Application of Cooperative and Politeness Principles in English Business Letter Writing 英语毕业论文.doc

CONTENTSAbstract.1Introduction.1Chapter 1 A Brief Study of English business letters.31.1 Definition of English business letters.31.2 The classification of English business letters.31.3 Stylistic features of English business letters.4Chapter 2 Statement of Cooperative Principles and Politeness Principles.9 2.1 Grices Cooperative Principle.92.2 Lakeoffs theory of politeness.102.3 Leechs Politeness Principle.10Chapter 3 The Application of Cooperative Principles and Politeness Principles in English Business Letters Writing.123.1 The Application of Cooperative Principle in English Business Letters Writing.123.2 The Application of Politeness Principle in Good-news English Business Letters Writing.143.3 The Application of Politeness Principle in Bad-news English Business Letters Writing.18Conclusion.24Notes.25Bibliography.26Acknowledgement.27Application of Cooperative and Politeness Principles in English Business Letter Writing Abstract: English Business letters are an important means and play a significant role in business activities. English business letters are regarded as the lifeline of modern business communication. The significance of English business letters determines the application of cooperative strategies and politeness strategies, that is, what language forms are used to present the politeness of the English business letters.The paper, on the basis of Grices cooperative principle and Leechs politeness principle introduces the definition and stylistic features of English business letters, and deals with the 7C principle, revealing the application of cooperative principles and politeness principles in English business letter writing .The thesis provides a descriptive analysis on the application of cooperative strategies and politeness strategies in the English business letters. However, the application of politeness strategies is variously manifested, among which similarities and differences coexist. Hopefully, this thesis can be of some help and give some inspiration to business people working on English business letter writing as well as those teachers involved in teaching of English business letter writing.Key words：English business letters; 7C; Cooperative Principle; politeness strategies 摘 要：英文商务信函是商务交际的一种重要方式，在商务活动中发挥着重要的作用，并被看作是现代商务交际的生命线。英文商务信函的这一重要作用决定了在英文商务信函中必须注重礼貌策略的运用，即采取何种语言形式来使信函表现得更加礼貌。本文以格赖斯的合作原则和利奇的礼貌原则为基础，介绍了英语商务信函写作的定义和特点，以及7C原则，集中研究了合作原则和礼貌原则在商务信函写作中的运用。本文采取了描述性的分析方式，对合作策略和礼貌策略在英文商务信函中的应用作了分析，然而，在英文商务信函中所应用的合作策略和礼貌策略却不尽相同，既存在着共同点，也存在着差异性。希一望此研究对从事英文商务信函写作的工作人员及英文商务信函写作教学的教师们提供一定的帮助和启示。关键词: 英语商务信函; 7C原则; 合作原则; 礼貌原则IntroductionWith the rapid development of the world economy, business communication between nations becomes more and more frequent. As the lifeblood of modern business, business letter is an indispensable part in business communication, both within a company and with external contacts. Business letter has the purpose of communicating a message to sell products, to make an adjustment, to collect money, and so forth, and at all times to maintain goodwill for business organizations. Therefore, we can say that business letter is really an image-maker in business communication. Successful business letter will reflect a business organizations good image and create a positive impression on the recipients, so it will help to build a good relationship between each other. In business letters, politeness and cooperation are the most important motivating factors of choosing what kind of language should be used and what kind of approaches to arrange the letter, which are the important means that can help to establish and maintain social bonds with others in communication. It is also necessary to consider the counterparts feelings so as to establish levels of mutual comfort and promote rapport, as well as to accelerate and facilitate communication. Companies establish and maintain their image in the business activities through the application of cooperative and politeness principle, which also consolidate long standing business relationship with each other.Many researchers in the study of composing good business letters usually employ Cooperative Principles(CP) and Politeness Principles(PP) as their theoretical background and conclude seven C principles (courtesy, consideration, completeness, clarity, conciseness, concreteness and correctness) from them to serve as standards in judging effectiveness and efficiency of business letters. Today we will research the means how to apply the cooperative and politeness principles to the English business writing. Hopefully the research will help to create more effective business transaction and will be helpful to teachers in teaching English business letter writing and people who work on English. Chapter 1 A Brief Study of English business lettersThe business letter is the basic means of communication between twocompanies.It is estimated that close to 100 million business letters are written each workday.It is a document typically sent externally to those outside a company but is also sent internally to those within a company. Business letters are regarded as the lifeline in business ommunication, therefore, it is necessary to write them successfully, and politeness should be paid more attention to the business letters.1.1 Definition of English Business LettersBusiness is the activity conducted by organizations of paid people working together to produce and market goods and services for profit. Thereby, business communication is the process of transacting meanings through written, oral, and nonverbal messages internal and external to organizations of paid people working together to produce and market goods and services for profit. Written communication in business is extremely important because you can refer back to what was said. Business letters are letters written in a formal language, usually used when writing from one business organization to another, or for correspondence between such organizations and their customers, clients and other external parties. Business letters have been regarded as the lifeline of modern business. It is an act of business communication by means of the written message between the businesses parties involved.1.2 The Classification of English Business LettersAccording to common practice, English business letters may be classified from various angles. The most common ways of classification are as follows:1) Classification is made according to the contents of the letter. The followings are among the most frequent in use: request letters, letters answering requests, claim and adjustment letters, credit and collection letters, sales letters, employment letters and social business letters, etc. 1 2) Classification is made according to the different functions in the process of a business transaction of the letter. Business letters may be used in every phase of business activities. There are letters for establishment of business relations, letters for the inquiry of business. There are quotation letters, negotiating letters, ordering letters, confirming order letters, payment letters, shipment and insurance letters, acknowledging goods receipt letters, claim letters and so on.3) Classification is also made according to the nature of the information given. There are usually three broad categories of business letters, namely routine letters negative news letters persuasive letters. Each of the three categories is to be inspected separately in the study as each of them has its particular characters concerning the degree and types of FTAs. Therefore, differences in the distributions of politeness strategies among the three categories are expected.Since English business letters have so many types, it is impossible in this thesis to make a complete and clear classification. It is noticeable that there is an overlap between some types of letters suggested above, so sometimes it is difficult to distinguish one kind of letters from another. 1.3 Stylistic Features of English Business LettersBased on Cooperative and Politeness principles, seven Cs, courtesy, consideration completeness, clarity, conciseness, concreteness and correctness, are concluded as principles of business communications. They provide guidelines for choice of contentend style of presentation, adapted to the purpose and receiver of the message delivered.1.3.1 CompletenessA business English letter is very successful and highly effective well only when it contains all the necessary information to the readers (the counterpart or the public) and answers all the questions and requirements put forward by the readers.In order to verify the completeness of what you write, five Ws (who, what, when, where and why) and one h (how) should be used. For example，if what you write is a letter of order，you should make it clear that who wants to order，what he wants，when he needs the goods，where the goods to be sent and how payment will be made .If some special requirements should be put forward, you would explain why you would do so. Incompleteness of a business letter will lead to the counterparts unfavorable impression toward your firm or even the miss of a deal.1.3.2 ConcretenessAny kind of practical English writing should be specific, definite and persuasive instead of being vague, general and abstract. In a general and vague message, everything seems to be mentioned but actually few are fully expounded. The readers only have a vague impression of what you try to achieve, so he or she is at a loss how to react upon reading your message e.g. We wished to confirm our telex dispatched yesterday. It is not suitable to be used here. The sentence should be changed into:We confirm our telex of July 2nd, 2000.July 2nd is a definite and specific concept, containing concrete message. From the example, we can clearly see that when writing a business letter, concreteness must be always stressed. In order to give the readers a clear and definite impression, its better to use specific facts, figures and time. 1.3.3 ClearnessClearness is one of the main language features of the practical English writing. The so-called clearness is to make sure that what you write is so clear that it cant be misunderstood. So it is advisable to write on 一not above or below一the level of the readers understanding and to make the reader understand the main points without thinking deeply Therefore, when writing a business letter, we should make clear whom or what the pronoun refers to. And whats more, we should also pay attention to the relations between the relative pronoun and the antecedent, or the readers will find it difficult to understand.1.3.4 ConcisenessConciseness is often considered to be the most important writing principle and language feature. It enables to save both the writers and the recipients time. Conciseness means we should clearly express what we would do in a short and pithy style of writing as possible as we can without sacrificing completeness, concreteness and courtesy. Compare the following pairs of sentences e.g.a. wordy: I wish to express my heartfelt gratitude to you for your kind cooperation.b. concise: Thank you for your cooperation.The second sentence is concise, for the writer tries to use everyday expressions and modern English, avoiding wordiness, out-of-date commercial jargons and unnecessary repeat.1.3.5 CourtesyCourtesy is an important language feature of international business letters. A letter expressed in the way of refined and courteous urbane can make yourself set up an honest and enthusiastic image in the eyes of the readers who will be glad to cooperate with you and serve you wholeheartedly. Courtesy not only means politeness, but also means thinking about the interests of the customers and offering the customer convenience in his work. In order to achieve courtesy，wed better use more expressions with the meaning of joy, willingness, thanks, regret; and more expressions with requesting tone and more mitigating expressions, such as please(kindly)，we are afraid that.，we would (might)say，we would suggest，Thank you for，we would appreciate it and so on.1.3.6 ConsiderationA letter functions well if it can deeply impress influence on its recipient. To gain such a favorable impression and influence, we should put ourselves in the position of the recipient, taking into consideration his demand, hope, interests etc. Everybody may have his own inconveniences. Thoughtful consideration enables us to better understand our recipient, thus our requirement will be more practical and understandable. Therefore，when writing，it is better for the writer to take the recipients attitude, namely,“You”attitude and try to discuss problems in a positive way .Please compare the following sentences:a. We allow a 5% discount for cash payments.(“We” attitude) b. You earn a 5% discount when you pay cash.(You attitude)1.3.7 CorrectnessPractical English writing for international business, especially, business letters often are bases for various commercial documents such as contracts, agreements, so they are concerned with the rights, obligation, etc. of the two sides of a trade, the fact of which must attract the writers special attention. Therefore, the expression in business letters must be correct and the facts, words and figures must be accurate and should not be overstated or understated.Now we have a clear idea of the language features of business English letters and we also know how to bring about these seven Cs. A good and appropriate business letter should have all the seven language features, which embody in the words, sentences and tones. Any one of the features is equally important to the other features and we can not achieve one feature by sacrificing the others so as to create good will and leave good impression on the reader and avoid disputes. As for whatever sort of business English letter, the manner of speaking is very important. Its better to write in a polite, respectful and positive way, showing your willingness to cooperate. Even if the customer has done something unsatisfied, wed better point out in a tactful way. Chapter 2 Statement of Cooperative Principles and Politeness PrinciplesCooperative Principle and Politeness Principle are the two very important principles in the buisness letter writing. Many scholars like Grice, Lakoff, Leech have made great contribution to the research and studies of these two principles. Here I will give a concrete illumination of each major contribution.2.1 Grices Cooperative PrinciplePaul Grice (1975) proposed that all speakers, regardless of their cultural background, adhere to a basic principle governing conversation. Grice then broke his principle down into four basic Maxims which go towards making a speakers contribution to the conversation cooperative: (i) The maxim of quantity; (ii) The maxim of quality: try to make your contribution one that is true; (iii) The maxim of relation: make your contribution be relevant; (iv) The maxim of manner: be perspicuous, and specifically. 2The above-mentioned maxims specify what participants have to do in order to conduct communication in a maximally efficient, rational and cooperative way. In order to achieve a particular communicative goal, people often deliberately violate the Cooperative Principle. Politeness often accounts for the violation of some maxims of the Cooperative Principle. Obviously, only being cooperative is not enough, people should be polite in order to save their own or others face.Grices Cooperative Principle cannot account for some deliberate linguistic strategies or skills in communication. As a result, it gives room for the development of politeness theories.2.2 Lakoffs Theory of PolitenessLakoff (1973) was among the first to adopt Grices construction of Cooperative Principle in an effort to account for politeness. Lakoff refers to politeness as a device used in order to reduce friction in personal interaction and proposes to integrate politeness with Grices Cooperative Principle in the following two rules of Pragmatic Competence:Be clear, which amounts to Grices maxims, andBe polite, which breaks down into three rules of politeness. The three rules of politeness are from the perspective of the speaker, adapted as follows:Rule 1:Dont imposeRule 2: Give optionsRule 3: Make hearer feel good She later reformulates the rules of politeness as follows: 1) Formality: keep aloof 2) Deference: give options 3) Camaraderie: show sympathy 3Lakoff argues that politeness may be manifested through behaviors other than linguistic ones and indicates that a linguistic behavior which is polite in one setting may be neutral or even rude in another setting. In that sense no linguistic behavior can be judged as being inherently polite or impolite unless investigated in context.2.3 Leechs Politeness PrincipleGeoffrey Leech proposes to supplement Grices Cooperative Principle with the Politeness Principle. By putting forward his Politeness Principle, Leech establishes himself as another key contributor to the research on politeness.Leech initially adopts the framework set out by Grice and formulates his Politeness