Complaining happens in all cultures, and offers a unique insight into the values, taboos, and communicative practices of a given society. The ways in which complaining is viewed and performed vary drastically not only cross-culturally, but across smaller communal groups and between individuals, too. This dissertation approaches complaining from a multilateral perspective to investigate how individuals in three different language groups – monolingual French speakers, monolingual English speakers, and native English speakers enrolled in upper-division university French courses – perceive and produce complaints as well as the influential role played by social context. In the perception study, the researcher explores how individuals within the examined language groups identify the presence of complaints and perceive their naturalness when presented with contextualized scenarios involving native speakers. In the production study, the researcher examines both the frequency with which individuals complain and the strategies they employ to perform a complaint in various social situations. Additionally, within the production study the researcher examines the frequency with which participants opt out from complaining and their provided rationale for doing so. This dissertation not only identifies a variety of universal linguistic and sociocultural features of complaints, it also uncovers several aspects distinctive to the individual language groups. At the core of this dissertation is the argument that to best understand complaint behavior, researchers should acknowledge the essential influence of social context on both the perception and production of complaints. Above all, future research must consider the complex and dynamic interplay that exists between cross-cultural complaint behaviors and social norms of politeness.

This paper surveys a range of constructions in which prosody affects discourse function and discourse structure.We discuss English tag questions, negative polar questions, and what we call “focus” questions. We postulate that these question types are complex speech acts and outline an analysis in Segmented Discourse Representation Theory (SDRT) to account for the interactions between prosody and discourse.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the complaint speech act set used by Turkish EFL learners speaking to a commiserating and contradicting teacher. For this purpose, four kinds of data sources were used: twenty native English speakers&amp / #8217 / role-plays, twenty five Turkish native speakers&amp / #8217 / role-plays, forty students&amp / #8217 / role-plays and two native speakers&amp / #8217 / judgments on the students&amp / #8217 / production. The subjects were given two different situations. Their role-plays were audio taped and transcribed. The subjects&amp / #8217 / complaint speech act sets were analyzed, using a coding scheme from a previous study in the literature. The baseline and the interlanguage data were compared using SPSS to see to what extent they were similar and different, and to see whether or not the Turkish EFL learners made positive and negative transfer, and whether there were any features unique to the interlanguage of the learners. The findings of the study revealed that Turkish EFL learners produced a complaint speech act set when speaking to a commiserating and contradicting teacher. The components of the complaint speech act set realized by the learners were &amp / #8216 / complaint&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / justification&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / candidate solution: request&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / candidate solution: demand&amp / #8217 / , and &amp / #8216 / explanation of purpose&amp / #8217 / . When speaking to the commiserating teacher, the students made positive transfer in using the components &amp / #8216 / explanation of purpose&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / complaint&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / justification&amp / #8217 / , and &amp / #8216 / request&amp / #8217 / . They made negative transfer in using &amp / #8216 / demand&amp / #8217 / . The students speaking to the contradicting teacher made positive transfer in their use of the components &amp / #8216 / explanation of purpose&amp / #8217 / , &amp / #8216 / complaint&amp / #8217 / and &amp / #8216 / justification&amp / #8217 / . The component &amp / #8216 / demand&amp / #8217 / was subject to negative transfer.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Stanford University, 1981. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 187-193).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Instytut Badań Literackich, 1975. / At head of title: Polska Akademia Nauk. Instytut Badań Literackich. Includes bibliographical references.

The author's Habilitationsschrift (Universität Zürich, 1983). / Includes bibliographical references (p. 313-326) and index.

This Report answers three questions: (a) Why is teaching pragmatic competence important? (b) What are the approaches to teaching pragmatic awareness? Specifically how do instructors teach Spanish requests?, and (c) What role does technology play in pragmatic awareness instruction? The first chapter explains why I chose to write my Report on developing pragmatic awareness through speech act instruction. Chapter two discusses development of pragmatic awareness. Chapter three and four address approaches to teaching pragmatic knowledge and technology’s role in pragmatic instruction. Chapter five proposes a lesson for an intermediate university Spanish class grounded on speech act theory. Materials and a rubric for classroom use accompany the lesson (Appendices A-C). The chapter concludes with a discussion of pedagogical challenges as well as pedagogical recommendations for teachers. Chapter six concludes the Report by answering my guiding questions succinctly, summarizing the pedagogical lesson proposed, and explaining the reasons why I think the lesson is a useful resource for teachers. / text

published_or_final_version / Linguistics / Master / Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics

Socialinė reklama – tai nemokama arba iš dalies apmokama, sukrečianti arba humoristinio pobūdžio komunikacijos forma, kuria stengiamasi pakeisti visuomenės požiūrį ar elgesį pozityvesne linkme, tiesiogiai nesiekiant pelno. Atlikta apklausa Socialinės reklamos poveikis visuomenei parodė, kad dauguma apklaustųjų žino, kas yra socialinė reklama. Ši reklamos rūšis padeda spręsti socialines problemas, o paveikiausia ji rodoma per televiziją. Lietuvoje vis dar trūksta kokybiškai sukurtų socialinių reklamų. Dažniausiai socialinės reklamos kuriamos direktyvais, kiek rečiau reprezentatyvais. Komisyvų rasta tik „Sveikatos apsaugos“ grupėje. Esama ir mišraus tipo reklamų. Socialinėse reklamose dažniausiai raginama liepiamosios nuosakos antruoju asmeniu. Taip pat nevengiama retorinių klausimų. Išskirtas gąsdinimo mikroaktas. Šis aktas pasireiškia ne tik žodinėje, bet ir vaizdinėje informacijoje. Šiurpūs vaizdai tampa išskirtiniu socialinės reklamos elementu. Socialinė reklama kuriama pagal tris kompozicijos modelius: klasikinį / uždarąjį; nepilną klasikinį / atvirąjį ir vieno dėmens. Būdingas atvirasis kompozicijos tipas. Vyrauja publicistinis funkcinis stilius, bet esama reklamų, kai susipina keli stiliai, daugiausiai publicistinis ir šnekamasis. Siekiant įtaigumo, naudojami įvairūs kalbos aktualizacijos būdai. Dažnesnė sintaksės aktualizacija. Daugiausiai retorinių sušukimų, elipsės, retorinių klausimų. Aktualizuojant leksiką, naudojamasi epitetais, nevengiama ironijos. Ypatingas... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Social advertising – is a form of communication, which is of shocking or comic nature. It tries to change the attitude or behaviour of society towards a more positive direction, not using direct account. It may be free, paid or partially paid. Questioning Social advertising effect of community revealed that most respondents know social advertising and it helps to solve social problems. This advertisement has the biggest influence on TV. In Lithuania social advertising still are not high quality. Social advertising mostly created by directives. Not so many advertisements created by constatives. Commissives used only in Health service group. Generally, social advertising used second person imperatives. Also used rhetoric questions. Commination act was taken a part. This speech act used not only in the text also in visual information. Horrific views become exceptional element of social advertising. Social advertising is created according to three composition models: classical / closed; not fully classical / open and having one element. Open composition type is characteristic. Publicist functional style is prevailing, though the most of advertisements are created using some styles – publicistic and spoken for the most part. In order to avoid conventionality, seeking for suggestibility, more effect, different ways of actualization are used. Syntax actualization is more frequent. There are rhetoric exclamations, ellipsis, rhetoric questions. Actualizing lexis, epithets are used... [to full text]

This dissertation is a descriptive study of speech acts encoded in Kirundi marriage transactional discourse and the strategies used by the participants to encode them and attempts to understand the interrelationships between the speech acts and the strategies.Chapter 1 states the objectives and describes the data to be studied and the approach to go about it. Chapter 2 provides the reader with some background information on Burundian society and culture in the area of matrimony.Chapter 3 explores the conversation activities and the management of the interactions between the interactants in the sociocultural context of marriage transactions. Formality participation status are discussed and shown to be crucial factors for the semantic and pragmatic interpretation of the participants' verbal contributions. Chapter 4 investigates the nature and the function of the speech acts performed by the interactants. The speech act identification and categorization are based on the social aspects of linguistic action and on the conventionality and contextuality of discourse. Chapter 5 inquires into the strategies applied by the interactants to encode and decode them. Chapter 6 is a summary and conclusion. / Department of English