【正文】 tain pattern with certain mendatory terms, such as I like your hair short like that. An implicit pliment requires certain inference work. For example, I wish I could manage my work like you. The positive assessment of the other party is given in an indirect way and is thus an implicit pliment. No matter what definitions the scholars give the pliment, no one will deny that the pliment is a polite speech act that frequently occurs in people39。 but more important is to save others39。 face and not elevating themselves above others. In this way, they maintain warm human feelings, promote the good of the group above their own interest, and thus follow the principles of humanism, faithfulness, and propriety. The Confucian tradition places a high value on education, and particularly on educating the members of society in the ways humans should relate and interact with each other. In contrast, the first person is used frequently in English pliments. English society is oriented by the principle of individualism and as a result equality between people is highly valued. Individualism refers to the broad value tendencies of a culture in emphasizing the importance of individual identity over group identity, individual rights over group rights, and individual needs over group needs. In individualistic culture, people are selforiented and take much care of themselves .Under the guidance of individualism, people behave according to their own needs without considering .the hearer39。 pliments on having beautiful hair are not. Compliments on attractive dress or blouse or on noticeable weight loss occur in almost any situation in which a pliment is at all appropriate。ve lost weight in Chinese is often a warning from a friend, which implies that the person should go and see the doctor. To someone who used to be thin, You39。s (1983) Modesty Maxim: minimize praise of self and maximize dispraise of self. It accurately captures the Chinese norm that seeks harmony among the social members. Moreover, selfdenigration maxim: denigrate self and elevate other, can be used to account for most of the Chinese pliments responses. The motivation of all these indirect strategies can be explained as: I know you are saying something good about me and I can39。s (1983) Agreement Maxim: minimize disagreements between self and others and maximize agreements between self and others. Brown and Levinson39。 qianxu is regarded as a virtue of selfcultivation, which serves as the foundation on which Chinese politeness is built whereas modesty 婁底職業(yè)技術(shù)學(xué)院畢業(yè)論文 Differences in Compliment Response Formulas 13 functions as a strategy of minimizing selfpraise However, in the American society there is a preference for agreement in interaction, and disagreements are particularly facethreatening. This suggests that they give priority to the Agreement Maxim over the Modesty Maxim. As long as the content of the pliment is basically true, they tend to accept it so as to confirm the taste of the speaker, thus offering solidarity. 婁底職業(yè)技術(shù)學(xué)院畢業(yè)論文 Conclusion 14 Conclusion This paper thoroughly pares Chinese and English pliment differences from the pliment expressing, topics, responses, analyzing the differences and similarities between them based on the cultural factors. The CrossCultural Comparison of English and Chinese Compliments demonstrate differences in American and Chinese cultures Confucianism stresses the benefits of fixed hierarchical relationship in which respect is shown for age, seniority, rank, and family background. This is why Chinese people concentrate on the topics of talent and achievement. It is observed that people of high status seem to enjoy being flattered extensively. The plimenting events in China are rooted in the hierarchal tradition and Confucianism, especially the concept of Li(禮 ).And, Confucianism stresses the benefits of fixed hierarchical relationship in which respect is shown for age, seniority, rank, and family background. This is why Chinese people concentrate on the topics of talent and achievement. It is observed that people of high status seem to enjoy being flattered extensively. On the other hand, the plimenting speech acts indicate that the American culture is individualoriented and that individualism and equality are the cores of social norms. And here modesty highly valued in Chinese culture is contrasted with honesty thought of highly in English. English pliments is acceptance while the majority of Chinese responses denigrate the pliment. Because modesty in English culture stresses otherelevating, but not necessarily and very rarely selfdenigrating whereas Chinese modesty emphasizes both selfdenigrating and otherelevating, but with a more stress on selfdenigrating. To denigrate the self is aimed to show respect to the other. Chinese modesty or more precisely selfdenigration, enpassing respectfulness and humility has long been a wellestablished tradition and a highly valued virtue in Chinese culture. Much crosscultural research on socialcultural values relevant to pliment is needed. More investigations of this type involving participants with the same cultural 婁底職業(yè)技術(shù)學(xué)院畢業(yè)論文 Conclusion 15 background can be done in order to make firmer claims on the pliment topics, express and responses among the users of the native language. More studies in this direction can provide further insights that may help validate some apparent findings given in this study. And we need more studies on investigating the historical variable and other social variables, which do great influences on the speech act of pliments. In short, the process of learning a new language is also the proces