A Contrastive Study On Gender Differences In Chinese Refusal Speech Act Based On Politeness Theory

Refusal speech act refers to negative responses to requests,invitations,offers,and suggestions,which is face-threatening in nature.In recent years,many scholars have started to pay attention to refusal speech act and a number of related studies have been published,however,gender differences reflected in refusal speech act have been relatively understudied.Males and females belong to different sub-cultural groups.Due to different values,the refusals by the two groups have distinctive linguistic features.Based on this,this paper is going to investigate gender differences of refusal speech acts.The major findings of this study are as follows:(1)In terms of refusal strategies,there are two types of refusal strategies frequently used by males and females: direct refusal strategies and indirect refusal strategies.11 kinds of specific strategies are involved,such as,expressing unwillingness or inability,giving reasons or excuses,providing alternatives.As far as adjuncts are concerned,“warning” is found to serve as a new type of adjunct besides those five types of adjuncts categorized by Beebe(1990).(2)There are both similarities and differences in refusal formulae and strategies used by males and females.Similarities: In all designed situations,the frequencies of indirect refusal strategies are extremely high,and both males and females adopt appropriate politeness strategies.Differences: In different situations,males and females use different refusal formulae and strategies.Males are inclined to criticize or take the interests of themselves or the community as excuses.Females are more likely to take family issues or health problems as excuses.Besides,males tend to use negative politeness strategies while females prefer positive politeness strategies.(3)Different psychological features,social roles,and semantic perceptions may account for those similarities and differences.In conclusion,though there are similarities in refusal speech acts made by males and females,differences are also obvious.Both males and females tend to use politeness strategies but only differ in refusal formulae and strategies,which is not in accordance with the traditional views on gender and politeness.This study aims to figure out gender differences in Chinese refusal speech act based on Brown & Levinson's(1987)and Sara Mills' s(2003)politeness theory,which may enrich related pragmatic and sociolinguistic studies to some extent.This study also sheds light on the successful communication between different genders.