A Contrastive Analysis Of Criticism Speech Acts In English And Chinese

In human communication, criticism is as important and indispensable as other speech acts, such as: compliments, apology, thanks, etc., as it serves as bridges that engender understanding and connect individuals together. When performing a criticism, people use particular communication strategies during social interaction, which is a universal phenomenon in all societies. Nevertheless, the strategies adopted could vary from culture to culture. What strategy do people prefer during the performance of criticism? What factors influence people's communicative strategies?Interpersonal communication is a topic of concern by pragmatists and sociolinguists. They propose that a certain maxim or principle should be abided by when people communicate among themselves. The various forms of the conversational styles and the selection of the communication strategies should all be based on the conversational maxim. Austin initially put forward the speech acts theory, and Searle systematized it and formulated his indirect speech acts theory; and Grice proposed the Co-operative Principle (CP), and after him, Leech and other scholars put forward Politeness Principle (PP) to complement CP. Brown and Levinson later put forward the 'face theory', which raises the Politeness Principle to a new practical height. Verschueren has stated that communication is a dynamic process in his adaptation theory, while Halliday is in favor of the dynamic context theory. The present writer adopts Halliday's and Verschueren's theories as the standard and principle that influence and control criticism strategies.