Speech Act 12

Speech act is a “minimal unit of speech that has rules in terms both of where and when they may occur and of what their specific features are.” set forth by Hymes at 1962 (Wolfson, 1989:

109). Noticing speech act is a speech that acts, speech act theory was put forward and became the first important theory in pragmatics (Austin, 1975). As Austin (1975: 1) said “the phenomenon to be discussed is very widespread and obvious, and it cannot fail to have been

already noticed, at least here and there, by others. Yet I have not found attention paid to it specifically”. Till today, there has been more and more studies on speech acts. One of the most contributing field is interlanguage pragmatics (ILP). In ILP studies, speakers’ speech used to perform speech acts is categorized into strategies. Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP) led by Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper(1989) was the first study that investigates ILP. Most later ILP research methods and themes were based on this project (Kasper & Dahl, 1991). The following section will provide the background of ILP and the CCSARP project.

2.2.1 Interlanguage Pragmatics (ILP)

The term interlanguage was first mentioned by Selinker (1972). Selinker believes that learner’s language was a sort of hybrid between learner’s L1 and the target language (Corder, 1981).

Thus, Selinker and Corder, along with many other scholars have shifted their conception of learner “errors” to the learner “interlanguage continuum” (Selinker, 1972).

Findings showed that learners’ “errors” follow the natural order of language learning, similar to that of L1 learning process. This is true across learners and languages. Thus, researchers doing interlanguage believe learner errors are not merely L1 transfer or unsuccessful learning of the target language, but are natural processes in language learning (Austin, 1975; Corder, 1981; Selinker, 1972). “Errors” are evidence of learners hypothesizing, testing, internalizing and eliminating their knowledge of the target language. Learners do not suddenly master another target language. They would experience the continuum between their mother tongue and the target language. Thus, Selinker (1972) called the interval

“interlanguage”.

The term “interlanguage pragmatics” first appeared in Kasper’s “Pragmatische Aspekte in der Interimsprache” in 1981. This book is an introduction to SLA interlanguage pragmatics, in which interlanguage pragmatics was announced to be an aspect in doing SLA researches. Since

then, significant findings and impacts in interlanguage pragmatics have been thriving (Al-Zumor, 2003; Kim, 2003; Lin, 2005; Liu, 1997).

The term was not recognized until the “English” thesis called “Interlanguage Pragmatics”

was published (Kasper & Blum-Kulka, 1993). After that, abundant studies have been carried with a focus on various topics and aspects within this area. The main concern of ILP was to know how and to what extent non-native speakers are different from native speakers in terms of sociopragmatic and pragmalinguistic aspects in different social contexts (Kim, 2003).

Liu (1997) has a very clear classification of studies in interlanguage pragmatics. He concluded that most researches in ILP can be categorized into eight themes, which are (1) discussions on the pragmatic comprehension of the speech acts of the target language (2) L2 Learners’ speech act behaviors (3) development and acquisition of L2 pragmatic competence (4) L1 transfer in pragmatic perception, production and acquisition (5) transferbility from L1 (6) the choosing of a pragmatic norm (7) the role of teaching in the development of L2 pragmatic competence and (8) the methodology of ILP research. Among the 8 themes or topics, most researches focus on the first two topics (Liu, 1997: 96-7).

Studies in ILP concluded that the differences between learners’ and native speakers’

sociopragmatic perceptions of comparable speech events are systematical and pragmatic transfer is evident among all learners regardless of their target language pragmatic proficiency.

ILP researches also found directness and verbosity of learners in less controlled speech situations. They also noticed the need to study the instrument for data collection. (Liu, 1997:

97). Dr Liu (1997) suggested that future pragmatic researches need to explore into learners’

previous pragmatic knowledge and their “comprehension, production and acquisition of target language pragmatic knowledge”, as well as L1 pragmatic transfer, competence and the research methodology (Liu, 1997: 97).

2.2.2 Pragmalinguistics vs. Sociopragmatics

Pragmatics can be distinguished into more specific aspects – pragmalinguistics and sociopragmatics. They are the main concerns of ILP in knowing how and to what extent non-native speakers are different from natives in different social contexts. Pragmalinguistics deals with the strategies in particular speech act. They involve pragmatic strategies, direct and indirect expressions, formulaic expressions, linguistic forms, etc. Sociopragmatics is “the socio-logical interface of pragmatics” (Leech, 1983). They deal more with the social factors, such as social power and distance, affecting language use. As suggested by Olshtain & Cohen (1989), when comparing apologies across languages, it is suggested to compare similar situations with respect to types of participants, their social status and familiarity and the content, namely, types and severity of infraction which has also been the main concern of CCSARP (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989).

2.2.3 CCSARP

Cross-Cultural Speech Act Realization Project (CCSARP) was designed to investigate cross-cultural variations in the speech acts of request and apology. It is considered the most comprehensive project (Cohen, 1996) for it discussed various factors such as social context, gender, etc. It also included data from eight different ethnic groups for cross-cultural comparisons. The studies in CCSARP compared the performance of native speakers with that of L2 learners. One of the major findings is that the “strategy types” of the acts are universal for every culture, however, their conceptualization and verbalization can vary to a great extent across cultures and languages (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989). That is to say that human beings, in any language, have the access to the same range of strategies to perform speech acts.

However, the strategies L2 learners choose to perform in the language may differ from the native speakers of that language. L2 learners must pay special attention to L2 socialcultural norms in order to be pragmatically competent (Scollon & Scollon, 1995). Therefore, studies of

the differences in combination of the universally existing strategies have became the major concern in ILP studies. To study the differences of the strategies and strategy combinaitons among the cultures, researchers discussed the differences of pragmatic performances between L1s of two cultures, between learners’s L1 and L2 or simply focused on the behaviors of participants’native langauge.

In 2.3, apology definition and strategy categorizations from former researchers will be presented. Studies in L1, corss-cultural studies, interlanguage studies and studies of Chinese subjects of the speech act of apology will then follow.