Please cite this article in press as: Aliakbari, M., & Changizi, M. On the realization of refusal strategies by Persian and Kurdish speakers. International Journal of Intercultural Relations (2012), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2012.04.009 ARTICLE IN PRESS G Model IJIR-899; No. of Pages 10 International Journal of Intercultural Relations xxx (2012) xxx–xxx Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect International Journal of Intercultural Relations journa l h o me pag e: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijintrel On the realization of refusal strategies by Persian and Kurdish speakers Mohammad Aliakbari * , Mahsa Changizi Ilam University, Iran a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Accepted 14 April 2012 Keywords: Refusal strategies Status Semantic formula Persian Kurdish a b s t r a c t The present study investigated the use of refusal by Persian and Kurdish speakers (PSs and KSs) as well as the frequency and shift of semantic formulas with regard to types of eliciting acts and status of the interlocutor. A group of 278 participants, including 136 PSs and 142 KSs, with the age range of 18–28 were asked to fill out a written Discourse Completion Test (DCT). The gathered data were coded and analyzed according to the taxonomy of refusals developed by Beebe, Takahashi, and Uliss-Weltz (1990). The results revealed that ‘direct refusal’, ‘regret’, ‘excuse and reason’, ‘wish’, and ‘postponement’ were the most frequently used strategies. Moreover, differences were observed in the frequency and shift of semantic formulas used by PSs and KSs. For instance, KSs displayed a higher level of frequency shift in their use of several semantic formulas regarding status level. They were also found to use a greater variety of strategies. Additionally, ‘Swearing’ was found to be a new category of semantic formulas which is not included in the classification of refusal strategies adopted as theoretical framework. As a culture specific strategy, ‘Swearing’ functioned as a type of face work technique used to soften the face threat existing in the speech act of refusal. The findings of the study can help reduce misunderstandings and breakdowns in communica- tion that may take place in the conversations between Persian and Kurdish interlocutors. They can also contribute to our understanding of refusal as a universal speech act and to the general concern to reduce miscommunication. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Over the last few decades, researchers have investigated speech act strategies in different languages and across a number of languages and cultures. Refusal, as one of the most frequently performed speech acts in our daily lives, has recently gained increasing attention in pragmatic and sociolinguistic studies. The speech act of refusal has been investigated in a number of languages such as Spanish (Félix-Brasdefer, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2008; Lauper, 1997; Ramos, 1991), Arabic (Abdul Sattar, Che Lah, & Raja Suleiman, 2010; Al-Eryani, 2007; Al-Issa, 1998, 2003; Al-Kahtani, 2005; Al-Shalawi, 1997; Morkus, 2009; Nelson, Carson, Al Batal, & El Bakary, 2002; Stevens, 1993), Persian (Allami & Naeimi, 2011; Sadeghi & Savojbolaghchilar, 2011), Japanese (Gass & Houck, 1999; Henstock, 2003; Ikoma & Shimura, 1994), Chinese (Chang, 2009; Chen, 1996, 2006; Li, 2007; Liao & Bresnahan, 1996), Taiwanese (Chen & Chen, 2007), Korean (Kwon, 2004; Lyuh, 1992), and German (Beckers, 1999). Face-threatening acts, as stated by Beebe and Takahashi (1989), are sources of so many cross-cultural and cross-linguistic miscommunications. The previous research on speech acts have shown that interlocutors from different culture and lan- guage backgrounds face the threat of offending each other when performing face-threatening acts. These differences are of high importance to study, because they have potentials for misunderstandings and miscommunications between speakers * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: Maliakbari@hotmail.com (M. Aliakbari), Mahsa.changizi.h@gmail.com (M. Changizi). 0147-1767/$ – see front matter © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijintrel.2012.04.009