Cultuurverschillen in de hantering van beleefdheidsstrategieën in Vlaamse, Nederlandse en Poolse direct mailbrieven

• Authors: Muriel Waterlot
• Languages of publication: NL

Abstracts

NL

The aim of this article is to present the results of an investigation on the presence of Hofstede’s dimensions or values in speech acts in Dutch, Polish and Flemish direct mail letters, and on the validity of the findings of his cross-cultural research. To ascertain to which extent differences in cultural values are being reflected in differences in the speech acts (requests) of these three cultures, two hypotheses were formulated in which a link was established between directness and the values ‘power distance’ and ‘individualism’. On the basis of the results a previously performed frequency analysis of the strategy use (as described in the theory of Brown and Levinson) in a body of direct mail letters, the two hypotheses seemed indeed consistent with Hofstede’s findings about value handling. Therefore can conclude that the values “power distance” and “individualism” are indeed being reflected in the language system of Dutch, Polish and Flemish direct mail letters.

• Publisher: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wroclawskiego
• Journal: Neerlandica Wratislaviensia
• Year: 2012
• Volume: 21
• Pages: 61-77

Contributors

author

Muriel Waterlot