Pragmatic transfer in interlanguage requesting by vietnamese learners of english

Chapter I: Introduction
I.1. Rationale for the study
With the advent of today's global economic system, we observe an increasing degree of
communication across different cultures between people of different languages. In order to be
successful in communication, it is essential for second language learners to know not just
grammar and text organization but also pragmatic aspects of the target language (Bachman
1990)1. ‘Pragmatic competence’ can be specifically defined as “knowledge of communicative
action and how to carry it out, and the ability to use language appropriately according to
context” (Kasper 1997).
The study of the learner language has been a growing source of concern in pragmatics in
recent years. The pragmatic perspective toward the learner language led to the birth of a new
interdiscipline, interlanguage pragmatics (ILP). ILP studies are concerned with language
learners’ performance and acquisition of pragmatic competence in their second language. The
influence of language learners’ linguistic and cultural background on their performance of
linguistic action in a second language has been a focal concern in ILP. Among non-structural
factors interacting with pragmatic transfer is second language proficiency, which has been
found to constrain pragmatic transfer in requesting (Blum-Kulka, 1982).
A number of ILP studies, both cross-sectional and longitudinal, regarding the use of pragmatic
realization patterns and strategies have been conducted on a number of languages such as
English, Hebrew, Spanish, French, German, Danish, Arabic, Portuguese, Korean, etc.
Informants examined ranged from the English learners of Hebrew as TL (Blum-Kulka, 1982;
1983; Olshtain, 1983), the German learners of English (House & Kasper, 1987; House, 1988;
DeCapua, 1989), the Danish learners of English (House & Kasper, 1987; Trosborg, 1987;
Faerch & Kasper, 1989), the Japanese learners of English as TL (Takahashi & Dufon, 1989;
Beebe et al, 1990), the Hebrew (Cohen & Olshtain, 1981), the Russian (Olshtain, 1983), the
German (House, 1988), the Spanish (Scarcella, 1983), the Venezuelan (Garcia, 1989), and the
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Japanese (Beebe et al, 1990; Takahashi & Beebe, 1993), and the Thai learners of ESL
(Bergman & Kasper, 1993). Up till now, the following speech acts have been investigated
cross-linguistically: request (Blum-Kulka, 1982; 1983; House & Kasper, 1987; Faerch &
Kasper, 1989; Takahashi & Dufon, 1989), complaint (DeCapua, 1989), and apology (Cohen &

Olshtain, 1981; Olshtain, 1983; Trosborg, 1987; House, 1988; Garcia, 1989; Beebe et al,
1990; Bergman & Kasper, 1993), refusal (Beebe et al, 1990), and correction (Takahashi &
Beebe, 1993).
Besides, some other non-linguistic factors, such as discourse accent (Scarcella, 1983) and
politeness orientation and styles (Takahashi & Beebe, 1993) were also investigated. Studies of
speech act realization have at least highlighted ILP research in five ways (Liu, 2002): first,
these reports suggested that even quite proficient learners tended to have less control over the
conventions of forms and means used by native speakers in the performance of linguistic
action; second, there were differences between learners’ and native speakers’ sociopragmatic
perceptions of comparable speech events that were systematically related to differences in
their speech act performance; third, pragmatic transfer at the pragmalinguistic and
sociopragmatic levels persisted at higher levels of proficiency; fourth, learners produced more
speech than native speakers did when the task was less demanding on their control skills; fifth,
researchers should pay close attention to the constraints of different data collection
instruments on learners’ performance (Kasper & Blum-Kulka, 1993:63).
There have been studies on similarities and differences in the realization of speech acts by
Vietnamese speakers and English speakers.
Nevertheless, pragmatic transfer, which has been a focal concern in interlanguage pragmatics,
has not been investigated in studies on Vietnamese learners of English.
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Requests, along with the speech acts of apology and refusal, have received substantial
attention in second language acquisition research (Ellis, 1994). Tam (1998) has investigated
how the form of requests made by native Australian speakers differs from that by Vietnamese
learners of English with respect to the use of strategies, internal modifications, and external
modifications, and how these forms vary in relation to the variables of Power, Distance and
Ranking of imposition. She found that Vietnamese learners were limited in modifying their
requests syntactically and lexically as well as internally. While, the choices of request strategy
by the Australian speakers and Vietnamese speakers were similar in some situations,
differences that were also found suggested that the Vietnamese speakers lack the pragmatic
knowledge of the appropriate strategy. However, the study still did not include data for L1

Vietnamese to provide confirmation of pragmatic transfer and did not look at the performance
of learners at different levels.
Addressing differences between English and Vietnamese in request perception and production,
this study will deal with pragmatic transfer of requesting by Vietnamese learners of English.
With the aim of finding useful information on the development of pragmalinguistic
competence, we pay attention to language proficiency effects on Vietnamese learners’
performance of request in English. Specifically, we are going to examine whether English
language proficiency affects Vietnamese learners’ pragmatic transfer in requesting. Besides,
the influence of gender on Vietnamese learners’ pragmatic transfer in requesting is also going
to be investigated for the first time.
I.2. Aims of the study
The study aims to find out:
- the influence of contextual factors on pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English in
the realization of request
- the influence of English proficiency of Vietnamese learners on their pragmatic transfer
from Vietnamese to English in the realization of request
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- the influence of Vietnamese learners’ gender on their pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese
to English in the realization of request
I.3. Scope of the study
The study is limited to the investigation of requesting and request realization in ten situations.
The survey does not cover paralinguistic and nonverbal aspects although their importance in
communication is undeniable. The informants of the survey include 21 native English
speakers and 48 Vietnamese learners of English (28 intermediate learners and 20 advanced
ones, 30 female learners and 18 male ones). All the native English speakers are working in
Vietnam.
The informants are not varied and numerous enough for the author to come to ‘fixed’
conclusions. However, the study is expected to point out the influence of contextual factors,
learners’ proficiency and gender in English on pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English.
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Chapter II: Literature review
I. Speech act
I.1. Speech act
When we are producing utterances containing grammatical and lexicological factors, we are
performing actions through these utterances. It means utterances not only contain a message, it
also have a social force For example, when we say ‘I promise I’ll do it’, not only information
is conveyed but the act of promising is also constituted. The actions performed via utterances
for the purpose of communicating are called speech acts. A speech act is separated into three
acts: locutionary, illocutionary and perlocutionary acts (Austin, 1962).
When we make an utterance, we perform an act of saying something, which is a locutionary
act. It is simply an act of producing a linguistically, well-formed and meaningful expression.
The illocutionary act is the function of utterance that the speaker has in mind. When we say
‘I’d like a cup of tea’, we not simply say the sentence but we also intend to require someone to
give us a cup of tea. Thus, the illocutionary act is performed for communicative function and it
is considered the most important of the three dimensions of a speech act. Yule claims ‘ the
term speech act is generally interpreted quite narrowly to mean only the illocutionary force of
an utterance.’ (1996,49). There may be no one-to-one correspondence between syntactic forms
and illocutionary acts. For example, the statement ‘ I’m cold’ may have the illocutionary act of
requesting somebody to turn on the heating system.
When we make an utterance, we intend to have an effect on the hearer and that is the
perlocutionary act. For example, when we say ‘I’d like to have a cup of tea’, we wish the
hearer to give you a cup of tea. The act of giving you a cup of tea done means that the
perlocutionary perfomed.
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As the illocutionary act is the most important, Searle (1969) has set up five types of speech
acts as follows:
♦ Declarations: are those kinds of speech acts that change the world via their utterances (bring
about states of affairs such as firings, namings, )
♦ Representatives: are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker believes to be the
case or not (E.g: assertions, conclusions, )

♦ Expressives: are those kinds of speech acts that state what the speaker feels. They denote the
speaker’s physical state or attitude (E.g: pleasure, pain, likes, dislikes, joy, )
♦ Directives: are those kinds of speech acts that the speaker uses to get someone else to do
something. (E.g: commands, requests, suggestions, )
♦ Commissives: are those kinds of speech acts that the speaker uses to commit themselves to
some future action. (E.g: promises, threats, refusals, pledges, )
I.2. Speech act of requesting
Requesting is defined as an act of requiring the other(s) to do something performed through
utterance(s) in interaction. As the speaker makes a request, s/he desires the hearer’s
expenditure of time, energy or material resource. In other words, requests impose the
speaker’s interest on the hearer. They can be regarded as a constraint on the hearer’s freedom
of action. Thus, requesting is considered one of the most sensitive illocutionary acts in
communication.
Requests are complex speech acts which involve a relationship of different elements. These
elements have been identified by Blum-Kulka (1991) as the request schema which includes
requestive goals subject to a cultural filter, linguistic encoding (strategies, perspective and
modifiers), situational parameters (distance, power, legitimization) and the social meaning of
the request according to cultural and situational factors. Whereas, Gordon and Lakoff (1971)
claims the combination of the three factors: the literal meaning of the sentence, the perceived
context, and a so-called conversational postulate, helps the hearer interpret the speaker’s
utterance intended as a request.
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I. Politeness
II.1. Politeness
Politeness is a common word that means ‘having or showing that one has good manners and
consideration for other people’ (Oxford Advanced Learners’ Dictionary.) It is similar to
‘civility’, ‘courtesy’, and ‘good manners.’ However, politeness also means that ‘behaving or
speaking in a way that is correct for the social situations you are in, and showing that you are
careful to consider other people’s needs and feelings’ (Longman Advanced American
Dictionary.) We have ‘commonsense’ politeness and ‘scientific’ notions of politeness.

Politeness can be manifested through general social behaviour as well as linguistic means.
This assumption, however, emphasizes once again on the fact that politeness cannot and
should not be assessed out of context, since from a pragmatic point of view, all utterances in
conversation are interpreted firstly contextually and only secondly literally (Coulmas, 1981).
The hypothesis that, what is implied and/or meant at a discourse level varies according to the
context of the utterance, was originally introduced by Grice, in 1968.
Every utterance has always been looked upon in the social context in which it is uttered.
Embedded in a social context the function of a greeting, an apology or a compliment differs in
its form. Obviously politeness is culturally determined and undergoes gender differences. This
means for example that Americans differ in their polite behavior massively from Japanese or
Indian politeness norms. Furthermore it is a recognized fact that within one culture there are
existing different polite social behavior structures between females and males. But some
things can be said as true overall. It is true that politeness expresses concern for the feelings of
others. The strategies to do so differ from situation to situation and can be expressed
linguisticly as well as non-linguisticly. In addition, politeness theories distinguish between
referential and affective function of language use and between negative and positive
politeness. If we look at personal face to face interactions there is more to being polite than
just opening the door and listening to the communication partner. Everyone has to establish a
public self-image, which is scientifically called face. Yule defines face by saying: “It refers to
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that emotional and social sense of self that everyone has and expects everyone else to
recognize.”
Therefore, politeness can be defined as being aware of another person’s face and presenting
one’s own face. To accept somebody’s face means using strategies which are either
threatening or saving respectively and which express a negative or a positive face. Using these
strategies helps to establish social distance, respect, deference or closeness, solidarity or
friendship, depending on the situation and the used strategies. On the one hand, if something is
said which could be seen as a threat to somebody else’s self image, it is called a face
threatening act. Face-threatening acts (FTA), are liable to threaten or damage the Hearer’s
positive face, i.e. expressions of disapproval/criticism, accusations, contradictions,

interrupting, expressions of violent emotions, etc., and threaten his/her negative face, i.e.
orders, requests, remindings, offers, promises, etc. Moreover, certain acts can also be face
threatening to the Speaker’s positive face, such as expressing thanks, excuses, acceptance of
offers/apologies, etc., as well as his/her negative face, such as apologies, acceptance of
compliments, confessions/admissions of guilt or responsibility, etc. On the other hand,
reducing the possibility of a threat to someone’s self image is seen as a face saving act. Being
polite means trying to save another persons face. We can either contribute to the needs of our
communication partner or not. Expressing polite behavior can be done either by employing a
negative face or by using a positive face.
A person’s negative face is the need to be independent, to have freedom of action, and not to
be imposed on by others. The word ‘negative’ here doesn’t mean ‘bad’, it’s just the opposite
pole from ‘positive’. A person’s positive face is the need to be accepted, even liked, by others,
to be treated as a member of the same group, and to know that his or her wants are shared by
others. In simple terms, negative face is the need to be independent and positive face is the
need to be connected.
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Thus, the Speaker should adopt certain strategies, in order to maintain his or her own face
undamaged and at the same time to minimize the possibility of affecting the positive or
negative face of the Hearer
It is generally accepted that various markers contribute to the politeness of an utterance and
the explanations of their existence are placed within a broad framework of cultural differences.
As aforementioned, it is undoubtful that different socio-cultural norms are reflected in all
levels of the linguistic code. Therefore, when observing politeness norms the researcher
should always take account of the relationship between the Speaker and the Hearer and the
nature of the interaction in which they are involved (Leech, 1983) A politeness strategy is
employed by the ‘weightiness.’ The weightiness is calculated by speakers from the social
variables such as power difference between speaker and hearer (P), the perceived social
distance between speaker and hearer (D), and ranking of imposition (R). R differs from culture
to culture because they are how threatening or dangerous in a specific culture. P, D and R do
not have any absolute value. Mainly a speaker values them according to the situation and

culture subjectively. Thus, weightiness is calculated as follows.
Wx = D (S, H) + P (S, H) + Rx
Leech (1983) sees cultural rules at work in expressions of politeness and attempts to
categorize in more detail some of the underlying intent behind these forms by articulating a set
of rules or Politeness Maxims at work in polite dialogue.
1) Tact maxim: minimize cost and maximize benefit to other.
2) Generosity maxim: minimize benefit and maximize cost to self.
3) Approbation maxim: minimize dispraise and maximize praise of other.
4) Modesty maxim: minimize praise and maximize dispraise of self.
5) Agreement maxim: minimize disagreement and maximize agreement between self and
other.
6) Sympathy maxim: minimize antipathy and maximize sympathy between self and other.
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While these maxims do not seem to contradict each other in principle, failure to recognize
these maxims as they are expressed in particular utterances can lead to what Thomas (1983)
calls “cross-cultural pragmatic failure” (p. 92). Thomas indicates that pragmatic failure can
occur at two levels: failure to understand which proposition the speaker has expressed and
failure to understand the pragmatic force of the speaker’s utterance. The potential of pragmatic
failure is apparent when reviewing specific contrastive examples of politeness features across
cultures.
II.2. Politeness-Directness-Indirectness
Politeness is a number of different general principles for being polite in social interaction
within a particular culture. S.Blum-Kulka has defined politeness as the interactional balance
achieved between the need for pragmatic clarity and the need to avoid coerciveness
If the Speaker decides to perform a FTA, then Brown and Levinson (1978) suggest a
framework that determines the choice of his/her strategy:
Even though certain pragmatic features do manifest themselves in any natural language, the
issue of universality of Politeness phenomena is challenged since the system of variant
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patterns governing the linguistic expression of Politeness, derives from different norms and

values that are culturally bound (Sifianou, 1989). This is the main source of criticism for
Brown and Levinson’s theory of politeness, which has shown to be inadequate especially as
far as face is concerned, since its exact content is culturally specific.
Different languages have different ways of marking politeness. People from some cultures
tend to favour directness, while people from other cultures favour less directness. Even so,
directness may also vary in relation to social context. The relationship between directness and
politeness as examined by Blum&Kulka (1987:133 ff.) illustrates that while these notions may
be related, they are not one and the same. This field of research suggests that politeness may
be better defined as doing what is appropriate in a given cultural context.
The relationship between directness and indirectness and politeness is examined first in a
general way, and subsequently using examples from cross-cultural research on speech acts and
politeness. Perhaps the most common comparison involves Americans and Europeans versus
Japanese and other Asian cultures. In Asian cultures, the importance of remaining in “good
face” assumes a particularly high value (Ho, 1975). Holtgraves and Yang’s (1990) comparison
of Korean and American speakers showed Koreans significantly more likely to use very polite
forms. A study by Kim and Wilson (1994) arrived at similar findings relative to Korean-U.S.
differences. Coulmas (1979) found apologies to be far more common in Japanese culture, to
the extent that they are often used in occasions when Americans would say “thank you.”
Comparing Hebrew, English, and Chinese expressions of apology, Olshtain and Cohen (1983)
found Chinese more polite than English, and English speakers more polite than Hebrew.
“While Hebrew speakers may appear somewhat rude to native English speakers when
expressing regret, Chinese speakers may appear overly polite, even obsequious” (p. 30). In
negotiating contexts with Japanese, Deutsch (1983) and Rowland (1985) noted that Americans
are known for their rudeness and brusqueness.
II.3. Politeness-Directness-Indirectness in requests
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While the overall distribution along the scale of indirectness follows similar patterns in all
languages, the specific proportions in the choices between the more direct and less direct
strategies were found to be culture-specific. Choice of politeness strategies is influenced by
both situational and cultural factors which interact with each other.

Proper request expressions are often preceded by prerequests that are face-saving for both
interlocutors. Prerequests check feasibility of compliance and overcome possible grounds for
refusal. For example, by first asking “Are you free tonight?” the speaker might try to check
physical availability of the interlocutor. Since no actual request has been issued, a negative
answer at this preliminary stage is face-saving. Speakers can also back out of admitting a
requestive intent and the hearers can avoid a requestive interpretation of the prerequest.
Sometimes the prerequest may also function as an indirect request and can be an effective
strategy to achieve the speaker’s goal. In response to “Are you free tonight?” the interlocutor
might offer help, “Do you need help with your paper?” In this case, the speaker spares the
need for an explicit request and again saves face.
Nine sub-levels of strategy types are brought up by Blum-Kulka (1989) according to the
scale of indirectness
Direct Strategies
1. Mood derivable (The grammatical mood of the verb in the utterance marks its illocutionary
force as a request.)
Leave me alone.
Clean up this mess, please.
2. Explicit performatives (The illocutionary force of the utterance is explicitly named by the
speakers.)
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I’m asking you to clean up the kitchen.
I’m asking you not to part the car here.
3. Hedged performatives (Utterances embedding the naming of the illocutionary force.)
I’d like to ask you to clean the kitchen.
I’d like you to give your lecture a week earlier.
4. Obligation statements (The illocutionary point is directly derivable from the semantic
meaning of the locution.)
You’ll have to clean up the kitchen.
Ma’am, you’ll have to move your car.
5. Want statements (The utterance expresses the speaker’s intentions, desire or feeling vis á vis

the fact that the hear do X.)
I really wish you’d clean up the kitchen.
I really wish you’d stop bothering me.
Conventionally indirect strategies
6. Suggestory formulae (The sentence contains a suggestion to X.)
How about cleaning up?
Why don’t you get lost?
So, why don’t you come and clean up the mess you made last night?
7. Query preparatory (The utterance contains reference to preparatory conditions, such as
ability or willingness, the possibility of the act being performed, as conventionalized in any
specific language.)
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Could you clean up the kitchen, please?
Would you mind moving your car, please?
Non-conventionally indirect strategies (hints)
8. Strong hints (The utterances contains partial reference to object or to elements needed for
the implementation of the act, directly pragmatically implying the act)
You have left the kitchen in a right mess.
9. Mild hints (Utterances that make no reference to the request proper or any of its elements
but are interpretable through the context as requests, indirectly pragmatically implying the act)
I’m a nun (in response to a persistent hassler).
These subcategories of conventional indirectness vary across languages in conventions of
form. In Australian English, the most frequently employed strategies were found to be
“can/could you ~,” “will/would you ~,” and “would you mind ~.” In Hebrew, “can you ~,”
“possibility (ef_ar + infinitive),” and willingness/readiness (muxan + infinitive) seem to be
most commonly used. See below for distribution of substrategies of conventional indirectness
in four languages. However, the substrategies are probably used in varying proportions in
different situations. Most strategies are limited by language and situation except for ability
Questions that are found to be used by speakers in all languages and all situations.
III. Pragmatic transfer

III.1. Pragmatic transfer
Kasper defined pragmatic transfer as “the influence exerted by learners’ pragmatic knowledge
of languages and cultures other than L2 on their comprehension, production, and acquisition
of L2 pragmatic information” (Kasper, 1992; 1995) while Bee viewed pragmatic transfer as
‘transfer of sociocultural communicative competence in performing L2 speech acts or any
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other function of language, where the speaker is trying to achieve a particular function of
language,’ (Bee, Takahashi, & Uliss-Weltz, 1990:56).
Pragmatic transfer manifested itself in two ways or categories, namely pragmalinguistic and
sociopragmatic (Kasper,1992). Both pragmalinguistic and sociopragmatic are terms derived
from Leech’s (1983:10~11) treatment towards the scope of pragmatics and which Thomas
(1983) picked up in classifying the types of pragmatic failure. Pragmalinguistics, in Leech’s
(1983) definition, refers to our linguistic knowledge of language use, and sociopragmatics is
related with how our sociological knowledge influences our interaction.
Kasper (1992) saw it fit to introduce both terms to categorize the learners’ pragmatic transfer,
for she remarked that “Leech’s (1983) distinction between pragmalinguistics and
sociopragmatics, applied by Thomas (1983) to identify two major types of ‘pragmatic failure’,
is equally suitable to broadly separate the two main loci of pragmatic transfer” (Kasper,
1992:208).
A pragmalinguistic transfer is the influence of the learner’s knowledge about the illocutionary
force or politeness value assigned to particular linguistic form-functions in the native language
(NL), which, when mapped by learners into the perception and production of a similar
situation in the target language (TL), sounds different to native speakers. In Kasper’s words, it
is “the process whereby the illocutionary force or politeness value assigned to a particular
linguistic material in NL influences learners’ perception and production of form-function
mappings in TL” (Kasper, 1992:209).
By a sociopragmatic transfer, it is a process “operative when the social perceptions underlying
language users’ interpretation and performance of linguistic action in TL are influenced by
their assessment of subjectively equivalent NL contexts” (Kasper, 1992:209).
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In order to investigate whether or where transfer occurs, ILP researchers usually compare the
following three data sources by adopting the design originally developed by Selinker (1966,
1969) : (1) the L1 baseline data from native speakers of the learners’ native language (NL);
(2) the IL data from the learners; and (3) the target language baseline data from native
speakers of the learners’ target language (TL) (see Kasper, 1992). Similarity in tems of
response frequencies in NL, IL, and TL leads us to claim positive transfer; and similar
response frequencies in NL and IL with different response frequencies between NL and TL
and between IL and TL evidences the fact of negative transfer. In this study, the product-
oriented research following the above design will be called the studies on “pragmatic
transfer”. They ought to be distinguished from the studies on “pragmatic transferability,”
which shed light on the conditions for pragmatic transfer to occur.
III.2. Studies on Sociopragmatic Transfer
By focusing on the speech act of correction performed by Japanese learners of ESL, Takahashi
and Beebe (1993) evidenced the case of negative transfer at the sociopragmatic level. The data
elicited from the 12-item discourse completion test (DCT) revealed the following: the
Japanese ESL learners transferred Japanese style-shifting patterns into English by selecting
different strategies according to the speaker’s higher or lower status vis-8-vis the hearer. The
same tendency was also identified in Japanese ESL learners’ performance of refusals in the
order, frequency, and content of semantic formulas (Beebe, Takahashi, & Uliss-Weltz, 1990).
Takahashi and Beebe attributed the distinctive style-shifting patterns observed between the
Japanese and the American groups to the differential conceptualization of linguistic politeness
between these two groups: Japanese consider it polite to emphasize the status difference when
there actually exist such differences, whereas, from the American perspective, being polite is
conveyed by denying that status differences do exist. Takahashi and Beebe (1993) also found
the two cases of L1 influence attributable to the different “politeness orientation” (Brown &
Levinson, 19 8 7 )’ between Japanese and Americans. According to Takahashi and Beebe, the
Americans favored the use of positive remarks, such as “That was a great account,” before
saying “but” in correcting the lower status interlocutor’s statement. Both the Japanese L1
16
speakers and Japanese ESL learners, however, showed their reluctance to use such positive

remarks in the same situations. This demonstrated the Japanese L1 influence of a “less
positive” politeness orientation as compared to the American politeness orientation.
Takahashi and Beebe further pointed out the tendency that the Japanese L1 speakers and
Japanese ESL learners more often used formulaic expressions than the Americans did. The use
of correct socially conventionalized formula is the prescribed norm as what Ide (1989) called
‘Ldiscernment politeness.” Takahashi and Beebe thus extrapolated that the above tendency
was a result of L1 transfer of “a belief in the efficacy of choosing the appropriate expression
according to relative status” (p.146).
Related to the issue of transfer of L1 politeness style, Garcia (1989) reported similar findings.
Garcia investigated the English IL apologies performed by Venezuelan Spanish speakers in a
role play situation. She found that the L2 learners transferred their L1 positive politeness
strategies (i.e., friendly, but not contrite, expressing themselves in terms of solidarity with the
interlocutor) to the L2 contexts. Since the target language speakers Brown and Levinson
(1987) proposed two types of politeness: positive politeness, which is redressive action
directed to the addressee’s positive face (i.e., the want to be approved); and negative
politeness, which is redressive action to maintain the addressee’s negative face (i.e., the want
to be unimpeded). Transfer in Interlanguage Pragmatics: New Research Agenda 3 employed
negative politeness strategies ( i.e., deferential, self-effacing toward the interlocutor) in the
same situation, the observed transfer was characterized as “negative” transfer.
The study of IL apology conducted by House (1988) revealed the transfer of L1
communicative style, rather than that of L1 politeness orientation. Using an 8-item DCT as the
data-eliciting instrument, House examined the English apology performed by German learners
of British English. House found that both the German speakers and German learners of British
English exhibited less routinized, specific, situation-bound excuses. The native British English
speakers, on the other hand, more frequently used their routinized apology “sorry.” Thus, she
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claimed evidence of the transfer of the German preference for less routinized apology
expressions to the L2 contexts. House further demonstrated another case of transfer of L1
communicative style to L2 contexts. According to House, the German learners of British
English transferred their L1-based self-oriented strategies (e.g., expressing lack of intent), in

comparison with the British English speakers’ preference for the use of other-oriented apology
strategies (e.g., showing concern for the hearer).
Scarcella (1983) also reported the case of transfer of L1 communicative style by
Spanishspeaking English learners. Specifically, she investigated the “discourse accent,” which
was defined as the use of conversational features in L2 in the same way in which they are used
in L1. Scarcella obtained 15 dyads of spontaneous conversation data which consisted of
Spanish/ Spanish (L1) , English/English (L1) , and English (L11 /English (IL) dyads. Despite
the Spanish learners’ high proficiency in English, L1 transfer was evident in the following
manner: more frequent verbal exchanged backchannel cues and more frequent pause fillers
were observed in Spanish L1 and English IL, as compared to native English speakers. Some
other studies yielded the findings that the degree of appropriateness in realizing a given L1
speech act influenced the realization of the same act in L2. Olshtain (1983) was among them.
Olshtain examined the extent and type of transfer in the speech act of apology performed by
English- and Russian-speaking learners of Hebrew as L2. The data were elicited by asking the
subjects to respond in Hebrew to the verbal cue issued by the investigator for eight situations.
By comparing the average frequency of all apology semantic formulas in Ll, except “offer of
repair,” Olshtain found the following: the highest degree of apology overall was in English,
somewhat lower in Russian, and the lowest in Hebrew. A similar trend was observed in the
Hebrew IL of Russian-speaking learners, somewhat less strongly in the Hebrew IL of English-
speaking learners, thereby displaying the negative transfer from L1 sociopragrnatic knowledge
(see below for the analysis based on the learners’ language-specificity perception). Similar
findings were obtained for the Hebrew speakers learning English as L2 (Cohen & Olshtain,
1981). Namely, the nonnative use of apology semantic formulas was overall considerably less
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than that of the native English speakers and more closely reflected the use of the formulas by
the native Hebrew speakers.
In Robinson (1992) as well, findings similar to Olshtain7s were reported, but for the speech
act of refusal attempted by Japanese learners of English. Robinson investigated the underlying
process of making IL refusals in the performance on a DCT. She analyzed the data obtained
from the learners’ concurrent verbal reports and the retrospective interviews with them.

According to Robinson, one of her subjects apparently transferred the Japanese preference for
not saying “no” to a request to her IL English discourse. Robinson observed that
“sociopragmatic transfer prompted at least part of this subject’s confusion over what to say”
(p.57) in a less familiar, American cultural context (“You are asked to function as a secretary
of your department’s student association”).
III.3. Studies on Pragmalinguistic Transfer
Pragmalinguistic transfer is the “process whereby the illocutionary force or politeness value
assigned to particular linguistic material in L1 influences learners’ perception and production
of form-function mappings in L2” (Kasper, 1992, p. 209). Pragmalinguistic transfer was
substantially evidenced by Blum-Kulka (1982, 1983) in her study on request realization by
English learners of Hebrew as L2. As a case of positive transfer, Blum-Kulka found that the
English learners of Hebrew successfully transferred the following crosslinguistically shared
strategies: imperatives, ability questions, ‘ why not ‘ questions, and ‘ Do you mind if…?’
forms. However, negative transfer was also found to be operative in their IL. The learners
tended to inappropriately use the Hebrew ability (“can you”) questions, resulting in foms
which did not carry the pragmatic force of a request. Blum-Kulka described this observed
tendency as a case in which the apparent similarity in form and function across the two
languages does not hold for all contexts. Negative pragmalinguistic transfer was also noted in
the choice of directness levels in request realization: the English learners of Hebrew preferred
less direct strategies in L2 than the native Hebrew speakers, thereby conforming more to their
L1 indirect strategies.”
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Deviations in the choice of directness levels in request realization have been substantially
evident in the studies conducted in the framework of CCSARP (Cross-Cultural Speech Act
Realization Patterns) project. By using the DCT eliciting technique, House and Kasper (1987)
examined the request realizations of German learners of British English and Danish learners of
British English in five request situations. One of their major findings was that both German
and Danish learners of English deviated from the British English norm and followed their L1
noms in their choice of the directness of the request in two of the five situations. For instance,
those L2 learners favored the use of direct imperatives, while the native speakers preferred to

use more indirect preparatory questions. The data were also analyzed along the dimension of
internal and external modifications. Negative pragmalinguistic transfer was observed in fewer
syntactic downgraders for both learner groups. Transfer was also operative differentially
between these two learner groups: the “Blum-Kulka (1982) pointed out that the English
learners of Hebrew overall followed their L1 preference for more indirectness. Blum-Kulka
interpreted this as evidence for transfer of social noms. In this sense, then, the obtained
tendency here can be considered as a case of “sociopragmatic transfer” (see also Kasper,
1992).
III.4. Studies on Transferability
The condition of transfer occurrence was technically referred to as transferability (Kasper,
1992). Takahashi (1995:11) observed three dimensions of transferability in SLA research,
namely the study on the developmental sequence of transferability, linguistic markedness, and
non-surface form transfer. And these three dimensions, Takahashi further indicates, are
usually approached in interlanguage pragmatics research from the perspective of
psycholinguistics (Olshtain, 1983; Olshtain and Cohen, 1983; 1989; House and Kasper 1987;
Kasper, 1981; Bodman and Eisenstein, 1988; Robinson, 1992; cited in Takahashi, 1995,
pp.46-49).
Takahashi (1992:69-124; 1993:50-83) made an explicit investigation on transferability of five
indirectness strategies realized by the “conventions of usage” of Japanese indirect requests
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when Japanese learners of English realized English indirect requests in four situations.
Takahashi used informants representing two proficiency groups: beginning-intermediate level
students, considered as low ESL group, and advanced students, high ESL group. They were
presented with an acceptability judgment task for five indirect request expressions in
respectively Japanese and English for each situation. The transferability rate was computed for
each strategy for each situation by subtracting the acceptability rate of the English indirect
request from the acceptability rate of the corresponding Japanese indirect request. The
obtained transferability rate was considered as the “psycholinguistic markedness” of each
strategy, which determined its language-specificity or neutrality. This study manifested that
contextual factors play a major role in determining transferability at the pragmatic level. The

results also displayed that some proficiency effected on the transferability of those indirectness
strategies.
Following the initial findings, further attempts were made to explore the type of contextual
factors that were most likely to affect transferability, and to expound the relationship between
the proficiency effects on the transferability of the indirectness strategies.
The transferability of the five indirectness strategies realized by the Japanese learners of
English was further discussed in Takahashi (1995). The study showed that the Japanese
learners differentially transferred the Japanese indirectness strategies. Furthermore, Takahashi
detected that the transferability of each L1 request strategy was determined by the interaction
between politeness and conventionality perceived in each strategy and the degree of mitigation
required in each imposition context. In addition, the transferability rate was influenced by the
proficiency factor. However, there was not a definite tendency for a positive correlation or for
a negative one between L1 transfer and proficiency.
III.5. TL pragmatic proficiency and its relation to negative pragmatic transfer
In the area of pragmatic transfer, the following nonstructural factors have been explored in the
interaction with transfer: sociopsychological factors, length-of-residence factors, learning-
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context factors, and linguistic proficiency factors. Compared with the other factors, ILP
researchers have put more emphasis on the investigation of the effect of proficiency on
pragmatic transfer.
Concerning the function of the learner’s fluent TL pragmatic knowledge in negative pragmatic
transfer, two views were presented. Takahashi and Beebe (1987; 1993) held that TL
proficiency was positively related with pragmatic transfer. In other words, the more highly
proficient learners had control over TL to express the NL native speakers’ sentiments at the
pragmatic level, the more likely they would transfer their NL sociocultural norms than low
proficient learners. They claimed that their hypothesis was rested on the observation of some
proficient Japanese ESL learners who used more typically Japanese formal tones in refusing in
TL. Their findings were supported by Maeshiba et al (1996).
An opposite view was proposed by Takahashi & Dufon (1989), Robinson (1992) and
Takahashi (1996). Takahashi & Dufon (1989) displayed that beginning-level Japanese learners

of ESL were similar to the Japanese control group with an NL-based pattern of bimodal
distribution of indirectness. Advanced students, on the other hand, were found not to transfer
the Japanese hinting strategies and thus posed more directness strategies in their IL requests.
Robinson (1992) made similar conclusion about her informants’ realization of refusals. She
reported that her lower and higher proficient Japanese ESL learners were both aware of the
differences in appropriate American and Japanese situations of the speech act. However, the
lower proficient students were more influenced by their NL refusal style, whereas the more
proficient learners knew how to apply the rules of English in doing the discourse completion
test (DCT) items on refusals. Another more recent challenge for Takahashi & Beebe (1987;
1993) came from Takahashi (1996) who reported that the distribution of negative pragmatic
transfers was conditioned by the imposition and form of request. As for the role of TL
pragmatic proficiency in negative pragmatic transfer, it was found that a learner with advanced
pragmatic knowledge about TL would not be likely to commit more transfers (Takahashi,
1992; 1993).
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III.6. Gender and TL Pragmatic Transfer
Together with age, personality and proficiency of the speaker (Ellis, 1994; Odlin, 1989;
Takahashi, 1996), gender is a factor that leads to variation in the patterns and likelihood of
transfer.
Holmes (1995) looked at gender differences in apologies and found both similarities
and differences between males and females. The most obvious differences that this
study found were the following three points: (1) Women used significantly more apologies
than men did; (2) Women used most apologies for the hearers of equal power, while men
apologized to women of different status; (3) Women used most apologies for female friends
whereas men used most for socially distant women (pp.379-380). Differences resulting from
gender in the realization of speech acts in a lot of cross-cultural studies show that gender may
effects on pragmatic transfer.
Hisae Kuribara Shea (2003) found that gender had much less influence than social distance
and relative status on the frequency of strategies of complaining by Japanese speakers of
English living in America (JEAs), Japanese speakers of Japanese living in Japan (JJJs), and

American speakers of English living in America (AEAs). It is the same in the case of many
other studies. That is why gender has received little attention in research into pragmatic
transfer.
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Chapter III: Methodology
III.1. Research Questions
In order to achieve the aims of the study, the following questions will be addressed:
- Is pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English in the realization of request constrained
by contextual factors?
- Is pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English in the realization of request affected by
learners’ proficiency in English?
- Is pragmatic transfer from Vietnamese to English in the realization of request affected by
learners’ gender?
III.2. Data collection method
Observational data from authentic interactions are underpresented in ILP. Among a limited
number of studies employing ethnographic research method are Wolfson’s (1989) and
Bardovi-Harlig and Hartford’s (1990). Ethnographic data is collected through observation and
recording of naturally occurring speech in everyday interactions in a wide variety of situations.
While ethnography may reveal the linguistic strategies used in many contexts in a given
language and culture as well as interpersonal situations in which requests have been observed,
it requires us a great amount of time and energy to transcribe taped interaction. This limits the
number of informants and contexts studied. Furthermore, it is easy to confront the limits of
cross-cultural comparability due to difficulties in finding equivalent culture-specific speech
events. Ethnography seems not to be a good choice if we want to control contextual variables
and investigate a speech act in the same situational and interpersonal context.
Role play is another method that has been used in ILP studies. Informants are asked to role-
play themselves in a situation orally described by the experimenter. While there is no
interaction in closed role plays, partially self-directed interaction between the players in open
role plays allows examination of speech act behaviour in its full discourse context. Because
instructions to accompany open role plays specify players’ roles, the initial situation and at

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least one player’s communicative goal, but do not predescribe conversational outcomes nor
how such outcomes are reached, the ensuing interaction is real in the context of the play. Open
role plays provide a rich data source, representing oral production, full operation of the turn
taking mechanism, impromtu planning decisions contingent on interlocutor input, and hence,
negotiation of global and local goals. They allow us to observe how speech act performance is
sequentially organized, what kinds of interlocutor responses are elicited by specific strategic
choices and how such responses determine the speaker’s next move. The advantage of open
role plays over authentic conversation is its replicability and control of contextual variables.
However, it is not certain that language produced by informants in role plays is real because
they may think they are in an experiment and modify their language consciously or
unconsciously. Also, the cost of recording and transcription needs to be taken into
consideration .
Multiple choice method gives informants a series of questions with answers. Informants are
asked to choose the answer they think most appropriate. This saves time and energy for both
experimenters and informants. Informants can quickly answer questions and experimenters
can quickly get information from a large population as well as code data. The disadvantage is
that possibilities of response are restricted to choices given in the Questionnaire. What is
more, the authenticity of information depends on the researcher’s preparation of questions and
answers.
Multiple choice method with such advantages and disadvantages has been chosen to
investigate Vietnamese learners of English and native speakers’ assessment of contextual
factors in this study. The limit of the number of the choices, which are points in rating scales,
is not a drawback in this case.

The Written Completion Task provides two options: open-ended elicitation and the Discourse
Completion Task (DCT). Situations are described in writing and space is provided for
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