An Approach to Instruction of Pragmatic Aspects: Implications of Pragmatic Transfer by American Learners of Japanese

Abstract

This study investigated pragmatic transfer in American learners of Japanese responding to compliments. A closed role play was used to collect interlanguage data from the learners and normative data from Japanese and American native speakers. An Initial Sentence Analysis indicated mat the learners transferred nonuse of avoidance strategies but not of positive strategies. The American normative data suggested a dominant use of positive strategies, whereas a mixture of three strategies was found in the Japanese normative data. A Semantic Formula Analysis further revealed qualitative differences between the learners and the native speakers. Based on the findings, suggestions concerning the instruction of speech act performance are made for second and foreign (L2/FL) language instructors. The study instantiates a utility of pragmatic transfer research for improving instructional approach and course content.

Compliment-giving Behavior in American English and Japanese

“…The counterpart to a compliment is the compliment response, which has been investigated across cultures since the late 1980s (e.g., Chen, 1993;Golato, 2002;Han, 1992;Herbert, 1989;Herbert & Straight, 1989;Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk, 1989;Lorenzo-Dus, 2001;Matsuura, 2002;Nelson, Al-Batal, & Echols, 1996;Saito & Beecken, 1997). Among those studies of cross-cultural comparison, Matsuura (2002) is one of the few studies that illustrates differences between American and Japanese response patterns, and suggests that ostensible acceptance, or light acceptance, of compliments may be characteristic of American English.…”

Pragmatic Comprehension in Japanese as a Foreign Language

“…Research in the area of speech acts has also revealed challenges that learners of Japanese face when performing illocutionary functions (e.g., Furukawa, 2001; Ikoma & Shimura, 1993; Jones, 1998; Kashiwazaki, 1993; Mizuno, 1996; Saito & Beecken, 1997; Sameshima, 1998; Tateyama, 2001). Ikoma and Shimura, for instance, examined the speech act of refusals by native speakers (NSs) of Japanese and American learners of Japanese, revealing several cases of negative transfer.…”

Strategies Employed by the Vietnamese to Respond to Compliments and the Influence of Compliment Receivers’ Perception of the Compliment on Their Responses

“…Compliment upgrading is found but at a low frequency. Thanking, perhaps is not used to signal an agreement with the compliment as often as has been found in previous papers (Holmes, 1988, Nelson, Al-Batal, Echols, 1996Saito & Beecken, 1997;Li & Feng, 2000). On the contrary, the two lowest degrees (level 6 and level 7) were found to outnumber the other levels of accepting Cs (respectively 47.62% and 26.66 %).…”