| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立臺灣師範大學 === 華語文教學研究所 === 97 === Pragmatic competence is important in cross-cultural communication, but it is usually neglected in language courses. The goal of this study is to investigate the discourse schema of the complaint expression in Chinese. The participants in this study are Japanese learners of Chinese. The author analyzes the difficulties with which the Japanese learner face when they are using complaint expressions in Chinese. At the end of this study, the author designs a pedagogical teaching plan to help improve abilities to form expressions of complaint in Chinese.
This study is based on the framework of face-saving theory proposed by Brown & Levinson (1987). Data was gathered from both the learners and native Chinese speakers through oral role play and an acceptability judgment test, which analyzed their strategies and the social parameters that influence their expression.
The study found that the Chinese native speakers started the complaint from greeting and followed by asking questions, showing expression of disapproval, and then justification and the request for repair, then finally an expression of thanks. Japanese learners were different from the native speakers in regards to choosing strategies. ‘Relative power’ and ‘mental distance’ may have been the factors that influenced the choices and strategies they made. Based on the data collected, in Chinese, ‘relative power’ had greater influence, while in Japanese, ‘mental distance’ was more important. The result proves Brown and Levinson’s stance: Chinese society is a ‘high power value’ culture, and Japanese society is a ‘high distance value’ culture.
The difference in the effect of power and distance are also related to their difficulties in expression. From a pragmalinguistics point of view, the difficulties of the learners are that they have not mastered the restrictions of the language form and context yet, especially in regards to question forms as well as the misuse of modal particles. From a sociopragmatics point of view, Chinese culture shows diversification, ambiguity, and involvement, while Japanese culture is unitary, precise, and independence.
At the end of this study, a teaching plan based on the findings is provided. It mixes the complaint schema as well as the learning difficulties into different contexts and present it with in the communicative language teaching (CLT) method.
|
|---|
