‘De rien ma puce ! C’est entre nous !’ Responding to Thanks in Cameroon French

Abstract

This study examines strategies employed by Cameroonian French speakers when responding to gratitude expressions. Based on data collected by means of Discourse Completion Tasks (DCTs), the study explores communicative choices in the realization of responses to thanks and the pragmatic motivations behind such choices in three different situations. The findings show that Cameroon French speakers have at their disposal a variety of face-saving and face-enhancing strategies that are used to downplay the cost of the benefit they are being thanked for, express positive feelings towards the addressee, express pleasure for providing the benefit, etc. Overall, responses to thanks occur in the data either as single head acts or as combinations of head acts and supportive acts.

Cuvinte-cheie: răspuns la mulțumiri, face, politeţe, franceza cameruneză, strategie

REZUMAT

În articol, abordăm modalităţile camerunezilor francofoni de a răspunde mesajelor de gratitudine. Bazându-ne pe datele înregistrate  după Discourse Completion Tasks (DCTs), ne propunem să cercetăm atât actele de răspuns la mulţumiri, cât şi motivarea pragmatică a acestora în trei situaţii de comunicare distincte. Rezultatele obţinute ne arată că camerunezii francofoni pun în aplicare strategii variate de face-saving şi face-enhancing, care au drept scop minimalizarea politicoasă a aportului lor la realizarea unui lucru sau acţiune, dar, în acelaşi timp, servesc la exprimarea atitudinii pozitive faţă de interlocutor, a plăcerii de a-i fi util etc. În general, răspunsurile la mulţumiri sunt repertoriate, în acest caz, atât ca acte unice, cât şi ca unele combinate cu alte tipuri de acte.

LANGUAGES OF PUBLICATION

English (main text), French (corpus)

UDC: 811.133.1(6)`22

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Received: February 20, 2017 | Reviewed: March 23, 2017 | Accepted for publication: March 27, 2017

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