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Exercise 6: Refusing Polite Offers
Your response has been submitted to
speechactstrategies@gmail.com.
One strategy is being aware of the cultural norm of making “ritual refusals”
before accepting an offer in Japanese culture. Fine-tuning your interpretation of such typical routines at a Japanese dinner table would also
be important. In other words, when
someone offers you food or drink over and over again,
don’t take it personally – s/he is not being persistent in order to convince
you to have more, but is merely being polite by making sure that you don’t eat
or drink too little on account of shyness on your part!
Another strategy is knowing
typical expressions for refusing offers (in dining situations in
particular). Note that a phrase 結構です Kekkou desu ‘No, thank
you’ is polite and appropriate for an older person or someone of higher status
than you, but would sound too formal for friends (Ikoma
& Shimura, 1993). Expressions of
refusal appropriate for use with a friend would be: うん、もういい。おなかいっぱいなの。 Un, mou ii. Onaka ippainano. ‘No, thanks. I’m full.’ すごくおいしかったけどもうおなかいっぱいだから・・・ Sugoku oishikatta kedo mou onaka ippai dakara...
‘It was really good
but I’m full...’ いや、もう十分食べたよ。 Iya, mou juubun tabetayo. ‘No,
I’ve eaten enough.’ Go Back to
Refusals Index |
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