Request Strategies in Kazakh and Japanese: A Cross-Cultural Pragmatic Analysis

This study investigated how native speakers of Kazakh and Japanese realize the speech act of request. Ten native speakers of Kazakh and ten native speakers of Japanese participated in the study. Data was obtained using an open role play, consisting of nine request situations. The Japanese participants used indirect strategies for someone equal in status more than the Kazakh participants: mostly when the imposition’s ranking was high and when the social distance between a requester and the requestee was near. When this study compared the unspecified request strategies, the Japanese used the anonymous request strategies more frequently than the Kazakhs. On the other hand, the Kazakh participants made use of Imperative more than the Japanese participants. This result showed that the use of Imperative in Kazakh society is more allowable than in Japanese society. Benefactive auxiliary verbs of the Japanese language had a relation to request strategies.