Jordanian college students' responses to compliments - A pilot study

This study provides a preliminary analysis from a pragmatic and sociolingui stic point of view, of compliment responses in Jordanian Arabic as they are used by Jordanian college students. It focuses upon the relation of the in dividual's sexual identity to her/his compliment behavior and the attitudes and values attached to it. The phenomenon has been investigated in terms o f simple vs. complex responses, macro- vs. micro-functions and intrinsicall y- vs. extrinsically-complex responses. Explanations are placed within a br oad framework of sociocultural differences between male and female college students. The semantic, pragmatic, and sociolinguistic characteristics of c ompliment responses are highlighted, based on an analysis of 268 responses. Also, an attempt has been made to shed light on the kinds of social relati onships and the range of strategies which elicited the compliment responses in the corpus. As in a number of other speech communities, the gender of t he speaker in Jordanian society seems to be a crucial parameter in the form ulation and acceptance or rejection of a compliment. (C) 2001 Elsevier Scie nce B.V. All rights reserved.