（外国语言学及应用语言学专业论文）基于顺应理论的英语间接拒绝语研究.pdf

摘 要 i 论文题目： 基于顺应理论的英语间接拒绝语研究 论文题目： 基于顺应理论的英语间接拒绝语研究 专 业： 外国语言学及应用语言学 专 业： 外国语言学及应用语言学 研 究 生： 研 究 生： 指导教师： 指导教师： 摘 要摘 要 本文是用顺应理论对英语中的间接拒绝语进行的理论性研究。间接拒绝是一 种面子威胁行为，因此是一个语言毗邻对中不受人欢迎的应答部分。对于间接拒 绝语国内外许多语言学家和学者从不同方面进行了研究，有人从语用方面研究表 达拒绝语的策略，有的从二语习得方面研究拒绝策略的迁移，还有的从社会语言 学方面研究影响拒绝策略的因素和从认知方面研究拒绝语的认知模式等。但是， 很少有人从认知语用方面来对间接拒绝语的交际过程进行系统的分析研究。本文 以 verschueren 的顺应理论和 brown and levinson 的礼貌理论为基础，建立了一 个间接拒绝语的顺应模式，认为间接拒绝语的使用过程是一个复杂的动态顺应过 程，在这个过程中，间接拒绝者为了实现自己的两个基本的交际目标即行为目标 （不答应或者不同意发话人的发话行为）和互动目标（维护面子或者减少因不同 意发话人而造成的面子损失，从而维护双方关系的和谐）而对具体语境的相关因 素进行顺应，从而做出相对礼貌的语言选择来对发话人的发话行为进行回应。这 个过程从答话人的交际目标开始，以表达间接拒绝的语言选择结束，从而实现或 接近交际目标。其中最重要的部分是语境，它和交际者的语言选择相互顺应，从 而使语境动态地生成。在这个过程中起着重要作用的是礼貌因素，它不仅对答话 人的交际目标产生影响，还对顺应过程中语境因素的顺应以及语言形式的选择都 产生重要的影响。 通过实例分析，我们发现顺应理论是语用学中具有强大解释力的理论，它能 从认知，社会和文化等方面对一些言语行为进行科学的解释。我们在此基础上建 立的顺应模式能够科学地分析英语中间接拒绝语的交际过程，因此，这个模式具 有很强的可操作性。同时，我们也发现了间接拒绝语的一些特点及其产生这些特 点的原因。比如，有时候间接拒绝言语行为并不能完全实现答话人的两个交际目 标。当这种情况出现时，间接拒绝者一般情况下会放弃互动目标，而采用直接拒 绝来实现其行为目标。在对交际双方的三个世界的顺应过程进行对比分析后，我 们发现，对于间接拒绝者来说，一般情况下，顺应对方的三个世界中的某些因素 摘要 ii 会比顺应自己的三个世界中的因素更容易实现或接近自己的交际目标。间接拒绝 的危险性来自于语言本身的可协商性，正是这种可协商性导致间接拒绝语意义的 不确定性，从而给对方重新协商的机会，因而使交际目标不能实现。这些是本研 究的理论意义。从实践上来看，本研究能帮助我们从语言形式中辨别交际者的交 际意图，指导我们在日常交际中怎样成功的拒绝别人。在教学上，可以帮助提高 学生对听力的理解及技巧从而提高听力水平。 关 键 词：关 键 词：间接性，拒绝，间接拒绝，礼貌，顺应理论，语境 论文类型： 论文类型：应用研究 abstract iii subject: study on indirect refusal based on the adaptation theory specialty: foreign linguistics and applied linguistics name: supervisor: abstract this is a theoretical study on indirect refusal. indirect refusal is a dispreferred second part of an adjacency pair in daily communication, since it is a face-threatening act. many linguists and scholars abroad and at home paid much attention to the study of it from perspectives of pragmatics, second language acquisition, sociolinguistic, cognitive linguistic, etc. but few studies from cognitive pragmatic perspective can give us a systematic analysis from the literature we obtained, which leaves us the space to do this study. this study，utilizing the adaptation model for indirect refusals (amir) based on the newly developed and famous pragmatic theory- adaptation theory, analyzes the communicative process of indirect refusals in english in the hope of understanding and explaining indirect refusal as the dynamic and complicated process in which the respondent adapts to correlates of the specific context and makes conscious linguistic choices to satisfy his two basic communicative goals (not complying with the initiation proposed by the initiator and maintaining face or saving face lost of the speaker which is caused by not complying with the initiator in order to keep a harmonious relationship). the process starts with the communicative goals and ends with the linguistic choice of indirect refusal as the realization or approaching to the communicative goals. the main part of this dynamic process is the adapting to context which is interadaptable with linguistic choices. it is just because of the interadaptability between the linguistic choices and context that context is generated and dynamic. through this study, we find that the adaptation theory is a powerful theory in pragmatics, and it can explain many pragmatic phenomena from cognitive, social and cultural perspectives from their uses in form of speech acts. the adaptation model built in this study is scientific and operable. for indirect refusal makers, sometimes, they can not meet or approach both of their communicative goals at the same time. when this happens, they will normally give up the interactional goal, just as in example two abstract iv and example three, and turn to use direct refusals to obtain their actional goals in order to be efficient. by comparing and analyzing the examples we collected, we find that, for the indirect refusal maker, it is generally easy to obtain his or her communicative goals by adapting to the factors of the initiators three worlds rather than those of the respondents. we also find that the risk of indirect refusals, in fact, comes from the property of negotiability of language itself which makes the meanings of indirect refusals indeterminate, and leaves the initiator chances to renegotiate. in practice, this study is of help in distinguishing the communicative goals of ones indirect speech act or the speakers meaning from the surface forms of language. it can also guide us to successful use of indirect refusals in our daily communications. it can improve students listening comprehension and hence improve their listening achievements. key words: indirectness, refusal, indirect refusal, politeness, adaptation theory, context dissertation type: applied study list of abbreviations vii list of abbreviations amir adaptation model for indirect refusal cfvc contrary-to-face-value communication fta face threatening act h hearer s speaker list of figures viii list of figures fig 3.1 the contextual correlates of adaptability.27 fig 3.2 the adaptation model for indirect refusal.28 chapter two literature review 1 chapter one introduction refusal is a common pragmatic phenomenon since it is inevitable for us to refuse to do something against our own willingness in daily communication. this chapter is the brief introduction to the studies of refusals made by relevant linguists and scholars abroad and at home in the past several decades, the objective and the significance of this study. the last part is the formation of this thesis. 1.1 introduction refusals are the dispreferred second parts of an adjacency pair in communication and they often threaten the interlocutors face. it is always embarrassed for both the receiver and maker of refusals to accept them because both of the interlocutors have their face want. so when refusals have to be used without any other choices, the realizations often involve politeness or some pragmatic strategies to maintain the communicators face or to mitigate face-threatening. thus indirect refusal becomes an important strategic responding act to express the respondents disagreement or disapprobation with the initiators initiating act such as request, order, invitation or command, etc. beebe and her colleagues taxonomy (1990) (see 2.1) of refusal reminds us that there are more strategies to refuse indirectly than directly. since 1980s, scholars abroad and at home start their researches on refusal. some study the strategies adopted to make refusal from the pragmatic perspective, (rubin, 1983; william turnbull chen, 1995, etc.). some, from the perspective of cross-cultural communication, study the similarities and differences of refusals between two languages (ma yuelan, 1998; wang aihua, 2001; yao jun, 2003, etc.). some study refusal strategies transfer from second language acquisition perspective to help sla learners acquire the pragmatic and cross-cultural communication competence (rubin, 1983; beebe and her colleagues, 1990, etc.). and recently gong ping (2006) from the cross-cultural communication perspective, proposed a cognitive model for refusal speech act. all of these studies contribute to the development of the study of refusals. but few studies can give us a specific analysis on the communicative process of indirect refusals in daily communication. hence it becomes necessary to make such a study so that we can have a clearer view about masters dissertation of henan university of science and technology 2 them and use them technically in our daily communication when it is needed in order to make our communication more smooth and harmonious. 1.2 objective of this study this thesis, from the cognitive pragmatic perspective, aims to analyze the communicative process of indirect refusal in english using the adaptation model which is based on the adaptation theory. the communicative process of indirect refusal is regarded as a dynamic and adaptive process in which the indirect refusal maker adapts to the relevant elements of context and chooses linguistic choice strategically to meet his two communicative goals. in doing so we aim to find how the indirect refusal are operated and hence to help us understand better the use of indirect refusal in different circumstances appropriately in daily communication. 1.3 significance of this study by proposing the adaptation model for indirect refusal based on the adaptation theory, this thesis is believed to contribute theoretically to the study of indirect refusal. the analysis of the communicative process of indirect refusal in specific context will find some of the reasons why indirect refusal has such characteristics such as risky and intentional. it will also help us have a better understanding of the specific usage of indirect refusal in specific context; therefore, it will help us have a felicitous communication in english when we are communicating with native english speakers and when refusal becomes needed for one reason or another. at last, it will help students to improve their understanding ability and listening comprehension and hence improve their listening scores. 1.4 overview of this thesis in chapter one of this thesis, we make a simple introduction of the objective and the significance of this study. chapter two is the literature review in which we survey the studies on indirect refusal, finding what have been found, their shortcomings and what is needed to be studied further. in chapter three we introduce the related theories such as politeness theory, adaptation theory and propose a pragmatic model of indirect refusal in english which is based on the adaptation theory. chapter four is the body chapter two literature review 3 part of this thesis, in which indirect refusal in english will be analyzed using the pragmatic model with the materials we collect in some english works and other materials. the last chapter is the conclusion part of this thesis. we will draw a conclusion of what we find in this thesis and of the weakness of this study. masters dissertation of henan university of science and technology 4 chapter two literature review the subject investigated in this thesis concerns the indirectness of language and refusal speech act. in this chapter we will review the achievements made by scholars in this field. first studies on indirectness of language will be reviewed, followed by those of refusal speech act. we will review what scholars have found and what is neglected and still needs us to make further study. finally a conclusion about indirect refusal will be made according to the review of the previous study by the author, which will make contribution to later analysis of indirect refusal. 2.1 indirectness of language indirectness is a common phenomenon of our human language (he zhaoxiong, 2000: 119). it is “any communicative behavior, verbal or nonverbal, that conveys something more than or different from what it literally meanswhich in context could not be defended as ambiguous between literal and conveyed meaning(s), and therefore provides no line of escape to the speaker or the hearer”(brown and levinson, 1978: 134). he zhaoxiong shows us two circumstances under which people use language indirectly. one is that the speaker intentionally chooses to use indirect language for one reason or another when he or she has a choice between direct and indirect language; the other is that the speaker is forced to use indirect language without other choices. for indirect refusal, the speaker is supposed to be intentional, so the second circumstance does not fall into the circle of our concern, only the intentional indirectness of language does. 2.1.1 searle according to searle, indirectness is about the “cases in which one illocutionary act is performed indirectly by way of performing another” (searle, 1975: 60). it is concerned with the phenomenon that the speaker utters a sentence, means what he says, and also means something more than what he said. searle classified the indirect speech act into two kinds: the conventional indirect speech acts and non-conventional indirect speech acts. conventional indirect speech acts refer to those indirect speech acts that are performed by way of conventionally chapter two literature review 5 used sentence structures or expressions, or by using illocutionary force indicating device. for example, when we hear the following sentence could you pass the salt? we will directly interpret them as polite request rather than as inquire of ones ability of passing the salt. non-conventional indirect speech acts refer to those indirect speech acts whose illocutionary forces have to be inferred, based on the mutual knowledge, the cooperative principle and the principle of politeness as well as the ability on the part of the hearer to make inferences in contexts of situation. for example, a: would you like to have tea? b: tea would make me awake. in this pair of utterances, bs implicit meaning (drinking tea or not) cannot be deferred from the literal meaning of his/her utterance, the hearer can only interpret it by reasoning within the context to obtain the real meaning of the speakers utterance. that is to say, conventional indirect speech act depends less on the communicative context than non-conventional one. in most cases, indirect refusals belong to the latter because the realization of the function of indirect refusals depends much on the context of the communication and also the cooperation of the hearer. 2.1.2 dascal dascal (1983) thinks that indirect expression is costly and risky which requires more processing time by both the utterer and interpreter. in order to interpret indirectness, a complex set of devices is supposed to exist and the sharing of many specific assumptions is also needed. if not, the risk of misunderstanding appears. dascal (1983: 159) gave a good description of the motivation of indirectness in interaction. he clarifies the motivation for indirectness into the following four kinds: (1) there is no alternative. speaker can only express what they mean indirectly. (2) speaker may have a quite precise thought to express, but the circumstances are such that they prevent him from conveying it directly to the listener (e.g., a social taboo). (3) indirect speech provides a means for the speaker to convey something while at the same time eschewing (full) responsibility for what he is conveying. (4) indirectness is used to save face. in this kind of classification, the first two kinds of the use of indirectness are the masters dissertation of henan university of science and technology 6 circumstances in which the utterer is forced to choose indirect expression because they have no other way or they are required to do so for some reasons, while the latter two are intentional because, by using the indirect expression, they can express something more than they literally mean which is just what they want to express to the hearer. 2.1.3 thomas thomas (1995: 124) described elaborately the factors which govern indirectness in all languages and cultures in his book meaning in interaction: an introduction to pragmatics. according to thomas, indirectness occurs when there is a mismatch between the expressed meaning and the implied meaning. the main factors are: (1). the relative power of the speaker over the hearer; (2). the social distance between the speaker and the hearer; (3). the degree to which x is rated an imposition in culture y; (4). relative rights and obligations between the speaker and the hearer. thomass study is mainly from the socialinguistic perspective, these factors thomas describes can be classified into the circle of communicative context in our study which is one of the objectives the indirect refusal maker adapts to. this is instructional to our study of indirect refusals. thomas also explained the reasons why people tend to use indirect speech acts. he lists four reasons of intentional indirectness: (1). the desire to make ones language more/less interesting (2). to increase the force of ones message (3). competing goals (4). politeness /regard for “face” (thomas, 1995: 143) here thomass study of the reasons of peoples using of indirect speech act is of particularly helpful to our study, especially the competing goals and politeness to the building of our adaptation model. indirect refusal is a representative indirect speech act, so competing goals and politeness / regard for “face” apply to it as well. 2.1.4 clark and locastro clark (1998: 100-103) listed the six properties of indirect speech acts: (a). multiplicity of meanings. indirect speech act generally have more than one meaning of illocutionary force. (b). logical priority of meanings. the several chapter two literature review 7 meanings of an indirect speech act are not conveyed in parallel. (c). rationality. the logical contingency between any two meanings of an indirect speech has a rational basis. the speaker must assume that he and the addressee have “shared knowledge.” besides, his utterance must be relevant. and he must adhere to certain conventions of such speech act. (d). conventionality. there are conventions for the use of indirect speech acts. (e). politeness. for many indirect speech acts, one of the main purposes is, perhaps, to achieve politeness between interlocutors. (f). purposefulness. indirect speech can be used to get people to believe that something is true (with assertions) or to get people to do something (requests). locastro (2003: 120 cited from qiu tianhe 2006: 32) also identified the