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VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE-STUDIES
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NGÔ THỊ MINH TRANG CONDITIONAL CLAUSES USED AS HEDGING
DEVICES IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
EQUIVALENTS: A PRAGMATIC PERSPECTIVE (Mệnh đề điều kiện được sử dụng làm phương tiện rào
đón trong tiếng Anh và tương đương của chúng trong
tiếng Việt: nghiên cứu trên bình diện dụng học) M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS




HANOI – 2012

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
CANDIDATE’S STATEMENT i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ii
ABSTRACT iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv
LIST OF FIGURES v
PART A: INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale of the Study 1
2. Objectives of the Study 3
3. Scope of the Study 3
4. Methods of the Study 4
4.1. Methods 4
4.2. Introduction of the novella 4
5. Design of the Study 5
PART B: DEVELOPMENT 6
CHAPTER ONE: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND 6
1.1. The Concept of Hedging 6
1.1.1. Definitions of Hedge 6
1.1.2. Forms of Hedges 8
1.1.3. Functions of Hedges 9
1.2. Cooperative Principle 10
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APPENDIXES I
Appendix 1: English Conditionals I
Appendix 2: English Pseudo-Conditionals and Vietnamese Equivalents VII vii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
EFL: English as a Foreign Language
ELT: English Language Teaching
FTA: Face Threatening Act
FSA: Face Saving Act

LIST OF FIGURES
Table 3.1: The percentage of true conditionals and pseudo-conditionals

Nevertheless, there has been considerable difference of opinion and much
terminological confusion in the area of pragmatic functions. Let consider the following
examples:
(1) If Squiggly knows the answer, he'll tell us.
(2) If Squiggly knows the answer, he isn‟t saying.
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In the sentence (1), the result clause “he'll tell us”- is dependent on the “if'-
clause”. But this is not the case in the sentence (2) where “If-clauses” does not express
a condition and result; but implies “Squiggly isn‟t saying anything, whether he knows
the answer or not”. And the same is true for the other examples which do not fit into
the 1, 2, 3 system, for example:
(3) If I may interrupt, when is the next train?
(4) If you kindly allow me, I‟ll have a meeting with you in the evening.
As can be seen, the If-clauses in the examples (3) and (4) are not dependent on
the main clauses, and they could equally be expressed as a politeness marker used in
speech act of requesting to avoid imposition on the hearer and mitigate the negative
effect of refusals in communication. These so-called conditionals are also used in
Vietnamese, causing a lot of confusing for learners to determine the type of
conditionals:
Nếu mai rảnh thì qua nhà tớ chơi nhé!
Nếu không phiền, cậu nhặt hộ tớ mớ rau nha!
Vietnamese, like English, has developed through usage; as the result, language
patterns may refuse to be forced into a logically consistent mold. One of the reasons
for the lack of appropriate system to categorize conditionals may be the inherent
flexibility of the language itself. In this case, teachers have to base on pragmatics‟
point of view to explain these so-called conditionals. Since conditional sentences are
basic to the material of grammar and pragmatics, a detailed understanding of
conditional sentences is vital for an accurate interpretation of its contents.
In consideration of the importance of conditionals in teaching and learning English

a politeness marker in a certain speech act. Also, the study explains pragmatic
functions of If-clauses as a hedging device basing on Grice‟s Cooperative Principle
and Brown and Levinson‟s Politeness Theory in consideration of FTA and FSA.
Particularly, the pseudo-conditionals from the novella named The Little Princess are
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used as data in this study. Detailed analysis and comparative study requires much time
and effort; therefore, semantic and syntactic theories are also employed at times to
help better analyze conditionals in English and Vietnamese equivalents.
4. METHODS OF THE STUDY
4.1. Methods
Such methods as descriptive, comparative and contrastive were employed to
describe and analyze, to compare and contrast the database in order to explore
similarities and differences in using English conditionals and Vietnamese equivalents.
Obviously, descriptive method was utilized to provide in-depth and detailed
description of conditionals in terms of pragmatics; whereas, comparative and
contrastive method was used to give a comparison and contrast relevant to pragmatic
properties of conditionals in English and Vietnamese equivalents.
A qualitative approach was also conducted to discover meanings that emerge
after careful documentation and thoughtful analysis for over approximately a five-
month period. The data were quantitatively converted into numeric patterns as the
primary basis for organizing and reporting results. It concentrates on smaller but
focused samples rather than large random samples. When studying the features of
sentence patterns used, as a result of quantification, the researcher can look for
recurring patterns emerging from the data.
4.2. Introduction of the novella
The Little Prince has been well-known all over the world because the novella
has captured the hearts and minds of both children and adults. Published by Harcourt
in 1943 and 1971, Katherine Woods' straightforward and beautiful translation is the
only one that does justice to The Little Prince. The novella is divided into 27 chapters,


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PART B
DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER ONE
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
This chapter provides the theoretical background of the thesis. It is divided into
four main sections; section 1 discusses the concept of Hedging, section 2 presents
Cooperative Principles, section 3 focuses on the Politeness Strategies, and section 4 deals
with the concept of Conditionals.
1.1. THE CONCEPT OF HEDGING
1.1.1. Definitions of Hedge
Hedging has been a major concern of various viewpoints such as cross cultural
comparisons, gender studies, translation studies, politeness theory, academic discourse
and so on over the last twenty years. In the literal sense, the term “hedge” and
“hedging” expresses the idea of “barrier”, “limit”, “defence”, or the way used to
protect or defend oneself. In the light of language, hedges have been defined in
various ways based on their forms and functions.
At the most basic level, Crystal (2008) defined hedge as “an application in
pragmatics and discourse analysis of a general sense of the word („to be non-
committal or evasive‟) to a range of items which express a notion of imprecision or
qualification”. Likewise, Richards and Schmidt (2010) described hedge as “a
mitigating device which is dedicated to decrease the impact of an utterance”. As can
be seen, both definitions of hedge come from pragmatics aspects regarding hedge as a
marker indicating how Gricean maxims are observed. In this case, hedges are
considered pragmatic markers which reinforce the influence of the message and hence
they appear to be associated mainly with the politeness strategies.
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their uncertainty about something or state something uncertain, and “hedges” are
words or phrase which carry the speaker‟s uncertainty (Bonano, 1982: 36). One reason
that speakers do not show certainty of what they say is that they want to indicate only
the criteria or type of criteria they find important at that time (Schmidt, 1974: 622).
In more technical definitions, hedges are particles, words, or phrases that
modify “the degree of membership of a predicate or noun phrase in a set” (Brown &
Levinson, 1987: 145). Remarkably, Brown and Levinson maintain both the
attenuation and the reinforcement aspects of hedging; revealing a fact that hedges are
“strengtheners” as well as “weakeners” which developed fully the speech act aspect of
hedging. Whereas Lakoff (1972) considers only propositional hedging and Fraser
(1975) concentrates only on performative verb hedging, Brown and Levinson deal
with the hedging of the illocutionary force of a speech act in term of politeness
phenomena.
As can be seen, research on hedges is difficult to clarify what hedging
expressions are. It lacks a solid definition of hedges and accordingly a profound
understanding of what might be used as a hedge. The complexity of these functional
definitions is that almost any linguistic item or expression can be used as a hedge.
This means that no clear-cut lists of hedging expressions are possible (Clemen, 1997:
6). Despite the difficulty in establishing definitions of hedges, there is some consensus
in the field that hedges should be discerned between the actual item and the function
of hedging in general. Regarding all the different approaches synthesized precisely by
Clemen (1998), hedging can be considered the general use of linguistic means to
mitigate the impact of an utterance; increasing the possibility of a better acceptance
and simultaneously minimizing the risk of rejection. In this case, hedging is thereby
nothing more than a way to relate to the maxims of conversation by Grice.
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all kinds of FTAs: “If you see what I‟m driving at…”
Later, hedges can act as one of politeness strategies (Brown & Levinson, 1987;
Buikema & Roeters, 1982) by which we are able to “recognize the speech function,
the type of offer, command, statement, or question, the attitudes and judgments
embodied in it, and the rhetorical features that constitute it as a symbolic act”
(Halliday & Hassan, 1989:45). In plenty of previous work, hedging has been viewed
as a negative politeness strategy; however, it may simultaneously be seen to have a
positive politeness dimension. Brown and Levinson comment that one way to express
positive politeness toward one‟s addressee; to communicate “that one‟s own wants …
are in some respects similar to the addressee‟s wants” is to avoid disagreement (1987:
101).
As can be seen, the functions of hedges are manifold and can be separated from
one another. However, it is necessary to note that these functions can, and in fact often
do, overlap (Mauranen, 2004: 176). Some linguists would rather to deal with the
functions of hedging as overlapping without any clear-cut distinctions.
1.2. COOPERATIVE PRINCIPLE
In cooperation with Speech Act Theory (e.g. Austin, 1962 & Searle, 1969),
Grice‟s work on the Cooperative Principle initiates the current interest in pragmatics,
and leads to its development as a separate discipline within linguistics. Grice (1975:
45) defined Cooperative Principle as one of the important principles in conversation
that “make your contribution such as required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the
accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged”.
According to Grice (1975), there are four maxims under this general principle namely,
maxims of quantity, quality, relation and manner.
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The maxim of Quantity:
- Make your contribution as informative as is required
- Do not make your contribution more informative than is required
The Maxim of Quality:

behavior enabling communication to take place between potentially aggressive
partners. Central to interpersonal politeness, Brown and Levinson‟s work is dealt with
two parts; the first part is their fundamental theory concerning the nature of
„politeness‟ and how it functions in interaction, whereas the second part is a list of
„politeness‟ strategies with examples from different languages (Kitamura, 2000).
In the theoretical part of their work, Brown and Levinson introduce the notion
of „face‟ in order to illustrate “politeness” in the broad sense. They confirm that
human beings have two kinds of face, namely “positive face” and “negative face”.
„Positive face‟ is described as the positive and consistent image people have of
themselves, and their desire for approval, whereas “negative face” is depicted as the
desire of every individual to have his/her own actions unimpeded by others (Brown &
Levinson, 1987). Additionally, the researchers assert that face is susceptible to face-
threatening acts (FTAs) such as orders, requests, warnings, remindings and threats,
and accordingly politeness strategies are employed with an aim to reduce the
imposition of FTAs. The significance of FTAs is evaluated in relation to three social
variables: the social distance between the speaker and the hearer, the relative power of
the speaker and the hearer and the ranking of impositions within a given culture
(Brown & Levinson, 1987). On the basis of a combination of these three variables,
speakers decide which of the following strategies to employ:
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1. Bald on record - without redressive action: saying things directly, such as
“Turn the light on”
2. Positive politeness - expressing solidarity: “Be a good boy and turn the light
on”
3. Negative politeness - expressing restraint: using conventional indirectness: “I
wonder if you could turn the light on”
4. Off-record - using non-conventional indirectness: “It's dark in here”
5. Don't do the FTA
(Brown & Levinson, 1987)

is a tool to express Brown and Levinson‟s politeness theory in order for avoiding FTA
by utilizing FSA. Brown and Levinson notice the existence of a “model person” with
two special properties: rationality and face. They try to develop a model of politeness
which would have validity across cultures. The common factor in Brown and
Levinson‟s (1987) approaches is that they all claim, explicitly or implicitly, the
universality of their principles for linguistic politeness. The general idea is to
understand various strategies for interactive behaviours based on the fact that people
engage in rational behaviours to achieve the satisfaction of certain wants.
1.4. CONDITIONALS
1.4.1. Definition of Conditional Sentences
In common sense, conditionals are introduced by “if”, “unless”, or other
conjunctions which are usually interpreted in terms of aspectual or modal verb forms.
Such other conjunctions are often used as unless, providing that/ provided that, as long
as, only if, if only, on the condition that, assuming that, given that, supposed that/
supposing that, and so on. Besides, the term is sometimes employed to refer to the
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entire two-part construction, including protasis and apodosis, which is aimed to
explain a particular situation or circumstance and its consequences.
In linguistics, conditionals are defined in various ways; however, few of them
provide clear-cut definition. For examples, Conditionals in “A Practical English
Grammar” (Thomson & Martinet, 1986) and Conditionals in “Comprehensive English
Grammar for Student” (Murphy, 1961) are only analyzed in lights of structures,
usages and variations. Later, Quirk (1987) came up with an idea which is regarded the
core of a definition about conditional sentence: “Conditional clauses state the
dependence of one circumstance or set of circumstances on another”. Furthermore,
Cobuild (1990) commented that: “Sentences containing conditional clauses are
sometimes called conditional sentences” and according to him, conditional clauses
begin with “if” or with conjunctions having similar meaning like “unless”. Regarding
the functions of Conditional clauses, Haiman (1978) convinces that conditional

“real or possible” situations. Quirk (1972) stated that “The condition leaves
unresolved the question of the fulfilment or non-fulfilment of the condition and hence
also the truth of the proposition expressed by the main clause”. Likewise, Elbaum
(1986) defines this type of conditionals as “condition that has a possibility of
occurring”. It means that these situations take place if a certain condition is met.
Particular case related to First conditional is so-called Zero conditional when
the result of the condition is always true, like a scientific fact such as:
If you heat ice, it melts.
Obviously, Zero conditional is used when the result will always happen; the
result of the condition is an absolute certainty. Regarding sentence structure, it is
necessary to note that two clauses use the present simple tense to talk about the
condition.
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Conditional type II: if + simple past tense + modal verb with future-in-the-
past reference (e.g. would, could, might). For example:
If he studied more, he would pass the exam.
They would buy a new house if they had more money.
Second conditional is called the "unreal" conditional because it is used for
unreal - impossible or improbable - situations. This conditional provides an imaginary
result for a given situation. The verb “to be”, when used in the 2
nd
conditional, is
always conjugated as “were”. According to Quirk (1972), “a hypothetical condition
conveys the expectation that the condition will not be fulfilled”. Later, Elbaum (1986)
stated that “An unreal condition tell about something that is not true or real. It makes a
supposition”. Moreover, Pyle and Munoz (1994) asserted that “The unreal conditional
expresses a situation (past, present or future) that would take place or would have
taken place if the circumstances expressed were or had been different now or in the
past”.

According to Wilamová (2005), pseudo-conditionals are illustrated by If-
clauses in the position of afterthoughts such as …, if I may say so, …, if I were you,
…, if you wanted to, …, if you like, …, if you insist, …, if it comes to that, …, if that
isn‟t an impertinent question, … This group of pragmatic markers is named pseudo-
conditionals because these If-clauses are not truly conditional sentences in their nature
as they syntactically lack the other part of the conditional structure and semantically
they lack the condition which has to be fulfilled before something else can happen
(Wilamová, 2005). Remarkably, Wilamova (2005) indicates that pseudo-conditional‟s
if-clauses are not one hundred percent conditional sentence because of the absence of
a characteristic conditional structure and a condition that should be in the conditionals
fulfilled.
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CHAPTER TWO
“IF” HEDGING AND POLITENESS
This chapter analyzes the pragmatic functions of pseudo-conditionals as hedging
devices in English and Vietnamese basing on Grice‟s theory of Cooperative Principle and
Brown and Levinson‟s theory of Politeness Principle.
2.1. “IF” HEDGING AND COOPERATIVE PRINCIPLE
2.1.1. “If” Hedging and Maxim of Quality
Quality hedges may suggest that speakers do not taking full responsibility for
the truth of their utterance. Using these hedges, the speakers want the listeners to
discern what they are talking about is true in the given conditions but it can be false in
other situations:
If I remember correctly, Ann comes from America.
In the above example, if the speaker only says that “Ann comes from
America.” and she does not know for sure if Ann comes from America, she may
violate the maxim of quality since she say something that she does not know to be true
or false. Nevertheless, by adding “If I remember correctly”, the speaker wants to
confirm that she are observing the conversational maxim of quality.