABRREVIATIONS ................................................................................. iv
LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................viii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................... 1
1.1. Rationale ................................................................................................................. 1
1.2. Aims and Objectives ............................................................................................. 3
1.3. Research questions ................................................................................................. 3
1.4. Scope of the study .................................................................................................. 3
1.5. Significant of the study.......................................................................................... 3
1.6. Organisation of the thesis ...................................................................................... 4
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW .............................................................. 6
2.1. Speech acts ............................................................................................................. 6
2.1.1. Definition of speech acts .................................................................................... 7
2.1.2. Classification of speech acts .............................................................................. 7
2.2. Speech act of apology ............................................................................................ 9
2.2.1. Definition of apology ......................................................................................... 9
2.2.2. Apology strategies ............................................................................................ 10
2.2.3. Politeness ........................................................................................................... 13
2.3. Previous studies about of speech act of apology .............................................. 15
2.4. Summary ............................................................................................................... 17
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ........................................................................ 18
3.1. Methods of the study ........................................................................................... 18
v
3.2. Theoretical framework ........................................................................................ 18
3.3. Participants ........................................................................................................... 19
3.4. Instruments ........................................................................................................... 20
3.4.1. Discourse completion task (DCT) .................................................................. 20
3.4.2. Interview ............................................................................................................ 24
3.5. Data collection procedure ................................................................................... 25
3.6. Summary ............................................................................................................... 26
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ................................................. 27
4.1. Main strategies and sub-strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and
young Americans ........................................................................................................ 27
4.1.1. Main strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners ................................... 27
4.1.2. Main strategies by young Americans ............................................................. 28
4.1.3. Sub-strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and young
Americans ....................................................................................................... 29
4.2. Sub-strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and young Americans in
each situation ............................................................................................................... 31
4.2.1. Sub-strategies in situation 1 (Meeting) ........................................................... 31
4.2.2. Sub-strategies in situation 2 (Salary) .............................................................. 32
4.2.3 Sub-strategies in situation 3 (Zoo) ................................................................... 32
4.2.4. Sub-strategies in situation 4 (Flashcards) ....................................................... 33
4.2.5. Sub-strategies in situation 5 (Plagiarism) ....................................................... 34
4.2.6. Sub-strategies in situation 6 (Book) ................................................................ 35
4.2.7. Sub-strategies in situation 7 (Restaurant) ....................................................... 36
4.2.8. Sub-strategies in situation 8 (Curfew) ............................................................ 37
4.2.9. Sub-strategies in situation 9 (Stepping foot) .................................................. 38
4.2.10. Sub-strategies in situation 10 (Camera) ....................................................... 38
4.2.11. Sub-strategies in situation 11 (Birthday) ...................................................... 39
vi
4.2.12. Sub-strategies in situation 12 (Vase) ............................................................ 40
4.2.13. Sub-strategies in situation 13 (Wrong size) ................................................. 41
4.2.14. Sub-strategies in situation 14 (Shopping) .................................................... 42
4.2.15. Sub-strategies in situation 15 (Lipstick) ....................................................... 43
4.3. Main apology strategies and sub-strategies distribution across situations ..... 43
4.4. Answers of the interview across four questions ................................................ 50
4.5. Summary ............................................................................................................... 51
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION .............................................................................. 53
5.1. Recapitulation ...................................................................................................... 53
5.2. Concluding remarks ............................................................................................. 54
5.3. Implications of the study ..................................................................................... 54
5.4. Limitations of the study ....................................................................................... 55
5.5. Recommendations for Further Studies .............................................................. 56
REFERENCES ......................................................................................................... 57
APPENDICES .............................................................................................................. I
APPENDIX 1: QUESTIONNAIRE ......................................................................... I
APPENDIX 2: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS AND TRANSCRIPTS ............IV
APPENDIX 3: RAW DATA................................................................................. XIII
vii
LIST OF TABLES
Table 2.1: Apology strategies categorized by Fraser (1981) ................................... 11
Table 2.2: Apology strategies categorized by Olshtain and Cohen (1983) ............ 11
Table 2.3: Apology strategies categorized by Blum-Kulka, House and Kasper
(1989) ............................................................................................................................ 12
Table 2.4: Apology strategies categorized by Holmes (1990)................................. 12
Table 2.5: Apology strategies categorized by Trosborg (1995) .............................. 13
Table 3.1: Main strategies and sub-strategies ............................................................ 18
Table 3.2: Power and Distance in some situations.................................................... 24
Table 4.1: Main strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners ............................ 27
Table 4.2: Main strategies by young Americans....................................................... 28
Table 4.3: Main strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and young
Americans ..................................................................................................................... 28
Table 4.4: Sub-strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and young
Americans ..................................................................................................................... 30
Table 4.5: Sub-strategies in situation 1 (Meeting) .................................................... 31
Table 4.6: Sub-strategies in situation 2 (Salary)........................................................ 32
Table 4.7: Sub-strategies in situation 3 (Zoo) ........................................................... 32
Table 4.8: Sub-strategies in situation 4 (Flashcards) ................................................ 33
Table 4.9: Sub-strategies in situation 5 (Plagiarism) ................................................ 34
Table 4.10: Sub-strategies in situation 6 (Book) ....................................................... 35
Table 4.11: Sub-strategies in situation 7 (Restaurant) .............................................. 36
Table 4.12: Sub-strategies in situation 8 (Curfew) ................................................... 37
Table 4.13: Sub-strategies in situation 9 (Stepping foot) ......................................... 38
Table 4.14: Sub-strategies in situation 10 (Camera) ................................................. 38
Table 4.15: Sub-strategies in situation 11 (Birthday) ............................................... 39
viii
Table 4.16: Sub-strategies in situation 12 (Vase)...................................................... 40
Table 4.17: Sub-strategies in situation 13 (Wrong size)........................................... 41
Table 4.18: Sub-strategies in situation 14 (Shopping).............................................. 42
Table 4.19: Sub-strategies in situation 15 (Lipstick) ................................................ 43
Table 4.21: Strategy A: Explicit expression of apology across situations .............. 44
Table 4.22: Strategy B: Explanation or account across situations........................... 46
Table 4.23: Strategy C: Acknowledgement of responsibility across situations ..... 47
Table 4.24: Strategy D: Promise of forbearance across situations .......................... 48
Table 4.25: Strategy E: Concern for the hearer across situations ............................ 49
Table 4.20: Sub-strategies by young Vietnamese EFL Learners and young
Americans in 15 situations ....................................................................................... XIII
ix
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale
English is no doubt the international language which is used in almost
every country in the world. Since it has become undeniable important,
English learners have studied many aspects of that language to apply to a lot
of fields of life including communication. The globalization and development
of global economy has promoted the valuable opportunities for citizens
around the world to interculturally communicate. Although many Vietnamese
learners are assumed to be excellent at English grammar system, not many of
them are confident that they can communicate correctly and competently
when using English as a second language. The reason can be
“Communication across cultures is, by definition, problematic, for cultures
are systems of symbolic meanings shared by one group yet foreign to
another” (Geertz, 1973; Trice & Beyer, 1993)
Several years ago, the traditional methods were popular in teaching
English, which allow Vietnamese learners to learn and use grammar solely
when speaking or producing an utterance. The result was that even they could
make grammar-acceptable sentences, their speech seemed to be quite robotic.
Fortunately, recognizing the demand for communicative competence, there
has been a shift in the teaching and learning methods over the past decade.
Many more subjects have been added to the universities‟ curricula with the
aim of assisting the learners to better understand about the culture within the
language, as Hall (1959) said “Communication is culture. Culture is
communication”. However, there has still been a gap between theory and
practice, since Vietnamese learners still lack real experiences, which leads to
the confusion when interacting with the native speakers. Although having
1
learned the culture, having known the culture, they still find it difficult to
apply it in real life because they have the tendency to use the speaking rules
from their native speech community when communicating with members in
other speech community. They seem to speak English in Vietnamese culture
and also express their thoughts basing on their own culture when interacting
with foreigners. It has still been challenging to them to determine what to say,
where to say, and how to say most effectively in specific situations although
they may know the theories or the rules in phonology, syntax, and semantics
of English.
Realizing that the differences in sociolinguistic rules in society have
interfered ESL learners, and have even caused the communication
breakdown, there used to be some researchers who have expressed their
concern about this field in different speech acts such as thanking, refusing,
greeting, complimenting, or those alike. In Vietnam, some research workers
also did some investigations about speech acts by using traditional contrastive
method in Vietnamese and English in greeting (Nguyen Phuong Suu, 1990),
requesting (Do Thi Mai Khanh, 2000; Phan Thi Van Quyen, 2001), or
disagreeing (Kieu Thi Thu Huong, 2006). Apologizing, nevertheless, has been
under-researched even though it is one of the most-interested topics all over
the world. Previously, some research about apology conducted by Cohen,
Olshtain and Rosenstein (1985), García (1989), Trosborg (1987, 1995),
Bergman and Kasper (1993), Maeshiba, Yoshinaga, Kasper, & Ross (1996) or
Rose (2000) showed that when doing the apology, the research subjects have
been influenced by their mother tongue. Also, they use apology strategies
differently in comparison to the native speakers. It is obvious that there would
be variation in how the apologizing is carried out among different human
societies because it is a social act. For those reasons, apologizing need to be
more deeply-researched.
2
1.2. Aims and Objectives
The overall aim is to identify the differences and similarities in apology
strategies between young Vietnamese EFL learners and young Americans in
order to enhance pragmatic learning and teaching in the English language
classroom. To obtain the final aim, two objectives were set. The first objective in
the present study examines how young Americans apologize in certain
situations. Similarly, apology strategies by Vietnamese EFL learners are also
carefully investigated. The other objective attempts to determine how apology
strategies by these two groups differ.
1.3. Research questions
The study attempts to answer the following questions:
1. In certain contexts, what are the apology strategies used by young
Vietnamese EFL learners and young Americans?
2. What are the differences and similarities between young Vietnamese
EFL learners and young Americans in the way they use apology strategies?
1.4. Scope of the study
In this study, pragmatics and the speech act of theory are the two
main applied theoretical frameworks. Due to the time limit, every matter
of the interlanguage can impossible to be discussed, which means the
study will only focus on the language use in apology strategies of young
Vietnamese EFL learners and young Americans in 15 situations.
Moreover, the DCT will mainly concentrate on verbal communication in
the use of the speech act of apology by the speakers/wrongdoers.
Therefore, it is beyond the scope of this study that whether or not the
hearers accept the apology.
1.5. Significant of the study
Some previous research about speech acts of thanking, promising,
arguing, or convincing have been undertaken, which presented the results that
3
there are differences in strategies between native and non-native speakers. In
addition, speech acts conducted in different cultures also have shown
dissimilar results. Apology is considered a sensitive part but very popular in
daily life; however, it has been under researched in Vietnam. Therefore, an
investigation into apology strategies in English with two groups of
participants – young Vietnamese EFL learners and young Americans will
bridge the gap in the literature because other speech acts have been
investigated fully except this. With the hope of contributing to studies in
speech acts, the finding in this research will be a reference material for not
only teachers but also learners or textbook writers.
In addition, with the finding in this study, English language learners
may be able to improve their communicative competence and avoid the
communication breakdown more effectively.
1.6. Organisation of the thesis
The study is divided into four chapters as follows:
Chapter 1 is the introduction of the research including six sub-parts:
Rationale, Aims and Objectives, Research questions, Scope of the study,
Significant of the study, and Design of the study.
In Chapter 2, the review of literature is clearly demonstrated. In
details, relevant theories of the study about speech act theory, and some
recent research on apology strategies are reviewed.
Chapter 3 presents the method and procedures of the study. In this
chapter, the stages of the research progress including selection of methods,
theoretical framework, subjects, data collection instruments, and data
collection procedure are described. After that, the data analysis and
discusses are presented in Chapter 4.
4
In Chapter 4, the results are objectively and clearly discussed,
compared, and interpreted before leading to the conclusions.
Chapter 5 is the conclusion of the research including 5 sub-parts:
Recapitulation,
Concluding
remarks,
Implications
of
the
study,
Limitations, and Recommendations for Further Studies. A summary of the
development of the study and a brief re-statement of the findings are
demonstrated in the Recapitulation and Concluding remarks. Then, two
pedagogical implications are discussed. In the Limitation sub-part, some
so-called shortcomings and their suggested practical solutions are be
mentioned. A statement of unanswered questions that requires further
research beyond the limits of the study is shown in Recommendations for
Further Studies.
5
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
In this chapter, the theoretical background of the research will be
presented into three main parts. The first section will discuss the theory of
speech act and its categories. Some notions about speech acts of apology and
the way they are classified by different researchers will be discussed in
section 2, together with the relation between the act of apology and the
concept of politeness. The final part in this chapter will be about some
previous studies about of speech act of apology.
2.1. Speech acts
In his first theory, Leech (1983) categorized pragmatics into two types.
The first type is pragmalinguistic, which is major in studying pragmatic
strategies, routines, and a variety of linguistic forms to convey communicative
actions. The second one has a tendency to be about social perceptions
underlying participants‟ interpretation and performance of communicative
action, whose name is sociopragmatics. In other aspect, Cohen (1996) put
pragmatics into two distinct levels of abilities required for pragmatic
competence – sociocultural ability and sociolinguistic ability. The former
ability enables language users to choose speech act appropriate for the given
contexts; and with the later one, they can choose the actual language forms for
realizing the speech act.
Speech acts are one of the most vital branches in pragmatics, which
seem to have aroused a wide interest, and to have been deeply dug and
studied for a quite long time. Speech acts have often been a powerful tool in
various fields such as psychology, literature, anthropology, or philosophy. In
linguistics, speech acts are applicable in problems in syntax, semantics,
second language learning, and so on.
6
2.1.1. Definition of speech acts
Because speech acts are a branch in pragmatics, there are also as
numerous definitions as pragmatics, based on different researchers‟
approaches. Austin (1962), considered speech acts are acts performed by
utterances like giving orders or making promises. These speech acts,
considered the basic or minimal units of linguistic communication, are
performed in authentic situations of language use. Nunan (1999), when
talking about speech acts, suggested that when people communicate with
others by issuing utterances, they not only make prepositional statements
about objects, contents, and situations, but also fulfill social functions, such as
greeting, inviting, refusing, apologizing, complaining, through the use of a
string of fabricated words, namely speech acts.
2.1.2. Classification of speech acts
Owing to different approaches, each researcher had their own ways of
categorized types of speech acts. Austin (1962), in his early work, claimed
that a speech act consists of three related acts, namely (a) locutionary act, (b)
illocutionary act, and (c) perlocutionary act. The first act – (a) locutionary act,
is the basic act of utterance of producing a meaningful expression; or in
simpler explanations, it is the act of saying, or the speaker‟s utterance, or the
literal meaning of the utterance. For example, the context is a date between
speaker A and hearer B. Speaker A came late and said: “The traffic was
terrible.”. By arranging the structure of the words, speaker A created a
meaningful utterance with an affirmative form of the sentence. By making a
locutionary act, the speaker does have some purposes that are expressed in (b)
illocutionary act. Illocutionary act is an utterance with some kinds of function
in mind, like a statement, an explanation, an offer, or other communicative
purposes
(promising,
apologizing,
threatening,
7
predicting,
ordering,
requesting, and so on). If locutionary act is the act of saying, then
illocutionary act is the inside act of utterance. In the example above, the
underlying meaning of his utterance might be an apology or an explanation,
or both. However, the interpretation of the utterance by the hearer might not
be different from what the speaker wish, which leads to (c) perlocutionary act.
This kind of act, which is the last part of the speech act, according to Austin
(1962), is the influence of the utterance on the hearer, depending on specific
circumstances. With the example above, the reaction of hearer B to speaker
A‟s utterance might be forgiveness or accusation.
Searle (1969), unlike Austin (1962), divided speech acts into five types:
(1) Representatives, (2) Commisives, (3) Directives, (4) Declaratives and (5)
Expressives, which tend to be the purposes of the utterance. When speaker
uses (1) representatives, they have the tendency to state what they believe to
be the case or not such as asserting or describing. For instance, when saying
“She made a cake yesterday”, the speaker wants to inform the hearer of the
information. In type (2) commisives, the speaker commits himself/herself to
some future actions. For example, with the utterance “I will pick you up
tomorrow”, the speaker is promising. The next type is (3) directives, which is
used when the speaker tries to make some effort to have the hearer do
something. “How about going out tonight?”, for example, means the speaker
is using a suggestion. With type (4) declaratives, I personally tend to feel that
it is normally used when the speaker has more power than the hearer, or when
the speaker wants to declare something for themselves. For example, the
officiant in the wedding tells the groom and bride: “I now pronounce you
husband and wife”. The last type according to Searle (1969) is expressives. It
is used when the speaker expresses his attitudes and feelings about something,
like in the utterance “How beautiful the weather is!”, he is praising the
mildness of the weather.
8
Cohen (1996), relatively similar to Searle (1969), categorized 14
speech acts and grouped into five major categories: (1) Representatives
(including assertions, claims, and reports); (2) Directives (including
suggestions, requests, and commands; (3) Expressives (With the acts of
apology, complaint, and thanks; (4) Commisives (Including promises, threats
or offers). The last major category is (5) Declaratives which involve decrees
and declarations. While the names of these groups may vary in other
classifications given by different scholars, the names of the speech acts from
Cohen‟s taxonomy seem to have been more widely accepted.
Allan (1998) had two ways of classifying speech acts that are probably
likely to be the combination of Searle‟s (1969) and Leech‟s (1983) theories.
The first way was called “a lexical classification” which distinguishes among
speech acts according to the illocutionary verbs the speakers expresses. The
second way is based on the act the speaker expresses, such as requesting,
apologizing, promising, and so on. However, this kind of classification,
personally, is a bit too wide and unfocused.
2.2. Speech act of apology
According to Cohen‟s (1993) taxonomy, along with speech act of
complaint and thanks, speech act of apology is grouped in expressives, which
is used when the speaker desires to show his attitudes and feelings about
something. In almost all contexts where L2 is used, there may be a link
between culture and pragmatic competence in a second/foreign language. In
this case, the need of giving the apology from the speakers may vary from
cultures to cultures. Nevertheless, the deep finding about how different
cultures affect speakers in perceiving the need of apologizing will not be
discussed in this study.
2.2.1. Definition of apology
The term “apology” may vary due to the differences in various
scholars‟ approaches and cultures. It is also defined according to the functions
9
- Xem thêm -