TÜRK HALKININ İLTİFAT YANITLAMA STRATEJİLERİNİN SÖYLEMSEL BİR İNCELEMESİ

Abstract

Bu çalışmanın amacı, Türk halkının kullandığı iltifat yanıtlama stratejilerini ve Türkçe konuşan bireylerin kullandığı stratejiler üzerinde cinsiyet ve resmiyet düzeyinin ilişkisini incelemektir. Bu amaçla, çalışma verileri 50 kadın ve 50 erkek olmak üzere toplam 100 Türk katılımcıdan toplanmıştır. Katılımcıların iltifat yanıtlama stratejileri hakkında veri elde etmek için 10 senaryodan (beş resmi ve beş gayri resmi) oluşan yazılı bir söylem tamamlama görevi kullanılmıştır. Toplanan veriler öncelikle söylem analizine tabi tutulmuş, kullanılan stratejiler Herbert'in iltifat yanıtları taksonomisine göre değerlendirilmiş ve daha sonra cinsiyetin ve resmiyetin iltifat yanıt stratejilerinin kullanımıyla ilişkisi incelenmiştir. İkinci olarak, nitel bir analiz yapılmış ve her bir senaryoya verilen tepkilerin benzer gruplarının içindeki eğilimleri belirlemek için yanıtlar tematik olarak kategorize edilmiştir. Çalışmanın sonuçları, Türk bireylerin ağırlıklı olarak iltifatları kabul etme ve nazikçe yanıt verme eğiliminde olduklarını ve iltifat yanıtlama stratejilerinin kullanımı açısından kadın ve erkek katılımcılar arasında büyük oranda bir fark olmadığını göstermektedir. Sonuçlar ayrıca, Türk bireylerin iltifatlara karşı kullandıkları baskın yaklaşımın hem resmi hem de gayri resmi durumlarda açıkça minnettarlık ifade ederek övgüyü kabul etmek olduğunu göstermektedir.

Keywords

• konuşma eylemleri
• iltifatlar
• iltifat yanıtlama stratejileri
• Türk halkı
• cinsiyet farklılıkları
• resmiyet derecesi

A DISCOURSE EXAMINATION OF COMPLIMENT RESPONSE STRATEGIES OF TURKISH PEOPLE

Abstract

This study aims to investigate the compliment response strategies employed by Turkish people. The analysis also examines the relations of gender and the level of formality in the compliment response strategies employed by Turkish-speaking individuals. For this purpose, data were collected from 100 Turkish participants, comprising 50 women and 50 males. A written discourse completion task consisting of 10 scenarios (five formal and five informal) was used to obtain data on participants' compliment response strategies. The collected data were first subjected to discourse analysis, strategies were assessed based on Herbert’s taxonomy of compliment responses, and subsequently, the relationship of gender and formality on the utilization of compliment response strategies was examined. Second, a qualitative analysis was conducted, and the replies were thematically categorized to identify trends within each analogous group of reactions to each scenario. The results of the study show that the Turkish individuals predominantly exhibit a propensity to accept compliments and respond courteously with minimal differences between female and male participants regarding the utilization of CR strategies. The results also demonstrate that the predominant approach employed by Turkish individuals in response to compliments is to acknowledge the praise by explicitly expressing gratitude in both formal and informal situations.

Keywords

• speech acts
• compliments
• compliment response strategies
• Turkish people
• gender differences
• formality degree

References

1. Abushihab, I. M. (2015). Contrastive analysis of politeness in Jordanian Arabic and Turkish. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 5(10), 2017-2022. http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.0510.06
2. Almallah, M. R. (2017). Gender differences in using compliment responses strategies: A case study (Master's thesis, Eastern Mediterranean University EMU).
3. Al-Shboul, Y., Huwari, I. F., Al-Dala'ien, O. A., & Al-Daher, Z. (2022). An analysis of compliment response strategies by Jordanian adolescent students: The influence of gender and Social Power. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 12(7), 1252-1261. https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1207.02
4. Azmimurad, A. M., Mohd, S. W., Salahudin, M. T., & Wan, I. N. (2024). Instagram compliment responses through Herbert’s taxonomy: A cultural and digital linguistic analysis. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 14(10). http://dx.doi.org/10.6007/IJARBSS/v14-i10/23125
5. Barron, A. (2003). Acquisition in interlanguage pragmatics. John Benjamins.
6. Cai, Y. (2012). A Study on Compliment Response Strategies by Chinese College Students. Journal of Language Teaching & Research, 3(3). https://doi.org/10.4304/jltr.3.3.543-549
7. Cenni, I. (2023). Responding to compliments online: The case of Airbnb online experiences. Sintagma: Revista de Lingüística, 35, 119–135. https://doi.org/10.21001/sintagma.2023.35.08
8. Creswell, J. W., & Plano Clark, V. L. (2023). Revisiting mixed methods research designs twenty years later. In Handbook of mixed methods research designs (pp. 21–36).

9. Culpeper, J., & Pat, K. (2021). Compliment responses in Hong Kong: An application of Leech’s pragmatics of politeness. Text & Talk, 41(5-6), 667-690.
10. Çiftçi, H. (2016). Refusal strategies in Turkish and English: A cross-cultural study. ELT Research Journal, 5(1).
11. Dehkordi, Z. G., & Chalak, A. (2015). English Compliment Response Strategies on Social Networks by Iranian EFL Learners. Journal of Language Teaching & Research, 6(2). http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/jltr.0602.28
12. Dilek, T. K. (2020). Pragmatic transfer in Turkish EFL learners’ compliments and compliment responses from L1 Turkish to L2 English. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 16(3), 1264-1281.
13. Herbert, R. K. (1990). Sex-based differences in compliment behavior1. Language in society, 19(2), 201-224. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500014378
14. Holmes, J. (1988). Paying compliments: A sex-preferential politeness strategy. Journal of pragmatics, 12(4), 445-465.
15. https://doi.org/10.1016/0378-2166(88)90005-7
16. Istifci, I. (2017). Comparison of Chinese and Turkish EFL learners on the use of compliment responses. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(2), 14-29.
17. Keshavarz, M. H., Çetereisi, Y., & Asit, G. (2020). Pragmatic features of the speech act of compliment in a Turkish TV drama. Journal of Pragmatics Research, 2(1), 1–25.
18. Korkmaz, N. (2020). Compliment responses in Turkish: A preliminary case study based on academic status and gender difference. International Journal of Social Science Research, 9(2), 123-134.
19. Lau, T. M. (2025). Compliments and approaches to compliment responses. International Review of Pragmatics, 17(1), 165-180.
20. Leech, G. N. (2014). The pragmatics of politeness. Oxford University Press.
21. Leech, G. N. (2016). Principles of pragmatics. Routledge.
22. Matiki, A. J., & Kgolo, N. N. (2017). A Socio-pragmatic analysis of compliment responses among students at the University of Botswana. Journal of Humanities, 25(2), 62-89.
23. Mejorada, K. M., Opo, K. G., & Malimas, M. A. P. (2022). Compliment and Compliment Response Strategies from Photo Comment Sections as used by Filipino Facebook Users. CMU Journal of Science, 26(1), 39-47. https://doi.org/10.52751/vaoe2170
24. Palinkas, L. A., Horwitz, S. M., Green, C. A., Wisdom, J. P., Duan, N., & Hoagwood, K. (2015). Purposeful sampling for qualitative data collection and analysis in mixed method implementation research. Administration and
25. Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research, 42(5), 533–544. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10488-013-0528-y
26. Placencia, M. E., & Lower, A. (2017). Compliments and compliment responses. In C. Hoffmann & W. Bublitz (Eds.), Pragmatics of social media (Handbooks of Pragmatics, Vol. 11, pp. 633–660). De Gruyter.
27. Pomerantz, A. (1978). Compliment responses: Notes on the co-operation of multiple constraints. In Studies in the organization of conversational interaction (pp. 79-112). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-623550-0.50010-0
28. Rabab’ah, G., Alghazo, S., Al-Hajji, R., & Jarbou, S. (2024). A pragmatic analysis of compliment response strategies by Emirati Arabic speakers. Cogent Arts & Humanities, 11(1), 2350814.
29. Razi, N. (2013). A contrastive study of compliment responses among Australian English and Iranian Persian speakers. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 70, 61-66.
30. Ruhi, Ş. (2006). Politeness in compliment responses: A perspective from naturally occurring exchanges in Turkish. Pragmatics. Quarterly Publication of the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA), 16(1), 43-101. https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.16.1.03ruh
31. Ruhi, Ş. (2007). Higher-order intentions and self-politeness in evaluations of (im) politeness: The relevance of compliment responses. Australian Journal of Linguistics, 27(2), 107-145. https://doi.org/10.1080/07268600701522756
32. 신효정. (2016). A Contrastive Study of Compliment Responses among Korean and Dutch University Students: Pragmatic Transfer in Focus. 영미어문학, (120), 195-224. https://doi.org/10.21297/ballak.2016.120.195
33. Suteerapongsit, R. (2020). An exploratory study of compliment response strategies across gender among Thai EFL learners. Language and Linguistics, 38(1), 72-95. [e-mail]
34. Şakırgil, C., & Çubukçu, H. (2013). Formulas and topics in Turkish and English compliments. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 70, 1126-1135.