Communicating through Vague Language

Communicating through Vague Language

Also by Peyman Sabet 15 M.A. PARALLEL TESTS IN TEFL FOR EXAMINATIONS A Book for M.A. Candidates in TEFL ( co- authored) EFFECTIVE READING FOR COMPREHENSION ( co- authored) Also by Grace Zhang ELASTIC LANGUAGE How and Why We Stretch Our Words CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES ON LANGUAGE EDUCATION: AUSTRALIA AND THE ASIA PACIFIC ( co- edited) NEGOTIATING WITH VAGUE LANGUAGE A Chinese Perspective ( co- authored) USING CHINESE SYNONYMS REQUEST STRATEGIES A Comparative Study in Mandarin Chinese and Korean ( co- authored) FUZZY SEMANTICS (2nd edition)

Communicating through Vague Language A Comparative Study of L1 and L2 Speakers Peyman G.P. Sabet and Grace Q. Zhang Curtin University, Australia

Peyman G.P. Sabet and Grace Q. Zhang 2015 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-48637-0 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6 10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2015 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave and Macmillan are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978-1-349-55661-8 ISBN 978-1-137-48638-7 (ebook) DOI 10.1057/9781137486387 This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sabet, Peyman G.P., 1976 Communicating through vague language : a comparative study of L1 and L2 speakers / Peyman G.P. Sabet, Curtin University, Australia; Grace Q. Zhang, Curtin University, Australia. pages cm Summary: Vague language refers to expressions with unspecified meaning (for instance, I kind of want that job ), and is an important but often overlooked part of linguistic communication. This book is a comparative study of vague language based on naturally occurring data of a rare combination: L1 (American) and L2 (Chinese and Persian) speakers in academic settings. The findings indicate that L2 learners have diverse and culturally specific needs for vague language, and generally use vague words in a more concentrated fashion compared with L1s. The book explores the interconnection and continuum between the linguistic realizations of a vague term and the functions it serves, and how elasticity underpins the frequency and functions of vague language. The implication is that vague language may be integrated into the curriculum of English language teaching as part of L2 speakers communicative competence. This book will be of great interest to researchers in the fields of intercultural education and applied linguistics Provided by publisher. 1. Semantics. 2. Vagueness (Philosophy) 3. Ambiguity. 4. Language and languages Philosophy. I. Zhang, Grace Qiao, author. II. Title. P325.S123 2015 401'.43 dc23 2015018336 Typeset by MPS Limited, Chennai, India.

Contents List of Figures and Tables Acknowledgments Transcription Conventions List of Abbreviations viii x xi xii 1 Introduction 1 1.1 Purpose of the study 2 1.2 Organization 3 2 Theoretical Foundations 4 2.1 Vague language: what is it and why do we need it? 5 2.2 Vague language in different settings 11 2.3 Vague language and education 15 2.3.1 Vague language in the classroom 15 2.3.2 Vague language in language learning and teaching 17 2.3.3 Vague language and learner language 19 2.4 Theoretical frameworks 23 2.4.1 Vague language and the cooperative principle 23 2.4.2 Vague language and Relevance Theory 26 2.4.3 The elasticity of vague language 29 2.5 Concluding remarks 31 3 Methodology 33 3.1 Three approaches 33 3.1.1 Quantitative approach 33 3.1.2 Qualitative approach 35 3.1.3 Mixed methods approach 38 3.2 Naturally occurring data 41 3.3 Data 42 3.4 Data analysis 44 3.5 Concluding remarks 46 4 Lexical Analysis of Vague Language 47 4.1 Subjectivizers 47 4.1.1 I think 48 4.1.2 I guess 53 v

vi Contents 4.1.3 I don t know 54 4.1.4 I believe 55 4.2 Possibility indicators 58 4.2.1 Maybe 59 4.2.2 May 63 4.2.3 Might 65 4.2.4 Probably and possible 66 4.3 Vague quantifiers 69 4.3.1 Some 71 4.3.2 Much 74 4.3.3 Many 75 4.3.4 A lot of 77 4.3.5 Most 77 4.3.6 (A) few 79 4.3.7 A little 80 4.3.8 Lots of 80 4.3.9 A lot 80 4.3.10 Majority 81 4.4 Vague intensifiers 84 4.4.1 Really 85 4.4.2 Very 88 4.4.3 Actually 92 4.4.4 So 94 4.4.5 Too 95 4.4.6 Quite 96 4.5 Placeholders 99 4.5.1 Something 99 4.5.2 Things 102 4.5.3 Thing 104 4.5.4 Anything 106 4.5.5 Someone 107 4.5.6 Somebody 108 4.5.7 Anybody 109 4.6 Concluding remarks 111 5 Pragmatic Functions of Vague Language 113 5.1 Mitigation 114 5.1.1 Self- protection 115 5.1.2 Politeness 118 5.1.3 Downtoning 123

Contents vii 5.2 Right amount of information 126 5.2.1 Quantification 126 5.2.2 Emphasizing 129 5.2.3 Possibility 132 5.2.4 Uncertainty 136 5.3 Structural function 138 5.3.1 Repair 139 5.3.2 Hesitation 143 5.3.3 Turn management 146 5.4 Concluding remarks 149 6 General Discussion 151 6.1 Overall frequency distribution 151 6.2 Clustering patterns 153 6.3 Density of vague language and concentrated distribution 160 6.4 Influence of first language 162 6.5 Influence of cultural protocols 169 6.6 Impact of lack of language proficiency 173 6.7 Impact of cognitive processing focus 175 6.8 Different communicative approaches 178 6.9 The manifestation of elasticity of vague language 181 6.9.1 Linguistic elasticity 182 6.9.2 Pragmatic elasticity 186 6.9.3 Versatility between realizations and functions 187 6.10 Concluding remarks 187 7 Conclusions and Implications 189 7.1 Conclusions 190 7.2 Limitations 194 7.3 Implications 194 7.4 Further research 196 Appendix I: Consent Form for the Director and Teachers 198 Appendix II: Consent Form for Participants 199 References 200 Subject Index 209 Author Index 211

List of Figures and Tables Figures 4.1 Frequency distribution of subjectivizers 56 4.2 Percentage distribution of subjectivizers 57 4.3 Frequency distribution of possibility indicators 68 4.4 Percentage distribution of possibility indicators 69 4.5 Frequency distribution of vague quantifiers 82 4.6 Percentage distribution of vague quantifiers 83 4.7 Frequency distribution of vague intensifiers 97 4.8 Percentage distribution of vague intensifiers 98 4.9 Frequency distribution of placeholders 109 4.10 Percentage distribution of placeholders 110 6.1 Positions of the three groups in the use of five lexical categories 154 6.2 Overall frequency continuum of possibility indicators 185 6.3 Elastic continuum of maybe 185 6.4 Overall frequency continuum of placeholders 186 6.5 Elastic continuum of things 186 Tables 3.1 Differences between quantitative and qualitative methods 35 3.2 Vague language lexical categories 44 3.3 Vague language pragmatic function categories 45 4.1 Distribution of subjectivizers 48 4.2 I think positions and clusters 52 4.3 Distribution of possibility indicators 58 4.4 Maybe positions and clusters 62 4.5 May clusters 64 viii

List of Figures and Tables ix 4.6 Might clusters 65 4.7 Distribution of vague quantifiers 70 4.8 Some clusters 71 4.9 Much clusters 74 4.10 Many clusters 76 4.11 Distribution of vague intensifiers 84 4.12 Really clusters 86 4.13 Very clusters 89 4.14 Distribution of placeholders 99 4.15 Something clusters 100 4.16 Things clusters 103 4.17 Thing clusters 105 4.18 Anything clusters 106 4.19 Frequency of lexical categories of vague language 111 6.1 Overall distributions of vague expressions 152 6.2 Ratio of vague expressions to total word count 161

Acknowledgments We would like to express our sincere gratitude to Chris Conlan, the anonymous reviewers and the final clearance reader; their valuable feedback has been incorporated into this book. We thank Rebecca Brennan and Libby Forrest at Palgrave Macmillan, Geetha Williams, Portia Winters and anyone else involved in this project, for their help with the production of this book. We are truly grateful to Margaret Johnson for her skilful assistance with the editing. Without the willingness of participants in the data collection, this book would not have been possible. We thank wholeheartedly those who participated in the data collection in Iran and China, and the organiser Hongbian Feng. We acknowledge, with gratitude, the research grant (AAPI and humanities) and scholarships awarded by Curtin University, and the use of the Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English. Finally, we thank our parents and spouses for all the selfless support and never- ending love they have given us. x

Transcription Conventions [ S1:] Overlap < SU- f, SU- m> Unknown speaker with gender identified <P: 04> Pause of 4 seconds Pause of 2 3 seconds <LAUGH> Current speaker laughs <S8 LAUGH> Speaker 8 laughs <SS LAUGH> Two or more speakers laugh (xx) Indecipherable xi

List of Abbreviations CANCODE Cambridge and Nottingham Corpus of Discourse in English CSLE CTFV Chinese- speaking learner of English Contrary- to- face- value EFL English as a foreign language ELT English language teaching ERIC Education Resources Information Centre ESL English as a second language LIBELCASE Limerick- Belfast Corpus of Academic Spoken English L1s L1 speakers MICASE Michigan Corpus of Academic Spoken English PSLE Persian- speaking learner of English SOV Subject- object- verb VOA Voice of America xii