摘 要

合作原则是语用学中十分重要的原则之一，本质上是一种关于人们如何运用语言的理论。中国民航业目前发展迅猛，在硬件设施与基础建设方面已经处于国际领先水平，提高服务质量俨然成为了目前发展中最重要的一环。合作原则是沟通乘客与航空公司的桥梁，在民航服务中发挥着不可估量的巨大作用。

本文共分为五个部分：第一部分介绍了合作原则的定义及其在海内外的不同研究结果；第二部分结合民航服务的发展，着重了论述了合作原则在民航英语中的重要意义；第三部分借违反合作原则而引起的航空危机分析了说话人与听话人在会话中要遵循合作原则以及四个准则；第四部分就如何提高合作原则的使用深入阐释；第五部分作为结论，对未来民航服务中的改进提出了新的意见。

关键词：合作原则；民航英语；听话人；说话人

Abstract

Cooperative Principle is one of the most important principles in Pragmatics, it is a theory of using language. Now civil aviation is growing by leaps and bounds in China, both in its equipment and infrastructure, therefore, it is necessary to improve the quality of service. Cooperative Principle, as the bridge between passenger and civil aviation company, is playing a vital role in civil aviation. This essay will illustrate Cooperative Principle in civil aviation through in five parts.

First part is the literature review on Cooperative Principle, researches down by Chinese scholars and abroad had been drawn out; Second part illustrates the significance of Cooperative Principle in civil aviation; In third part, the author gives some examples about civil aviation crisis caused by violating Cooperative Principle; In the fourth part, counter-measurements for improving the awareness of Cooperative Principle are drawn up; The fifth part is conclusion, it talks about the application of Cooperative Principle in civil aviation in the future.

Key Words: Cooperative Principle; Civil aviation English; Addresser; Addressee

Contents

1 Introduction 1

2 Literature Review on Cooperative Principle 2

2.1 Definition of Cooperative Principle 2

2.2 Domestic and Abroad Studies on Cooperative Principles 2

3 Significance of Cooperative Principle in Civil Aviation 4

3.1 Service of China Civil Aviation: Past and Present 4

3.2 Significance of Following Cooperative Principle in Flight 4

3.3 Four Maxims of Cooperative Principle in Conversation 6

3.4 Side-effect Caused by Violating Cooperative Principle 7

4 Aviation Crisis Caused by Violating Cooperative Principle 8

4.1 Aviation Crisis Violating the Cooperative Principle Caused by Addresser 8

4.2 Aviation Crisis Violating the Cooperative Principle Caused by Addressee 9

5 Counter-measurements of Improving the Awareness of Cooperative Principle 11

5.1 Simple but Informative Sentences 11

5.2 Consideration on Passengers’ Side 11

6 Conclusion 13

References 14

Acknowledgement 15

Cooperative Principle in Civil Aviation English

1 Introduction

Cooperative Principle, a specific term in Pragmatics, plays a vital role in effective communication. Pragmatics is one part of Linguistics relating study of language meaning. Among all of the definitions of Pragmatics, there are two basic concepts. One is meaning, another is language environment. Pragmatics studies the specific words in specific situation and how to understand and use language according to language environment. When people use language, the speakers do not just express the language element and the static meaning of symbols. At the same time, the listener has to understand the speaker’s real intention through a series of psychological inference. American linguistic philosopher Grice was the first person put forward the principle. He mentioned that in the process of understanding, both the addresser and the addressee in the talk should have the willingness to carry the conversation on. For this reason, Dr. Grice developed an approach to discourse analysis what he termed Cooperative Principle. Make your conversational contribution such as is required at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. It includes four maxims to build up the principle. In this age, people pay much more attention to language using. Cooperative Principle can be applied in different language field such as education, service. Airplane is a special working place where Cooperative Principle seems to be more important. In this essay, I want to combine the linguistics theory termed as Cooperative Principle with my future work application- civil aviation English, which is very practical and meaningful, and it will be a good example of combination of theory and application.

2 Literature Review on Cooperative Principle

2.1 Definition of Cooperative Principle

The theory of Cooperative Principle was first put forward by the Oxford philosopher Paul Grice. Grice (1967) proposes that all speakers, regardless of their cultural backgrounds, adhere to a basic principle that he terms as the Cooperative Principle. That is, the participants will try to cooperate with each other in a conversation. The Cooperative Principle and its maxims are as follows: the Maxim of Quantity (make your contribution as informative as is required), the Maxim of Quality (try to make your contribution true; specifically do not say what you believe to be false; do not say what you lack adequate evidence), the Maxim of Relation (make your contributions relevant), and the Maxim of Manner (be explicit and avoid ambiguity; be orderly and be short). In brief, participants should observe these maxims so as to make the conversation maximally efficient, reasonable, and cooperative. That is, they should speak informatively, truly, relevantly and perspicuously.

2.2 Domestic and Abroad Studies on Cooperative Principles

After Cooperative Principle appeared, Chinese scholars took a wide research on this pragmatic inference mechanism and came up with a new conversation meaning theory suitable for the situation of our country. It mainly talks about the effect and supplement Politeness Principle brings to Cooperative Principle. Politeness Principle contains six maxim, maxim of tact, maxim of generosity, maxim of approbation, maxim of modesty, maxim of agreement and maxim of sympathy. If we consider more about Cooperative Principle in a conversation, we need to consider less about Politeness Principle, and vice versa. Politeness is closely connected with culture, for this reason, politeness in one culture is different from other cultures. Gu Riyuan(1990) came up with the idea of Politeness Principle of Chinese people. It improved the development of Pragmatics in China. “With existence of Politeness Principle, flouting principle derives from cooperative principle. Flouting Principle needs the listener to understand the deep meaning that the speaker wants to express from the surface meaning that the speaker talks.”(Sun, 2012) As we can see from the above, Cooperative Principle plays an important part in daily communication and social contact.

We know there happened so many accidents in the air. The way flight attendant solve problems and the way they communicate with passengers are still not perfect. It is necessary to improve the skill of speaking in civil aviation. “Violation of Cooperative Principle is a way to express deep meaning. It has a balance to use it.”(Liu, 2011)

Cooperative Principle is believed to play a regulative role in English-speaking communication and any real or apparent violations of the maxims of Cooperative Principle will lead to what we call “conversational implicature”, but this is not the case in Chinese culture. Chinese language users only conform to the Maxim of Relevance of the Cooperative Principle in a broad sense. Cooperative Principle is quite limited to explain the natural Chinese expressions. (Ali, Arezou, 2014)

3 Significance of Cooperative Principle in Civil Aviation

3.1 Service of China Civil Aviation: Past and Present

China civil aviation has been always developing since our country was found. In fact, at the very first, China civil aviation was like a child learning walking. In a long time, it still grew up very slowly. The plane and the flight attendant both need to be improved. Finally in 2000, China civil aviation began to make great progress. Up to now, China has developed a system of our own civil aviation and has become not only a huge but also a strong country in the field of civil aviation. On one hand, with the economy develops, the infrastructure constructions of airport are built better and better. On the other hand, the employed people are still needed in civil aviation to compare with the development. Service is urgently needed to improve in the field of civil aviation system. The airplanes using in China Civil Aviation are on the top list with other developed countries. So it is important for the employed people to improve the level of their skills and abilities. There are so many ways to improve method of service, but the most basic element is communication. Communication is the way people know each other’s idea. Language is full of power, it can connect people with people like building a bridge in the air.

3.2 Significance of Following Cooperative Principle in Flight

Cooperative Principle is necessary for people working in civil aviation to follow. There are three reasons to prove it. First, civil aviation is very different from other means of transportation. In other means of transportation, the stewards are just in charge of cleaning and station broadcasting. They hardly have chance to communicate with the passengers directly. While in civil aviation, the flight attendants need to serve the passengers face to face to solve their problems. The only way they communicate with each other is talking. Flight attendants’ work is to serve passengers and make them comfortable. To achieve this goal, flight attendants need to know what the passengers really want. The way is communication and the most important element in communication is Cooperative Principle. Flight attendants need to understand what passengers want, and passengers should express their minds clearly. When Cooperative Principle works, flight attendants could serve in a right way.

Second, Cooperative Principle used in communication can improve the safety level. When the plane flies at an altitude of thirty thousand feet, it seems like a small society out of the world. This special situation makes people feel anxious and panicky when accident happens. When accidents or even just mistakes happen in the air, flight attendants must appear to solve them. They need to pacify the passengers’ feelings at once. At this period, flight attendants need to follow maxim of quality to tell passengers what really happens and follow maxim of manner to use a peaceful way to calm down passengers. Language is one thing that can make human beings calm. This power is magical and useful.

Third, passengers with diversified education and social background may present in the flight, which will pose more challenging jobs. With the price of air ticket becomes lower and lower, it is even lower than the price of train ticket, so all kinds of people are able to afford a flight. People from everywhere and every class take on the same plane. Flight attendants need to communicate with them in various ways with Cooperative Principle. Flight attendants need to use different moods and intonation to serve different passengers. It follows the maxim of manner in cooperative principle.

Fourth, passengers prefer to choose a civil aviation company which could offer better service. It is very important to feel comfortable during the time on a plane. Now every civil aviation company begins to train the flight attendants skills on speaking to compete with each other. There is no doubt that it has already become a new standard to measure the service in civil aviation. Chinese civil aviation such as China Southern Airlines, Air China and China Eastern Airlines has already been ranked on the top ten in the world, with the rapid development of civil aviation, the service is needed to be better and better. Recent years the society is always calling for humanized service. The relationship between flight attendants and passengers will be the sally port to improve the level of service. Cooperative Principle is the key to solve this situation.

If a flight attendant is full of experience, he or she would use Cooperative Principle smoothly. For example, when a flight attendant serves an old man, he or she would better speak politely with a slow speed; when he or she serves a child, he or she should use some simple words and speak in a sweet tone. There is no standard rules to tell flight attendants how to serve every passenger, but Cooperative Principle helps a lot. People could solve problems through communication. We could see what people really want to express under the words they say. Flight attendants and passengers will understand each other’s minds with a clear and detailed conversation.

3.3 Four Maxims of Cooperative Principle in Conversation

Four maxims of Cooperative Principle hide in the conversation everywhere. For example, following the maxim of quantity, the speaker should tell all of the details on the situation out to make the listener understand what is happening or happened quickly. Every detail may affect the progress of current situation so it is important to tell all of the details we know to help others know the event. If the speaker conceals the things he or she knows, the listener will know what happens or happened in a slow rate or even miss some important details; following the maxim of quality, the speaker must tell out all of the facts he could make sure to let the listener think about it. The speaker must avoid telling others any words that he or she doesn’t have enough evidences to prove the authenticity, or even the words he or she has already known are wrong. If the listener believe in this kind of words, the judgement he or she makes will be disturbed. It is dangerous for us to violate the maxim of quality.