VI

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY OF STUDY PROJECT REPORT I
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS II
ABSTRACT IV
TABLE OF CONTENTS VI
ABBREVIATIONS AND CONVENTIONS X
LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES, AND GRAPHS XII

PART A: INTRODUCTION 1

1. Rationale 1
2. Aims of the study 5
2.1. Overall purpose 5
2.2. Specific aims 5
3. Research questions 6
4. Scope of the study 6
5. Contributions of the study 7
6. Methodology 8
7. Organization of the study 8

PART B: DEVELOPMENT 11

CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND AND LITERATURE REVIEW 11
1.1. Cross-Cultural pragmatics (CCP) and interlanguage pragmatics (ILP) 11
1.1.1. Notion and scope 11

2.1.2.2. Reasons for choosing the methods 64
2.2. Research design 65
2.2.1. Data collection instruments 65
2.2.1.1. Meta-pragmatic assessment questionnaires (MAQ) 65
2.2.1.2. Discourse completion task (DCT) 67
2.2.2. Subjects 69
2.2.3. Procedures of developing instruments and gathering data 70
2.3. Data analysis 71
2.3.1. Validity test (T-Test) for developing data-gathering instrument (DCT) 71
2.3.1.1. A description of the T-Test 71
2.3.1.2. Interpretation of the T-Test scores 72
2.3.1.3. Results of the T-Test 75
2.3.2. Chi-square analysis of the MAQ and DCT 79
2.3.2.1. A description of the Chi-square 79
2.3.2.2. Interpretation of the Chi-square 82
2.3.2.3. Results of the Chi-square analyses 90

CHAPTER III: CROSS-CULTURAL DIFFERENCES AND PRAGMATIC
TRANSFER IN THE PERCEPTION OF RELATIVE POWER 91
3.1. Power and language in social interactions in previous studies 91
3.1.1. The concept and nature of power in social interactions 91
3.1.2. Previous studies of power and language in social interactions 92
VIII
3.1.3. Major findings and shortcomings in the previous studies of power 93
3.1.3.1. Power and language are closely interconnected 93
3.1.3.2. Power is conceptualized differently in different cultures 95
3.1.3.3. Factors that need taking into concern when studying power 97

4.2. Disagreeing politeness strategies in powerless situations 150
4.2.1. Situation 1 150
IX

4.2.2. Situation 9 155
4.2.3. Situation 27 159
4.2.4. Concluding remarks 164
4.3. Disagreeing politeness strategies in powerful situations 168
4.3.1. Situation 5 168
4.3.2. Situation 12 173
4.3.3. Situation 13 178
4.3.4. Concluding remarks 182

PART C: CONCLUSION 188

1. Major findings 188
1.1. On inverse PT and CC differences in power perception 188
1.2. On negative PT and CC differences in the use of disagreeing politeness
strategies 189
1.2.1. On negative PT in the use of disagreeing politeness strategies in
specific situations 190
1.2.2. On CC differences in the use of disagreeing politeness strategies in
specific situations 191
1.2.3. On the use of disagreeing politeness strategies in powerful and
powerless situations 193
2. Implications 196
3. Suggestions for further studies 196

ILP: Interlanguage pragmatics
MAQ: Metapragmatic assessment questionnaire
P: Relative Power
PT: Pragmatic transfer
R: Ranking of imposition
S: Speaker
Se: Setting
VLE: Vietnamese learner of English
VNS: Vietnamese native speaker

Politeness strategies:
Avoid D: Avoid disagreement
Bald-on R: Bald on record
Common G: Presuppose/ raise/ assert common ground
Concern: Assert or presuppose S’s knowledge of or concern for H’s wants
Conventionally ind: Be conventionally indirect
Deference: Give deference
Encourage: Condolence, encouragement
FTA as a GR: State the FTA as a general rule
Gift: Give gifts to H
Hint: Give hints
Impersonalize: Impersonalize S and H
In-group: Use in-group identity markers
Include S&H: Include both S and H in the activity
Interest: Intensify interest to H
Ironic: Be ironic
Minimize the imp: Minimize the imposition, R
x

Multiple P: Multiple positive politeness

-P: Powerless/Low power
=P: Equal-power
+P: Powerful/High power
+Se: Formal setting
=Se: Semi-formal setting
-Se: Informal setting
Sit.: Situation
No PT: No pragmatic transfer

In numbered examples:
Examples are numbered for ease of reference. For example, (4.9) signifies the ninth
example in the fourth chapter.
Underlined: used to highlight what is being demonstrated.

In the text:
Italics: used for emphasis, examples, politeness strategies, or technical terms mentioned for
the first time.
&: used to replace “and” for linking the names of co-authors of references.
XII

LIST OF FIGURES, TABLES, AND GRAPHS
FIGURES
In chapter I:
Figure 1.1: Classification of communicative illocutionary acts 17

Table 3.9: University powerful situations (Sit. 11 and 12) 114
Table 3.10: CC differences and inverse PT in P perception in the university context 116
Table 3.11: Work equal-power situations (Sit. 15, 17, and 18) 117
Table 3.12: Work powerless situation (Sit. 16) 120
XIII
Table 3.13: Work powerful situations (Sit. 13 and 14) 121
Table 3.14: CC differences and inverse PT in P perception in the work context 123
Table 3.15: Social equal-power situations with gender aspect (Sit. 19 and 20) 125
Table 3.16: Social equal-power situations with social status (Sit. 21 and 22) 127
Table 3.17: Social equal-power situations with economic status (Sit. 23 and 24) 129
Table 3.18: Social equal-power situations with physical strength (Sit. 25 and 26) 130
Table 3.19: Social equal-power situations with intellectual capacity (Sit. 29 and 30) 132
Table 3.20: Social powerless situation with age aspect (Sit. 27) 134
Table 3.21: Social powerful situation with age aspect (Sit. 28) 135
Table 3.22: CC differences and inverse PT in P perception in the work context 136

In chapter IV:
Table 4.1: Perception of P, D, and Se in situation 1 151
Table 4.2: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 1 152
Table 4.3: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 1 154
Table 4.4: Perception of P, D, and Se in situation 9 by the three groups 156
Table 4.5: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 9 157
Table 4.6: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 9 158
Table 4.7: Perception of P, D, and S in situation 27 by the three groups 160
Table 4.8: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 27 161
Table 4.9: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 27 163
Table 4.10. CC differences and negative PT in the subject’s use of six major groups of


In chapter III:
Graph 3.1: Family equal-power situations (Sit. 3 and 6) 103
Graph 3.2: Family powerless situations (Sit. 1 and 4) 105
Graph 3.3: Family powerful situations (Sit. 2 and 5) 107
Graph 3.4: University equal-power situations (Sit. 7 and 8) 110
Graph 3.5: University powerless situations (Sit. 9 and 10) 112
Graph 3.6: University powerful situations (Sit. 11 and 12) 114
Graph 3.7: Work equal-power situations (Sit. 15, 17, and 18) 119
Graph 3.8: Work powerless situation (Sit. 16) 120
Graph 3.9: Work powerful situations (Sit. 13 and 14) 121
Graph 3.10: Social equal-power situations with gender aspect (Sit. 19 and 20) 125
Graph 3.11: Social equal-power situations with social status (Sit. 21 and 22) 127
Graph 3.12: Social equal-power situations with economic status (Sit. 23 and 24) 129
Graph 3.13: Social equal-power situations with physical strength (Sit. 25 and 26) 130
Graph 3.14: Social equal-power situations with intellectual capacity (Sit. 29 and 30) 132
Graph 3.15: Social powerless situation with age aspect (Sit. 27) 134
Graph 3.16: Social powerful situation with age aspect (Sit. 28) 135

In chapter IV:
Graph 4.1: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 1 152
Graph 4.2: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 1 154
Graph 4.3: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 9 157
Graph 4.4: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 9 158
Graph 4.5: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 27 161
Graph 4.6: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 27 163
Graph 4.7: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 5 170
Graph 4.8: Realization of 12 subgroups of disagreeing strategies in situation 5 172
Graph 4.9: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 12 175
Graph 4.11: Realization of 6 major groups of disagreeing strategies in situation 13 179

trend, namely interlanguage pragmatics (henceforth ILP) studies. The overall
purpose of the CCP studies is to help learners and non-native speakers of English
become aware of potential similarities and differences between their language and
culture and English language and culture as well as potential PT, especially
2

negative PT or pragmatic failures, which may affect their study or use of English to
communicate with English native speakers and possibly cause culture shock or
communication breakdowns.
As regards the contrastive pragmatics trend, there have been a great number of
studies conducted by researchers all over the world, as reviewed by Trosborg
(1995). Those studies investigate different speech acts, with a focus on requests,
apologies, compliments, and thanks (cf. Trosborg, 1995: 46-47). In Vietnam, there
have been a number of contrastive pragmatics studies, as part of the researchers’
unpublished PhD research projects, comparing and contrasting Vietnamese and
English in certain speech acts comprising complimenting (Nguyen Van Quang,
1998), requesting (Nguyen Van Do, 1999), disagreeing (Kieu Thi Thu Huong,
2006), and inviting (Duong Bach Nhat, 2008). There have also been a great number
of other relevant studies of a variety of speech acts on a smaller scale of MA theses,
as presented in Nguyen Quang Ngoan and Nguyen Tien Phung’s (2007) review,
presenting various speech acts such as greeting (Nguyen Phuong Suu, 1990; Huynh
Thi Ai Nguyen, 1997), requesting (Nguyen Van Do, 1996; Do Thi Mai Thanh,
2000), apologizing (Dang Thanh Phuong, 1999), refusing a request (Pham Thi Van
Quyen, 2001), among others (cf. Nguyen Quang Ngoan and Nguyen Tien Phung,
2007: 26-29).
Regarding the ILP trend, Kasper & Dahl (1991) present a detailed literature
review of 39 ILP studies. Trosborg (1995) also does a good job of reviewing ILP

Huong (2001) and Nguyen Quang Ngoan (2004) at the level of MA theses, from the
perspective of contrastive pragmatics. It was also studied from the perspective of
conversational analysis combined with contrastive pragmatics by Kieu Thi Thu
Huong (2006) for her PhD research project. Thus, no studies of the speech act of
disagreeing from the ILP perspective have been conducted in Vietnam.
Additionally, in literature, the dissertation author is able to access only one study of
this type which was conducted by Beebe and Takahashi in 1989 to contrast English
by Japanese learners and that by English native speakers. Hence it is expected that a
thorough investigation into disagreeing from the ILP perspective will contribute to
drawing a whole picture of studies of the speech act.
4

Secondly, another focus of the present study is on the effects of P on verbal
interactions, and according to many researchers (Beebe & Takahashi, 1989; Rees-
Miller, 2000; and Locher, 2004), the realizations of disagreeing strategies are
proven to be under great influence of P. In other words, disagreeing is a potential
speech act on which P is enacted. However, the dissertation author has not noticed
any studies of speech acts, in which P was realized as a separated social variable
that is in focus. Thus, it is the author’s purpose to attempt to investigate the issue.
There are also some other reasons for his choice of P as the focused social variable
operating in this study of disagreeing as an example of verbal interaction.
One reason is that, as far as the author knows, there have been no thorough
empirical studies of power influence on verbal interaction in Vietnam although
there have been a lot of relevant discussions and studies on power and its
correlation with language in English-speaking cultures (Leech, 1983; Thomas,
1985; Brown & Levinson, 1987; Wartenberg, 1990; Ng, 1995; Ng and Bradac,
1993; Watts, 1991, 2003; Hofstede, 1977, 1991, 2001; Holmes, 1992; Rees-Miller,

negative PT from Vietnamese into Australian language and culture, and secondarily
noteworthy Vietnamese-Australian CC differences as valid clues for the
interpretation and discussion of the PT in the speech act of disagreeing under the
effects of P in the investigated situations.
2.2. Specific aims
To achieve the overall purpose, the study is aimed:
- to find out the major features of Vietnamese-English PT caused by the VLE and
CC differences between the VNS and ANS in their use of disagreeing politeness
strategies with the more powerful as well as with the less powerful in the
investigated situations.
- to investigate the effects of P on the subject’s use of disagreeing politeness
strategies reflected from the differences in their use of politeness strategies for
disagreeing which is affected by their perception of P described in the relative roles
in the investigated situations.
6

3. Research questions
1. What are some significant features of negative PT caused by the VLE and what
are some significant CC differences between the VNS and ANS in their use of
disagreeing politeness strategies in the investigated situations? Sub questions are:
- Which features of negative PT and CC differences in the use of disagreeing
politeness strategies are significant?
- Which CC differences between the VNS and ANS lead to negative PT and
which CC differences do not?
- Which disagreeing politeness strategies are used and preferred by the VLE,
ANS, and VNS? What are the differences in their use of those strategies in
the powerful and powerless situations?

- “Among power-unequals” is meant to cover all the interactions between not only
the more powerful and the less powerful but also the less powerful and the more
powerful in various situations in the four contexts: (1) at home, (2) at work, (3) at
school, and (4) in society.
- P is described in the relative roles, such as a parent versus his/her child (at home),
a university lecturer versus a student (at school), a boss versus an employee (at
work), or an elder person versus a younger one (in society).
- The focused social variable is P, which is used to refer to the relative power each
speaker temporarily has in each given context. However, the social distance
(henceforth D) and the speaking context (henceforth Se) are also taken into
consideration for detailed interpretation and discussion of each particular situation.
- Vietnamese-Australian PT in disagreeing among power-unequals is what the study
aims to investigate. Thus, comparison and contrast of disagreeing strategies by the
VLE and ANS are in focus. However, for the objectivity and validity of the
research, the study is expanded to cover the comparison and contrast of the power
perception and disagreeing strategies by the VNS and ANS to serve as the basic
background for the interpretation, discussion, and conclusion of the PT.
5. Contributions of the study
8

The study is expected to bring out some following contributions:
- Theoretically, it contributes an investigation to some research areas in Vietnam:
(1) socio-cultural effects (i.e. power effects) on verbal interactions, (2) pragmatic
transfer (i.e. Vietnamese-English transfer), (3) speech act theory (i.e. disagreeing as
a speech act), and (4) linguistic politeness. Specifically, this is the first thorough
empirical research in Vietnam, the focus of which is on the influence of P on
language, or to be more exact on disagreeing, and also the first study of

Part B is the major part which is divided into four chapters, discussing the relevant
theoretical concepts, literature review, methodology and results of the empirical
research of the study.
Chapter one is where a theoretical background and literature review are done in
light of CCP. It begins with an introduction to basic terminologies and concepts of
CCP and ILP. Then the speech act theory is visited with critical comments,
followed by a discussion of disagreeing as a potential face-threatening act. Next,
politeness theory is revisited with critical comments on its notion and approaches in
literature. Especially, Western politeness approaches are compared to the Asian
ones, with reference to the perception of the issue by Vietnamese researchers to
build up a theoretical background for the chosen theoretical framework in the
present study. Finally, all the up-to-date studies of disagreeing as a speech act that
the author is aware of and able to get access to, be they domestic or international,
are introduced for an overview of the achievements and shortcomings in the
previous studies of the speech act.
Chapter two describes the methodology of the present study. In this chapter, various
research methods in ILP studies with their strengths and weaknesses, as discussed
by well-known authors, are introduced with critical comments before an
introduction to the methods in the present study is made, with specific reasons for
choosing them. Then, the research design including the data-gathering instruments,
subject selection, and data-gathering procedures are all introduced. Finally, the data
analysis procedures are clarified with a thorough description of the T-test analysis,
Chi-square analysis, and analytical framework.
10

Chapter three discusses the effects of the relative power as a socio-cultural
dimension in verbal interactions, especially in disagreeing. It is conducted to

11

PART B: DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND AND LITERATURE
REVIEW
1.1. Cross-Cultural pragmatics (CCP) and interlanguage pragmatics (ILP)
1.1.1. Notion and scope
In his discussion of approaches to inter-cultural communication, Clyne (1996: 3)
states,
There are three main ways in which the role of culture can be, and has been,
studied – by comparing native discourse across cultures (the Contrastive
Approach), by examining the discourse of non-native speakers in a second
language (the Interlanguage Approach), and by examining and comparing the
discourse of people of different cultural and linguistic backgrounds interacting
either in a lingua franca or in one of the interlocutors’ languages (the Interactive
Inter-cultural Approach).
He (1996: 4) also argues that the three approaches are not always clearly
differentiated and that the third approach has been the least developed and
investigated so far. Actually, Clyne’s classification and comments are completely
appropriate, as seen from the perspective of CCP.
According to Kasper & Blum-Kula (1995: 3), pragmatics is considered as “the
study of people’s comprehension and production of linguistic action in context”.
Thus, CCP is the study of liguistic action patterns carried out by language users of
different cultural backgrounds. Blum-Kulka, House, and Kasper (1989: 1-11) argue
that the field of CCP can be divided into two trends: one is contrastive pragmatics
and the other is ILP.
Contrastive pragmatics is concerned with comparing and contrasting the similarities
and differences in different pragmatic aspects such as politeness or speech act
performance across cultural communities. Contrative pragmatics studies are
conducted in the belief that in different cultural communities, people speak

interlanguage pragmatics study”. Another reason for the chosen subtitle is that
“ILP has derived its theoretical and empirical foundation from general and
especially cross-cultural pragmatics” (Kasper and Blum-Kulka, 1993: 4).
1.1.2. Pragmatic transfer and relevant issues
Pragmatic transfer, as defined by Beebe & Takahashi (1989: 200), is “transfer of
some culturally specific politeness strategies from one’s native language to the
13

target language”. It is resulted from the “influence from learners' native language
and culture on their IL pragmatic knowledge and performance” (Kasper & Blum-
Kula, 1995: 10).
On the one hand, PT can be divided into negative PT and positive PT, the first of
which is the influence of the first language pragmatic competence on the
interlanguage pragmatic knowledge that differs from the target language, while the
latter refers to pragmatic knowledge behaviors that display consistent across the
first language, the interlanguage, and the target language. The focus of ILP is,
however, on negative PT because it may lead to communication breakdown.
Positive PT attracts less attention possibly because it usually results in
communicative success, and thus appearing less exciting to study.
On the other hand, in literature, PT is divided into two types of pragmatic failures,
as suggested by Thomas (1983). They are: sociopragmatic failure and
pragmalinguistic failure. According to Blum-Kulka, House, & Kasper (1989: 10), in
the first type, learners “assess the relevant situational factors on the basis of their
native sociopragmatic norms” and in the second type, “native procedures and
linguistic means of speech act performance are transferred to interlanguage
communication”. Pragmatic failure is another term used to refer to negative PT.
As possibly seen in a number of studies, negative transfer has been found at both

something that has a certain sense and reference, the speaker normally also does
something such as making a promise, a request, or an apology (Austin, 1962; Geis,
1995). For example, in saying, “I’ll come and pick you up.”, a speaker not only
produces a meaningful utterance but also constitutes the act of promising.
In studying speech act theory, it is essential to have a deep insight into the well-
known distinction made by Austin (1962) between the three kinds of acts:
locutionary act, illocutionary act, and perlocutionary act. According to Austin
(1962) and Searle (1969), clarified by Richards et al. (1992: 217), a locutionary act
is the saying of something, which is meaningful and can be understood; an
illocutionary act is using the sentence to perform a function; and a perlocutionary
act is the results or effects produced by means of saying something. Clyne (1996:
11) puts it simply that locution is the actual form of an utterance, illocution is the
15

communicative force of the utterance, and perlocution is the communicative effect
of the utterance.
The three acts are, however, ultimately related because normally, in a meaningful
utterance, “S says something to H; in saying something to H, S does something; and
by doing something, S affects H” (Bach & Harnish, 1979: 3). For example, on
producing the meaningful utterance, “I’ve just made some coffee” (the locutionary
act), we might make an offer (illocutionary act) which might get the hearer to drink
some coffee (perlocutionary act).
Of the three dimensions, as stated by Yule (1997: 52), the most essential act that
counts is the illocutionary force because the same utterance can potentially have
quite different illocutionary forces. For instance, the utterance, “I’ll see you later”
can count as a prediction, a promise, or a warning in different contexts. That
partially explains why Yule (1997: 52) claims that “[t]he term ‘speech act’ is

most influential and widely used classification of speech acts with a focus on how
listeners respond to utterances intentionally, which is on the contrary to Austin
(1962) whose attention is on how speakers realize their intentions in speaking
(Wardhaugh, 1986: 287). Searle’s classification consists of five broad types: (1)
commissives (e.g., a promise or a threat), (2) declarations (e.g., a pronouncement at
court), (3) directives (e.g., a suggestion or a request), (4) expressives (e.g., an
apology or a complaint), and (5) representatives (e.g., an assertion or a report)
(ibib.: 10-16). Following Searle (1976), Yule (1997: 55) clarifies the five general
types of speech acts that in declarations, the speaker (S) causes the situation (X); in
representatives, S believes X; in expressives, S feels X; in directives, S wants X;
and in commissives, S intends X. Bach and Harnish (1979: 41) appear more specific
when they divide illocutionary acts into six categories. Two of them, the effectives
and verdictives, are conventional, not communicative. The four communicative
ones are constatives, directives, commisives, and acknowledgements, which are
more or less similar to Austin’s expositives, exercitives, commissives, and
behabitives, and closely related to Searle’s representatives, directives, commissives,
and expressives, respectively, but their characterizations are a bit different from
Searle’s. For instance, suggestions belong to the constatives in Bach and Harnish’s
but to the directives in Searle’s.