A Study On Politeness Strategies In Teacher Talk In Senior High School English Classroom

Based on Brown and Levinson's face theory,the study is intended to investigate the senior high school English teachers' politeness strategies employed in classroom talk,especially in questioning and feedback-giving.The research questions addressed in this thesis are:(1)Are teachers aware of students' face wants in classroom teaching?And how do teachers perceive the politeness strategies,especially politeness strategies in questioning and feedback-giving?(2)Whether can teachers satisfy students' face wants or not?(3)How do teachers actually apply politeness strategies in questioning and feedback-giving in classroom teaching? Is there difference between teachers' perception and actual application of politeness strategies in questioning and feedback-giving? If so,what causes the difference?Both quantitative and qualitative methods have been used in this study,including questionnaire,classroom observation and interview.A teachers' questionnaire and a students' questionnaire are used in the quantitative research.The experiment involves 12 teachers and 160 students in grade two from Nankang No.2 Middle School,a senior high school in Ganzhou,Jiangxi Province.The qualitative research includes classroom observation and interviews.The author and her friends use video to record four teachers' classes,one class for one teacher.Then the four teachers are also interviewed.Detailed analysis of quantitative and qualitative research yields the major findings as follows:(1)Most teachers can recognize the importance of protecting students' face and are willing to satisfy their face wants in questioning andfeedback-giving.(2)Students like their teachers to be polite in class.However,even though teachers can realize the significance of attending to students' face wants,still there is a gap between teachers' actual politeness and students' expectation.(3)Teachers can utilize politeness strategies to soften imposition of FTAs.Usually they tend to employ four politeness strategies: bald on record strategy,positive politeness strategy,negative politeness and off record strategy.Considering the characteristic of classroom,off record strategy is rarely used in class.The most frequently used politeness strategies are positive politeness strategy and bald on record strategy,then next comes negative politeness strategy.(4)There is difference between teachers' perception and actual politeness strategies used in class.Even though teachers prefer to employ more indirect and polite strategies,practically,they still often utilize direct strategies.This study is expected to motivate English teachers to use appropriate politeness strategies in class to satisfy students' face and create a harmonious classroom environment.In addition,the limitations of the study are also pointed out.