Friends or foes? Communicating feelings through language in cross-cultural interactions

Abstract

This study examines cross-cultural communication in English between Americans and Brazilians through the lens of intercultural pragmatics. Three groups of speakers participated: native speakers of American English, native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese, and English learners who spoke Brazilian Portuguese as a first language. Using a mixed design including role plays and interviews and both quantitative and qualitative data, the study identified pragmatic transfer among the ESL learners, who also showed evidence of developing awareness of the sociolinguistic norms of the target language and its speakers.