Pragmatic Research On Politeness In Teacher Talk In The Chinese EFL Classrooms

This study is an analysis of Teacher Talk from the pragmatic perspective of politeness. The main purposes of this study are to explain the common features of teacher talk from a new perspective, find out how the politeness phenomenon is manifested in the speech of a teacher and what politeness strategies are adopted by the teachers to show politeness in the Chinese College EFL classrooms.The data were collected from eight English classes at two universities in Hefei. The observed eight classes were audio-recorded and then the interactions between the teachers and the students were transcribed in detail. All the teacher talk recorded was analyzed from the perspective of politeness to confirm the strategies teachers used in classroom to show politeness. Most typical politeness strategies employed by teachers were summarized and interpreted with authentic examples. Students in the classrooms have face wants as they do on other occasions; consequently teachers pay certain attention to the politeness issue. Most teachers in the language classrooms employ similar or same strategies to show politeness concern for students, while the face theory can provide answer to the individual variability of teachers, for they have their own styles to be polite.As to the politeness strategies in instruction, teachers use the following devices to protect their students' face: repeating main points, speaking more slowly, using pauses, changing pronunciation, and simplifying grammar. While questioning the students, teachers usually point out difficulty, use different kinds of questions, ask other students to participate, wait for a while or offer help to students in order to make sure that their face wants are satisfied. In the process of feedback giving, it is found that the following strategies are adopted to realize politeness: acknowledging a correct answer, praising, repeating, summarizing, appreciating, neglecting errors, and encouraging. By these means, teachers pay attention to the politeness issue, redress some unavoidable face threatening acts and protect students' face.By applying the politeness theories to the study of teacher talk, it is proved that politeness study in certain context is very promising. Furthermore, if teacher talk can be analyzed from the pragmatic view of point, then it can provide us with extended vision to explain more about it.