Differences Of Politeness Strategies In English Business Correspondence Written By Chinese And Natives

Politeness is universal and can be perceived in almost every aspect of our daily life. No matter it is daily communication or business communication between corporations, politeness plays an important role in them. At the same time, language is the most important carrier of politeness. Therefore, in recent years, more and more linguists have brought out politeness theories and made efforts to examine politeness as a linguistic phenomenon. Among these theories, there are Leech's Politeness Principle, Lakoff's View of Politeness, Brown and Levinson's Face theory. All these theories lay the foundations for the research on politeness and politeness strategies. English business correspondence is an important way to make communications in businesses. It can not only convey information but also shoulder the responsibility of building up and promoting business relations. So, politeness is a quite important part in business correspondence. This thesis, on the basis of Brown and Levinson's face theory, examines the use of politeness strategies in English bushiness correspondence written by Chinese and English speakers.In this study, 80 selected English business letters are classified and sampled into two groups. Those written by Chinese people are referred to as the Chinese group, while those written by native English speakers are referred to as the Native group. In each group, the letters have been stratified into four classes by the illocutionary acts. Each class consists of ten letters. Before the specific analysis, this thesis explores the linguistic realizations of politeness strategies, according to which the selected 80 are analyzed. Then, specific analyses have been made. First, it analyzes the overall use of politeness strategies in both the Chinese and native groups. Second, it analyzes the influence of the types of correspondence on the employment of politeness strategies. It is found that both the Chinese and natives have adopted some politeness strategies in business correspondence. Compared with the natives, Chinese businessmen neglect the use of negative strategies. And there are also some differences in their application of positive strategies and negative strategies in different categories of business correspondence. As the degree of threat goes higher, negative strategies take a higher portion. In convivial letters, the rate of positive strategies is higher than that of negative strategies. As to the conflictive letters, it is just the opposite.The analyses of politeness strategies in business correspondence in this thesis could make some contribution to the understanding and using of politeness strategies in cross-cultural communication. And it may also provide some insight into the learning and teaching of English in China.