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1、Pragmatic Failure in Politeness Language: Intercultural Communicative Perspective跨文化透视：汉英礼貌用语语用失误Student: Supervisor:(College of Foreign Languages, CTGU) 学位论文原创性声明 本人郑重声明：所呈交的论文是本人在导师的指导下独立进行研究所取得的研究成果。除了文中特别加以标注引用的内容外，本论文不包含任何其他个人或集体已经发表或撰写的成果作品。本人完全意识到本声明的法律后果由本人承担。作者签名： 年 月 日 学位论文版权使用授权书本学位论文作者完全
2、了解学校有关保障、使用学位论文的规定，同意学校保留并向有关学位论文管理部门或机构送交论文的复印件和电子版，允许论文被查阅和借阅。本人授权省级优秀学士学位论文评选机构将本学位论文的全部或部分内容编入有关数据库进行检索，可以采用影印、缩印或扫描等复制手段保存和汇编本学位论文。本学位论文属于1、保密 ，在_年解密后适用本授权书。2、不保密 。（请在以上相应方框内打“”）作者签名： 年 月 日 导师签名： 年 月 日 ContentsAbstract（2）摘要（2）Key words （2）关键词（2）Introduction （2）1 Some Fundamental Knowledge about
3、 English Euphemism （4）1.1 Definition of English Euphemism（4）1.2 Origin of English Euphemism（5）1.3 Formation of English Euphemism（5）1.3.1 Borrowing （6）1.3.2 Widening（6）1.3.3 Semantic Shift（6）1.3.4 Metaphor（6）2 Three Basic Principles of Using English Euphemism （6）2.1 Cooperative Principle and English
4、Euphemism（6）2.1.1 The Cooperative Principle（6）2.1.2 Violating the Cooperative Principle（7）2.2 Politeness Principle and English Euphemism（8）2.3 Face Principle and English Euphemism （10）3 Communicative Function of English Euphemism（10）3.1 To Evade （11）3.1.1 In Terms of Disease and Disabilities （11）3.1
5、.2 In Terms of Death（11）3.1.3 In Terms of Sex （11）3.1.4 In Terms of Body Excretion and Body Elimination Process（11）3.2 To Upgrade （12）3.2.1 In Terms of Appearance（12）3.2.2 In Terms of Unemployment and Poverty（12）3.2.3 In Terms of Occupation （12）3.3 To Disguise （12）3.3.1 In Terms of Commerce （12）3.3.
6、2 In Terms of Politics （13）4 Implications （13）4.1 Implication on Cross-cultural Communication（13）4.2 Implication on Foreign Language Teaching (FLT) and Learning（14）Conclusion（15）Acknowledgements （15）Bibliography （15）Abstract: Nowadays, with the information and globalization, the earth becomes smalle
7、r and smaller. And intercultural communication among countries is more frequent than even. When people from different cultures communicate with each other, they habitually judge the behaviors of their counterparts according to their own social norms and politeness principles. What is polite in one c
8、ulture may not be polite in another, thus pragmatic failures arise inevitably.On the basis of various theories on politeness advocated by scholars at home and abroad, this paper intends to investigate the issues of pragmatic failure in intercultural communication made by English learners in China, a
9、ccording to the framework of “dichotomy” of pragmatic failure by Thomas. The paper also presents some useful suggestions on how to improve English learner pragmatic competence after a contrastive analysis of Chinese and English polite expressions.摘要: 如今，随着信息化与全球化， 地球变得越来越小，各国间的跨文化交际也越来越频繁，越来越密切。当来自不
10、同文化的人在进行交流时，人们会习惯地根据自己所遵循的礼貌原则来判断交际者的语言是否礼貌。在一种文化中被认为是礼貌的可能在另一文化中便是不礼貌的，语用失误便由此产生。本文在回顾中外学者所提出的有关礼貌理论的基础上，按照Thomas 提出的语用失误“二分法”的框架结构，调查中国英语学习者在跨文化交际中易出现的语用失误问题。本文通过对汉英礼貌用语进行对比分析，进一步提出一些有利于英语学习者提高语用能力的建议。Key words: Politeness principle; Pragmalinguistic failure; Sociolinguistic failure; Pragmatic tra
11、nsfer关键词: 礼貌原则; 语用语言失误; 社交语用失误; 语用迁移Introduction With the development of science and technology, communication among people from different countries and different cultures is more frequent and important. Our world is multicultural. When we communicate with people from another culture, we are not onl
12、y affected by the difference of language, but also disturbed by the difference of culture. To ensure a successful understanding and communication, we should pay attention to politeness, one of the most universal phenomena in intercultural communication. Politeness is a very important part of every n
13、ational culture. When we communicate with others, we should be polite. Polite and proper form of language helps to establish and maintain harmonious social relationships. It may lead to pragmatic failure when people from different cultures use polite forms to communicate with each other. English is
14、Chinese students foreign language, and we are not very familiar with its language rules. When we make some grammatical errors, its easy to be found. And its also could be forgiven, because we are “foreigners” to English. If we can speak English fluently, but we dont pay attention to the context and
15、speak English improperly, we will be considered to be impolite, and then it will break the atmosphere of the whole communication. Therefore, it is necessary and important to study pragmatic failure in politeness language.This paper makes an analysis of the cultural difference of politeness language
16、in intercultural communication according to an investigation of Freshmen English Majors Cross-Cultural Pragmatic Competence in Politeness, on the basis of some theories. And it also proposes some suggestions on how to improve students pragmatic competence.1 Theoretical Background1.1 Intercultural Pr
17、agmatic Failure1.1.1 Intercultural CommunicationIntercultural communication is “the communication between people whose cultural perceptions and distinct enough to alter the communication event. Frequently, the term cross-cultural communication is used when referring to communication between people f
18、rom different cultures” (Samovar, 2000:48).Nowadays, cross-cultural communication is more frequent and important in the world. In order to communicate with people from different cultures successfully, we must improve our intercultural communicative competence. Generally speaking, intercultural commu
19、nicative competence is the competence and quality that a successful cross-cultural communication needs (Chen Junsen, Fan Weiwei & Zhong Hua, 2006:13-14).1.1.2 Pragmatic FailurePragmatics is a new area in linguistics, and intercultural pragmatics is a new-emerged branch of pragmatics. Until now, ther
20、e have been many linguists and scholars both at home and abroad who have studied intercultural pragmatic failure. Among them, Thomas Jenny plays the most important role at abroad while He Ziran at home. The term pragmatic failure was first advanced by Thomas Jenny as “the inability to understand wha
21、t is meant by what is said” (Thomas, from He Zhaoxiong, 2003:677). Pragmatic failure has occurred on any occasion on which H (hearer) perceives the force of Ss (speakers) utterance as other than S (speaker) intended s/he should perceive it (Thomas, from He Zhaoxiong, 2003:683). In China, He Ziran re
22、aches the most outstanding achievements in this regard. He has his own different definition. He defined as “failure to achieve the desired communication effect in communication”. (He Ziran, 1988:226). Pragmatic failure is different from grammar error. “Its legitimate to speak of grammatical error, s
23、ince pragmmaticality can be judged according to prescriptive rules (prescriptive for language-teaching purposes, at least), whereas pragmatic competence, as Candlin has observed, entails probable rather than categorical rules. The nature of pragmatic ambivalence is such that it is not possible to sa
24、y that the pragmatic force of an utterance is wrong. All we can say is that it failed to achieve the speakers goal” (Thomas, from He Zhaoxiong, 2003:684).There are two types of pragmatic failure: pragmalinguistic failure and sociopragmatic failure.1.1.2.1 Pragmalinguistic FailurePragmalinguistic fai
25、lure occurs when the pragmatic force mapped on to a linguistic token or structure is systematically different from that normally assigned to it by native speakers (Thomas, from He Zhaoxiong, 2003:696). Pragmalinguistic failure may arise out of the following sources: pragmalinguistic transfer, pragma
26、tic ambiguity and teaching-induced errors. The pragmalinguistic failure occurs when the speaker cant correctly interpret the words, phrases or sentence patterns. For example:A (to fellow passenger on a long-distance coach): Ask the driver what time we get to Birmingham.B (to diver): Could you tell m
27、e when we get to Birmingham, please?C (the driver): Dont worry, love, its a big place- I dont think its possible to miss it! (Thomas, from He Zhaoxiong, 2003:682)In this case, the drive understood that Bs utterance as a request for information-“What time will we get to Birmingham?”, but misunderstoo
28、d the intended sense of when. Pragmalinguistic failure usually also occurs when Chinese people respond to the English tag question in a wrong way. For example, in Chinese, shi is an affirmative answer to the whole question no matter this tag question is in a positive or negative form, while in Engli
29、sh “yes” is just confirms the basic part of the verb and doesnt include the negative structure.1.1.2.2 Sociopragmatic Failure Sociopragmatic failure occurs when interlocutors dont understand or ignore the social and cultural differences between themselves. As we know, language is a reflection of cul
30、ture. When people from different cultural backgrounds communicate with each other, there inevitably occur some misunderstandings between them because of their different social systems, habits and customs, beliefs, values and so on. For example: Mrs. Brown is about fifty years old. One day, she wore
31、a new dress and then a student said, “You look nice and younger wearing this dress.” The student wanted to get the middle-aged teachers favor, but this made Mrs. Brown unhappy. Because this made she feel that she was old in speakers eyes, only the dress made younger. Or she thought the speaker flatt
32、ered her. But in Chinese, this topic is absolutely free.When scholars study pragmatic failure, most of them pay more attention to sociopragmatic failure. Its the main pragmatic failure. It is usually caused by the inappropriate use of the grade of courtesy and the difference of culture values.1.2 Pr
33、agmatic TransferInterlanguage Pragmatics is a young discipline. The study and acquisition of the foreign language is easy to be influenced by mother tongue or native language culture, and then the pragmatic transfer appears. Pragmatic transfer is a domain of Interlanguage Pragmatics.There are two ty
34、pes of pragmatic transfer: pragmalinguistic transfer and sociopragmatic transfer. A pragmalinguistic transfer 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 mapping
35、s in TL”(Kasper, cited in Liu Shaozhong, Liao Fengrong, 2002:37).The following dialogue between a native English speaker (Speaker A) and a Chinese speaker of English (Speaker B) is a typical case of pragmalingistic transfer.A: Would you like to go out and have dinner with me tonight?B: Excuse me, bu
36、t Im busy tonight.In this dialogue, Speaker A gave an invitation to B, expecting B to go to have dinner with him. B refused A directly, and apologized for it before giving an excuse. But B inappropriately used the expression “Excuse me” instead of suitable expressions such as “Im sorry”. “Excuse me”
37、 and “Im sorry” have the same Chinese meaning “对不起”, but they used in different contexts in English. B failed to use the suitable English expression due to the lack of linguistic means of expression.A sociopragmatic transfer is a process “operative when the social perceptions underlying language use
38、rs interpretation and performance of linguistic action in TL are influenced by their assessment of subjectively equivalent NL contexts” (Kasper, cited in Liu Shaozhong, Liao Fengrong, 2002:37).The following dialogue between a native English speaker (Speaker A) and a Chinese speaker of English (Speak
39、er B) is a typical case of pragmalingistic transfer.A: Your English is really fluent.B: No, no, my English is still very poor. (He Ziran & Chen Xinren, 2002:172)In this dialogue, A praised Bs English. Following Chinese cultural pattern, B answered modestly. This was absolutely suitable to Chinese cu
40、lture, but not suitable to English culture. It would make A think that his view was denied and he would feel unhappy. In China, when one is praised, he would behave modestly, and often say “哪里，哪里”. But in English culture, when someone praises you, “Thank you” is the most proper response. So in the d
41、ialogue, B can reply “Thank you”. This kind of pragmatic transfer, which is due to the cultural differences between Chinese and English cultural paradigms, is what we call “sociopragmatic transfer”.Pragmatic transfer can also be divided into positive pragmatic transfer and negative pragmatic transfe
42、r according to the effect of transference, which plays an important role in communication. Negative transfer of pragmatic is the directly reason which causes pragmatic failure. The rules of language are different in every culture. When we acquire our mother tongue, we acquire the rules of mother ton
43、gue unconsciously at the same time. In the intercultural communication, we are often unconsciously to express our own thought according to the language rules of our native culture. Because we always ignore the difference of cultural background between each other, and we are lake of the understanding
44、 of others culture and dont master the language rules of others culture. So the “interlanguage” has come into being, and it may cause pragmatic failure. This is what we usually said pragmatic failure which is caused by pragmatic negative transfer. We can use the following figure to summarize: Pragma
45、tic failure violating the rules of native language violating the norms ofnative culturePragmatic negative transferPragmatic transferThe difference between native language and target language1.3 Politeness PrinciplesPoliteness is a hot study in pragmatics. It is a universal phenomenon, and it exists in all cultures. In the English-speaking culture and the Western world in general, politeness has been closely r
