چکیده:
The study seeks to provide a systematic pragmatic analysis of suggestion speech act among Iranian EFL learners. The purposes of the investigation are determining: the application of suggestion semantic formulae, the attitude of appropriateness in terms of confidence in the employment of appropriate supportive moves, polite and impolite mannerism, and the relationship between attitude of appropriateness and mannerism. To this end, an OQPT was administered as a placement test among 60 Iranian EFL learners. These participants along with 10 American native speakers then underwent a suggestion DCT addressing interlocutors with various power statuses (higher, lower, and equal) and social distances (intimate and strange). The DCT also involved attitudinal appropriateness scale and (im)politeness mannerism likert scale. The results indicated variations in the Iranian learners and American speakers’ performances in the employment of semantic formulae as well as in attitudinal appropriateness and (im)politeness manner. Moreover, the output revealed a positive relationship between the attitude and mannerism scales.
خلاصه ماشینی:
Keywords: Pragmatic awareness; Iranian EFL learners; Suggestion speech act; Attitudinal appropriateness; (Im)politeness strategies * Corresponding Author Submission date: 6 July, 2017 Acceptance date: 11 Sept, 2017 <H2>1.
The high-priority point is that (im)politeness judgments do not occur in vacuum (Fauzia, Ibrahim, &amp; Marosc; 2014) but they are the constant consideration of the application of strategies and speech acts by way of cross-cultural norms.
This study has focused on examining an account of suggestion formula among Iranian EFL learners and American native speakers to find the similarities and discrepancies of supportive moves as well as to explore the degree to which Iranian EFL learners’ patterns would match to the target language patterns.
The objectives of this research are to determine; firstly, Iranian EFL learners’ pragmatic awareness of suggestion semantic formulae; secondly, similarities and differences in suggestion speech act production between the two groups of the learners and American native speakers; thirdly, the participants’ suggestion patterns based on Jiang’ (2006) coding scheme; fourthly, the learners’ attitudinal ratings of their suggestion structures in terms of appropriateness; and finally, the learners’ awareness of (im)politeness strategies in comparison with the values of native-like strategies.
Results</H2> Considering the purposes, the study aimed to identify success in pragmatic domain and to report the similarities and differences in frequencies of suggestion patterns among the Iranian EFL learners and the American native speakers.
Conclusions</H2> The findings provid insights into Iranian EFL learners’ pragmatic awareness in stating suggestion speech act, confidence in employing appropriate supportive moves, mannerism in applying (im)politeness strategies.