Abstract
Considering the cross-cultural nature of teacher-student discourse,
the present study aims to investigate university teachers’ use of
refusal strategies in response to students’ requests and the students’
perception of politeness in teachers’ refusals. The study was divided
into two phases: the data for the first phase were collected through a
written Discourse Completion Task (DCT) based on requests that
students often make in their classroom. The teachers were required to
complete the DCT by declining each request in writing. After
categorizing teachers’ refusals, using the framework proposed by
Beebe, Takahashi, & Uliss-Weltz (1990), a rating assessment
instrument was shared with the students for collecting data for the
second phase of the study to investigate their notion of linguistic
(im)politeness. The sample size was based on 50 teachers and 50
students from different faculties of the University of Karachi. The
results of the study show that irrespective of their designation and
gender, teachers employed indirect refusal strategies with greater
frequency than the direct refusal strategies. However, significant
gender differences were found in the nature of indirect refusals, as
the female teachers were found to use multiple refusal strategies for
each situation with greater frequency as compared to their male
counterparts. As far as the students’ notion of (im)politeness with
reference to teachers’ use of refusals is concerned, students
considered indirect refusal strategies to be more polite as opposed to
the direct ones. The study has important implications for classroom
discourse as it can help teachers mitigate the face-threatening nature
of refusals which in turn can make the classroom environment more
conducive to learning.
Shumaila Shafket Ali. (2019) University Teachers’ Use of Refusal Strategies and Students’ Perception of Linguistic Politeness in Teachers’ Refusals, The Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences, Volume-27, Issue-2.
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