Speech Act Theory and its Application in Chinese EFL Classroom.doc

speechacttheoryanditsapplicationinchineseeflclassroom 作者：yan manzhen 转贴自：跨文化交流杂志 点击数：654 更新时间：2003-12-11 文章录入：joan abstract：to learn a language is to learn how to communicate in that language. but in daily communication with native speakers, many chinese learners of english fail to use english tactfully or appropriately. this article intends to analyze some basic principles of speech act theory and their application in efl classroom. it is concluded that in foreign language teaching, teachers should try to foster learners linguistic competence and pragmatic competence as well. key words：speech act，cross cultural communication，pragmatic competenceintroduction in our daily life, it seems that we live in a world of speeches, because we keep producing “speech acts”. we have the linguistic competence. but it doesnt mean we have the communicative competence in that language. communicative competence is made up three component parts: linguistic competence, pragmatic competence and cognitive and affective capacity.traditionally, in teaching english as a foreign language (efl), the form of english has been emphasized in the efl classroom. it results in the fact that students with good mastery of english forms fail to communicate in english appropriately. here is an example:a foreign guest remarked to a chinese interpreter, a young lady who had graduated not long ago from a university:foreign guest: your english is excellent. really quite fluent.chinese lady: no, no. my english is quite poor. the foreign guest felt a bit puzzled. the foreign guest meant to express his appreciation. in response to this appreciation, the chinese lady should follow some cooperative principles by saying “thanks”. but her reply violated the quality maxim of cooperative principles (grice, 1975). as a result this conversation cant go on.the failure in the communication mentioned above is just an example. in cross-cultural communication, when we speak a foreign language, though our grammar may be correct, we cannot speak it tactfully and appropriately just because of cultural differences. so in foreign language teaching, it is very important to help the students understand the speech acts and the cultural difference between source language and target language. hence in teaching efl in the chinese context, communicative approach takes priority though the forms are important as well.speech acts theoryspeech acts theory makes great contribution to cross-cultural communication. the theory was initiated by the philosopher, j.l. austin in 1962. in his book austins initial distinction is between constative and performative utterances (speech). a constative one is an utterance which roughly serves to state a fact, report that something is the case, or describe what something is. performative utterances, on the other hand, are those that have three characteristics: (a) they are performed in saying something; (b) they cannot be performed unless language is used; (c) they have connected with them performative verbs the occurrence of which as a main verb in a present tense, indicative, active, a first person sentence marks explicit what act a speaker intends to be performing in uttering the sentence. austin suggests that statements are merely one kind of speech act, that any statements, if only they are uttered in appropriate circumstances, may be regarded as implicit performatives. this leads to his new account: any speech act comprises at least two and typically three, sub-acts: locutionary act, illocutionary act and perlocutionary act. according to austin, the locutionary act “includes the utterance of certain noises, the utterance of certain words in a certain construction and the utterance of them with a certain meaning” (austin, 1962: 94). in other words, it is the act of conveying literal meaning by means of syntax, lexicon and extra-linguistic knowledge. as austin puts it, the illocutionary act can be regarded as the force with which the sentence was employed. “saying something will often, or even normally, produce certain consequential effects upon the feelings, thoughts, or actions of the audience, or of the speaker, or of other persons. we shall call the performance of an act of this kind the performance of a perlocutionary act or perlocution” (austin, 1962: 101). perlocutionary act is the consequence of, or the change brought about by, the utterance. j. searle (1969) improved this speech act theory by introducing indirect speech act theory. he argues that, where a certain force is part of the meaning, where the meaning uniquely determines a particular force, these are not two different acts but two different labels for the same act, and he reached the conclusion that there are only illocutionary acts. searle holds that (1) the basic linguistic unit is not a sign, but a speech act; (2) speech acts are controlled by two types of rules: regulative rules (dynamic rules for performing illocutionary acts in communication) and constitutive rules (basic rules recognized as for performing utterance and prepositional acts). “in contrast to austin, who focused his attention on how speakers realize their intentions in speaking, searle focuses on how listeners response to utterances, that is how one person tries to figure out how another is using a particular utterance. what we can see in both austin and searle is a recognition that people use language to achieve a variety of objectives. if we want to understand what they hope to accomplish, we must be prepared to take into account factors that range far beyond the actual linguistic form of any particular utterance” (r. wardhaugh, 1998:285). on the basis of the speech act theory, some linguists have developed theories on word meaning and conversational implicaure. grice (1975) develops his remarkable theory of conversational implicatures. in any conversation, only certain kinds of “moves” are possible at any particular time because of the constraints that operate to govern exchanges. these constraints limit speakers as to what they can say and listeners as to what they can infer. grice calls the overriding principles in conversation “cooperative principles”: “make your conversational contribution such as is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged.” (grice, 1975: p45). he lists four maxims that follow from the cooperative principle: quantity, quality, relation and manner. the most important cooperative principle in human communication is linguistic politeness put forward by leech (1983). he holds in communication, participants should follow the politeness principle of tact maxim, generosity maxim, modesty maxim, agreement maxim and sympathy maxim. but different cultures have different value of politeness and have different expressions in their speech acts. these differences may lead to pragmatic failure in cross-cultural communication. cross-cultural communicationscommunication is dynamic, interactive and irreversible. it usually includes the following components: behavioral source, encoding, message, channel, responder, decoding, response and feedback. successful communication involves the participants mutual understanding and tactful and appropriate verbal exchanges. but the communication between people from different cultural background can more easily go wrong than that from the same culture, because “many of the meanings and understandings, at the level of ongoing processes of interpretation of speakers intent, depend upon culturally specific conventions, so that much of the meaning in any encounter is indirect and implicit. the ability to expose enough of the implicit meaning to make for a satisfactory encounter between strangers or culturally different speakers requires communicative flexibility” (gumperz and cook-gumperz, 1982, p14). foreign language learners need to develop this communicative flexibility, this ability to cross cultural boundaries. different cultures have different expressions in their speech acts. in cross-cultural communication, any utterances can be interpreted to have illocutionary speech acts. however, when we want to translate an utterance with a certain illocutionary act into another language, there may be various kinds of interpretations. the illocutionary force of the utterance may be diminished. for example, “你吃了吗?”(ni chi le ma? “have you eaten?”), “你上那儿去?” (ni shang naer qu? “where are you going?”). these utterances have the illocutionary speech acts of greeting in the chinese context. but if one asks american friends the same questions, the original illocutionary force doesnt exist. the american friends may feel confused at this “inquiry”. w. barnett pearce (1994) analyzes the differences of the performative speech acts (especial in different cultures): (a) differences in coverage of speech acts that people can perform. for example, the remark “you have a lovely wife” is regarded natural and highly appreciated by westerners, but in the chinese context it would be regarded indecent. (b) differences in the diversity of speech acts. for example, people from one culture may express “i love you” in various ways, while people from another culture may express in only one or two ways. (c) differences in rules of performing speech act. in some western countries, it is very common to make promise by swearing to god, but in other countries, it may be regarded insincere. (d) differences in the acceptance of new message. (e) differences in attitude to the conversation. doctors are sensitive to patients intentional runaround while some people pay little attention to speakers intention.obviously, we have to overcome these differences to master the ability of speech acts in order to achieve successful communication. however, it is very difficult to define the illocutionary force of speech acts, thus the problem is how to deal with it to serve for efl teaching effectively. olshtain and cohen offer the term “speech act set” to refer to a single function with a set of structures beyond that of the single utterance, differing from a speech act (single utterance functions) and a speech event (a conversation, a lecture, etc.). olshtain and cohen suggest that speech acts be studied as sets of formulas, which perform the same function by referring to the speech act of apology as an example of analysis. for example, when the offender is positively inclined to apologize, the steps of the formulas may be: step one: an expression of an apology (“im sorry.” “please forgive me”, etc.); step two: an explanation or account of the situation (“i was caught in the rain.”); step three: an acknowledgment of responsibility (“its my fault.”); step four: a promise of non-recurrence (“i will never be late again.”), etc.the study of speech acts and the sets of formulas are very useful in cross-cultural communication, because different cultures, even different communities in the same culture have different rules in performing the speech acts. so sets of formulas of speech acts are important for foreign language learners to perform appropriate communication. speech acts vary in cultures, gender, occupation, etc., which causes great difficulties in our daily communication. it is very important for foreign language learners to understand the cultural differences between the source language and the target language. how to help learners to develop this communicative ability in classroom setting? is it possible to conduct an effective pedagogical approach in efl teaching in nonnative background? this is a challenge to traditional way of foreign language teaching.communicative approach in teaching eflteaching efl in the chinese context is traditionally related to the form of english (phonological, grammar and vocabulary), which a person needs to know about in his communication. “but a knowledge of the form (even when that knowledge is perfect) does not enable a person to communicate” (li, 1987). any language course should aim to help the students acquire not just knowledge of the form but communicative competence. communicative competence in english is made up of three component parts: linguistic competence, pragmatic competence, and cognitive and affective capacity. traditional english course focus only on one dimension of the communicative competence, ignoring the other two. the structuralists believe that “teachers should teach the language, not about the language” (j. c. richards & t. s. rodgers, 1986). on the stimulus-response basis, they claim that foreign language learning is a mechanical habit-formation process. by doing pattern drills and reciting dialogues, the learners are expected to minimize the chances of making mistakes so that they can form a good habit. typical pattern drills include : “ask me if i have seen any movies lately”, “ask me who the screenwriter is”. the students respond grammatical correctly: “have you seen any movies lately?”, “who is the screenwriter?” (yang, 1998) yet, language is not just words and grammar. there is always content when people communicate. “in fact, language is best learnt when it is a medium for learning some other subject or an exchange for affective or humanistic purposes” (li, 1987). students are human beings. they have their cognitive and affective capacity. pragmatic competence (the use of language) is also neglected in traditional and structuralist language courses. actually, this competence “enables students to know how different communicative functions are realized in english, and who can say what to whom, how, when, why, under what circumstances and in what context” ( li, 1987). in efl classroom of the chinese context, teachers should help the learners to develop the communicative competence from the dimensions of linguistic competence, communicative competence and cognitive and affective capability. while teaching the knowledge of forms of english, teachers should also provide information about the usage of english language. for example, the utterance “sit down please” has the illocutionary force of command. its improper to address to a visiting foreign guest. instead, the chinese host should make another utterance with the illocutionary acts of invitation, such as “please take a seat” or “be seated please”. in order to learn standard, decent and universal english, efl learners should be exposed to “authentic language” (li, 1984) of english. “authentic language” is the language that a person uses in real life to achieve communicative purposes. lets look at the following dialogue:billy: excuse me, miss， could you please tell me if this is the way to the business department? miss: yes, it is. go to the far end of the hall, turn right, and youll be there.billy: thank you. by the way, what time do you start work here?miss: we start at eight-thirty in the morning.billy: do you work on weekends?miss: no, we only have a one-hour break for lunch. we open at one oclock in the afternoon.billy: do you work on weekends?miss: yes, but only on saturday morning.billy: how many employees are there in this company?miss: therere about two hundred.billy: do you ever work overtime?miss: yes, but only when were very busy. that rarely happens.billy: are your salaries high?miss: (fu, “two way english” book ii, pp.11-12)this is obviously a pattern-drill practice fabricated by the compiler of the book. in daily communication of our real life, there is a formula of the speech acts set of inquiry. when a passer-by asks the way, he is less likely to ask any unrelated questions. in western countries, asking about salaries is very impolite and rude. in daily communication both the speaker and the hearer will hew to “the politeness and the cooperative principle” (leech, 1983). the following is another dialogue asking the way: p: now you turn right out of heret: into st. aldates?p: yes, into st. aldates and you go back up to carfax, the big crossroad.t: oh, yes, i know, where the clock tower isp: and turn right into the hight: its called the high and not high street, isnt it? p: yes, thats right, the high. then go down the high until you get to a church on your left, thats called st. mary the virgin churcht: st. mary the virgin?p: thats right. and its just there on the other corner, on the other side from the church.t: its right on the corner?p: yes, thats right, opposite the church.t: great, thanks a lot.(li, “communicative english for chinese learners”，book ii，p.55)：this dialogue seems to be a scene of real life. the language is very natural, which means real communication. according to li (1987) “communication is carried out by means of language for the purpose of giving or receiving a message”. “communication entails freedom and unpredictability and it presupposes authenticity of the context and of the language”. in teaching efl in the chinese context, teachers have the responsibility to extend learners knowledge of english language and the english-speaking culture, particularly in relation to the chinese culture.conclusionenglish as an international language plays an important role in cross-culture communication. teaching english as a foreign language in the chinese context should not only include the forms of the language but its social functions as well. “each utterance is an act serving the direct aim of binding hearer to speaker by a tie of some social sentiment or other” (malinowski, 1923). so efl teachers have the responsibility to help students learn about the difference between chinese culture and western culture, and different speech act sets in two cultures. teaching efl in the chinese context should be a course with its objective of development of students competence rather than their formal knowle