Abstract

Politeness has been a common social phenomenon in human societies. Because of cultural differences, the meaning of polite interpretation is not the same. In cross-cultural communication, usually, people will judge each other’s words based on its own cultural backgrounds, so misunderstanding or communication failures are inevitable. Linguists regard this kind of communication failure as pragmatic failure. So as far as cross-cultural communicators are concerned, thorough understanding of different cultures and expressions of politeness connotation are absolutely necessary. Under the perspective of cross-cultural communication, this thesis makes a study of pragmatic failures of polite language between Chinese and English and its countermeasures according to Grice's cooperative principle, Leech's politeness principle, and a Chinese professor Gu Yueguo’s politeness theory. In particular, as far as cross-cultural communicators are concerned, in order to achieve successful communication, we must enhance our awareness of cultural differences and improve our cross-cultural communication skills. 

Keywords:  politeness  intercultural communication  pragmatic failures

Contents

Acknowledgements

Abstract

摘要

Chapter One Introduction-1

1.1 Background of the Study-1

1.2 Significance of the Study-1

Chapter Two Literature Review-3

2.1 Pragmatic Failure-3

2.1.1 Pragma-linguistic Failure-3

2.1.2 Socio-pragmatic Failure-3

2.2 Studies on Politeness in Western Countries-3

2.3 Researches on Politeness in China-4

Chapter Three Analysis of Pragmatic Failures in Intercultural Communication-6

   3.1 Addressing Forms-6

   3.2 Greetings-6

   3.3 Compliments-7

   3.4 Apologies-7

   3.5 Gratitude-8

Chapter Four Causes of Pragmatic Failures in Intercultural Communication-9

   4.1 Individualism vs. Collectivism-9

4.2 Directness vs. Indirectness-9

   4.3 Modesty-9

   4.4 Privacy-10

Chapter Five Strategies to Avoid Intercultural Pragmatic Failures-11

5.1 Awareness of Cultural Differences-11

5.2 Adoption of Empathy in Intercultural Communication-11

5.3 Improvement of Intercultural Communication Competence-11

Chapter Six Conclusion-13

References-14