中英道歉语异同分析

中英道歉语的使用差异及原因探析
On the Differences of Apology Speech Act in Chinese and English
摘要:道歉语是指能够为被冒犯的人挽回面子的一类语言。

在全球化日益增强的现代社会,中美合作与接触不断增多，但由于社会背景,文化及价值观念的不同,在跨文化交际中经常会出现一些误解甚至是冲突。

由于任何一种言语行为都反映了一定的社会准则和价值,并服务和维护那些价值观，因此,道歉言语行为能够像镜子一样折射出中美文化价值的差异。

所以，为了在跨文化交际中获得更好的交际目的,就有必要对中美道歉语进行跨文化研究。

本文首先介绍了道歉语研究的国内外现状，接着阐述了道歉语的种类、策略及制约因素，后对中英道歉策略的选择进行比较；最后从文化价值方面分析汉语和英语道歉语的差异。

通过研究表明, 由于英汉文化不同、交际方式和价值取向的不同, 道歉策略的选择上也相应的有所不同。

关键词：道歉语，文化差异，道歉策略
Abstract: The language of apology is a special kind of speech which could provide support for the hearer who is offended. In the increasing global world, cooperation and contacts between Chinese and Americans are rapidly rising. However, along with this are the constant misunderstandings or even conflicts in cross-cultural communications due to different cultures and values. Because any speech act reflects a variety of culture norms and values and serves, the speech of apology can act as a mirror of certain cultural values in Chinese and English cultures. Therefore, in order to help people cultivate intercultural communicative competence and achieve better communicative purposes, it is necessary to study the language of apology between Chinese and Americans. This paper firstly introduces the study of research to the speech of apology both at home and abroad. Then the second part analyzes the different categories, strategies and restraining factors of the apologized speech. Finally, differences in the speech of language between English and Chinese language are probed from the aspects of different cultural values. Through the study, the
following conclusion is arrived: The cultural differences between English and Chinese, the different communication ways and value orientation directly lead to the different choices of apology strategies。

Key Words: the speech of apology; cultural differences; apology strategies
一．Introduction
In our daily life, people often offend others without any intention. Then the speech act of apology would be employed to get forgiveness and maintain the harmonious interpersonal relationship. But usually people just think the apology speech act as a simple thing, and they never imagine it’s a very complicated language phenomenon. Actually, the apology speech act is an important content of cross-cultural communication for the reason that people from different backgrounds may have different understandings on the same speech act. This kind of cultural-based understanding, which seriously affects the normal cross-cultural communication, is like a gap existing between people in different cultures. So, it is necessary for us to study the widely used apology speech in different languages so that we can better exchange ideas and understand each other in cross-cultural communication.
二．The present research and classification of apology speech act
1. The present research of apology speech
The British philosopher J.L.Austin firstly put forward the Theory of Speech Acts. He defined 'apologize' as a “implementation speech”. Based on the classification of the Austin, Searle treated “apologize” as an “expression speech". Brown & Levinson, however, regarded apology speech from the perspective of “politeness”. They thought that good manners are reasonable behaviors taken to meet the demand of “face-preservation”. Here "face" means the p ositive public image of one person. It could be divided into the positive face (hoping to gain approval from others) and negative face (not wanting personal behaviors to be hampered by others). In all kinds of communication, enough attention to other's positive and negative face could ensure us smooth interactions. But Brown & Levinson thought that some speech acts carry
the inherent nature of threatening the face. In this case, we need to choose proper strategies to avoid or remedy. So people deploy apology speech to remedy and maintain each other's face when they realized that the hearer's negative face is threatened. So the apology speech act is used to restore the relationship between people when we offend others intentionally or unintentionally. Brown & Levinson thought the following factors were involved as to the threatening of face: (1) the social distance between speakers and hearers; (2) the relevant power of speakers and hearers; (3) speech act inherent in the imposition of the absolute sense. These are called the "Brown and Levinson's Face Theory (The Face going)". But Olshtain and Cohen firstly made a detailed study to apology speech. And they defined apology language as a culture - sensitive researched - act set of semantic formulae or strategies. They also proposed the original mode of apology speech act. Later, scholars represented by Blum Kalka and Olshtain improved the early model and incorporated the improved one into “Cross-Cultural Study of Speech Act Realization Mode Project" (CCSARP).
2. The classification of apology speech act
Among these researchers, Cohen and Olshtain should be mentioned in detail. They roughly divided apology strategy into five different kinds according to their observations and experiments: 1.the direct expression of apology; 2. the expression of responsibility to offend others; 3.the explanation to offensive behavior; 4.the Provision of compensation; 5.the promise to discipline oneself. Actually, two strategies are clearer in the sense of apology and more common in daily life. The latter three may appear or not because they are related to different situations. In addition to the above-mentioned five kinds of apology strategies, the speaker can also strengthen or weaken their degree of apology by using adverbs of degree such as "true" and "very” or conjunctions such as “however” or “but” etc. For example, during the sentence "I'm sorry, but you should also be careful”, the conjunction “but” is used to ease the speaker’s responsibility.
According to inner meanings and application of apology speech in real life, we put it into the following three types: "from the channels of communication, it is divided
into verbal and nonverbal forms; from the perspective of stylistics, it could be divided into formal and informal." The following would show these specifically:
(1) The verbal and nonverbal forms
Verbal apology, which is the most widely used, is conducted through verbal behavior. Verbal apology could be conducted by different parties: the offender’s direct behavior o n the other party offended or a third party’s delivering the behavior. Nonverbal apology could be all kinds of forms except verbal expression. For example, in China, if a student can't answer the teacher's questions, his face may blush with embarrassment or he may scratch his head with the hand and wears the silent even apologetic smile. Here silence and scratching his head implies the apology speech "sorry, I'm sorry." In addition, Chinese also use hands to express the meaning of apology. The idiom "offer a humble apology" originated from China’s Spring and Autumn warring states is also a kind of non-verbal behavior to apologize. These are not seen in English speaking countries. It should be pointed out that nonverbal and verbal apology is not completely separate. People combine verbal with nonverbal behaviors to strengthen their degree of apology. In real life, people also can write to apologize. Showing apology by written also belongs to nonverbal forms. But because of its deficiency in time and space, the written form may create new misunderstanding. And with the use of modern ways of communication, people are provided with more ways to communicate. For example, people can express apology through broadcasting, television, newspaper etc. These methods are more formal.
(2) The formal and informal ones
Apology is divided into formal and informal according to the different relationship of the involved two parties. Informal apology is mainly used for showing apology to acquaintance, friend, lover, colleagues for the purpose of clarifying the misunderstanding and eliminating barriers. And formal apology is mainly used between the media and the public or between two countries. For example: The former US President Eisenhower apologized to the Soviet Union for U - 2 planes flying over Sue. So a formal apology could help clarify the misunderstanding and make the whole in public.
三．The apology strategies and its cultural-based elements
1. The apology strategies
Apology speech is commonly used in daily life when we interrupt or offend others. We offend others because we violate the social norms or haven’t met each other's expectations. The following behaviors are all offense to others: we were late for the meeting, played wrong phone, forgot to bring book in class or walked past acquaintances without saying "hello". "Many scholars conducted profound study about apology strategies. This paper quoted Professor Jia Yuxin’s (a professor in Harbin Institute of Technology) apology strategies. He divided apology strategies into seven forms:
Strategy: 0 offender refused to apologize (the strategy of rejecting);
Strategy 1: light own degree of offense (the strategy of minimizing);
Strategy 2: admit liability (the strategy of acknowledging);
Strategy 3: explain the reasons (the strategy of explaining);
Strategy 4: apologize directly (the strategy of apologizing);
Strategy 5: try other means to remedy (the strategy of offering repair);
Strategy 6: guarantee (the strategy of promising forbearance);
Strategy 7: show concern to the person being offended (the strategy of showing concern).
So we have many apology strategies. But how we make choices in real life? So we need to discuss major characters that affect our choice. Many linguistic-factors determine the choice of apology strategies. The forms of apology strategies also change along with the change of contextual factors. According to the investigation and study, many social linguists believe that the choice of apology strategies is mainly restricted by social factors. The following are the most decisive ones:
(1) The social distance between the offender and the one being offended called “social distance”;
(2) The relative power between the offender and the one being offended called” relative power”;
(3) The relative rights and obligation between the offender and the one being offended called “obligation of apology”;
(4) The gender between the offender and the one being offended called “gender”;
(5) The degree of the offense called “severity of offence”.
In general, people’s feeling of guilty is proportional to these decisive factors. Accordingly, they tend to strengthen their apology speech act. For example, if the social distance is too far or the relative power is too different, people tend to try every means to strengthen their apology speech in order to keep everything smooth.
2. The cultural-based elements affected the apology strategies
(1) The social distance
As above-mentioned, the social distance namely the familiarity or intimacy among people, which involves the relationship with an acquaintance, a stranger, friends, etc. Closeness affects the choice of apology strategy, which manifests in different ways in China and America.
Chinese tend to use the strategy of direct apology to strangers. They often say "对不起" "不好意思", etc. To those people who are intimate, they incline to use informal or casual apology speech, such as "老爸，对不起啦，是我的错." To a friend, the mixture of formal and other various strategies are used, such as “昨天是我的错，不该误会你，真心诚意向你道歉，保证不会有下次啦.”
In comparison, the Americans apologize to friends in a way not so formal. And they apologize to intimate people in a way not so casual. Actually, you can see British and American apologize in almost all the places and time, though we as Chinese think it unnecessary. That’s b ecause their view of individualism contrary to our collectivism. American culture emphasizes self-oriented and the individual interests, “Even one person coughs or sneezes and says “Sorry.” That’s because these behaviors spread bacteria and lead to environmental pollution. Such behaviors are also violation of others’ sensory organ. So apology is a kind of compensation to others.
(2) The relative power
The relative power refers to the involved parties’ power, including social status, age, etc. In China, if the offender enjoys high status, he can choose strategy lightly
damaged his face. If the offender has a low social status, he may choose the contrary strategy. Age, which is also the cultural-based factor, affects the apology strategies in Chinese and American cultures differently. Chinese have a tradition of respecting the elderly and the history, so offending the elderly should be compensated by choose a strategy greatly damaged the offender’s face. However, Westerners emphasize individualism which means the elderly and young people is equal, so people usually choose to strategies damaged little to their face. We can put this in another way. In China, people of high status tend to choose strategy of indirect apology rather than admitting liability. Contrary to this, people in low status will choose the strategy of direct apology and admitting liability if they offend their superiority. In most cases, some adverbs such as”真、很”are used. In America, however, both the young and elder use the strategy of direct apology very often. Both of them directly admit liability according to the fact. For Example:
Chinese: 昨天我说话有点重了，请见谅。

English: I’m sorry. Due to a misunderstanding, I blamed you for someone else’s mistake. Please accept my apologies. It was all a terrible misunderstanding.(对不起。

由于误会你,我责备了你。

请接受我的道歉。

这真是个可怕的误会。

) (3) The obligation of apology
Apology speech act is the offender publicly acknowledges that he hasn’t done something that should be done or he has done something that shouldn’t be done. For example, a staff failed to complete a special task assigned by his boss. Then the Chinese and Americans may adopt different apology strategies.
Chinese: 真对不起，老板，没能完成您交给我的任务，我一定自我检讨，也请您批评我吧。

English: I’m very sorry. I completely forgot about it. I suppose I should have been more careful. It will definitely never happen again. (真对不起。

我把这回事忘得一干二净。

我应该仔细些的。

我保证这种事不会再发生。

)
(4) The influence of the gender
With the development of social civilization, men and women tend to be equal, so the effects of gender on apology strategies selection in China and America are
basically the same. The differences only exist between male and female speakers. Actually women are more likely to apologize to others than men. Minor offence may cause the female's apology, while men only apologize for serious offense. In Addition, women incline to choose the direct apology strategies in polite and appropriate language. Contrary to women, men’s selections of apology strategies are greatly influenced by social factors such as social distance and rights, etc.
There are a lot of differences between men’s and women’s apology speech act. For apology speech act, men generally start from themselves and identify apology with admitting defeat, so they try to avoid using in order to maintain their face and social status. Only when men realize the high degree of offense or the encounter’s position is higher, they may adopt an apology speech act without hesitation. But women are more likely to think about from others’ perspective. They re gard apology as an effective way of eliminating barrios and restoring the harmonious relationship.
(5) The severity of offence
The severity of offence works differently in China and America. Americans say" sorry "does not necessarily mean that they have done anything wrong. For example, if you are in the way, one person say" sorry " implying you “Get out of my way, so I can come out.”This way of speaking is more acceptable. Strictly speaking, " Excuse me "is equal to the Chinese" 借过"or" 劳驾". The civilized Chinese may express it as "麻烦请让一下". Another difference between Chinese and America apology should be mentioned. Chinese sometimes apologized like this:”对不起，真不应该这样说你的.”However, in English, it may be said like this:”I apologize for what I have said. I take back what I said”. Chinese hold the view that you can’t take back what you said.
四．The cultural values reflected by apology strategy selections Domestic professor Jia Yuxin has made a questionnaire to Chinese who haven’t learn t English about apology strategies. Many foreign scholars’ conducted the same research to native English-speakers. Comparing the collected dater, it could be seen that:
From the form, the following should be analyzed:
Firstly, context plays an enormous role in human communication. "China belongs to high context culture, because they pay more attention to social position and other psychological contexts in communication, namely people emphasize “understanding in inner heart “. But English-speakers’ country belongs to the low context culture, so they often ignore the nonverbal factors and relies more on the verbal things ,namely people pay more attention to 'talk'." Two different cultures directly lead to the two different communication ways and value orientation. Secondly, the big difference between the choice of the responsibility strategy and compensation strategy, Chinese-speakers are respectively 3.9%, 3.9% and English-speakers are 20.9%, 21.7%. So it’s clear that the characteristics of the low-context culture are separation and difference. They value individualism and attach great importance to the interests of the individual. In this mode, the personal opinions and differences were advocated and a certain degree of conflict is supposed to be positive.
From the perspective of saving face, the Chinese take apology strategy to keep two parties’ face. But English-speakers adopt minimizing strategy to save face, so social relation is also a focus in the study of intercultural communication. China's social relationships follow the following principles: (1) obedience to the superiors or elders; (2) a relative hierarchy; (3) the following of collectivism. These are different from even contrary to American values, such as equality, individualism, etc. It is these
cultural differences that lead to their different choice of apology strategies.
Conclusion:With the rapid development of modern society, the ways of communication is becoming more and more various. The increasing globalization and international exchanges allow people from totally different cultures to communicate with each other. During the process, it’s necessary to understand more about different cultures and cross-cultural communication skills for the sake of better communication. On such occasion, everyone should know about apology strategies so that he can apologize politely and properly on different occasions. In cross-cultural communication, it’s important to take others’ cultural habits and value orientation when we offer apology. Usually it is by offering polite apology that we could eliminate understanding s and create a harmonious social environment. So learning proper apology deserves our further discussion.
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