tailieunhanh - Types of hedges used by American and Vietnamese celebrity

The study was to compare and contrast type of hedges used by American and Vietnamese celebrities in responses to questions in interviews. The data were collected from 96 online interviews with American and Vietnamese celebrities. The study was conducted mainly with quantitative methods with the combination of some qualitative methods for explanation and discussion. | VNU Journal of Science: Foreign Studies, Vol. 32, No. 2 (2016) 32-41 Types of Hedges Used by American and Vietnamese Celebrity Nguyen Quang Ngoan*, Nguyen Le To Quyen Department of Foreign Languages, Quy Nhon University, 170 An Duong Vuong, Quy Nhon, Binh Dinh, Vietnam Received 13 August 2015 Revised 27 January 2016; Accepted 24 May 2016 Abstract: The study was to compare and contrast type of hedges used by American and Vietnamese celebrities in responses to questions in interviews. The data were collected from 96 online interviews with American and Vietnamese celebrities. The study was conducted mainly with quantitative methods with the combination of some qualitative methods for explanation and discussion. The findings showed that out of the five categories under investigation, “Quality hedges” were most frequently-used with a rather high rate, while “Relevance hedges” took the lowest position in frequency by both groups of celebrities. Also, hedges used in the American and Vietnamese data were different from each other in the distribution of “Quantity hedges”, “Manner hedges” and “Mixed hedges”. Keywords: American celebrities (Acels), Vietnamese celebrities (Vcels), hedges on quality maxim (QlHs), hedges on quantity maxim (QnHs), hedges on relevance maxim (ReHs), hedges on manner maxim (MaHs), mixed hedges (MiHs). 1. Introduction* theoretical background, followed by the methodology of study and results of the study before it ends up with the conclusion. Hedging is supposed to be one of the most effective means to achieve the communicative purpose as well as to reduce the friction and maintain harmony. Hedging is likely to be frequently used by celebrities, whose all communicative activities and behavior always attract the attention and concern of the public. It is for this reason that we decided to examine semantic features of hedges used by American and Vietnamese celebrities in responses to questions in interviews with all their characteristics as well as