HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

CODE: 26

FACULTY OF ENGLISH
-----

-----

GRADUATION THESIS
B.A DEGREE IN ENGLISH STUDIES
A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF THE UTTERANCES CONTAINING
IMPLICATURES IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE CULTURE
(Based on Utterances from Funny Stories)

Supervisor

: Nguyen The Hoa, M.A

Student

: Hoang Thi Yen

Date of birth

: 20/11/1994

Course

: K19 (2012-2016)


At this stage of research accomplishments, I would first like to thank my
supervisorMr. Nguyen The Hoa of the Fulculty of English at Hanoi Open
University. He consistently allowed this paper to be my own work, but steered
me in the right the direction whenever he thought I needed it.
I would also like to acknowledge Faculty of English, Hanoi Open
University, all my teachers and the librarians for providing favorable conditions
for my study to be implemented.
Finally, I must express my very profound gratitude to my parents and to
my friends for providing me with unfailing support and continuous
encouragement throughout my years of study and through the process of
researching and writing this thesis. This accomplishment would not have been
possible without them. Thank you.

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)


Graduation Paper

TABLE OF CONTENTS
DECLARATION
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF ABBREVIATION
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES
PART A: INTRODUCTION............................................................................... 1
1. Rationale ...................................................................................................... 1
2. Aims and objectives of the study ............................................................... 3
3. Scope of the study ....................................................................................... 3
4. Research questions...................................................................................... 4
5. Methods of the study .................................................................................. 4

2.1.1. Violating the Maxim of Quantity ..................................................... 23
2.1.2. Violating the Maxim of Quality ....................................................... 24
2.1.3. Violating the Maxim of Relation ..................................................... 27
2.1.4. Violating the Maxim of Manner ...................................................... 29
2.2. Funny stories in Vietnamese ................................................................. 32
Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)


Graduation Paper

2.2.1. Violating the Maxim of Quantity ..................................................... 32
2.2.2. Violating the Maxim of Quality ....................................................... 34
2.2.3. Violating the Maxim of Relation ..................................................... 38
2.2.4. Violating the Maxim of Manner ...................................................... 39
2.3. Discussion ............................................................................................... 41
2.3.1. The violating of maxims in English and Vietnamese ..................... 41
2.3.2. Similarities between English and Vietnamese implicatures........... 43
2.3.3. Differences between English and Vietnamese implicatures .......... 45
2.3.4. Summary ........................................................................................... 48
CHAPTER III. SUGGESTION SOME STRATEGIES TO TRANSLATE
THE UTTERANCES CONTAINING IMPLICATURES ............................. 49
PART C: CONCLUSION.................................................................................. 52
REFERENCES

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)


Graduation Paper

LIST OF ABBREVIATION

one due largely in part to the great difficulty in understanding people’s cognitive
processes when they communicate.Each of nations has their own language and
culture; therefore, Vietnamese learners of English have to encounter with a
variety of issues in understanding this language. Moreover, along with social
exchanges, the utterances usually contain implicature, making people confused
in the communication. As Geoffrey Leech (1983, p.34) argues “we cannot really
understand the nature of language itself unless we understand pragmatics”. Thus,
melting the theory of pragmatics is the key step to improve the ability of using
language.
Pragmatics deals with the study of language in use in different contexts. It
did not appear as an independent branch of linguistics until 1960s and 1970s. As
a branch of pragmatics, the theory of implicature experienced along history and
can be traced back to relations with Semiotics and the Theory of Deviation.
However, in 1967, the theory ofimplicature was formally suggested by Herbert

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)

1


Graduation Paper

Paul Grice (1913-1988), an English linguistic philosopher. He introduced the
technical notion of implicature in systematizing the phenomenon of meaning one
thing by saying something else. In introducing the notion, Grice drew a line
between what is said, which he understood as being closely related to the
conventional meaning of the words uttered, and what is conversationally
implicated, which can be inferred from the fact that an utterance has been made
in context. Since Grice’s seminal work, implicatures has become one of the
major research areas in pragmatics.In particular, some of the best-known works

provide the background of implicature, help Vietnamese learners understand
deeply messages of funny stories and realize the value of implicatures in the
funny stories.
2. Aims and objectives of the study
The thesis aims at:
• Providing background knowledge of implicatures.
• Comparing and contrasting English and Vietnamese implicatures in terms
of maxims.
• Pointing out the value of implicatures in the funny stories.
3. Scope of the study
Scopeof the study is limited to analyze implicature in some selected
English and Vietnamese funny storiesin terms of Cooperative principal and
maxims.The writer studies on Vietnamese funny stories in“1001 truyện cười dân
gian xưa và nay” (Hung Danh, 2000), and English funny stories in sources from
internet.

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)

3


Graduation Paper

4. Research questions
• What is the role of implicature in English and funny stories?
• What are similariries and differences between English and Vietnamese
implicatures?
5. Methods of the study
• Contrastive analysis
• Collecting available information, statistics from related material and



Graduation Paper

PART B. DEVELOPMENT
CHAPTER I. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
1.1.

Overview of discourse analysis

1.1.1. Definition of discourse
Since the 1960s of the twentieth century, the discourse analysis has
become a scientific movement thrived in Europe and become a central concept
which is widely circulated in the social sciences and humanities. However,
discourse analysis did not receive much attention from Vietnamese linguists until
the end of the twentieth century.
According to Crystal (1992, p.25) discourse is “a continuous stretch of
(especially spoken) language larger than a sentence, often constituting a
coherent unit, such as a sermon, an argument, joke or narrative”.
Nunan (1993),whocomesfrom amorelinguisticbackground, takes an even
different cut at the definition of discourse. He uses text to refer to the written or
tapedrecord of a communication event and discourse to refer to the interpretation
of that event in the context in which it occurs. According to him, “discourse can
be defined as a stretch of language consisting of several sentences, which are
perceived as being related in some way. Sentences can be related, not only in
terms of the idea they share, but also in terms of the jobs they perform within the
discourse – that is in terms of their functions”.

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)




Graduation Paper

Discourse analysis began in branchesof philosophy,sociology, linguistics,
and literary theory, and it is continuing to develop in additional disciplines such
as anthropology, communication, education, and psychology.One of the most
prominent scholars is Yule (1997, p.139), he states in his study of language that
“In the study of language, some of the most interesting questions arise in
connection with the way language is used, rather than what its components
are…We were, in effect, asking how it is language - users interpret what other
language-users intend to convey. When we carry this investigation further and
ask how it is that we, as language users, make sense of what we read in texts,
understand what speakers mean despite what they say, recognize connected as
opposed to jumbled or incoherent discourse, and successfully take part in that
complex activity called conversation, we are undertaking what is known
discourse analysis”.
ForNunan (1993), what he calls discourse analysis involves language as it
is being used, whereas text analysis is concerned with patterns and regularities
that occur in written language, such as phonemic or grammatical analyses. In
other words, discourse analysis is concerned with patterns and regularities in
language but also with the people using language (what they mean and the
purpose to which language is put) and the context in which it is used.
In short, discourse analysis is a branch of linguistics that deals with the
largest unit of language in communication – discourse or text. It considers the
ways that the use of language presents different views of the world and different
understanding.

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)



9


Graduation Paper

terms, then, we can think about pragmatics as the study of the contribution of
context to meaning.
Utterances are not only dependent on the physical context for their
interpretations, they are also closely related to the language surrounding them
(co-text). Hence, according to Brown and Yule, the more context there is, in
general, the more secure the interpretation is. (1983, p.50)
In summary, context plays a vital role in discourse analysis. Context
makes clear interpretation and is references among words and sentences.
1.2.

Utterance meaning

Utterance meaning is defined as what a speaker means when he makes an
utterance in a certain situation. In other words, utterance meaning is contextdependent and the meaning of an utterance is determined by the context in which
it is used.
According Austin, there are two kinds of utterances: constative and
performative utterance. A performative utterance is one that actually describes
the acts that it performs. It brings about a state of affairs such as bids, blessings,
promising, firings, arrests, complaints, marrying. For instance, “I promise to pay
you tomorrow” is performative because in saying it the speaker actually does
what the utterance describes. In constrast, a constative utterance is one which
makes an assertion, i.e it is often the utterance of a declarative sentence, but is
not performative.
According to Nguyen Thien Giap (2014), the utterance meaning refers to

developed and practiced as an application of structural linguistics to language
teaching. As regards its definition James, C. (1980, p.3) declares:
“Contrastive Analysis is a linguistics enterprise aimed at producing
inverted (i.e. contrastive, not comparative) two-valued typologies (a C.A. is
always concerned with a pair of language), and founded on the assumption that
languages can be compared.”
James also claims that there are three branches of two-valued (two
languages are involved) interlingual linguistics: translation theory – which is
concerned with the process of the text conversion; error analysis; and contrastive
analysis – these last two having as the object of enquiry the means whereby a
monolingual learns to be bilingual. Among these branches of linguistics, C.A.
seems to be the most effective way in comparing between the first language and
the second language as well as a pairs of languages foreign language learners are
learning.

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)

11


Graduation Paper

Contrastive analysis is defined, according to James (1980), as a form of
interlanguage study and a central concern of applied linguistics. As a matter of
fact, C.A. has had much to offer not only to practical language teaching, but also
to translation theory, the description of particular languages, language typology
and the study of language universals. In relation to bilingualism, C.A. is
concerned with how a monolingual becomes bilingual; in other words, it is
concerned with the effects exerted by the first language on the foreign language
being learnt. Thus, C.A has been a preferable method used by Vietnamese

gap between what is literally said and what is actually said. Yule (1996, p.36)
adds that implicature is a primary example of more being communicated than is
said but in order for them to be interpreted, some basic cooperative principle
must first be assumed to be in operation. Furthermore, Grice as quoted by
Levinson (1992, p.97) explains that the term of implicature to be a general cover
term to stand in contrast to what is said or expressed by the truth condition of
expression, and to include all kinds of pragmatics.
In Vietnamese pragmatics, some Vietnamese linguists mentioned the
notion of implicature on their works or books. Cao Xuan Hao (1995) considered
that a sentence includes two meaning: propositional meaning and illocutionary
meaning. In his opinion, “We can see that there are two different parts basing on
“content” or “meaning”. A part occurs on sentence by itself (propositional
meaning) separating from all of the events, the other brings another meaning
(illocutionary meaning) when it is used in a particular event.” The notion of
propositional and illocutionary meaning of Cao Xuan Hao is quite similar with
the notion of explicature and implicature of Nguyen Duc Dan (1998). The
illocutionary meanings/ implicaturesare supposed the meaning of speech.
Grice

divides

implicature

into

conventional

implicature

and

C.I, a listener must have already parsed the sentence, assigned it its literal
interpretation, realized that additional inferences must be added to make it

Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)

14


Graduation Paper

conform to the Griceanmaxim, and determined what these inferences are. Such
activity could not reasonably affect the initial steps of parsing.”
(Clifton & Ferreira, 1989)
Nguyen Thien Giap (2000) says that in conversation, to understand what
the speaker wants to communicate, the listener must be aware of not only the
explicit meaning drawn from the literal meaning of the words and the structures
of the utterance, but the implicit meaning inferred from what is said.
Related to conversational implicature and its reasons, Cao Xuan Hao
raised a question why people avoid saying explicitly or indicating literal meaning
instead of saying implicitly, which sometimes challenges the hearers. He showed
that conversational implicatures were produced because of the complicated
requirements of social communication, of the interaction in community, of the
distinctive culture and of the trends towards the beauty.
Grice (1975, p.26) states C.I is triggered by “certain general features of
discourse” rather than by the conventional meaning of a specific word.
Grice

introduces

conversationalimplicature:

Graduation Paper

generalized conversational implicature is implicature that arise without any
particular context or special scenario being necessary.
Levinson (1983, p.126) defines Generalized conversational implicatures
occur without reference to any particular features of the context. In other words,
special background knowledge or inferences are not required in calculating the
additional conveyed meaning. Grice (1989, p.37) states this type of implicature
is characterized by, “the application of a certain form of words in an utterance
(in the absence of special circumstances) would normally carry such
implicature”.
Particularized Implicature
A particularized conversational implicature is one which depends on
particular features of the context. Lakoff (1993, p.107) defines particularized
implicature is implicature that needs context or cultural understanding must be
assumed. Particularized implicature is a conversational implicature that is
derivable only in a specific context.
1.4.3. The Cooperative principle
The success of conversation depends on the various speakers approach to
the interaction. In order to explain how hearers interpret the utterance
implicature, Grice introduced the Cooperative Principle (CP). The CP is a basic
underlying assumption we make when we speak to one another is that we are
trying to cooperate with one another to construct meaningful conversations.
Grice (1975) proposes the CP which states “make your conversational
contribution such is required, as the stage at which it occurs by the accepted
Hoang Thi Yen - 1271A06 (2012 - 2016)

16