Intercultural Communication: Analysis of Complaint Speech Acts Report

This report summarizes a study examining the speech act of complaint within an intercultural context, specifically focusing on Italo-Australians, Anglo-Australians, and Italians in Australia. The research, employing an open role play methodology with adult couples from each group, analyzes how complaints are expressed and resolved in various scenarios. The study reveals that Australians generally achieved the best repair outcomes, followed by Italians and Italo-Australians, with Italo-Australians showing a preference for forceful complaints. The findings highlight the impact of cultural norms on pragmatic language use, with Italo-Australians demonstrating a blend of native pragmatic competence and Anglo-Australian influences. The report also critiques the methodology, suggesting improvements for future studies, including a more detailed participant recruitment process and greater clarity regarding the study's location and the support of the study with previous literature.

Intercultural
Communication

Summary of the Paper
 The paper seeks to study the variance in speech act of complaint in a
migration context of Italo-Australians, Anglo-Italians, and Italians.
 Rubino (2011) maintains that less attention has been granted to
pragmatic language transfer from the host to the migrant language.
 The current study was propelled by the fact that studying the impact
of host language on the pragmatics of migrant language may prove
to be problematic.
 Conducting studies in the migrant country can be challenging
considering that an excellent examination of pragmatic behavioral
changes can only be conducted in the home nation (Mahler & Pessar,
2006).

Summary of the Paper Cont’
 The interaction between the natives and migrants is often
characterized by prejudice and misunderstandings thus causing
conflicts (Ting-Toomey & Chung, 2005).
 The gap identified by the author is insufficient information concerning
complaints handling in a cross-cultural perspective considering that
Australia contains people from different parts of the world (Syed &
Pio, 2010).
 In brief, this study specifically examines the complaints of Anglo-
Australians and Italians in Australia and relates them to the same
scenario of Italians in Italy.

Methodology
 The author applied an open role play to study the speech act of
complaint.
 The research was composed of only the adults; 10 couples picked
from each group of the Italians, Italo-Australians, and Anglo-
Australians.
 In essence, the couples were needed to act under nine scenarios
entailing complaints where one partner acted the role of complainee
and the other complainer.
 When selecting the Italo-Australian participants, the study excluded
those who had not lived in Australia for more than 20 years.
 The 10 Italo-Australians who were recruited met the set criteria, with
ages ranging from 40 and 66, and a secondary education
achievement at the minimum.

Methodology Cont’
 An analysis of three role plays was carried out;
 In the first role, the complainer raises alarm over loud late night
music; the repair is attained if the addressee lowers the music.
 In the second role, the complainer complains as a result of another
driver taking his/her parking spot; the repair is attained once the
driver vacates.
 In the third role, the addressee caused an accident due to not
following traffic rules, hence involving the complainer in a car
accident; repair is attained once the addressee takes full
responsibility.

Results
 Australians showed remarkable success in getting repair followed by
Italians and Italo-Italians in that order.
 However, Italo-Australians recorded the highest/remarkable positive
resolution in the act involving rock music.
 One of the interesting facts is that some participants did not have the
knowledge to handle resolution as indicated in multiple previous
studies (Gal, 2006).
 Additionally, Italo-Australians expressed dominance in showing the
complaint where they preferred launching a forceful and explicit
complaint (Rubino, 2011).

Discussion
 Similar to the Italo-Australians, the Australians portrayed their
complaints explicitly but exhibited the least conflict since they
applied a high number of supportive acts to substantiate their
complaints.
 Conversely, the Italians avoided open complaints since they preferred
leaving the complaint implicit and chose directive acts.

Conclusion
 The Italo-Australians were noted to have kept pragmatic competence
of native although they exhibited impact of Anglo-Australian norms.

Critique
 The methodology section should be composed in a manner that it is
possible to conduct a similar study elsewhere and generate similar
results.
 The author should have described the procedure used to recruit
participants.
 There author was not clear about the impact of the location of the
study.
 There ought to have been more previous literature to support the
current study.

References
Gal, S. (2006). Migration, minorities and multilingualism: Language ideologies
in Europe. In Language Ideologies, Policies and Practices (pp. 13-27). Palgrave
Macmillan, London.
Mahler, S. J., & Pessar, P. R. (2006). Gender matters: Ethnographers bring
gender from the periphery toward the core of migration studies. International
migration review, 40(1), 27-63.
RUBINO, A. (2011). Changes in the Speech Act of Complaint in a Migration
Context: Italo-Australians vs Italians and Anglo-Australians. Italica, 88(1), 115-
139.
Syed, J., & Pio, E. (2010). Veiled diversity? Workplace experiences of Muslim
women in Australia. Asia Pacific Journal of Management, 27(1), 115-137.
Ting-Toomey, S., & Chung, L. C. (2005). Understanding intercultural
communication. New York: Oxford University Press.