Exercise 7: Compliment Response Strategies
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Although
speakers can be honest and accept compliments from someone close and/or equal
in status, there are a number of ways in which Japanese speakers attempt to
appear modest while accepting or deflecting compliments. Responses to compliments often contain multiple
strategies, combining 2 or 3 of the strategies we have seen here.
When
speaking to someone distant and/or higher in status, Japanese speakers may
often prefer deflecting or refusing compliments due to the nature of
compliments in the culture in which compliments are considered to show
deference and create distance between the speaker and the hearer, rather than
building solidarity between the two.
There
may also be gender differences: male speakers are more likely to accept
compliments than females, who tend to downgrade or refuse compliments more
frequently (Koike, 2000).
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of Strategies for Responding to Compliments