Impoliteness in Interlanguage Pragmatics of Inviting by Indonesian Efl Learners

Abstract

This study aimed at describing impoliteness in making inviting strategy in the target language (English) by Indonesian EFL learners regarding social status, power, and rank of imposition. The data of research was elicited by administering written Discourse Completion Tasks (DCT) with nine scenarios adopted from Blum-Kulka (2000). The participants of this study were 66 students of Senior High School in Central Java. The findings show that the proficiency of mastering English grammar does not guarantee the successful communication in terms of inviting others based on social status and familiarity. Impoliteness was found in the use of impolite (neutral) inviting strategies in terms of imperative forms and asking for willingness using neutral (impolite) strategies toward higher invetees as they only employ words grammatically ordered without considering context of situation. Brown-Levinson super strategies of politeness in the form of Bald on record was found in the interaction to higher invetees as well.