A study on politeness strategies manifested in advising in english and vietnamese
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1. Rationale
English has played a vital role in society and made considerable contribution to education,
culture, science and technology. The number of people learning English for various
purposes (such as for job, business, traveling…) is continually on the increase everyday.
Therefore different kinds of English teaching and learning materials are available over the
world, especially in Vietnam.
In our country, English has been regarded as the most important foreign language
nowadays, especially since the Vietnamese Government carried out the open door policy.
English has been taught for a long time in Vietnam. It becomes a compulsory subject in
most universities and schools throughout the country. However, the emphasis on
transmission of structural rules and forms often sever as the principal method of teaching
English in Vietnamese schools and universities. Most of Vietnamese teacher tends to focus
on teaching as much grammar and vocabulary as possible. In fact, this method cannot do
much help for students to assure a successful communication in daily life. The students
may get difficulty in achieving contextual, situational and cultural appropriateness in
communication. Therefore, the failure or the cultural breakdown might easily happen in
oral communication even though they learn English grammar well.
Thus, cultural knowledge is obviously an important key for Vietnamese students to
succeed in learning English because second language learning is second culture learning.
In order to acquire the second language, English, it is necessary to learn not only linguistic
knowledge and interaction skills but also knowledge of culture. When understanding the
cultural factors students may have chances to expose themselves to native speaking
environments. Normally Vietnamese students tend to employ English based on their native
culture and cause misinterpretation in oral communication. They are sometimes impolite,
unfriendly or even hostile by chance. Hence, to communicate well across culture students
must be aware of their own culture as well as the English culture, especially the hidden
part of culture including politeness and politeness strategies, which is really important part
in all social interaction.
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According to Wierzbicka in “A different cultures, different languages, different speech act”
cultural norms reflected in speech acts differs not only from one language to another. Like
the other speech acts, advising may be different from language to language, culture to
culture and community to community. It is our essential component in most aspects of
human life. Thanks to advising human beings seem to be closer, women look prettier,
children behave nicer, men are more perfect and home are more civilized. Together with
other speech activities, advising does a function of identifying a specific culture of people
and speech behavior in politeness, which makes the communication light, bright and
workable.
The author of this study aims to investigate and draw out the politeness strategies
manifested in advising in English and Vietnamese.
2. Aims of the study:
The aims of the study are:
* To draw out the important role of politeness in social communication, especially in cross
- cultural communication
* To study positive and negative politeness strategies manifested in advising in English
and Vietnamese.
* To put forward some suggestions for teaching advising situations
3. Scope of the study:
In all aspects of politeness, the study only deals with verbal aspects. Paralinguistic and non
- verbal factors are not discussed here.
This thesis focuses on positive and negative politeness strategies based on Brown and
Levinson’s theoretical framework (1987). Off record politeness strategies, politeness rules
and politeness principles are out of the scope of the thesis.
The paper is aimed to investigate the English – Vietnamese cross - cultural interaction on
speech act of advice. Its central focus is on which politeness strategy used in advice in both
languages English and Vietnamese. The data analysis is mainly taken in to account of
politeness based on what is collected from ten situations of case study in which the act of
advising occurs and three kind of relations: family relation, social relation, business
relation. The data were collected by conducting survey questionnaires by author herself. In
addition, the data from the interviews with informants is also utilized in the study.
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Examples for illustration are mostly taken from the data and reference is made when they
are taken from other sources.
A part from that, the study referred to positive sense of advice. It does not cover negative
senses such as irony, sarcasm, incitement and so on. With the limitation of thesis, the
response to advice is not regarded.
4. Research questions:
The study will focus on dealing with the following questions:
* How are politeness strategies manifested in advising in English and Vietnamese?
* How is the implication of politeness in advising related to the teaching of language?
5. Methods of the study
The major method that the author has employed is quantitative with due reference to
qualitative method as this study is mainly about the practical aspects of cross - cultural
communication. All the considerations and conclusions are mainly based on the data
analysis and references. Survey questionnaire comes from the daily personal observation.
The Vietnamese Northern dialect and English speakers at Vietnam are chosen for the
contrastive analysis. By “English speaker”, the author means the foreigners who mostly
come from Western countries and speak English as their first language. Approaches and
procedures employed to achieve the research goals are as follows:
* To establish a theoretical background, both home and foreign relevant publications are
critically reviewed and referred to
* To collect sufficient data, the informants are asked to tick in the appropriate space
* The investigation is resorted to in the investigation with the illustration of tables and
charts
* Consultation with supervisor, discussion with colleagues and personal observation are
also significant contribution to the study
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6. Design of the study:
The study is divided in to 3 parts:
Part A: Introduction (Includes: Rationale, Aims of the study, Scope of the study, Research
questions, Methods of the study and Design)
Part B: Development
Chapter 1: Theoretical Background
1.1. Cross – cultural communication
1.1.1. Communication & Communicative competence
1.1.2. Cross - cultural communication
1.2. Speech act
1.2.1. Definition of speech act
1.2.2. Classification of speech acts
1.3. Politeness
1.3.1. What is politeness?
1.3.2. Politeness strategies
1.3.2.1. Positive politeness strategies
1.3.2.2. Negative politeness strategies
1.4. On advice
1.4.1. Definition of advice
1.4.2 Advising as a speech act
1.4.3. Characteristics of advising
Chapter 2: Politeness in advising
2.1. The advising frequency in English and Vietnamese
2.1.1. The data analysis
2.1.2. English findings
2.1.3. Vietnamese findings in comparison and contrast to English
2.2. Politeness in advising
2.2.1. Politeness in advising as a need in English and Vietnamese interaction and cultures
2.2.2. Politeness in advising in English and Vietnamese
2.2.2.1. Data collection
2.2.2.2. Data analysis and findings
2.2.2.2.1. Politeness in advising as seen from informant parameters
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2.2.2.2.2. Positive politeness strategies manifested in English and Vietnamese
2.2.2.2.3. Negative politeness strategies manifested in English and Vietnamese
Chapter 3: Some applications of politeness in advising in English teaching and learning
3.1. Application of politeness advising in the teaching of speaking skill
3.2. Application of politeness advising in the teaching of writing skill
Part C: Conclusion
1. Summary of the major findings
2. Suggestions for further study
Part D: Bibliography
Appendix
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This chapter provides of the theoretical background of the thesis. It is also divided in to
four main sections. Section 1 discusses the concept of cross - cultural communication,
section 2 positive, negative politeness and section 3 focuses on the issues of the key notion
of Speech Act. Lastly, advice is discussed in section 4.
1.1. Cross – cultural communication
1.1.1. Communication and communication competence
Communication can be defined as “the exchange and negotiation of information between at
least two individuals through the use of verbal and non verbal symbols, oral and
written/visual modes, and production and comprehension processes” (Canale, 1983:4). It is
a form of social interaction and involves a high degree of unpredictability and creativity in
form and message.
Communication competence encompasses an underlying system of knowledge and skills.
The former refers to what one knows about the language and about other aspects of
communicative use; the latter refers to how well one can perform this knowledge in actual
communication. The theoretical framework for communicative competence proposed by
Canale includes four areas of knowledge and skills: Grammar competence, sociolinguistic
competence, discourse competence and strategic competence. In the Ethnography of
Communication, Saville-Troike provides a more elaborate component of communication,
which includes:
1.1.1.1. Linguistic knowledge
a. Verbal elements
b. Non verbal elements
c. Patterns of elements in particular speech events
d. Range of possible variants (in all elements and their organization)
e. Meaning of variants in particular situation
1.1.1.2 Interaction skills
f. Perception of salient features in communication situations
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g. Selection and interpretation of forms appropriate to specific situations, roles and
relationships (rules for the use of speech)
h. Norms of interaction and interpretation
i. Strategies for achieving goals
1.1.1.2 Cultural knowledge
j. Social structure
k. Values and attitudes
l. Cognitive maps/ scheme
m. Enculturation process (transmission of knowledge and skills)
(1982:25-26)
Communicative competence therefore involves not only the mastery of language codes but
also the rules of speaking, social cultural convention and ability to manage in
communicative situations. A good communicator is supposed to know when it is
appropriate to open a conversation and how, what subjects to choose for particular speech
events, which forms of address are to be used to whom, and in which situation and how
such speech acts as compliments, request, refusing, etc… are to be given, interpreted and
responded to. Factors determining their choice of language may include age, sex, social
status, goals of interaction and the setting in which communication occurs (Saville Troi,
1982). The nature and extent of this diversity also vary across cultures. This is the main
subject of discussion in the following section.
1.1.2. Cross - cultural communication
1.1.2.1. Definition of cross - cultural communication
So far, there has been no unified definition of culture. This word has several meanings, all
derived from its Latin source, which refers to the tilting of the soil. Hofstede (1991) noted
that in most Western languages, culture commonly means “civilization” or “refinement of
the mind”. In broader sense, culture is a catchword for all the thinking patterns, feeling and
acting, including the ordinary and menial things in life such as greeting, eating, showing
feeling and so on. Kramsch (1998) suggests defining culture by contrasting it with nature.
It is my view that favors the following definition:
“Culture is the systemic, rather arbitrary, more or less coherent, group invented and group
shared creed from the past that defines the shape of “reality”, and assigns the sense and
worth of things. It is modified by each generation and in response to adaptive pressure. It
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provides the code that tells people how to behave predictably and acceptably, the cipher
that allows them to derive meaning , from language and other symbols, the map that
supplies the behavioral options for satisfying human needs” (Seelyr,1997:23)
A part from that according to Kramsch cross - culture can be understood as “the meeting of
two cultures or languages across the political boundaries of nation states.” (Kramsch,
1998:81) This cross - cultural communication is the exchange and negotiation between
individuals who come from different cultural background.
Normally, people know how to behave appropriately within their own culture and society,
but when they move from country to country, this social etiquette changes. For instance it
is quite usual for Vietnamese people to greet each other by saying “where are you going?”.
Such utterance may be perceived as annoying curiosity by native English speakers because
for most Western cultures the individuals and personal privacy come first. For Asian
cultures, nevertheless the emphasis is on promoting group harmony. It should be noted that
for the purpose of the study Vietnamese examples in this thesis are translate literally, thus,
in some cases they may sound unnatural in English. The nature of difference will be made
clearer in the following part.
1.1.2.2. Individualism – collectivism in cross - cultural communication
In 1974, Hofstede conducted a large - scale study about the cultural values of people in
over 50 countries. Based on the result of this research Hofstede (1980, 1991) delineated the
two cultural values patterns, labeled individualism – collectivism. The data show that the
United States, Australia, Britain and Canada (English speaking countries) are highly
individualistic while East Asian countries are at the opposite pole, highly collectivistic
(1991:53). In Hofstede’s terms, individualism pertains to societies in which the ties
between individuals are loose; everyone is expected to look after him or herself and his or
her family. Collectivism as its opposite pertains
to societies in which people form birth inwards are integrated in to strong, cohesive in -
groups, which throughout people’s lifetime continue to protect them in exchange for
unquestioning loyalty (1991:51).
Generally, individualistic and collectivistic value tendencies can be felt in everyday family,
school and workplace interaction. The typical individualistic values are freedom, honesty,
social recognition, comfort, hedonism, personal equity and personal autonomy. Nguyen
Quang further states that individualistic cultures tend to promote the respect for personal
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privacy; therefore, avoidance of “trespassing on the other’s territory” is regarded as polite
behavior (2003:19). Whereas the top collectivistic values include harmony, face saving,
respect and conformity of parent’s wish. It is noticeable that in collectivistic culture the
power distance is large. Meanwhile for East Asian countries particularly China and
Vietnam these values are largely due to the Confucianism doctrine, which maintains that
the stability of society is based on unequal relationships between people.
The origin of individualism can be traced to various sources. Hofstede highlights the
correspondence between modernization and urbanization with individualism. Another
important influence stems from Adam Smith, which assumed that “the pursuit of self
interest by individuals through an invisible hand would lead to the maximal wealth of
nations.” This is a highly individualistic idea that can be found in most Western societies.
In conclusion, individualism – collectivism may be the most important dimension in cross-
cultural study. It is interesting to find that there is among correlation between the
dimensions of individualism – collectivism and the dimensions of negative politeness and
positive politeness, small power distance and large power distance, respectively. Therefore,
it can serve as guideline for investigating communication behavior of individuals from
unalike cultures. However, it should be stressed that not everyone in a collectivistic culture
is equally collectivistic in speaking, thinking and behaving, nor are all of the people in an
individualistic culture equally individualistic. In fact, we can find certain Vietnamese who
are assertive and direct in speaking style and behavior. Likewise, some European –
Americans and Canadians may be as collectivistic as the average Vietnamese or Chinese.
The truth of the matter should be studied dynamically in relation to the static.
1.2. Speech act
Speech act theory was first introduced by the philosopher Austin who originally (1960-52)
used the term speech act to refer to an utterance and was later studied by other theorist,
such as Hymens (1964), Searl (1969), Levinson (1983), Brown and Yule (1983)… Speech
act theory has led to the design of the notional - functional syllabus in English language
teaching and speech act analysis has offered a valuable way to look at language function
and the connection between function and grammatical forms.
1.2.1. Definition of speech act
Although many theorists have studied speech act theory, generally all of them share the
common theme that speech act are the actions that are involved when one says something.
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According to Searle (1964:24), language is part of theory of action, and speech act are
those verbal acts such as promising, threatening and requesting that one perform in
speaking.
George Yule (1996:47) defines that actions performed via utterance are generally speech
acts and in English, are commonly given more specific labels such as apology, complaint,
compliment, invitation, promise or request.
Indeed, when expressing themselves, people do not only produce utterance containing
grammatical structure and lexical factors but also perform actions through these utterances.
In saying “Shall I open the door for you ?” the speaker is making an offer or in saying
“Anh di dau day ?” right after greeting, the Vietnamese speaker does not want to know
where you are going, but rather, she is simply producing a greeting routine. In real life
conversations, these sentences have their uses quite independent from lexical and
grammatical forms. Richards (1985:104) points out: “Speech acts are acts in nature, not
sentences. There is no one utterance - one function limitation. A single utterance can have
more than one function. For example, the utterance “I’m thirsty” can be used to perform
the acts of statement and request.”
1.2.2. Classification of speech act
On any occasion, according to Austin the action performed by producing an utterance will
consists of three related acts: Locutionay act, illocutionary act and perlocutionary act.
* Locutionary act is the physical act of producing a well - formed and meaningful
utterance. For example, if we make a simple sentence like “I want to have a cup of coffee.”
We are likely to produce a locutionary act.
* Illocutionary act is the force or intention of the speaker or writer behind the words. Take
the pervious sentence as an example. We do not only simply say that sentence but also
intend to require the listener to bring us a cup of coffee. The illocutionary act is performed
via the communicative force of an utterance. We might utter to make a statement, an offer
and an explanations or for some other communicative purpose. This is generally known as
the illocutionary force.
* Perlocutionary act is the effect of the illocution on the hearer or the reader. It also
includes the change to state of mind, knowledge or attitude of the hearer or the reader. For
the sentence “I want to have a cup of coffee” we wish the act of bringing a cup of coffee to
be done or the perlocutionay force is performed.
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Related to the notion of illocutionary act is the concept of illocutionary point. It refers to
the point of purpose of illocution (Searle, 1990:351). Searle identifies five illocutionary
points namely declarations, representatives, expressive, directives and comissives.
- Declarations are those kinds of speech acts that change the world via their utterance.
E.g, Hanoi is the capital of Vietnam.
- Representatives are those kinds of speech acts that tell people how and what things are.
E.g. The Earth goes around the Sun.
- Expressive are those kinds of speech acts that express feelings and attitudes.
E.g. Please to meet you.
- Directives are those kinds of speech act that speaker use to get someone else to do
something.
E.g. Stand up, please!
- Commissives are those kinds of speech acts that speakers use to commit themselves to
some future action.
E.g. I promised not to tell you any more.
Another approach to distinguish types of speech act is based on the relationship between
the structure and functions. George Yule claims that speech acts can be divided in to direct
and indirect ones by combining three structures forms (declarative, interrogative,
imperative) and three general communicative functions (statement, question,
command/request).
+ In direct speech act, the speaker says what she/he means, and there is direct relationship
between a structure and function. E.g. “What time is it?”
+ In indirect speech act there is an indirect relationship between a structure and function. In
this type of speech act the speaker means more than what she/he simply says, i.e. the
speaker performs one illocution act implicitly by way of performing another illocutionary
act explicitly.
E.g. Instead of asking, “What time is it?”(A direct speech act), one could ask, “Could you
tell me the time?”(An indirect speech act)
In short, speech act is the act we perform in making a speech. The speech act theory helps
us interpret the function and operation of language.
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1.3. Politeness
1.3.1. What is politeness?
In general, politeness means showing consideration to others. A polite person is purposed
to make others feel good. Being linguistically politeness requires people to speak
appropriately according to the kind of relationship between them. Inappropriate language
use may be considered rude and may lead to communication breakdown. For example
using an imperative such as “stop complaining!” to a superior at work is likely to earn the
clerk a reprimand or being excessively polite to a friend can be considered as being ironic
or sarcastic. Obviously, politeness is a key element in cross-cultural studies.
The notion of politeness has been largely discussed. Lakoff sees politeness as “a system of
interpersonal relations designed to facilitate interaction by minimizing the potential for
conflict and confrontation inherent in all human interchange” (Eden 2001:2). This author
connected politeness with Grice’s Cooperative Principle (CP), which is based on the
assumption that people are cooperative and aim to be as informative as possible in
communication. Yule specially lists the characteristics of politeness, including “being
tactful, generous, modest and sympathetic toward others” (1997:60).
Leech (1983) defines it as “strategic conflict avoidance, which can be measured in terms of
the degree of effort put into the avoidance of a conflict situation, the establishment and the
maintenance of comity” (Watts, 2003:50). Brown and Levinson (1987) emphasize
politeness as strategies employed by a speaker to obtain a variety of objectives such as
promoting or maintaining harmonious relations. In interaction, there is a narrower type of
politeness at work, which serves as a crucial concept for people to conduct their
communicative behavior.
1.3.2. Politeness strategies
Linguists have stated different ways of expressing politeness strategies. Among them, the
most influential theory of politeness is put forward by Brown & Levinson. According to
Thomas the Brown and Levinson’s “has been extraordinarily influential and very widely
discussed” (1995:176). Although there might be some criticism, such as a few overlaps and
borderlines between positive and negative politeness, their theory can reliably serve as a
theoretical framework for cross - cultural research.
1.3.2.1. Positive politeness strategies
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Positive politeness shows the closeness, intimacy and rapport between the speaker and the
hearer. According to Brown and Levinson (1987:101), “positive politeness is redress
directed to the addressee’s positive face, his perennial desire that his wants (or the action,
acquisition, values resulting from them) should be thought of as desirable. In positive
politeness the sphere of redress is widened to the appreciation of other’s wants in general
or to the expression of similarity between egos and other’s wants”. In order to be polite the
S’s concern to the listener and hopes to satisfy the listener and hopes to satisfy the A’s
communicative need should be shown during a conversation.
1.3.2.2. Negative politeness strategies
Negative politeness in Brown & Levinson (1987:129) is “redressive action addressed to
the addressee’s negative face: his want to have his freedom of action unhindered and his
attention unimpeded”. Agreeing with Brown & on definition of negative
politeness, Nguyen Quang (2003) emphasizes, “Negative politeness is in any
communicative act which is appropriately intended to show that the speaker does not want
to impinge on the addressee’s privacy, thus enhancing the sense of distance between them.”
It is believed that there are eleven negative politeness strategies to avoid the FTAs.
In short, “negative politeness” involves the speaker and hearer’s independence. This is also
known as the “formal politeness strategy” which creates the distance between the speaker
and hearer. In most English speaking countries, people are more inclined to employ
negative politeness strategies. However, what politeness strategy is preferred by what
culture suggests a problem. In many Oriental Languages, including Vietnamese, negative
politeness is not always put in a high place. Vietnamese people tend to use positive
politeness to show concern to others and narrow the distance between the speaker and the
hearer. However, in reality there are some overlaps and borderlines between PPS and NPS,
i.e. people sometimes use both negative and positive politeness marker in one utterance as
in the following examples:
Kevin, could I possibly use your computer for a short while? (Group identity marker: Kevin
[Positive politeness] + conventionally indirect strategy [Negative strategy] )
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1.4. On advice
1.4.1. Definition of advice
This is a definition abstracted from the Oxford dictionary (1995): “Advice is the giving of
one’s opinion about what somebody else should do or how he/she should behave.”
According to Wierzbicka (1987:181), advice is an official speech act. It is regarded as one
of the essential communicative activities in order to show concerns and other psycho -
cultural aspects in social interaction.
Normally a piece of advice offered is not necessarily based on any general views and
principles it maybe purely personal. In an informal situation, for example, English people
say “If I were you, I would leave the country soon.”
The speaker seems to be implying and in fact, this is often what he actually says but in an
informal situation, he may say “Brantley, I advise you to leave the country soon, because
the white people are going to be destroyed.”
The fact that the phrase “I advise you” is seldom used in ordinary speech because it sounds
very stiff and formal.
1.4.2. Advising as a speech act
According to Wierzbicka (48,181), advice is known to have two sets of syntactic frames.
One, which is rather official verb, takes that - clause and is closely to inform, as well as to
advise.
The other can be performed by means of a bare imperative (“Hand it this way, he
advised”), and like ask, suggest and many other speech act verbs, refers to a possible future
action of the addressee. The speaker thinks that he knows what the addressee should do and
he says so, confident that it will be a good thing if the addressee follows the proposed
course of action. The speaker rather expects that the addressee will welcome his opinion.
Advice, in the later meaning, is an official speech act. It is the speaker’s responsibility to
convey the relevant information whereas in the former meaning of advice. It is assumed
that the addressee will act upon the information received.
1.4.3. Characteristics of advising
First, the attentive characteristic of advising is that the addresser often speaks with the
gentle miner and soft voice when giving advice. In Hoang Phe’s viewpoint when the
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adviser gives his opinion to the addressee about what he should do or what he should
behave, his saying would often gentle and soft.
Second, advising is often performed (in writing) by institutions addressing individuals. It is
also the characteristic of lawyers, agents and other professional people who need to convey
information to their clients and other members of the public, implying that they are acting
in the addressee’s interest. Their responsibility is to convey the relevant information upon
which the addressee will respond.
Despite the fact that advising may be different from language to language, culture-to-
culture and community to community, it is nevertheless our essential components in most
aspects of human life. Thanks to advising, human beings seem to be closer, woman looks
prettier, children behave nicer, and men are more perfect and home are more civilized.
Together with other speech activities, advising does a function of identifying a specific
culture of people and speech behavior in politeness, which makes the communication light,
bright and workable.
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We cannot deny that there are more and more centers that are advisory related to many
fields in our life. Actually, everyone wants to work better, live longer and behave nicer so
we need advice. Rich or poor, young or old, happy or unhappy each of us wish to be paid
attention. We want to be heard, to be listened and understood thoroughly. For example,
some people always achieve success in their work, earn a lot of money and get along with
colleagues at office as well as everyone outside their home but they do not live in a happy
atmosphere in their own home. It means that being husbands and fathers at home they try to
control their wives and children like a boss in their house. Their action and attitude will
make the children rebellious and leave home as soon as possible to get out of their father’s
iron hand. Therefore, in this case they need help to make home life happier. Another
example, a little girl was very sad because she got bad mark and their mother punished her.
We could lift her pain and made her happy by giving a piece of advice.
Through these examples, we see that it is necessary for us to give advice however; it is not
simple because giving a piece of advice is affected by many factors basing on each
particular situation. For instance, we are able to replace the standard imperative form in the
following sentence: “Let him do in his own way!” by “You should let him do in his own
way” or “I think it will be a good thing if you let him do in his own way” etc…
Actually, we cannot live without advice because we need advising and need giving advice.
The important thing is that everyone knows how to be nice when giving advice. We should
not say anything represents as a FTA (Face threatening face) because it is generally
expected that each person will attempt to respect the face wants of others. Look at the
following example (Kahn, M. in The TAO of Conversation):
Sally and Paul are addressing to go out with friends; Sally finishes dressing and turns to
Paul for comment.
Paul: I would be really embarrassed to be seen with you wearing all that make up.
Sally, in tears, cancels their plans on the spot. The evening is in ruins.
In fact, Paul expressed his feeling and did not care Sally’s thought. His utterance did not
follow the politeness strategies so it made Sally move to tears. He could choose the
following way to express his opinion on Sally:
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Paul: I love the dress so much and you really look graceful in it, but to tell you the truth I
really do not love the make up.
Sally: What is wrong with it?
Paul: There may be nothing with it, Sally. It is just a bit heavier than I like and it makes me
feel a bit uncomfortable. If you would not mind, I would be really grateful if you would tone
down a bit.
In the second utterance, Paul also tells the truth but in a better way of expressing. He has
done his best to honor his love and concern for Sally sacrificing his truth.
The necessity of politeness in conversation is illustrated in more detail in a very famous
novel “Chi Pheo” of Nam Cao:
!"#$%&'(")*+,-./0
1-23/4#5&
1#-"67689
13!"#:#323;<&
(… Strongly throwing five pence on the ground, he told him
- Get it and go away, then work for good or you just sponge upon others forever?
- I do not come here to ask for five pence.
Seeing that he was rude and able to make trouble he softens his voice.
- Well, take it. I have no more.
It is common that we do not only use language as an instrument to transfer ideas. If we
convey our ideas in a polite way when advising someone, we will get a nice response from
the hearer. The fact is that we are able to use imperative structure to give an advice to
somebody but with the soft voice and smooth manner, we will win the hearer.
2.1. The advising frequency in English and Vietnamese
As mentioned above, advice is very necessary in our life, however the frequency of giving
advice in English and Vietnamese depends on many factors, especially on culture.
In most Western countries, the independence and individualism are highly appreciated. All
members from grandparents, parents and children have freedom to do anything and make
their own decision in their life. Especially the life style of children in Western society is
different from one in Vietnam. When they are eighteen years old, they are encouraged to
leave the nest and begin an independent life. Further more, the old may seek their own
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friends rather than become too emotionally dependent on their children. In addition, with
less emphasis on tradition, on religion and on the economic dependence Western people
seem less likely to remain in marriage. In fact, any social or economic pressure in marriage
does not tie them down. Therefore, we can see that there are and more and more divorce
today. Actually, each generation becomes more independent in their life style. That is the
reason why their concern for each other is not so strong and giving advice is not as frequent
as they do when they are in the same house.
Their life style is not only reflected in family but also in the whole community. According
to Abraham and Mackey in “Contemporary American Society”, most Americans often
move from neighborhood to neighborhood, city to city and coast to coast. We rarely find
anyone who lives all his/her life in one community. They move so frequently that they do
not have chance to know their neighbors. He added that is the reason why Americans tend
to have a more casual attitude about friendship than others are. In this community, they
respect the other people’s freedom and independence so much so giving advice is not as
frequent as in other society.
In comparison with those societies there is no doubt that Vietnamese families are more
closely too united. In some families, there are four generations to live together. Parents take
care of the children carefully and keep an eye on their children’s action. They usually have
meals together and talk during meal so the relationship becomes closer.
Apart from that, Vietnamese often live in a certain community and get on well with their
neighbors. People in the same family regard it as their duty to help and advise other to
overcome trouble and make life better.
It cannot be denied that advising is heard more frequently in Vietnamese community
because of above characteristics. Besides this, friendliness, hospitability and superstition
included make them lazy to take part in conversations. Their concern for each other
increases the quantity of advising speech act when communicating casually or
intentionally.
In conclusion, in the Vietnamese culture which based on community life and economic
dependence the speech act of advising is of higher frequency than that of Western culture
in general.
The result of the data collection may help clarify this assumption.
2.1.1. The data analysis
19
The data taken from the survey questionnaire is used as the linguistic input. The survey
concentrates on whether giving advice or not on the suggested situations. There are fifteen
situations has been designed for family relation, social relation and business relation. Of
the 31 English speakers and 25 Vietnamese informants, 40 people have been selected for
the analysis (20 English speakers and 20 Vietnamese people). The former group are all
European – Canadians and Australians, speak English as their mother tongue. Most of them
are reporters and go on business at Vietnam News Agency – Tran Hung Dao Street – Hanoi.
The rest are tourists. I met these tourists at some famous places of Hanoi, such as West
Lake and Sword Lake etc…. Obviously, they know very little about Vietnam and have no
bias toward answering the survey questionnaire. The later group, the Vietnamese in the
North of Vietnam, is my colleagues at Panasonics Company and my students at Language
Link Centre. Since the survey questionnaire was administered in Vietnam by the author
herself, she was able to have face to face contact with the informants. It is the author’s
assumption that the status parameters of the informants may affect the way people
communicate, therefore informants from both groups were asked to provide information
about their:
* Nationality
* Age
* Gender
* Marital status
* Occupation
* Area where they spend most of their time
They are required to stick in one of the three columns if necessary or not to give someone
a piece of advice in the following situation:
Column 1: Highly necessary Column 2: Necessary Column 3: Unnecessary
The purpose is:
* To investigate the occurrence frequency of advising in Vietnamese and English
* To find out the similarities and differences in giving advice between Vietnamese and
English
2.1.2. English findings
Table 2.1.1The advising frequency in English
20
STT
Situations 1 2 3
I. Family relation
1 Your daughter wears a lot of jewelry when she goes out with her
boy friend.
5% 25%
70%
2 Your mother makes friend with a married man.
0% 20% 80%
3 Your brother phones his darling all night. 20%
20%
60%
4 Your father drinks a lot with his friends after work. 25%
25%
50%
5 Your father always asks your mother for money. 0% 25%
75%
II. Social relation
1 Your roommate does not care much about her study. 0% 10%
90%
2 Your neighbor has a party and makes noise all night. 20%
30%
50%
3 Your close friend loves a married man. 10%
20%
70%
4 Your girl friend wears a lot of make up while coming to class. 10%
40%
50%
5 A boy phone you every night and flirts you although you really
do not like.
10%
35%
55%
III. Business relation
1. Your manager likes hearing false flattery from his colleagues. 0% 20%
80%
2. Your assistant does not go to work on time. 10%
15%
75%
3. Your colleague wants to move to another office with high salary. 0% 10%
90%
4. One of your staff always make phone call for private purpose
during working hours.
10%
10%
80%
5. Your colleagues always make joke at someone’s behavior. 5% 0% 95%
As you can see in the table, English speakers do not want to poke their nose in to other’s
business, social relation as well as in their family. Most of them choose to tick in the third
column and the percentage of “highly necessary” column is the lowest.
2.1.2.1. In family relation:
Overall, a majority of the informants think that it is not necessary to give advice in family
relation. As in situation 1, only 5% of people ticked in the first column and 25% in the
second column. Meanwhile most of them (70%) agree that they should not give advice
when their daughter wears a lot of jewelry while going out with her boy friend. This
21
indicates that people generally respect their daughter’s freedom. The author assumes that
the only informant, who considers it highly necessary, may be just an exception.
In situation 2, 20% of the informants think it is necessary and 80% unnecessary. No one
considers it highly necessary to advise his or her mother when she makes friend with a
married man. When considering their background the author finds that half of them are
office staff and live in urban areas.
In situation 3, the number of people who ticked in highly necessary column is similar to the
number of people in necessary column (20%). However, a large number of them (60%)
thought that this is only their brother’s thing so they should not interfere.
We get the same feedback in situation 4 and 5. As we can see in the chart, most of
informants (50%, 70%) would not do anything if their father drank a lot with his friends
after work or asked their mother for money. It is interesting to note that some informants
provide extra information, saying that their fathers often drink after work and this happens
regularly. It does not matter for them.
From what has been presented so far we can roughly conclude that in the Western culture
in general people can act in their own way if it does not affect the others.
2.1.2.2. In social relation
It can be easily observed from the table that English speakers give the similar feedback for
5 situations in social relation. This reflects individualistic values, which emphasize the
importance of personal time, plan and freedom.
In situation 1, nobody (0%) expressed his/ her idea when his/ her roommate does not care
much about her study. This result perhaps makes many Vietnamese people surprised
because they think that Western people live together in the same room without having
influence on each other’s. Only two informants highly agreed that everybody should give
advice when their close friend loves a married man (situation 3), wears a lot of make up
while coming to class (situation 4) and a boy phone you every night. A large number (20%,
40% and 35%) shared the same idea. Meanwhile most of them (70%, 50% and 55%) give
their idea in the opposite way.
2.1.2.3. In business relation
It is noticeable that in situation 1 and 3 nobody shares their idea in the highly necessary
column. Some office staff informants said that they only concerned their work. Therefore,
the other things were out of their mind. In addition, they do not usually have any opinion
22
on their manager. This is the strong indication of individualism, which emphasize the
importance of privacy. The author observed that Western people in office do not spend
their time on talking idly whereas Vietnamese people often sit together and talk a lot in
their break time as well as in working hour.
An implication can be drawn from the data that a negative politeness orientation possibly
decides the case. This result proves deeply Yule’ assumption that negative politeness tends
to show deference, emphasize the importance of the other’s time or concern and even
include an apology for the imposition or interruption. In addition, “a person’s negative face
is needed to be independent to have freedom of action and not to be imposed on by others”
(Yule, 1996:61). Actually, the result in this table does not amaze us at all because
independence and individualism are valuable in Western society. They do not want to have
influence on the other people’s life. Not only in family and society relation but also in their
business relationship a remarkable number of people do not want to give advice in these
situations. Perhaps they concern their job more than other things of their manager or
colleagues. In conclusion, the frequency of advice in English is not as high as in
Vietnamese due to the society background and culture.
2.1.3. Vietnamese findings in comparison and contrast to English
Table 2.1.2:The advising frequency in Vietnamese
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The result in this table is different from one in the above table. The necessity of giving
advice focuses on family and social relation, especially in family relation. Higher
percentage in the third column expresses that it is not necessary to give advice in business
relation.
2.1.3.1. In family relation
In Vietnamese family, each member always keeps an eye on the others so we usually
express our opinion on other member’s action. It is not surprising to see that the vast
majority of opinions (60% in situation 2, 50% in situation 4) incline “highly necessary”
column and “necessary” column (50% in situation 2, 60% in situation 3, 50% in situation 4
and 5). Meanwhile a small number of informants considered that it was unnecessary for
them to give advice when their father drinks a lot with his friends after works and their
brother phones his darling all night or their father asked their mother for money. The author
observed that 70% of these informants live in urban area. Perhaps the life style in urban
area has already had influence on them. They are busy with many things all day so they do
not spend much time to concern each other.
2.1.3.2. In social relation
In these situations, there are some differences between English and Vietnamese people.
The Vietnamese proportions of “highly necessary” and “necessary” column are higher than
English ones (50% vs. 10% in situation 3, respectively). The most noticeable is the
appearance of 20% “highly necessary” column in situation 1 in the Vietnamese data while
there is no such a single case in the English. Apart from that, the number of people ticked
in column 1 and 2 are nearly the same. This tendency is opposite to result in table 1.
24
2.1.3.3. In business relation
It cannot be denied that the difference between English table and Vietnamese one is
expressed the most clearly in business relation. While English speaker seem to ignore many
things not related to their work Vietnamese people often keep an eye on their colleagues as
well as their manager. Therefore, the first column takes account for a quite high proportion
(40% in situation and situation 5). The reason for this difference is derived from the two
major sources as mentioned in the above part. The author finds that the Vietnamese
informants with “highly necessary” column are mostly women, who generally spend much
time on the other people’s things at office.
In brief, family and social relation plays an important role in Vietnamese people’s life so
they have tendency to concern each other. The figure 65% in column 1 and 65%, 55%, and
50% in column 2 for situation 1 in family relation and situation 3 in social relations have
approved this assumption. In contrast, we find the lower number in these columns of chart.
In their opinion, the freedom and independence in one’s life is the most important thing.
Actually, the closeness makes the Vietnamese give advice more frequently than the English
does. The feedback mostly are in column 1 and 2 has shown that the positive politeness
makes them concern the other people.
2.2. Politeness in advising
2.2.1. Politeness in advising as a need in English and Vietnamese interaction and cultures
People live in a community and have relationship with each other. However, this
relationship is very complicated and sometimes makes us confused. Now and then, we do
not know how to say richly, how to behave moderately and reasonably. At these moments,
we need advice. A great number of books have been written to advise people to live better
and to act nicer. Thousands of folk songs and proverbs are born to teach or to remind
human beings of what is right, good or beautiful in life. We are very lucky and wonderful
to live with available advice.
However the problem is how – where – when and what we give advice. It will be
unreasonable of us to advise a Western couple to choose a nice day in a good month to
celebrate their wedding. We also get negative feedback if we advice someone to let their
grandparents and parents live in the same house to help each other. In contrast, these
advices are very necessary in Eastern culture in general and in Vietnamese culture in
particular.
25
As mentioned above the speech act of advising depends on the social cultural background
in which politeness is an important factor. While giving advice we try to anticipate
problems, which the hearer may make sense of what we say and avoid exposing the
hearer’s weakness.
The result of the data collection may help clarify this assumption.
2.2.2. Politeness in advising in English and Vietnamese
2.2.2.1. Data collection
This survey was done with the participation of 20 English speakers and Vietnamese ones.
There are ten situations designed in the form of multiple choice, three answers for each
situations. 20 Vietnamese informants and 20 English are asked to choose the right one,
which they think the most suitable in their opinion. The result of this survey is expressed in
the following table.
The table 2.2.1 The frequency of using politeness strategies
The frequency of using politeness strategies
Vietnamese English
Positive
politeness
strategies
Negative
politeness
strategies
Positive
politeness
strategies
Negative
politeness
strategies
Strategy
Situation
sum % Sum % Sum % Sum %
Situation 1 17 85 3 15 6 30 14 70
Situation 2 16 80 4 29 8 40 12 60
Situation 3 18 90 2 10 8 40 12 60
Situation 4 16 80 4 20 17 85 3 15
Situation 5 20 100 0 0 20 100 0 0
Situation 6 0 0 20 100 0 0 0 100
Situation 7 0 0 20 100 0 0 20 100
Situation 8 17 85 3 15 6 30 14 70
Situation 9 17 85 3 15 8 40 12 60
Situation 10 17 85 3 15 10 50 10 50
