Requests and Apologies: A Cross-Cultural Study of Speech Act Realization Patterns .

Requests and Apologies: A Cross-Cultural Study of Speech Act

Realization Patterns .

(Published in International multidisciplinary research journal)

Dr Sudhansu Kumar Dash

Introduction

In recent years, the relevance of pragmatics has become increasingly clear to applied linguists. Though the scope of pragmatics is far from easy to define, the variety of research interests and developments in the field share one basic concern is the need to account for the rules that govern the use of language in context. One of the basic challenges for research in pragmatics is the issue of universality: to what extent is it possible to determine the degree to which the rules that govern the use of language in context vary from culture to culture and from language to language? Answers to this question have to be sought through cross-cultural research in pragmatics. For applied linguists, especially for those concerned with communicative language learning and teaching, cross-cultural research in pragmatics is essential in coping with the applied aspect of the issue of universality: to what extent is it possible to specify the particular pragmatic rules of use for a given language, rules which second language learners will have to acquire in order to attain successful communication in the target language? The issue of universality is especially relevant in the context of speech act studies.

 Review of Literature

A number of studies have established empirically (Cohen and Olshtain1981; Kasper 1981; House 1982; Wolfson 1981; Blum-Kulka 1982; Thomas 1983)that second language speakers might fail to communicate effectively (commit pragmatic failures), even when they have an excellent grammatical and lexical command of the target language. In part, second language speakers' pragmatic failures have been shown to be traceable to cross-linguistic differences in speech act realization rules, indicating in Widdowson's terms (Widdowson 1978) that learners are just as liable to transfer 'rules of use' having to do with contextual appropriateness as those of 'usage' related to grammatical accuracy. There have been several attempts in theoretical, as well as empirical work on the speech act of request (Searle 1975,1979; Ervin-Tripp 1976; House and Kasper 1981; Blum-Kulka1984) to set up a classification of request strategies that would form a cross linguistically valid scale of directness. On theoretical grounds, there seem to be three major levels of directness that can be expected to be manifested universally by requesting strategies; The most direct, explicit level, realized by requests syntactically marked as such ,such as imperatives, or by other verbal means that name the act as a request, such as per formatives (Austin 1962) and 'hedged per formative s' (Fraser 1975); The conventionally indirect level; procedures that realize the act by reference to contextual preconditions necessary for its performance, as conventionalized in a given language (these strategies are commonly referred to in speech act literature, since Searle 1975, as indirect speech acts; an example would be 'could you do it' or 'would you do it' meant as requests);Nonconventional indirect level, i.e. the open-ended group of indirect strategies that realize the request by either partial reference to object or element needed for the implementation of the act, or by reliance on contextual clues .On the basis of our empirical work on requests in different languages (House and Kasper 1981; Blum-Kulka, Danet, and Gerson 1983),  have subdivided these three levels into nine distinct sub-levels called 'strategy types', that together forma scale of indirectness. The categories on this scale are expected to be manifested in all languages studied; the distribution of strategies on the scale is meant to yield the relative degree of directness preferred in making requests in any given language, as compared to another, in the same situation. Face-threatening acts (Brown and Levinson, 1978),by making a request, the speaker impinges on the hearer's claim to freedom olfaction and freedom from imposition.

Purpose of the Study

The project concerned with a cross-cultural investigation of speech act realization patterns. The goals of the project are to compare across languages the realization patterns of two speech acts—requests and apologies—and to establish the similarities and differences between native and non-native speakers' realization patterns in these two acts in each of the languages studied within the project. Therefore three objectives are taken for the project.

Objectives of the project

1 To establish native speakers' patterns of realization with respect to two speech acts—requests and apologies relative to different social constraints, in each of the languages studied (situational variability).

2 To establish the similarities and differences in the realization patterns of requests and apologies cross-linguistically, relative to the same social constraints across the languages studied (cross-cultural variability).

3 To establish the similarities and differences between native and non-native realization patterns of requests and apologies relative to the same social constraints (individual, native versus non-native variability).

Methodology

 The theoretical and methodological framework for this investigation has been developed as a result of close collaboration among the participants of the project, which has all followed the same approach in data collection and data analysis. The paper outlines the theoretical framework for the project; present the methodology developed, and illustrate our procedures for analysis by giving examples from the data in some of the languages studied.

Hypothesis

The methodological framework set up for the study of requests and apologies is based on the assumption that observed diversity in the realization of speech acts in context may stem from at least three different types of variability: (a) intra- cultural- situational variability; (b) cross-cultural variability; (c) individual variability. Thus, there might be systematic differences in the realization patterns of speech acts, depending on social constraints embedded in the situation. Requests addressed to superiors might tend, in a given culture, to be phrased in less direct terms than requests addressed to social inferiors, or vice versa. On another dimension, within the same set of social constraints, members of one culture might tend to express a request more or less directly than members of another culture. Finally, individuals within the same society might differ in their speech act realization patterns, depending on personal variables such as sex, age, or level of education. In order to investigate the nature of variability on each of these dimensions, and in order to be able to determine their relative role as compared to each other, the researcher needs to study speech act realization patterns in a variety of situations within different cultures, in cross-culturally comparable ways, across similar situations, preferably involving different types of individuals. Furthermore, in order to establish the ways in which second language speakers' patterns of use differ from those of native speakers, and  needs to establish first how the different intra-cultural sources of variability (situational and individual) account for actual use in the two languages, the learner's native language and the learner's target language.

Universe of the Study

The project focuses on two speech acts (requests and apologies) in eight languages or varieties, divided among the participants of Australian English, American English, British English, Canadian French, Danish, German, Hebrew and Russian. For each language, data are being collected from both native and non-native speakers. The group of informants for each language totals 200, and comprises an equal number of male and female university students in their second and third years of study in any subject but linguistics. Half of the informants are native speakers, and half non-natives.

Procedure of data collection

In order to achieve the above-mentioned goals, we needed an empirical design that would allow us to account for cross-cultural variability, situational variability, and individual variability (of learners) in the realization patterns of the same speech acts.

 Instrument

In order to ensure cross-cultural comparability, it was decided to obtain the data by the use of a controlled elicitation procedure. The instrument used is a discourse completion test, originally developed for comparing the speech act realization patterns of native speakers and learners. The test consists of incomplete discourse sequences that represent socially differentiated situations. Each discourse sequence presents a short description of the situation, specifying the setting, the social distance between the interlocutors and their status relative to each other, followed by an incomplete dialogue. Informants are asked to complete the dialogue, thereby providing the speech act aimed at in the given context. In the following examples of test items, (1) is constructed to elicit a request, and (2) to elicit an apology.

Design of the study

The analysis of the data yielded by the responses to the discourse completion test is based on an independent evaluation of each response according to a number of dimensions. These dimensions have been given operational definitions, presented in the form of a coding scheme. The scheme comprises two main parts—one for apologies and one for requests—and each of these in turn is subdivided into relevant major categories for analysis, further subdivided into sub classifications. The process of developing a coding scheme with its major categories and sub classifications is a major challenge for research of this kind. Originally, the categories were defined on the basis of general theoretical considerations and previous work in the field by members of the team. This scheme was then further modified and refined so as to fit the data yielded in the different languages. The main categories or dimensions of the scheme were kept constant, since they proved to be valid for analyzing the data in the languages investigated. The coding scheme with its major categories and sub classifications are 1 Mood derivable (The grammatical mood of the verb in the utterance marks its illocutionary force as a request). 2. Explicit per formatives The illocutionary force of the utterance is explicitly named by the speakers. 3. Hedged per formative (Utterances embedding the naming of the illocutionary force). 4. Locution derivable (The illocutionary point is directly derivable from the semantic meaning of the locution).5. Scope stating (The utterance expresses the speaker's intentions, desire or feeling).6 Language specific suggestive  formula( The sentence contains a suggestion ).7 Reference to preparatory conditions (Utterance contains reference to preparatory conditions e.g. ability or willingness, the possibility of the act being performed as conventionalized in any specific language).8 Strong hints (Utterance contains partial reference to object or to elements needed for the implementation of the act directly pragmatically implying the act).9 Mild hints' (Utterances that make no reference to the request proper or any of its elements but are interpretable through the context as requests indirectly pragmatically implying the act.

Analysis

The first version of the discourse completion test in English, prepared by the researcher, was pilot-tested with a group of fifty native English speakers at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi ,and Delhi University, where students of almost all the languages of the world have their study and Odisha Tourism ,Bhubanaswar. The goal of the pilot test was to establish the contextual appropriateness of the items in eliciting the speech acts under study, i.e. to check whether the completion items indeed elicited requests and apologies. Dialogues that did not prove to be sufficiently delimited contextually were slightly changed, and the resulting version was administered to another thirty-five native English-speaking students. This version proved to be reliable in eliciting the speech acts under study; it became the master version for the project and was distributed among the members of the research group for translation into each of the respective languages. In the process of translation, each researcher was free to introduce slight cultural and stylistic modifications, as long as the main features of the social context presented by each item remained intact. In addition to such cultural modifications, it was also necessary to differentiate stylistically between different English versions of the test, so as to adapt the style to the different English dialects studied. To date, the test has been administered in seven target languages (except Russian) to one hundred native speakers and one hundred learners. The analysis of the results, now under way, is based on a coding scheme prepared by the researcher.

 The unit of analysis for both requests and apologies in the discourse completion test is the utterance or sequence of utterances supplied   by the informant in completing the test item, provided it realizes the speech act under study. The first problem in looking at the sequence is in deciding whether all of its parts are of equal importance or serve equal functions in realizing the speech act aimed at. In the procedure adopted, the problem is dealt with by analyzing the sequence into the following segments: (a) Address Term(s); (b) Head act; (c) Adjuncts to Head act. The segmentation is meant to delimit the utterance(s) that constitute the nucleus of the speech act (the 'Head act'), i.e. that part of the sequence which might serve to realize the act independently of other elements. For example,  Danny / could you lend me £100 for a week / I've run into problems with the rent for my apartment. The sequence in would be broken down into three parts:

a. 'Danny' Address term

b. 'could you . . . etc' Head act

c. 'I've run into problems...' Adjunct to Head act

 Between room-mates in a student apartment

 A: Would you mind cleaning up the kitchen? / You left it in a mess last night.

B: OK, 111 clean it up.

4b A: You left the kitchen in a mess last night.

B: OK, 111 clean it up.

The point to be considered in contrasting and  is that the same words i.e., 'you left the kitchen in a mess last night' might in one case serve only to strengthen or support an act realized by other verbal means, while in another case, this utterance constitutes the act itself. Thus, utterance B is redundant from a strictly elocutionary point of view, while the same utterance realizes the request. It follows that the segmentations in Head acts and Adjuncts is based on sequential, as well as contextual and functional criteria.

Request

The variety of direct and indirect ways for making requests seemingly available to speakers in all languages is probably socially motivated by the need to minimize the imposition involved in the act itself. One way in which the speaker can minimize the imposition is by preferring an indirect strategy to a direct one, by activating choice on the scale of indirectness. But even after the speaker has decided on the level of directness for performing the acts he still has a variety of verbal means available with which to manipulate the degree of imposition involved. Such manipulations might take the form of either 'internal' or 'external' modifications. Internal modifications are achieved through devices within the same 'Head act', while the external modifications are localized not within the 'Head act' but within its immediate context. In neither case does the modification affect the level of directness of the act, nor does it alter its propositional content elements, manipulating by his or her choice the perspective s/he wishes the request to take. For example the difference between 'could you do it' and 'could we have it done' is one of perspective—'could you . . .' emphasizes the role of the hearer in the speech event, while 'could we . ..' stresses that of the speaker. Given the fact that in requests it is the hearer who is 'under threat', any avoidance in naming the addressee as the principal performer of the act serves to soften the impact of the imposition.

Mitigating the speech act of request might also be achieved by purely syntactic means (compare 'Do it'/'Will you do it?'). Hence the researcher included in the analysis a dimension of syntactic down graders, which enabled him to account for language specific surface structure variations in form independently of strategy type. The use of syntactic mitigation can indicate several different attitudes. For-example, the speaker might wish to indicate that s/he is pessimistic with regard tothe outcome of the request (certain negative usage) or that s/he feels hesitant about making the request (marked modals, such as 'might' instead of 'can'). Syntactic manipulations also serve as distancing elements (past tense) and as hedging devices(embedded 'if clause).The phenomenon analysed on this dimension relates tokinds of modifications available to the speaker for achieving different effects of'softening' the act, a phenomenon widely discussed in speech act literature.  Elements by means of which the speaker avoids specification in making a commitment to the illocutionary point of the utterance, in naming the required

action, in describing the manner in which it is to be performed, or in referring to any other contextual aspect involved in its performance:Elements by means of which the speaker modulates the impact his/her utterance is likely to have on the hearer, achieving the modulation via devices signalling the possibility of non-compliance: Besides the options for decreasing the impact of the speech act, speakers also have available means by which to increase its compelling force.This function of aggravating the request can again be achieved through internal modifications.Elements by means of which the speaker over-represents the reality denoted in the propositions. Lexical intensifiers by means of which the speaker explicitly expresses negative emotional attitudes:The modifications analysed so far are all internal,

i.e., operate within the 'Head act'. In addition to or instead of internal modification,the speaker might also choose to support or aggravate the speech act by external modifications. External modification does not affect the utterance usedfor realizing the act, but rather the context in which it is embedded, and thus indirectly modifies illocutionary force. The speaker prefaces his/her main speech act with an utterance intended to check if the precondition necessary for compliance holds true.The speaker precedes the act by an utterance that can count as an attempt to obtain a precommital.By expressing exaggerated appreciation of the hearer's ability to comply with the request, the speaker lowers the imposition involved.. The speaker  indicates his/her awareness of a potential offense, thereby attempting to anticipate possible refusal.

 Apologies

The speech act of apologizing is rather different from that of requesting, since apologies are generally post-event acts, while requests are always pre-event acts:requests are made in an attempt to cause an event or change one—apologies signal the fact that a certain type of event has already taken place (or the speaker might be aware of the fact that it is about to take place). By apologizing, thespeaker recognizes the fact that a violation of a social norm has been committed and admits to the fact that s/he is at least partially involved in its cause. Hence,by their very nature, apologies involve loss of face for the speaker and support for the hearer, while requests might involve loss of face for both interlocutors.In order for the apology to materialize when these two preconditions exist, must be aware of all the preconditions and infer the need for him/her to apology by  paying  tribute to the social norm , attempts to placate the The linguistic realization of the act of apologizing can take one of two basic forms, or a combination of both. The most direct realization of an apology is done via an explicit elocutionary indicating device  which selects a routinized, formulaic expression of regret (a performative verb) such as: (be) sorry; apologize, regret; excuse, etc.It fulfills the function of signalling regret and thus is intended to placate the hearer.. Another way in which one can perform an apology is to use an utterance which contains reference to one or more elements from a closed set of specified propositions. The semantic content of these propositions

relates to the preconditions (mentioned earlier) which must hold true for the apology act to take place. Thus, in addition to the it, the apology speech act set includes four potential strategies for performing the act of apologizing: (1) an explanationor account of the cause which brought about the offence; (2) an expression of the

S's responsibility for the offence; (3) an offer of repair; (4) a promise of forbearance.In studying apologies, the  researcher, therefore, concerned on the one hand with theselection of an IFID and on the other with an open-ended variety of utteranceswhich must, however, contain reference to the specified set of propositions.As the researcher  has seen so far, the difference in nature between requests and apologiesis such that documentation of verbal realizations requires different criteria foreach of these two speech acts. For requests, the continuum between direct andindirect means available for realizing the act includes for every language a finite set of conventional (indirect) strategies, which are realized in linguistically fixed ways.For apologies, on the other hand, there is no distinct set of mutually exclusive categories comparable to the request strategy types. Instead, we need to establish the presence or absence of the IFID and of each one of the four potential strategies which make up the speech act set. Accordingly, the general procedure for coding apologies used here is based on a series of independent, dichotomous questions:(a) does the utterance in question contain an IFID? (b) does it contain an explanation?(c) does it express speaker's responsibility? (d) does it convey an offer of repair?or (e) does it contain a promise of forbearance?  The answer to any of these questions is affirmative, and the utterance is assigned that category according ly.The first strategy analysed is that of speaker's responsibility.In the attempt to placate heares, speaker often chooses to take on responsibility for the offence which created the need to apologize. Such recognition of one's faultis face-threatening to speaker and intended to appease hearer. The sub-categories for this strategy may be placed on a continuum from strong self-humbling on speaker’s part to a complete and blunt denial of responsibility. Thus, the acceptance of responsibility would be viewed by hearer as an apology, while denial of responsibility would be intended as speaker's rejection of the need to apologize. In the coding scheme the researcher allows for various degrees of 'taking on responsibility'. Explanation, offer of repair, and promise of forbearance, the three strategies which have not yet been discussed in detail, are inherently situation-dependent and are therefore closely related to the type of violation which occurred. Thus,when speaker  intends to justify the offence as resulting from external factors over which she/he has no (or very little) control, then an explanation or account of the situation fulfills the function of an  apology.Such an explanation may be explicitly related to the offence or it may present the 'state of affairs' in a general way, thus relating implicitly to the offence. In situations where the damage or inconvenience which affected hearer can be compensated for, speaker can choose to offer repair in a specified or general manner, intending this as an apology. Lastly, there are offences for which speaker feels the need to promise forbearance. This, in a way, is also admitting responsibility without necessarily stating it explicitly. Examples of the coding categories for the three strategies discussed are:a. Explanation or account of cause b. Offer of repair c. Promise of forbearance.

There are a number of different factors which affect the speaker’s decision to apologize in order to further restore the hearer's face, even at high cost to speaker's face. Perhaps the most significant of these factors is the degree of violation or the seriousness of the offence, as perceived by S. Furthermore, there may be cultural, personal, and contextual elements that influence the decision to apologize, and affect the strategy selection. Culturally, for instance, coming late to a meeting might be perceived asa more serious offence in an American setting than in a comparable Israeli one, and therefore Americans, as a group, will tend to apologize more intensely in this situation.

On the individual level, some people tend to apologize more than others.On the contextual level, the physical setting may be such that an offence can be perceived as more or less serious. Thus, bumping into someone in a crowded bus might be viewed as a considerably lower offence than bumping into someone in an open space. The degree of offence as being assessed in terms of the extent to which it violates norms of behaviorism a given socio-cultural structure and how it affects the interlocutors' role and relationship.Social parameters of distance, power, and age might also contribute, within the cultural setting, to intensification of the apology. Thus, in some cultures the need to apologize to an older person or to a superior may be very pronounced.

Findings

From the answers given to (1) we can learn the preferences native speakers have for realizing a request for action among familiar equals; a cross-linguistic comparison of the answers provided for the same item will tell us whether there are differences in the type of strategy chosen to realize the act under the same social constraints across languages. From the answers to (2) we can tell whether speakers in a given culture consider it appropriate to apologize in the specific situation, and if they do, what strategies they use for realizing the act, as compared to members of other cultures.

Situational variation: The test is also designed to capture possible variability across social constraints. There are eight items eliciting requests, and eight items eliciting apologies, which vary on the social parameters of  social distance and dominance.

Individual variation: Theoretically, it would be possible to capture individual variability along personal variables such as age, sex, level of education, type of occupation, etc., by seeking out different types of populations of informants in each language. In practice, our design at this stage allows for only one dimension of possible personal variance in native use (sex differences), and aims at an otherwise homogeneous population for both native and non-native speakers. On another level, individual variation is being studied by seeking out native and non-native informants for each of the languages studied.

Conclusion

The  project is initiated in an attempt to investigate intra-language and inter-language (cultural) variability in the realization patterns of requests and apologies, with special emphasis on the comparison between native and non-native usage. We would like to conclude this paper by considering some of the basic theoretical and empirical implications raised by this type of research. One of the central issues in the study of speech acts in general is the question of universality: to what extent is it possible to reveal basic pragmatic features for given speech acts, expected to be manifested in any natural language? The analytical framework for the investigation of speech acts developed for this study is based on a series of working hypotheses regarding what constitutes possible candidates for universal features of requests and apologies. For requests, three such working hypotheses regarding universal features guided our work: (a) in requesting behavior it is possible to distinguish among central phenomena such as strategy types as different from internal and external modification;(b) requesting behavior is inherently based on choices from a variety of options ranging from direct to indirect ones;(c) the scale of indirectness encompasses at least three main types of options (direct, conventionally indirect, andnon-conventionally indirect).For apologies, two working hypotheses are relevant: in apologies it is possible to delimit linguistic markers of pragmatic force (IFIDs); and (b) additionally (or alternatively) to IFIDs, apologies can be realized by reference to a set of specified propositions.The above hypotheses have been translated into operational dimensions fordata analysis. The classification of the CCSARP data along these dimensions is thusa constant challenge to the possible universality of the pragmatic feature captured\by each dimension.Another facet of the issue of universality relates to the degree and nature ofpossible cross-cultural variance in speech act realization. The use of the same empirical framework for the analysis of data from the CCSARP languages is expectedto reveal this degree of variance. Thus, for example, the distribution of request strategy types for the situations represented by the test will enable us to determine general cultural preferences along the direct/indirect continuum. Furthermore,cross-linguistic comparison of the distribution of request strategy types along the same social parameters should reveal the differential effect of these parameters on strategy selection.The nature of cross-linguistic variance is expected to be revealed by further analysis of the data, via the sub-classifications within each dimension. These sub classifications represent a repertoire of pragmalinguistic options; languages mightdiffer in the range of options included in the repertoire, in the degree to which these options are realized and in the manner in which they combine to realizethe speech act in actual use. It should be added that the full nature of language specific pragma-linguistic features will probably be revealed only by further qualitative analysis of the request and apology data in each of the languages studied.The analysis of CCSARP data so far seems to be in line with the basic assumptions underlying the study. Namely, on the one hand the phenomena captured by the main dimensions are validated by the observed data, and thus might be regarded as potential candidates for universality; on the other hand, the cross linguistic comparative analysis of the distribution of realization patterns, relativeto the same social constraints, reveals rich cross-cultural variability.The CCSARP project, as outlined in this paper, is admittedly an ambitious undertaking. Hence a word of caution is called for; the phenomena captured by the analytical framework of the project are not to be regarded as an exhaustive description of requests and apologies, but rather as reflecting our present understanding of the speech acts studied. Subsequent stages of the project will, we hope,deepen this understanding.

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