Disagreeing in english and vietnamese

4.2. Empirical Study

4.2.1. Aims and Methodology

4.2.1.1. Aims

This empirical study aims at finding evidence for the following hypotheses:

1. 
   Disagreement tokens made by native speakers of English and Vietnamese may be similar in terms of preference format pertaining to the minimization of disagreements as dispreferred seconds and maximization of disagreements as preferred seconds.
   
2. 
   The English informants are inclined to take advantage of devices like back channels, partial repeats, repair initiators and turn prefaces to hedge their disagreements while their Vietnamese are prone to deploy address terms and particles in conformity to their social norms.
   

4.2.1.2. Data collection methods and respondents

As required by conversation analytic research, all the data used in this paper should be obtained from mundane talk occurring in natural settings. The data were collected in 2003 in Hanoi and Toronto. The Vietnamese corpus is from 30 native speakers of Vietnamese living and working in Hanoi. They all have university/college education (except one old-aged woman in the first conversation), and are rated as middle-class citizens. The corpus contains eight conversations, each of which is 45 minutes long.

The first conversation is between an old-age woman and her three adult children: two mid-aged women and one young man aged around 30. They talk about their family issues and relatives. The second tape is a conversation among three women, who used to be students in the same department at college. Two of them met by chance at the house of the third woman twenty years after their graduation, and the conversation was recorded on that day. The third conversation is between five people, two men and three women. They used to be classmates at school and have been in close contact since then. They exchange ideas about their families, children, and individual lifestyle. All the conversationalists in the second and third conversations are in their early forties. The fourth and the fifth conversations are between a group of first-year college students and their schoolteacher. They talk about their school days, studies, exams, fashions, as well as teacher-student and student-student relationships. They assess the school activities they once took part in, and many other things. The sixth tape contains a conversation between a four-member family and an old friend of the mother. Both the parents, aged around 50, are officers and their children, aged between 20 and 26, are college students. The family’s friend, who is in her forties, is close to the family and they have a good relationship. They exchange information about daily activities, their children’s heath, studies and the like. During the talk, the daughter and the son seem to be quiet compared to their parents. Maybe, the presence of the guest inconveniences them in some way, although they know her well. Or maybe, it is a reflection of the norms of Vietnamese behavioral manners: children do not actively engage in conversations among adults until they are asked to.

The seventh conversation is about preparations for college entrance exams between two mothers and two students. The mothers, who are actually cousins, are in their forties. One of the students is a first-year college boy, and the other is a twelfth-grade girl, who is preparing for the up-coming competitive college-entrance exams. The last conversation is between an old-aged man, who used to be a middle-ranked official of the government, his son and a female school classmate of the son, who are about 40. Being friends for more than 20 years, the son and his friend understand each other quite well, and find it comfortable to talk about different issues. At that time, the son was still single and this was one of the concerns of the father.

The English corpus consists of 6 tapes, two of which have been recorded in Hanoi and four in Toronto. All the 16 informants are native speakers of English from North America and have college/university degrees. The first tape contains a conversation between two mid-aged women who come from New York. They used to be good friends and just met again in Hanoi after a long time of no contact. The second tape is made with the help of 4 American English teachers working in Hanoi, aged from 24 to 30, one male and three females. They didn’t know each other until they came to teach in Vietnam. However, they had some time working together and were frequently engaged in interaction. The first Toronto tape is between 2 mid-aged Ph.D. students, a man and a woman and both are native speakers of English. The second is a conversation between a Canadian old-aged couple and the husband is a graduate student in the Department of Anthropology, University of Toronto. This kind man recorded the conversation between him and his oldest son, a mid-aged man, making the third tape for the researcher. The fourth Toronto tape records two young MA students doing their research at University of Toronto. All the informants are asked to freely talk about their daily activities, hobbies and friends and provide assessment of things they do and of people they know.

However, for the particular purpose and size of the present paper, a major part of the English corpus is taken from excerpts and extracts used by respected researchers in the field of conversation analysis like Heritage and Drew (1979), Pomerantz (1975, 1978, 1984a-b), Levinson (1983), Heritage (2002, forth.), Goodwin and Goodwin (1987) and others. These data are claimed to come from actual interactions between native speakers of English in natural everyday settings. Generally, they are transcribed on the basis of the conventions used in CA. This, according to Psathas (1995: 45) is appropriate and allowable in CA, as ‘Data may be obtained from any available source, the only requirement being that these should be naturally occurring, rather than produced for the purpose of study.’

The present researcher has the respondents’ permission to use the tapes, although some of the informants were recorded without being informed earlier. The majority of the tapes were collected after the informants agreed to be recorded. The recordings were done only when the informants got so involved in the talk that they forgot about the recorder and the researcher herself. By and large, the data can be assumed to consist of naturally occurring interactions, and are very much similar to those happen in everyday exchanges between native speakers.

Being audio-taped, both kinds of data lack visual documentation. The prosodic features may fully be incorporated in the English corpus, but not in the Vietnamese due to the shortage of adequate technologies. And although the researcher is aware of the significance and contribution of participants’ gestures, body movements, gazes, and other facial expressions, she cannot address such body behaviors. The field-notes taken by the researcher herself are employed for reference only when necessary and appropriate. On the whole, the study focuses on the basic vocal features of the talk while analyzing preference organization in English and Vietnamese on the grounds of disagreeing data. One of the main concerns of the present paper is to examine the preference structures in disagreeing turns and sequences. Thus, some translations from Vietnamese into English may lack naturalness as the researcher would like to maintain the main features of talk-in-progress in Vietnamese.

4.2.2. Strategies for Disagreements as Dispreferred Seconds

4.2.2.1. English corpus

1. Delay devices: In interactional exchanges, the initiating of assessments is often treated as a way of inviting agreements from co-participants. However, not all the responses are agreements. According to the data, English Ss tend to delay or withhold stated disagreements and avoid early delivery of negative answers within turns and sequences. Such markers as partial repeats (e.g. ‘I do’), repair initiators (e.g. ‘I mean’), turn prefaces (e.g. ‘Well’, ‘Er’), requests for clarification (e.g. ‘What?’, ‘Hm’) and so on so forth are frequently employed to signal the special turn shapes for disagreements as dispreferreds. The following fragments can be good examples:

32. 
    A: Why whhat’sa mattuh with y-Yih sou//nd HA:PPY, hh
    

B: Nothing.

→ B: I sound ha:p//py?

A: Ye:uh.

(0.3)

B: No:, (Pomerantz 1984a: 71)

33. 
    Angel: I don’t think Nick would play such a dirty trick on you.
    

→ Brit: Well, you obviously don’t know Nick very well.

(Finegan 2004: 309)

2. Silences: Pomerantz (1984a) and Goodwin & Goodwin (1987) assume that pauses and silences following the prior assessments are comprehended as second Ss’ signals of yet-stated disagreements. In the example by Goodwin & Goodwin (1987: 43) given below, Curt’s forthright disagreement finally comes after two pauses leading to Mike’s prolonging his turn and the whole sequence:

34. 
    Mike: Well I can’t say they’re ol: clunkers- eez gotta Co:rd?
    

(0.1)

Mike: Two Co:rds.

(1.0)

Mike: //And

Curt: Not original,

Pomerantz (1984a: 71) also calls this strategy ‘no immediately forthcoming talk’ strategy. In her extract (Ibid. 70) given below, the initially silent part of the response (marked with →) may imply an upcoming disagreement [marked with (D)] and engender an elaborate assertion on the part of the first S:

35. 
    A: God izn it dreary.
    

→ (0.6)

A: //Y’know I don’t think-

(D) B: .hh- It’s warm though,

3. Downgrading prior assessments: Native speakers sometimes express their negative answers by downgrading or qualifying the already stated evaluations, as in the following extract by Pomerantz (1978: 96):

36. 
    E: That Pat. Isn’t she a do::ll?
    

→ M: Yeh isn’t she pretty,

Not completely agreeing with and not wishing to publicly be opposite to the co-conversant, M chooses the strategy of downgrading levels of first assessments. Quite similarly, the second S in another example by Pomerantz (1984a: 68) lessens the strength of the prior evaluative token by providing a scaled-down or weakened assessment:

37. 
    A: She’s a fox.
    

→ L: Yeh, she’s a pretty girl.

English Ss can also make use of such downtoners as kind of, sort of, a bit, nearly, almost, slightly, somewhat etc., which will be examined in Chapter five, to qualify their disagreements, as in an extract by Pomerantz (Ibid.):

38. 
    A: Oh it was just beautiful.
    

→ B: … uh I thought it was quite nice.

4. ‘Agreement + Disagreement’ format: English speakers may deploy the ‘agreement plus disagreement’ format or weak disagreement, accompanied with ‘but’ as in another example by Pomerantz (1984a: 72):

39. 
    D: We’ve got sm pretty // (good schools.)
    

→ C: Well, yeah but where in the hell em I gonna live.

Disagreements might also be delayed within the turn construction. Ss may preface disagreement components with “uh’s”, “well’s” (as in the above extract) and so on, expressing discomfort or inconvenience.

The interesting and mysterious combination of agreeing and disagreeing in this format is worth noting. In essence, agreements and disagreements are contrastive elements, and in theory, they should go in opposing directions. In this special format, however, they go together and form a type of weak or partial disagreements, as in the two fragments below by Pomerantz (1984a: 73):

40. 
    R: Butchu admit he is having fun and you think it’s funny.
    

→ K: I think it’s funny, yeah. But it’s a ridiculous funny.

41. 
    A: … cause those things take working at,
    

(2.0)

→ B: (hhhhh) well, they // do, but-

A: They aren’t accidents,

→ B: No, they take working at but on the other hand, some people …

Supposing that the agreement tokens in the excerpts above were left out, the disagreements would then be judged as strong, as the evaluation components would be directly contrastive with the prior.

4.2.2.2. Vietnamese corpus

1. Delay devices: When Vietnamese Ss find themselves in disagreement with prior assessments, they may delay their outright answers by asking for more information or clarification, as in the following extract:

V03.9.56.

42. 
    B. … Vµ nhiÒu c¸i nã lµm t«i thÊy lµ ®Çu t­­ kh«ng hîp lý.
    

and many classifier he do I see be investment no reasonable

(And lots of what he’s done can be considered unsound investment.)

H. Nh­­ng mµ nã vÉn kiÕm tiÒn tèt.

But he already get money good

(But he can still make plenty of money.)

B: C¸i kiÕm tiÒn cña th»ng N Êy (0.5) tí thÊy kh«ng ph¶i lµ tèt.

classifier get money of address-term N that I see no must be good

(I don’t think the way N makes his money is good.)

 H: õ, sao l¹i kh«ng tèt?

Yeah why particle no good

(Yeah, why isn’t it good?)

B. Míi chØ lµ b»ng c¸i c¸i c¬ b¾p th«i.

New only be equal classifier classifier muscle already

(He’s just used his muscles.)

 H. Ai b¶o b¹n lµ c¬ b¾p?

Who say you be muscle

(Who told you [he’s just used his] muscle?)

The use of first person pronoun in the prior turn is worth noting. The first S, a mid-aged man named B, uses ‘tí’ in talking with H, his female classmate at school, and this exhibits their friendship and closeness. This term for self-reference is exploited in informal talk between peers and sometimes, in downward speech, from the superior to the inferior. The talk, assumed to be intimate and open, takes place in B’s house, when H comes to visit B. Perhaps, all these things affect the way in which the two conversationalists word their ideas and evaluations.

H does not agree with B in his assessment of N, their mutual friend at school, and she uses ‘Nh­­ng mµ’ (But) to point out the fact that N can still make a lot of money. When B insists on his view, H prefaces her request for reason with an agreement element ‘õ, sao l¹i kh«ng tèt?’ (Yeah, why isn’t it good?). Her asking about the source of information ‘Ai b¶o…?’ (Who told…?) is deployed as a way of expressing disagreeing, and it deserves to be mentioned. It provides the second S with a chance to better understand her partner’s stance, and at the same time, it helps her avoid producing an outright disagreement, which might make her sound too critical or aggressive. Vietnamese Ss in my data are inclined to make frequent use of this way to perform their disagreement.

In the fragment below, L requests evidence of the information source as she talks with her classmate about the college entrance exams they just sat.

V03.8.45

43. 
    T: C¨n b¶n lµ khèi A n¨m nay khã h¬n.
    

essential be block A year present difficult more

(Essentially, group A is more difficult this year.)

 L: Ai b¶o thÕ?

Who tell that

(Who told (you) that?)

T. §iÓm cao h¬n nhiÒu.

Mark high more a lot

(The marks are a lot higher.)

 L. §iÓm cao lµ do mäi ng­­êi thi giái nªn ®iÓm nã míi cao.

Mark high be as all beings exam excellent so mark it new high

(They’re high because the candidates did so well in the exams.)

L’s using of ‘Ai b¶o…’ (Who told…) seems a way of withholding or hiding her different point of view. She might change her stance if her partner has good reasons for his assessment. She may also go on stating her disagreeing if he does not.

In short, the second Ss in these extracts seem to wish their interlocutors to either prove or elaborate their assertions before verbally stating their opposite positions. In other words, they use different delay devices to initiate chances for the first Ss to somehow reconstruct the prior evaluations.

2. Silences: Native Vietnamese Ss also deploy silences or pauses to signal potential disagreements in face-to-face interactions. In the fragment given below, B and H are talking about their mutual friend at school, who is now a director in a joint-venture. H’s second assessment is followed by B’s long silence of four seconds, causing H to reassert her evaluation. Only after H’s completion of her reassertion does B’s forthright disagreement come.

V03.9.57

44. 
    H: §µn bµ… thÕ lµ qu¸ giái råi.
    

Woman … that be much excellent already

(Women… [like her] are really excellent.)

B. Tí… mµ cã vî nh­­ thÕ tí kh«ng thÝch.

I…particle have wife like that I not like

(I don’t like to have a wife like that.)

H: ¤ng kh«ng thÝch nh­­ng mµ ng­­êi ta thÝch.

Grandfather not like but particle people like

(You don’t like but people do.)

 B: (4.0)

H: ¤ng kh«ng thÝch nh­­ng ng­­êi kh¸c thÝch.

Grandfather not like but people other like

(You don’t like but other people do.)

 B. Tí quan ®iÓm kh¸c.

I point of view different

(I have a different point of view.)

It is of interest to talk about the use of reference terms in this recording. H, a female friend of B, addresses him as ‘¤ng’ (grandfather), which is a typical kinship term used among friends and peers. ‘¤ng’ in this case indicates that the gender of the interlocutor is male, and its equivalent for a female is ‘Bµ’ (grandmother). When used in this way, these kinship terms do not demonstrate the normal relationship between relatives. B in this extract, however, does not make use of ‘Bµ’. He uses ‘Tí’, a first person pronoun used in informal talk between peers. The utility of person reference terms in this fragment exhibits an informal and friendly atmosphere.

3. Downgrading prior assessments: The second Ss in the Vietnamese data may disagree with the first Ss by softening and rewording prior assessments. In the excerpt given below, T qualifies the frequency of the action mentioned by the first S, leading to a weakened disagreement within his turn:

V03.8.46.

45. 
    D: T. nµy “ch¸t” ghª l¾m … suèt ngµy lªn m¹ng.
    

T (proper name) this chat extremely much …. all day go up net

(This boy T. chats a great deal…all day on line.)

• 
  T: ThØnh tho¶ng.
  

Sometimes (Sometimes.)

In other cases, second Ss make use of the preferred format by initially agreeing and then downgrading prior assessments, thereby producing weak disagreements. The following fragment may serve as an example:

V03.9.55

46. 
    B: N­­íc Êy nã cò::ng (0.5) Kü thuËt cña nã còng m¹nh phÕt ®Êy.
    

Country that it a:::lso technology of it also strong intensifer particle

(That country is also (0.5) its technology is also very powerful.)

® H: õ, kü thuËt cña nã th×: (1.0) còng kh¸.

Yeah technology of it be also good

(Yeah, its technology is also good.)

B: Còng siªu phÕt ®Êy. NhÊt lµ n«ng nghiÖp cña nã (1.0) rÊt giái….

Also super intensifier particle especially agriculture of it very good

(It’s excellent. Especially its agriculture (1.0) is really good.)

As clearly seen, after agreeing with B’s assessment, H qualifies it by proposing a lower level of evaluation. Her so doing causes her co-conversant to reaffirm his position, adding more turns to the sequence to strengthen his point. B seems to adhere to emphasizers like “rÊt”, “phÕt” make clear his stance.

4. ‘Agreement + disagreement’ format: Subsequent Ss in Vietnamese may first agree with prior assessments, and then begin their contrastive evaluation with ‘but’, i.e., they deploy the ‘agreement plus disagreement’ format, as in:

V03.5.21

47. 
    H: Con g¸i nã thuÇn h¬n.
    

Classifier girl pronoun obedient more

(Girls are more obedient.)

 V: õ, (1.0) nh­­ng mµ con trai b©y giê th×…

Yeah but classifier boy now be…

(Yeah, but boys are now…)

Vietnamese Ss tend to make advantage of particles like ‘nµo’, ‘nhØ’, ‘­’, ‘nhÐ’, ‘®Êy’, ‘®©u’, ‘®ã’, ‘v©ng’ etc. Among them ‘¹’ and ‘v©ng’ are often utilized in upward speech from the inferior to the superior or from the junior to the senior (Vu T. T. H. 1997, 2000) to express respect and deference; therefore, they are called politeness/deference markers or honorifics (cf. Nguyen D. H. 1995). Let us have a look at the following example:

V03.6.21

48. 
    H: Con giai lµ ch­­a:: ch­­a theo quü ®¹o (1.0) cho nªn lµ bè ph¶i rÌn
    

Classifier boy be not yet follow orbit for need be father must train

nhiÒu ((c­­êi))…

much ((laughs))

(Boys aren’t very obedient, so fathers have to pay more attention.)

 N: Kh«ng ph¶i thÕ ¹.

No must that particle-¹

(That’s not true.)

N’s father, a friend of Ms. H, says that he pays more attention to his son N than to his daughter, N’s older sister. In the excerpt above, H tries to verbally interpret the father’s purpose of so doing. N, a first-year student at Hanoi Conservatory, is not in agreement with H, as her overgeneralization might allude that he is among those who are not very obedient. Although his utterance is full of contrastive components, and the English version may sound too forthright, his wording in Vietnamese would be judged as respectful and acceptable thanks to the use of the sentence-final particle ‘¹’. The politeness level of an utterance in Vietnamese is commonly carried out via the use of such semantic items as appropriate address terms, particles and other supportive devices to show solidarity, intimacy, respect and deference, leading to high degree of discourse indirectness. From time to time, the appropriate level of formality may be of great help.

In the next fragment, A states her disagreement right after her teacher assesses the college entrance exams. Her using ‘¹’ twice within the turn increases the level of politeness and respect necessary in her upward speech to her teacher. A’s ‘unpolished’ answer can be treated as an exaggeration in terms of meaning, but it is fine from the viewpoint of socially accepted norms.

V03.4.13

49. 
    C: … viÖc thi rÊt khã … sÏ ®µo t¹o (1.0) sÏ chän ®­­îc nh©n tµi
    

… work exam very difficult … will train will select gifted

thùc sù ®Ó vµo ®¹i häc

really for go college

‘…difficult exams … will train will help select really gifted students

for colleges.’

 A: Kh«ng cã ®©u ¹. Tiªu cùc vÉn cùc nhiÒu lu«n ¹.

No have where marker-¹ negative also extremely many often marker-¹

(No, it’s not. There are still a great many secret deals.)

However, ‘¹’ is not always treated as a means of displaying respect to people hierarchically higher than second-assessment profferers. In the example given below, ‘¹’ just plays its normal role of a particle, as there is no need to use it to demonstrate deference and respect in talk between peers. Also, the use of “cùc” as an amplifier in “cùc nhiÒu” helps to increase the impact of the disagreeing attribute.

4.2.2.3. Comments

The proffering of disagreements as dispreferred seconds is produced in turns and sequences typically characterized by delaying the overtly stated contrastive components and performing weakened or qualified assertions. Such turns and sequences are exploited to express disagreements as unfavorable, and at the same time, they are oriented to in talk-in-progress to minimize explicitly stated disagreement tokens.

The data show that Vietnamese Ss construct their disagreements within turns and sequences in nearly the same ways as the English Ss do. Vietnamese Ss may exploit (i) delay devices such as asking for more elaboration or evidence to hedge or withhold their opposite opinion, (ii) silences and pauses to inform interlocutors of upcoming disagreements. They can sometimes indicate unwillingness or reluctance not to be in accord with co-participants by (iii) downgrading or modifying/softening prior assessments, or they may utilize (iv) ‘agreement plus disagreement’ format. Intensifiers including emphasizers, amplifiers and downtoners (Quirk et al. 1972) are observed to be exploited in both English and Vietnamese disagreements.

The striking differences that emerge are in the pervasive use of pronouns and particles in Vietnamese. Unlike English, Vietnamese is full of personal pronouns and kinship terms (both fictive and non-fictive use) deployed for self-reference or address. It is the appropriate use of particles, as well as person-referring terms that contribute much to the production of polite and socially acceptable disagreements. English Ss probably make more use of repair work, turn prefaces and backchannels (“hm”, “mh” and the like) compared with their Vietnamese counterparts.

4.2.3. Strategies for Disagreements as Preferred Seconds

4.2.3.1. English corpus

1. Immediate disagreements: As aforementioned, the English data exhibit that conversationalists tend to avoid dispreferred format when interacting with others. It is the fact that they are inclined to delay, withhold or qualify their disagreements with prefaces, hesitations, silences, repair initiators and the like. This, of course, does not mean that English Ss never forthrightly disagree with their co-conversants. Strong and immediate disagreements are prone to appear after prior self-deprecations. Disagreements in such cases generally occupy entire turns subsequent to self-deprecations. Second Ss may partially repeat (PR) prior self-deprecations and then overtly stated disagreement (D) with profferers of self-deprecations, as in an example by Pomerantz (1984a: 83):

50. 
    B: …I’m tryina get slim.
    

(PR) A: Ye:ah? // You get slim, my heavens.

B: heh heh heh heh hh hh

(D) A: You don’t need to get any slimmah,

Such negations as ‘no’, ‘hm-mh’, and ‘not’ may occur in initial spaces in turns containing answers to self-deprecatory formulations. The following extracts by Pomerantz (1984a: 84) might be good examples of this kind:

51. 
    R: Did she get my card?
    

C: Yeah she gotcher card.

R: Did she t’ink it was terrible?

 C: No she thought it was very adohrable.

52. 
    B: I was wondering if I’d ruined yer- weekend // by uh
    

 A: No. No. Hm-mh. No. I

just love to have-

2. Complimentary components: It is obvious that disagreements subsequent to prior self-deprecations are likely to contain evaluative components. As oppositions to self-deprecating assessments, they are constructed as positive, complimentary attributes. Pomerantz (1984a: 85) exemplifies this view in the extracts below:

53. 
    C: …’ere Momma She talks better than I do.
    

 B: Aw you talk fine.

54. 
    B: And I never was a grea(h)t Bri(h)dge play(h)er Clai(h) re,
    

 A: Well I think you’ve always been real good,

Given that a self-deprecatory formulation is produced the next S’s response is made due and relevant in the subsequent turn. The mechanism of preference organization in this case is the reverse of the normal case. Agreements turn out to be dispreferred seconds and disagreements preferred seconds. The reason is simple: agreements with self-critical assessments are interpreted as criticisms, and disagreements are conceived as favorable, positively evaluative tokens. As a result, disagreements with self-denigrations are performed in preferred-action turns and sequences.

Disagreements as preferred seconds tend to be overtly stated in a range of various forms. Second Ss may, for instance, proffer assessments quite contrastive to prior self-deprecating assessments as in the example by Pomerants (1984a: 87):

55. 
    A: … I’m so dumb I don’t even know it. hhh! – heh!
    

 B: Y-no, y-you’re not du:mb, …

3. Undermining self-denigrations: Recipients may criticize self-deprecatory formulations, hence disaffiliating with their validity, as below:

56. 
    C: I have no dates. I don’t go: there // is no sense in hanging onto the
    

clothes

J: (Are you-) ((high pitch))

J: Wha do ya mean you don’t have any da:tes. ((low pitch))

C: Well: I just don’t go out anymore that’s all.

 J: Oh: that’s ridiculous. (Pomerantz 1984a: 87)

By undermining, recategorizing or reformulating self-critical assessments, second Ss can produce pleasing disagreements with first Ss. They may, from time to time, show that prior self-deprecations are not proper actions, as in (Ibid. 88):

57. 
    W: And I’m being irritable right now by telling you so,
    

 L: Ah! Ah! .HHHH No. hehhhheh! No but- but uh-yuh-Wilbur agai::n.

again. Stop trying to do this of your se:lf. (1.2)—leave it alone en

you’ll be shown the way to overcome it.

Second Ss may undermine prior self-deprecatory formulations by suggesting that they are common and normal. It is of interest to pay attention to the deployment of emphasizers, amplifiers or downtoners in English disagreements. These two points are illustrated in the following extract:

58. 
    W: Yet I’ve got quite a distance tuh go yet.
    

• 
  L: Everybody has a distance.
  

Pomerantz (1984a: 87)

Native English Ss in disagreements to prior self-deprecations are observed to act quite directly. They may explicitly negate the first assessments, provide compliments or downgrade their seriousness.

4.2.3.2. Vietnamese corpus

In response to self-deprecations, Vietnamese Ss deploy a set of strategies similar to those used by English Ss to produce disagreements as preferred seconds within turns and sequences to demonstrate their favorable, positively evaluative assessments.

1. Immediate disagreements: Prior self-deprecatory formulations may strongly and immediately be disapproved of by such negation components as ‘kh«ng’ (no/not), ‘kh«ng ph¶i’ (no/not), ‘kh«ng h¼n’ (not really) and the like, possibly located within turn/sequence shapes. Let us have a look at this excerpt:

V03.3.11.

59. 
    L: ¤ng T. h­ còng (1.0) mét phÇn do L.…
    

Grandfather T spoiled also one portion because L.

(That Mr. T has been spoiled is partly my fault.)

 B: C¸i ®ã kh«ng ph¶i ®©u L ¹. C¸i vÊn ®Ò lµ=

Classifier that no must particle L particle-¹ classifier problem be….

(That’s not true, L. The problem is…)

 N: Kh«ng ph¶i ®©u.

No must particle

(No, it’s not.)

L criticizes herself for spoiling her husband by taking over almost all of the family duties. Her school classmates directly disagree with her, saying that it is not her fault. In her self-deprecation, L calls her husband by a kinship term ‘¤ng’ (grandfather), which is used in this situation as a title equivalent to English ‘Mr.’ and is not comprehended in relation to its original connotation. Here, we can see that particle-¹ is not used to show respect or deference at all. It just plays a role of a normal vocative.

From time to time, second Ss may negate prior self-criticisms by pointing out other sources concerning present conditions, as below:

V03.9.62.

60. 
    BB: Anh ch­­­­a ý thøc ®­­­­îc lµ anh lµ chñ c¸i tÕ bµo
    

Older brother not aware be older brother owner classifier cell

cña x· héi …C¸i ý lµ khuyÕt ®iÓm do b¸c.

of society classifier that be fault because uncle

(He’s not aware that he’s the head of a society cell ... That’s my fault.)

 H: Còng kh«ng h¼n lµ khuyÕt ®iÓm cña b¸c ®©u ¹. Cã lÏ lµ B còng lµ

Also not be mistake of uncle particle particle. Perhaps be B also be

(1.0) còng kh«ng muèn nghÜ ®Õn c¸i chuyÖn Êy cho nã ®ì ®au ®Çu.

also not want think about classifier story that for it less headache

(It’s not really your fault, uncle. Perhaps, B doesn’t want to think

about this to avoid a headache.)

The person mentioned by Mr. BB is B, who is H’s old school classmate, and the ‘society cell’ in Mr. BB’s wording is his family. The old man blames himself for the fact that his son B, a mid-aged man, is still single. H defends both him and his son, and perhaps, that is why her disagreement token does not sound really forthright. Had she been more aggressive, she would have been interpreted as in favor of the father while in opposition to the son.

The use of ‘anh’ (older brother) by Mr. BB in this fragment has nothing to do with relative links. It just means ‘he’ in English, a third person singular pronoun. While talking Mr. BB refers to himself as ‘b¸c’ (uncle), and H, addresses him ‘b¸c’ too. Similar to other kinship terms, ‘b¸c’ is utilized to show respect and solidarity with co-conversants and the fictive use of the kin-term ‘b¸c’ here imply that they are as close as family members. Also, H’s deployment of polite marker ‘¹’ in her response to Mr. BB’s self-deprecating assessment demonstrates her respect to him.

2. Complimentary components: Native Ss of Vietnamese may combine strong disagreements with complimentary attributes. In the following fragment, the co-participants talk about whether one should be thin or fat. H, the oldest, seems to bother herself about her weight and keeps making self-critical assessments. The other Ss, D and T, on the contrary, disagree with her by indicating that her body build is normal at her age. In the previous sequence, D says that her mother wants to gain weight to be plumper. Thus, H wishes that they could ‘exchange’ their body builds. The disagreement tokens in this fragment are made with partial repeats of the prior assessments. Apart from showing that H is normal compared to other women T includes complimentary evaluative terms in his response to H’s self-denigration.

V03.8.51.

61. 
    H: Ch¶ bï cho c«::
    

No compensate for aunt

(May she and I make an exchange.)

 D: Nh­­­ng c« lµm g× mµ bÐo.

But aunt do what particle fat

(But you are not fat.)

H. ((C­­­êi)) Kh«ng bÐo g× n÷a. §Êy:::

((Laughs)) no fat what else. That:::

((Laughs)) (I’m fat, you see.)

 D. §Õn tuæi c« thÕ nµy th× bÐo g×.

come age aunt that this be fat what

(You’re not considered fat at this age.)

 T. C« thÕ nµy lµ b×nh th­êng råi… §Çy ®Æn, c©n ®èi…

aunt this be normal particle plump well-proportioned

(You look normal this way... Plump and well-proportioned.)

H uses ‘c«’ (aunt) to address herself, and the same kinship is exploited by other parties taking part in the ongoing conversation. Of course, the address term ‘c«’ here does not mean that they are relatives. As mentioned above, kinship terms are the most widely used among person reference words (Luong 1987, 1990), and ‘c«’ in this fictive use has the meaning of ‘Miss - female teacher’.

3. Undermining self-denigrations: Second Ss may sometimes undermine the prior self-deprecations by demonstrating that they are irrational or unreasonable, as in the following excerpts:

V03.8.41

62. 
    D: …Tr×nh ®é cña m×nh b©y giê chØ dËy ®­­­îc cÊp mét th«i…
    

Level of we now only teach particle elementary level particle

(At our present level, we can only teach elementary students.)

 L: Ví:: vÈn. Ch¶ ai biÕt.

Irrational nobody know

(It’s irrational. Nobody knows.)

The two female freshmen want to work part-time as tutors. D seems to be worried that her present level of knowledge is not enough to be a tutor. L, in contrast, is more self-confident, and she points outs that D’s self-deprecation is improper and irrational. In the same vein, T undermines D’s self-critical comment:

V03.8.42

63. 
    D. CÊp ba nã vÆn cho chÕt.
    

Level three they cross-examine for death

(High school students may cross-examine you to death.)

 T: VÆn g×.

Cross-examine what

(What can they cross-examine.)

In another extract, T concludes that they cannot teach primary school students math, as it seems to be hard. Being in disagreement with T, D criticizes him, therefore disaffiliating with his self-denigrating attribute:

V03.8.44

64. 
    T. CÊp hai kh«ng dËy ®­­­îc ®©u. Kh«ng dËy ®­­­îc ®©u.
    

Level two not teach particle particle not teach particle particle

(We cannot teach primary school students. We cannot.)

 D. (C­­­êi) Coi th­­­êng nhau thÕ.

((Laugh)) Look down on other so

((Laughs)) (You look down on others.)

Vietnamese Ss can also disaffiliate with prior self-deprecations by criticizing their grounds. In the extract below, T assumes that his inattentiveness in grade 12 is due to purity changes. In contrast, H points out that his account is a bit weird, as his purity has already gone. In her turn, she repeats T’s key word ‘purity’ and thus, invalidates it.

V03.8.54.

65. 
    T: N¨m 12 con häc ví vÈn… Ch¾c lµ ®ang tuæi dËy th× ((C­­­êi))…
    

year 12 son study foolish… maybe present age purity ((laughs))

(I was inattentive in studies in grade 12…Maybe because of purity)

 H: ((C­­êi)) Tuæ:i dËy th×! ói giêi, gím, dËy th× c¸i

((laugh)) purity exclamation god exclamation purity classifier

g× n÷a (1.0) DËy th× tõ bao giê…

what else purity from when.

((Laughs)) (Purity! Oh god, what kind of purity (1.0). Purity’s gone…)

T uses ‘con’ (son) meaning ‘I’ to refer to himself. This kinship term is fictively used by teachers instead of ‘em’ to address students, and this has become a prevalent trend in schools in Vietnam in recent years.

The extracts above demonstrate strategies for disagreements with prior self-negations in Vietnamese, which are similar to those used in English. However, Vietnamese Ss are prone to supplementary elements such as addressing terms, deference markers to express politeness while exploiting direct linguistic forms.

4.2.3.3. Comments

When disagreements are shaped as preferred seconds to self-deprecations, they seem to be explicitly verbalized with such negations as ‘no’ and ‘not’, and may occupy the entire turn/sequence shapes. They may be accompanied with partial repeats or complimentary evaluative terms. Recipients can undermine prior self-critical assessments by re-categorizing, reformulating or criticizing them.

The Vietnamese in the data seem to be direct and outright in their disagreements with prior self-deprecations. Like the English Ss, they are inclined to produce (i) immediate disagreements, combine disagreement tokens with (ii) complimentary components, or they may abide by disaffiliating with or (iii) undermining self-denigrations. Unlike English Ss, Vietnamese Ss can make effective and polite disagreements to achieve communicative goals, basing on the rich vocabulary of person-referring terms, particles, and other supportive markers of politeness.

4.2.4. Summary

The English and Vietnamese corpora have persuasively proved the hypotheses of similarities between English and Vietnamese in terms of preference format concerning the speech act of disagreeing. While disagreements as dispreferred seconds tend to be delayed or hedged disagreements to self-denigrations as preferred seconds are inclined to overtly and forthrightly articulated. Disagreements as dispreferred seconds are characterized by softeners and hedges, questions or requests for more information to invalidate earlier stated evaluative attributes. Second Ss may produce weak disagreements by using ‘agreement plus disagreement’ format (Yes, but….), qualify or downgrade prior assessments. In addition, pauses and silences are considered signals imminent negative responses in both languages.

The English informants prefer to exploit such delay devices as partial repeats, repair initiators, turn prefaces or back channels whereas the Vietnamese make use of the rich repertoire of person referring terms, particles although all of them deploy emphasizers or downtoners to upgrade or downgrade their disagreements.