A Comparative Study On Chinese And English Compliments From Cross-cultural Perspective

Since the1950s when John. J. Austin proposed the speech act theory, one of thecore contents of modern pragmatics, the linguistic philosophers and linguists start todedicate to the study of speech act theory with the representatives Austin and Searle.The speech act theory arouses the interest of language philosophers and linguists athome and abroad.In human verbal communication, compliment, as a kind of frequently-used positivecommunication behavior, is the lubricant of communication. Compliment is a politespeech act, is direct or indirect praise which is given from the speaker to the listenerabout his good qualities or possessions. Compliment in human verbal communication,the application range is wide, the use frequency is high. There are rich compliments inboth English and Chinese; they play the irreplaceable functions in the social life. Thereare many differences between Chinese and English compliments. In the west, theresearches on compliments were carried out from different perspectives. Compared withforeign researches, the researches on compliment start relatively late in China. Thedomestic studies on compliment and response have received much attention in recentyears with the development of linguistics in China.With the rapid development of information technology, people from differentcountries with different cultural background communicate more and more frequently.Using compliments and making responses properly plays a very important role ininterpersonal communication. Based on the speech act theory and politeness principleand from the prospective of cross-cultural communication, using the comparativeanalysis method, the thesis mainly studies the differences between Chinese and Englishcompliments on using context, topic distribution, response strategies, compliment form,social function, and rhetoric. It also explores the cultural factors which influence thesedifferences. English and Chinese compliments in use of family, school and theworkplace show obvious differences. In the study of English and Chinese compliments,we find gender differences in the use of compliments and responses. Compared withEnglish compliment, Chinese compliment is carrying more social functions. In terms ofmorphology and sentence patterns, Chinese compliment is more flexible and changeable. Chinese compliments are much richer and with more literary nature in rhetoric andidiom. Both English and Chinese compliments have the characteristics of vagueness.With the development of the times, people’s aesthetic standards also change. Based onthe compliment towards women in the Chinese history, the diachronic changes areshown. All these differences are just because the two countries have different culturalbackgrounds, different traditional values and thinking modes; the application ofpragmatic principles such as cooperative principle and politeness principle is different.Thus it can be seen that Chinese and English compliments reflect the culture andare restricted by culture at the same time. Only by understanding the cultural differencesbetween the two countries, can we use the compliment better--this positive non-verbalcommunication behavior so as to achieve the expected effect of communication.