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It is widely believed that language is a popular and useful tool for human beings in all societies. Different cultures have their own languages. Therefore, language helps people not only communicate with each other but also acquire other communities’ cultures. In fact, the relationship between language and culture has been taken into account by many researchers and linguists until now. There are many different opinions around this issue; however, all arguments lead to a common point about the social interaction between these two items. As Them (2000, p.119) said, language is a product as well as an important part of culture. Similarly, this point is shared by Hudson (1981): “As for the relation between language and culture, most of language is contained within culture” and Goodenough (1957): “A society’s language is an aspect of its own culture…The relation of language to culture is that of part to people”. Language and culture are two factors playing important roles in communication. Once language is combined with culture effectively, it is likely to establish a successful communication. In communication, encouraging strategies which help people be confident are very important. According to Fleishman, “most of us, swimming against the tides of trouble the world knows nothing about, need only a bit of praise or encouragement and we will make the goal”. In fact, encouragement is really useful for people in any cases, even in simple ones. For instance, children who have enthusiastic support from their parents may learn better than others. Another example showing the necessity of encouragement is that disabled people would have enough strength to cope with all difficulties they have to encounter if they are supported by the whole society. Obviously, the role of encouragement is undeniable. However, this point has not received as much attention from Vietnamese researchers and linguists as it should be. As mentioned above, encouragement plays an important role in a variety of aspects of life. It is considered as a type of speech act common in both American and Vietnamese cultures. This study only focuses on a specific situation in which the role of encouraging strategies is also incontrovertible. It is in two reality shows named American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010. American Idol and Vietnam Idol are two reality shows proving a popular attraction for audiences in both these countries. This study may help viewers have a closer look into encouraging strategies employed in these two programs, and the similarities as well as the differences in the ways American judging panels and Vietnamese ones use to encourage the candidates if any. In addition, these findings hopefully make positive contributions to the success in Vietnamese American crosscultural communication.
PART A: INTRODUCTION 1. Statement of the problem and rationale for the study It is widely believed that language is a popular and useful tool for human beings in all societies. Different cultures have their own languages. Therefore, language helps people not only communicate with each other but also acquire other communities’ cultures. In fact, the relationship between language and culture has been taken into account by many researchers and linguists until now. There are many different opinions around this issue; however, all arguments lead to a common point about the social interaction between these two items. As Them (2000, p.1-19) said, language is a product as well as an important part of culture. Similarly, this point is shared by Hudson (1981): “As for the relation between language and culture, most of language is contained within culture” and Goodenough (1957): “A society’s language is an aspect of its own culture…The relation of language to culture is that of part to people”. Language and culture are two factors playing important roles in communication. Once language is combined with culture effectively, it is likely to establish a successful communication. In communication, encouraging strategies which help people be confident are very important. According to Fleishman, “most of us, swimming against the tides of trouble the world knows nothing about, need only a bit of praise or encouragement - and we will make the goal”. In fact, encouragement is really useful for people in any cases, even in simple ones. For instance, children who have enthusiastic support from their parents may learn better than others. Another example showing the necessity of encouragement is that disabled people would have enough strength to cope with all difficulties they have to encounter if they are supported by the whole society. Obviously, the role of encouragement is undeniable. However, this point has not received as much attention from Vietnamese researchers and linguists as it should be. 1 As mentioned above, encouragement plays an important role in a variety of aspects of life. It is considered as a type of speech act common in both American and Vietnamese cultures. This study only focuses on a specific situation in which the role of encouraging strategies is also incontrovertible. It is in two reality shows named American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010. American Idol and Vietnam Idol are two reality shows proving a popular attraction for audiences in both these countries. This study may help viewers have a closer look into encouraging strategies employed in these two programs, and the similarities as well as the differences in the ways American judging panels and Vietnamese ones use to encourage the candidates if any. In addition, these findings hopefully make positive contributions to the success in Vietnamese American cross-cultural communication. 2. Research aims and research questions This study aims to investigate common strategies employed by the American & Vietnamese judging panels to verbally encourage the candidates in American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010. Subsequently, the similarities as well as the differences in the ways American & Vietnamese panels apply these encouraging strategies could be found out. Additionally, this study is expected to contribute to provide for viewers, especially Vietnamese ones who are interested in these two reality shows, a critical look into the cultural factors leading to these differences. With a view to achieving the above aims of the study, the research questions guiding the investigation are as follows: 1. What are the common strategies the American & Vietnamese judging panels use to express verbal encouragement to the candidates in American Idol 2010 & Vietnam Idol 2010? 2. What are the similarities and differences in the ways the American & Vietnamese judging panels apply these strategies in the two reality shows? 2 3. Significance of the study It is hoped that the findings of the study will contribute to provide a realistic look into encouraging strategies used by the American and Vietnamese judging panels in the two reality shows: American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010. The study, therefore, could identify potential distinctions between American and Vietnamese customs reflected in their use of encouraging strategies in these two reality shows. Moreover, the study is expected to strengthen the cross-cultural communication between people from the two cultures: American culture and Vietnamese one. 4. Scope of the study It is widely known that encouraging behaviors are reflected through both verbal and nonverbal communication. This study, however, focuses only on verbal encouraging strategies employed by the judging panels in these two reality shows. Nonverbal communication (including paralinguistic and extra-linguistic factors) is not discussed in this paper in spite of its considerable importance in real-life communication. In addition, only judging panels in American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010 are within the scope of this study. Other elements such as audiences, candidates and other versions of Idol are not taken into consideration in this study. 5. Organization The study consists of 3 parts, each of which takes responsibility for a particular function. Part A: Introduction This part presents the overview of the study including statement of the problem and rationale for the study, research aims and research questions, significance, the scope and the organization of the study. 3 Part B: Development Chapter 1: Literature review In chapter 1, all the terms as well as the key theoretical concepts that the study is based on are clearly explicated so that the next parts of the study can be easily followed by readers. Chapter 2: Methodology This chapter describes the participants and instruments of the study. Additionally, the procedure applied for collecting and analyzing data for the study is introduced. Chapter 3: Results and discussion Chapter 3 presents the results of the study that the researcher investigates from the collected data based on the two research questions. Besides, it provides a detailed discussion about the employment of encouraging strategies by the judging panels in these two reality shows. Part C: Conclusion A summary of the study, the major findings, the implications, the limitations as well as suggestions for further studies are all mentioned in this final chapter. 4 PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW 1.1. Cross-cultural communication 1.1.1. Culture There is a variety of definition of culture from time to time. According to Levine and Adelman (1993), culture is “a shared background (for example, national, ethnic, religious) resulting from a common language and communication style, customs, beliefs, attitudes and values”. In this definition, the researchers tend to emphasize the association between language and communication to make a full culture. Similarly, Triandis (1994) defines culture “as a set of human- made objective and subjective elements that in the past have increases the probability of survival and resulted in satisfaction for the participants in an ecological niche”. Besides these ways of defining culture, Kluckhohm (in Clyne’s) hypothesizes: “Culture is the patterned ways of thinking, feeling and reacting, required and transmitted mainly by symbols, constituting the distinctive achievements of human groups, including the embodiments of artifacts; the essential core of culture consists traditional ( i.e. historically derived and selected) ideas and especially their attached values. (Cited in Thanh & Trang, 2006, p.4) Within the limitation of the paper, the definition which seems to be the simplest one of all is Ferrando’s. He says that “culture is everything that people have, think or do as a member of a society”. (Cited in Nguyen Quang’s lectures notes) 1.1.2. Communication 5 Communication is an integral factor in all spheres of life. It is an effective tool helping people share all beliefs, values, ideas and feelings with each other. Communication, therefore, is very familiar with human beings. However, it seems to be quite difficult to find out the only definition for it. Up to present, there are hundreds of definitions of communication. Linguists, based on different features of communication, try to give their own distinct ones. As defined by Beisler (1997), communication is “the transmission from one person to another of a message which is understood by the receiver as the sender intended”. In other words, communication, which is a process including three factors: a sender, a message, and an intended receiver, is actually the activity of conveying meaningful information. Also regarding communication as a process, Samovar, Potter and McDaniel (2007: 12) define communication as “the process through which symbols are transmitted for the purpose of eliciting a response”. From this definition, these researchers tend to focus on the hearers’ response as well as the means of communication- the common system of symbols. This is the same opinion as Alder and Rodman (1997: 3) when they mention communication as “the process of human beings responding to the symbolic behavior of other persons”. A little bit different from other researchers, Berko (1989) pays more attention to features of human communication. He defines: “The process of communication is a conscious or unconscious, intentional or unintentional one in which feelings and ideas are expressed in verbal and nonverbal messages. It occurs in intrapersonal, interpersonal, and public levels. Human communication is dynamic, continuous, irreversible, interactive and contextual”. According to him, the process of human communication is a complex one which is reflected in a variety of different characteristics. Even if people interact with 6 each other by verbal or nonverbal ways, it is necessary for communicators to be fully aware of the typical nature of communication. Nguyen Quang also gives a chart of communication and its system as follows: 7 Figure 1.1: Diagram of components of communication (Nguyen Quang, 2001: 9) 8 Extralanguage -Eye contact -Facial expression -Gestures -Touch/Haptics/Tactile -… -Clothing -Jewellery -Make- up -Artificial scents -Flowers -Gifts -… -Setting -Conversational distance/ proxemics -Time/Chronemics -Lighting system -Colour - …. COMMUNICATION Verbal communication Nonverbal communication Intralanguage Paralanguage -Vocabulary -Grammatical rules -Phonetic rules -Rules of language use -… -Vocal characteristics + Pitch + Volume +Rate + Vocal quality + Types of vocal flow -Vocal interferences -Silence Body language (Action) Object language (Artifact) Environmental language It can be inferred clearly from the chart, communication has various functions and implications. Through communication, people can reveal their own identities, attract others or cooperate with them. As in the Oxford Dictionary, communication means “to have a common door with”. Therefore, people communicate as a daily need for human beings. In conclusion, although there are many different arguments among linguists about the definition of communication, it is still an integral need for human beings in real life. It may be the reason why William gives a statement that “communication may not save us, but without communication we will not be saved”. (Cited in Samanta, 1993: 1) 1.1.3. Cross-cultural communication As is mentioned from the previous parts, culture and communication are two interactive factors. Different countries have different cultures. When having a meeting between two different cultures, it is likely to cause some serious problems. It is the reason why the term “cross cultural communication” exists in our life. Kramsch (1998) defines cross cultural communication as “the meeting of two cultures or two languages across the political boundaries of nation- states”. Besides, according to Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics, cross cultural communication can be seen as “an exchange of ideas, information, etc. between people from different background”. (1992: 92) 9 Another definition is that “cross- cultural communication involves interaction between people whose cultural perceptions and symbols systems are distinct enough to alter the communication event.” (Samovar, 2007) Levine and Adelman (1993: 94) imply “cross cultural communication is communication (verbal and nonverbal) between people from different cultures; communication that is influenced by cultural values, attitudes and behavior; the influence of culture on people’s reactions and responses to each other”. It is understandable from these definitions that culture shapes communication and ways of interpreting communication. Once cross cultural communication happens, many misunderstandings or communication failures may happen due to different communicating styles or different background knowledge. 1.2. Speech acts 1.2.1. Definition of speech acts Speech act is a technical term in linguistics and the philosophy of language. The concept of speech acts was originated by the Oxford philosopher J.L. Austin in the 1930s and then was developed in his famous book entitled “How to do things with words” published in 1962. Up to now, it has been widely discussed by many philosophers and linguists such as Hymes (1964), Searle (1969), Leech (1983), Levinson (1983), Thomas (1995) and Yule (1996). Although there are many different ways to define speech acts, these theorists have a point of view in common. It is the confirmation of the close relationship between speech acts and language functions. According to Searle (1969: 1), speech acts are “the basic or minimal units of linguistic communication” and “those verbal acts such as promising, threatening and requesting that one performs in speaking”. Specifically, in English, there are more labels of speech acts such as apology, complaint, complement, encouragement, 10 [...]... of using these strategies by American and Vietnamese judging panels As a result, a comparison between American judging panels and Vietnamese ones in the frequencies of using encouraging strategies has been discovered 2.2 Analytical Framework As is mentioned above, encouraging utterances of American judging panels and Vietnamese ones in American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010 have been interpreted into... These performances were all shown on television as well as various internet sources such as YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/), the official website of American Idol 2010 (www.americanidol.com/), and the official website of Vietnam Idol 2010 (www.vietnamidol.com.vn/) From the author’s point of view, these performances were the most interesting ones which would be extremely useful for the data analysis... data collected to answer the two research questions The common strategies employed by the American and Vietnamese judging panels to verbally encourage the candidates in American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010 are evaluated and interpreted to discover similarities as well as differences in the ways the American & Vietnamese panels give verbal encouragement 3.1 Findings Strategy 1: Alleviating hearer’s... observed, only one Vietnamese panel member used this strategy to encourage the contestant - Em tự tin là em đã được 10 điểm (Siu Black – Episode 34: Uyên Linh) 3.2 Discussion The aim of this part is to find out the prevalence of the use of encouraging strategies by the American panel as well as the Vietnamese panel in the two reality shows: American Idol 2010 and Vietnamese Idol 2010 Then the answer... (the best 6 contestants), gala 6 (the best 5 contestants), and gala 7 (the best 4 contestants) were involved As for American Idol 2010, each performance night of the contestants was called an episode while it was named a gala in Vietnam Idol 2010 Actually, the studio round 3 in Vietnam Idol 2010 is the gala conducted to find out the best ten performers to continue competing in following nights These performances... Vietnamese ones To 35 put it in another way, Vietnamese judges use this strategy nearly five times as often as American ones do Strategy 4: Predicting bright prospect Table 3.6: Use of strategy 4 by American panel and Vietnamese panel Strategy 4 American panel 4.90% (39/796) Vietnamese panel 7.58% (33/435) Table 7 shows significant differences in the use of strategy 4 between American panel and Vietnamese... “What are the similarities and differences in the ways American & Vietnamese judging panels apply these strategies in the two reality shows?” can be discovered 29 • American panel Table 3.1: Use of encouraging strategies by the American panel in American Idol 2010 Str 1 Str 2 Str 3 Str 4 Str 5 Str 6 Str 7 Str 8 Str 9 (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) (%) American 0.12 0.00 6.15 4.90 87.95 0.63 0.00 0.25 0.00... that the Vietnamese judges consider when giving verbal encouragement Strategy 3: Giving advice Table 3.5: Use of strategy 3 by American panel and Vietnamese panel Strategy 3 American panel 6.15% (49/796) Vietnamese panel 27.59% (120/435) As can be seen from table 6, there exist a contrast between the American panel and the Vietnamese panel in the use of this strategy when just about 6.2% of American. .. collection During the process of data collection, the researcher watched all episodes/galas of American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010 After that, the transcripts of encouraging utterances in the selected episodes/galas were noted down to discover encouraging strategies employed by American judging panels and Vietnamese ones 2.1.4 Procedures of data analysis First and foremost, the encouraging utterances... also accounts nearly 0.9% by the Vietnamese ones Strategy 2: Offering help or reward Table 3.4: Use of strategy 2 by American panel and Vietnamese panel Strategy 2 American panel 0.00% (0/796) Vietnamese panel 1.15% (5/435) At first glance, it can be seen clearly from table 5 that while this strategy is not used by the American panel, its frequency of use by the Vietnamese one is nearly 1.2% Although . American and Vietnamese judging panels in the two reality shows: American Idol 2010 and Vietnam Idol 2010. The study, therefore, could identify potential distinctions between American and Vietnamese. (http://www.youtube.com/), the official website of American Idol 2010 (www. americanidol .com/ ), and the official website of Vietnam Idol 2010 (www. vietnamidol .com. vn / ). From the author’s point. As for American Idol 2010, each performance night of the contestants was called an episode while it was named a gala in Vietnam Idol 2010. Actually, the studio round 3 in Vietnam Idol 2010 is