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The Realization of Request Strategies by Non-Native Speakers of English

Ahmad Sofwan and Rusmi Universitas Negeri Semarang sofwan1589@yahoo.com and rusmi.pri@gmail.com Abstract: This study deals with request strategies realized by non-native speakers of English by looking at the social variables of power, distance and rank of imposition in the choice of request strategies. The subjects were ten males and ten females of English teachers of Junior High Schools. The data were collected by using oral discourse completion tests which consisted of nine situations. The subjects were asked to respond to the situation presented to them. Their responses were analyzed based on Blum Kulkas coding scheme and based on Brown and Levinsons politeness system. The findings showed that most of the teachers utilized conventionally indirect strategies, followed by direct strategies, and non-conventionally indirect strategies. It was also found that the higher the rank of imposition, the more indirect the request strategies will be. Keywords: request strategies, power, distance and rank of imposition

INTRODUCTION
The speech act approach has been used effectively for both in first and second language acquisition research. According to speech act theory, speakers perform illocutionary acts by producing utterances (Searle, 1969). An illocutionary act is a particular language function performed by an utterance. That is, through their utterances, speakers convey communicative intentions, such as requests, apologies, promises, advice, compliments, offers, refusals, complaints and thanking. The study of speech acts provides a useful means of relating linguistic form and communicative intent. An utterance is treated as the realization of a speakers intention and goal in a particular context. One of the speech acts that attract many people in pragmatic studies is the act of requesting. Requests are a type of speech act which has been the focus of discussion for quite long time in the study of Pragmatics (Fukushima, 2003). Most of studies have focused on request expressions (Blum-Kulka, House, & Kasper, 1989). This might be because requests are close to being the prototype case of a social transaction and are useful and occur frequently in everyday communication. Requests are defined as attempts by the speakers to get the hearer to do something. The verbs that evoke this category include ask, order, command, request, beg, plead, pray, entreat, invite, permit, and advise. These verbs differ in the degree to which they mark the intensity of the act (e.g. I ask that you clean up the room vs. I order that you clean up the room) (Searle, 1975). There are certain rules to identify whether a certain speech act can be categorized as the act of requesting. The rules can be described as follows. Propositional content : Preparatory : Future act A of H 1. H is able to do A. S believes H is able to do A. 2. It is not obvious to both S and H that H will do A in the normal courses of events in his own accord. S wants H to do A. Counts as an attempt to get H to do A (Searle, 1969: 66).

Sincerity Essential

: :

Requests consist of two parts: the core request or head act and the peripheral elements. The former is the main utterance which has the function of requesting and can Ragam Jurnal Pengembangan Humaniora Vol. 11 No. 2, Agustus 2011

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stand by itself, thus it can be used on its own, without any peripheral elements in order to convey the request. Requests can be linguistically realized with imperatives, interrogatives, negative interrogatives and declaratives. Direct imperatives are usually defined as appropriate constructions for commands and instructions thus they are less appropriate or even unacceptable for making requests. In English, the declarative such as Id like is a conventionalized way of stating a request, in which the modal would enhances the unreal and hypothetical. The use of hints is another way of expressing requests in the declaratives. Requests can be made at different levels of directness: direct strategies (DS), conventionally indirect strategies (CIS), and non-conventionally indirect strategies (NCIS). Direct strategies are defined as utterances in which the propositional content of the utterance is consistent with the speakers intent while indirect strategies are defined as utterances in which the speakers meaning and the propositional content are not identical. Thus direct strategies convey only one meaning or illocutionary force, while indirect strategies convey more than one. For direct strategies a speakers intention is explicit. In contrast, with indirect strategies his or her intention is conveyed implicitly. Intentions in direct strategies are conveyed more efficiently and unambiguously. The most direct, explicit level realized by requests syntactically marked as such, for example, imperatives, or by other verbal means that name the act as a request, such as performatives (Austin, 1962) and hedged performatives (Fraser, 1975). There are two types of indirect strategies: one uses conventionally indirect strategies and the other makes use of non-conventionally indirect strategies. The latter are known as hints. The conventionally indirect level includes strategies that realize the act by reference to contextual preconditions necessary for its performance, as conventionalized in a given language. Blum-Kulka, House, & Kasper (1989) describes that in the conventional indirectness, the conventions of propositional content and linguistic form combine to signal requestive force whereas the non-conventional indirectness is in principle open ended, both in terms of propositional content and linguistic form as well as pragmatic force. The nonconventional indirect level realizes the request either by partial reference to the object or element needed for the implementation of the act or by reliance on contextual clues. Requests are generally realized in the form of strategies. A request strategy is defined as the obligatory choice of the level of directness by which the request is realized. Directness is defined as the degree to which the speakers illocutionary intent is apparent from the locution (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989: 278). There are nine strategy types of requests, as in the following: 1. mood derivable (e.g. Go out); 2. performatives (e.g. I am asking you to clean up the mess); 3. hedged performatives (e.g. I would like to ask you to give your presentation a week earlier than scheduled); 4. obligation statements (e.g. Youll have to move that car); 5. want statements (e.g. I really wish youd stop bothering me); 6. suggestory formulae (e.g. How about cleaning up?); 7. query preparatory (e.g. Could you clean up the kitchen, please?); 8. strong hints (e.g. You have left the kitchen in a right mess); 9. mild hints (e.g. I am a teacher) (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989: 18) The nine levels are combined into three major levels of directness: direct strategies (15), conventionally indirect strategies (67), and non-conventionally indirect strategies (89) (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989: 467). It could be assumed that the realization of request strategies by non-native speakers of English seems to be influenced by the context in which the cultural aspects are embedded. Non-native speakers produce utterances not in a cultural vacuum (Thompson, 2003: 83). In producing requests, pragmatic and sociolinguistic transfer potentially occurs due to differences in their culture as compared to the English culture. The non-native speakers inappropriate speech act realization could also be caused by the inability to convey or comprehend the intended illocutionary force or politeness value. In addition, other sociopragmatic factors such as age, sex, relative status of the interlocutors and other

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situational constraints could affect the speech act performance (Trosborg, 1994: 55). With respect to the politeness of the request strategies, the power relation, distance and rank of imposition between the interlocutors will also affect the choice of the request strategies. Nonnative speakers with their cultural background may fail to observe these factors leading to the use of the inappropriate request strategies. This study investigates types of request strategies used by English teachers of Junior High School, examines the power relation, distance and rank of imposition between the interlocutors in the choice of request strategies, and provides the implications of the research result to the English language teaching and learning.

METHODS
This study adopted an applied descriptive qualitative approach. The subjects consisted of 20 teachers, ten male and ten female from Junior High Schools. They have been teaching English for more than five years and were holders of the degree of Bachelor of Arts in English language education. The data were collected by using oral discourse completion tests (DCT) by following Blum-Kulkas model (1982). The discourse completion test consisted of nine situations that the subjects may encounter. The subjects were asked to give their responses orally toward the situations on the scenarios. The responses from the subjects were recorded and transcribed. Before the subjects responded to the situations, they answered some questions about their name, age, and places they work. The responses from the subjects were then analyzed based on CCSARP categories (Blum-Kulka, House & Kasper, 1989), the 9-level scale for analysis of request strategies to get the types of request strategies used by the respondents. The situations were designed by considering the power relation, distance, and rank of imposition, as specified in Table 1. Table 1: Specification of the scenarios
Role play 1 2 Listener Librarian Student Pragmatic situation Asking a librarian to check the books availability in computer Asking one of students to take a book on the table in the teachers room Asking a participant of a seminar to lend a laptop Asking another participant of teacher training to lend the notes Asking a friend to lend some money Asking a friend to meet in other time Asking a vice of principal to give the missed information Requesting to leave work early Requesting a superintendent to postpone the supervision Power +P +P Distance =D -D Rank of imposition +R -R

3 4

5 6 7 8 9

A participant of a seminar Another participant of teacher training Friend Friend Vice of principal The Regent Principal

+P -P

+D +D

+R -R

-P -P -P -P -P

=D -D -D =D +D

+R +R -R -R +R

In terms of the power relation, the status of the interlocutors is classified into three categories, as described in Table 2.

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Table 2: Classification of Scenarios


Categories Category One Status Higher-rank to lower-rank Scenario Situation One Situation Two Situation Three Situation Four Situation Five Situation Six Situation Seven Situation Eight Situation Nine

Category Two

Equal to equal

Category Three

Lower-rank to higher-rank

The description of the situations is presented below. 1. Situation One You are having difficulties in finding articles and books for one of your essays in the library. You fear that you will not be able to write the essay. You ask the librarian to check the computer to see whether or not the book you are looking for is available. You also tell her that it is urgent. What would you say to her? Situation Two You will give lesson to your students but you left your book on your desk in the teachers room. You want to ask one of your students, Hendra to take it. What would you say to him? Situation Three You are being a speaker of a seminar. During your presentation, suddenly, you have a trouble with your laptop. You want to ask one of the participants of the seminar to lend you his laptop because but you dont know him well. What would you say to him? Situation Four You are one of the participants of the teacher training. Yesterday you were absent and now you ask another participant for the notes you missed in some sessions. You dont know the participant well because she is a new English teacher in your area. What would you say to her? Situation Five You urgently need some money to buy a very important reference book because you need the reference book to do your project in which the deadline is tomorrow but your money is not enough to buy it. You want to borrow some money from a friend but your relation is not too close with him. What would you say? Situation Six You arranged to meet a friend of yours at 4 p.m. to help you with your preparation to hold reading competition. But in the morning, you wake up with a terrible toothache and the dentist can only see you at 4 p.m. Your friend has cancelled another meeting to see you this afternoon although he is a very busy man. In the morning he had a seminar and you wait for him after his seminar and ask him to meet you tomorrow instead. What would you say? Situation Seven You missed an important briefing from your principal yesterday, and you want to ask for information to the vice of principal, Mr. Ali about what you have missed. What would you say to him? Situation Eight Your son is unwell at home, meanwhile you are at job today. You want to ask your principal to let you leave work early because you have an appointment with your family doctor. What would you say to him/her? Situation Nine You have been scheduled to be supervised by a superintendent at your school. But half an hour before the supervision, you got news from your distance family that your sisters The Realization of Request Strategies by Non-Native Speakers of English (A Sofwan & Rusmi)

2.

3.

4.

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6.

7.

8.

9.

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husband passed away. You want to ask him to postpone the supervision on another time. Meanwhile, you know that the superintendent is very busy with his tasks and hard for him to have re-scheduled. What would you say to him?

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION


The results of the study are divided into two main parts in order to analyze the realization of requests: strategy types and social variables or social status: power (P), distance (D), and rank of imposition (R). The strategy types are classified on a nine-point scale of mutually exclusive categories based on three levels of directness: direct, conventional indirect, and non-conventional indirect. Realization of Request Strategies There were 180 request strategies in the utterances found in this study. The strategies were then classified into three categories: higher-ranking to lower ranking, equal to equal, and lower-ranking to higher-ranking. Figure 1 presents the findings of the study. Figure 1: Realization of request strategies in three categories
35,0 30,0 25,0 20,0 15,0 10,0 5,0 0,0 Direct Conv. Indirect 2,8 7,8 6,1 0,6 0 0 Category 1 Category 2 Category 3 30 25,6 27,2

Non-Conv. Indirect

In category one the teachers used direct strategies 5 times (2.8%), conventional indirect strategies 54 times (30%) and non-conventional indirect strategies only once (0.6%). The only non-conventional indirect strategy was in the form of mild hints. In category two the teachers used direct strategies 14 times (7.8%), conventional indirect strategies 46 times (25.6%) and 0% non-conventional indirect strategies. In category three the teachers used eleven times (6.1%) of direct strategies, 49 times (27.2%) of conventional indirect strategies and 0% of non-conventional indirect strategies. Out of the three categories, the teachers employed conventionally indirect strategies in the form of query preparatory 144 times (80%) and suggestory formulaee 4 times (2.2%) of all strategies in the three categories. It is followed by direct strategies in the form of hedged performatives 18 times (10%), mood derivable 11 times (6.1%) and want statements twice (1.1%). Only one teacher employed non-conventionally indirect in the form of mild hints (0.6%). The finding of this study is almost similar with the results by Economidou-Kogetsidis (in Rue and Zhang, 2008) on the degree of request directness between English and Greek in the work place. Their data were collected by means of telephone opening requests performed in the flight reservation centre, based on the coding scheme of CCSARP (BlumKulka, House & Kasper, 1989). The results showed that Greeks frequently utilized the most direct strategy including mood derivable and want statement. Meanwhile, English participants were prone to employ conventionally indirect strategies, including query preparatory. Further elaboration of the findings for each category is presented below.

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Category one (higher-rank to lower rank) Category one includes situation one, two, and three. The complete set of requests strategies used by the teachers is summarized in Table 3. Table 3: Request strategies used by the teachers for the first three situations
No 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Strategies Mood derivable Performatives Hedged performative Obligation statements Want statements Suggestory formulaee Query preparatory Strong hints Mild hints Total Situation One F % 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 20 100 0 0 0 0 20 100 Situation Two F % 5 25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 14 70 0 0 1 5 20 100 Situation Three F % 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 20 100 0 0 0 0 20 100 Total F 5 0 0 0 0 0 54 0 1 60 % 8.3 0 0 0 0 0 90 0 1.7 100

Table 3 shows that English teachers of Junior High Schools tend to use more conventionally indirect strategies in addressing the librarian, student, and participant of seminar in descending the orders. They used conventional indirect strategies in the form of query preparatory (90%), mood derivable (8.3%), and mild hints (1.7%). In situation one, two and three, the teachers made greater use of the conventional indirect strategy in the form of query preparatory strategy. This strategy was used all in situation one in which the requester asked a librarian to check the book availability in computer and in situation three in which the requester asked a participant of a seminar to lend a laptop. Meanwhile, in situation two, the teachers used query preparatory fourteen times or 70%. The second strategy most widely used by the teachers was direct strategies in the form of mood derivable (8.3%) of all strategies used in three situations and all of them were used in situation two only in which the requester asked one of students to take a book on the table in the teachers room. Hints (non conventional indirect), both strong and mild hints, were rarely found in those situations. The teacher used only once (5%) of mild hints of all strategies and only one respondent used mild hints. In situation one and two the speakers used formulaic utterances such as terms of address Miss Diah in the former situation and Hendra in the later to express the involvement between interlocutors and to weaken the illocutionary force of the upcoming direct requests. The term of address (Hendra) used mostly in the second situation in the form direct request strategies (mood derivable). It happened as a result of the requester has higher power position than the requestee. Also the speaker used formulaic utterances such as attention getter (excuse me) and apologizing (please) to soften a direct request and to make it more polite. In situation one, the teachers only used four times of attention getter (excuse me) and they did not apply apologizing expression. Most of them did their requests regardless the politeness devices. In situation two, they utilized twelve times of surname or term of address (Hendra) as the alerter but they did not utilize attention getter. Meanwhile, in situation three, the teachers utilized eleven times of attention getter (excuse me). Only one teacher utilized apologizing (Im sorry) and the rest did their requests regardless the politeness devices. Category Two (Equal to equal) Category two consists of situation four, five and six, expressing the request of borrowing note, asking to lend some money, and arranging a meeting in other time. Table 4 illustrates a complete set of responses given to these situations by the teachers.

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Table 4: Request strategies used by the teachers for situation four, five, and six
Strategies 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Mood Derivable Performative Hedged performative Obligation statement Want statements Suggestory formulae Query preparatory Strong hints Mild hints Total Situation Four F % 0 0 0 0 4 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 16 80 0 0 0 0 20 100 Situation Five F % 1 5 0 0 4 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 15 75 0 0 0 0 20 100 Situation Six F % 3 15 0 0 2 10 0 0 0 0 4 20 11 65 0 0 0 0 20 100 Total F 4 0 10 0 0 4 42 0 0 60 % 6.7 0 16.6 0 0 6.7 70 0 0 100

Table 4 shows that the teachers showed a preference for conventionally indirect request forms in the form of query preparatory more than indirect request in the form of others. In situation four, five, and six, the teachers made greater use of the conventionally indirect strategy (query preparatory). This strategy is used forty two times (70%) of all strategies used in the second three situations. This strategy was used more frequently in situation four in which the requester asked another participant of teacher training to lend the notes and situation five in which the requester asked a friend to borrow some money. This strategy is used sixteen times (80%) of all strategies and fifteen times (75%) of all strategies. Meanwhile, in situation six the teachers used eleven times (65%) of all strategies. In these situations they have high rank of imposition, especially in situation five in which the addresser requested the addressee to lend some money. The second strategy most widely used by the teachers is direct strategies. The teachers used hedged performatives and mood derivable. Hedged performatives are used ten times (16.6%). In fact, this strategy is also used more frequently in situation four (asking another participant of teacher training to lend the notes) and situation five (asking a friend to borrow some money). Mood derivable is used four times (6.7%) and it is used more frequently in situation six (asking a friend to meet in other time). Hints (non- conventional indirect), both strong and mild hints, are not used in those situations. In Indonesian culture direct strategies or imperatives are common and permitted in the interaction between people with close relationship only such as family members and close friends. In these situations the teachers used direct strategies fourteen times (23.3%), consisting of hedged performatives and mood derivable. In the second category the teachers utilized attention getter (surname, apologize, etc). The terms were used to soften and to make their strategies more polite. The terms are also intended to honor the requestee. In situation four there were ten teachers applied the attention getter (excuse me) in their request expressions of the twenty respondents. The reason of preceding their requests was intended to soften their requests. In situation five there were only three attention getters preceded the head acts. They varied more different kinds of strategies in this situation. Meanwhile, in situation six, the teachers employed only three times of attention getter (excuse me), nine times of apologies (pardon me and Im sorry). All of them preceded the head acts. In this category, it was also found that ten teachers did not employ some politeness devices in their requests. They did not utilize any kinds of alerters or supportive moves neither preceding nor following the head acts. It seemed that they did their request regardless the politeness devices although they were parts of the politeness. The teachers did not apply politeness devices mostly in situation five. It might be influenced by the equal status between the interlocutors.

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Category three (lower-rank to higher-rank) Category three also consists of three situations: seven, eight and nine, expressing the request of asking for information, asking the principal to let someone to leave work early, and asking the superintendent to postpone the supervision in another time. Table 5 summarizes the strategies used by the teachers to realize requests in the above three situations. Table 5: Request strategies used by the teachers for situation seven, eight, and nine
No 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Strategies Mood Derivable Performative Hedged performative Obligation statements Want statements Suggestory formulae Query preparatory Strong hints Mild hints Total Situation seven F % 1 5 0 0 4 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 15 75 0 0 0 0 20 100 Situation eight F % 0 0 0 0 1 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 19 95 0 0 0 0 20 100 Situation nine F % 0 0 0 0 3 15 0 0 2 10 0 0 15 75 0 0 0 0 20 100 Total F 1 0 8 0 2 0 49 0 0 60 % 1.7 0 13.3 0 3.3 0 81.7 0 0 100

Table 5 shows that English teachers of Junior High Schools used mostly the conventional indirect strategy of Query preparatory 49 times (81.7%) for all three situations. This strategy was used fifteen times (75%) in situation seven, nineteen times (95%) in situation eight, and fifteen times (75%) in situation nine. The second strategy they used was direct strategies including hedged performatives, want statements, and mood derivable. The hedged performative strategy was used eight times (13.3%). This strategy was used more frequently in situation seven (asking the vice principal to give the missed information) and nine (requesting a superintendent to postpone the supervision). Want statements was used twice (3.3%). This strategy was used only in situation nine. Mood derivable was used only once (1.7%). This strategy was only used in situation seven. The head act strategy of query preparatory was mostly used in situation seven, eight and nine, followed by hedged performatives, want statements, and mood derivable strategies. In situation seven the use of query preparatory is 75%, that of hedged performatives is 13.3%, that of want statements is 3.3%, and that of mood derivable is 0%. Male used the hedged performative strategy by 10% but female used the same strategy by 1.7%. In situation eight the use of query preparatory is 95%, and that of the hedged performative strategy is 5%. In situation nine the use of query preparatory is 75% that of hedged performative strategy is 25%. None of them used other strategies. In addition, English teachers of Junior High Schools tend to use more indirect strategies in addressing their vice principal in asking to give the missed information, in requesting to leave work early from their principal, and in requesting to postpone the supervision in descending the orders from their superintendent. They utilized most conventionally indirect in the form of query preparatory represented by the use of attention getter, surname, apologize, etc. The terms were used to soften and to make their strategies more polite. The terms are also intended to honor the requestee. In situation seven, there are thirteen teachers applied the attention getter excuse me and twelve teachers called surname Mr. Ali in their request expressions of the twenty respondents. In situation eight there were twelve of the attention getter (Excuse me) and two terms of apologies (Pardon me and Im sorry) used by the teachers to soften their requests. All of them preceded the head acts. Meanwhile, in situation nine, the teachers employed five times of attention getter (Excuse me), seven terms of apologies (once of Pardon me and six times of Im sorry). In this situation the teachers applied five times of Im sorry before the head acts and once after the head act.

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In this category, it was also found that some teachers did their requests barely without employing some politeness devices. They did not utilize any kinds of terms as alerters or supportive moves neither preceded nor followed the head acts. It is seemed that they did their request regardless the politeness devices sub-consciously. This happened might be as a result of different cultural background of the respondents with native speakers. The Impact of Power, Distance, and Rank of Imposition There are different strategies in choosing head acts according to different combinations of power, distance and rank of imposition. Power (P) and distance (D) could affect the choice of the request strategies. When there is a social distance (+D) between the interlocutors as they were new acquaintance or they do not know each other or when there is power relation between interlocutors, different patterns may emerge as a result of this combination. The impact of power can be seen from different situations. In a situation, when the addressees held a higher rank, the teachers utilized a great number of conventionally indirect head acts with little regard for the extent of familiarity. It was found that the teachers who participated in the current study used three kinds of strategies: mood derivable, query preparatory, and mild hints when addressing an interlocutor with unequal status. The teachers, in the position of higher status, employed conventionally indirect strategies especially query preparatory. With familiar friends, the teachers used conventionally indirect (query preparatory, 75%) head acts as their preference. The teachers employed attention getter like Excuse me as an alerter. For example, Excuse me, Mr. Ali, would you tell me the information of yesterdays briefing? With a low power they also used low level mood derivable (5%), then they inclined to use hedged performatives (20%) - direct strategy towards the lower status. When the distance was neither too close nor too distant, the teachers were prone to use query preparatory (95%) head acts and followed by hedged performatives (5%). They used both direct and conventionally indirect strategies. There was a high frequency of conventionally indirect head acts occurring in query preparatory where as a less number of direct head acts occurred in hedged performatives. Besides, the teachers employed attention getter Excuse me as alerter preceding the head act of query preparatory to soften the request and to show politeness. For example, Excuse me, sir. Would you mind if I leave early today? I have to see a doctor. My son is unwell. They applied Can you ?/Could you ...?/Would you mind ? in making requests in the form of query preparatory. The use of indirect strategies was more than that of direct strategies. With the high status and high distance, the teachers used three strategies: query preparatory (conventionally indirect), followed by hedged performatives, and want statements (direct). In requests to unfamiliar addressees, the teachers continued to choose conventionally indirect head acts (75%). They displayed little direct strategies: hedged performatives and followed by want statements. In requests made to unfamiliar equals, the teachers utilized conventionally indirect head acts. The majority of the teacher opted most for query preparatory and followed by hedged performatives, for instance, Yesterday, I was absent. Could I borrow your notes, please? The speaker asked the addressee to lend the notes. In making requests of equal acquaintances, the teachers employed direct and conventionally indirect head acts. This finding is in line with Indonesian culture in which a direct strategy is frequently utilized by acquaintances. For example, I need some money to purchase a book. My money is not enough to buy it. I will pay it back to you soon. It is mood derivable head act that was used toward equal acquaintances. In addition, the teachers made great use of conventionally indirect strategy toward acquaintances. When requests were made towards familiar equals, the teachers chose a higher frequency of conventionally indirect strategies of query preparatory than direct head acts. With regard to distance, the results show that in general, the teachers of Junior High School preferred to use conventionally indirect strategies toward unfamiliar addressees (+D), regardless of power position. They utilized conventional indirect head acts in the form of query preparatory as the preferred formulae and most of them in the form of questions, Ragam Jurnal Pengembangan Humaniora Vol. 11 No. 2, Agustus 2011

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containing reference to preparatory condition (e.g. ability and willingness). They expressed their head acts using different formulae such as May I, Could you, would you, or would you mind. It can be seen in the head acts of situation four (Could you lend me your note I missed last session? and May I borrow your note?). They also tent to use attention getter (Excuse me) as the alerter when they do request to the addressees whose higher power position (+D, +P). It can be seen in situation three. They used attention getter eleven times of all responses given for situation three. In this situation only one teacher utilized the formula of apology (Im so sorry) to give response. The responses given by the teachers were different in situation nine in which the requester has lower power position than the requestee and their relation was not close (+D, P). They employed formulae of apology more in giving their responses. It can be seen in responses in this situation (Im sorry, sir. Could you postpone your supervision in other time?). They applied their reasons before and after head acts most to all responses to show their respect to the requestees in which the requestees hve higher power position .They also used attention getter (Excuse me) as the alerter and the term Please to soften their requests. In a situation in which there is no social distance (-D) between the requester and the requestee as they are close friends or close acquaintance, the most frequently used form of head acts chosen by the teachers was the query preparatory (66.6%), followed by mood derivable (15%), hedged performatives (10%), suggestory formulae (6.7%), and the least, mild hints (1.7%). In a situation in which the requester and requestee are friends or acquaintance but their relation is not too close, the teachers showed a tendency to use conventional indirect head acts toward superiors, juniors and equal. With respect to the rank of imposition, two possible situations: low imposition (-R) and high imposition (+R) are found. Low imposition means that size of imposing the addressees is small. When the imposition of the situation is low, the teachers used three kinds of strategies: direct, conventionally indirect, and non-conventionally indirect strategies, with the mood derivable strategy is the most direct strategies, followed by Query preparatory, and then mild hints. When the imposition of the situation is high, all the teachers used conventional indirect strategies to address their requests. They used query preparatory (75%), followed by direct strategies in the form of hedged performatives (20%) and mood derivable (5%). Although the power relation and the social distance between the interlocutors are equal, the rank of imposition in this situation is high because the request was asked by the teachers related to financial burden (borrowing some money). In situation nine (+R-P), the teachers used conventionally indirect strategies in the form of the query preparatory (75%), followed by direct strategies in the form of hedged performatives (15%) and want statements (10%). The rank of imposition in this situation is high because the requester had obligation to do his or her job, meanwhile he or she must left the job for certain reason (his/her son was sick) and the requestee (the principal) had right to ask the requester to stay at job. So, the rank of imposition was high. From the result of rank of imposition above, it can be concluded that the request strategies used by the teachers are mostly conventionally indirect strategies in the form of query preparatory. The higher the imposition is, the more indirect the request the requester applied will be. The lower the rank of imposition is, the more varied the strategies the requester use will be. The results of this study support the importance of the cultural dimension of communicative competence. English language syllabus designers as well as teachers should sensitize their students to issues of cultural differences. More specifically, the students should be made aware of the pragmatic differences between English and Indonesian. An appropriate Indonesian request scheme in a given situation might not be appropriate in English in the same situation. Furthermore, there is a correlation between social variables especially, rank of imposition and the choice of requesting strategies. It can be seen that the choice of requesting strategies was influenced by the three social variables and the rank of imposition was the most influential variable. They showed that the higher the rank of imposition is, the more indirect the request strategies were chosen, which confirmed Brown Levinsons

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prediction. It was argued that, all three dimensions P, D and R contribute the seriousness of FTA, and thus, the determination of the level of politeness with which, other things being equal, an FTA will be communicated. That is, the bigger the face threat (computed by the three variables), the higher the number of the strategies is employed (Brown and Levinson, 1987: 76). There were a number of studies supported this prediction such as Brown and Gilman (1989), Holtgraves and Yang (1992) that found the consistency of the imposition rank predicted by Brown and Levinson. A great tendency for the teachers in using direct head acts is shown in the results in situation two of the first category in which the requester has higher power position (a teacher) than the requestee (a student). In this situation the teachers utilized most direct strategies of all the three categories. But there is also a tendency that the teachers utilized indirect strategies in requesting others although the requestees power position is lower than the requesters as done by the teachers to their students in situation two. It might be influenced by a little part of Indonesian socio cultural background in which there is a great tendency of using indirect strategies in doing requests although it is done to the lower power status persons. It could be summarized that the social variables (power, distance and rank of imposition) have some impacts on the choice of head acts or strategies of requests. First, when the interlocutors had high distance (+D), it means that they did not know each other, the addresser used conventionally indirect strategies when they were in high status position. Secondly, when the interlocutors had high familiarity (-D) or close friend, they used conventionally indirect strategies when they were in low status position. Thirdly, when the interlocutors had equal distance (=D), it means that they are friends or acquaintance but their relation is not too close, the addresser used conventionally indirect strategies when they were in high status position. When the interlocutors had high status position (+P), the addresser used conventionally indirect strategies when they do not know each other well or equal distance (=D). Meanwhile, when the interlocutors had low status position (-P), the addresser used conventionally indirect strategies when they are friends or acquaintance but their relation is not too close. Lastly, when the interlocutors had equal power (=P), they used conventionally indirect strategies when they dont know each other or had high distance (+D). The results in this study are different from the results of research done by Rue and Zhang (2008) which discussed a comparative study of request strategies in mandarin Chinese and Korean. In their study, it was showed that Chinese had tendency to employ head acts based more on familiarity than power status, but Koreans showed awareness of power status as well as familiarity. Implications for English language learning Related to the English language learning, this study may have some important theoretical and pedagogical implications. Theoretically, this study provides data on the request strategies used by English teacher of junior high school and it was found that they used most of conventionally indirect strategies in the form of query preparatory. It means that the strategies they used containing reference to preparatory conditions (e.g. ability, willingness) as conventionalized in different languages such as the use of would you, could you, would you mind, can you. It was demonstrated that the use of English request strategies in this study fall back on their cultural background, Indonesian culture, when formulating their request strategies. In other words, it is not always the norms of target language that determine the choice of request strategies. A related point that should be highlighted here is that different culture view strategies from different perspective. On the pedagogical level, the results of this study support the importance of the cultural dimension of communicative competence. English language syllabus designers as well as teachers should sensitize their students to issues of cultural differences. More specifically, the students should be made aware of the pragmatic differences between English and Indonesian. An appropriate Indonesian request scheme in a given situation might not be appropriate in English in the same situation.

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It is in line with material in Standard of competence and basic competence for the junior high school. It is stated that the findings of this study is very useful for junior high school English teachers because one of the competences in the present curriculum is to equip students to be able to express the meaning in the transactional and interpersonal conversations in an accurate, fluent, and acceptable manner in various language functions including in requesting, giving and refusing services, asking, giving refusing goods, admitting and denying facts, and asking and giving opinions (Permen 24, 2006). Some of Indonesian teachers, especially, Junior high school English teachers, must be aware in adopting English request strategies. It must be based on the English cultural norms of politeness as standard for all other cultures. This awareness can only be attained through a variety of classroom drills and exercises that involve realization of the speech act of request in different situations. The students should be given enough chance to practice these drills of pragmatic competence until they become part of their linguistic repertoire. Role play may be recommended as a class room procedure to enhance linguistic and cultural appropriateness of different speech acts. In the same time, students should be implicitly and explicitly instructed to observe the role of social distance and social power in performing request. The students should also be taught the proper syntactic and semantic techniques to modify their request acts.

CONCLUSION
The study on the linguistic behavior of making requests in English is one of the ways to add a new dimension to the study of speech acts. This study explores the request strategies and the impact of social variables (power and distance) and the impact of rank of imposition on the choice of the strategies. It offers new insights into generally held ideas of directness and requesting behaviors used by Junior High school English teachers and the problems of cross-cultural and cross-linguistic communication. In general, it can be concluded that the teachers used the most conventionally indirect strategies (82.7%), of all available request strategies. The second choice is direct strategies (16.7%) and then followed by nonconventionally indirect strategies (0.6%). The contribution of distance, power, and rank of imposition to the choice request strategies was also found in this study. When there was a different distance between the interlocutors, there was also different choice of making request strategies. With respect to the power relation between interlocutors, the lower the power of the requesters is, the more varied the teachers choice of request strategies will be. The higher the power the requesters is the less different types of request strategies they will use.

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