中国英语专业研究生与非英语专业研究生英语批评语策略对比研究

中国英语专业研究生与非英语专业研究生英语批评语策略对比研究［Abstract］Criticism is a speech act which is indispensable in university contexts. This speech act can pose considerable difficulty to intercultural communication for foreign language (FL) learners. This study aimed to investigate the overall use of the pragmatic strategies in criticisms employed by English and non-English major postgraduates. The data were gathered from 34 English and 26 non-English majors (n=60) by means of a written discourse completion task (WDCT). The results showed that there was no significant difference in the use of direct strategies, external mitigating devices or internal mitigating devices between English majors and non-English majors. However, the non-English majors employed the indirect strategies significantly more frequently than the English majors.［Key words］criticism strategies,postgraduates,English majors,non-English majorsI. IntroductionIn human communication, criticism is as important and indispensable as other speech acts, as it serves as bridges that engender understanding and connect individuals together. Giving critical feedback is an important communicative task in university contexts, especially forpostgraduate students, since giving presentations and having discussions have become their major tasks in classroom activities. Criticizing has been a rather under-represented speech act in interlanguage pragmatics (ILP) literature. Native speakers (NSs) find this speech act challenging, and they need to pre-plan how to perform it (Murphy & Neu 1996). Thus, it can be expected that EFL learners will also experience considerable difficulties.There is limited research on criticism in the linguistic literature, no agreed and scientific definition of criticism can be found, either. The New Oxford Dictionary of English defines criticism as the expression of disapproval of someone or something based on perceived faults and mistakes. And the Modern Chinese Dictionary gives the definition of criticism as: 1. Comments on someone’s merits and demerits; 2. evaluation of someone’s strength and weakness; 3. comments on someone’s mistakes and faults. It can be found the latter interpretation is similar to the definition given by the New Oxford Dictionary of English. Obviously, the two definitions are static without taking the dynamic context and pragmatic function into full account. According to Nguyen (2005a), criticizing is an illocutionary act whose illocutionary point is to give negative evaluation of the hearer’s (H) actions, choice, words, and products for which he or she may be held responsible. In the present study, the researcher defines criticism as a speech act in which the Speaker givesa negative evaluation directly or indirectly of the Hearer’s manner, verbal expression, audio-visual design and written content in the presentation context.To date, criticizing has been addressed in only a few linguistic and interpersonal communication studies (House & Kasper 1981; Tracy, van Dusen, Robinson 1987; Tracy & Eisenberg 1990; Wajnryb 1993, 1995; Toplak & Katz 2000; and Nguyen 2005a, 2005b). Of these studies, Toplak and Katz (2000) focused on the communicative effects of direct and indirect criticisms (i.e. sarcastic comments). Nguyen (2005a, 2005b) has dealt with L2 learners and provided a typology of criticizing realization strategies.However, there is no research about the pragmatic strategies of criticism between English and non-English major EFL postgraduate learners. The present research aims to investigate the overall use of the pragmatic strategies in criticism of the English and non-English major postgraduate EFL learners in the presentation context. The taxonomy of the present research is adopted from House and Kasper’s (1981) the taxonomy of mitigating devices and Nguyen’s (2008) taxonomy of criticism. Based on the research objectives, the researcher formulates the following research questions:1. What are the overall pragmatic strategies in criticism employed byEnglish major and non-English major postgraduate EFL learners in the presentation context?2. Do the pragmatic strategies in criticism employed by the postgraduates in the presentation context vary significantly in terms of field of study? If they do, what are the main patterns of variation?Ⅱ. Method2.1 ParticipantsParticipants for the study were 60 postgraduates: 34 English majors （EMs）and 26 non-English majors （NEMs）were selected by means of purposive sampling from universities in China. NEM postgraduates were from a variety of study fields. This sampling method was employed on the grounds of the availability and convenience and the students’willingness to participate in the study.2.2 InstrumentA written discourse completion task (WDCT) was used to elicit the speech act production of criticisms from the respondents. The researcher conducted a pre-survey that contained possible 12 situations, three of which were under each of the following issues: manner, verbal expression, audio-visual design, and written content. 20 respondents (10EMs and 10 NEMs) were required to choose one common criticism situations from each issue. A total of four situations were included in the questionnaire of the main study. Before the instrument was implemented, two validation measures were taken to ensure validity and reliability. This data-gathering tool was validated by two experts in the field of pragmatics. In addition, a pilot study was conducted with two EM and two NEM postgraduates.2.3 Data analysisThe purpose of this study was to examine the performance of the speech act of criticizing in the classroom contexts. Descriptive statistics were applied to calculate the overall use of strategies and chi-square tests (2) were used to determine the significant difference between the use of direct, indirect strategies (Nguyen, 2008) and external, internal mitigating devices (House and Kasper, 1981).Ⅲ. Results3.1 The general patterns of criticism strategiesFigure 1 showed the general patterns used by the EM and NEM postgraduates. NEM postgraduates employed all the strategies slightly higher than their EM counterparts except the internal mitigating devices. This may suggest that NEMs were likely to use more criticism strategiesthan EMs. However, according to the Chi-square results, the two groups employed indirect strategies significantly differently, the NEMs used more often than the EMs.Figure 1General patterns of Criticism (%)ndirect strategies: 2=12.11, p=.01, NEM >EM3.2 The criticism patterns corresponding to the four specific situationsThe frequency of criticism in the setting of manner is presented in Figure 2. It showed that both of the two groups employed indirect strategies the most frequently, and the two groups showed similar patterns in using direct, indirect strategies and external mitigating devices. NEMs employed the three strategies more often than EMs. But EMs employed internal mitigating devices more often than NEMs. The Chi-square results showed NEMs employed indirect strategies significantly more frequently than EMs.Figure 2Criticism to Manner Relating (%)Indirect strategies: 2=6.18, p=.05, NEM >EMEx. EM14: I think you shouldn’t read from your notes. Present your information from your understanding and make eye contact with theaudience. (Direct strategy: statement of the problem + Indirect strategy: indicating standard)NEM10: I think you have a very clear speech pattern. Good job but it could be better if you would like to present more information besides the idea you put on the slides. (External mitigating device: sweeteners + Indirect strategy: suggestion)Figure 3 indicated the frequencies of criticism in the setting of verbal expression employed by EMs and NEMs were different. NEMs employed indirect strategies more often than EMs, while EMs employed the other three strategies more often than NEMs. Both of the two groups employed indirect strategies the most frequently, and the two groups showed similar patterns in using the four strategies. However, the Chi-square results didn’t show any significant differences.Figure 3Criticism to Verbal Expression (%)Ex. EM 2: Could you please speak louder and tell us again? (Indirect strategy: request for change + Internal mitigating device: syntactic) NEM 12: I cannot catch your idea, would you please say it again? (Direct strategy: statement of difficulty + Indirect strategy: request for change)Figure 4 showed that the two groups followed almost the same pattern of preferences in criticizing audio-visual design. They preferred indirect strategies the most, then direct strategies, and EMs preferred external mitigating devices while NEMs preferred internal mitigating devices the least. However, Chi-square results didn’t indicate the two groups employed the strategies significantly differently.Figure 4Criticism to Audio-Visual Design (%)Ex. EM 27: I am confused by your presentation, and I can not understand. (Direct strategy: statement of difficulty)NEM 12: Would you like to organize your presentation a little more clearly? (Indirect strategy: request for change + External mitigating device: steers)As shown in Figure 5, both EM and NEM postgraduates preferred direct and indirect strategies to external and internal mitigating devices in criticizing written content. NEMs employed direct, indirect strategies and external mitigating devices more often than EMs, but less often in the use of internal mitigating devices. However, Chi-square results didn’t show any significant difference in the two groups.Figure 5Criticism to Written Content (%)Ex. EM 5: There are too many words and I cannot see very clearly. (Direct strategy: statement of the problem + Direct strategy: statement of difficulty)NEM 22: I think there are too many words on your presentation slides. I suggest you delete some of them. (Direct strategy: statement of the problem + Indirect strategy: suggestion for change + Internal mitigating device: lexical)Ⅳ. DiscussionsOn the general level, both EM and NEM postgraduates employed indirect strategies the most frequently. The general trend of the strategy use in the four settings also showed the use of indirect strategies reached the top. As Triandis and Singelis (1998: 36) state, “East Asian collectivists are especially eager to maintain harmonious relationships…”. This may explain why when Chinese performing criticism, they prefer to use indirect strategies to the others. Pragmatic transfer was also observed in the case of explanation. The way they communicate in their native language reflects this personality of being modest which is transferred to the target language. Chinese are influenced by Confucianism for many years, and they form indirect and introvert character. This is also shown in their speech act, and criticism is no exception. In criticism, they are apt to use the indirect strategies in order to decrease the degree of facethreatening. Hu and Grove (1991: 7-8) stat ed “With respect to the Chinese, maintaining harmonious relationship is a matter of supreme concern.”However, the EM and NEM groups showed a significant difference in indirect strategies use on the general level and in the setting of manner. The NEMs use this category more frequently than EMs. This might be explained by the degree and time exposed to the western culture of the two groups. The EMs had more time to communicate with western native speakers and they had more chances to expose to English environment than NEMs. In western countries, people value individualism and freedom of expression, a communication style that stresses confrontation and aggressive style does not develop by chance. When interacting with others, they are direct and assertive. EMs were influenced more by this culture, so in their criticism, they are less indirect than NEMs.Ⅴ. ConclusionsIt is important to note that the findings from this study cannot be confidently generalized to all speakers of EM and NEM postgraduates. However, they do provide insights into the employment of criticism strategies by these two groups of people. In general, there seems to be more similarities than differences between them regarding the performance of criticizing. They preferred indirect to all the otherstrategies. However, NEM postgraduates used almost all the strategies slightly higher than EM ones.This study has pedagogical implications for the development of pragmatic competence to achieve successful communicative goals. In order to become L2 learners competent in the target language, not only should they master the linguistic forms of the spoken language, but also they should be exposed to “the sociolinguistic rules of the L2 culture” (Wannaruk, 2008). Therefore, language lessons should incorporate the speech act of criticisms in different cultural contexts to expose students to pragmatic rules of the target culture. Teachers can use a corpus-based approach to collect authentic spoken texts and identify common patterns which can be exploited for teaching communicative or pragmatics skills (Pérez Basanta & Rodriguez Martin, 2007).Some limitations in this study should be addressed. WDCTs were employed as a research tool which might yield data different from naturally occurring data. Future research studies may conduct classroom observations to video-record realistic classroom situations so that we can broaden our understanding of criticism behaviors in naturalistic settings. In addition, although WDCTs are frequently employed as a key instrument by pragmatics research, it is imperative that retrospective interviews be incorporated to provide insights into their production ofcriticisms.【References 】［1］House, J., Kasper, G. 1981. Politeness markers in English and German［C］//F. Coulmas. Conversational Routine. Explorations in Standardised Communication Situations and Pre-patterned Speech. New York: Mouton Publishers.[2] Hu Wengzhong, Grove, C L. 1991. Encountering the Chinese: A guide for Americans［M］.Yarmouth, Me: Intercultural Press.[3] Murphy, B., Neu, J. 1996. My grade’s too low: the speech act set of complaining［C］//S. Gass, J. Neu.[4] Nguyen, Minh Thi Thuy. 2005a. Criticizing and Responding to Criticism in a Foreign Language: A study of Vietnamese learners of English［D］.New Zealand: the University of Auckland.[5] Nguyen, Minh Thi Thuy. 2005b. Pragmatic development in L2 use of criticisms: A case of Vietnamese EFL learners［C］//Susan H. Foster-Cohen, María del Pilar García-Mayo, Jasone Cenoz. Eurosla Yearbook 5. Philadelphia: John Benjamins.[6] Nguyen, Minh Thi Thuy. 2008. Modifying L2 criticisms: How learners do it?［J］.Journal of Pragmatics, 40(4).[7] Pérez Basanta, C., Rodriguez Martin, M. 2007. 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