VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY
HA NOI COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES TRAN THI THANH HUONG TELEPHONE CONVERSATION OPENINGS
IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
(FROM A LANGUAGE-CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE)
Mở đầu hội thoại qua điện thoại trong tiếng Anh và tiếng Việt
(Nhìn từ góc độ ngôn ngữ và văn hóa)

M.A. MINOR THESIS Major: English Linguistics
Code: 60 22 15
HANOI - 2009
VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY
HA NOI COLLEGE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES
DEPARTMENT OF POST – GRADUATE STUDIES
INTRODUCTION 1
1. Rationale 2
2. Aims of the study 2
3. Scope of the study 3
4. Theoretical / practical significance of the study 3
5. Methodology 3
DEVELOPMENT 4
Chapter 1: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND . 4
1.1. Language and culture 4
1.2. The historical development of telephone conversations 5
1.3. Conversation Analysis and Telephone Conversations 6
1.4.Culture and telephone conversations 8
Chapter 2: TELEPHONE CONVERSATION OPENINGS AS COMMUNICATIVE
ACTS 11
2.1. General structure of telephone conversation openings 11
2.1.1. Conversation opening structure 11
2.1.2. Telephone conversation openings 12
2.2. Cross-cultural Communication and Telephone Openings 17
2.2.1. Opening sequence in other cultures 17
2.2.2 Telephone openings in other cultures 18
Chapter 3: COMPARISON BETWEEN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
TELEPHONE CONVERSATION OPENINGS 21
3.1. The receiver’s first turn - individual moves 21
3.1.1. Summon-answer sequence 21
3.1.2. Identification-recognition sequence 23
3.1.3. Greeting sequence 26
3.1.4. How-are-you sequence 27

v
3.2. The caller’s first turn - individual moves 29

Hopper, 1992). The study of conversation openings, particularly on the telephone, has
become prominent for the following particular reasons:
a) Openings are interactionally compact and brief (Schegloff, 1986:112).
b) Generally, at the beginning of a conversation, participants may utilize conversational
strategies or “routines” to negotiate interpersonal relationships (Gumperz, 1982:142;
Schegloff, 1986:113). This also counts for the beginnings of conversations on the
telephone, as co-participants have resources available to them to manage identification and
recognition of one another.
c) Schegloff (1972, 1979, and 1986) describes telephone conversation openings in
American English in terms of an ordered set of four core opening sequences: (1) the
summons-answer sequence; (2) the identification-recognition sequence; (3) the exchange
of greeting tokens (Hi/Hi), and (4) the how-are-you sequence. Accomplishing these tasks
or “routines” is the focus of the first utterances in telephone conversation openings.
d) Another important feature of telephone conversation openings is that they have a
"perfunctory" character (Schegloff, 1986:113). In other words, in opening a telephone
conversation, participants go through these routines in a rather automated manner.
However, in all the studies I have examined Vietnamese is absent in the literature.
Gumperz (1982:166) notes that while speech activities exist in all cultures, there might be
differences in the ways particular activities are carried out and signaled. Using
Conversation Analysis (CA) as the methodology, this study illustrates the cultural
characteristics of the format and interactional routines of opening conversations on the
telephone in Vietnamese and English languages to determine to what extent this data fits
within Schegloff‟s theoretical model of sequencing in telephone openings. At the same
time it will illustrate how the cultural differences within telephone conversation openings
may interfere with speaker‟s intentions and expectations when talking on the phone. 2
Finally, the relevance of my investigation for second language teaching and learning will
be highlighted.
3
In general, telephone conversation openings in both English and Vietnamese follow the
same routine as Schegloff suggested. However, there is slight difference between English
and Vietnamese. In English telephone openings there is higher formality, but Vietnamese
language has more variants which depend on age, power and relationship between speakers
and people from different backgrounds have different ways to start a telephone
conversation.
5. Methodology
The research presented in this paper is based on data in English textbooks and 50
questionnaires on telephone conversation openings. All questionnaires were made by 20
English and 30 Vietnamese speakers, ranging in age between 18 to over 60 years old. The
telephone calls include conversations between acquaintances, colleagues, relatives and
friends. In doing so, the participants were asked to fill in the questionnaires sent to them by
e-mail and given in person. I also did interview some of them.
The first descriptive stage of analysis led to the identification of recurrent patterns in the
data and the recognition of the most evident cross-cultural differences.
In a subsequent phase, systematic comparison across languages was carried out by a
quantitative analysis based on the core sequences framework presented above. It is through
such cross-cultural comparisons that the great relevance to second language learning will
be realized.
Statistics is also used for this study to find out the differences between English and
Vietnamese languages using in telephone conversation openings.
For a better understanding of how the ritual “how are you” sequence in English and
Vietnamese telephone conversation openings, Conversation Analysis (CA) is used as
the appropriate method for investigation of foreign language interaction. The English
translation is provided next to the original talk.
Gumperz writes that speakers of the same language may find themselves separated by deep
cultural gaps, while others who speak distinct languages share the same culture (Holliday,
Hyde, Kullman; 2005: 74-75) 5
„Language and culture do not drive each other, but co-evolve in the same relationship‟ (M.
K Halliday 1992: 11). Each language is adapted to a unique cultural and social
environment, with striking differences in usage patterns (Bauman & Sherzer 1974).
Through language culture affects the way we think (Gumpezs and Levison, 1996: 1).
Language is the principle means whereby we conduct our social lives. When it is used in
contexts of communication, it is bound up with culture in multiple and complex ways.
First, the words people utter refer to common experience. They express facts, ideas or
events that are communicable as they refer to knowledge about the world that other people
share. Words also reflect their authors‟ attitudes and beliefs, their points of view. But
members of a community or social group do not only express experience; they also create
experience through language. They give meaning to it through the medium they choose to
communicate with each other, for example, speaking on the telephone or face-to-face,
writing a letter or sending an e-mail message, reading the newspaper or interpreting a
graph or a chart. The way in which people use the spoken, written, or visual medium
creates meanings that are understandable to the group they belong to, for example, through
a speaker‟s tone of voice, accent, conversational style, gestures and facial expressions.
Language is also a system of signs that have a cultural value. Speakers identify themselves
and others through their use of language; they view their language as a symbol of their
social identity (Kramsch 1998: 3). In other words, there is a strong relationship between
language and culture.
1.2. The historical development of telephone conversations
Robert Hopper states in his book “Telephone conversation” (1992: 25) that the history of
the telephone is tied to our rediscovery of human speaking. During the first decade of the
twentieth century, Ferdinand de Saussure, based on previous philologists and

the prototypical kind of language use, the form in which we are all first exposed to
language – the matrix for language acquisition.‟ (David Nunan: 84)
Conversation analysis is the outstanding empirical tradition in pragmatics, because its data
remain open to any investigator inspection. Any reader may test the claims by inspecting
the transcriptions and recordings used as exemplars (Hopper, 1992:10).
From the very beginning, conversation analysis has been closely linked to the analysis of
telephone conversations. Conversation analysis focuses on the common, everyday
competencies that make everyday social interaction possible. The general strategy in
conversation analysis is to examine actual verbal interactions and recorded telephone
conversations were much used (Holtgraves, 2001: 92).
Conversation analysis is especially applicable to the study of telephone speech and
telephone conversation is among the easiest interaction to tape record. The participants 7
stay at one location and speak into a device that can be easily connected to a tape recorder.
Conversation analysts describe empirical details by participants to one another. Evidence
for analyses includes details displayed in recordings and transcriptions. Recordings and
transcriptions are incomplete copies of actual talk but they are relatively rich and
replayable representations of many speech details. Recordings of telephone conversations
therefore are audible and available. The current volume‟s descriptions of telephone
conversations follow the paradigm and method of conversation analysis. This method is
particularly appropriate for telephone speaking (Hopper 1992: 18-22).
Telephone call openings have been the object of a considerable amount of cross-cultural
and intercultural pragmatic research. The first systematic investigation in this area dates
back to Schegloff‟s (1968) analysis of telephone calls openings in the United States. This
and much of subsequent research was carried out within the Conversation Analysis (CA)
paradigm, which implies careful observation of the details of interactions in order to
uncover how social order is created and reproduced in everyday life. The fundamental
analytic units are moves and sequences.

1977; Levinson, 1983; Sifianou, 1989; Houtkoop-Steenstra, 1991; Lindström, 1994;
Pavlidou, 1994; Hopper & Chen, 1996). Some of these studies use the telephone opening
sequences in American English described by Schegloff (1972, 1979, 1986) as a template in
order to explore how telephone conversation openings in other cultures are carried out
(Houtkoop-Steenstra, 1991; Lindström, 1994; Pavlidou, 1994; Hopper & Chen, 1996).
Their analysis illustrates that although there are similarities in the opening sequences of
telephone conversation, some cultural variations exist as well.
Godard (1977) explored the organization of telephone openings in French and suggests that
some differences exist between summons-answer sequences in French versus American
telephone openings. According to Godard, Americans interpret the answer to summons as
an indication that the channel of communication is open; the French see it as an indication
of the answerer's availability to be interrupted in the middle of what s/he was doing, not of
her or his availability as a partner in the conversation. French callers thus provide an
apology in the opening sequence.
Levinson (1983) agreed that in telephone calls we can recognize the typical components of
an opening section: the telephone rings, and upon picking up the receiver, the person at the
receiving end almost invariably speaks first, either with station identification (name of the
firm, telephone number, etc), or a plain Hello, whereupon the caller produces a Hello, with
a self-identification. If the call is between two close friends or acquaintances we may
expect the exchange of How are you. Then at that point we expect some announcement
from the caller of the reason for the call. Thus telephone conversations have recognizable
openings. 9
In an investigation of Greek telephone openings, Sifianou (1989) found that there is a
greater variety of linguistic options for answering the phone in Greek. In choosing a
particular response type, Greeks can develop a personal style in answering the telephone.
Thus, the answer to a summons may provide the caller with resources for identifying the
answerer.

telephone opening sequences described by Schegloff (1986) and that there are some
cultural variations.
Chapter 2: TELEPHONE CONVERSATION OPENINGS AS COMMUNICATIVE
ACTS
2.1. General structure of telephone conversation openings
2.1.1. Conversation opening structure
Conversations are opened in socially recognized ways. Before beginning their first
conversation of the day, we normally greet each other, as two office workers meet in the
morning.
Jeff: Morning, Stan!
Stan: Hi. How‟s it going?
Jeff: Oh, can‟t complain, I guess. Reading for the meeting this afternoon?
Stan: Well, I don‟t have much choice.
Greetings exemplify openings sequences, utterances that ease people into a conversation.
They convey a message “I want to talk to you.”
Greetings are usually reserved for acquaintances, who have not seen each other for a while,
or as opening sequences for longer conversations between strangers. Some situations do
not require a greeting, as with a stranger approaching in the street to ask for the time:
Excuse me, sir, do you know what time is it? The expression Excuse me, sir serves as an
opening sequence appropriate to the context. Thus, greetings are not the only type of
openings sequences.
Very few conversations do not begin with some type of opening sequences, even as
commonplace as the following:
Eric: Guess what.
Jo: What?
Eric: I broke a tooth.


Marcia: Hello.
Tony: Hi Marcia,
Marcia: Yeah?
Tony: This is Tony 12
Marcia: Hi Tony
Tony: How are you?
Marcia: OHhhh hh I‟ve got a paper b-the yearly paper due tomorrow.
Tony: How about that.
Marcia: heheheh hh I can tell you a lot ab(h)out th(h)at . .
This example shows the four basic parts of phone conversation openings described by
Schegloff (1968) which are stated in Hatch (1992) and Hopper (1992):
1) Summons – answer sequence, consisting of the telephone ring and the first thing said by
the answerer indicating that the communication channel is open;
2) Identification – recognition sequence, i.e. parties identify themselves and/or recognize
each other;
3) Greeting sequence, which can be produced by one party or both; consisting of an
exchange of greeting token „Hi‟;
4) How-are-you sequence and their answer, which may constitute themselves the main
object of the conversation or may be preliminaries leading to the „reason for call‟.
Summons-answer:
Telephone calls begin not with speech, nor with visual pre-beginning, but with a summons-
noise such as a ring. The telephone summons repeat every few seconds until somebody
answers, or till the caller gives up. The summons should be answered by a brief item such
as “Hello”. If the person answering know ahead of time to expect a call, the response may
be a “hi” or “yeah” Self-identification responses such as “Acme Computers” or “Dr.
Jones‟s office” more often mark the communication as business rather than personal. If
you were trained to answer the phone as “Smith residence” or whatever, you will object to

S: hhMom?
Sometimes the intonation is exclamatory or given with falling intonation.
(phone ringing)
E: Hello
S: MOM-my, you‟re home.
Caller may give an immediate self-identification
(phone ringing)
E: Hello
S: Hi mom, it‟s me.
According to Schegloff (1979), these resources for identification are graded in American
phone conversations so that identification from the voice sample aloe is “preferred.” If a
name is given, a first name rather than first and last name is “preferred.” It appears that the
less information needed for identification, the better. When identification falters even for
an instant, however, self-identification is forthcoming, often in the second turn. 14
(phone ringing)
S: hhHello,
D: Hi Sue,
S: Hi.
D: It‟s Dennis.
S: ohh HI, Denis.
Greeting sequence:
Greetings are usually the first utterances in face-to-face encounters. If somebody says
„Hello‟ to you, you return the greeting immediately with a similar greeting. However,
telephone greetings, unlike face-to-face ones, are not first utterances. Summons- answer
and identification / recognition speech pushes the greeting back into the encounter. This
perhaps helps explain the durability of „Hello‟ as a telephone answering turn. An initial
“hello” may retain some greeting function or survive as a vestige of beginning an

E: Hi Sue, How are yuh.
S: Fine, how‟re you.
E: hhh Oh, not so good. I had a run-in with B.
These inquiry-response exchanges do not carry heavy literal content, but they set the
direction for a telephone call. In other words, the how-are-you gives the answerer the
opportunity to capture the first topic of conversation. In some instances, the answer to the
question leads to a multitude of sequences and to a closing before the caller gets around to
the real reason for the call (Hatch, 1992:11).
These four basic parts of telephone conversation openings can be seen in the following
extract:
J: (rings) (Summons)
M: Hello (Answer)
J: Hi, Mary. This is John. (Greeting + identification)
M: Oh, hi John. How‟s everything? (Greeting + How-are-you)
J: I‟m in a very good condition. How are you? (How-are-you)
After this very adjacency pairs, sequences of identification (self- and other- identification,
either by name or telephone number), greeting and counter-greeting usually follow.
Sometimes, when the caller and called already know each other, ritual inquiries like „How
are you?‟ may appear before the partners proceed the main section of the call. In other
words, the opening sections of a telephone call comprises a number of basic or constitutive
sequences, which, however, may vary in their realization from context to context (e.g.
workplace versus home setting, business call versus private call, etc.) and from culture to
culture (Helen Spencer-Oatey, 2000: 124)
2.2. Cross-cultural Communication and Telephone Openings 16
2.2.1. Opening sequence in other cultures
English conversations are often started with the conventional phrase „How are you?‟ which
is a greeting, not a question. However, in fact „How are you?‟ is a kind of cross between a

17
Alexander Graham Bell spoke through a wire to his colleague Thomas Watson in 1876.
"Come here," he said, the first command uttered on a telephone. Around the world,
different cultures have developed characteristic phone manners since Bell's day.
In telephone conversation in the United States, opening sequences serve primarily to
identify speakers and solicit the interlocutor‟s attention. In France, opening sequences for
telephone conversations normally include an apology for invading someone‟s privacy.
Person called: Allô?
Person calling: Allô? I‟m terribly sorry for disturbing you. Can I speak to
Marie-France?
In an American telephone conversation, an opening sequence is not customary. Thus, in
two relatively similar cultures, the role played by the opening sequence in a telephone call
is different. As a result, the French can find Americans intrusive and impolite on the
telephone, while Americans are puzzled by French apologetic formulas, which they find
pointless and exceedingly ceremonious (Finegan, 2004: 313).
No people open a call with more effusive hospitality than the Arabs. Arabs greet each other
with profuse politeness. Whatever the subject of the conversation, it begins with what
seems like five minutes of generally meaningless but absolutely essential greetings.
A ringing phone is answered:
"May your morning be good."
"May your morning be full of light," the caller responds.
"Praise God, your voice is welcome."
"Welcome, welcome."
"How are you?"
"Praise God."
"Praise God."
"What news? Are you well? Your family well?"
"Praise God. How are you?"
"All is well. All is well. Welcome. Welcome."
Only then might the reason for the call be mentioned. And the goodbyes will take almost

might ask. "I wouldn't know what to tell you," is the answer. Business people and
government officials commonly refuse to speak to strangers on the phone even if it
concerns simple inquiries like "Where can I buy one of your vacuum cleaners?" The train
system will not divulge ticket fares or schedules on the phone; you must go to the station
and ask in person. 19
In Russia, "Da" or "Yes" and "Slushayu vas" or "I am listening to you" are common
telephone openings.
In Japan, the person answering will customarily say, "Moshi moshi," the equivalent
of "Hello," or perhaps "Hai," that is, "Yes." If he or she has the right connection, the caller
may say something like "Osewa ni natte imasu," or "I am indebted to you for your
kindness." Sometimes people bow over a phone, although the other party cannot see the
bow. Many older Japanese, who never saw phones until the era of the 1964 Tokyo
Olympics, continue to use ceremonial phrases and bows over the telephone - as if it weren't
there. The standard goodbye is "Ja, mata" "See you later" with the word "Sayonara"
reserved only for occasions of a long or final parting.
Chapter 3: COMPARISON BETWEEN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE
TELEPHONE CONVERSATION OPENINGS
3.1. The receiver’s first turn - individual moves
After the caller‟s summons, i.e. the phone ringing, the person at the other end of the line
picks up the phone and starts speaking. These are the very first words in the call and a
crucial interactional site, where several moves can be performed and social identities and
roles begin to be defined. As Schegloff (1979: 25) notes “The opening is a place where the
type of conversation being opened can be proffered, displayed, accepted, rejected,
modified – in short, incipiently constituted by the parts of it”.
Minimally, one may simply display that the communication channel is open and that the
conversation can proceed. However, it is often the case that other moves are produced in
the receiver‟s first turn, including greetings, self-identification, and offers of availability

Caller: Hi Mum, it‟s me.
Receiver: Hi, where are you?
(Cunningham and Moor, 2005: 171)
Vietnamese use Alo, which is a French word, as an expression uttered in the receiver‟s
first turn only in the context of a telephone call, but not for greeting.
Receiver: Alo?
Caller: Alo. Tôi Đức nghe đây. (This is Duc speaking)
English summons-answers are usually „Hello‟ (88%); „Hello, this is (receiver‟s name)
speaking (12%). Business calls are often opened with „Hello, company‟s name and then
the receiver‟s name. The participants agreed that they regularly say „Hello‟ at the
beginning of the call, however it much depends on situations and who the caller is.
The receiver may answer in the caller‟s language if they know each other. I interviewed an
American and he said sometimes he said „Wei” which is a Chinese word as he worked with
Chinese people. And he opens telephone conversations in various ways which depend on
who calls him. To a friend or his family he would say „Hello. How are you? / How are you 21
doing?‟ or „What are you doing‟; to a colleague „What‟s up‟; to his boss „What‟s going on‟
or „What‟s up‟; and to a stranger it may be „Who is it?‟ English young people aged
between 18 and 25 may start their phone calls with „Hi, how‟s it going‟; „Hey, how are
you‟; „Hey, how you doing‟; „Hiya‟ with their family and friends.
Summons-answers in Vietnamese are different when using table telephones and mobile
phones. With table telephones the receiver usually says „Alo‟, and with mobile telephones
Vietnamese people address each other differently depending on their age and relationship:
„Mẹ à?‟ (Mom?); „Đây rồi‟ (this is me); „Mai đấy hả?‟ (Is that Mai?), Chị/ Anh à; or „Dạ‟
(yes).
„Alo‟ is the most used (53%); „Alo, tôi nghe đây‟ (Alo, I‟m listening) (23%). Some people
answer their telephone calls without summons: 13% starts with „Tôi nghe đây/ Tôi xin
nghe‟ (I‟m listening); „Ai đấy ạ‟ (Who is it?) is 11%.