A Comparative Study Of Requests In Cross-cultural Communication

It is known to all that requests are a good example of speech acts which imply an intrusion on theaddressee’s territory. In a request the speaker imposes on the addressee to a greater or lesser extent. Makingthe requests more polite decreases imposition and helps keep a good relationship. If requests are not madeappropriately, the desired goal may not be reached or the relationship may be damaged. Recent researchhas shown that producing appropriate requests and responses and identifying them accurately are importantaspects of communicative competence, as they can be very tough for language learners in the cross-culturalcommunication. Requests and responses vary from culture to culture. This paper reports a systematiccomparative study on requesting behavior between English and Chinese. It has two objects:(1) to discoversimilarities and differences of requesting behavior between the two groups, and (2) to reveal the differentnorms and values that govern the differences between the two cultures.I focus my study on request strategy; request perspective; request modification; the theoretical basisof requests; politeness principle and face work; cultural difference related to politeness in request betweenthe English and Chinese speakers.Studies show that similarities and differences in requests between English and Chinese exist along anumber of dimensions.(1) Conventional indirectness is the most preferred strategy for requesting in English. And socialdistance appears to be the motivating factor in the realization of request behavior in British English. Nativespeakers of Chinese, on the other hand, show an overwhelming preference for a conventionally direct baldon-record strategy in most face to face interactions. As a matter of fact, relative power is positivelycorrelated with this request strategy.(2) The English show a preference for hearer-oriented requests. They pay more attention to (attachgreat importance to) negative politeness, and seem to be more sensitive to considerations of privacy whenrequesting. While the Chinese display a strong preference for the use of a speaker-oriented requestperspective.(3) Both English and Chinese requests show a very high incidence of internal modifications. However,the English prefer more syntactic devices in internal modifications as mitigators whereas native speakers ofChinese tend to use lexical devices like terms of address and other politeness markers. It should be alsoborne in mind that Chinese speakers place greater emphasis on the use of terms of address, which marksocial distance and relative power.(4) The Chinese tend to state reasons in requests more frequently in comparison to the English speakers.Unlike the English, who pay more attention to negative politeness, the Chinese attach great importance topositive politeness in requests.(5) There seems to be distinct difference in terms of the types of request response between the twogroups. In English cultures, direct ‘yes’ or ‘no’ response to a request is often considered to be polite whilein Chinese, a clear-cut ‘black-or-white’ utterance and ‘yes/no’ response are often avoided. Hedges like ‘woxiang’ or ‘wo yi wei’(I think),‘yexu (perhaps)’,‘dagai (probably)’, etc. are often used.In daily life, it is undoubtful that requests play a very important role in the communication. In thispaper requests are studied on both grammatical level and pragmatic level, which may be helpful inconducting requests felicitously as well as making appropriate request responses.The thesis involves six parts. Part one is the introduction, embracing literary review of requestingbehavior, theoretical and practical significance of the comparison, and the purpose and format of the thesis. Part two is concerned with the theories which requests are based on, including Co-operative Principle,Politeness Principle and Face Work, Face and Politeness in English and Chinese Context, etc.. Part threedeals with the difference in request strategies between the two cultures, at the same time reveals thecultural difference that governs requests and responses. Part four concerns the difference in requestperspective and Part five shows the similarity and difference in terms of request modification. Part six, thelast part of the thesis, serves as the conclusion.