SPEECH ACT OF REFUSAL IN CHINESE AND JAPANESE LINGUAL CULTURES: CONTEMPORARY THEORETICAL APPROACHES

Jiang Qingchuan
PhD student
Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17721/StudLing2021.19.166-175

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ABSTRACT

Refusal, as a speech act that can easily threaten both sides of communication, is a problem that needs to be handled with special care in cross-cultural communication. If the refusal is not handled properly, not only the communication might fail to proceed smoothly, but it even can destroy the relationship between the two parties and cause adverse consequences. Therefore, the implementation of the speech act of refusal requires certain strategies. Due to the differences between different languages, cultures, living habits and ways of thinking, there will be differences in the way of refusal between Chinese and Japanese. In order to reduce the negative impact of cultural differences and other factors of cross-cultural communication between Chinese and Japanese, as well as promoting smoother cross-cultural interaction, the Chinese-Japanese refusal speech act should be thoroughly analyzed in both theoretical and practical aspects. For the time being there are already tangible results in the comparative theoretical research of speech refusal act in the Chinese and Japanese lingual cultures. This article aims to summarize and review the previous researches, as well as to seek inspiration for exploring the new directions and the new entry points in this research field in order to facilitate the future innovative research.

Kee words: refusal speech act, cross-cultural communication, cultural differences, refusal strategy, comparative study.

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