“REFUSING AN INVITATION
IN ENGLISH AND SOME
CONTRASTS WITH THAT IN
VIETNAMESE”

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my supervisor, M.A.
Nguyễn Thị Tường, who introduced me to this thesis: “Refusing an
invitation in English and some contrast with that in Vietnamese and
inspired me to do this research. If without her valuable guidance,
comments, and criticism, my thesis would not have been accomplished.
And I would also like to express my indebtedness to D.r Lê Cơng
Thìn and all my teachers at Foreign Languages Departerment for their

1


great help with useful and up-to-date materials concerning my field of
study
Finally, my sincere thanks are due to my family, to my friend. They
help me with good ideas and remind me finishing this thesis.

Vinh, May 2004
Lê Tuấn Anh

TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART A

1

INTRODUCTION

3

1. The reasons for the study

3

2. Scopes of the study

3

3. Methods of the study

4

4. Aims of the study

4

2


5. Design of the study

4


PART B
CHAPTER I:

DEVELOPMENT

5

THEORITICAL BACKGROUND 5

1. 1. Functions of language

5

1. 2. Theory of contrast

6

1. 3. Speech act and its classification

7

1. 4. Interaction and politeness

11

1. 4. 1. Interaction

11

1. 4. 2. Politeness


13

CHAPTER II: REFUSING AN INVITATION

16

2. 1. Refusing as a response to a speech act

16

2. 2. Refusing an invitation in language communication

16

2. 3. Directness and indirectness in refusing an invitation

21

2. 3. 1. Directness- indirectness- Politeness
in refusing an invitation

23

2. 3. 2. The factors effecting directness and
indirectness in refusing an invitation
2. 4. Strategies of refusing an invitation

27
28


CHAPTER III: THE DIFFERENCES AND SIMILARITIES
OF REFUSING AN INVITATION
IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE

3

32


3. 1. The differences

32

3. 2. The similarities

32

3. 3. Concluding remarks

33

PART C

PART A

CONCLUSION

35


INTRODUCTION

1. The reason for the study
We live in development world, so communication and exchange
information are very important. People may be Asian, American, and
African; European…They have different languages, but having same
purpose to exchange information daily. And language is considered as a
mean of communication and an instrument of thought.
Refusing an invitation has an important role in communication of
spiritual life. It is a way in daily life and how people can use it suitable, so

4


this thesis is quite important.
For example:
A: Would you like to get the cinema tonight?
B: I‟m sorry, tonight I must do homework
During the process of study English we can know some ways to
refuse an invitation. And then with studying pragmatic, speech act,
politeness and conversational theory we understood more about language
and use it better. So we want to take great consideration on comparing and
contrasting refusing an invitation between languages.

2. Aims of the study
- To present some ways to refuse an invitation
- To compare and contrast the refusal of an invitation in the two
languages in order to clarify the similarities and differences in the way
Vietnamese and English speaking people refuse an invitation in their own
language and culture


3. Scopes of study
The study confines only to verbal aspects of the actor refusing an
invitation. Although the author is fully conscious of the role of
paralinguistic and non-verbal factors in real-life communication. They are
beyond the scope of this study.
The study especially focuses on strategies of refusing an invitation in
English and Vietnamese.
The Vietnamese Northern dialect and the English language spoken in
the USA, Great Britain, Australia and Canada are chosen for contrastive
analysis.

5


4. Methods of the study
To set up the theoretical framework for the study, the authors refer to
both home and foreign publication in order to achieve of research as
mentioned above. The main method of the study is the quantitative one.

5. Design of the study
The thesis is divided into three main parts:
Part A

Introduction

All the academic routines required for graduation thesis are
presented.
Part B


Development

It focuses on the study and consists of three chapters:
Chapter I:

Theoretical background

Chapter II:

Refusing an invitation

Chapter III:

The differences and similarities of refusing
an invitation between English and Vietnamese

Part C

Conclusion

PART B
CHAPTER I:

DEVELOPMENT
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1. 1. Functions of language
We are difficult to find out the functions of language, because
language is a complicated business. In every day talk, we use the word
“language” in many different ways. It is not clear how “language” should

be defined or what person on street thinks it actually is. We talk about how
miraculously a child’s language is developing but how they make charming

6


“grammar mistake” like “me maden that” instead of “I made that”. Here
language is an ability that is blossoming in the child (William Downs

-

1999:6).
We know that everyone uses and speaks a language but we are sure
that it is difficult to explain clearly, what the nature of language is?
Language plays a central roll in our daily social and mental life thought.
We have not been able to get access to it inner manipulations. “What is a
language?” is different from “What is language?” In order to answer two
questions, it has debated many linguists. The concept of language carries
with it many of the ambiguity and unclarity.
Gary Grosgrain (1995:5) believes that “language” shapes our
conception of reality. And H. Jackson and P. Stockweell (1996:1) use the
term “language” to refer to general facelty, which enables human being to
engage in the verbal exchange of information. The exchange may take
place by means of speech, writing, signing, and braille.
According to Jack C, Richards (1992:150) language is divided into
three main functions. The first is “descriptive” function of language which
means that language conveys factual information. The second is
“expressive” function of language. That means language is to know about
the speaker’s felling, preferences, prejudices and past experience. The last
is “social” function of language which serves to establish and maintain

social relations between people.
According to Halliday (1970:151) language also is divided into three
main functions but different terms. The first is “ideational” function which
refers to the speaker’ experience of the real world. The second is
“interpersonal” function of language meaning that language indicates,
establishes or maintains social relations between people. The last is
“textual” function of language. It means that language is to create written

7


or spoken texts which fit the particular situation.
Above are some ideas of linguistic. We also understand some functions
of language. In real life, we know that language is used to convey meaning,
communicate, establish and maintain social relations between people. In
addition, how to understand meaning which speaker wants to convey? It is
very important. It depends on speech act.

1. 2. Theory of contrast
Contrastive analysis is a branch of comparative linguistic.
Comparison and analysis are carried out on the same order, factor, feature
of the same object based on linguistic document, passage on act. There are
two kinds of contrastive analysis: interior and exterior.
- Interior comparison is comparison on the different units, categories
of different levels and aspects of only one language. For example:
Comparison of phonemes, morphemes, words, phrases, and sentences in
one language.
- Exterior is comparison on the different units, categories of two or
more language.
We know that language has many functions and the most important

one is information exchange. In order to successfully exchange information
we need to have a deep understanding about culture and language of others.
For example: The word “to be” in English and “là” in Vietnamese may
make foreigners get confused. A Vietnamese beginning learner may
translate the sentence “She is beautiful” into “Cụ ấy là đẹp”. So contrastive
analysis is very important in linguistic and more important, we contrast
between two or more languages to find out the similarities and the
differences between them (culture, society, language).

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1. 3. Speech act and its classification
Let’s take this small dialogue as an example:
A: Would you like to go fishing, tomorrow?
B: My father will visit me, tomorrow
In the A and B conversation A wants to invite B to go fishing, but
B does not agree and he/she refuses A’s invitation. Both A’s utterance and
B’s utterance are speech acts.
So, when attempting to express themselves, we not only make
sentences containing grammatical and lexicological factors but also
perform actions thought these actions such as the examples above. They do
not only intend utter those sentences but also we want to convey more than
those. As we know, John Austin (1962), a British philosopher, was the
originator of the term “speech acts” and the author of “how do you think
with words”. He has put forward the notion of “speech act” and initiated
the speech act theory. His theory was developed and presented more
systematically by other linguists such as: John Searle (1969), Hymes
(1964), Levinson (1983), Brown and Yule (1983), Schmidts and Richards
(1983)… All these speech act theorists share the idea that there is a close

link between speech acts and language functions.
Speech acts are actions which performed via utterances for
communicating. In English, they are commonly given such specific labels
as apologizing, complaining, requesting, invitation, etc... In addition, the
circumstances in which, via utterances, actions are performed to
communicate are generally called speech events.
John Austin believes that when people have a single speech act, it
actually contains three separations but it is related acts. In his three –fold
division of speech acts, Austin categorizes them as: locutionary acts,
illocutionary acts, perlocutionary acts.

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Making an utterance, the speaker performs a locutionary act that is an
act of saying something with a sense and referent. It is the basic act of
utterance and this act of producing a meaningful-linguistic expression. If
you were a foreigner, you would be difficult to perform a locutionary act.
For example:
I want to have a cup of tea.
The illocutionary act is the function of utterance, which the speaker
wants to express from his/her mind. And the communicative purpose is
intended or achieved by the utterance. In your utterances you might
promise, threaten, inform, question, greet, etc. This distinction is useful
because there is not always a one to one correspondence between syntactic
forms and illocutionary acts.
For example:
This tea is cold.
It could have the illocutionary force of a statement, an offer, and an
explanation on some other acts. So we know that the illocutionary force is

regarded as the most important while the three dimensions of a speech act
are performed simultaneously. Hearing an utterance the hearer needs
contextual clues and regulative rules such as his/her relationship with the
speaker, the speaker’s purpose, the previous utterance. They are called
performatives. And the verb that explicitly names the illocutionary act
called performative verb.
For example:
I sentence you to prison.
I name you Lan.
The perlocutionary acts refer to the hearer’s understanding of the
illocutionary act that the speaker intends. In addition, the hearer may feel
amused, annoyed, persuaded or warned as a consequence of the speaker’s

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utterance. In this example: I have just made some coffee. If the intended
illocutionary force of it is an invitation then it causes the hearer to drink
some of coffee or to decline this invitation. This is the perlocutionary force
of the speech act. In addition, it is important to appreciate and its
perlocutionary effect may not coincide. If I warn you against a particular
course of action, you may or may not heed my warning.
There are many ways to classify the illocutionary acts but one of the
most influential and most widely used is J, Sealer’s (1969) classification.
He has examined more closely the nature of illocutionary acts and set up
five basic types as follows:
(i) Declarations: are those kinds of speech acts that change the word
via their utterances.
(ii) Representatives: are those kinds of speech acts that state what the
speaker believes to case or not. For examples: statement of fact assertions,

conclusions and descriptions.
(iii) Expressive: are those kinds of speech acts that state what the
speaker feels. They express psychological states and can be statements of
pleasure, pain, like, dislike, joy and sorrow.
(iv) Directives: are those kinds of speech acts that the speaker uses to
get someone else to do something. They express what the speaker wants.
They are commands, orders, invitations, requests, suggestions, etc.
(v) Co missives: are those kinds of speech acts that the speaker uses to
commit themselves to some future actions. They express what the speaker
intend. They are promises, threats, refusals, and pledges.
Another approach to distinguish between types of speech acts is
based on the relationship between the structure and functions. As G. Yule
claims, three structure forms (declarative, interrogative, imperative) and
three general communicative functions (statement, question, command)

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can be combined to create two other types of speech acts: Direct and
Indirect speech act.
For examples:
You make some coffee.
Do you make some coffee?
Make some coffee
There is a direct relationship between a structure and a function as in:
Could you open the window? (Directive) which directly get the addressee
to open the window? It is direct speech act. However, we can make one
speech act with the intention of performing another. We might say: It is hot
here! (Representative) It is simply that in the room very hot but it is also
directive causing the hearer to open the window. Such an indirect

relationship between structure and function marks an indirect speech act.
Therefore, speech act may perform either directly or indirectly. In
English, “indirect speech acts are generally associated with greater
politeness than direct speech acts” (G. Yule-1996). According to J. Searle,
(1969: 61), In direct speech acts the speaker communicates to the hearer
more than he actually says by way of relying on there mutually shared
background information both linguistic and non-linguistic, together with
the general power of rationality and inference on the part of the hearer.
Generally, in order to be an effective speech act, certain facility
conditions must be satisfied. These conditions can be simply summarized
as: the utterance must be said by right person to right person in the right
place at right time in the right manner and so on. Then a speech act is said
to be appropriately performed (Jackson and Stock Well. 1996:140). These
conditions reflect the nature of communication that is a constant attempt for
co-operation and all participants should be aware of the rules governing the
speech event.

12


Thus, speech act plays an important role in function of language.
And Guy Cook reviews that: “Speech act theory, which relates the function
of utterances to set up facility conditions and the knowledge of participants
that these conditions exist, may help us to understand the unity of
exchanges in communication” (1990:37).

1. 4.

Interaction and politeness


1. 4. 1. Interaction
In a developing society, communication is undeniably necessary for
each member. And what we want to say is determined by our social
relationships. Language, which used in communication necessarily, comes
from our social interaction.
Particularly, G. Yule (1996:59) claims that the factors affecting an
interaction are called social distance and closeness. They relate to an
interaction and consist of external factors. They typically involve the
relative status of the participants based on social value such as age and
power. For example, you are a lower status and your boss is a higher status,
you tend to mark social distance between your boss and you by using
address form such as: Murmurs and his/her last name. In addition, with the
strangers we usually use external factors to speak to them. Near by, there
are some other factors. These are internal factors. They are amount of
imposition or degree of friendliness. For example, in the conversation, we
can change from a title-plus-last name to a first name if we feel friendlier
during the talk.
Smith (1983) who called “five senses” says more specifically. They
affect the process of interaction.
 A sense of self: they always exist in each person such as race,

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gender, nationality, age, social economic status, belief, values, etc which
need to be known by ourselves.
 A sense of other: when we want to communicate effectively, we
should understand about our participant. The best way to have this is
through personal experience.
 A sense of relationship between self and other: it is distance

between the speaker and the hearer. They decide what discourse is.
Strategies are used in communication.
 A sense of the setting and/or social situation: in order to have
effective communication with people who have different culture, we should
take geographic setting and social situation, formal and informal occasions,
etc into account.


A sense of the goal or objective: the goal or objective of a

conversation should be accomplished. Important general goals and
objectives are commonly at a subsconscious state of awareness and require
effort to verbalize.
Thus, there are many factors effecting on communicating and its
effectiveness. They are relationship between the speaker and the hearer or
the “social distance” and “closeness between them” in Yule’s words. That
has the great influence on the conversation. In order to reach the goal and
objective of the communication we must carry out the interaction at the
right time. Recognizing the factors that impact what is communicated is
very essential and the investigation of those should be undertaken in term
of politeness. In generally, interaction is understood as communicating,
exchange and sharing information.

1. 4. 2. Politeness
In human communication, we always try to make our speech as

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polite as possible. In pragmatic textbook, culturally, politeness is treated as

“the idea of polite social behavior or etiquette, within a culture” (G. Yule.
1996: 60). More correctly, politeness is “a number of different general
principles for being polite in social interaction within a particular culture.”
Linguistic tried to specify generally principle for being polite in
social interaction. Layoff (in Green 1989:142) described three different
rules that a speaker might follow in choosing to be polite.
Rule 1 is “do not impose”; it means that avoiding mitigating or
asking permission or apologizing for making addressee, doing
anything which address does not want to do.
Rule 2 is “offer options”, these mean expressing oneself in such a
way that one’s opinion or request can be ignored without being
contradicted rejected.
Rule 3 is encouraged feeling camaraderie/ making a feel good.
Almost any topic of conversation is fair game so with close friend, one
should be able to discuss anything.
And another linguist, Leech (1983:16) lists the politeness principle in
order to “minimize the expression of impolite beliefs”. It consists of six
maxims:
Tact maxim: minimize cost of the other and maximize benefit to
other. Generosity maxim: minimize benefit to self and maximize
cost to self.
Approbation maxim: minimize dispraise of other and maximize
dispraise of self.
Modesty maxim: minimize praise of self and maximize praise to
other.
Agreement maxim: minimize disagreement between self and
other. Maximize agreement between self and other.

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Sympathy maxim: minimize antipathy between self and other.
Maximize sympathy between self and other.
In six maxims, Leech considers that the “tact maxim” is the most important
in politeness in English speaking society.
According to Brown and Levinson, politeness is divided into five
strategies to minimize risk of costing face corresponding to the degree of
face-threaten.
- Strategy 1: Bald on record
- Strategy 2: Positive politeness
- Strategy 3: Negative politeness
- Strategy 4: Off record (implicating)

-

- Strategy 5: Do not do the face threatening acts (FTA)
And Brown and Levinson (1987:60) describe possible
strategies for doing “face threatening acts” as following:
Lesser risk

(1) without redressive action, badly
On record

Do the FTA

(2) Positive
With redressive

(4)Off record


(3) Negative

(5) Do not do the FTA

Greater risk
Circumstances determining choice of strategy
(Brown & Levinson 1987:60)
FTA: face threatening acts
This approach has proved that there are factors, which make one
strategy more appropriate than the others do. There are three factors as in
Brown and Levinson’s analysis:
“In broad terms, research seems to support our claim that three

16


sociological factors are crucial in determining the level of politeness which
a speaker will use to an address. There is relative power of the hearer and
the speaker; the social distance between the hearer and the speaker; and the
ranking of the imposition involve in doing the face threatening act”
(1987:15).
In conclusion, the concept of politeness strategies is still
controversial and it is very important in interaction. Different language may
have different politeness strategies, seeking effective divides successful
communication.

CHAPTER II

2. 1.


REFUSING AN INVITATION

Refusing as a respond to a speech act

“Refuse” is the act “to show or say that one is unwilling to give,
accept or do something” (Oxford Advanced learner’s dictionary-Oxford
university press 1995:961)
In real-communication, we always use language to respond the
communication of other. In addition, refusals are usually used to express
what we do not want to do after other’s invitation.
For example:
A: Would you like drink some coffee?
B: Thank you, I must go out now.
Refusing as a responding a speech act and as replying to an invitation
speech act. Tsui (1995:57) characterizes a respond as “an utterance which
fulfils an interactional expectation set up by the preceding initiating act”.
And according to Wierzbicka(1987:94) “Refusing means, essentially,

17


saying “no, I will not do it” in respond to someone else’s utterance, in
which he has conveyed to us that he wants us to do something and that he
expects us to do it ”. In conversation the speaker can make his\her
expression invitation as: “Would you like…. or let‟s…etc.” and the hearer
respond the speaker’s invitation. Refusals are such as “sorry, I can‟t…/
sorry, I‟m busy…etc.” So “refusing is a negative respond to directives”
(Hence Verschieren 1985 in Wierzbicka 1987:96).

2. 2. Refusing an invitation in language communication

Refusing an invitation is post-event and negative responding, in
which invitation is pre-event act and initiation. Using refusals so the hearer
does not carry out the illocutionary of the speaker’s invitation.
In real life, sometimes we feel different to refuse an invitation and
how to make a polite refusal, it is very difficult. If we make an impolite
respond, the speaker will feel uncomfortable or painful feeling. Wierzbicka
(1987:94) remarks: “this prevents any further discussion and highlights the
direct opposition of the two parties”. If the refusing person does not care
about the interlocutor’s emotion and attitude, his refusal can be regarded as
a blunt or even rude act and refusals might implicate loss of face for the
person who invites.
For example: refusing an invitation to go to the cinema may
constitute the threat.
Positive face: It spends a lot of time to go to the cinema with you.
Negative face: I do not want to go to with you.
In terms of the pragmatic, invitation and refusing are natural sequences
in the structure of the conversation, which called “adjacency pairs”.
Adjacency pairs in Yule’s description consist of two parts. Yule has
observed this structural preference in the following table.

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Second part

First part

Preferred

Dispreferred


Assessment

Agree

Disagree

Invitation

Accept

Refuse

Offer

Accept

Decline

Proposal

Agree

Disagree

Request

Accept

Refuse


The general pattern of preferred and dispreferred structure.
For example:

Coming and having dinner with me.

This invitation sets up the expectation of an acceptance or a refusal.
An acceptance is the preferred respond. It is also considered as a positive
responding.
- Sure
- Okay
A refusal is the dispreferred responding
- No
- Sorry, I have had dinner
Initiation and refusing is communication situation, which have the
conflicting desires between speaker and hearer. That is why the hearer is
difficult to say “no” to an invitation.
“From a pragmatic perspective, the expression of the preferreds (…)
clearly, represents closeness and quick connection. The expression of a
dispreferreds (…) would represent distance and lack of connection. From a
social perspective, it is easy to see why participants in a conversation might
try to avoid creating contexts for dispreferreds” (Yule 1996:82).

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In order to produce polite and effective disprefereds, a number of
optional elements might be employed. These elements in English in Yule’s
observation are:
How to do a Dispreferred


Example

Delay/hesitate

-pause/ er/ em/ah.

Preface

-well /oh

Express double

-I’m not sure/ I don’t know

Taken yes

-That’s great/ I’d love to

Apology

-I’m sorry/ that’s a pity

Mention obligation

-I must do X/ I’m expected in Y

Appeal for understanding

- You see/ you know


Making it non-personal

- Everybody else/ out there

Giving an account

- Too much work/ no time left

Using mitigates

- Really/mostly/ sort of

Hedge the negative

- I guess not/not possible

Usually, the hearer tends to avoid absolution refusal such as: “no, I
do not want”. They can be performed in a polite way, which reduces
painful and more acceptant for the person who invites. Such as: “I‟m really
sorry, I must stay at home”.
In English, the refusal usually contains some words and phrase as:
-Features of delay: hehh/ hh/ uhm
-The use of prefacing fillers: well
-The use of mitigated refusals: I wish/ I can…
-Hesitations: Let‟s see…
-An explanation of refusals
-Erosive answers to indicate their reluctance
In Vietnamese, according to Nguyễn Phương Chi (1997), the refusals
are usually used some words and phrases such as:


20


-Negative and declarative: khụng, khụng thể, thụi, đừng, chẳng
For example:
Em khụng thể đi với anh đõu.
(I can’t go with you).
Bõy giờ em chẳng muốn ăn.
(Now, I don’t want to eat).
-Negative interrogatives: With such words and phrases as: Sao cú
thể, làm sao được, làm gỡ được, tại sao …
For example:
Làm sao cú thể khi chiều nay tụi cú một cuộc họp.
(How can when I have a meeting this afternoon).
- Refusal can be softened the use of “courteous” words repressive
elements such as: Đỏng tiếc, đỏng buồn, xin lỗi, xin bỏ qua cho, xin thụng
cảm, tha cho em…
For example:
Xin lỗi hụm nay em rất bận.
(Sorry, I’m busy, today).
- Providing explanation or reason for the refusal of invitation.
For example:
Hụm nay tụi phải làm bài tập về nhà.
(Today, I have to do my homework).
Em phải đến trường bõy giờ.
(Now, I must go to school).
- Resorting to the inappropriateness and meaninglessness of the
invitation.
For example:

Nú thỡ phớ thời gian.

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(It is waste of time).
Tụi ở nhà cũn hơn đến đú.
(I stay at home better than get there).
- Conditioning (depend on context, in what case)
For example:
Nếu ngày mai trời nắng tụi sẽ đến.
(If tomorrow, it is sunny, I will come).
- Negative the presupposition of the invitation.
For example:
A: Hụm nay đi chơi với anh nhộ.
(Would you like to go out with me, today?).
B: Em xin lỗi, mẹ em khú tớnh lắm.
(My mother is very fastidious).

2. 3. Directness and indirectness in refusing an invitation
Leech (1983:108) suggests that with the same prepositional content
we can increase the degree of politeness by raising indirect illocution. And
we want that our refusals of an invitation are more polite so we usually use
indirect refusal.
For example: A: Would you want to go fishing?
B: Yesterday, You said that today is your friend‟s birthday
But sometime indirect refusals are impolite:
For example:
-Rỗi hơi mà đi với anh tối nay à.
-Bộ phim đú thỡ hay ho gỡ?

-It is waste of time yo go out tonight.
-I‟m not crazy as you.

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Indirect refusals may be short, sometimes very short utterances.
For example:
- Trouble some! (Nhiễu sự!)
- Crazy!( Điờn à!)
- Vớ vẩn
But most of indirect refusals tend to be longer utterances.
For example:
-Tiếc thật, hụm qua mỡmh đó hứa với xếp là tối nay mỡnh phải
đỏnh mỏy xong bản hợp đồng này để sỏng mai ký rồi. Thụi thỡ để bữa
khỏc nhộ.
-I‟m sorry, tonight my husband will come back home, so I want to
prepare for him an excellent dinner.
In both in English and in Vietnamese, conventional refusals occur at a
very modest rat. And Blum- Kulka’s assumptions about the link between
conventional indirectness politeness is till questionable in the case of
refusing behavior.

For example:
- You„ve got no hope in the world.
-Tụi nghĩ là sẽ chẵng bao giờ“đỏ nổi bưởi chỡm cả”.

Indirect refusal can be a question, using question to refuse sometime
is very polite.
For example:

A: Would you like to come to dinner?
B: Does it rain tonight?
Direct refusals are suitable for people who use European language
and it is polite,too.

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For example:

1) Formal ways:
- Sorry, I can‟t.
- No. It's a pity, but I'll be (away) then.
- I'm afraid I can't make it ( to your party).
- I'd love to, but I (have some work to do).
- I'd very much like to accept (your kind
invitation) but I regret that (I cannot).

2) Informal ways:
-No. I can't.
-No. I'm working/I'm doing something else.
Generally speaking, everybody wants to express a polite refusal.
Usually we use indirect refusals, and refusing an invitation is the case with
direct and indirect vary across language and culture.

2. 3. 1. Directness- Indirectness- Politeness
in refusing an invitation.
There are many scholars’ opinion showing that directness,
indirectness and politeness are concerned with each other associated with
the speech acts and events. As we know, that speech can be performed

directly and indirectly.
For example:
- No, I don‟t want. (directly)
- I‟m tired today. (indirectly)
In addition, directness and indirectness in language have a close link
with culture. There are some correlation directness, indirectness and

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politeness. We have many ways to avoid imposing on the hearer or to give
options to them. So politeness is understood as “Thing you say or do simply
because it is socially correct to do or say them, rather than because you
mean them sincerely”( Collin Cobuild English Language Dictionary).
Indirectness which defined by Brown and Levinson is any
communicative behavior verbal or non-verbal that conveys something more
than or different from what it nearly means (1987:134).
Leech (1983:108) assumes that: “Indirect illocutions tend to be more
polite, because they increase the degree of optionlity and the more indirect
an illocution is the more diminished and tentative its force tend to be ”
Cottrill(1992:2) said that: “ directness is another potential universal
associated with politeness, since it mitigates the threat to face ”. But
Nguyễn Quang (1998) claims “Indirectness doesn’t always imply
politeness”.
For example:
1)

It is meaningless. (Indirect)
(Nú thỡ thật vụ bổ)


2)

I don‟t want, today. (Direct)
(Hụm nay, em khụng muốn)

Obviously sentence (1) is more polite than sentence (2). According to
Searle, J (1969), Brown and Levinson (1978), Blum-Kulak (1987)…There
are two kinds of indirectness: conventional and non-conventional.
“Conventional indirectness” realises the act by systematic reference
to some precondition needed for its relisation, and shares across language
the property of potential pragmatic ambiguity between pragmatic meaning
and literal meaning.
For example:
- About 6 p. m,the wife has not prepared for dinner. The

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