INVESTIGATING AGE–BASED COMPLIMENTS IN PERSIAN

Vahid Shahidi Pour, Gholam Reza Zarei

Abstract


The present study was an attempt to investigate differences in the use of compliments in Persian across age as a social variable. Data was gathered through a Discourse Completion Task (DCT) with imaginary situations in which 200 native Persian speakers were asked to put themselves in those situations and give compliments. The results indicated that the most frequently used compliment strategies by Persian native speakers were explicit unbound semantic formula and non-compliment strategies. However, the participants used 'other' strategies, future reference, contrast, and request strategies the least. The results also suggested the effect of age on the distribution of compliments. While the younger participants preferred non-compliment strategies the most, the older participants preferred explicit unbound semantic formula strategies the most. However, despite minor differences, all age-groups rarely tended to use future reference, contrast, request, and 'other' strategies. The results cashed light on the cultural and socio-cultural factors affecting the way people offer compliments.

Keywords: Pragmatic competence, Speech acts, Compliments, Discourse Completion Task (DCT), Social variables


Full Text:

PDF

References


Aston, G. (1995). Say ‘Thank you’: Some pragmatic constraints in conversational closings. Applied linguistics, 16(1), 57-86.

Austin, J. L. (1962). How to Do Things with Words. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Bardovi-Harlig, K. (2001). Evaluating the empirical evidence: grounds for instruction in pragmatics. In K. R. Rose & G. Kasper (Eds.), Pragmatics in Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Barnlund, D. C., & Araki, S. (1985). Intercultural Encounters The Management of Compliments by Japanese and Americans. Journal of cross-cultural psychology, 16(1), 9-26.

Billmyer, K. (1990). I really like your life style: ESL learners learning how to compliment. Penn Working Papers in Educational Linguistics, 6(2), 31-48.

Brown, H. D. (2007). Principles of language learning and teaching (5th edition). San Francisco: Prentice Hall.

Brown, P., & Levinson, S. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Chick, J. K. (1996). Intercultural communication. In S. L. McKay & N. H. Hornberger (Eds.). Sociolinguistics and language teaching (pp.329-348). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Golato, A. (2003). Studying compliment responses: A comparison of DCTs and recordings of naturally occurring talk. Applied Linguistics, 24, 90–121.

Golato, A. (2005). Compliments and Compliment Responses: Grammatical structure and sequential organization. Philadelphia: John Benjamins.

Halliday, M. A. K. (2003). On language and linguistics. New York: Continuum.

Hartford, B. S., & Bardovi-Harlig, K. (1992). Experimental and Observational Data in the Study of Interlanguage Pragmatics. Pragmatics and language learning, 3, 33-52.

Heidari, M. A., Rezazadeh, M., & Eslami-Rasekh, A. (2009). A contrastive study of compliment responses among male and female Iranian teenage EFL learners. The International Journal of Language Society and Culture, 29, 18-31.

Herbert, R. K. (1991). The sociology of compliment work: An ethnocontrastive study of Polish and English compliments. Multilingua-Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication, 10(4), 381-402.

Herbert, K. R. (1997). The sociology of compliment work in Polish and English. In N. Coupland & A. Jaworski (Eds.). Sociolinguistics: A reader (pp.487-500). New York: St. Martin’s Press.

Holmes, J. (1988). Paying compliments: A sex-preferential positive politeness strategy. Journal of Pragmatics, 12(4), 445-465.

Holmes, J. & Brown, D. (1987). Teachers and students’ learning about compliments. TESOL Quarterly, 21, 523-546.

Huth, T. (2006). Negotiating structure and culture: L2 learners’ realization of L2 compliment-response sequences in talk-in-interaction. Journal of Pragmatics, 38(12), 2025-2050.

Jin-pei, Z. (2013). Compliments and compliment responses in Philippine English. GEMA Online® Journal of Language Studies, 13(1), 25-41.

Kasper, G. (1997). Can pragmatic competence be taught. NetWork, 6, 105-119.

Leech, G. N. (1983). Principles of pragmatics. London, England: Longman.

Long, M. H., & Doughty, C. (Eds.). (2003). The handbook of second language acquisition (pp. 487-536). Oxford, England: Blackwell.

Mackey, A., & Gass, S. M. (2005). Second language research: Methodology and design. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Manes. J., & Wolfson, N. (1981). The compliment Formula. In F. Coulmas (Ed.), Conversational routine (pp.115-132). The Hague: Mouton.

Mohammad-Bagheri, M. (2015). Differences in compliment response across gender. International Journal of Language Learning and Applied Linguistics World, 8(1), 173-185.

Sadeghi, E., & Zarei, G. R. (2013). Investigating the use of compliments in Persian and English: A case study of Iranian EFL students. Journal of Foreign Language Teaching and Translation Studies, 2(2), 30-49.

Sharifian, F. (2005). The Persian cultural schema of “Shekaste-nafsiâ€: A study of compliment responses in Persian and Anglo-Australian speakers. Pragmatics and Cognition, 13(2), 337-362.

Tang, C. H., & Zhang, G. Q. (2009). A contrastive study of compliment responses among Australian English and Mandarin Chinese speakers. Journal of Pragmatics, 41(2), 325-345.

Wolfson, N. (1982). Compliments in cross-cultural perspective. TESOL Quarterly, 15, 117-124.

Wolfson, N. (1983). An Empirically based analysis of complimenting in American English. In N. Wolfson & E. Judd (Eds.). Sociolinguistics and language acquisition (pp.82-95). Rowley, MA: Newbury House.

Wolfson, N. (1989). Perspectives: Sociolinguistics and TESOL. Newbury House Publishers, New York.

Yousefvand, Z. (2010). Study of compliment speech act realization patterns across gender in Persian. Arizona Working Papers in SLA & Teaching, 17, 91-112.

Yousefvand, Z. (2012). A Sociolinguistic Perspective: Compliment Response Patterns in Persian. The Internet Journal of Language, Culture and Society, 34, 68-77.

Yu, M. C. (2005). Sociolinguistic competence in the complimenting act of native Chinese and American English speakers: A mirror of cultural value. Language and speech, 48(1), 91-119.

Yuan, Y. (2001). An inquiry into empirical pragmatics data-gathering methods: Written DCTs, oral DCTs, field notes, and natural conversations. Journal of Pragmatics, 33(2), 271-292.

Yuan, Y. (2002). Compliments and compliment responses in Kunming Chinese. Pragmatics, 12(2), 183-226.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.25134/erjee.v4i2.341

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2016 English Review: Journal of English Education