| Popis: |
The purpose of this study is to reveal the status of politeness features used in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) textbooks. The researchers examined 56 business e-mail requests in seven textbooks focusing on the level of directness, internal modifications, external modifications, and request perspectives. The findings of this study are as below: (1) Three textbooks showed extremely high level of directness. (2) In all textbooks, the requests were insufficiently modified with lexical/phrasal downgraders. Moreover, three textbooks showed relatively high percentages of upgraders. (3) Two supportive moves preferred by Americans were not found, whereas two textbooks showed relatively high percentages of aggravating moves. (4) The Impersonal perspective, the most polite perspective, was shown least frequently. (5) One textbook, written by an author who had not experienced studying abroad, showed significant shortcomings in all four politeness features. In conclusion, this suggests that when textbooks are developed including those elements for their requests, it might be necessary that explanation for negative effects of them should be included to prevent their learners from any pragmatic failures. |
