A Study On Pragmatic Failure In Intercultural Communication

Nowadays with the development of science and technology, international communication among people becomes more and more frequent, and no one can deny the fact that the process of globalization is increasingly advanced day by day. Different countries are usually of different cultures; culture and communication are closely connected with each other, so that intercultural communication has become one of the most important activities in the world presently. Under different cultural backgrounds, such as the difference of cultural values, difference of pragmatic rules, thought pattern, and the like, pragmatic failure will inevitably occur in the process of intercultural communication, which may have a bad effect on the communication.The term"pragmatic failure"was first put forward by Jenny Thomas. She defines"pragmatic failure"as"the inability to understand what is meant by what is said"(Thomas, 1983). Then many scholars have done further study on failures occurred in communication. Most of them pay more attention to pragmatic failure in verbal communication, but less attention to pragmatic failure in nonverbal communication. As nonverbal communication is an inseparable part to the whole communication process, and at the same time it serves several functions, including complementing, contradicting, regulating and the like, thus this thesis focuses on pragmatic failure both in verbal communication and in nonverbal communication.This thesis mainly attaches importance to the research of pragmatic failure in intercultural communication. It will take a view of intercultural communication, meanwhile the logical analysis will be adopted, with deductive and inductive methods included. Generally speaking, people always interpret others'speech act or non-speech act according to their own cultural background. This study may help communicators understand the different cultural orientation of different countries, so as to avoid misunderstanding in intercultural communication and try to achieve a successful communication. In a word, communicators should master certain knowledge of the culture of the other's, in order to better the communication effect. This thesis is composed of five chapters, besides introduction and conclusion.The first chapter elaborates the concepts and characteristics of culture, communication and intercultural communication.The second chapter introduces the concept and classification of pragmatic failure.The third chapter states pragmatic failures commonly occurred in intercultural verbal communication and intercultural nonverbal communication.The fourth chapter analyzes the causes of the pragmatic failure in intercultural communication.The last chapter presents some strategies to avoid or lessen pragmatic failure. It is useful to give oneself more exposure to the target cultural environment and to improve the awareness of cultural differences.