A Comparative Study Of Positive Face And Negative Face Among Chinese Students

Politeness is a linguistic phenomenon that exists in all kinds of languages in the world. Many famous linguists abroad such as Grice (1975), Goffman (1967), Lakoff (1973), Leech (1983) and Brown & Levinson (1978, 1983) have done a lot of researches into this phenomenon. In the theoretical frame of politeness studies in the west, Leech's Politeness Principle (PP) and Brown & Levinson's Face-Saving Theory can claim the most influential ones. Leech studies politeness from a perspective of interpersonal rhetoric and emphasizes that Politeness Principle, compared with Cooperative Principle, possesses the regulative function at a higher level. Brown & Levinson, based on the face theory proposed by Goffman, defines face as "the public self-image" that every member wants to claim for himself (1983: 61), and proposes the concepts of Face-Threatening Act (FTA), Politeness Strategies and Formula on Seriousness of FTAs. In China, many scholars such as Gu Yueguo (1990, 1992), He Zhaoxiong (1995) and Xu Shenghuan (1992) have also participated in the research. Of all the scholars, Gu Yueguo can claim the most influential figure, who for the first time proposes the Politeness Maxims with Chinese characteristics.However, regarding the above-mentioned politeness theories, the studies of western scholars are generally based on English context and relate little to Chinese context. Though Gu Yueguo puts forward five politeness maxims that are more adaptable to Chinese context than Leech's six politeness maxims, he has only carried out a study based on generalization of Chinese traditional concept "Li", which lacks empirical evidence. Moreover, his study relates little to positive face and negative face in Chinese contexts.This paper attempts to examine the applicability of Brown & Levinson's view on positive face and negative face in Chinese culture from a pragmatic and sociolinguistic perspective, so as to test whether negative face is more important than positive face in Chinese contexts. It employs statistic data for the first time to analyzethe influence of such social variables as gender and educational background on interlocutors in choosing positive politeness strategy or negative politeness strategy, which, thus, provides empirical evidence to test the applicability of Brown & Levinson's Face Theory in Chinese contexts.This study adopts a quantitative approach. Data are collected through questionnaires distributed among altogether 180 students from Junior Middle School to University in Anhui province, among which, the proportion of male subjects and female subjects is 90:90 and that of junior middle school students, senior middle school students and college students is 60:60:60. Regarding data analysis, SPSS is used to determine whether differences, if any, are significant, and what contributes to those differences.After analysis on data, the writer finds that Chinese people also value negative face more than positive face, and social variables such as gender and educational background have also a significant influence on people's attitude towards positive face and negative face. Statistical evidence reveals that negative face is more frequently valued by women instead of by men in China; as to the social variable of educational background, people receiving college education weigh a little more on positive face than negative face, while people receiving middle school education (both junior and senior) hold the same opinion that negative face is more important than positive face in China.This paper consists of five chapters. Chapter One is a brief introduction. In this chapter, the motivation, purpose, significance and overall design of this paper are presented. Chapter Two is the literature review. In this chapter, the writer classifies the former studies concerning politeness phenomenon both at home and abroad, and reviews Speech Act Theory and various politeness theories. Chapter Three is assigned to introduce the methodology of this paper, the data resource, and the analysis of variables, etc. In Chapter Four, a detailed analysis of the questionnaires completed is carried out, so as to testify the positive face and negative face in Chinese students, and discuss the influence of such social variables as gender, educational background on interlocutors in choosing positive politeness or negative politeness. Chapter Five is the conclusion part. In this chapter, the findings of this paper are concluded, besides, the limitation of this study and the direction to which it can be further explored are also mentioned.