MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNVERSITY M.A THESIS A STUDY ON DISAGREEING STRATEGIES COMMONLY EMPLOYED IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THOSE IN VIETNAMESE (NGHIÊN CỨU NHỮNG CHIẾN LƯỢC BÀY TỎ SỰ BẤT ĐỒNG THƯỜNG DÙNG TRONG TIẾNG ANH CÓ LIÊN HỆ VỚI TIẾNG VIỆT) NGHIÊM THỊ THU HÀ Hanoi, 2016 MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING HANOI OPEN UNVERSITY M.A THESIS A STUDY ON DISAGREEING STRATEGIES COMMONLY EMPLOYED IN ENGLISH WITH REFERENCE TO THOSE IN VIETNAMESE (NGHIÊN CỨU NHỮNG CHIẾN LƯỢC BÀY TỎ SỰ BẤT ĐỒNG THƯỜNG DÙNG TRONG TIẾNG ANH CÓ LIÊN HỆ VỚI TIẾNG VIỆT) NGHIÊM THỊ THU HÀ Field: English Language Code: 60220201 Supervisor: Assoc Prof Dr Vo Dai Quang Hanoi, 2016 CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled “A study on disagreeing strategies commonly employed in English with reference to those in Vietnamese” submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master in English Language Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis Hanoi, 2016 NGHIÊM THỊ THU HÀ Approved by SUPERVISOR Date:…………………… i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis could not have been completed without the help and support from a number of people First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Assoc.Prof Dr Vo Dai Quang, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher A special word of thanks goes to all my lecturers, colleagues, staff and students at Hanoi University of Industry and many others, without whose support and encouragement it would never have been possible for me to have this thesis accomplished Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my family, my husband for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work ii ABSTRACT Based on the theoretical framework of pragmatics, this study investigates the ways in which the speech act of disagreeing is expressed by Vietnamese people and native speakers of English There were 80 people participating in the study (40 Vietnamese teachers in HAUI and 40 native English speakers), who were randomly selected from the researcher’s colleagues, neighbors and acquaintances of different ages, genders and social status The participants were asked to complete a discourse completion test (DCT) designed by the researcher, which was about three situations, and react to them via making disagreements Respondents were expected to disagree with the three situations that they had to express their disagreement The main findings of the study are prominent strategies for disagreeing commonly employed by English speakers with reference to similarities and differences in disagreeing strategies commonly employed by Vietnamese under investigation according to age, gender, and social status This study also suggests some implications for teaching the politeness strategies in English to EFL learners in Vietnam iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS # Number & And D Relative distance D/I Directness/ Indirectness DCT Discourse Completion Task EFL English as a foreign language FTA Face threatening act H Hearer P Relative power R Rating of imposition S Speaker ST Situation HaUI Hanoi University of Industry iv LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES Table 2.1 The five general function of speech act 14 Table 2.2.The general patterns of preferred and dispreferred structure 33 Table 4.1 The common strategies for disagreeing in English and 42 Vietnamese Figure Possible strategies for doing FTAs (Brown and Levinson, 23 1987:69) Figure Strategies for performing a disagreement (Nguyen,2003:18) 27 v TABLE OF CONTENTS CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iv LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES v TABLE OF CONTENTS vi Chapter INTRODUCTION 1.1 Rationale for the research 1.2 Aims of the research 1.3 Objectives of the research 1.4 Scope of the research 1.5 Significance of the research 1.6 Structural organization of the thesis Chapter LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Review of previous studies 2.1.1 Previous studies overseas 2.1.2 Previous studies in Vietnam 2.2 Review of theoretical background 2.2.1 Theoretical framework 2.2.2 Theoretical background 11 2.3 Disagreeing in Vietnamese and English 28 2.4 Chapter summary 35 vi Chapter 36 METHODOLOGY 36 3.1 Research-governing orientations 36 3.1.1 Research questions 36 3.1.2 Research setting 36 3.1.3 Research approach 37 3.1.4 Data collection and data analysis 38 3.2 Research methods 38 3.2.1 Major methods vs supporting methods 38 3.2.2 Data collection instruments 39 3.2.3 Data analysis techniques 40 3.3 Chapter summary 41 Chapter 42 FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 42 4.1 Strategies for disagreeing employed by English and Vietnamese people 42 4.1.1 Results of the survey 42 4.1.2 Realizations of strategies for disagreeing in English and Vietnamese 44 4.1.3 The strategy employment for expressing disagreement by English and Vietnamese speakers 54 4.2 Major cross-cultural similarities and differences in using the strategies to express disagreement by English and Vietnamese speakers 58 4.2.1 Similarities 58 4.2.2 Differences: 59 4.3 Implications of the research findings 61 4.3.1 Implication on teaching English disagreeing strategies to EFL Vietnamese learners 61 vii 4.3.2 Implications on learning English disagreeing strategies 62 4.4 Chapter summary 63 Chapter 64 CONCLUSION 64 5.1 Recapitulation 64 5.2 Concluding remarks 64 5.3 Limitation of the current research 66 5.4 Recommendations for further research 67 APPENDIX BẢNG CÂU HỎI KHẢO SÁT APPENDIX2 SURVEY QUESTIONNAIRE IN ENGLSH In Vietnamese 13 viii REFERENCES IN ENGLSH Austin,J.L (1962) How to things with Words New York: oxford university Press Bach,K and Harnish,R (1979) Linguistic communication and speech acts England: The MIT Press Blum-Kulka,S (1989) playing is safe: The role of convertionality in indirectness In S Blum-Kulka, J.House, & G Kasper (Eds), Cross-cultural Pragmatics: Requests and Apologies (pp.37-70) Norwood, N.I.:Ablex Blum-Kulka,S (1987) Indirectness and politeness in requests: Same od different? 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