Pragmatic Failures in InterculturalCommunication跨文化交际中的语用失误Abstract:With the globalization of economy and the rapid development of high technology, international communication has become a significant concern in the world nowadays. However, there is a great potential for communicators to suffer communication breakdowns in intercultural context because of the cultural differences. pragmatic failures are arisen therefrom. The thesis aiming at expounding pragmatic failures in international communication, explains the definitions of intercultural communication and of pragmatic failure, illustrates the expressing forms of pragmatic failure in the intercultural communication, analyzes the reasons of pragmatic failure in the intercultural communication, and deals with precaution strategies of pragmatic failure in the intercultural communication. All above can help foreign language learners acquire sound linguistic and communicative competence, and participate in international communication flexible and properly.Key words: pragmatic failure; intercultural communication; precaution strategiesTable of Contents Abstract (Ⅰ)Introduction………………………………………………………………………..() 1 Brief Review of Relevant Theories……………………………………………...() 1.1Intercultural Communication………………………………………………….()1.1.1 Culture and Communication……………………………………………..()1.1.2 Definition of Intercultural Communication………………………………()1.1.3 Three Elements of Intercultural Communication………………………...() 1.2 Pragmatic Failure in Intercultural Communication…………………………...()1.2.1 Definition of Pragmatic Failure…………………………………………..()1.2.2 Classification of Pragmatic Failure……………………………………….()2. Expressing Forms of Intercultural Pragmatic Failure………………………...() 2.1Pragma-linguistic Failure………………………………………………………...() 2.2 Socio-pragmatic Failure……………………………………………………….()2.3 The relationship between them………………………………………………..()3. The Causes of Intercultural Pragmatic Failure………………………………..() 3.1 Different Cultural Values and Norms………………………………………….()3.1.1 Modesty vs. Self-denigration……………………………………………...()3.1.2 Privacy vs. Mutual care…………………………………………………...()3.1.3 Directness vs. Indirect ness………………………………………………..()3.2 Inappropriate Transfer………………………………………………………………...()4.Precaution Strategies of Intercultural Pragmatic Failure…………………….() 4.1 Cultivating Our Pragmatic Competence………………………………………() 4.2Strengthening Cultural Awareness………………………………………………..() Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………..() References…………………………………………………………………………..()中文摘要……………………………………………………………………………() Acknowledgements…………………………………………………………………()IntroductionNowadays, the development of worldwide transportation and communication networks, the growth in foreign travel for pleasure, study and business, the expansion of international trade and the migration of people seeking work in the multinational companies have naturally led to a concomitant increase in contacts across national boundaries. The international and domestic changes in the past few decades have brought us into direct or indirect contact with people who, because of their cultural diversity, often behave in ways that we do not understand. It is no longer difficult to find social and professional situations in which members of once isolated groups of peoples communicate with members of other cultural groups. Now these people may live thousands of miles away or right next door to each other. In other words, intercultural communication prevails in the so-called global village.1 Brief Review of Relevant TheoriesIn this chapter, brief review of Intercultural Communication and Pragmatic Failure in Intercultural Communication will be made. This hopefully provides theoretical background for analyzing the causes of intercultural pragmatic failure in chapter four and dealing with precaution strategies of intercultural pragmatic failure in chapter five.1.1 Intercultural CommunicationIn this section, such concepts as culture, intercultural communication and pragmatic failure will be discussed one by one.1.1.1 Culture and CommunicationAccording to sociolinguists and anthropologists, culture refers to the total patterns of beliefs, customs, institutions, objects and techniques that characterize the life of a human community. In communicative process, culture is a critical factor. But what is culture? Culture is omnipresent. What people talk about, how they talk about it, what they see, attend to, or ignore, how they think and what they think about are influenced by their culture. Culture consists not only of such material things as cities, schools and organizations, but also of non-material things such as languages, ideas, family patterns and customs. Put it simply, culture refers to the entire way of life of a society, “the ways of a people” (Klineberg 1935). In order to suit the goal of this thesis, I adopt the concept of culture defined by Samovar, Porter and Stefani in their book Communication between Cultures (2000), that is, “We define culture as the deposit of knowledge, experience, beliefs, values, attitudes, meanings, hierarchies, religions, notions of time, roles, spatial relations, concepts of the universe and material objects and possessions acquired by a group of people in the course of generations through individual and group striving”(Samovar, Porter & Stefani, 2000:36).Everyday when people share ideas and emotions with others they are communicating, regardless of their gender, age, occupation, or even culture. Despitethe differences in culture, they are in fact performing the same communicative activity. The methods and the results may be different, but the process is the same. Communication occurs whenever meaning is attributed to behavior or the residue of behavior-those things that remain as a record of our actions (Samovar and Porter, 1994:8). It is also the basis of all human contact. But it is not enough, and this term needs further explanation. It is impossible for people to share their feelings and experiences by means of direct mind-to-mind contact. People all isolated from one another by the enclosure of their skin, so what they know and feel remains insides of them, unless they communicate. In fact, whenever people interact they must communicate.Hall once noted, “Culture is communication, and communication is culture” (Hall, 1977:14). The link between culture and communication is crucial to the understanding of intercultural communication. Culture and communication are inseparable. Communicative behavior is largely dependent on cultures, and culture is the foundation of communication. Whenever people interact they communicate. To live in societies and to maintain their cultures they have to communicate. Culture is learned, acted out, transmitted, and preserved through communication. Culture and communication act on each other. As the carrier of culture, communication influences the structure of a culture, and culture is necessarily manifested in our communication patterns by teaching us how we should talk and behave. The relationship between culture and communication is the key factor to understanding intercultural communication.1.1.2 Definition of Intercultural CommunicationOnce we understand the meaning of communication and culture it becomes clear that intercultural communication refers to the communication between people from two different cultures. (Chen Guoming & Starasta, 1998:28) Intercultural communication refers to communication between different socio-cultural groups. Samovar (1981:19) claims that intercultural communication occurs “whenever a message that must be understood is produced by a member of one culture for consumption by a member of another culture”. Precisely speaking, intercultural co mmunication is the communication between people whose cultural perceptions and symbols are distinct enough to change communication events.The term “intercultural communication” includes the entire range of communication across boundaries of groups or discourse systems, form cultural groups to the communication which takes place between men and women. In linguistic, one can explain intercultural communication as taking place whenever participants introduce different knowledge into the interaction which is specific to respective socio-cultural groups. Increasing the shared cultural knowledge is essential in communication, because language is intrinsically ambiguous. Since meanings are constructed jointly by the speaker and the listener, it is always necessary for the receiver to draw inferences about the intentions of the sender.1.1.3 Three Elements of Intercultural CommunicationCulture is very complex and influences people’s life in every aspect. There are many important elements contained in the study of intercultural communication. Among them, perceptual process, verbal process and nonverbal process are three main elements. Perception is the internal process by which people select, evaluate, and organize stimuli from the external environment. It is the process by which people construct their unique social realities by attributing meanings to social objects and events they encounter in their environment. It is an extremely important aspect in communications. There are three major elements that have direct influences on the development of people’s perception; they are belief/value/attitude systems, world view and social organization. As far as belief is concerned, there are no right or wrong judgments in matters of intercultural communication. If someone believes that voices in the wind can lead one’s behaviors in the right way, no one can say the belief is wrong. People should be able to recognize and to deal with different beliefs if they wish to obtain satisfactory and successful communications. Value is the valuative aspect of belief/value/attitude systems. Although everyone has his/her personal values, cultural values penetrate personal values. Cultural values are a set of organized rules for people to make choices, reduce uncertainty and conflicts within a certain society. These values are generally normative, which inform the member of a culture what is good and bad, right and wrong, true and false, etc. they also specify what behaviors are important and what should be avoided. Belief and value contribute to the development of attitudes. An attitude may be defined formally as a learned tendency to respond in a constant manner to a given object of orientation. In other words, people tend to avoid those things they dislike and to keep those they like.World view is one of the most important elements formed in the perceptual aspect of intercultural communication. It deals with a cultural orientation toward such philosophical issues as God, humanity, nature and the universe. World view has a deep influence on culture and intercultural communication. Social organization is the place in which a culture organized its institutes and affects how members of the culture perceive the world and how they communicate. Family and school are two dominant social organizations which influence the development of values and the pursuing of goals.The second element of intercultural communication is verbal process, which includes not only how people talk with each other, but the internal activities of thinking to interact with others. Verbal language is an organized system used to represent human experiences within a geographic or cultural community. In fact, language is the primary vehicle by which one culture transmits its beliefs, values, and norms.The third element of intercultural communication is nonverbal process. Although verbal process is the primary means for communication, nonverbal process is important in intercultural communication as well. Nonverbal process consists of thefollowing topics: gestures, facial expressions, eye contact, silence, space, time and paralanguage.1.2 Pragmatic Failure in Intercultural CommunicationLearning a foreign language well means more than merely mastering the pronunciation, grammar, words and idioms. It means learning also to see the world as native speakers of that language see it, learning the ways in which their language reflects the ideas, customs and behavior of their society, learning to understand their ”language of mind”.Because of cultural differences, misunderstandings and miscommunications may arise in spite of grammatically correct utterances. The same words or expressions may not mean the same thing to people from different cultures.A serious question may not cause seriousness, and a happy statement may cause unhappiness or anger because of cultural differences. Among these errors, pragmatic failures derived from cultural transfer are more serious in that they contribute to communicative failure directly in intercultural communication.1.2.1 Definition of Pragmatic FailureIf people fail to achieve the desired communicative effect in communication, pragmatic failure will be likely to occur. It can be summarized that they are unable to understand what is meant by what is said. Jenny Thomas (1983:91-94) defines pragmati c failure as “the inability to understand what is meant by what is said” and she notes that pragmatic failure has occurred on any occasion ”on which the hearer perceives the forces of the speaker’s utterances as other than the speaker intended he or she s hould perceive it”. Li Yuansheng (2004: 27) defines pragmatic failure as follows: Pragmatic failure is those failures (excluding linguistic errors such as ungrammaticality and misspelling) committed in the process of understanding or expressing utterances (both verbal and non-verbal).The definition of pragmatic failure can be understood from four aspects. Firstly, pragmatic failure can be studied in two senses. In a broad sense, it includes all the errors in language use, such as spelling mistakes, grammatical mistakes and discourse mistakes. In a narrow sense, it indicates not grammaticality but acceptability of language use. Secondly, "Appropriateness is the most important principle of language use"(Li, R. H., No. 3, 1994), therefore pragmatic failure can be considered as the result of language users' violation of the principle of appropriateness. In other words, language users violate interpersonal norms and neglect social cultural context and concrete communicative occasions out of unconsciousness or for the purpose of obtaining certain effect. Thirdly, the judgment of pragmatic failure is speaker-oriented without consideration of the hearer's comprehensive ability and process, though the ultimate judgment of failure depends on perlocutionary act. Thus, whether communication is successful or not depends on whether the communicative value (A) of the language used is equivalent to the intended meaning (B) of the speaker. If C isused to stand for the unintended meaning of the speaker, pragmatic failure can be formulated as: A=B+C or A=C (Sun Y and Dai L., No. 3, 2002). Finally, the categorization of pragmatic failure is in terms of different criteria. In intercultural communication, according to Jenny Thomas's theory, pragmatic failure is often divided into pragmalinguistic failure (on account of language users' improper assurance of linguistic context) and sociopragmatic failure (on account of language users' improper assurance of social cultural context). Pragmalinguistics, in Leech’s definition, refers to our linguistic knowledge of language use, and sociopragmatics is related with how our sociological knowledge influences our interaction (Leech, 1983:10). In China, according to the criterion of whether communication occurs in the same cultural context or in cross-cultural context, pragmatic failure is divided into intralingual pragmatic failure and interlingual pragmatic failure. Since this thesis mainly deals with intercultural communication, Jenny Thomas's theory is adopted. 1.2.2 Classification of Pragmatic FailureAs Thomas pointed out, pragmatic failure refers to the inability to understand “what is meant by what is said”. She further divided pragmatic failures into two types: pragmalinguistic failure and sociopragmatic failure (Thomas, 1983:95). This distinction can, of course, cover any sort of pragmatic failures and therefore is adopted by many scholars (e.g. Hu Wenzhong, Huang Cidong, etc.) in their study of pragmatic failures. Sun Ya and Dai Lin (2002) distinguished pragmatic failure in the broad sense and in the narrow sense in their survey of pragmatic studies in china. Qian Guanlian (2001) noticed that pragmatic failure can be divided into pragmatic failure in intercultural communication and pragmatic failure within the same mother tongue communi cation, or in SunYa’s term inter-lingual pragmatic failure and intra-lingual pragmatic failure. Based on their research findings, the author arranged and grouped the data collected into 3 categories, namely, pragmalinguistic failure, sociopragmatic failure, and value-related behavioral failure.2 Expressing Forms of Intercultural Pragmatic FailureThere are various expressing forms of pragmatic failure. And we will discuss some of them in this section.2.1Pragma-linguistic FailurePragmalinguistics and sociopragmatics belong to two sub-branches of general pragmatics. Leech (1983:11) points out the distinction between pragmalinguistics and sociopragmatics. In Leech’s definition, the term pragmalinguistics “can be applied to the study of the more linguistic end of pragmatics- where we consider the particular resources which a given language provides for conveying particular illocutions”. Pragmalinguistic failure occurs “when the pragmatic force mapped by a speaker ontoa given utterance is systematically different from the most frequently assigned to it by a native speaker of the target language, or when speech act strategies are inappropriately transferred from L1 to L2”(Thomas, 1983:95). To make it easier, pragmalinguistic failures are caused by people’s different understanding on a linguistic token or structure. They have something to do with linguistic features such as sentence structure and lexical connotations. Pragmalinguistic failure may arise from two identifiable sources: teaching-induced errors and pragmalinguistic transfer. The latter refers to “the inappropriate transfer of speech act strategies from one language to another, or the transferring from the source language to the target language of utterances which are semantically/syntactically equivalent, but which, because of ‘interpretive bias’, tend to convey a different pragmatic force in the target language.” (Thomas, 1983:101)2.2 Socio-pragmatic FailureCompared to pragmalinguistic failure, sociopragmatic failure involves not only students’linguistic knowledge of the target language but also students’ culture knowledge of the target language. Sociopragmatic failure is caused by mistakes which arise from intercultural different assessments within the social parameters affecting linguistic choice--size of imposition, social distance between speaker and hearer, relative rights and obligations, etc. Because of the different cultural backgrounds and social conventions, people respond to the same utterance differently. Chinese culture has been rooted in our mind so that we always behave according to the rules and principles of the society. The standards to judge what is right and what is wrong have been acquired since we were born. It’s safe to say that we do things unconsciously under the control of our own culture. So when two cultures meet, the differences will result in many failures in communication. It seems like we play international chess by the rules of Chinese chess.2.3 The relationship between themPragmatic failures appear in the process of using language. Pragmalinguistic failures approximate grammatical errors, while sociopragmatic failures communicative errors. The distinctions between them are those of language and culture, although the sources of contradictions are utterly not alike. These two kinds of pragmatic failures cannot be clear-cut in that they are closely connected and overlapped. An inappropriate utterance may be regarded as pragmalinguistic failure from one angle, or sociopragmatic one from another angle, which relies on different contexts, different intention and understanding of interlocutors. Seen from the general tendency of language and culture, they are a pair of contradictions that are not only linked but also differentiated, they are linked because they both belong to language in use and deal with speakers’ meaning of utterances. They are differentiated for the relationship between them embodies the differences of language and culture. Like verbal communication, non-verbal communication cannot be separated from culture, either.There exist very marked differences in non-verbal communication across culture. These differences are very often derived from different perception of values and in most cases cause pragmatic failures. The following example is an illustration of this kind of failures.Example:On the first day of the five-day course, many students were late because of the heavy rain. These students occasionally knocked at the door and asked, “May I come in?” loudly. After class, professor Brian asked me to tel l the students not to enter the classroom in that manner when they are late. Instead, he suggests, they should open the door and get to their seats silently. In this case, the students said, “May I come in?” in order to show respect to the professor, which is regarded as good manners in China. However, the professor thought otherwise. He didn’t want to be interrupted during his lecture, because he valued time more.3 The Causes of Intercultural Pragmatic FailureVarious causes can result in pragmatic fail ure. Learner’ lack of the knowledge of cultural differences can cause pragmatic failure. Different cultural values and norms among countries can cause pragmatic failure. Learner’ inappropriate transfer of language itself, of cultural meanings, and of situation meanings can cause pragmatic failure.3.1Different Cultural Values and NormsDifferent cultures have different cultural conventions, and different languages have different conversational norms, hence different people under different cultural backgrounds have different cultural values and norms. These cultural differences in values and norms have a great influence on intercultural communication for foreign language learners. In fact, cultural differences can cause many problems in intercultural communication and in foreign language teaching. If Chinese students cannot distinguish cultural differences, they cannot truly achieve a desired result in intercultural communication. In China, on the one hand, Chinese students want to practice their English, they are eager to speak; on the other hand, they do not know the rules of some cultural conventions and differences for native English speakers. They often violate these rules unconsciously and commit some pragmatic errors in interacting with native English speakers.3.1.1 Modesty vs. Self-denigrationIt is universally acknowledged that to be modest is a way to show politeness, but how people in different cultural backgrounds think of “modesty” is another question. In Chinese culture, the “Modesty Maxim” is valued much more highly than in western cultures, so the Chinese rank “modesty and humility” over “honesty quality”. That’s why the Chinese would like to respond to a compliment with a kind of modest attitude. Chinese “modesty” involves putting down onese lf and elevating others, while“modesty” as Leech’s Politeness Principles puts, is to avoid self-praise. Therefore, Chinese politeness is built whereas “modesty” functions as a strategy of minimizing self-praise (Hu, 1999: 348-349). When being complimented, English people tend to accept the compliment frankly, with a remark like “Thank you” to show his/her acknowledgement of self-worth as well as his/her appreciation to the compliment. In contrast, Chinese speakers usually tend to deny the praise by saying something like “哪里，哪里，您过奖了”, which is equivalent to “Oh, it’s nothing. You are flattering me”. As Deng and Liu (1989) note that such different reactions stem from their different cultural assumptions and values: in English culture, it is generally assumed that the praise is sincere and/or the praise is for some not unworthy achievement or something else, and thus, there should be no false humility or no pretended modesty; however, to Chinese, acceptance of a praise will be assumed to be self-conceited or lack of good manners. So, the Chinese would like to underrate what he himself has achieved and deny the truth of a complimentary remark to show “modesty. For example, (10) Foreign guest: You’ve done a good job. Chinese attendant: No, there are many defects. (Wang Jianhua 1998:20) (11) Foreign teacher: Your handwriting is beautiful! Chinese student: No, no, not at all. You’re joking.(He Zeran 1988: 96)To sum up, English “modesty” stresses other-elevating, but not necessarily and very rarely self-denigrating whereas Chinese “modesty” emphasizes both self-denigrating but other elevating, stresses more on self-denigrating. To denigrate the self is to show respect to the other. (He 1995: 4).3.1.2 Privacy vs. Mutual CarePrivacy is valued in all cultures but it is more highlighted in English culture than in Chinese culture. The perception of “privacy” in Chinese culture and English culture is quite different, for the reason of the differences between individualism and collectivism. Chinese culture might be sometimes viewed intrusive for native English speakers. Chinese culture attaches great importance to human feelings and interpersonal relationships. Therefore, it is usual for the Chinese to initiate their conversation by asking some questions such as age, martial status, income, and occupation when they meet each other for the first time. For example, (12) a. How old are you? b. Are you married/single? c. How much do you earn each month? d. How many people in your family? e. What’s your father/mother/husba nd/wife? f. Are you a Christian? In Chinese Culture, asking the above questions can show your concern for others and will shorten the social distance between the interlocutors. Hence, harmonious relationship is maintained. “The concept of privacy” is har d for Chinese students to grasp when they are communicating with native English speakers, for what is regarded “privacy” in western culture is often no “privacy” in China. In fact, in western culture, such topics like age, income, marital status, politics and religion are taboo and unacceptable. When they hear such questions, they may feel uncomfortable and offended. For native English speakers, the natural way to start a conversation is to choose some public topics to talk about, such as weather, traveling,sports, etc. Their sense of privacy is so strong that they are easily offended by such common Chinese greetings as “Where are you going?” or “Where have you been?” In this case, the natural response of most native English speakers is most likely to be like “It is none of your business” (Deng & Liu 1989: 29).The above study doesn’t mean the Chinese have no privacy, but implies that their conception of privacy is quite different from that in English culture. Indeed, Chinese “privacy" has changed a lot with the development of China’s reform and opening up. Those, which were not taken as one’s privacy in the past, are gradually regarded as privacy now, including age, income and marital status. In a broad sense, Chinese privacy is somewhat similar to that in western culture, while in a strict sense, they are still quite different. In addition to the above conversations, the Chinese tend to care about others by saying some caring words while the westerners regard it as another kind of invasion of their privacy. These questions may be asked for some specific contexts. For example, (13) a. The weather is changeable, put on more clothes. b. Remember to take some medicine. c. Drink more boiled water. d. Eat more fresh vegetable. e. You are old. You sit here.3.1.3 Directness vs. IndirectnessIn Chinese culture, people prefer to talk something else before getting to the point. The reason is, in Chinese culture, it seems a little rude to say anything directly, either to ask for help or to make complaints. But, in western culture, if you do so, they will think that either you have mental disturbance or you intend to slide over the key point. They may misunderstand what you mean. For example, (14) (a Chinese student wants to ask his English teacher for help) A: Are you very busy? B: Yes, I’ve been very busy recently. In the above example, the student wanted to ask for help, and according to Chinese cultural norms, he asked “Are you very busy?” Its equivalent Chinese is “现在忙吗?” In Chinese, if somebody says “现在忙吗?” the most likely answer is “有什么事? (Anything I can do for you?)” But in western culture, they would like to come straight to the point, so the English teacher responded the Chinese student in terms of the western sense of value, i.e. to consider something as it stands. As a result, A may feel uncomfortable because of B’s direct refusal. In this case, A should ask his/her English teacher for help directly, like “Could you give me a hand now?” Such dialogues often occur in students’ textbooks. In fact, these dialogues are the combination of the Chinese thought and the English form. Some textbooks designed pay less attention to cultural and psychological differences. Students just imitate what they learn in the classroom and remember mechanically. Asking such questions seems that you are an immigration officer. It sounds uncomfortable for the westerners, for it is an invasion of their privacy.3.2 Inappropriate TransferWhen people from different cultural backgrounds interact with each other, they must transfer from their mother tongue to the target language and vice versa, for there。
