An Investigation of the Use of Apology Strategies in English by the Taiwanese EFL College Students

Abstract

The paper investigates Taiwanese college students' sociolinguistic competence in making apologies in English. The study includes six types of offence: social gaffe, space, talk, time, inconvenience, and possession. Apologies for twelve offence situations were elicited from fifty-two freshmen at an intermediate level of English. The results indicate that the majority of the elicited apologies were acceptable, with simple apologies dealing with the lighter offences and multiple apologies dealing with the heavier offences. However, there are still differences between the native and the nonnative apologies. For social gaffe, space, talk, time, and inconvenience, the native apologies relied heavily on Strategy A and combinations with All, whereas the nonnative apologies involved not only Strategy A and combinations with AB but also combinations with strategies other than A and 13. For possession, native apologies showed a heavy reliance on Strategy A, combinations of All, and combinations with A: whereas the normative apologies were mainly combinations containing AC. In relation to the severity of the offence, for light offences, the native apologies showed a heavy use of Strategy A and combinations of AB, whereas the nonnative apologies showed a heavy use of Strategy A and combinations with All or AC. For heavy offences, the native apologies made a heavy use of Strategy A and combinations with A and other types of combinations, whereas the nonnative apologies made a heavy use of Strategy A and combinations with AB or AC. The paper ends with a number of pedagogical implications.