Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
A STUDY OF VIETNAMESE NARRATIVE: VIETNAMESE “PEAR”
STORIES IN COMPARISON WITH AMERICAN “PEAR” STORIES
_______________
A Thesis
Presented to the
Faculty of
San Diego State University
_______________
In Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree
Master of Arts
in
Linguistics
_______________
by
Diep Minh Pham
Summer 2011
iii
Copyright © 2011
by
Diep Minh Pham
All Rights Reserved
iv
DEDICATION
This thesis is dedicated to my dear parents, my loving husband, and my precious
daughter, all of whom have been making my life crazy, beautiful, and worth living.
v
A man is always a teller of tales.--Jean Paul Sartre
Nausea
vi
ABSTRACT OF THE THESIS
A Study of Vietnamese Narrative: Vietnamese “Pear” Stories inComparison with American “Pear” Stories
byDiep Minh Pham
Master of Arts in LinguisticsSan Diego State University, 2011
Narrative analysis has drawn much attention in the field of linguistics. Analysis ofVietnamese narrative, especially of its oral version, however, has not received sufficientconsideration. Thus, this present study expects to reveal some of the most importantcharacteristics of Vietnamese tradition of oral narrative.
The goal of this study is to look at the structure, the evaluation element, and thenarrator perspective of Vietnamese oral narratives. Twenty Vietnamese narratives of the Pearstory were collected. They were analyzed in comparison with twenty American narratives ofthe Pear story. The analyses of narrative structure, narrative’s evaluation element, andnarrator perspective yield some valuable results of the differences and similarities betweenVietnamese and American narrative, as well as some features of Vietnamese oral narrative.
The study found that even though Vietnamese and American narrators resemble eachother in their uses of evaluative comments, they differ in a number of other aspects.Vietnamese narrators tell stories of better narrative structure, that is, with elements that arenecessary for a good story: abstract, orientation, complication, resolution, and coda.American narrators, however, are more concerned with the task of retelling of all the detailsfrom the movie rather than picking out the most relevant ones like the Vietnamese narratorsdo. In comparison with American narrators, Vietnamese narrators interpret the story moreoften and they vary more in interpreting it. These differences may be resulted from anotherfinding of how the narrators view themselves and their narratives. Vietnamese narratorsconsider themselves story-tellers and the narratives a performance. In their opinion, the story-tellers must be invisible in the process of narrating so that the performance may receive fullattention. Meanwhile, American narrators consider themselves as movie reviewers and theirnarratives movie reviews. To American narrators, their narratives are to be embedded in theconversations whose topic is movie viewing. These different strategies in narrating imply thedissimilarities in narrative conventions of the Vietnamese and the American speakers.
vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PAGE
ABSTRACT............................................................................................................................. vi
LIST OF TABLES................................................................................................................... ix
LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................x
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS..................................................................................................... xi
CHAPTER
1 INTRODUCTION .........................................................................................................1
2 LITERATURE REVIEW ..............................................................................................5
Narrative and Narrative Structure............................................................................5
Evaluation in Narrative ..........................................................................................10
The Pear Film and Narrative Analysis...................................................................13
Analysis of Vietnamese Narrative .........................................................................15
Hypotheses on Vietnamese Oral Narrative............................................................16
3 METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................18
Participants.............................................................................................................18
Materials ................................................................................................................18
Procedure ...............................................................................................................19
Coding....................................................................................................................19
4 ANALYSIS OF THE STRUCTURE AND CONTENT OF NARRATIVE...............22
Analysis of the Structure of the Pear Story............................................................22
Description of the Movie .................................................................................22
Analysis of the Story Structure in the Vietnamese and AmericanNarratives.........................................................................................................25
Content of the Narratives .......................................................................................32
Misplacement of Events...................................................................................33
Omission of Events ..........................................................................................34
Addition of Events ...........................................................................................36
Different Interpretation of Same Events ..........................................................38
Summary................................................................................................................41
viii
5 ANALYSIS OF EVALUATIVE COMMENTS .........................................................43
Cross-Linguistic Differences .................................................................................44
Causal Connectors ...........................................................................................45
Hedges..............................................................................................................47
Similes & Metaphors .......................................................................................49
Cross-Linguistic Similarities: Frames of Minds versus Words/Phrases PerSe............................................................................................................................50
Gratuitous Terms, Negative Qualifiers, Reported Speech, andOnomatopoeia ........................................................................................................53
Gratuitous Terms .............................................................................................53
Negative Qualifiers ..........................................................................................53
Reported Speech ..............................................................................................54
Onomatopoeia ..................................................................................................54
Summary................................................................................................................55
6 ANALYSIS OF NARRATOR PERSPECTIVE..........................................................56
Film-Viewer Perspective Versus Story-Teller Perspective ...................................56
Narrator-Visible Versus Narrator-Invisible ...........................................................59
Summary................................................................................................................63
7 CONCLUSION............................................................................................................64
Differences .............................................................................................................64
Similarities .............................................................................................................66
Vietnamese Narrative Conventions .......................................................................67
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................69
APPENDIX
A VIETNAMESE “PEAR” STORIES ............................................................................71
B AMERICAN “PEAR” STORIES ..............................................................................133
ix
LIST OF TABLES
PAGE
Table 1. Number of Narrators Providing Obligatory Elements of the Pear Story...................26
Table 2. Number of Narrators Providing Optional Elements of the Pear Story ......................29
Table 3. Number of Narrators Providing Narrative Elements of the Pear Story .....................31
Table 4. Number of Narratives That Contain Misplacement, Omission, Addition, orDifferent Interpretation of Events................................................................................32
Table 5. Distribution of Nine Categories of Evaluative Comments in the Americanand Vietnamese Narratives ..........................................................................................43
Table 6. Use of Categories of Evaluative Comments in the American and VietnameseNarratives.....................................................................................................................44
Table 7. Use of Hedges in the American and Vietnamese Narratives.....................................48
Table 8. Use of Similes in the American and Vietnamese Narratives.....................................49
Table 9. Occurrences of Nouns “movie/film/video” in the American and VietnameseNarratives.....................................................................................................................57
Table 10. Number of Allusions to Film as Film or Film-Viewer Perspective in theAmerican and Vietnamese Narratives .........................................................................57
Table 11. Occurrences of the Noun “Story” in the American and VietnameseNarratives.....................................................................................................................57
Table 12. Use of 1st Person and 2nd Person Subject Clauses in the American andVietnamese Narratives .................................................................................................61
x
LIST OF FIGURES
PAGE
Figure 1. Labov’s model of narrative elements. ........................................................................6
Figure 2. Story schema model. ..................................................................................................8
Figure 3. Structure outline of the Pear story. ...........................................................................24
xi
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I owe my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Soonja Choi, for her insightful
suggestions since I started working on the project and for the invaluable encouragement and
stimulating advices during the whole process.
I am indebted to Dr. Jeffrey Kaplan and Dr. Margaret Field for their instructive and
interesting comments.
I am also thankful to my teacher, Kathren Bouldin, and my friend, Viclie Mellos, for
sparing their time to proofread this thesis.
Last but not least, my special thanks go to my Vietnamese friends who have served as
Vietnamese participants in the study. Without them, this work would not be possible.
1
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Narrative appears in everyday life of all people on the earth. People all love telling,
hearing, and retelling narrative of some kind, either of real or made up stories, personal or
someone else’s stories. Not only does narrative attract lay people, but the fact that its
interesting facets reveal important facts about human cognition and human language makes it
one of the academic fields that have received considerable attention in recent years.
In 1932, Bartlett published the book Remembering which later greatly influenced the
research of human memory. In this book, Bartlett makes two critical arguments about
narratives relating to the analysis of remembering. One is that what is told by people is
organized carefully and consciously, rather than told simply detail after detail. When an
individual is to perceive an event, especially one that is a “complex situation,” which also
means unfamiliar, and then talk about it, there is great likelihood that the individual will not
memorize it and retell it meticulously. The person has what is called schema in his mind,
which comprises cultural expectations of how stories unfold; this schema guides the person
in perceiving and later in constructing narratives. The missed details of the experience will be
filled in with the help of this schema. Bartlett (1932) states that, in fact, an individual “has an
overmastering tendency simply to get a general impression of the whole; and, on the basis of
this, he constructs the probable detail” (p. 206).
Even more importantly, Bartlett argues that different cultures have different ways of
telling stories. People growing up in a culture develop for themselves a set of schemata that
later determine the way they perceive, image, remember, think, and reason. In other words,
that set of schemata involves in “every human cognitive reaction… as an effort after
meaning” (Bartlett, 1932, p. 44). A ‘foreign’ story that comes from another culture with
schemata, or expectations, different from their own culture would cause them difficulty in
reasoning, remembering, and retelling. One would expect, from this finding, that people from
two distinct cultures would interpret and later retell the same given story dissimilarly.
2
Reality is not so simple, however. Previous studies have demonstrated a complex
relationship among cultures and their narrative conventions. Using a short movie without
dialogue in order to eliminate all the difficulties in understanding, Tannen (1980) and
Erbaugh (1990) examine and compare the narratives from two groups of native speakers of
Greek and American English, and Chinese and American English, respectively. The criteria
used in their analyses are, among others, narrative length, narrative frame or perspective,
attribution of causality, and philosophical comments. While Tannen (1980) finds mainly
dissimilarities and contrasts, Erbaugh (1990) reports “overwhelming resemblances” and few
differences. Erbaugh (1990) observes that both Chinese and American narratives have small
information units and similar lengths. The Chinese and American narrators in Erbaugh’s
study both prefer a strict and chronological order in telling the events. The supposedly great
contrast between the East and the West is therefore not so much contrastive.
While focusing on childhood bilingualism, Minami’s (2008) findings further support
the existence of discrepancies in cultural criteria of telling a good story. Despite some
similarities, stories told in English and stories told in Japanese are put under different
standards of what is considered “good”; a good story in Japanese may not be so from the
point of view of an English native speaker and vice versa. A good story in Japanese is one
told with “less emphasis on non-sequential information,” such as the narrator’s comments on
the story itself (Minami, 2008, p. 83). On the other hand, American adults prefer a story with
personal information of emotions and feelings. The Japanese and the American, therefore,
have opposing opinions on what makes a story a good one.
This present study will look into the case of Vietnamese speakers narrating one given
story. On the one hand, it may be expected that the Vietnamese tradition of narrative is closer
to that of the Chinese than those of Japanese, Greek, or English. This is because in
discovering the language and culture of Vietnamese people in regards to narrative
expectations, one must note that Vietnamese language and culture and those of Chinese
resemble each other and have had much influence on each other throughout both countries’
long histories. Both languages are tonal and analytic. Nearly 90% of Vietnamese vocabulary
has Chinese roots, especially the words that denote abstract ideas. People from Vietnam and
China celebrate some common holidays like the Lunar New Year and the Mid-Autumn
3
Festival. Moreover, many folktales that similarly imply moral standards and expectations are
found in both cultures.
It is equally important, however, to remember that the two languages belong to
different families, Vietnamese to the Austro-Asiatic and Chinese to the Sino-Tibetan. These
linguistic and cultural discrepancies suggest that Vietnamese and American narrative
conventions may resemble each other and differ from each other in ways different from
Chinese and American narrative conventions. What is found in Erbaugh (1990) may very
well be absent in the results of this present study.
Skimming through the literature, one can easily see that there has been no study of
Vietnamese oral narratives to date. The only discourse analysis on Vietnamese narrative was
that of Karen Ann Daley (1998), which was done on Vietnamese folktales, and focused on
Vietnamese classifiers. Text narrative, which comprises the data body in Daley’s (1998)
study, may offer readiness and ease in data collection, as well as the supposed grammatically
correct discourse, especially when one hopes to see an overall picture of the language.
Nonetheless, I strongly believe that the casual language found in everyday speech carries in it
many interesting and lively facets that might be polished when written down. Consequently,
in great demand is an analysis of Vietnamese oral narrative tradition.
This study expects to draw out the main characteristics of narrative in Vietnamese
including its underlying structure and the strategies the narrators use when telling a story. As
American narrative has often been used in comparison with another language’s narrative
(Erbaugh, 1990; Minami, 2008; Tannen, 1980), the current study also compares stories told
in Vietnamese by Vietnamese native speakers with those told in English by American
narrators. The results from the current study hopefully would bring out the identity of
Vietnamese narrative tradition and put it among the traditions of other languages and
cultures. With this objective, I hope to answer the following questions:
1. What is the common structure of oral narrative of Vietnamese?
2. What are the strategies that Vietnamese narrators use when producing narrative?
3. How do Vietnamese narrators differ and resemble American narrators when telling astory?
The rest of this thesis is organized as follows: The next chapter provides a review of
the current understanding of various aspects of narrative study (that are relevant to the
present study), and Chapter 3 discusses the methodology used in this study. The next three
4
chapters, Chapter 4 through 6, report and discuss the results of the analysis, using those
methods. In Chapter 7, I will summarize the findings as well as relate them to the literature.
5
CHAPTER 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter first reviews current understanding in the literature about narrative
structure and the evaluation element in narratives. It then gives an overview of the previous
studies using the Pear film and their results that relate to this present study. Finally, the
hypotheses that this present study is based on are discussed.
NARRATIVE AND NARRATIVE STRUCTURE
Since Bartlett (1932), who suggested that stories are patterned, much effort has been
put into examining and studying narratives and their underlying structure. Two significant
approaches to narrative analysis are the sociolinguistic approach presented in the work of
Labov & Waletzky (1967) and Labov (1972), and the psycholinguistic approach used by,
among others, Mandler & Johnson (1977) and Mandler (1978).
Working with oral narratives of personal experiences, Labov & Waletzky (1967) and
Labov (1972) proposed an analytical framework for narrative analysis. According to these
scholars, narrative is “one method of recapitulating past experience by matching a verbal
sequence of clauses to the sequence of events which (it is inferred) actually happened”
(Labov, 1972, p. 359-60) and it performs two main functions: reference to what actually
happened and evaluation of the story by the narrator. However, a fully established narrative
contains clauses that can be grouped into six sections serving six functions. The sections are
Abstract, Orientation, Complication, Resolution, Coda, and Evaluation. Figure 1 illustrates
the typical narrative structure of these elements.
An explanation of these elements is as follows.
The Abstract section serves to answer the question of what the narrative is about.
The Orientation section provides the information of who (the character(s)), when (the
time), where (the place), and what (the situation).
The next section in a narrative is Complication, which is also the most fundamental
part of the narrative. It is comprised of sequence(s) of narrative events in order to answer the
6
Figure 1. Labov’s model of narrative elements.
question of what happened (next). According to Labov & Waletzky (1967), a minimal
narrative will contain this section but not any other section; without it, there is no narrative.
An example of a minimal narrative follows from Labov & Waletky, 1967.
“Well, [this person had a little too much to drink], and [he attacked me], and [a friend
came in], and [she stopped it].” (p. 16)
This narrative reports all the events that happened in a sequence that tells the listener
how one event leads to another. The section of Complication, therefore, is said to fulfill the
referential function of narrative (Labov & Waletzky, 1967).
The sequence of complicating actions in the Complication section is ended with
result, which is the core of the Resolution section. The Resolution section is to answer the
question of what finally happened.
The fifth section, which is at the end of a narrative, is Coda. It signals to the listener
that the narrative is finished and often brings the listener back to the present time.
The Evaluation section of a narrative, however, is not set to be at one place in a
narrative. The evaluative clauses that make up the Evaluation section may appear at any
point during the narrative. They help make it clear to the listener why the narrative is worth
telling. They are said to “indicate the point of the narrative: […] why it was told, and what
the narrator is getting at” (Labov, 1972, p. 366). The Evaluation clauses, therefore, answer
the question, “So what?” and perform the evaluative function at various places in the
narrative.
Abstract Orientation Complication Resolution Coda
Evaluation
7
Labov (1972) finds that evaluative clauses may be found individually or in clusters at
the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of the narrative. However, it is common that
narrators suspend the narrative at the high point, where the complicating actions have built
up to a climax, to give their comments before going on to end that sequence of events with a
result. Because of this finding in Labov & Waletzky (1967), their analysis of narrative
structure is often referred to as “high point analysis.”
The other popular model of analyzing narrative structure comes from the work of
various psycho-linguists including Mandler & Johnson (1977), Mandler (1978), and Stein
(1986). In this model, a narrative starts with a Setting, in which the characters and the
situation are introduced. The rest of the narrative then goes on to follow the protagonist(s) in
their path of solving their problems. This is called Event Structure, which is usually
composed of more than one episode. An episode, as described in detail by Mandler &
Johnson (1977), consists of Initiating event, Reaction and/or Goal, Obstacle, Attempt,
Outcome, and Ending. The episodes in a narrative may follow one another chronologically or
may be embedded in one another. The model, often called “story grammar,” is pictured
differently only in details in the studies of those scholars. A simple story schema, however, is
presented in Figure 2.
Because the story structure is organized in episodes, the story schema is referred to as
the model of episodic analysis (Peterson & McCabe, 1983).
Both of these models are created in an effort to unravel the structure of stories told by
people. However, they differ in many aspects, the most important of which are in data
collection and in the goal of analysis. Labov’s model was developed originally for the
analysis of narratives of personal experience. Labov & Waletzky (1967) and Labov (1972)
use the narratives collected from asking the participants questions about their own
experience, one of which is “Were you ever in a situation where you thought you were in
serious danger of getting killed?” (Labov & Waletzky, 1967). Of course, one may never
expect two similar narratives. In addition, these scholars set out the goal of finding the
fundamental structures of oral narrative and to “relate the formal properties of narrative to
their functions” (Labov & Waletzky, 1967, p. 12).
8
Figure 2. Story schema mode
Meanwhile, the story s
linguists is used mainly to exa
intended to find the effect of st
studies, the participants are giv
participants are to read the stor
ability of retrieval. Also, the da
differences in performance of
The differences betwee
good only for studying oral na
Story
Setting Event Structure
Episode 1 Episode 2
(similar to Episode 1)
Initiating Event Development Ending
Reaction G
Obstacl
l.
chema developed by Mandler (1978) and other psycho-
mine narratives elicited from a given story. The studies are
ory schema on remembering and recalling of stories. In these
en a script that contains a fully developed story. The
y and to recall it later. The stimulus story is used to assess the
ta comprise similar stories so that investigators are able to test
different age groups.
n the two models do not mean that the high point analysis is
rrative and that episodic analysis fits only with examining
oal Path Outcome
e Attempt
9
recalled non-personal narrative. In fact, Peterson & Mccabe (1983) have shown that both
models are valid in the analysis of narrative, whether personal or non-personal. Peterson &
McCabe (1983) use both models to analyze children's narratives of personal experience. Each
model reveals different aspects of the narratives and does not in any way interfere with the
other. They find that older children are more likely to tell a story of more complex structure
than younger ones. Even more important is that this finding is consistent across the analyses
using both models. Later, in another article, when comparing the high point analysis with the
episodic analysis, Peterson & McCabe (1984) contended the following:
Episodic analysis aptly captures the cognitive component of human activity, theextent to which we plan, execute and either achieve or fail to achieve our goals.High point analysis is excellent for capturing the overall coherence of a narrative,the way in which it is organized around meaningful events. It foregroundsemotional information, which is half of the business of language. (p. 478)
According to Peterson & McCabe (1984), episodic analysis is best suited for
revealing the psychological characteristics of the production of narrative. The story is told
with respect to the main character’s perspective. It tells how the character solves his/her own
problems. First, an initiating event triggers the main problem. After the character’s first
reaction comes the real obstacle, which leads to the climax of the story. This is when the
character needs to step up to really set out a goal path to solve the problem. Since episodic
analysis values “the cognitive component of human activity,” it helps to point out the ways
people are able to manage to make sense out of a set of events in order to remember them
and reconstruct them at a later time. In general, episodic analysis helps to study the human
brain when producing and retelling a narrative.
Peterson & McCabe (1984) argue that high point analysis is most helpful when one
seeks to unveil the coherent structure of a narrative. With less emphasis on the “cognitive
component of human activity,” high point analysis focuses on the general narrative
organization. High point analysis contends that a narrative is produced firstly to fulfill the
referential function, that is, to provide the information of who, what, where, when, and how.
Moreover, it also puts a strong emphasis on the “emotional information” of a narrative and
the ways people express this in their narratives. In doing so, high point analysis carefully
examines the elements of a narrative and their functions. These differences imply that high
10
point analysis fits better as the method for this study, whose objective is to look for the
general and typical features of Vietnamese narrative structure.
EVALUATION IN NARRATIVE
As seen in previous discussion, Labov & Waletzky (1967) and Labov (1972) argue
that there are two important functions that a narrative performs: referential function and
evaluative function. The referential function is fulfilled by the Complication section, which is
the most fundamental part of a narrative. The evaluative function is provided by evaluative
clauses scattered at different points in a narrative. While the Complication section is so
important that there is no narrative without it, the Evaluation section is equally vital to a
narrative since the narrative would be pointless without it. The Evaluation section answers
the question of what the point of a narrative is by revealing "the attitude of the narrator
towards the narrative" (Labov & Waletzky, 1967, p. 37). Take the minimal narrative from the
previous discussion as an example.
“Well, [this person had a little too much to drink], and [he attacked me], and [a friend
came in], and [she stopped it].” (Labov & Waletky, 1967, p. 16)
If someone is to listen to this narrative, he/she may very well ask, “So what?” The
narrative clearly contains events put in a chronological order which is easy to understand.
Yet it lacks the point. More context from Labov & Waletzky (1967) reveals that the narrator
of this short narrative does not want to talk about the topic “Were you ever in a situation
where you thought you were in serious danger of getting killed?” and the narrative only
results from his being further questioned by the investigator, “Well, tell me as much about it as
you can” (Labov & Waletzky, 1967). Obviously, the narrator himself/herself does not want to
discuss the incident, let alone find the point of it and prove it to another person. Not only is
the narrative simple, it may also appear pointless and boring. It is, then, apparent that
evaluation plays a critical role in the production of narrative, according to Labov & Waletzky
(1967) and Labov (1972).
Later, Labov (1972) identified two kinds of evaluation: external and embedded.
External evaluation is used when the narrator steps out of the story world and explicitly states
what the point of the narrative is or comments on it. In other words, the narrator is visible in
that he/she is also the speaker in the conversation relationship with the listener (and is subject
11
to the conversation rule of speaker-listener role switching). An example of external
evaluation is followed.
“[A]nd it was the strangest feeling because you couldn’t tell if they were really gonna
make it.” (Labov, 1972, p. 371).
External evaluation, therefore, is usually recognized in clauses with the appearance of
first person or second person subject.
Embedded evaluation, on the other hand, is implicit and may be called "hidden"
evaluation. Some linguistic devices that are included as embedded evaluation are: quotes by
characters (“But that night the manager, Lloyd Burrows, said, ‘You better pack up and get
out because that son of a bitch never forgets anything once he gets it in his head’” (Labov,
1972, p. 373)), quantifies (All of them stood up), negatives (He didn’t say a word), and
modals and evaluative action (They were screaming).
Peterson &McCabe (1983), in their analysis of children's narratives, compile 21 types
of evaluation, ranging from semantic ones like similes and metaphors (“His eyes got as big as
tomatoes” (p. 223)) to technical-sounding ones, e.g. repetition. They find that even in early
years, children are able to provide all types of evaluative comment, making their personal
stories very interesting.
Comparing the ability of children to provide evaluative comments with that of adults,
Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991) combine all types of evaluation analyzed in Labov (1972)
and Peterson & McCabe (1983) and reduce them to five devices that serve evaluative
function: frames of mind, negative qualifiers, causal connectors, hedges, and reported
speech. They find that of the five devices, frames of mind are preferred by adult speakers of
English over all other evaluative devices. In addition, frames of mind are often found in
clusters and in connection with causal connectors. According to Bamberg & Damrad-Frye
(1991), this can be explained by considering the “rather common communicative convention
in Western-European languages” (p. 697) of narrators attributing a particular mental state to
the characters in their stories; there is a natural need to support that act of attributing.
Recently, Minami’s (2008) work on bilingualism in narrative production shows that
the main characteristic that distinguishes a good story in Japanese from a good story in
English is evaluation. The participants are forty bilingual school-age children who speak
Japanese as their first language and English as the second. They are asked to read and then
12
retell the story of the wordless picture book Frog, Where Are You? in both English and
Japanese. The stories are then rated by Japanese and American adults; stories with higher
ratings are supposed to be good. The results suggest that to tell a good story in English is to
provide the listener with not only referential information but also evaluative comments.
When telling a story, it is as important to let the listener know what one thinks about it as to
state what it is about. A good story in Japanese, however, does not necessarily contain
evaluation as background information. That is, a story told in Japanese that focuses on
“actions (i.e. plot-advancing, sequential foreground information)” (Minami, 2008, p. 88)
would most likely be rated as a good one.
As discussed in Minami (2008), other studies also find that speakers of different
languages prefer different techniques in telling a story when it comes to evaluation. Kuntay
& Nakamura (1993) (cited in Minami, 2008) report that Japanese and Turkish speakers tend
not to make explicit evaluative comments in their stories.
As cited in Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991), Kamio (1979) and Kuno (1987)
concluded that in Japanese, the attributions of mental states to the characters in a narrator’s
story “are simply not possible, since they do not fall into “the speaker’s territory of
information” (Bamberg & Damrad-Frye, 1991, p. 698). Conversely, according to Bamberg &
Damrad-Frye (1991) and Berman & Slobin (1994) (cited in Minami, 2008), even children
who speak English and Hebrew do not seem to spare their comments during the course of
story-telling. Evaluation in narrative is, therefore, culturally specific, in that it may be
essential in one language and may be trivial in another language. In English, evaluation
provides the point of a narrative (Labov, 1972). In Japanese, however, evaluative comments
perhaps are implicit. The Japanese speaker and listener are expected to share cultural
understandings, so there seems to be no need to mention the emotions or feelings of the
speaker.
In fact, according to Beck, Walters, & Francisco (1977), narrative tradition of
American Indian tribes also does not value overt evaluation. The “why” question is not
supposed to be asked or answered in a narrative. American Indian people accept that there
are things in life that exist just because they do, that is, without a reason. Asking “why”
means stupidity in the society of American Indian. The listener is to “listen and learn” from
the story without questioning the story-teller.
13
The attitude towards evaluation in narrative tradition, it seems, appears to be different
in different societies. Examining the way an ethnic group favors evaluating some details or
events in their narratives may help to shed light on the conventions of narrative in that
language and its culture.
THE PEAR FILM AND NARRATIVE ANALYSIS
In 1979, Wallace Chafe and other linguists carried out a project to examine aspects of
language that are related to cognition, culture, and linguistics (Chafe, 1980). They used a
short movie specifically made for the project. In the movie, there is a man picking pears from
a pear tree and a kid riding a bicycle who steals one of the man’s baskets of pears. The kid
falls down while running away and gets help from three other boys who receive three pears
in return. The three boys eat the pears when walking past the pear picker, who now discovers
his loss. The movie is commonly referred to as the Pear film.
Speakers of different languages are asked to watch the movie and then tell a person
who has not watched the movie about it. The narratives were collected, transcribed, and
analyzed by researchers from different but related fields: cognitive science, linguistics, and
socio-linguistics. Their work was put together in the book The Pear Stories: Cognitive,
Cultural, and Linguistic Aspects of Narrative Production (Chafe, 1980). Since then, the Pear
film has been used in several linguistic experiments, among which the most notable and
relevant to the current study include Tannen (1980) and Erbaugh (1990).
Tannen (1980) examines Greek narratives of the Pear film and compares them with
American ones. She finds that the American narrators tend to "discuss the film as a film" and
to "report events as objectively as they could," while the Greek narrators tend to recount the
events of the story, without saying that they were from a film (p. 54). The American narrators
explicitly state that they are narrating about a movie they just saw and refer to movie frames;
they often use the nouns movie and film and allusions to the movie such as the setting,
scenes, it opens up, etc. In other words, they maintain a “film perspective” throughout their
narratives. In contrast, the Greeks focus on the content of the movie rather than on the movie
itself, frequently giving personal comments on the moral message of the story, unlike the
American narrators whose personal comments are on the movie features of setting, actors, or
sound. Moreover, not only do the Greek narrators frequently interpret the events, but they
14
also show a greater variety in their accounts of the events and in naming the characters than
the American narrators, who seemed to be in agreement in most cases. Tannen (1980) finds
that the Greek narrators mention only the events that they consider relevant to the story and
ignore those that they do not, i.e. they play up and play down the details of the movie. The
American narrators, however, are much more obsessed with reporting as many details as they
can. They do not seem to want to play up or play down any of the details. According to
Tannen (1980), the American narrators see themselves as movie-viewers, and as
“sophisticated” ones (Tannen, 1980), while the Greek narrators present themselves as “acute
judges of human behavior and good storytellers” (Tannen, 1980, p. 55).
On the basis of Chinese narrative data collection, Erbaugh (1990) suggests that
Chinese narrators settle somewhere in between the English and the Greek tellers. The
Chinese narratives are organized similarly to the American ones: starting with characters and
setting, proceeding with actions in chronological order, and ending with an explicit statement
such as “That’s it.” The Chinese narrators follow the chronological order even more strictly
than the American narrators. In describing the cause of the bike boy’s fall, both groups of
narrators mention the complete events leading to the fall: the boy looking at the girl and the
bike hitting a rock. However, the Chinese narratives differ from the American ones in several
aspects. Firstly, the Chinese narrators provide more psychological interpretations than the
American narrators, which is similar to the case of the Greek narrators. For example, the way
the man picks pears is described as painful, fraught with hardship, or happy; and the three
boys, who help the bike boy, do it helpfully, generously, or gladly. Secondly, like the Greeks,
the Chinese speakers use more interpretive names, while the American narrators use general
names; the man who picks pears in the movie is referred to as fruit picker, guava picker, or
fruitier in Chinese narratives, and person or man in American narratives. Lastly, the two
leitmotifs, theft and thanks, are present in most of the Chinese narratives and absent in most
of the American ones. The bike boy is more likely to be a thief and to be criticized for not
thanking the three helping boys in the Chinese narratives than in the American narratives.
Besides those similarities and differences between the Chinese and the American
narratives, there is a fuzzy opposition regarding the film-viewer perspective of these
narratives. The Chinese narrators, in general, rarely comment on cinematic aspects of the
movie, but when they do, they do it extensively: five Chinese narrators place great emphasis
15
on the “close-ups, camera angles, lighting, light effects, and changes of scenes” (Erbaugh,
1990, p. 27). These five narrators, then, resemble the group of American narrators, while the
rest of the Chinese narrators do not.
What surprised Erbaugh (1990) the most in her study, however, are the similarities
found between Chinese and American narrators. In accounting for these similarities, she
argues that the Chinese school system traditionally values memory tasks, rewards
“meticulous recitations” and punishes “outbursts of personal opinion” (Erbaugh, 1990, p.
30). This cultural belief leads to the preference for details and their timely exactness in the
Chinese narratives. The findings indicate that there is no clear-cut distinction between
Eastern and Western traditions of narrative. Erbaugh (1990) concludes the following:
(T)his study undercuts easy generalizations about East and West, since theChinese matched or surpassed the Americans in the amount of detail theyincluded, but were closer to the Greeks or Japanese in their social interpretations.(p. 29)
ANALYSIS OF VIETNAMESE NARRATIVE
To date, there is only one study of Vietnamese narrative, that by Daley (1998). In this
study, Daley examines Vietnamese classifiers used in four written narratives. She argues that
the use of more than 100 noun classifiers in Vietnamese is subject to only one factor, that is,
referential salience. Daley (1998) suggests that nouns are classified if they are subjectively
perceived as significant for the story line.
Daley’s (1998) study relies on written narrative whose language has been carefully
structured in comparison to the language of spontaneous oral narrative. As made clear in
Tannen (1982) and Chafe & Danielewicz (1987), spoken language is so immediate and
dynamic that there is not much precision in it. Once the words are uttered, they cannot be
unsaid. There are enormous examples of false start, hesitation, and rephrasing. This is caused
by the fact that the speakers do not have a chance to revise what they say and to re-say it in a
better way. Spoken language, therefore, is much messier and rougher than written language.
For this reason, I believe that it is through examining spoken language that one can reveal the
psychological aspect of human language while written language is more helpful when it
comes to gramaticality.
16
HYPOTHESES ON VIETNAMESE ORAL NARRATIVE
The present study is intended to analyze Vietnamese oral narratives in comparison
with American oral narratives in order to draw out the structural and stylistic characteristics
of the stories that are told in Vietnamese by Vietnamese native speakers. The Vietnamese
narratives will be elicited from the participants after they have watched the Pear film. Next,
these narratives will be transcribed, coded and analyzed in three aspects: narrative structure,
evaluation, and narrative perspective.
For narrative structure, the model of narrative proposed by Labov & Waletzky (1967)
and Labov (1972) will be used to assess the completeness or incompleteness of the
narratives. It is expected that the Vietnamese narrators will focus on the content of the movie
rather than the cinematographic aspects of the movie (e.g., features like sound effects, color
effects, and camera angles). Originated in the 1920s, Vietnamese cinema has a short history
compared to U.S. cinema. The Vietnamese film industry is also poorly developed.
Consequently, Vietnamese audiences are not familiar with cinematographic features and,
therefore, do not have as good a background knowledge of cinema as American audiences.
Moreover, Vietnamese speakers may pay close attention to the story. They may pick up the
relevant details and ignore the irrelevant ones, and later retell it with their own interpretation
in mind. Their narratives, therefore, may conform to the typical narrative structure, and differ
from the American narratives, which are already known for their resemblance to movie
reviews.
Regarding evaluation, the narratives will be examined for the frequencies of
evaluative comments. Since Vietnamese narrators are more likely to focus on the content of
the movie, i.e. the Pear story, than American narrators, there is a great possibility that they
will interpret the story and provide more evaluative comments than American narrators. It
will also be interesting to see in which categories of evaluative comments the two groups will
be dissimilar and alike. [See Chapter 3 on Methodology for the specific types of evaluative
comments that are analyzed in the present study.]
Finally, analysis of narrative perspective focuses on how the narrators view
themselves in the act of narrating: Will they see themselves as film viewers or story tellers?
And will they reveal themselves while telling the story? It is hypothesized that Vietnamese
narrators will be more concerned with being good story tellers rather than with being
17
experienced film viewers (as hypothesized above for analysis of “narrative structure”), which
is exactly what American narrators see themselves to be. Moreover, with a culture that values
humbleness over self-confidence and us over me, Vietnamese narrators are more likely to
hide themselves while emphasizing the topic of the interview—the Pear story.
These hypotheses will be addressed in the Analysis and Result chapters (Chapters 4-
6) and the Conclusion chapter (Chapter 7).
18
CHAPTER 3
METHODOLOGY
This chapter provides information about the participants, materials, and the procedure
of the study, as well as the coding process of the data.
PARTICIPANTS
Twenty Vietnamese speakers who range in age between 20 and 30 years were
recruited. Gender was not of interest in this study and therefore was not controlled. There
were 13 male and 7 female participants in the Vietnamese group of narrators. All of them
were born and had earned high school diplomas in Vietnam. They had been living, studying,
and (for some) working in the U.S for 3-10 years. The narratives collected from these
participants make up the body of the Vietnamese data.
The American narratives are taken from Chafe’s study in 1979. Their transcripts are
available in the book The Pear Stories: Cognitive, Cultural, and Linguistic Aspects of
Narrative Production or online at http://www.pearstories.org/. The Americans in the study
were undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley.
MATERIALS
The Pear film was made especially for Chafe’s (1980) project. The film is available at
http://www.pearstories.org/. The video is six minutes long and in color. It has sound but no
dialogue.
A more detailed description of its content will be provided in Chapter 4. A brief
description is as follows. A man is picking pears on a pear tree. A boy rides by, sees the pear
baskets and steals one of them. While running away, he falls down and is helped by three
other boys who later receive three pears from him. The three boys walk by the pear tree,
eating the pears when the man discovers his loss. The man watches them walking away.
The movie has some features that are intentionally created for Chafe’s research.
According to Chafe (1980), it was made so that people from different cultures could
understand without any specific background knowledge. The scene of a pear falling when the
19
man is in the pear tree and the scene of a man with his goat are irrelevant to the main plot;
they are included to test how people account for them. Also, the appearance of a ping-pong
toy in the story is intended to see how people describe an unfamiliar object.
PROCEDURE
Each participant was tested individually.
Firstly, the investigator went over the instructions and the procedural steps with the
participants in Vietnamese. An English translation of the instructions is as follows. “ You
will see a short film. After the film, you will tell a person who has not seen the movie about
it. You can tell the story in any way you want to. There are no right or wrong answers and
there is no time limit.” After the first viewing, the participants were allowed to ask for the
replaying of some parts of the movie due to the low quality of the online video.
The participants then watched the movie individually. When they finished watching,
another person, not the investigator, came into the room and asked, “I haven’t seen the movie
you have just seen. I want to know what happens in it. Can you tell me about it?” The
participants then told the story. The participants’ stories were recorded and transcribed for
later coding and analysis.
The whole process was done in Vietnamese and was closely adapted from the
interview procedure of Chafe (1980)’s experiment to ensure accurate analysis.
CODING
The twenty Vietnamese narratives collected from the above procedure were
transcribed. The transcipts of these twenty Vietnamese narratives, as well as the twenty
American narratives from Chafe’s (1980) study, are provided in Appendix A and Appendix
B for easy reference.
Then, all of these forty narratives were coded in three dimensions: narrative structure,
evaluative comments, and narrative perspective.
Firstly, Vietnamese and American narratives were coded using Labov’s narrative
model. This model consists of five elements: Abstract, Orientation, Complication,
Resolution, and Coda.
Secondly, regarding evaluative comments, Labov (1972) was the first to carefully
examine types of evauation. Later, Peterson & McCabe (1983) analyzed evaluative
20
information in narratives using 21 types of linguistic devices. After that, Bamberg &
Damrad-Frye (1991) combined the two previous studies and reformulated all of the
categories into only five linguistic devices.
In the present study, I have picked some of the most salient categories from all of
those analyses. As a result, nine types of evaluative comments were used to assess American
and Vietnamese narratives. The following lists the nine categories with examples from both
American and Vietnamese data.
4. Frames of mind: These are the references to emotions and mental states. Examplesare sad, think, scared, puzzled and hí hửng (joyful), định (intend to), ngạc nhiên(surprised), tẩn ngẩn (stunned), biết (know).
5. Reported speech: All direct and indirect statements of characters are included in thiscategory. The statements “attribute particular intentional states to a third person, andas such can be regarded as a device used by the narrator to distance him-/herself fromthe plot-line” (Bamberg & Damrad-Frye, 1991, p. 694). Examples are “and then hesays ‘well wait a minute’” and “Lúc trong lúc đó thì là ổng xuống thì ổng thấy, ‘ủa, sao mất một cái rổ rồi?’” (Meanwhile the man comes down and he sees, ‘Oh? Where is one of the baskets?’).
6. Hedges: These express the speaker’s uncertainty of the truth. Examples are kind of,probably, and xem như là (kind of/ sort of), kiểu như là (kind of/ sort of), hình như(probably).
7. Negative qualifiers: These include references to negative states and actions. Theyshow the narrator’s expectation of something that should have happened. Examplesare no, not and không (no/ not).
8. Causal connectors: These linguistic devices help to establish cause-and-effectrelationship between events. Examples are because, so that, to and để (to/ in order),thế nên (therefore/ so), thế là (then/ so), thì (then/so).
9. Gratuitous terms: According to Peterson & McCabe (1983), these lexical itemsintensify or stress what they modify. “They give no information and are thus whollyevaluative” (p. 223). Examples are very, just, even, still, and mới (just/ only), cứ (keepdoing something), liền (at once/immediately), bèn (at once/immediately), vẫn (still),thôi (only).
10. Similes and metaphors: These are the means used to compare one concept to anothermore commonly known concept. Similes include words like (look) like, as if, and như(like), giống như (like). Metaphors are sentences like “the mind is an ocean,” whichdoes not contain like or as.
11. Words per se/ phrases per se: These include lexical items that are “in and ofthemselves evaluative” (Peterson & McCabe, 1983, p. 223). Examples are big, busyand xinh đẹp (beautiful), cẩn thận (careful); whole, all of a sudden and mải(concentratedly), thực ra (in fact).
21
12. Onomatopoeia: This device refers to the lexical items used to imitate the sounds, forexample, bah bah in English and be be in Vietnamese, both of which describe thegoat sound.
Thirdy, it is as important to examine the perspective from which the narrators view
their own stories as to analyze the stories themselves. Based on Tannen’s (1980) original idea
of looking at the “maintenance of film perspective” of American versus Greek narrators, this
current study will examine the strategies that Vietnamese narrators, in comparison with
American narrators, use when telling about the Pear film. In the present study, I examine
whether the narrators view themselves as film-viewers or story-tellers, and whether they let
themselves be visible or invisible in the narratives. The analysis of narrative perspective,
therefore, contains two parts. Firstly, a method similar to the “maintenance of film
perspective” method from Tannen (1980) is used. The nouns “film/movie/video” and “story”
and the allusions to film/story perspectives are tallied. In the second part, the first person and
second person pronouns, as well as any other method for referring to the narrator and the
listener are examined.
In the following three chapters, results from these three coding methods are
discussed. In Chapter 4, both structure and content of the narratives are examined. In Chapter
5, how the narrators evaluate in their narratives and which types of evaluative comments they
prefer are addressed. Chapter 6 investigates the viewpoint from which the speakers produce
their narratives.
22
CHAPTER 4
ANALYSIS OF THE STRUCTURE AND CONTENT
OF NARRATIVE
Chapter 4 examines the Pear narratives for their structure and content. In story
structure analysis, the narrative model first developed by Labov & Waletzky (1967) is used
as the framework. The five narrative elements (abstract, orientation, complication, resolution,
and coda) are identified in each of the narratives. The content analysis is focused on the
detailed events of the Pear story presented in the narratives. Whether one event is misplaced
according to chronological order, omitted, added, or interpreted differently from the common
interpretation is recognized and analyzed in this section.
ANALYSIS OF THE STRUCTURE OF THE PEAR STORY
In this section, I first give a detailed scene-by-scene description of the movie’s
content. The model of narrative structure by Labov & Waletzky (1967) and Labov (1972) is
applied to find the elements of the Pear story. Results from this application are used to
determine what elements are present or missing in each of the narratives.
Description of the Movie
The following is a scene-by-scene description of the movie.
Scene Segment (SS) 1. It is sunny in a forest-like area. A man is on a ladder picking
pears in a pear tree. There are some baskets on the small road near the tree.
SS2. A pear is dropped. He goes down the ladder to put the pears from his apron
pocket into a basket which is now full. There are two other baskets; one is full and the other
empty. He picks up the pear on the ground, cleans it with his kerchief, and puts it into the full
basket. He goes up the ladder again.
SS3. Another man leading a goat passes by the pear tree. The goat looks at the pear
baskets and hesitates to go on. The man pulls the goat forward. The man and the goat walk
away.
23
SS4. The pear picker keeps picking pears. A boy riding a bicycle approaches the pear
tree. The boy stops by the baskets, picks up one pear, and looks up at the man on the ladder
in the tree. The man does not see the boy. The boy puts the pear down and picks up one
whole basket of pears to put on his bicycle. The boy rides away with the basket.
SS5. The road is rocky and some pears drop from the boy’s bicycle basket. Ahead of
him, a girl also on bicycle comes towards the boy. The boy turns to look at her as she passes.
His hat blows away. He touches his head and looks back trying to hold it. The bike hits a
rock. He falls down and the pears spill on the ground.
SS6. He sits up brushing his clothes and rubbing his leg. He looks up to see three other kids,
one of whom is playing with a ping-pong toy. They come to help him get up and pick up the
pears and put them back into the basket. They put the basket on the bike and the boy
continues his way, limping. The three boys start walking down the road towards the pear tree.
SS7. The three boys see the hat. The boy who plays with the ping-pong toy whistles
to the bike boy. He brings the hat back to the bike boy and gets three pears in return. The
bike boy walks his bike away. The ping-pong boy goes back and shares the pears with the
other two kids. The three brush off the pears and eat them while continuing their way.
SS8. The pear picker comes down the ladder and discovers the loss. He looks at the two
baskets and scratches his head. He sees the three boys walking by eating three pears. He
keeps sitting by the tree trunk and the three boys walk away.
The story of the Pear film can be considered to have a double-layered structure. The
first layer can be recognized with the pear picker as the protagonist (from now on referred to
as the PP story). The PP story can be considered the main plot of the movie. The second layer
has the bike boy as the protagonist (from now on referred to as the BB story). The BB story
can be considered the subplot of the movie. In other words, the subplot of the bike boy’s
adventure is embedded in the main plot of the PP story. While this BB subplot story can be
fully analyzed using the basic units in Labov’s framework, the main PP plot cannot be. The
BB story has a resolution section (SS6—SS7) where the bike boy and three other boys finally
get what they want and continue their way happily. The PP story, however, has no resolution
section; the complicating actions build up to the climax (SS8: the pear picker’s discovery of
the loss of a basket), or high point (Labov & Waletzky, 1967) where it is expected that the
pear picker will question the three boys about his lost basket of pears. However, he does not
24
question the boys, but simply watches them pass by. Thus, the PP story is not resolved; it
ends at high point. Whether the narrators provide a resolution in their versions of the story is
an interesting phenomenon to observe.
Except for the Evaluation section, which will be analyzed in the next two chapters,
narrative elements in the Pear story can be presented in the tree diagram in Figure 3.
Figure 3. Structure outline of the Pear story.
Based on Labov & Waletzky’s (1967) and Labov’s (1972) analyses, it is expected
that a narrative will have a minimum of three components: orientation, complication, and
resolution. In both story layers of the Pear story, the abstract and coda are optional. The
abstract gives the listener an overall idea of what the story is about, while the coda signals
that the story ends. Although narrators may not include these two elements in their narratives,
it is possible to provide abstract and coda such as is in the following examples. The first pair
of abstract and coda is for the main plot and the second pair for the subplot.
PEAR STORY
PP STORY (main plot)
(ABSTRACT) ORIENTATION COMPLICATION RESOLUTION (CODA)
SS 1 SS 2 — SS 8 Ø
BB STORY (subplot)
(Abstract) Orientation Complication Resolution (Coda)
SS 4 SS 5 SS 6 — SS 7
25
ABSTRACT: “The movie is about a man who picks pears and a kid who steals
pears.”
CODA: “That’s it.”
Abstract: “Here is the story of the kid and the pears he has stolen.”
Coda: “The kid and the group go on their merry way. And, now, back to the pear-
picker’s story.”
The other three elements, namely, orientation, complication, and resolution, are
necessary to complete a narrative. The orientation provides information of character(s), time,
place, and the situation. The complication tells the listener about the events that happened.
Those events make up a sequence with a climax that needs to be resolved in the following
narrative component, the Resolution.
Figure 3 above demonstrates the structure of the Pear story: scene segments follow
each other in a chronological order and in the orientation-complication-resolution order. The
PP story (main plot) starts with orientation and has a long complication. However, it ends at
high point and, therefore, lacks the resolution element. The BB story (subplot) is embedded
in the complication section of the PP story. The BB story consists of all of the three
necessary components.
Analysis of the Story Structure in the Vietnamese andAmerican Narratives
A complete narrative about the Pear story is expected to include all necessary and
optional elements, except for resolution of the PP story, which is not provided in the movie.
In all narratives, the story elements are identified and tallied. Results and discussion of the
analysis are presented in two sub-sections: the first part presents analysis of the obligatory
elements, and the second part presents analysis of the optional elements.
OBLIGATORY ELEMENTS OF THE PEAR
STORY: ORIENTATION, COMPLICATION, AND
RESOLUTION
Table 1 demonstrates the number of narrators in American and Vietnamese groups
who provide obligatory elements of the Pear story in their narratives.
26
Table 1. Number of Narrators Providing Obligatory Elements of the Pear Story
PP story BB story
OR COM RES Or Com Res
American (N=20) 10 20 0 17 20 20
Vietnamese (N=20) 18 20 1 19 20 20
(OR/Or = Orientation, COM/Com = Complication, RES/Res = Resolution)
The two groups of narrators differ much in providing the orientation and resolution
elements for the PP story, and differ slightly in providing the orientation element for the BB
story.
Since the complication elements for both stories include the sequence of actions
explicitly presented in the movie, no narrator fails to provide them. Likewise, the BB story
has an ending with the characters walking away happy with what they get, and all of the
narratives contain the resolution element for this story. The differences between the two
groups of narrators regarding these three components are in content, which is the focus of
section 4.2. Therefore, the PP story and the BB story’s complication sections as well as the
BB story’s resolution are not included in this analysis of the narratives’ structure.
Following is close examination of the differences.
Orientation of the PP Story
Almost all the Vietnamese narrators and only half of the American narrators, as
shown in examples (1)1 and (2) below, provide their narratives with an orientation specifying
the time, place, and characters of the story.
(1) Xong rồi cái cái đoạn phim ý là, nó à ở đại loại như một cái thung lũng trên đồi gì
đấy. Àm sáng sớm tại vì là có tiếng gà gáy o o gì đó. À thì cái ông này là chắc là ông nông
dân ông ý bắc thang hái à lê ờ. Thì ông ý cũng hì hục hì hục thôi chắc là làm từ sáng. (V5)2
(Well then the movie is, it uh is in kind of a valley on a hill or something like that.
Umm, it is early morning because there is the sound of cocks crowing or something like that.
1 The numbers in parentheses represent examples taken from this present study’s data.
2 The letters followed by numbers represent the narrative sources that the examples come from.
27
Umm so this man, maybe a farmer, he uses a ladder to pick pears, well. Then, he is pretty
busy probably started working from early morning.)
(2) Okay, well, it starts out it's the setting looks like it's a place maybe-- in California,
the Santa Barbara area, ... or something like that. U—h there was this orchard surrounding
him. l guess what he's picking is pears. There's a—uh farm laborer, a Mexican farm laborer
picking pears and he has three baskets, ..filled with and he's filling them with pears. (A20)
The other half of the American narrators are concerned about each scene of the movie
and the sound and color of the movie. They often start their narratives with what “the
opening scene” is about rather than what and who the movie is about or where, when, and
how the story starts.
(3) The opening scene,.. was ..uh..a—y kind of middle-aged round, Possibly, he
looked like he was made up to be a Mexican, or th that kind of person, picking ..pears from
the tree. (A12)
They also give comments about the sound of the movie right from the beginning or
very soon after they start the narratives.
(4) Okay. The movie seemed very sound oriented. Even though there weren't there
was no dialogue. A—nd the first thing I noticed ..was ..the sound of the man picking ..pears.
(A4)
Resolution of the PP Story
One Vietnamese narrator, V18, is the only one of all the narrators from both groups
who makes up a resolution for the story. This is an extreme case where the narrator feels the
urge to provide the listener with a fully formed story even though that means he has to make
something up. The laugh at the end of his narrative, in some way, signals this untruthfulness.
(5) Thế là ông già à ờ đoán là ba thằng này đang đã ăn ổi của ông ý, đã ăn trộm ổi, và
đánh ba thằng. [laugh] (V18)
(Then the old man, well, uh, guesses that these three boys have eaten his guavas, have
stolen his guavas and beats them up.)
Acknowledging that the PP story does not have a resolution on its own, eighteen
Vietnamese narrators and sixteen American narrators make an effort to supplement their
narratives by commenting on the pear-picker’s emotion after discovering the loss and seeing
28
the three boys walk by. These comments are called evaluative comments. [Evaluative
comments are analyzed more closely in the next chapter.] Some narrators use ‘frames of
mind’ like “puzzled”, “bewildered,” “thắc mắc” (wondering), “ngạc nhiên” (surprised).
Some others use negative qualifiers “can’t figure out,” “did not stop or ask them,” “không
biết” (does not know), “không hiểu” (does not understand). Others use reported speech
“Hmm, how did they get those pears” or “Ba đứa này lấy đâu ra ba trái lê ở đâu đó để ăn
vậy” (Where did these three get the three pears to eat like that.)” While there is not a real
Resolution, it seems that the narrators include evaluative comments at the end of the story to
make up for this lack.
Orientation of the BB Story
In general, most narrators recognize the bike boy as an important character and pause
the sequence of actions to introduce him.
(6) A—nd the next people ..who come by, /and there’s/ a little boy on a bicycle ..who
comes by from the other direction,.. he's riding a bike,.. it's a little too big for him. (A11)
(7) Một lúc sau thì có một thằng bé đi qua. Thằng này thì người thì bé con mà đi cái
xe rất là cao nên là cũng chật vật. (V1)
(A while later there is a little boy passing by. Though he is little, he rides a very high
bike. So, it is quite strenuous for him.)
In contrast, the narrators who do not introduce the bike boy keep the flow of actions
going and the bike boy appears as the actor of the next few actions rather than as a significant
character in a story of his own. In those narratives, the narrators focus on the pear picker, and
all the events are to revolve around him. Those narrators switch from the pronoun “he”
referring to the pear picker to the same pronoun referring to the bike boy with a minimal
mention of the boy within the same clause. In example (8), it is the noun phrase “a little boy”
and in example (9), “his child.”
(8) And he's up there picking, and a little boy comes on his bicycle. A--nd he sees ..u-
-m.. that there are baskets of pears there. T so he gets an idea that maybe he’ll get off his
bicycle, and get one. And he gets off his bicycle, a--nd u-h he he takes one, and then he says
“well wait a minute.” (A9)
29
(9) Rồi khi mà sau đó thì đứa con của ổng đến ơ để mà lấy lê đem về nhà thì trên
đường nó đi ơ trên đường nó đi á thì à nó a lảng vảng chuyện gì đấy. Thì nó vấp phải cục đá
và muốn muốn té. (V13)
(And then after that his child comes to take the pears home. So on the way he uh on
the way he is walking he loses his attention to something else. So he trips on a rock and
seems to fall down.)
While the noun phrase “little boy” briefly describes the looks of the new character,
i.e. the bike boy, the noun phrase “his child” describes him in the relationship with the
already known character, i.e. the pear picker. In both cases, therefore, the narrators give a
minimal orientation of the bike boy, which can be considered as introducing a new character
but not introducing the main character of a new story.
OPTIONAL ELEMENTS OF THE PEAR STORY:ABSTRACT AND CODA
Table 2 illustrates the number of American and Vietnamese narrators who provide
optional elements of the Pear story in their narratives.
Table 2. Number of Narrators Providing Optional Elements of the Pear Story
PP story BB story
ABSTRACT CODA Abstract Coda
American (N=20) 1 19 0 1
Vietnamese (N=20) 9 20 0 1
The main differences between the two groups are in providing the abstract of the PP
story. Only one America narrator but nearly half of the Vietnamese narrators provide the PP
story’s abstract.
Since the PP story is the main plot of the Pear story, its abstract is important and
necessary in telling what the narrative is about. However, Table 2 indicates that most
narrators in both languages (75%, N=30) do not include such information in their narratives.
Likewise, the coda of the PP story is necessary in that it ties up the whole narrative. Yet one
American narrator provides no coda for her narrative.
30
As for the BB story, its abstract and coda are embedded in the complication section of
the PP story. None of the narrators in either language include an abstract for this story, and
only one narrator in each language give a coda for the story.
Following is discussion of the two stories’ abstracts and codas.
Abstract of the PP Story
Nearly half of the Vietnamese narrators have an abstract for the story while only one
American narrator includes an abstract in her narrative. In Vietnamese, the pear-picker is
mentioned in six abstracts and the pear, the morning, and the truthfulness each is considered
to be the theme of the story in the other three abstracts.
(10) À thì bộ phim chỉ về một buổi sáng. (V12)
(Uh well the movie is just about a morning.)
(11) Ờ thì câu chuyện kể về à hình như là về à một quả lê. (V4)
(Uh well the story is told about uh perhaps about uh a pear.)
The one American narrator who has an abstract for this story says that the movie is
about two main characters, a pear picker and a bike boy.
(12) Okay, ..u—h the movie is basically about uh u—m a number of individuals, uh
a guy who's picking pears, u—m and a kid on a bicycle. Basically those are the two...
protagonists in this. (A3)
Coda of the PP Story
Unlike what is found with the abstract element, Table 2 shows that nearly all of the
narrators provide the PP story with a coda. Nineteen narrators from each group end their
narratives with a typical coda: “that’s it,” “end of film,” “vậy thôi” (that’s it), “đấy là nội
dung của câu chuyện” (that’s the content of the story). One American narrator does not
include a coda in her narrative, while one Vietnamese narrator has an elaborated coda when
he summarizes the story with a moral lesson using a proverb.
(13) Thì chuyện này thì có thể thì kết ngắn lại một câu giống như của Việt Nam là
kiểu làm phúc phải tội [laugh]. Đấy thế thôi. (V15)
(So this story may be summarized shortly like a proverb in Vietnamese, some kind of
“no good deed goes unpunished.” There, that’s it.)
31
Abstract and Coda of the BB Story
In both languages, the abstract is non-existent in the BB story. This seems to indicate
that the BB story is not recognized at all as another story that is embedded in the PP story.
However, in each language, there is one narrator who provides a coda for the BB story. The
narrators are A9 and V13 as shown in examples (14) and (15). These two narrators provide
an explicit coda for the BB story before going on to tell the rest of the PP story. Although
these narrators provide neither abstract nor orientation for the BB story (see examples 8 and
9 above), they clearly state that they are ending the BB story.
(14) And that’s the end of that story. (A9)
(15) Vậy thôi. (V13)
(That’s it.)
Overall, both groups provide an abstract and a coda for the PP story but none has an
abstract and only two have a coda for the BB story. This suggests that to both groups, except
for A9 and V13, the movie tells one story and has no double layer.
Table 3 summarizes the analysis of obligatory and optional elements (i.e., Table 1 and
Table 2 combined). As Table 3 shows, none of the narratives in either language has a
complete structure based on Labov’s framework. The Vietnamese narrators, however, do a
better job of fulfilling the framework of five elements.
Table 3. Number of Narrators Providing Narrative Elements of the Pear Story
American (N=20) Vietnamese (N=20)
PP story
ABSTRACT 1 9
ORIENTATION 10 18
COMPLICATION 20 20
RESOLUTION 0 1
CODA 19 20
BB story
Abstract 0 0
Orientation 17 19
Complication 20 20
Resolution 20 20
Coda 1 1
32
CONTENT OF THE NARRATIVES
This section reports and discusses four common phenomena found in the narratives in
comparison with the Pear story from the movie. Overall, while narrating, the narrators do not
always tell the events in their chronological order as presented or include all of the events as
shown in the movie. (Refer to the complete and precise description of the Pear story
presented in section 4.1.1.) In fact, there are many cases of misplacement, omission, and
addition. The events are not told in the order in which they occur in the movie but appear
somewhere else in the narratives (misplacement). The events may also be omitted in the
narratives (omission). On the other hand, an event can be made up and included in the
narrative as if it really happened in the movie (addition). Moreover, narrators also have
different interpretations of the same events; that is, they understand and explain some events
differently. The four phenomena, namely, misplacements, omissions, additions, and different
interpretations are found in both languages. Table 4 illustrates the number of these cases in
American and Vietnamese narratives.
Table 4. Number of Narratives That Contain Misplacement, Omission, Addition, orDifferent Interpretation of Events
Misplacement Omission Addition Different Interpretation
American (N=20) 2 5 6 3
Vietnamese (N=20) 2 9 4 11
One may argue that those cases happen because of memory deprivation. This is
caused when the narrators forget some of the details or events from the movie. In fact, one of
Chafe’s goal in designing the Pear film was to tell an unusual story which does not match
with a common story schema. Hence, the narrators may very well be affected by the fact that
the story is uncommon.
However, taking into account that the narrators produced their narratives just a few
minutes (ten minutes at the most, according to Chafe (1980)) after watching the movie, there
is a good chance that the narrators intentionally choose to misplace, omit, add, or interpret
differently some of the events. What is included and what is not in their narratives may
reflect their decision about making a better narrative.
Following are discussions of each of these four phenomena.
33
Misplacement of Events
There are two Vietnamese narrators (10%, V1 and V5) and two American narrators
(10%, A15 and A17) who misplace one event of the Pear story, namely, the event of the hat-
blowing in scene segment 5 (SS5). Examples (16) and (17) come from V5 ad A17
respectively. (Recall that the hat blowing off and falling on the ground occurred between the
two events of the boy not looking the way he is going and the boy hitting a rock.)
(16) Thế là chắc là do cu cậu mất tập trung, vì thấy là có cô bé gái xinh đẹp đạp xe
qua thế là không để ý. Thì đang mải mải nhìn lại về hướng cô bé lúc hai đứa đi tạt qua nhau
ấy, thì là không để ý trên đường nhìn đường, thế là vấp phải một cục đá rất là to, thế là
ngã kềnh xuống…
[…]
Thế là cầm cầm xe, chắc là do ngã đau cho nên là không không không thể nào mà đạp
xe được nữa. Thế cho nên là cu cậu tập tễnh dắt xe à dắt xe với rổ lê ở trên rồi định đi về nhà
thôi. Thế nhưng mà à xong cái lúc mà khi đạp xe ngang qua cùng với cô bé ấy thì à tại vì gió
thổi mát nên cái mũ nó bay nữa. Thế là à chính vì thế nên mới ngoái lại sau thì là nó bị
ngã… (V5)
(Then perhaps the boy loses concentration because (he) sees the beautiful girl riding
by and therefore does not pay attention. Then when (he) is busy looking back at the girl
direction when the two pass by each other, then (he) does not pay attention, does not look
where he is going, then (he) trips on a very big rock, then (he) falls right down…
[…]
So then (he) holds his bike, probably because (he) fell and is hurt, so (he) cannot ride
anymore. So he is limping and walking his bike with the basket of pears on it, and he is just
going home. But then… oh and when passing by that girl because the wind blows (then) the
hat is blown away…)
(17) A—nd he's paying attention to her, as she--passes him,..and isn't ..watching too
much where he’s going, and hits a rock in the road,..falls down,
[…]
A—nd they see what's happened to the l.. little boy, and they come over sort of very
calmly, a--nd.. help him get on his feet, pick up his pears for him, a--nd.. put them back in the
basket, and.. brush him off,.. and everything, a--nd u—m tsk then they u—m put him tsk u—
34
m back on his bike, and he goes off. The little boy {creaky sound}..that was on the bike, had
been wearing a hat. A—nd in the i--n passing the little girl, it had..fallen off. (A17)
As seen in examples (16) and (17), the two narrators misplace the time of occurence
of the hat-blowing: They do not mention the ‘hat’ event when they talk about the two events
of the boy not looking his way and the boy hitting a rock (SS5). It is only later, when the
sequence of events in SS7 requires the appearance of the hat on the road that these narrators
pause the storyline to include the event of the hat blowing off, which is in SS5. Note that SS7
starts with the three boys picking up the hat, which leads to the event of the bike boy giving
them three pears. This last event is the key event in the whole story since at the end of the
movie the pear picker seems to suspect the three boys are thieves. Because of this, the
narrators cannot completely omit the event of the hat blowing off; they misplace it.
A closer look at these four cases of both languages shows that narrators describe the
falling scene roughly similarly: boy sees girl – boy does not pay attention – boy hits a rock
with his bike – boy falls. This sequence of events appears to be neat enough. It reflects an
expectation of social relationships: beautiful girls may cause boys trouble. In other words,
this may be referred to as typical “boy-meets-girl” cliché (Tannen, 1980).
Omission of Events
There are more omissions in the Vietnamese narratives than in the American
narratives. In Vietnamese, there are seven narratives (35%) told with omitted events, and
these omissions involve four different events. In English, there is only one event that is
omitted in the five American narratives (25%).
Among all the omissions in the Vietnamese narratives, the event which is omitted
most often (in five narratives – 25%) is the event of the hat blowing off in SS5. In four out of
those five narratives, the narrators exclusively ignore the event, even though they do mention
the event of the three boys picking up the hat in SS7. Like the four Vietnamese and American
narrators who misplace this event (see section 4.2.1.), these narrators attribute the event of
the boy falling down to the girl’s appearance.
In one Vietnamese narrative, not only the event of the hat blowing off but also the
event of the three boys picking up the hat is omitted. The narrator of this narrative, V18, even
completely ignores the girl on the bike (SS5) in his narrative, as shown in example (18).
35
(18) Thế nó chạy. Thế nó trên đường nó lái xe rất là vội vội vàng vàng thì nó nó đâm
phải hòn đá, thế là nó ngã ra, thì làm cho rổ ổi tung tóe. (V18)
(So he runs (away). So on the way he rides very fast and carelessly, therefore he hits a
rock, so he falls over, which makes the basket of guavas scatter all over.)
This narrator is also the one who omits the greatest number of events. An
examination of his narrative shows that he prefers picking up the important or necessary
details when watching and then telling the story based on his understanding rather than
reporting everything he has seen. The story is simpler in his interpretation: A bike boy steals
pears from a pear-picker, falls off while running away, and gets help from some other boys.
These boys receive one pear each from the bike boy and walk in the direction of the pear-
picker, who now discovers the loss. The pear picker thinks the three boys are thieves and hits
them. Note that this last event is not included in the movie and is added by the narrator. [This
addition will be discussed in section 4.2.3.] In fact, from the viewpoint of good story-telling
skills, this narrator succeeds in telling a straightforward story with needed details (truthful to
the movie or created), but without any unnecessary ones.
Three Vietnamese narrators (V4, V18, and V19), including one who also omits the
event of the hat blowing off (V18), do not mention the man and his goat (SS3). Example (19)
comes from V19.
(19) Rồi bắt đầu. Ừ àm câu chuyện kể về một người đàn ông trong mùa thu hoạch lê.
Àm trong khi mà ông ta đang mải miết leo lên cây để hái lê, thì à àm ở dưới gốc cây khi ông
đã thu hoạch được một cái giỏ đã đầy, thì có một đứa trẻ con đi xe đạp đến gần, và nó nhìn
lên cây thấy khi mà ông ý đang mải mê để hái lê, nó tranh thủ, nó đã ăn trộm mất cái giỏ lê
của ông ta. (V19)
(So starting (the story). Uh hmm the story is about a man in the harvesting season of
pears. Mm while he is busy climbing up the tree to pick pears, at the foot of the tree, when he
has had one full basket already, a kid riding a bike approaches. And he looks up at the tree.
When he sees that he (the man) is busily picking pears, he takes advantages, and he steals his
basket of pears.)
In example (19), the narrator completely omits the whole sequence of the man and his
goat passing by the pear tree. The narrative starts with the pear picker picking pears (SS1).
The next event is the bike boy coming (SS4). The sequence of the man and his goat (SS3) is
36
supposed to be in between these two events. However, this sequence of events, in fact, does
not contribute to the development of the story. It is rather trivial, according to Chafe (1980).
The omission of SS33 indicates that it is “played down” (Tannen, 1980) in these narratives.
Meanwhile, there is only one event that is omitted in five American narratives. These
five American narrators completely omit the event of the hat blowing off, as shown in
example (20). Again, this may be explained with the typical boy-meets-girl cliché: boy falls
off because of looking at girl and not paying attention to what he is doing.
(20) And on his way,..riding, he comes across another bicyclist, bicyclist, it’s a young
woman, and for some reason she catches his attention, and he’s turning his head, ..behind
him, looking at her, and there's a rock in the r road, and he hits it with his bike, ..and falls.
(A5)
In general, there are omissions in both American and Vietnamese narratives that are
simply caused by a common social expectation of relationship between males and females:
male stumbles while admiring female’s beauty. In those narratives, the event of the hat-
blowing is deleted, and the indirect cause of the bike boy’s fall, namely, the girl’s
appearance, is told as a direct cause.
In addition, some Vietnamese narratives also contain omissions that reflect the
selection strategy used by their narrators. That is, these narrators examine the details of the
events in the Pear story and evaluate how much those details contribute to the storyline’s
development. The relevant ones are included in the narratives, while the trivial ones are
completely ignored.
Addition of Events
There are two types of addition found in both the American and Vietnamese
narratives. One is added speech (note that the Pear film has no speech but only sound), and
the other is added events. The Vietnamese narratives contain fewer additions than the
American narratives. However, there are both types of additions in the Vietnamese
narratives, while there is only one type of addition in the American narratives.
There are three Vietnamese narrators who add speech to their narratives, and one
Vietnamese narrator adds an event to the story. Among the additions of speech, the pear-
picker is the only character who gets to say something. On the one hand, these narrators seem
37
to feel the need to provide an ending to the story and try to report some kind of emotional
state of the characters. The narrators seem to expect that there will be a resolution to the
complicated situation which has developed throughout the movie. However, the pear picker
is the one character who is not treated fairly in this regard in the movie, i.e., there is no
visible resolution for the pear picker whose basket of pears was stolen. The narrators seem to
believe that he deserves to get some kind of attention. Besides, because the PP story ends at
high point (SS8) without an ending (i.e., anti-climatic), the narrators fill the void themselves
to make a “better” story.
Notably, these three Vietnamese narrators seem to be uncomfortable with the fact that
the movie has absolutely no speech especially when it comes to the climax. V11 and V14 in
examples (21) and (22) let the pear picker speak up and voice his thoughts and feeling of
bewilderment.
(21) … thì ổng thấy “Ủa sao kì dzậy còn có hai trạ hai cái rổ?” (V11)
(… then he sees, “Oh that’s strange, there’re only two baskets?”)
(22) … thì ổng thấy “Ủa sao mất một cái rổ rồi?” (V14)
(… then he sees, “Oh why has one basket disappeared?”)
The second type of addition in the Vietnamese narratives is the addition of an event.
Only one narrator does this. As shown in example (23), the added event describes the pear
picker hitting the three boys at the end of the story.
(23) Thế là ông già à ờ đoán là ba thằng này đang đã ăn ổi của ông ý, đã ăn trộm ổi,
và đánh ba thằng. [laugh] (V18)
(Then the old man, well, uh, guesses that these three boys have eaten his guavas, have
stolen his guavas and beats them up.)
Interestingly enough, V18 is also the narrator who omits events most frequently (see
section 4.2.2.). While V18 omits many details and events that he thinks irrelevant to the
storyline, he makes up and adds one event that he thinks is ‘necessary’ to make a complete
story: the ending event, or resolution of the high point. This narrator clearly has a schema of
a good story in mind and follows it by all means. At the end of his story, the narrator laughs
while telling the ending event, in a way, signaling that he is making it up—but does it
anyway.
38
Meanwhile, the American narrators seem to be more concerned with the fact that the
movie has no conversation or speech in it. Many of them explicitly comment on this in their
narratives, either at the end or the beginning or in the middle of an event.
(24) There’s sounds, you know, like the birds and stuff, but there..the humans beings
in it don't say anything. (A6)
(25) U—h there's no to begin with, there's no spoken speech in it. (A10)
The only type of addition that the American narrators use is added speech. In these
narratives, not only the pear-picker but also the ping-pong boy does some speaking in those
cases. Examples (26)-(28) illustrate added speech.
(26) So one of them whistles ..to him, he was saying, “Hey you forgot your hat,” (A7)
(27) One of them ..whistles back to the guy on the bicycle, “Here’s you hat.” (A9)
(28) A--nd u—h he has just clambered down, from his ladder, and notices “Whoa-
My pear my basket is gone.” (A12)
In general, all of the additions in the American narratives and most of the additions in
the Vietnamese narratives are characters’ speech, which is lacking in the movie. The
American narrators also seem to be more concerned about this type of addition than the
Vietnamese narrators. Besides added speech, there is one case of addition (by one
Vietnamese narrator), which give a whole new ending to the story. There seems to be one
main motivation underlying all the additions that the narrators make: to make the Pear story
complete, providing details that should have been given in the movie.
Different Interpretation of Same Events
In both languages, there are numerous cases of different interpretations of the same
details and events. Two types of different interpretations are identified. One of them is
caused by mistakes, either because the narrators are not familiar with an object in the movie
or because they do not see some details very clearly. This type of different interpretations is
simple and easily recognized as false interpretations when compared to the movie. The other
type of different interpretation, however, cannot be called false interpretation since there is
no clear evidence that it is wrong. In this type, different narrators ‘read’ the same events
dissimilarly. None of the readings may be said to be correct, even though one of them is
39
much more plausible and common than the others. In contrast to the first type, this type of
different interpretation may be referred to as a ‘complex type’.
These two types of different interpretation are discussed separately below.
SIMPLE TYPE OF DIFFERENT
INTERPRETATION
If one takes time to watch the movie very carefully, and if the video quality is good
enough, it will not be too difficult to recognize that some narrators mis-watch some details
and events in the movie. Four ‘erroneous’ interpretations belong to this type of different
interpretation.
The first error is about the pears: they are mistaken for guavas. Three Vietnamese
narratives (15%) have guavas as the fruits in the story, while none of the American narratives
have this error. In fact, it is understandable that these Vietnamese narrators name the fruits
guavas. Pears are not native to and not commonly grown in Vietnam. In example (29), the
narrator (V7) hesitates to talk about the fruits and then calls them guavas. Later in the
narrative, he shows that he is uncertain about the kind of the fruits in the story.
(29) À anh ta trèo lên một cái cây và thu hoạch nh những cái quả… như quả ổi.
[…]
Thì để cám ơn thì cậu bé à đưa lại cho những người bạn nhỏ nhỏ đấy thì là ba quả ổi
chẳng hạn anh gọi là quả ổi. (V7)
(Um he climbs up a tree and collects the fruits… looks like guavas.
[…]
So to thank the three boys, the little boy gives those little friends uh three guavas for
example, I call them guavas.)
The second error also appears in the Vietnamese narratives only. One Vietnamese
narrator tells that the three boys steal pears from the bike boy while helping him (cf. SS6).
Another Vietnamese narrator believes that the ping-pong boy steals pears from the bike boy
when he goes back to return the hat (cf. SS7). In example (30), the narrator laughs and seems
to find it amusing that the stealing happens to the bike boy, who is also a thief.
(30) Xong rồi nó thấy thằng nhóc này rớt cái mũ, cái nó lượm cái mũ nó đưa lại cho
thằng này. Thì lúc nó đưa cho thằng này thì nó lấy ba trái lê. [laugh] (V17)
40
(Then he sees that this (bike) boy dropped the hat, so he picks it up (and) gives it back
to the (bike) boy. So when he gives (it) back to this (bike) boy he takes three pears. [laugh])
The third error appears only in one American narrative (A14). In this narrative,
(shown in example (31)) the bike boy tips his hat to the bike girl. According to Tannen
(1980), this error is largely due to the boy-meets-girl cliché discussed earlier.
(31) This other little girl in pigtails,. black pigtails, rode by, and he tipped his hat to
her, and as he did that, lost his hat, ..and ran into a b--ig rock, and the pears spilled all over.
(A14)
The fourth error is found in two Vietnamese narratives and two American narratives.
These narrators believe that the bike boy crashes into the bike girl and falls off. In example
(32), the narrator emphasizes the fact that the bike boy is the thief and he has to run away as
fast as he can to avoid being caught. Therefore, it is likely that he bumps into other people on
his way. This motif of thieves running away and crashing into some people or things may
well be as common as the boy-meets-girl cliché.
(32) À trong khi mà nó phóng xe đạp nhanh thì nó không để ý đến mọi người xung
quanh, thì có một cô gái cũng đi xe đạp ở hướng ngược lại, và nó đã ờ hai người đã đâm vào
nhau. Thì à cô gái thì ok cho nên là đã đạp xe đi khỏi. Còn cậu ta thì đã bị ngã ra à cùng với
giỏ lê văng ra khắp nơi. (V19)
(Uh while he is riding very fast he does not pay attention to the people around him, so
there is a girl also riding a bike from the opposite direction, and he uh the two crash into each
other. So uh the girl is okay so (she) rides away. But he falls off and uh with the basket of
pears scattered all over.)
In general, except for the first error, the three other errors indicate that the narrators’
interpretation of the Pear story is in part influenced by the schemas they already have. The
common motif of boy-meet-girl and the popular scenario of thieves getting ripped off or
crashing while running away are found in both Vietnamese and American narratives.
COMPLEX TYPE OF DIFFERENT
INTERPRETATION
This type of different interpretation is found only in four Vietnamese narratives.
These narrators believe that the bike boy is either the pear-picker’s son or his worker. They
41
tell that the bike boy comes to bring the basket of pears home. In their point of view, the bike
boy is not a thief.
(33) Rồi sau đó có một thằng bé nó tới nó nó chất hết một cái ơ tất cả những quả lê
lên một cái sọt rồi nó bỏ lên xe đạp rồi nó nó chạy để ờ nó chở về nhà. Thằng bé chắc là con
của ổng hay là ai đó... (V16)
(Then after that there is a boy who comes and piles up one uh all of the pears into a
basket and he puts it up on the bike and he he rides uh brings it home. The boy is probably
his son or someone…)
Interpretations of this type are different from the more commonly found interpretation
in most of the narratives, which is that the bike boy is a thief. However, the movie does not
explicitly say whether the bike boy is a thief or not. It is completely based on personal choice
when one narrator decides that the bike boy is a thief or the pear picker’s son. When
questioned after the narrative has been recorded as to why he thinks the bike boy is the pear
picker’s son, V16 in example (33) answers that the bike boy does not look suspicious to him
at all. He says that the bike boy probably does not want to interrupt the pear picker while he
is working, and that the pear picker’s surprise at the end of the movie is simply because he
wonders if the bike boy has come and taken the basket home. Clearly, all of the American
narrators and 80% (N=16) of the Vietnamese narrators do not have this schema (i.e. the bike
boy being the pear picker’s son) when they process the information given in the movie. The
schema of thief story (i.e. the bike boy being a thief) is more common in both languages.
SUMMARY
Overall, there are more cases of omission and different interpretation in the
Vietnamese narratives than in the American narratives. There is also one extreme case of
addition in one Vietnamese narrative. The Vietnamese narrators do a lot more “playing up”
the details they see as important and “playing down” those that they consider not critical to
the development of the story. They are also less unanimous in interpreting the movie than the
Americans.
The Vietnamese narrators, therefore, seem to be more interested in producing a good
story, while the American narrators seem to be concerned with reviewing the movie and its
set of features in which the content is only one among others. As a result, there is more
42
conformity to the narrative model in the case of the Vietnamese speakers than in the case of
the Americans. The Vietnamese narratives better follow the structure of narrative first
proposed by Labov & Waletzky (1967).
In general, what I have demonstrated in this section is that cases of misplacement,
omission, addition, and different interpretations of events are in part influenced by the
conventional story structure and in part by cultural and social schemas. The two most
common schemas found in both languages in the present analysis are the boy-meets-girl
cliché and the thief story. These schemas are part of the evidence for the existence of the
expectations of social situations by speakers of American English and Vietnamese. Of
course, the specifics of relevant cultural and social schemas should be further investigated in
another study.
43
CHAPTER 5
ANALYSIS OF EVALUATIVE COMMENTS
This chapter examines the use of evaluative comments in the narratives. Evaluative
comments are recognized as lexical items, phrases, or sentences that convey the narrator’
evaluation of the story. According to Labov (1972), a narrative may become pointless
without evaluation. In the present study, evaluative comments were categorized into nine
categories: frames of mind, reported speech, hedges, negative qualifiers, causal connectors,
gratuitous terms, similes & metaphors, words/phrases per se, and onomatopoeia.
Results of the analysis on evaluative comments are presented in Table 5 and 6. Table
5 shows the distribution of the nine categories in the American and Vietnamese narratives.
Table 5. Distribution of Nine Categories of Evaluative Comments in the American andVietnamese Narratives
American narratives Vietnamese narratives
Frames of Mind 72 (12%) 87 (13%)
Reported Speech 12 (2%) 18 (2%)
Hedges 105 (17%) 71 (11%)
Negative Qualifiers 65 (10%) 57 (8%)
Causal Connectors 36 (6%) 145 (20%)
Gratuitous Terms 113 (18%) 96 (14%)
Similes & Metaphors 16 (3%) 3 (<1%)
Words/Phrases per se 198 (32%) 230 (32%)
Onomatopoeia 2 (<1%) 2 (<1%)
TOTAL 619 (100%) 708 (100%)
Overall, both groups give equal numbers of evaluative comments on the movie and its
content, with Vietnamese narrators doing so slightly more often: 708 comments in the
Vietnamese narratives versus 619 comments in the American narratives. Both groups use
44
Table 6. Use of Categories of Evaluative Comments in the American and VietnameseNarratives
American narratives Vietnamese narratives
Most Words/Phrases per se (32%) Words/Phrases per se (32%)
2nd Gratuitous terms (18%) Causal connectors (20%)
3rd Hedges (17%) Gratuitous terms (14%)
4th Frames of mind (12%) Frames of mind (13%)
5th Negative qualifiers (10%) Hedges (11%)
6th Causal connectors (6%) Negative qualifiers (8%)
7th Similes & metaphors (3%) Reported speech (2%)
8th Reported speech (2%) Similes & metaphors (<1%)
Least Onomatopoeia (<1%) Onomatopoeia (<1%)
‘words/phrases per se’, which are descriptive words or phrases that are “in and of themselves
evaluative” (Peterson & McCabe, 1983, p. 223), most frequently and onomatopoeia, which
are words or phrases that imitate sounds, least frequently in their evaluative comments. The
distributions of the order most-to-least-used types of evaluative comments in the two groups
are presented in Table 6.
As shown in Table 6, in both groups ‘words/phrases per se’ was the most frequently
used type, and frames of mind the fourth. However, the two groups differ substantially in
their uses of hedges, causal connectors, and similes & metaphors. Of the three, the use of
causal connectors shows the most cross-linguistic difference. Following is analysis of the
similarities and differences in the uses of evaluative devices in the Vietnamese and American
narratives.
CROSS-LINGUISTIC DIFFERENCES
The most prominent cross-linguistic differences between the two groups of
Vietnamese and American narratives are in the uses of causal connectors, hedges, and similes
& metaphors.
45
Causal Connectors
Causal connectors are used to express cause-effect relationship between events and/or
states. For example, “because” is the causal connector that connects the two events in “she
was angry because I lied to her.” Some of the common causal connectors are “because,”
“since,” and “therefore.”
The Vietnamese narratives contain many more causal connectors than the American
narratives. In most cases, the connectors appear within a sequence of events, such as in the
sequence of events about the bike boy’s falling off the bike. Sequences of events linked by
causal connectors like the one in example (34) are quite common in the Vietnamese
narratives.
(34) Thế nhưng mà à xong cái lúc mà khi đạp xe ngang qua cùng với cô bé ấy thì à
tại vì gió thổi mát nên cái mũ nó bay nữa thế là à chính vì thế nên mới ngoái lại sau thì là nó
bị ngã thì là lúc mà chắc là do đau quá nên không để ý là là là là là phải quay lại nhặt mũ thế
cu cậu cứ tiếp tục dắt xe với rổ lê lếch thếch đi về nhà. (V5)
(But then… oh and when riding by passing that girl, um, because the (cool) wind
blows so the hat is … blows away then, um, because of that then (he) turns his head back
then he falls down, then when perhaps because (he) is hurt too badly then (he) does not pay
attention (and) to, to, to go back to pick up the hat so he keeps walking back home with his
bike and the basket of pears.)
In other cases, causal connectors are used to explain the narrators’ decisions. In
telling about the setting, the narrator in example (35) clearly states why she decides that it is
not in the forest even though it looks wild.
(35) Ông này ng đang à ở ngoài cái con đường nhỏ. Nó là giống như là hoang dại
giống rừng ấy. Nhưng mà hông phải tại vì hình như là có cái làng gần ở đó có nhiều người đi
qua lại lắm. (V14)
(This man um is out on the small road. It is… looks wild, looks like in the forest. But
it is not because (it) seems like there is a village nearby, there are a lot of people walking
by.)
Unlike the findings from Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991) about English causal
connectors in children and adults’ narratives, causal connectors in the Vietnamese narratives
do not always appear in clusters in connection with ‘frames of mind’ (i.e. mental states of
46
characters). Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991) contend that the “need to signal the link
between psychological/mental states and knowledge of events by use of overt causal
connectors is very common in adult speech” (p. 697) as well as in children speech. In this
present study, however, it seems that when the Vietnamese narrators attribute some mental
state to the characters, they do not always feel the need to include an explanation for why
they do so. Moreover, they prefer staying on the storyline, ignoring ‘trivial’ information that
does not belong to the story and does not contribute to the development of the story.
A close examination also shows that Vietnamese narrators use causal connectors
mostly in order to link events and make sense of them. In doing so, the narrators make
explicit the cause-effect relationship between events. They seem to be concerned about
putting events in their ‘correct’ order of cause and effect rather than simply listing them
based on chronological order.
In contrast, the American narrators use mostly the connectors “and” in those cases.
“And” seems to well compensate for the absence of explicit causal connectors such as
“because, so, so that, then.” When American narrators do use causal connectors (e.g.,
“because”), they do so once in a while and the connectors are not embedded in causal
sequences like those seen in the Vietnamese narratives.
(36) And as they pass, he sort of turns, and looks at her, and his hat flies off, a—nd
his bicycle hits a rock... Because he’s looking at the girl. Falls over, uh there's no
conversation in this movie. There’s sounds, you know, like the birds and stuff, but there..the
humans beings in it don't say anything. (A7)
In example (36), A7 uses “and” twice to talk about the events that might be told with
causal connectors. There is one “because” but this is a summary one: the reason the boy falls
is the girl’s appearance.
To sum up, the Vietnamese narrators use causal connectors often to reason out loud
the cause-effect relationship of events even though they are quite self-evident. The American
narrators, for the same reason, rarely use this type of evaluation. Neither group, however,
always has causal connectors and frames of mind in clusters.
47
Hedges
Hedges are linguistic devices that help the speaker distance him/herself from what
he/she is saying. That is, they express degrees of uncertainty in speech. Examples of
linguistic devices for hedges are “probably,” “perhaps,” and “kind of.”
Table 4 above indicates that the American narrators in the present study use hedges
more often (17%) than the Vietnamese narrators do (11%). In both languages, hedges are
used mainly in the cases of uncertainty of the characters’ ages and mental states as well as for
the setting of the movie, as shown in examples (37) and (38) in the Vietnamese narratives
and (39) and (40) in the American narratives.
(37) Chuyện đến đây là hết nhưng mà trong lòng của anh ta chắc là cũng nảy sinh
một cái sự nghi ngờ nào đó những cái đứa trẻ trong nhóm. (V2)
(The story ends here but deep inside (of his) probably sprouts some suspicious
thought of those kids in the group.)
(38) Và ở giữa con đường làng thì có một cái cây à um tùm trái ngọt và đang đến mùa
như là ra quả. (V3)
(And in the middle of the village road there is a tree uh full of sweet fruits and is kind
of in season of making fruits.)
(39) It’s out in the country, maybe in um uh the valley or something. (A9)
(40) And uh three boys, probably about the same age, are walking by. (A10)
However, there is a tendency for the American narrators to use hedges even when
they are certain about what they are telling. In most of these cases, “sort of” is used. In those
narratives, “sort of” seems to belong to stylistic variation rather than being a pure hedging
device.
(41) Then u—m a little boy on a bicycle, comes riding past the tree, a—nd sort of
goes past the pears the pears in the baskets and then stops and looks up at the guy in the tree,
[…] And he sort of /visually/ counts them with his fingers. (A6)
(42) And apparently he I think by the breeze, ..his hat sort of gets blown off his head
so he sort of turns around, to look at it, and runs into a rock, ..and crashes over. And all the
..pears a--nd the basket and everything goes goes uh flying. Or all spills all over the ground.
And So he sort of gets up, and he’s checks his leg to make sure to see if he's got any bruises
or anything. (A10)
48
A closer look at the use of hedges in the narratives of the two groups results in
Table 7.
Table 7. Use of Hedges in the American and Vietnamese Narratives
Time(s) of uses 0 1-10 11-20 21-30 31+
American (N=20) 3 15 1 1 0
Vietnamese (N=20) 6 13 0 0 1
Table 7 shows that fewer Vietnamese narrators use hedges than American narrators
(30% (N=6) in the Vietnamese group versus 15% (N=3) in the American group). Most
narrators in both groups use hedging devices in the range of one to ten times. Among the
Vietnamese narratives, there is one extreme case where 33 hedges are used. This narrative
has mainly “chắc là” (probably). This hedge seems to help the narrator reason out loud about
the events.
(43) Thì ông ý cũng hì hục thôi chắc là làm từ sáng.
[…]
Thế là cu cậu đang ngồi phủi chân rồi thì phủi quần áo rồi mới bắt đầu lễ mễ đứng
dậy chắc là tại vì ngã chắc là cũng bị xước một chút cho nên cũng tập tễnh một chút thì đang
coi như là lò dò ngồi dưới đất để phủi cát thì là có ba thằng bé a cũng tầm tầm tuổi đấy thôi
àm đang đi chơi lang thang chắc là mùa hè cho nên chúng nó không phải đi học. (V5)
(So he is very busy, probably has worked since early morning.
[…]
So he (the boy) is just sitting and brushing off dust from his clothes and then starts to
stand up difficultly probably because (he) fell, so maybe (he) has some scratches, so (he)
limps a bit, so while he was kind of sitting on the ground to brush off dust there were three
boys just uh about his age umm who were just hanging around probably (because) it’s
summer so they don’t have to go to school.)
In general, both groups of narrators use hedges similarly when uncertain about the
depicted events or details from the movie. There is also stylistic variation in some narratives
in Vietnamese and English, where hedges are used not purely for the hedging purpose. It is
because of this second usage of hedges that the American narratives have more hedges than
49
the Vietnamese narratives. Many American narrators use hedges even when they are certain
about what they are telling. In these narratives, hedges like “sort of” sound rather colloquial.
Similes & Metaphors
Similes are expressions used to compare one thing to another. They are recognized
with the words “as” or “like.” Metaphors, however, do not include “as” or “like” even though
they also describe one thing by referring to another. For example, “the rain sounded like a
song” is a simile, and “the mind is an ocean” is a metaphor.
In both the Vietnamese and American narratives, there are similes but no metaphors.
The use of similes makes up less than 1% and 3% of all the evaluative comments in the
Vietnamese and American narratives, respectively. The American narrators use this category
of evaluative comments three times as often as the Vietnamese narrators. Occurrences of
similes in American and Vietnamese narratives are tallied and presented in Table 8.
Table 8. Use of Similes in the American and Vietnamese Narratives
Time(s) of uses 0 1 2 3
American (N=20) 9 7 3 1
Vietnamese (N=20) 17 3 0 0
Table 8 indicates that most of the Vietnamese narrators (17 out of 20) do not use this
type of evaluative comment. Only three narratives employ evaluative comments and each of
them has only one simile.
(44) Ban đầu thì có một bác trung niên ăn bận có giống như là người Mê-xi-cô. (V4)
(At first there is a middle-aged man dressing like a Mexican.)
(45) Ông này ng đang à ở ngoài cái con đường nhỏ. Nó là giống như là hoang dại
giống rừng ấy. Nhưng mà hông phải tại vì hình như là có cái làng gần ở đó có nhiều người đi
qua lại lắm. (V14)
(This man um is out on a small road. It is… looks wild, looks like in the forest. But it
is not because (it) seems that there is a village nearby, there are a lot of people walking by.)
(46) Ba thằng nhóc này đi nó có một cái giống như là cái binh boong cái đánh table
tennis cái đánh ờ bóng bàn ờ cái đánh bóng bàn. (V17)
50
(These three boys walk away … he has something that looks like a ping pong a thing
to play table tennis with the, oh yeah, the table tennis racket.)
In all of the three cases, the narrators are trying to describe the character’s style of
dressing, the setting, and unusual objects. The purpose is simply to connect what is in the
movie with what is more or less commonly known: a Mexican person, a forest, and a table
tennis racket. Similes of similar type are also found in more than half of the American
narratives. In addition, in the American narratives there are cases where the compared
concept may be considered a bit odd.
(47) The man climbed down out of the tree,.. and put the pears in the basket, and it
looked like he was… giving birth. (A14)
(48) And ..they looked sort of mean, one was had a little paddle with a ba--ll, and
they looked like bullies. (A20)
Not everybody has seen a person giving birth, and a picture of bullies in one person’s
mind may very well be different from another’s. The comparison in these cases is more
heavily packed with evaluation than in the other instances of similes.
In general, the American narrators use more similes and use them more frequently
than the Vietnamese narrators. They also use them with a higher degree of evaluation than
the Vietnamese narrators, whose similes are more common and simpler.
CROSS-LINGUISTIC SIMILARITIES: FRAMES OF MINDS
VERSUS WORDS/PHRASES PER SE
According to Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991), frames of mind are linguistic devices
that refer to emotions and mental states. Some examples of this type of evaluative comment
are “worried,” “wonder,” and “notice.”
Results from Table 3 above show that, unlike what Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991)
found in their experiment, the American adult speakers in this study do not favor frames of
mind “significantly more” than hedges and negative qualifiers. The same may be seen with
the Vietnamese narrators, who use frames of mind less frequently than they do causal
connectors. Frames of mind are only the fourth most frequent category of evaluative
comments in both groups. They make up only 12% and 13% of the evaluative comments in
the American and Vietnamese narratives, respectively.
51
In their study, Bamberg & Damrad-Frye (1991) claim that in adults’ speech, linguistic
devices to express frames of mind are used “to signal the hierarchical organization of the
story events” (Bamberg & Damrad-Frye, 1991, p. 689). This means that American adult
narrators refer to the characters’ mental states as a cause for their actions, i.e. elements that
push the story forward at critical points. In Bamberg & Damrad-Frye’s study (1991), the
American participants are concerned about the fact that emotions and feelings govern
actions.
In the present study, however, such phenomena are not found. Emotions and feelings
of the characters are referred to, but mainly for the purpose of description.
(49) Meanwhile... the man who's picking pears, comes down from the tree, and starts
emptying his... um load of pears into one of the two remaining baskets, he notices that the
third basket is gone. A—nd the at... just about this time, he's just kind of looking a little um
kind of visibly a little upset. A—nd these three boys go walking by, and they each have a
pear in their hands, so he's..kind of looking at them, trying to make a connection wondering
they got the pears,... and... if they were his pears, you see how this is just all what what you're
projecting on the man. And I think that was it. It was neat. (A7)
In example (49), the narrator describes the last scene with a few ‘frames of mind’
referring to the mental states of the pear picker. However, the narrator does not emphasize
them as the cause for any considerable action by the pear picker. The reason is clear: the pear
picker does not do anything. The narrator is perhaps wondering about the pear picker’s last
action, but she accepts the fact that this character stays where he is and does nothing. “It is
life. That is what really happens in real life. No evidence, no revenge,” she may have
thought. The narrator then ends her story with an approval comment, “It was neat.”
The data show that there are three American narrators and two Vietnamese narrators who
never use ‘frames of mind.’ They tell the Pear story without referring to any character’s
feelings or emotions. The question is why ‘frames of mind’ are not as favored in this study as
in Bamberg & Damrad-Frye’s study (1991).
Part of the answer may very well come from looking at the most frequent category of
evaluative comments used in both groups of speakers: the type of words/phrases per se.
Peterson & McCabe (1983) define words per se as lexical items that are “in and of
themselves evaluative” (p. 223). This category of evaluative comment includes items such as
52
“pretty” and “busy.” In this study, phrases such as “all of a sudden” and “all the way” are
also found to be “in and of themselves” evaluative.
(50) And then, all of a sudden,.. three boys come alo—ng. (A13)
(51) And you see him disappearing all the way. (A1)
Unlike ‘frames of mind’, which do not appear at all in five of the forty narratives
(three in English and two in Vietnamese), ‘words/phrases per se’ is a type of evaluative
comment—in fact the only type—that is used in all forty narratives. They comprise 32% of
all evaluative comments in each of the groups of American and Vietnamese narratives.
(52) Bắt đầu câu chuyện kể về một người nông dân đi hái lê. À ông này thì tính rất
cẩn thận, hái xuống một giỏ rơi xuống một quả ống vẫn để ý thấy và ống nhặt lên ống lau
chùi rất cẩn thận. Xong ống lên ống hái tiếp. Một lúc sau thì có một thằng bé đi qua. Thằng
này thì người thì bé con mà đi cái xe rất là cao nên là cũng chật vật. Thì nó dừng lại nó nhìn
ông này. Thì không biết nó có phải con ông này không, nhưng mà nó [laugh] nhìn lén lén
lúc. Xong nó lấy một cái rổ lê ông này hái được xong bê đi. Thằng này thì thứ nhất là người
thì bé đi xe to thứ hai là người đã bé nhưng mà thấy gái thì mắt lại tớn lên. (V1)
(The story starts. It is about a farmer who goes to pick pears. Uh this old man is very
assiduous, (he) collects the whole basket of pears, but one pear drops and he still notices,
and he picks it up and cleans it very carefully. Then he goes up the ladder to pick pears
again. A while later, there is a boy passing by. This little boy has a tiny body but he rides a
very tall bike, so it is very strenuous for him. So he stops and looks at the man. (I) don’t
know if he is the man’s son, but he [laugh] looks around furtively for a while. Then he takes
a basket of pears that the man has collected and carries it away. This little boy, firstly, he is
small but he rides a big bike, secondly, he is small but when he sees a girl his eyes perk up.)
In example (53) of the first part of V1’s narrative, the narrator uses many
‘words/phrases per se’ to describe the first scenes and only one ‘frame of mind’ (“notice”) to
refer to the pear picker’s mental state. The choice of ‘words/phrases per se’ seems to help the
narrator in wording his visual memory of a visual experience: watching the Pear film. Instead
of emphasizing the emotions and feelings of the characters, the narrator prefers using
evaluative words and phrases to help the listener picture the looks and the actions of the
characters.
53
In general, the quest of retelling the story from a movie makes it possible for the
narrators to prefer describing it visually. This is especially true for the American narrators
who consider their narratives the answers to a memory task (Tannen, 1980). Even for the
Vietnamese narrators, the visual experience influences their choice of the more preferable
type of evaluative comment: ‘words/phrases per se’.
GRATUITOUS TERMS, NEGATIVE QUALIFIERS,REPORTED SPEECH, AND ONOMATOPOEIA
The evaluative categories of gratuitous terms, negative qualifiers, reported speech,
and onomatopoeia are used in both the American and Vietnamese narratives for similar
purposes, which are also their original purposes (see Methodology chapter).
Gratuitous Terms
Gratuitous terms occur at points in the narratives where the narrators want to
emphasize some of the events.
(53) And a man comes along with a goat, and the goat obviously is interested in the
pears... But the man just… walks by with the goat. And the man up in the tree doesn't even
notice. (A2)
In example (53), “just” and “even” are used to stress that the event happens
differently from what is usually expected: since the goat likes pears, its owner should have let
it have one of them, but he did not; and since the man and his goat walk by the tree so
noisily, the pear picker should have noticed them, but did not. These ‘less likely’ events that
really happened are emphasized with gratuitous terms.
Negative Qualifiers
Negative qualifiers are similar to gratuitous terms in that they are both used in cases
where the narrators show failure of common expectations and highlight the failure. By using
negative qualifiers, the narrators talk about what did not happen rather than what happened.
(54) Thế … thấy vậy thì ở cạnh đó có mấy em bé khác đang chơi nên là các em bé
này thì chạy lại và giúp em bé đó nhặt lại sọt ổi và đặt lên xe đạp. Và trước khi em bé đi khỏi
thì họ còn không quên trả lại cho em bé cái mũ. Chính vì vậy mà em bé rất là cảm động nên
là chia cho mỗi người trong trong nhóm một quả ổi. (V2)
54
(So… having seen that (the bike boy fell), some boys who were playing nearby come
to help this bike boy pick up the whole basket of guavas and put it back onto the bike. And
before the bike boy goes away, they do not even forget to give back to him the hat. The bike
boy is very moved by that, so he gives each of the three other boys a guava.)
The narrator in example (54) seems to be concerned about the fact that the three boys
are very helpful and honest, which is why they do not forget about the bike boy’s hat. By
using the negative qualifier “không” the narrator directs the listener’s attention to the
characters’ honesty.
Reported Speech
As mentioned earlier in Chapter 4, in the present data, reported speech usually occurs
at points where the narrators believe that the characters should have said something. The
scenes that elicit reported speech are in SS7 and SS8 (see section 4.1.1.) where the ping-pong
boy whistles to the bike boy and where the pear picker discovers the loss. Examples (26) and
(28) from Chapter 4 demonstrate the use of reported speech.
(26) So one of them whistles ..to him, he was saying, “Hey you forgot your hat,” (A7)
(28) A--nd u—h he has just clambered down, from his ladder, and notices “Whoa-
My pear my basket is gone.” (A12)
In examples (26) and (28), one could see that the reported speech is made up since the
movie contains no speech. However, instead of describing what happened in the movie, the
narrators decide that a bit of speech would make the story more interesting. According to
Labov (1972), using characters’ speech is one of the most efficient means of evaluation.
Onomatopoeia
There are only a few occurrences of onomatopoeia in either the American or the
Vietnamese narratives. In each group of narratives, the sound of the goat and the sound of the
cock are each imitated once.
(55) And later on, as he was picking pears a man came along with a goat, and the goat
was bahying or whatever goats do, [laugh] what do goats do. Baeing hmm… Bae. (A4)
(56) Àm sáng sớm tại vì là có tiếng gà gáy o o gì đó. (V5)
(Um it is early morning because there is the sound of cock crowing “o o” or
something.)
55
SUMMARY
American narrators provide nearly as many evaluative comments as the Vietnamese
do. However, the two groups differ in their use of three categories of evaluative comments:
causal connectors, hedges, and similes & metaphors. The Vietnamese narrators use more
causal connectors in reasoning out loud the events in the story for the listener to understand,
even when the events are quite self-explanatory. On the other hand, by using more hedges
and similes & metaphors, the American narrators distance themselves from their narratives
more often than the Vietnamese narrators. In other words, the American narrators prefer
giving the listener as many details of the movie as possible to the listener so that the latter
can interpret them, while the Vietnamese narrators prefer telling an already interpreted story.
There also exist some similarities between the two groups of narrators in using evaluative
comments. Both the American and Vietnamese narrators express their evaluation of the
movie nearly equally often, with the Vietnamese narrators slightly more often: 619 and 708
evaluative comments in the American and Vietnamese narratives, respectively. Both groups
use ‘words/phrases per se’ the most frequently and onomatopoeia the least frequently. That
‘words/phrases per se’ appear the most frequently—and in 32% of all the evaluative
comments in each of the two groups’ narratives—may be explained by the fact that the visual
experience of watching the Pear film influences their choice.
In general, nine categories of evaluative comments are used frequently in the
American and Vietnamese narratives. Most narrators in both the American and Vietnamese
groups use them similarly regarding their functions. Causal connectors help in organizing
events in causal sequences. ‘Frames of mind’ refer to emotions and mental states, while
‘words/phrases per se’ describe the physical states of the characters or events. ‘Hedges’
indicate the narrators’ uncertainty of what they are saying while negative qualifiers show the
failure of the narrators’ expectation (of what should have happened but did not). Reported
speech is used when the narrators want to mention what was said by the characters in the
movie, which, however, is not true, since the movie contains no dialogue or even monologue.
Gratuitous terms help to intensify or emphasize what the narrators are telling. Onomatopoeia
imitates sounds, while similes help the narrators visualize what happened in the movie by
referring to a more common scenario that they expect to be in the background knowledge of
the listener.
56
CHAPTER 6
ANALYSIS OF NARRATOR PERSPECTIVE
In this chapter, the results of two analyses are presented and discussed. The first
analysis reveals whether the narrators consider themselves film-viewers or story-tellers. This
examination is done through tallying the appearances of the nouns “story” and
“film/movie/video,” and by noting the allusions to the film-viewer perspective and the story-
teller perspective.
The second analysis unveils the visibility of the narrator in his/her narrative. One
narrator may want to be visible in his/her narrative by frequently referring to his/her own
emotions and/or mental states. Another narrator may prefer not letting the listener see who
and where he/she is in the narrative as well as what he/she feels or thinks about it.
The results from this chapter will show what stances the narrators take to produce narratives,
and what the relationship is between the narrators and their own stories.
FILM-VIEWER PERSPECTIVE VERSUS STORY-TELLER
PERSPECTIVE
The perspective that is taken to narrate the experience of watching the pear film is not
the same in the two groups of narrators. The American narrators prefer talking about the
movie’s features, while the Vietnamese narrators focus on its content.
Firstly, similar to what Tannen (1980) did in her analysis, the nouns
“movie/film/video” in English and “phim/vi-de-o” (film/video) in Vietnamese are tallied. In
addition, the cinematic terms and allusions to movie and film such as “scene/cảnh,”
“soundtrack,” “it opens up,” “you could hear,” “I noticed” are also counted in the narratives.
These words and phrases refer to the movie with scenes, sounds, and soundtrack and,
therefore, help to create a scenario in which the narrator is the film-viewer and film-reviewer,
not a story-teller.
Next, the occurrences of the nouns “story” in English and “chuyện/câu chuyện” in
Vietnamese are counted.
The results are presented in Table 9, Table 10, and Table 11.
57
Table 9. Occurrences of Nouns “movie/film/video” in the American and VietnameseNarratives
Number of mentions 0 1 2 3 4 5 6
American (N=20) 4 8 2 1 2 1 2
Vietnamese (N=20) 12 6 0 1 1 0 0
Table 10. Number of Allusions to Film as Film or Film-Viewer Perspective in theAmerican and Vietnamese Narratives
Number of mentions 0 1-9 10-15
American (N=20) 1 14 5
Vietnamese (N=20) 17 3 0
Table 11. Occurrences of the Noun “Story” in the American and Vietnamese Narratives
Number of mentions 0 1 2 3 4 5 6
American (N=20) 19 0 1 0 0 0 0
Vietnamese (N=20) 6 8 5 0 0 1 0
As shown in Table 9, the American narrators use the nouns “movie/film” more often
than the Vietnamese narrators do. 80% (a total of 16 out of 20) of the American narrators and
40% (a total of 8 out of 20) of the Vietnamese narrators use those nouns at least once.
Followed are some examples.
(57) The movie was in color. And the movie had sound track. It's important. And
then the mo, the whole movie started with a, a cock crowing. (A1)
(58) À thì bộ phim chỉ về à một cái buổi sáng. (V12)
(Uh well, the movie is only about, uh, a morning.)
80% of the American narrators compared to 40% of Vietnamese narrators mention
those nouns in their narratives.
Table 10 shows that 95% (N=19) of the American narrators use allusions to film or
film-viewer perspective in their narrative. The allusions include “scene,” “setting,” “pan
shot,” “sound effects,” “flash back,” etc. Those cinematic terms, along with
“film/movie/video,” are scattered everywhere in the narratives, as if to frequently signal to the
listener that the narrators are talking about a movie. Speaker A1 in example (57) above, after
58
mentioning the “movie” with its “color” and “soundtrack” and how it starts, keeps noting
what she sees in the movie, rather than how the story proceeds.
(57-con’d) A—nd you see him, riding off and the next scene you see him, like at a at
a distance, a pan shot. (A1)
Note that the only one American narrator (A16) who does not use those allusions
does mention the “movie.”
(59) Oh. You want to know what happened in the movie. (A16)
It may seem like this American speaker is just repeating the request of the listener. In
doing so, however, she is also setting up the frame of her narrative: one that is about the
movie—not just its story.
In contrast to the American narrators, 85% (N=17) of the Vietnamese narrators never
refer to film or film-viewer perspective. Moreover, when the other 15% (N=3) of the
Vietnamese narrators allude to film or film-viewer perspective, they do not have a wide
range of cinematic vocabulary like the American do. In fact, only one basic and quite
common term, “cảnh” (scene), is used once, three times, and five times in those three
Vietnamese narratives.
The use of the nouns “film/movie/video” and the allusions to film-viewer perspective
as demonstrated in Tables 8 and 9 correlates with the use of the noun “story,” which is shown
in Table 10 below.
Table 11 shows that only one American narrator (A9) uses the noun “story” twice in
her narrative; this is the one narrator who distinguishes the two stories—one ends with the
bike boy and the threesome group happily continuing their ways (the BB story) and the other
with the pear picker left bewildered (the PP story). Meanwhile, 70% (N=14) of the
Vietnamese narrators mention “story” in their narratives. Among those, three narrators use
both “story” and “film.” V8 starts his narrative by saying what the “film” is about and ends it
by stating that the “story” ends there. V14 does it the other way around: he starts with “story”
and ends with “film.” In the narrative of V13, the nouns “film,” “scene,” and “story” are
mentioned without any specific order. The data suggest that those three narrators do not
differentiate the movie from its story. The movie, in their point of view, has a story, and
talking about the movie and talking about its story are the same thing. The other eleven
59
Vietnamese narratives in this subgroup contain the word “story” either at both the beginning
and the end or at just one of the two ends.
Among the six Vietnamese narrators who do not mention the word “story,” five
speakers exclusively refer to the film with the nouns “film/movie/video” along with their
allusions. However, the remaining one, V10, does not use the noun “film” or refer to it in any
way.
(60) Ờ có một cái ông ơ làm công việc thu lượm trái quả quả lê.
[…]
Hết rồi. (V10)
(Uh there is a man uh (who) has a job harvesting the fruit the pears. […] (It) ends
already.)
As seen in example (60), however, V10 starts her narrative with a “there is” clause
which is a typical opening of tales in Vietnamese. This makes her narrative very much like a
story rather than a movie review even when she does not announce that she is telling a story.
Overall, the Vietnamese narrators frequently frame their narratives as stories. Even
when they signal that what they are telling comes from a movie, its content is what is
highlighted in the narratives. In other words, the movie’s story is what is told, not the movie
frames that project the story. The American narrators, however, choose to tell the story
within the frame of the movie, and they often refer to features relevant to film-making. They
comment on its sound effects, color, characters, and setting along with telling its story.
NARRATOR-VISIBLE VERSUS NARRATOR-INVISIBLE
In this section, I will examine the visibility of the narrators in their narratives. The
strategy of including oneself in narratives, if found consistent in one group of narrators, may
very well be part of the narrative tradition of that group.
The forty narratives are examined for the use of first person and second person
subject clauses. In the American narratives, first person subject clauses are recognized with
“I + mental state verb” such as “I thought,” “I don’t remember,” “I noticed.” Second person
subject clauses in the American narratives are those with “you” as subject. In the Vietnamese
narratives, there is not only one first-person pronoun that is used, depending on the
relationship between the speaker and the listener. Moreover, a null subject may also be used
60
in place of a first-person pronoun. For example, there are clauses like “Ø chẳng biết” (I don’t
know), “Ø không hiểu” (I don’t understand). Similarly, there is not even one second-person
pronoun in the Vietnamese narratives. All of these cases are counted in this analysis.
In the American narratives there are times when the narrators use the generic “you”
rather than a real second person pronoun. It is important to note, however, that the generic
“you” includes the listener. In narratives, the use of “you” may show an effort of involving
the listener in the act of telling the story. In fact, in the present English data, those clauses
with “you” as subject occur in expressions such as “you see,” “you think,” “you kind of
notice,” where “you” could be considered to include both the narrator and the listener.
(61) And of course there was a a man there standing on a ladder in a pear tree, and it
was very visual... But you k..you kind of noticed the sounds more ..than what you're seeing.
And then he dropped a pear, and I heard it drop, [laugh]...a--nd he walked down the ladder,
and he emptied pears into baskets. (A4)
Note that in example (61), the narrator uses both “you” and “I” pronouns to describe
what she herself notices, sees, and hears.
There was only one case in the American narratives in which “you” is actually
referred to you, the listener.
(62) I'm giving you all these details. I don't know if you want them. U—m the ..the
reason I'm giving you the details is ‘cause I don't know what the point of the movie was.
Okay? So maybe you can see [laugh begins] something that [laugh ends]I didn't. (A1)
In Vietnamese, speakers may use each other’s names to replace “I/you” in their
conversations. This was particularly appropriate in the present study because the narrators
and the listener were acquaintances. In fact, in the present Vietnamese data, the narrators use
proper names to address the listener, “Hiếu.”
(63) À anh kể cho Hiếu một cái đoạn video. (V7)
(Uh I (will) tell Hieu about a video clip.)
The use of these two types of clauses in the narratives of the two groups is presented
in Table 12.
61
Table 12. Use of 1st Person and 2nd Person Subject Clauses in the American andVietnamese Narratives
1st person subject 2nd person subject
American (N=20) 18 (90%) 20 (100%)
Vietnamese (N=20) 6 (30%) 1 (5%)
Table 12 shows that while the American narrators often use the “I/you” subjects in the
course of telling, the Vietnamese narrators do this much less frequently. All the American
narrators (100%) mention either “I” or “you” at least once in their narratives. In contrast,
fourteen Vietnamese narrators (70%) do not use clauses with “I/you” as subject at all in their
narratives.
Also seen in Table 12, two American narrators never use “I”-subject clauses but still
use “you”-subject clauses. These narrators produce clauses starting with “you hear” and “you
see.” In 18 of the 20 American narratives, the narrators use both “I”-subject and “you”-
subject clauses and there are numerous cases of “you”-subject clauses. Below is one
example.
(64) A--nd u—m but the old man, you don't know quite what he’s thinking. Either,
first thing I thought was that they they're the ones that stole the pears. (A2)
In example (31), the pronoun “you” does not really distinguish itself from the first
person pronoun. It includes the “I” in it. The example of “you don’t know” makes the act of
“not knowing” not the narrator’s responsibility. It is as if the narrator says, “I don’t know,
you would not have known if you watched it, and neither would anyone who watched it.”
The choice of the generic “you,” therefore, seems to help the narrator in getting the listener
more involved in the experience and, more importantly, in gaining the listener’s sympathy.
As seen in example (64) above, the “I/you” clauses in the American narratives often
serve as a device of external evaluation to explicitly state what the narrator thinks or feels
(Labov, 1972) during the course of watching the movie.
The use of first person and second person subjects in Vietnamese narratives is much
more restricted and serves a different function. The first person subject is used only when the
narrator wants to state that he/she does not know or understand something.
62
(65) Thì cái đấy thì làm cho ờ thì Ø không hiểu phần đó lắm. Nhưng mà đấy là nội
dung của câu chuyện. (V13)
(So that makes uh mm so (I) don’t really understand that part. But that is the content
of the story.)
Among the six Vietnamese narrators who use “I”-subject clauses, two never actually
say the “I” pronouns but only use null subject referring to themselves. V13 in example (65) is
one of the two.
None of the Vietnamese narrators use clauses with the second person subject. There is
only once the listener is addressed; and that is when the narrator uses a proper name, not a
pronoun. This was demonstrated in example (63).
The opposing strategies of the two groups suggest that the American narrators let
themselves be seen more in what they are telling, while the Vietnamese narrators hide
themselves behind their stories. The American narrators’ reactions and emotions to the movie
are provided without hesitation. Not only are the American narrators visible, but they also
prove that they are more active in keeping the listener’s attention. The use of the generic
“you” throughout the narratives shows the effort to get the listener involved in the experience
of “seeing” the movie. The American narrators are not simply narrators; they are also
speakers in the conversations. The narrative is embedded in a conversation.
Moreover, when the American narrators frequently say, “you see,” “you could hear,”
“you kind of notice,” they are actually talking about what they themselves saw, heard, and
noticed in the movie. The common use of the first person pronoun and the generic “you” in
the American narratives suggests that the “I,” or the narrator herself, seems to be as
important as the content of the telling.
The strategies that the Vietnamese narrators use are the exact opposite. The
Vietnamese narrators consider narrative a performance, where the content of the telling
should receive the most attention. They themselves, as well as their own thoughts, and the
listener are not critical elements of the telling, and therefore need not be mentioned. Only
when they are very puzzled by some details from the movie do they feel the need to reveal
themselves. Example (66) from V17, below, is a rare case in which the narrator intentionally
stops the narrative to comment extensively on how she was distracted by a detail in the
movie.
63
(66) Mà em ngạc nhiên cái là lúc hồi nãy là em thấy hai cái cần xé đó là thằng nhóc
nó lấy một cái cần xé còn một cái mà sao giờ lại có hiện hai cái một cái có lê một cái không
có nó lại… tự nhiên em cứ bị [laugh] dính chỗ đó luôn stick chỗ đó ờ thì … (V17)
(But I was surprised that a while ago I saw the two baskets that that the boy he took
one basket leaving the other basket but now why there are, it shows two baskets, one with
pears one empty so… naturally I have been [laugh] stuck there ‘stick’ right there uh then…)
SUMMARY
The Vietnamese narrators do not usually separate the ideas of “movie” and “story.” In
their opinion, a movie has a story and telling about a movie is telling about its story. Even
when they refer to the movie itself, they do not comment on anything else other than the
content of the scenes and the movie as a whole. Moreover, the Vietnamese narrators are not
visible in their narratives. They seem to consider narrative a performance where the focus
should be on the ‘performed’ narrative, not on the performer.
American narrators, however, focus a lot more on the movie features. Besides its
story, a movie has sound, color, the setting, and the actors. And a good movie does not only
consist of a story; it needs to have high quality in those features. Thus, telling about a movie
should include giving the listener information about the cinematographic features of the
movie. In addition, as they tell stories this way, the American narrators also reveal
themselves with what they think and feel very often. They also tend to view the telling of the
experience of watching the Pear film as embedded in the conversation between the listener
and themselves.
64
CHAPTER 7
CONCLUSION
The goal of this study was to examine the basic characteristics of the Vietnamese
narrative. For this purpose, the Vietnamese participants were shown a short movie and then
were asked to retell it to a person who had not seen it. The Vietnamese narratives were
recorded, transcribed, and analyzed in comparison with the American narratives that had
been collected from Chafe (1980)’s study. The study examined the narrative structure and
content, evaluation devices, and narrative perspective. The findings indicate more
dissimilarities than resemblances between the Vietnamese and American narratives. Overall
six types of differences and two types of similarities were found. In the following, I
summarize those differences and similarities.
DIFFERENCES
First of all, the Vietnamese narrators carefully abide by the conventions of telling a
good story. Their narratives contain more narrative elements than the American narratives.
While the prompt video does not provide a story with straightforward and easily identified
structure of the basic narrative elements (abstract, orientation, complication, resolution, and
coda (Labov & Waletzky, 1967; Labov, 1972)), the Vietnamese narrators put much effort
into maintaining a smoothly flowing narrative even though that equals a lot of misplacing,
omitting and adding of events and details. Meanwhile, the American narrators pay more
attention to producing a good review of the movie in which the story is just one aspect
among others. Their narratives, most of the time, follow a chronological order of events with
less misplacing, omitting, and adding.
Secondly, in telling about the movie, the Vietnamese narrators differ from one
another in interpreting some important events and details. Compared to the American
narrators, the Vietnamese narrators are less unanimous. One possible explanation may be that
the setting and the characters of the movie may not be as familiar to the Vietnamese speakers
as they are to the American narrators, even though the Vietnamese participants all have spent
65
at least a few years living in the US. They may interpret the cues of a situation differently
from the way a native English speaker does. For example, there are some Vietnamese
narrators who believe that the bike boy is the pear picker’s son or worker while all the
American narrators see him as a stranger who comes and takes the pears away without the
pear picker knowing.
The third difference is that the Vietnamese narrators are fond of explicitly stating the
cause and effect relationship of the story events rather than leaving them as-is, like the
American narrators do. In addition, they do not hedge as much as the Americans do while
telling the story; they also do not use the similes & metaphors device as much. This finding
suggests that the Vietnamese narrators like to impose their interpretation on the listener and
that the American narrators prefer being subjective in reporting what they have seen—when
the Vietnamese narrators do interpret, they do so implicitly by using evaluative comments.
The fourth difference relates to the first difference. The Vietnamese narrators produce their
narratives from the perspective of story-tellers, while the American narrators do it from the
perspective of film-viewers. The Vietnamese frame their narratives as stories with the typical
tales’ openings and endings. Very rarely do they refer to what they are telling as coming
from a movie. The Americans, however, extensively signal that they are talking about a
movie with all of its features: color, sound, setting, and characters. They also prove to have
more sophisticated cinematic vocabulary than the Vietnamese narrators.
The fifth difference is found in regards to the element of evaluation in narrative. It is
found that the Vietnamese favor the embedded type of evaluation, which is expressed in
evaluative comments, over the external type of evaluation, where the narrator explicitly states
his/her thoughts and emotions about what he/she is telling. Meanwhile, the Americans use
both types; they comment on the movie both by using evaluative devices and by revealing
their own emotions with the “I/you” subject clauses.
The last difference refers to the stances the two groups of narrators take in their
narratives. Even though the Vietnamese narrators evaluate slightly more than the American
narrators do in the form of evaluative comments, they hesitate when it comes to revealing
their own selves and their own emotions about the movie. The type of evaluation in the
Vietnamese narratives is implicit rather than explicit. They tend to stand behind their
narratives, not mentioning themselves and not mentioning the listener either. They consider
66
themselves narrators and not speakers in a conversation. The American narrators, however,
consider the act of narrating as part of the conversation in which the topic is only one of the
three essential elements: the topic, the speaker, and the listener. Not only is the movie as a
topic present, but they themselves and the listener are all visible in the narratives. Clearly, we
see a performance of story-telling in the case of the Vietnamese narrators and a conversation
with movie-reviewing in the case of the Americans.
SIMILARITIES
In the present study, two types of cross-linguistic similarities were found. Firstly, in
evaluating the movie and its story, both groups use approximately equal evaluative
comments. They also prefer the evaluative device of words/phrases per se to any other
device; onomatopoeia is the least used device in both groups. Possibly due to the nature of
this study’s material, a movie video, both the Vietnamese and American speakers favor the
evaluative device of words/phrases per se over that of frames of mind. The visual experience
of watching the movie, the insufficient story structure of the movie, the interview question of
“What happened in the movie?” and the challenge of memory deprivation all seem to play a
role in the decision of which categories of evaluative comments to use. The narrators rely
mostly on the visual cues both in order to understand the movie when watching it, and to
recall its details when telling about it. Especially for the American narrators, who value the
memory task, the movie is recalled with specific details of the scenes.
The second type of similarity between speakers of Vietnamese and English is that
neither group expects the story to be multi-layered and to lack an essential element, the
resolution. Seeing that the story shown in the movie does not conform to the typical story
with opening and ending, they often supplement the ending with evaluative comments.
To sum up, the Vietnamese narrators use narrating strategies that are different from those
used by the American narrators. The Vietnamese narrators consider the task of retelling about
a movie as telling about its content only. Their narratives, therefore, are more complete in
structure and may be considered better stories. The American narrators, however, interpret
the task as a memory one. And for this purpose, they succeed, in that they provide all the
details and features of the movie that they have seen, among which the content is only one
feature.
67
The Vietnamese narrators are fond of creating an unreal world of tale, where the
narrator and his/her emotions of the real world are hidden. The American narrators do not
create but report and review a movie within a conversation; they show more awareness of the
“here” and “now” dimensions of communication.
The Vietnamese narrators conform to the conventions of good stories; they tell the
necessary details and ignore those that are not critical to the version of the story that they
understand and choose to tell. Thus, they are subjective in interpreting the movie. In contrast,
the American narrators favor facts and details and do not often impose their interpretation.
VIETNAMESE NARRATIVE CONVENTIONS
Narrative norms are acquired gradually by children during their childhood. By the
adolescent years, their narratives already mirror an adult’s narrative (Peterson & McCabe,
1983; Bamberg & Damrad-Frye, 1991). These findings in previous studies indicate that the
speakers of a language master the skill of narrating before the time they reach adulthood.
Thus, narratives told by adults may well reflect the common expectations of their society and
culture about how a good narrative should be; that is, they abide by the narrative rules that
are agreed upon by most people in their community. The Vietnamese participants’ narratives,
as well as the American speakers’ narratives in the present study, may be considered to
illustrate the norm of Vietnamese and English (in the US) narrative.
The characteristics of the Vietnamese narrative identified in this study suggest that a
full development of a narrative with the elements of abstract, orientation, complication,
resolution, and coda is expected when one is to tell a story. To do this, the narrator has to
interpret the story and then give the completed product of their interpretation to the listener.
Many details get played down or played up so the story may be considered better.
Because the self is not as important or emphasized in the Vietnamese culture as in the
American culture, it is understandable that the pronoun “I” is rarely seen in the Vietnamese
narratives, and is many times replaced with a null subject. The Vietnamese speakers do
comment on the movie, but they do it implicitly by embedding the evaluative devices into the
flow of narrative, rather than explicitly talking about what they think. This may be the result
of an education system in which individual opinions are not valued, and giving opinions can
even be punished sometimes. Personal opinions are seen to be in opposition to the common
68
opinion of the bigger group. Moreover, in the Vietnamese culture, the world of the tale is
separated from the world of the speaker and the listener; the first receives full spotlight while
the second is hidden. The one who tells the story is a performer, performing the skill of story-
telling. Story-telling seems not to be part of a conversation; rather, it serves its own function:
telling a story. Another fact that should be noted along with these findings is that the
Vietnamese may not have as much knowledge about cinema and film as the Americans; this
contributes to the finding that the Vietnamese favor talking about the movie’s content, while
the Americans also love to comment on the features of the movie itself: color, sound, camera
angles, setting, etc.
The current study is limited, in that the participants’ gender and their periods of time
living in the US are not controlled, due to the difficulties in the process of recruiting.
However, it is still the first to shed light on how the Vietnamese people produce narrative and
on how their narrative strategies are different from the Americans’ narrative strategies. It is
clearly shown that the way one narrates tells much about his/her language and culture.
Understanding the way people from a particular culture tell stories can help in understanding
their language and mind.
69
REFERENCES
Bamberg, M. & Damrad-Frye, R. (1991). On the ability to provide evaluative comments:Further explorations of children’s narrative competencies. Journal of ChildLanguage, 18, 988-1000.
Bartlett, F. C. (1932). Remembering. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
Beck, P., Walters, A., & Francisco, N. (1977). Learning the way: Traditional education. In P.Beck, A. Walters, & N. Francisco (Eds.), The sacred: Ways of knowledge soucres oflife (pp. 47-63). Tsaile, AZ: Navajo Community College Press.
Chafe, W. (Ed.), 1980. The Pear stories: Cognitive, cultural, and linguistic aspects ofnarrative production. Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
Chafe, W., & Danielewicz, J. (1987). Properties of spoken and written language. In R.Horowitz & S. J. Samuels (Eds.), Comprehending oral and written language (pp. 83-111). San Diego and London: Academic Press.
Daley, K. (1998). Vietnamese classifiers in narrative texts. Arlington, TX: The SummerInstitute of Linguistics and the University of Texas at Arlington.
Erbaugh, M. S. (1990). Mandarin oral narratives compared with English: The Pear/Guavastories. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association, 25, 21-42.
Labov, W. (1972). Language in the inner city. Philadelphia, PA: University of PennsylvaniaPress.
Labov, W., & Waletzky, J. (1967). Narrative analysis: Oral versions of personal experience.In J. Helm (Ed.), Essays on the verbal and visual arts (pp. 12–44). Seattle, WA:University of Washington Press.
Mandler, J. M. (1978). A code in the node: The use of a story schema in retrieval. DiscourseProcess, 1, 14-35.
Mandler, J. & Johnson, N. (1977). Remembrance of things parsed: Story structure and recall.Cognitive Psychology, 9, 111-151.
Minami, M. (2008). Telling good stories in different languages: Bilingual children’s styles ofstory construction and their linguistic and educational implications. NarrativeInquiry, 18, 83–110.
Peterson, C., & McCabe, A. (1983). Developmental psycholinguistics: Three ways of lookingat a child’s narrative. New York, NY: Plenum.
Peterson, C., & McCabe, A. (1984). What makes a good story? Journal of PsycholinguisticResearch, 13 (6), 457-480.
Tannen, D. (1980). A comparative analysis of oral narrative strategies: Athenian Greek andAmerican English. In W. Chafe (Ed.), The Pear stories: Cognitive, cultural, andlinguistic aspects of narrative production (pp. 51-87). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
70
Tannen, D. (1982). Oral and literate strategies in spoken and written language. Language, 58,1-21.
71
APPENDIX A
VIETNAMESE “PEAR” STORIES
72
Firstly, each of the twenty Vietnamese narratives is translated morpheme-by-morpheme and divided roughly into clauses. After that, the clauses are put together in acomplete form. Following are some transcription conventions.CL ClassifierR/M Rheme markerPRO-3rd Third person pronoun (regardless of number)PRES Present time marker (note that Vietnamese does not have tenses)PLU Word(s) expressing plural numberPAST Past time marker
Speaker 1Bắt-đầu câu chuyện kể về một người nông-dân đi hái lê.Start CL story tell about a CL farmer go pick pearÀ ông này thì tính rất cẩn-thận, Well man this R/M characteristics very carefully
hái xuống một giỏ rơi xuống một quả ống vẫn để-ý thấy,pick down one basket fall down one CL that-old-man still notice seevà ống nhặt lên,and that-man pick upống lau-chùi rất cẩn-thận,that-man brush-and-clean very carefullyxong ống lên ống hái tiếp.then that-man go-up that-man pick continue
Một lúc sau thì có một thằng bé đi qua.One while after R/M there one CL small go pastThằng này thì người thì bé-con,CL this R/M body R/M tiny
mà đi cái xe rất-là cao nên-là cũng chật-vật.but ride CL vehicle very high therefore also strenuous
Thì nó dừng-lại,So PRO-3rd stop
nó nhìn ông này.PRO-3rd look man this
Thì không biết nó có-phải con ông này không.So not know PRO-3rd yes child man this notNhưng-mà nó [laugh] nhìn lén-lén lúc,But PRO-3rd look furtively while
xong nó lấy một cái rổ lê ông này hái được,then PRO-3rd take one CL basket pear man this pick get-posxong bê đi.then carry away
Thằng này thì thứ-nhất là người thì bé đi xe to,CL this R/M firstly be body R/M small ride vehicle big
thứ-hai là người đã bé nhưng-mà thấy gái thì mắt lại tớn lên.secondly be body already small but see girl then eyes again pop up
Thế-là nó thấy một cô-gái đi ngược chiều lại,
73
So PRO-3rd see one girl go opposite direction backthế-là nó nhìn,so PRO-3rd lookthế-là đâm-phải một hòn đá,so crash-into one CL rockngã xuống,fall downrơi hết lê xuống đất.fall all pear down ground
Lúc đấy thì có một nhóm ba thằng nó…Time that R/M there one group three CL-male-young PRO-3rd…Thì… cũng chả biết là ba thằng này nó có-phải So… also not know that three CL-male-young this PRO-3rd yeslà thằng đặt hòn-đá ở-đấy không.be CL-male-young put CL-rock there notTrông lúc đầu thì tưởng là du-côn nó ra nó định trấn-lột thằng này.Look time first R/M thought be bullies PRO-3rd go PRO-3rd intend rob CL thisXong lại thấy nó ra nó giúp nhặt lê,Then again see PRO-3rd go PRO-3rd help pick pear
xong-rồi nó còn giúp nhặt mũ nữa.then PRO-3rd even help pick hat more
Thằng này đi bỏ-quên cái mũ trên đường mà.CL this go forget CL hat on road becauseXong-rồi chắc nó nhặt xong,Then probably PRO-3rd pick finish
nó giúp cho thằng kia.PRO-3rd help for CL that
Nó lấy ba quả lê làm-công cho ba thằng.PRO-3rd take three CL pear payback for three CLXong-rồi đi lại cái chỗ ông chỗ người nông-dân hái lê.Then walk back CL place man place CL farmer pick pearThì ông này hái xong,So man this pick finish
đi xuống,go downthì nhìn qua nhìn lại,so look forth look backthấy thiếu mất một giỏ.see lack lose one basket
Thì ống chả biết là làm-sao lại thiếu,So that-man not know that why that lack
nhưng-mà lại thấy ba thằng nghênh-ngang đi ngược-lại,but that see three CL-male-young swaggeringly go backcầm quả lê ăn.hold CL pear eat
Ống thắc-mắc. [laugh]
74
That-man wonderKhông biết làm-sao,Not know why
nhưng-mà đến đấy thì hết mất rồi.but to there R/M end lose already
Starts a story about a farmer who picks pears. Well, this man is very careful, (he)picks a whole basket but only one pear falls down he still notices… and he picks it up,brushes it off very carefully. Then he goes up to pick pears again. A while later there is alittle boy going by. This boy, he is small but rides a tall bike so (it is) very strenuous. So hestops. He looks at the man. (I) don’t know if he is his child but he looks furtively for a whilethen he takes one basket he has picked then carries away. This boy, firstly he is small butrides a big bike secondly he is small but sees some girl then (his) eyes pop up. So he sees agirl riding from the other direction (towards him). So he looks. So (he) crashes into a rock.(He) falls down. Fall down all the pears on the ground. At the same time there is a group ofthree other boys. (I) don’t know if they are those that put the rock there or not. At first (they)look like bullies who are going to rob this boy. Then (I) see that they come to help pick upthe pears, then they also help pick up the hat. This boy goes away leaving the hat, that’s why.He takes three pears to pay back the three boys. Then they walk to the place where the farmeris picking pears. So he finishes picking, goes down, so look back and forth, and sees that onebasket is gone. So he doesn’t know why it’s gone, but (he) sees three boys swaggering bywhile eating pears. He wonders. (I) don’t know why, but (it) ends there.
Speaker 2Rồi…Okay…Thế thì… câu chuyện xảy-ra ở một ờ.So then… CL story happen at a uhBên lề đường có một người đàn-ông đang hái ổi.Beside side road there one CL man PRES pick guavaThế anh-ta hái… ổi,So he pick… guava
và cho vào những cái sọt.and put into PLU CL basket
Khi anh-ta hái được khoảng ba sọt,When he pick get-pos about three basket
thì anh-ta trèo lên cây hái tiếp.so he climb up tree pick continue
Đột-nhiên trong lúc đó thì có một à đứa trẻ-con em-bé đi qua.Suddenly during time that R/M there a uh CL baby kid go pastEm-bé nhìn chự-dự đạp em-bé đạp một chiếc xe-đạp.Kid look um ride kid ride a CL bikeTrông-thấy những sọt ổi,See PLU basket guava
thì em-bé dừng-lại nhìn trước nhìn sau không thấy ai,so kid stop look before look after not see who
75
thấy một người đàn-ông thì vẫn đang chăm-chú hái ổi,see one CL man R/M still PRES concentrated pick guavanên em-bé liền lấy một sọt ổi,so kid at-once take one basket guavađặt lên trên chiếc xe-đạp và à lái đi.put up on CL bike and uh ride away
Ừm ờ trong trong lúc đi thì do vô-ý,Um uh during during time go R/M because lose-attention
nên-là em-bé có va-chạm với một người đi-đường khác,so kid yes crash with a CL passer-byer differentnên-là ngã,so falllàm cái sọt ổi bị đổ ra đổ hết ra bên-ngoài.make CL basket guava get-neg spill out spill all out outside
Thế … thấy vậy,So… see so
thì ở cạnh đó có mấy em-bé khác đang chơi,R/M at beside there there some kid different PRES playnên-là các em-bé này thì chạy lại,so PLU kid this R/M run backvà giúp em-bé đó nhặt lại sọt ổi,and help kid that pick back basket guavavà đặt lên xe-đạp.and put up bike
Và trước-khi em-bé đi-khỏi,And before kid go-away
thì họ còn không quên trả lại cho em-bé cái mũ.R/M they even not forget give back for kid CL hat
Chính vì vậy mà em-bé rất-là cảm-động,Exactly because that that kid very moved
nên-là chia cho mỗi người trong trong nhóm một quả ổi.so share for each person in in group one CL guava
Những những người trong nhóm tiếp-tục đi về phía cây ổi.PLU PLU person in group continue go towards direction CL-tree guavaVà khi họ đi qua ngang qua người hái ổi,And when they go past by past CL pick guava
thì người hái cũng là lúc người hái ổi vừa trèo xuống cây ổi,R/M CL pick also be time CL pick guava just climb down CL-tree guavavà người hái ổi kiểm-tra lại,and CL pick guava check againthì thấy thiếu mất một thiếu mất một sọt,then see lack lose one lack lose one basketvà anh-ta lại nhìn-thấy rằng-là mỗi người trong nhóm trong nhóm trongand he again see-notice that each person in group in group innhóm trẻ cầm trên tay một quả ổi.group kid hold on hand one CL guava
76
Chuyện đến đây là hết,Story to here be end
nhưng-mà trong trong lòng của anh-ta thì chắc-là cũng nảy-sinh một cái sựbut in in gut of he R/M probably also sprout one CL CLnghi-ngờ nào-đó những cái đứa-trẻ trong nhóm.doubt some-kind PL CL kid in group
Hết.End
Okay. So the story happens in a… On the side of a road there is a man pickingguavas. So he picks guavas and put them into baskets. When he has picked about threebaskets full, he climbs up the tree to continue picking. Suddenly at that time there is a kidpassing by. The kid rides a bike. Seeing the baskets of guavas, he stops and looks back andforth to see that there is no one, except for a man busy picking guavas, so the kid takes onebasket of guavas, put it on the bike and rides away. Uh while riding, because (he) doesn’t payattention, the kid crashes into another person, so he falls down, making the basket pourguavas all out. So… seeing that, some other kids who are playing nearby come, help this kidpick up the basket of guavas and put it on the bike. And before the kid goes away, they evenremember to give the hat back. Exactly because of that, the kid is very grateful, so (he) shareswith each person in the group a guava. The group continues to go toward the guava tree. Andwhen they pass by the guava picker, it’s also when the guava picker just climbed down, andthe guava picker checks and sees that one basket is gone; and he sees that each person in thegroup has a guava in their hands. The story ends here, but inside he must be suspecting thekids in the group. The end.
Speaker 3Àm vào một buổi-trưa hè nắng à đẹp,Uhm on one noon summer sunshine uh nice
và rất-là mát-mẻ giữa một làng-quê nông nông-thôn,and very cool middle one village coun--countryàm cây-cối um-tùm à xum-xuê xung-quanh à,mm trees luxuriant uh abundant around uhvà rợp-bóng mát trên con đường làng,and shady cool on CL road villagecó rất nhiều vườn cây vườn-tược xung-quanh,there very a-lot garden tree garden aroundvà ở ở giữa con đường làng thì có một cái à cây à um-tùmand in in middle CL road village R/M there one CL uh tree uh luxurianttrái ngọt,fruit sweetvà đang đến mùa như-là ra quả.and PRES to season like produce fruit
À thì giữa trưa hè nắng đẹp đó có một chàng nông-dân à đangUh so middle noon summer sunshine nice that there one CL farmer uh PRESmiệt-mài hái quả trên cái cây trĩu-quả đó.devotedly pick fruit on CL CL full-of-fruit that
77
Và anh-ta trèo lên cây,and he climb up tree
và hái từng từng lụm từng lụm từng lùm rất-là nhiều quả,and pick every every bunch every bunch every bunch very a-lot fruitvà trèo xuống,and climb downvà bỏ vào trong ba cái sọt to.and put into in three CL basket big
Thì [clearing throat] àm ợ ợ anh-ta sau-khi anh-ta ạm ợ hái được một loạt So uhm oh oh he after he uhm oh pick get-pos one seriesđược được được một thời-gian rồi,get get get one period-of-time already
anh-ta à trèo xuống cây,he uh climb down treevà và bỏ đầy vào vào sọt thứ-hai.and and put full into into basket second
Như-vậy tại cho-đến thời-điểm này thì anh-ta đã hái đầy hai sọt.So at until point-in-time this R/M he PAST pick full two basketSau-khi bỏ đầy vào sọt thứ-hai anh-ta lại mải-miết miệt-mài,After put full into basket second he again concentratedly devotedly
và cần-cù chăm-chỉ lại leo lên cây tiếp-tục à miệt-mài hái tiếpand industrious assiduous again climb up tree continue uh devotedly pick continueà các quả tiếp-theo.uh PLU fruit next
Thì lúc anh-ta đang hái nhứ này,So time he PRES pick like this
thì dọc từ phía xa-xa ở trên con đường làng có một chàngR/M along from direction fairly-far at on CL road village there one CLfarmernông-dânkhác à cũng lững-thững dắt một con à àm dê con kêu be bedifferent uh also leisurely lead one CL uh uhm goat small make-sound bae-baeđi ợ lững-thững đi ngang qua dưới gốc-cây mà chàng nông-dân thứ-nhấtgo oh leisurely go past by under foot-of-tree that CL farmer firstđang hái quả.PRES pick fruit
Khi đi ngang qua gốc cây đó thì à chú dê nhỏ có-vẻ rất-là chú-ý đến When go past by foot-of-tree that R/M uh CL goat little seem very pay-attention toờ các cái trái ngọt trong hai cái sọt đầy ờ của chàng-trai thứ-nhất và để dưới uh PLU CL fruit sweet in two CL basket full uh of young-man first and leave underchân cây.foot treeVà chú à chú-ta ờ có-vẻ như-là muốn rất-là do-dự muốn dừng-lại muốn có-vẻ And he uh he uh seem like want very hesitate want stop want seemnhư muốn ăn chẳng-hạn các cái trái-cây đó,like want eat like PLU CL fruit that
78
nhưng-mà à người-chủ thì à cứ cố-gắng kéo nó đi.but uh owner R/M uh keep try pull PRO-3rd away
Rồi một lát sau đó từ phía xa-xa trên con đường làng có một cậu-béThen one while after that from direction fairly-far on CL road village there one young-boyờ lững-thững đạp xe đi về phía ờ cái cây nơi có chàng nông-dânuh leisurely ride vehicle go towards direction uh CL tree where there CL farmerthứ-nhất đang miệt-mài hái quả trên cây.first PRES devotedly pick fruit on treeỜ khi đạp xe ngang qua gốc-cây thì cậu-ta cậu-bé để-ý thấy ờ Uh when ride vehicle past by foot-of-tree R/M he young-boy pay-attention see uh
chàng nông-dân đang rất-là chăm-chú ờ hái hái quả,CL farmer PRES very-(emp) concentrating uh pick pick fruitvà không-hề để-ý gì đến à cái thành-quả của mình để ở dưới gốc-cây,and not-at-all pay-attention to uh CL result of self left at under foot-of-treevà cậu-bé liền láu-cá à bê một cái sọt đầy à của chàng nông-dân,and young-boy at-once cunning uh carry one CL basket full uh of CL farmervà đặt lên xe của mình,and put up vehicle of selfvà chở đi chở đi.and transport away transport away
Và cậu-ta đi được một đoạn ra-khỏi tầm ờ mắt của chàng nông-dânAnd he go get-pos one short-distance out-of range uh eye of CL farmernơi anh-ta vẫn đang chăm-chú hái quả,where he still PRES concentrating pick fruit
thì ờ phía trước mặt trên con đường làng của cậu-ta có mộtR/M uh direction before face on CL road village of he there onecô-bé con khác à cũng lững-thững đạp xe đi à ngược về young-girl small different uh also leisurely ride vehicle go uh back towardsphía của cậu à.direction of he uh
Và cô-bé con thì cũng rất-là xinh-xắn duyên-dáng.And young-girl small R/M also very-(emp) cute charmingVà khi đi gần à khi hai xe-đạp đi ngang gần đến a tầm của nhau,And when go near uh when two bike go past near to uh range of each-other
thì ờ cậu-bé mải-mê quay sang ngắm cô-bé,R/M uh young-boy devotedly turn over admire young-girlvà đồng-thời lúc đó có một cơn gió ờ tương-đối mạnh thổi tới,and simultaneously time that there one CL wind uh relatively strong blow to-theretạt à bay cái mũ của cậu-bé xuống đường ờ,knock uh fly-away CL hat of young-boy down road uhlàm-cho cậu-ta giật-mình giật-nảy-mình ờ,make he startled startled-(emp) uhvà ờ bị như-là cái sự chú-ý trong việc đạp xe của cậu ợ bị and uh get-(neg) like CL CL attention in CL ride vehicle of he ooh get-(neg)ờ bị bị giảm đi,ooh get-(emp) get-(emp) reduce away
79
và do-vậy à cái xe-đạp của cậu-ta ờ đã bị như-là vô-tìnhand because-of-that uh CL bike of he uh PAST get-(neg) like unintentionallyđâm vào một hòn đá trước mặt,crash into one CL rock before facevà cậu-ta ngã à ờm ngã cùng-với cả xe ngã xuống đường,and he fall uh uhm fall with-(emp) also vehicle fall down roadvà cái sọt trái-cây ờ của cậu ờ bị đổ xuống,and CL basket fruit uh of he uh get-(emp) pour downvà trái-cây văng tung-tóe hết à hết ra xung-quanh ờ chỗ cái xe đổ.and fruit cast all-over all uh all out around uh place CL vehicle fall
Lúc đó thì khi ngẩng mặt lên,Time that R/M when raise face up
cậu-ta nghe tiếng sáo-huýt của ba cậu-bé khác ờ ờ đi chơi cùng-nhauhe hear CL-sound whistle of three young-boy different uh uh go play togetherờ lúc đó cũng vừa như-là tạt ngang ngang qua chỗ đó.uh time that also just like drop past past by place that
Thì ba cậu kia bèn thân-thiện cúi xuống giúp nhặt à trái-cây đổ văng tung-tóeSo three boy that immediately friendly bend down help pick uh fruit fall cast all-overxung-quanh cho cậu-bé này,around for young-boy this
và bỏ lại bỏ lại vào sọt cho cậu-bé đạp xe.and put back put back into basket for young-boy ride vehicle
À sau đó thì sau-khi ờ trái-cây nhặt đầy-đủ hết rồi,Uh after that R/M after uh fruit pick complete all already
thì ờ thì ờ cậu-bé đạp xe bèn ờ lại bỏ trái-cây lên xe,R/M uh R/M uh young-boy ride vehicle immediately uh again put fruit up vehiclevà và lại chăm-chú đạp đi.and and again concentratedly ride away
Nhưng đi chưa được bao xa thì được khoảng một đoạn rất ngắn But go not get-pos how far R/M get-pos about one short-distance very shortcỡ-khoảng-độ ờ mười mét ờ mười mười-lăm mét gì-đó chẳng-hạn,about uh ten meter uh ten fifteen meter about kind-of
thì ờ thì ba cậu-bé kia huýt-sáo,R/M uh R/M three young-boy that whistlegọi giật gọi giật cậu-bé này lại à,call sudden call sudden young-boy this back uhthì để cậu thấy là cậu để-quên cái mũ mà bị bay từ lúc đầu à.so let he see that he forget CL hat that get-neg blow from time first uh
Thế-là một cậu một trong ba cậu-bé kia à vốn cầm cái vợt bóng-bàn à,So one boy one in three young-boy that uh previously hold CL racket table-tennis uh
vừa đi vừa vừa dùng vợt bóng-bàn nghịch-ngợm simultaneously go simultaneously simultaneously use racket table-tennis playfullyờ đập đập tung tung một cái hòn-đá trên vợt bóng-bàn đó,uh bat bat toss toss one CL rock on racket table-tennis thatthì cậu-bé à dùng vợt bóng-bàn đó bèn cầm cái mũ quay lại,so young-boy uh use racket table-tennis that at-once hold CL hat turn back
80
đưa trả lại cho cậu-bé đạp xe.give return back to young-boy ride bike
Cậu-bé đạp xe cảm-ơn bằng cách à à tặng lại cho ờ ba cậu-bé nàyYoung-boy ride bike thank by way uh uh present back to uh three young-boy thismỗi người một cái trái-cây to ngon ngọt,each person one CL fruit big delicious sweet
và nhờ cậu-bé cầm vợt bóng-bàn mang lại,and ask young-boy hold racket table-tennis bring backvà cậu-bé cầm vợt bóng-bàn như-là mang ba trái-cây đó lại,and young-boy hold racket table-tennis like bring three fruit that backvà chia cho hai người bạn kia của mình mỗi người ờ một trái,and share to two CL friend that of self each person uh one CL-fruitvà ba cậu-bé này đi tiếp,and three young-boy this go continuecòn cậu-bé đạp xe thì cũng chở cái sọt của mình và đi mất-dạng.and young-boy ride bike R/M also transport CL basket of self and go out-of-sight
Ờ ba cậu-bé giúp cậu-bé đạp xe này sau đó thì lững-thững đi a điUh three young-boy help young-boy ride bike this after that R/M leisurely go uh gotiếp trên con đường làng,continue on CL road village
và lại đi ngược trở-lại đến đúng ờ ngang cái chỗ cái cây của chàng-traiand again go opposite back to exactly uh by CL place CL tree of young-mannơi đang hái hái hái quả,place PRES pick pick pick fruitthì à đi ngang qua cái cây đó,so uh go pass by CL tree thatvừa đi vừa huýt-sáo ngang qua ạ,simultaneously go simultaneously whistle pass by uh
Thì tiếng sáo là đánh-thức à làm-cho chàng-trai hái quả à nghe thấy,So CL-sound whistle be wake-up uh make young-man pick fruit uh hear see
và chàng quay xuống để-ý,and he turn down pay-attentionvà chui xuống đất nhìn-thấy hóa-ra một cái sọt cây của mình đãand cringe down ground see it-turn-out one CL basket fruit of self PASTbiến-mất đâu rồi à,disappear where already uhvà chàng-trai có-vẻ rất-là ngạc-nhiên,and young-man seem very surprisevà và và nhìn-ngó xung-quanh tìm-kiếm.and and and look around search
Và đến đó là câu chuyện chấm-dứt.And to there R/M CL story end.
Uh on a summer noon with beautiful sunshine, it is very cool in a village; around area lot of tree with shades along the village road. There are gardens, or fields around, in themiddle of the village road is a tree with many delicious fruits which are in season. Uh on that
81
summer noon there is a farmer busy picking pears on that fruity tree. And he climbs up thetree, picks bunches of fruits and climbs down and puts them in three big baskets. So uh afterpicking for a while he climbs down and puts (them) into the second basket. So at this pointhe has piled up two baskets. After filling the second basket he climbs up the tree again, veryindustriously. So when he is picking like that, on the village road approach another farmerand his goat which is baeing. They walk pass the tree where the first farmer is picking fruits.When passing the tree, the little goat seems to be paying attention to the delicious fruits in thetwo baskets left under the tree. And he uh seem to want uh to stop to eat the fruits, but theowner tries to pull him away. A while later a boy on a bike approaches. Uh when riding bythe tree the little boy notice that the farmer is very concentrated on picking fruits and notpaying attention to his fruits left under the tree. So the little boy carries one full basket of thefarmer, puts it on the bike, and rides away. And when he has rode a long way out of sight ofthe farmer, ahead of him on the village road there is a little girl also on a bike coming towardhim. And the little girl is also very cute and charming. And when the two bikes approacheach other, the boy turns head to admire the girl. At that time, a fairly strong wind blow theboy’s hat away which then falls on the ground, making the boy startled and loses attention inriding. Therefore his bike unintentionally hits a rock in front of it and he with the bike fallsdown on the ground, which makes the basket pours out and the fruits scatter all over near thefallen bike. At that time, when he raises his head, he hears the whistle of three other boyswho have been going and playing with each other and have just passed by. So three otherboys immediately and very friendly help pick up the fruits for this boy, and put them backinto the basket. Uh after that after the fruits have been picked up, the bike boy immediatelyput them on the bike, and rides away. But not long after, only for one very short distance,about ten or fifteen meters or something, the three other boys whistle to call this boy to showthat he forgets the hat that he has left before. So one of the three boys previously holding atable tennis racket to hit a rock, uh the boy who uses the table tennis racket hold the hat andturn back to give to the bike boy. The bike boy thanks by giving the three boys each a bigand sweet fruit, and asks the table tennis racket boy to bring back, and the table tennis racketboy, like, brings the three fruits back and shares with the other two friends of him each afruit, and the three boys continues, and the bike boy carries the basket and goes away. Uh thethree boys who helps the bike boy later continue to walk on the village road, and back to theexact place of the young man who is picking fruits, uh passing by and whistling. So thewhistle wakes the man who picks fruits and he turns his head down to see, and climbs downto see that one basket has disappeared. He seems very surprised, and he looks aroundsearching for it. And the story ends there.
Speaker 4Ờ thì câu chuyện kể về à hình-như-là về à một quả lê.Uh so CL story tell about uh probably about uh one CL pearBan-đầu thì có một bác trung-niên ăn-bận có giống-như-là người Mêxicô.At-first R/M there one older-man middle-age dress-up there like CL-person MexicoBác đang thu-hoạch lê từ một cây lê rất-là to.Older-man PRES harvest pear from one CL-tree pear very bigThì bác có một cái khăn gọi là khăn chắc của người MêxicôSo older-man have one CL scarf call be scarf probably of CL-person Mexicorất-là đặc-trưng.
82
very typicalThì ban-đầu bác đã có một cái rổ lê rồi,So at-first older-man PAST have one CL basket pear already
thì bác tiếp-tục bác trèo lên để hái tiếp một rổ lê khác.so older-man continue older-man climb up to pick continue one basket pear different
Thì hình-như là có một đứa-bé khác chắc-là con của bác tới để giúpSo it-seem that there one young-kid different probably child of older-man arrive to helpbác chở lê về nhà.older-man transport pear back homeThì lúc nó tới để-mà nó lấy cái giỏ lê nó để lên xe-đạp So when PRO-3rd arrive to PRO-3rd take CL basket pear PRO-3rd put up bikenó chở về,PRO-3rd transport back
thì lúc đó bác kia vẫn-còn đang trên cây lê,R/M time that older-man that still PRES on CL-tree pearbác không biết là nó tới là nó lấy đi rồi.older-man not know that PRO-3rd arrive that he take away already
Thì thằng-bé tiếp-tục là chở dùng cái xe-đạp để chở lê trên đường đi về.So young-boy continue that transport use CL bike to transport pear on road go backThì trên đường đi về thì cái đường rất-là xóc,So on road go back R/M CL road very bumpy
cho-nên là nó chạy,therefore that PRO-3rd runnhưng-mà nó rất cẩn-thận.but PRO-3rd very carefully
Đột-nhiên có một cái đứa-bé đứa-nhỏ con-gái chạy ngang,Suddenly there one CL young-kid small-kid female run by
thì cái anh này mất tập-trung,R/M CL guy this lose concentrationthì không-có giữ được cái giỏ lê,so not keep get-(pos) CL basket pearkhông-có giữ được thăng-bằng của xe,not keep get-(pos) balance of CL-transportationthì-là vướng phải một cục đá á,so trip negative one CL rock thatthì-là chiếc xe lật ngang,so CL transportation flip overthì ờ sau đó là cái nón của cái thằng-bé này nó lật rớt ra,so uh after that R/M CL hat of CL young-boy this PRO-3rd flip fall outrồi nguyên giỏ lê đổ ra đường.then whole basket pear pour out road
Sau đó là tự-nhiên có một đám đứa khác nữa ba thằng con-trai tiếp-tục tới,After that R/M suddenly there a group CL other also three CL male continue come
thì nó thấy cái xe đổ,so PRO-3rd see CL transportation falllê lê rớt ra ngoài,
83
pear pear fall out outsidethì nó tiếc cho thằng này,so PRO-3rd regret for CL thislấy lê bỏ lại trong giỏ,take pear put back in basketđể lên xe,put on transportationrồi tiếp-tục giúp thằng này là lấy lấy lại cái nón rớt trên đường.then continue help CL this that take take back CL hat fall on road
Sau đó là cái thằng đó tiếp-tục chở chở lê tới một chỗ khác,After that R/M CL CL that continue transport transport pear to a place different
thì ba thằng còn-lại hí-ha-hí-hửng trên đường đi về,R/M three CL rest very-happy on road go backthì-là thằng kia tặng cho ba quả lê nữa mỗi thằng một quả ăn,so CL that give-as-a-gift for three CL pear more each CL one fruit eatrồi trên đường đi về thì đi tiếp-tục,then on road go back R/M go continuethì-là đi ngang qua cái bác bố của thằng kia gì-đó,so go past by CL older-man father of CL that or-somethingthì cái ông này tự-nhiên thấy giỏ lê mất-tiêu,so CL old-man this suddenly see basket pear disappearmà-lại có ba cái thằng-nhóc đang cầm lê của mình ăn.but there three CL little-boy PRES hold pear of self eat
Thì không biết là bác nghĩ gì,So not know that older-man think what
nhưng-mà chắc bác nghĩ là “ba thằng này nó ăn-trộm lêbut probably older-man think that three CL this PRO-3rd steal pearcủa nhà mình.”of family self
Rồi?So?Kết-thúc câu chuyện.End CL story
Uh so the story uh seems to be about a pear. At first there is a man of middle agedressing like a Mexican. He is harvesting pears from a very big pear tree. So he has a scarfwhich seems to be typical of Mexicans. So at first he has already had a basket of pears, so hecontinues to climb up to pick another basket. So it seems that another kid probably his soncoming to help him bring pears home. So when he arrives to take the basket of pears and putit on the bike to bring home, uh that time the man is still on the pear tree, he does not knowthat he has come to take it away. So the boy continues to transport the pears home. So on theway home the road is very bumpy, so he rides very carefully. Suddenly there is a little girlriding by, so this boy loses attention, cannot hold the basket of pears and cannot keepbalance, so (he) trips on a rock, so the bike falls over, so uh after that his hat flips and fallsoff, then the whole basket falls off on the ground. After that suddenly there is a group ofthree boys coming, so they see the bike falling and pears falling off, so they feel regret for the
84
boy. (So they) pick pears to put back into the basket and put it on the bike, and then continueto help this boy get his hat back. After that that boy continues to transport the pears toanother place, and three other boys happily go on their way, because that boy give them threepears, each one a pear to eat. Then on their way (they) continue and walk past the man uhfather of that boy. So this man suddenly notice the basket has disappeared and there are threebys holding his pears to eat. So (I) don’t know what he is thinking, but probably he thinksthat “these three boys have stolen my family’s pears.” So. The story ends.
Speaker 5Bắt-đầu chưa?Start yet?Mkay.Mkay.Xong rồi cái cái đoạn phim ý là nó à ở đại-loại như một cái thung-lũng trênSo then CL CL piece movie that R/M PRO-3rd uh at in-general like a CL valley onđồi gì-đấy.hill or-somethingÀm sáng sớm tại-vì là có tiếng gà gáy o o gì-đó.Um morning early because that there sound cock crow o o or-somethingÀ thì cái ông này là chắc-là ông nông-dân ông ý bắc thang hái àUh so CL old-man this be probably old-man farmer old-man that stand ladder pick uhlê ờ.pear uhThì ông ý cũng hì-hục hì-hục thôi,So old-man that also busy busy just
chắc-là làm từ sáng.probably work from morning
Thế-là đại-loại là lúc đầu thì-là hì-hục một lúc thì-là cũng a mỗi lần mà trèoSo in-general R/M while first R/M busy a while R/M also uh each time that climbxuống để để cho lê vào rổ,down to to put pear into basket
thì chắc-là được khoảng một-phần-ba hoặc nửa rổ gì-đấy.R/M probably get-pos approximately one-third or half basket or-something
Thế-là có-vẻ rất-là vất-vả.So seem very-emp strenuousÀ cái lúc mà đang đang được khoảng hơn hơn nửa rổ rồi,Uh CL while that PRES PRES get-pos approximately more more half basket already
thì-là cái tiếng ư con động-vật đi qua,R/M CL sound uh CL animal go bythì hóa-ra là một cái ông chăn dê ông ý đi qua cùng thì à dắt then turn-out that one CL old-man tend goat old-man that go by with so uh leadmột con dê qua.a CL goat by
Thì à ai ai bận việc người đấy thôi,So uh who who busy job person that just
ông ông hái lê thì thì thả lê vào rổ,
85
old-man old-man pick pear R/M R/M drop pear into basketvà còn à kiểm-tra cho đảm-bảo là các quả đều kiểu tròn đầy-đủ and even uh check to ensure that PLU fruit all kind-of round enoughkhông bị dập hỏng-hóc gì-đấy thế-là đều đều vừa-chín-tới,not get-neg batter stale or-something so all all just-ripethế còn ông a dắt dê qua thì cũng đi qua.so and old-man uh lead goat by R/M also go by
Con dê thì chắc-là cũng tò-mò về cái rổ rổ lê,CL goat R/M probably also curious about CL basket basket pear
thì à cũng ngoái lại,so uh also turn backđịnh định hít ngửi gì-đấy,intend intend sniff smell or-somethingnhưng-mà chủ-nhân thì cứ dắt dê đi-theo thế.but owner R/M keep lead goat follow like-that
Thì ông ơ ông hái lê thì cứ cặm-cụi ở ờ trèo lên thang hái,So old-man uh old-man pick pear R/M keep concentrated uh uh climb up ladder pick
rồi lại trèo xuống,then again climb downthì được khoảng hai rổ đầy,so get-pos approximately two basket fullthì-là đang coi-như là hái nốt để được đầy rổ thứ-ba,so PRES kind-of that pick finish to get-pos full basket thirdtại chỉ có ba rổ đấy thôi ấy,‘cause only there three basket that only thatthì chắc-là xong việc thì được về.so probably finish job R/M get-pos go-home
Thì-là lúc đang cặm-cụi hái à à leo thang để hái tiếp lê,So while PRES concentrated pick uh uh climb ladder to pick continue pear
thì-là có thằng-bé con a chắc khoảng tầm tám chín tuổi R/M there young-boy little uh probably approximately about eight nine agegì-đấy à đạp xe-đạp đi qua.or-something uh ride bike go by
Cái xe thì cũng màu đỏ CL transportation R/M also color redThằng-bé thì chắc-là trời nắng nên đội mũ lái xe đạp xe qua,Young-boy R/M probably sky sunny so wear hat ride transportation ride transportation by
thì thấy thấy rổ rổ lê,R/M see see basket basket pearthế-là cu-cậu cũng tò-mò,so the-kid also curiousthế-là à thả xe xuống à,so uh put transportation down uhđứng nhìn lên trên,stand see up onthì thấy ông đang hái lê bận-bịu nên-là chắc không để-ý.
86
R/M see old-man PRES pick pear busy therefore probably not pay-attentionThế-là cậu-bé có-vẻ là nảy-ra ý-định là là là định ờ định ờ đồ chắc-làSo young-boy seem that flash idea that that that intend uh intend uh thing probablyđồ-chùa thì định định ờ xách bớt một rổ về.free-stuff R/M intend intend uh carry less one basket homeThế thì à thế thì cứ ơ tần-ngần một lúc để để ngoái lên nhìn lên nhìn xuống So then uh so then keep uh hesitant a while to to turn-head up see up see downđể xem ông ông ông hái lê ông ý có để-ý gì không.to see old-man old-man old-man pick pear old-man that yes pay-attention anything not
thế-là thằng-bé a xách một rổ lê a cái…so young-boy uh carry one basket pear uh CL…
Cũng may là cái xe-đạp của nó thì lại có-vẻ là cao hơn tức rất-làAlso fortunate that CL bike of PRO-3rd R/M again seem that high more mean very-empcao,high
thế cho-nên-là chỉ vừa để để để cho nó đạp thôi thế,so therefore only enough to to to for PRO-3rd ride only therethế nhưng mà rất may là cái cái trước của cái bánh ấy thì nó có một cáiso but very fortunate that CL before of CL wheel that R/M PRO-3rd have a CLgiá-đỡ.hanger
Thế-là lúc đầu thì em còn thắc-mắc,So time first R/M I-younger still wonder
không hiểu làm-sao cái rổ lê nó to như thế,not understand why CL basket pear PRO-3rd big like thatmà nó đầy,and PRO-3rd fullkhông biết làm-sao mà nó có-thể mang mang lên xe-đạp được,not know why that PRO-3rd can bring bring up bike get-posthì-là tại-vì cái phía bánh trước nó có một cái cái giá-đỡ,that because CL direction wheel front PRO-3rd have one CL CL hangerthế-là nó để hẳn cái rổ lê lên đấy.so PRO-3rd put all CL basket pear on that
Thế sau thì thì-là nó hì-hục một lúc,So after R/M R/M PRO-3rd busy a while
thì cũng cho được rổ lê lên,R/M also let get-pos basket pear updựng được xe lên,set-up get-pos transportation upthì rồi bắt-đầu đạp xe chắc-là quay-lại về nhà hoặc-là đâu-đó,R/M then start ride transportation probably return back home or somewhere-elseđể để thả cái rổ lê [laugh] lấy-trộm được.to to drop CL basket pear steal get-pos
Thế trong cả cái lúc mà nó cất rổ lên lên trên xe,So during also CL time that PRO-3rd put-away basket up up on transportation
thì ông hái lê ông ý vẫn cặm-cụi hái lê ở trên cao,
87
R/M old-man pick pear old-man that still busy pick pear at on hightại-vì-là thang thì bắc cao lên,because ladder R/M set-up high upmà chắc-là vừa phải cẩn-thận cho khỏi ngã,but probably simultaneously must careful to not fallvừa chọn được lê quả lê nó đúng đúng cỡ ấy,simultaneously select get-pos pear CL pear PRO-3rd right right size thatcho-nên-là ông ấy không biết gì không biết gì hết.so old-man that not know what not know what anything
Thế-là thằng-bé đang đi rất-là hí-hửng đạp xe qua một kiểu-như-làSo young-kid PRES go very happy ride transportation by one kind-ofđoạn đất cũng bằng-bằng thôi-à,passage dirt also flat just
cỏ dại mọc hai bên phủ đầy,grass wild grow two side cover fullthì-là có một con bé-gái cũng đạp xe qua ngược đường.R/M there one CL young-female also ride transportation by opposite way
Thế-là chắc-là do cu-cậu mất tập-trung,So probably because young-boy lose attention
vì thấy là có cô bé-gái xinh-đẹp ừ đạp xe qua,because see that there CL young-female beautiful uh ride transportation bythế-là không để-ý.therefore not pay-attention
Thì đang mải nhìn lại về hướng cô-bé lúc hai đứa đi qua nhau ấy,So PRES busy look again back direction young-girl time two CL go pass each-other that
thì-là không để-ý trên đường nhìn đường,R/M not pay-attention on road look waythế-là vấp-phải một cục đá rất-là to,R/M trip-on a CL rock very bigthế-là ngã kềnh xuống,therefore fall whole downcho-nên-là lê-liếc là bay tứ-tung khắp-nơi.therefore pear-and-things R/M fly scatter all-around
Thế-là cu-cậu đang ngồi ờ phủi chân,So young-boy PRES sit uh brush-off leg
rồi thì phủi quần-áo,then then brush-off clothesrồi mới bắt-đầu lễ-mễ đứng dậy,then just start heavily stand upchắc-là tại-vì ngã chắc-là cũng bị xước một chút,probably because fall probably also get-neg scratch a littlecho-nên cũng tập-tễnh một chút.therefore also limp a little
Thì đang coi-như-là lò-dò ngồi dưới đất để phủi cát,So PRES kind-of busy sit down ground to brush-off sand
thì-là có ba thằng-bé cũng tầm tuổi đấy thôi đang đi chơi lang-thang,
88
R/M there three young-boy also about age that only PRES go play wanderchắc-là mùa-hè cho-nên chúng-nó không phải đi học,probably summer therefore they not must go studythì-là đang đi chơi lang-thang.R/M PRES go play wander
Thế-là chúng-nó thấy đứa-bé này ngã,So they see young-kid this fall
thì-là nó dừng-lại,R/M PRO-3rd stopnó giúp nó giúp cho nhặt hết lê cho-vào rổ,PRO-3rd help PRO-3rd help for pick all pear into basketrồi nó giúp dựng xe lên,then PRO-3rd help set-up bike uprồi đỡ dậy,then help set-up-rightrồi thì đặt lê lên rổ giúp cho thằng-bé kia.then then put pear on basket help for young-boy thatthì à đại-loại là cũng biết-ơn.so uh in-general that also grateful
Thế-là cầm xe,So hold transportation
chắc-là do ngã đau,probably because fall hurtcho-nên-là không thể nào mà đạp xe được-nữa,therefore not able how that ride transportation anymorethế cho-nên-là cu-cậu tập-tễnh dắt xe với rổ lê ở trên,so therefore young-boy limp walk transportation with basket pear at onrồi định đi về nhà thôi.then intend go back home only
Thế nhưng-mà xong cái lúc mà khi đạp xe ngang qua cùng với So but then when time that when ride transportation pass by also withcô-bé ấy,young-girl that
thì à tại-vì gió thổi mát,R/M uh because wind blow coolnên cái mũ nó bay nữa,therefore CL hat PRO-3rd fly alsothế-là à chính vì thế nên mới ngoái lại sau,therefore uh exactly because that therefore just turn back behindthì-là nó bị ngã,R/M PRO-3rd get-neg fallthì-là lúc mà chắc-là do đau quá,R/M when that probably because hurt too-muchnên không để-ý là là phải quay lại nhặt mũ.therefore not pay-attention that that must turn back pick hat
Thế cu-cậu cứ tiếp-tục dắt xe với rổ lê lếch-thếch đi về nhà,
89
So young-boy keep continue walk transportation with basket pear untidy go back homeThì ba thằng-bé đấy tại-vì nó đi đi hướng ngược lại,So three young-boy that because PRO-3rd go go direction opposite back
cho-nên lúc đang đi trên đường nó nhìn-thấy cái mũ,therefore when PRES go on road PRO-3rd see CL hatcho-nên nó huýt-sáo va quay lại nó,therefore PRO-3rd whistle and turn back PRO-3rd
rồi một thằng-bé nó đưa nó cầm mũ quay lại cho,then one young-boy PRO-3rd give PRO-3rd hold hat turn back forthì nó đưa lại cho mũ.so PRO-3rd give back for hat
Thì thằng-bé à mà ăn-cắp rổ lê thì-là đại-loại-là đưa à kiểu-như đáp-lễ cảm-ơn.So young-boy uh that steal basket pear R/M in-general give uh kind-of thank thank
thì-là đưa ba quả lê cho thằng-bé nó đưa mũ cho mình,R/M give three CL pear for young-boy PRO-3rd give hat for selfrồi thì-là ai về đường nấy.then so who back way that
Thằng-bé cầm có rổ lê thì với xe-đạp thì lếch-thếch a coi-như tập-tễnh Young-boy hold have basket pear R/M with bike R/M untidy uh kind-of limpdắt dắt xe với cả rổ lê về nhà.walk walk transportation with also basket pear back homeCòn thì cậu-bé kia thì quay lại với hai đứa bạn hoặc-là anh-em gì-đấy,And so young-boy that R/M turn back with two CL friend or brother or-something
đưa cho mỗi người một quả lê,give to every person one CL pearrồi hai đứa đại-loại lau qua-qua ở áo,then two CL in-general clean careless at shirtrồi thì lại tiếp-tục coi-như-là tiếp-tục đi chơi coi-như tiếp-tục cái hành-trìnhthen then again continue kind-of continue go play kind-of continue CL adventuređi chơi à đi chơi hoặc đi đâu-đó thôi.go play uh go play or go somewhere only
Cái lúc mà cái ông hái lê ông ý đầy đầy đầy túi rồi,CL time that CL old-man pick pear old-man that full full pocket already
ông ý xuống,old-man that downthì-là ông ý bắt-đầu định bắt-đầu định thả lê vào cái rổ thứ-ba,so old-man that start intend start intend drop pear into CL basket thirdthì mới rất-là ngạc-nhiên,R/M just very surprisebắt-đầu lẩm-nhẩm đếm lại.start mumble count again
Thì-là chắc-là ông ý mới nhận-ra là mình rõ-là có ba rổ,So probably old-man that just realize that self clearly have three basket
mà bây-giờ chỉ còn có hai rổ thôi.but now only left there two basket only
Cái rổ đầy đã mất rồi cái rổ chỉ có một rổ lê đầy,
90
CL basket full PAST lose already CL basket only there one basket pear fullcòn một rổ nữa thì đang chờ để để đổ lê vào.and one basket more R/M PRES wait to to pour pear into
Ống đang ngơ-ngẩn đang ngạc-nhiên là,That-old-man PRES astounded PRES surprise that
không biết là tại-sao cái rổ lê nó lại biến đi đâu mất,not know that why CL basket pear PRO-3rd again disappear go where losethì ba cái thằng-bé kia bắt-đầu nó đi lại theo cái hướng đấy,R/M three CL young-boy that start PRO-3rd go back toward CL direction thatnó tạt qua,PRO-3rd pass bymỗi đứa thì đang gặm quả lê rất-là ngon-lành đi qua,each CL R/M PRES munch CL pear very yummy go bykhông biết trời đất gì cả,not know heaven earth what allnó vừa đi vừa chơi thôi,PRO-3rd simultaneously go simultaneously play onlykhông a không để-ý gì,not uh not pay-attention whatcòn cái ông hái lê thì ông ý cứ tẩn-ngẩn,and CL old-man pick pear R/M old-man that keep bedazzleống không biết là là cái rổ lê kia đâu,that-old-man not know that that CL basket pear that wheretrong-khi ba cái thằng-bé này thì nó cứ nó đi qua,during three CL young-boy this R/M PRO-3rd keep PRO-3rd go bynó đi chơi-bời,PRO-3rd go playvà trong trong tay thì cầm gặm-nhấm quả lê,and in in hand R/M hold munch CL pearcũng không biết là có-phải là lê của mình không,also not know that yes be pear of self not
Thì-là đến lúc đấy thì-là … hết. [laugh]So arrive time that R/M … end
Start now? Mkay. So then the movie is in a, like, a valley on the hill or something.Um it’s early morning because there is the sound of cock crowing. Uh so this old manprobably a farmer sets up a ladder to pick pears. So he is quite busy working hard, (he)probably has worked from morning. So at first (he) is very busy; each time he climbs downto put pears into the basket, it is probably for one third or half the basket. So it seems to be avery strenuous job. Uh when (he) has got about more than half of a basket, there is a sound ofan animal going by, (it) turns out it is a goat owner going by with a goat. So each man is busywith his own job; the pear picker drops pears into baskets and checks to see if they arewithout scratches and just ripe enough, and the goat owner leads the goat passing by. Thegoat is probably curious about the basket of pears, so (it) turns back to sniff them, but theowner keeps pulling him away. So the pear picker keeps working hard climbing up the ladderto pick pears and climbing down. Now he has got about two full baskets, so he kind of
91
continues to pick the third basket, because there are only three baskets there, and perhapswhen (he) finishes (he) can go home. So when (he) busy picking uh climbing up the ladder topick more pears, there is a little boy about eight or nine years old or something riding a bikeby. The bike is red. The boy, probably because it is sunny, wears a hat to ride the bike. (Theboy) see the basket of pears, so he is also curious, so (he) put the bike down and looks up tosee that the man is picking pears and not paying attention. So the boy seems to intend to uhfree stuff so to carry one basket home. So (he) stands thinking for a while turning head up tosee if the pear picker pays attention or not, so the boy carries a basket uh. It’s fortunate thathis bike is also higher uh very high so therefore there is only enough for him to ride, but it’svery fortunate that on the front wheel there is a hanger. So at first I still wonder why thebasket big like that, full like that, uh, (I) don’t know why he can bring it up on the bike. (It)turns out because in the front wheel there is a hanger, so he put it right there. So after he triesa little bit, he manages to put the basket up, set the bike up, then starts to ride it back perhapsback home or somewhere to drop the basket. So during all the time he put the basket on thebike, the pear picker is still very busy picking pears up on the tree, because the ladder is high,and probably because (he) has to be careful not to fall and to select the pears of the right size,so he does not know anything. So when the boy is riding very happily through a flat roadwith grass growing wildly high on the sides, there is a little girl also riding bike goes on theopposite way. So probably because the boy loses attention because of the beautiful girl ridingby, so (he) doesn’t pay attention. So when (he) is busy looking back at the girl when theypass each other, (he) does not notice the road, so (he) trips on a very big rock, so (he) fallright over, therefore pears and things scatter all over. So the boy is sitting and brushing offhis leg, then his clothes, then stands up with difficulty, probably because he gets somescratches, therefore (he) limps a little bit. So when (he) is kind of busy sit on the ground tobrush off the dust, there are three boys also of the same age who are playing and wanderingaround, probably because it’s summer so they don’t have to go to school, so (they) gowandering around. So they see this boy fall, so they stop to help pick all of the pears to putinto the basket, then they help set the bike up right, then help him get up, then put the pearinto basket for the boy, so (the bike boy) is kind of grateful. So (he) holds the bike, probablybecause (he) is hurt, therefore (he) is not able to ride the bike any more, therefore he walksthe bike with the basket, limping on the way home. So but when (he) rode by the girl,because the wind blows cool, therefore the hat is blown away, there, so, exactly because ofthat (he) turn his head, so he fell, so when probably because (he) is hurt too much, therefore(he) forgets to turn back to pick the hat. So he keeps walking the bike home. So the threeboys uh because they on their way they see the hat, therefore they whistle and turn back to uhone boy gives back the hat. So the boy who steals the basket of pears kind of uh pays backthanks so gives three pears to the boy who gives him his hat, then each goes on their way.The boy who has the basket of pears with his bike goes bask home limping. And the otherboy returns to his friends or brothers, gives each of them a pear. Then those two kind ofbrush them off, then they all continue their uh adventure. When the pear picker has filled hispocket, he comes down, so he is going to drop the pears into the third basket when he is verysurprised and counts the baskets again. So probably he just realizes that obviously he hasthree baskets but now there are only two. The full basket has gone uh there is one full basketleft, and another basket which is waiting for the pears. While he is bewildered that the baskethas disappeared, the three boys start walking by each eating a pear very happily and knowing
92
nothing. They don’t pay attention (to the man) at all, but the pear picker keeps wonderingwhere the basket is and thinking if the pears they are eating are his or not. So (it) ends there.
Speaker 6Chuyện là ở trong một cái à đại-loại là đây là khu ờ một khu rừng ấy,Story that at in one CL uh in-general be this be area uh one CL forest that
nó không hẳn là rừng đâu,PRO-3rd not really be forest nonhưng-mà có một ông nông-dân đang hái hoa quả.but there one old-man farmer PRES pick flower fruit
Thế-là ông-ta thì cứ say-sưa hái hoa quả,So he R/M keep busy pick flower fruit
và hiện-tại thì ống đã hái được hai sọt để dưới rồi.and present R/M that-old-man PAST pick get-pos two basket put under already
Thì trong-lúc hái thì có một người có một người đàn-ông dắt một con dê đi qua.So during pick R/M there one person there one person male walk one CL goat go byThì thật-ra thì con dê nó cũng ngoái nhìn những cái quả có-vẻ thèm-thuồng,So in-fact R/M CL goat PRO-3rd also turn look PLU CL fruit seem crave
nhưng-mà nó không hề động-chạm gì vào những cái quả đấy,but PRO-3rd not at-all touch what to PLU CL fruit thatnó cứ đi qua,PRO-3rd keep go bynó đi tiếp.PRO-3rd go continue
Thì người nông-dân vẫn cứ tiếp-tục hái.So CL farmer still keep continue pickThế lại có một cậu-bé đi xe-đạp đi qua nữa.So again there one little-boy ride bike go by alsoThế rồi cậu-ta thấy những cái quả.So then he see PLU CL fruitThế-là lúc đầu cậu tính cậu lấy một quả,So time first CL think CL take one fruit
nhưng-mà sau rồi là nghĩ thế-nào cậu xách luôn cả một giỏ cậu đi. [laugh]but after then that think how CL carry also whole one basket CL go
Vì là đi xe-đạp nên-là khi mà trên đường cậu đi khi cậu ấy lấy,Because that ride bike therefore when that on road CL go when CL that take
thì người nông-dân là không hề biết là-vì ông ấy vẫn đang hái quả.R/M CL farmer R/M not at-all know because old-man that still PRES pick fruit
Thế-là khi mà cậu ấy đi trên đường đối-diện thì có một người cô-bé,So when that CL that go on road opposite R/M there one person young-girlđi xe-đạp đối-diện nữa.ride bike opposite alsoThì đi qua thì thì khi mà đi qua thì cũng may thì nó gió ấy.So go by R/M R/M when that go by R/M also fortunate so PRO-3rd wind thatRồi là cậu bé ngoái nhìn một cái cô-bé đấy,Then that young-boy turn-head look one CL young-girl that
93
thế-nên là cái mũ của cậu bé nó rơi,therefore that CL hat of young-boy PRO-3rd fallthế-là trong lúc đấy thì-là có một viên đá đằng trước,therefore while time that R/M there one CL rock direction beforethế-là cậu va vào cái viên đá đấy,therefore CL crash into CL CL rock thatthế-là ngã xe ngã,therefore fall transportation fallthì rơi hết các cái cái củ quả đấy ra.so fall all PLU CL CL CL fruit that out
Thế-là đang nhặt những cái quả đấy,So PRES pick PLU PLU fruit that
thì có ba cậu-bé nữa đi ngược đường đi lại,R/M there three young-boy also go opposite way go backthì-là à thấy cậu-bé này đang a nhặt quả,so uh see young-boy this PRES uh pick fruitthì cũng giúp-hộ.so also help
Thế-là giúp cho cậu bé này xong thì cậu-ta đi tiếp.So help for young-boy this finish R/M he go continueNhưng-mà các cái mm ba cái cậu bé này cũng đi.But PLU CL mm three CL young-boy this also goNói-chung là cậu bé này là không hề là đưa cho ba cậu này một cái quả nàoIn-general that young-boy this R/M not at-all that give for three CL this one CL fruit anygọi là để cảm-ơn,call that to thank
mà vẫn cứ thế cầm giỏ quả đi tiếp.but still keep like-that hold basket fruit go continue
Thì khi mà đi được một đoạn thì những cái cậu bé này thấy cái mũ của So when that go get-pos one passage R/M PLU CL young-boy this see CL hat ofcậu-bé kia rơi.young-boy that fallThế-nên một cậu-bé mới cầm cái mũ đấy lại trả cho gọi cái cậu kia để trả cho.Therefore one young-boy just hold CL hat that back return for call CL CL that to return forThì khi mà thấy cậu-bé đấy trả cho cái mũ,So when that see young-boy that return for CL hat
thì cậu-bé này mới nghĩ thế-nào,R/M young-boy this just think howmới đưa cho cậu-bé đấy ba quả để cảm-ơn các bạn đấy,just give for young-boy that three fruit to thank PLU friend thatrồi lại đi tiếp.then again go continue
Thế-là ba cậu này lại tiếp-tục đi,So three CL this again continue go
đi thì đi qua một cái lại đi qua cái đường mà có thấy,go so go by one CL again go by CL way that yes see
94
người nông-dân đang hái quả.CL farmer PRES pick fruit
Thế-là anh a lúc đấy thì anh-ta vừa xuống xuống So he uh time that R/M he just down down
để bỏ những quả anh-ta vừa hái được vào giỏ tiếp to put PLU fruit he just pick get-pos into basket continuethì ánh phát-hiện ra là mất một quả à mất một giỏ R/M he discover out that lose one fruit uh lose one basket
Thì đồng-thời lại thấy ba cái cậu-bé đấy cầm ba cái quả đấy đi qua So simultaneously again see three CL young-boy that hold three CL fruit that go by
nên-là cũng phân-vân [laugh]therefore also wonder
Chuyện có vậy thôi.Story have like-that only.
The story is that uh in a uh kind of a forest, not really a forest but there is a farmerpicking fruits. So he is busy picking fruits, and at this point he has already picked twobaskets full which are put at the foot of the tree. So while (he) is picking there is a manleading a goat passing by. Actually the goat does turn to look at the fruits cravingly, but itskeeps walking by. So the farmer keeps picking fruits. Then there is a boy riding by. Then hesees the fruits. Then at first he intends to take one fruit, but then after (he) thinking he takes awhole basket. Because he rides a bike, the farmer doesn’t know that he has taken the basket.So when he is on his way, in front of him there is a girl riding a bike too. So when (they) passby each other, it is fortunate uh there is a wind. Then the boy turns head to watch the girl, sohis hat fall off, so at that point there is a rock in front of him, so he trips on that rock, so hefalls off, so all of the fruits pour out. So while picking the fruits, there are three other boyswalking from the opposite direction, seeing that this boy is picking fruits, they come to help.So after helping this boy, he continues his way. But these three boys also walk away. Thisboy does not give any fruit to the three boys to thank at all, but keeps carrying the basketaway. So after walking for a while these boys see the hat of this boy. So one boy brings thehat back to that boy. So when seeing that that boy returns the hat, this boy thinks a bit thengives three fruits to thank the friends, then continues to walk away. So these three boyscontinue their way, then pass the road that the farmer picking is at. So he uh that time he hasjust come down to put the fruits he has just picked into the next basket, an he discovers thatone basket has gone. So at the same time (he) sees the three boys carrying three fruits goingby, so he wonders… The story is just like that.
Speaker 7À anh kể cho Hiếu một cái đoạn video.Uh I-male-older tell for Hieu one CL piece videoÀ mm mở-đầu cái đoạn video này là một cái hình-ảnh một người đàn-ông.Uh mm open CL piece video this be one CL image one CL manÀ anh-ta trèo lên một cái cây,Uh he climb up one CL tree
và thu-hoạch những cái quả như quả ổi.and havest PLU CL fruit like CL guava
95
Thì mỗi khi anh-ta thu-hoạch được anh-ta cho vào trong một cái túi ở trong áo,So every when he harvest get-pos he put into in one CL pocket at in shirt
và mỗi khi cái túi đầy thì anh-ta lại trèo xuống,and every when CL pocket full R/M he again climb downvà đưa những quả ổi đấy vào một cái sọt để sẵn ở bên-dưới.and carry PLU CL guava that into one CL basket put given at under
Thì m khi mà anh-ta trèo lên đưa xuống lần thứ-nhất,So m when that he climb up carry down time first
lần thứ-hai thì anh-ta trèo lên cái thang,time second R/M he climb up CL ladderthì-là cảnh xen-kẽ là có một người đàn-ông dắt theo một con dê,R/M scene interrupt that there one CL man walk along one CL goatđi ngang qua đấy.go pass by that
À sau đó thì thì có một cái cậu-bé cậu đi một cái xe-đạp đến à,Uh after that R/M R/M there one CL young-boy CL go one CL bike arrive uh
và cậu-bé có-vẻ như-là cậu bé là cái người chuyên để chở những and young-boy seem like young-boy be CL person professional to transport PLUcái giỏ như cái cái thùng quả này à chở về nhà thế.CL basket like CL CL barrel fruit this uh transport back home there,
Thì khi cậu-bé đến à người đàn ông thì vẫn ở trên cao và lúi-húi hái quả,So when young-boy arrive uh CL man R/M still at on high and busy pick fruit
thì cậu-bé cứ đặt cái xe xuống,R/M young-boy keep put CL transportation downvà bắt-đầu bê cái cái thùng quả lên cái xe,and start carry CL CL barrel fruit up CL transportationvà chở đi.and transport away
À nó đi đường thì nó có một cái cảnh rất-là hay là cậu-béUh PRO-3rd go way R/M PRO-3rd have one CL scene very interesting be young-boyđi ngang qua một cái cô-gái cũng chạc chạc tuổi như thế,go pass by one CL young-woman also same same age like that
và thế-là chú-bé cũng có gì-đấy là bị để-ý đến cô-gái,and so young-boy also have something be get-neg pay-attention to young-womanvà cơn gió nó thổi qua bay mất cái mũ,and CL wind PRO-3rd blow by fly lose CL hatvà ngay sau đấy thì-là đâm vào một cái hòn đá rất-là to ở giữa đường.and immediate after that R/M crash into one CL CL rock very big in middle road
Thì khi bị đâm vào đấy thì cậu-bé bị ngã xuống,So when get-neg crash into there R/M young-boy get-neg fall down
và cái giỏ quả nó đổ đổ hết xuống đường.and CL basket fruit PRO-3rd pour pour all down road
Thì ờ may là ở đấy thì có ba ba cậu ờ cũng tuổi như thế,So uh fortunate be in there R/M there three three CL uh also age like that
thì-là giúp nhặt những cái quả này cho vào trong cái giỏ,R/M help pick PLU CL fruit this put into in CL basket
96
và đặt lên xe giúp cho cậu-bé,and put up transportation help for young-boyvà cậu-bé lại tiếp-tục ờ lần này thì dắt cái xe về.and young-boy again continue uh time this R/M walk CL transportation back
Và khi thì ba cái cậu nhỏ kia thì lại vẫn đi tiếp-tục đi trên cái đường đấy,And when so three CL CL little that R/M again still go continue go on CL road that
và thấy cái mũ thì các cậu nhặt cái mũ,and see CL hat R/M PLU CL pick CL hatvà trả lại cho cho cậu-bé kia.and return back for for young-boy that
Thì để cám-ơn thì cậu-bé đưa lại cho những người bạn nhỏ đấy thì-là ba quả So to thank R/M young-boy give back for PLU CL friend little that so three CLổi chẳng-hạn.guava for-exampleAnh gọi là quả ổi.I-male-older call be CL guavaÀ thì cái cảnh như thế thì nó rất-là vui-vẻ giữa hai bên ấy.Uh so CL scene like that R/M PRO-3rd very happy between two side thatThì-là mấy cậu-bé này vừa đi.So PLU young-boy this simultaneous goCái đoạn-kết là mấy câu-bé vừa đi vừa ăn những quả ổi rất-là CLending be PLU young-boy simultaneous go simultaneous eat PLU CL guava veryngon-lành,delicious
và đi ngang qua cái cái chỗ người đàn-ông đang hái quả,and go pass by CL CL place CL man PRES pick fruitthì người đàn-ông đang hái quả lúc này thì bắt-đầu trèo từ trên cây xuống,R/M CL man PRES pick fruit time this R/M start climb from on tree downnhìn-thấy ơ chỉ còn có hai cái giỏ thôi,see uh only left there two CL basket onlythì có-thể là cũng thắc-mắc là không biết là cái giỏ kia làso perhaps that also wonder that not know that CL basket that beđược à được chuyển đi từ lúc-nào,get-pos uh get-pos move away from whenvà lúc đấy thì ngang qua là ba cậu-bé.and time that R/M pass by be three young-boy
Và à đấy là cái đoạn-kết của cái cái phim của cái đoạn video clip đấy.And uh that be CL ending of CL CL film of CL piece video clip thatHết.End
Uh I tell Hieu about a video clip. Uh the opening of this video clip is the scene of aman. He climbs up a tree and harvest the fruits which look like guavas. Every time when hegets a guava he puts it into a pocket on his shirt, and whenever the pocket is full he climbsdown to put them into a basket. So when he climbs up and brings down the guavas for thefirst time, the second time he climbs up the tree, uh the intervening scene is that there is a
97
man leading a goat passing by. Uh after that there is a boy riding a bike, and it seems like heis the person to transport the baskets like those basket back home. So when the boy arrivesthe man is still up in the tree picking fruits, the boy puts the bike down, and starts carryingthe basket up on the bike and transports it away. Uh on his way there is an interesting scenethat the boy goes past a girl of the same age and so he kind of pays attention to her and thewind blows his hat away, and immediately after that (he) bumps into a very big rock in themiddle of the road. So when (he) bumps into the rock he falls down, and the basket pours allover. So uh it’s fortunate that there are three boys of the same age who help pick up thosefruits and put them into the basket and put up on the bike for the boy, and the boy continues,uh, this time, walking the bike home. And when uh the three boys keep walking on the roadand see the hat, they pick up the hat, and return to the other boy. So to thank, the boy givesback to the little friends three guavas, for example, uh I call them guavas. Uh that scene isvery happy for the two sides. So these boy walk eating the guavas. The ending is that theseboys walk eating the guavas very happily and pass by the man who is picking pears, so theman who is picking pears, at this point, starts climbing down from the tree to see that thereare only two baskets, so probably wonders that uh does not know when that basket wascarried away, and at that point, three boys pass by. And uh that is the end of the video clip.The end.
Speaker 8Mm cái đoạn phim này kể về một à anh nông-dân.Mm CL piece film this tell about one uh CL farmerThì anh-ta ở trên rừng họ trồng quả,So he in on forest they grow fruit
hình-như là quả táo hay quả gì-đó.probably that CL apple or CL something
Thì một hôm anh-ta đi à nhặt đi bứt quả táo vào trong cái giỏ,So one day he go uh pick go pluck CL apple into in CL basket
thì anh-ấy trèo lên trên cao để bứt táo.R/M he climb up on high to pluck apple
Và nói-chung khi ánh trèo lên cao thì không nhìn-thấy người đi qua lại dưới đường.And in-general when he climb up high R/M not see person go by back under roadThì anh-ta bứt được hai cái rổ táo thì đặt ở dưới đường,So he pluck get-pos two CL basket apple so put on under road
và lên bứt rổ thứ-ba.and up pluck basket third
Thì trong-khi bứt táo thì có một vài người qua lại,So during pluck apple R/M there one some person by back
và trong đó có một đứa-trẻ đi cái xe-đạp đến,and in that there one young-kid ride CL bike arrivevà nhìn-thấy anh-ta đang ở trên cây cao,and see he PRES in on tree highvà đứa-trẻ này nó lấy đi một giỏ táo,and young-kid this PRO-3rd take away one basket applevà ông-ta không biết.and he-old not know
98
Sau đó thì đứa-trẻ này đi một đoạn,After that R/M young-kid this go one passage
thì gặp một cô-bé.R/M meet one young-girl
Gặp một cô-bé thì nó nhìn cái cô-bé,Meet one young-girl R/M PRO-3rd see CL young-girl
và chẳng-may cái mũ nó bay đi,and unfortunate CL hat PRO-3rd fly awayvà húc vào hòn đá,and crash into CL rockvà ngã xuống.and fall dow
Thì ngã xuống.So fall downThì sau đó lại thấy ba đứa-trẻ khác đi ngang qua,So after that again see three little-kid different go pass by
thì thấy vậy,so see thatthì nhặt táo cho nó,so pick apple for PRO-3rd
và nó cảm-ơn,and PRO-3rd thankvà đi.and go
Nhưng sau đó ba đứa-trẻ này lại nhìn-thấy cái mũ của nó bay ra,But after that three little-kid this again see CL hat of PRO-3rd fly out
và cầm mang lại à trả lại cho nó,and hold bring back uh return back for PRO-3rd
và nó thấy thấy thế,and PRO-3rd see see thatcho-nên nó lấy ba quả táo và cám-ơn mấy ba đứa này,therefore PRO-3rd take three CL apple and thank PLU three CL thisvà ba đứa này cầm táo vừa ăn vừa đi,and three CL this hold apple simultaneous eat simultaneous govà đi ngược trở lại cái chiều đó,and go opposite return back CL direction thatđi ngược trở-lại cái chỗ anh cái ông nông-dân đang bứt go opposite return CL place CL-male-young CL CL-male-old farmer PRES plucktáo.apple
Và khi ông-ta xuống,And when he down
bứt xong rổ táo mới đi xuống,pluck finish basket apple just go downthì nhìn-thấy mất đi một rổ táo,so see lose away one basket apple
99
và nhìn-thấy ba đứa-trẻ đang cầm ba quả táo,and see three little-kid PRES hold three CL applevừa ăn vừa đi ngang.simultaneous eat simultaneous go by
Và ông-ta cũng không biết là chuyện gì xảy-ra nữa.And he also not know that story what happen anyVà đến đó là kết-thúc câu chuyện.And arrive there that end CL story.
Mm this short film is about a farmer. So he is in the forest where they grow fruits,perhaps apples or something. So one day when he goes to pick apples to put into a basket, uhhe climbs up to pick apples. And when he is up in the tree (he) cannot see people going downon the road. So when he has filled up two baskets and out them on the ground, (he) climbs upto pick the third basket. So while (he) is picking there are some people walking by, amongwhom is one boy riding a bike, and (he) sees that he is in the tree, and this kid takes onebasket away, and he does not know. Then when this kid has gone for a while, he meets a girl.Meeting the girl, uh he watches the girl, and unfortunately the hat blows away, and (he) hits arock, and falls down. So (he) falls down. Then after that (he) sees three other kids walkingby, so (they) see that, (they) pick the apples up for him, and he thanks, and goes away. Butafter that these three kids see his hat that was blown away, and bring it back to him, andwhen he sees that, therefore he gives three apples to them as his thanks, and these three kidswalk away eating the apples, back to the place of the farmer who is picking pear. And whenhe gets down, finishing the basket then goes down, so (he) sees that one basket is lost, andsees the three kids eating the apples walking by. And he does not know what happened. Andthe story ends there.
Speaker 9Ờ câu chuyện là như sau.Uh CL story be like followingBuổi trong một buổi-sáng thì có một ông-lão nông-dân đang hái quả lê ở cánh đồng.Day in one morning R/M there one old-man farmer PRES pick CL pear in CL farmThì ông-ấy cứ trèo lên cây hái quả,So he keep climb up tree pick fruit
và trèo xuống,and climb downbỏ những quả hái được vào cái sọt ở phía dưới.put PLU fruit pick get-pos into CL basket in direction down
Thì một lúc sau khi ông ấy đang ở trên cây ấy,So one while after when old-man that PRES in on tree that
thì có một chàng thanh-niên dắt một con lừa đi ngang qua.R/M there one CL young-guy walk one CL donkey go pass by
Ông ấy nghĩ rằng chàng thanh-niên này có-thể lấy quả lê của ông ấy,Old-man that think that CL young-guy this able take CL pear of old-man that
nên ông ấy nhìn xuống.therefore old-man that look down
[lúc ấy ông ấy đang ở trên cây à?]
100
[time that old-man that PRES in on tree right?]À lúc ấy ông ấy đang ở trên cây,Uh time that old-man that PRES in on tree
và nhìn xuống,and look downthì thấy chàng thanh-niên này chẳng làm gì cả,R/M see CL young-guy this not do what at-allvà dắt lừa đi qua thôi.and walk donkey go by only
Ờm một lúc sau thì lại có một ờ cậu trẻ-con một đứa-trẻ đạp xe qua,Umm one while after R/M again there one uh CL little one little-kid ride transportation by
thì ông này nghĩ rằng ông này ờ không nhìn xuống dưới nữa,so old-man this think that old-man this uh not look down under any-morevì nghĩ rằng sẽ chẳng có ai lấy quả của ông ấy.because think that will not yes who take fruit of old-man that
Thế nhưng-mà cậu-bé đến,There but young-boy arrive
và thấy ông ấy lúi-húi ở trên cây,and see old-man that busy in on treevà xách cả một cái sọt xách cả một cái sọt quả lê,and carry whole one CL basket carry whole one CL basket CL pearnó bỏ lên xe-đạp,PRO-3rd put on bikevà chở đi mất.and transport away lose
Ờm cậu này đi được một đoạn,Umm CL this go get-pos one passage
thì gặp một cái xe-đạp ngược chiều,R/M meet one CL bike opposite directionvà làm bay mũ của cậu ấy.and make fly hat of CL that
Vì bay mũ,Because fly hat
cho-nên cậu ấy quay lại,therefore CL that return backnhìn theo cái mũ,look follow CL hatvà húc vào một hòn một cái tảng đá rất to ở trên đường,and crash into one CL one CL CL rock very big in on roadnên bị ngã,therefore get-neg fallkhiến cho cái sọt lê ờm rơi tung-tóe ra ngoài đường.make for CL basket pear uh fall scatter out outside road
Thì một lúc sau thì cậu ấy bị còn đang chẳng biết làm thế-nào,So one while after R/M CL that get-neg still PRES not know do how
thì có ba đứa-trẻ khác đi ngang qua,
101
R/M there three little-kid different go pass byvà ba đứa-trẻ này nó giúp cậu này,and three little-kid this PRO-3rd help CL thisthu-dọn cái đám quả lê đấy vào trong sọt,tidy-up CL bunch CL pear that into in basketvà xách lên xe để cậu ấy chở đi.and carry up transportation to CL that transport away
Ờ đi được một đoạn ấy thì mấy đứa-trẻ này lại thấy chiếc mũ ờm Uh go get-pos one passage there R/M PLU little-kid this again see CL hat ummchiếc mũ của cậu-bé,CL hat of young-boy[cậu ấy làm rơi lúc trước, đúng không?][CL that make fall while before, right not?]
thấy được cái mũ ấy,see get-pos CL hat thatthế mới cầm cái mũ lên,so just hold CL hat upvà gọi cậu-bé trở-lại để để đưa trả lại chiếc mũ.and call young-boy return to to give return back CL hat
Ờm sau đó thì cậu-bé chở quả lê đi mất.Umm after that R/M young-boy transport CL pear away loseCòn ba ba cậu-bé kia tiếp-tục đi,And three three young-boy that continue go
và lại đi ngang qua cái chỗ lão nông-dân đang hái lê.and again go pass by CL place old-man farmer PRES pick pear
Lúc này ờ lão nông-dân đã xuống dưới gốc cây,Time this uh old-man farmer PAST down under foot tree
và nhìn-thấy mất mất một cái sọt,and see lose away one CL basketvà nhìn-thấy ba đứa-trẻ đi qua mỗi đứa đang ăn một quả lê,and see three little-kid go by each CL PRES eat one CL pearvà không hiểu chuyện gì xảy-ra cả.and not understand story what happen at-all
[hết à?][end huh?]Đến đấy là hết.Arrive there be end
Uh the story is like this. On one morning, there is a farmer picking pears in a field. Sohe keeps climbing up the tree picking pears and climbing down to put the fruits into thebasket under. So a while later when he is in the tree, there is a young man leading a donkeyby. He thinks that the young man may take his pears, so he looks down. Uh at that time he isin the tree, and looks down, to see that the young man does not do anything, just leads thedonkey away. But the boy comes, and see that he is busy in the tree, so (he) takes a wholebasket to put on the bike, and carry it away. Umm when this kid has rode for a while, he seesanother bike going toward him, which makes his hat blow away. Because the hat blows
102
away, he turns back to look for it, and bumps into a very big rock in the middle of the road,therefore (he) falls, making the basket scatter all over on the ground. So a while later whenhe still doesn’t know what to do, there are three other kids going by, and these three kids helpthis boy tidy up the pears into the basket, and carry it on the bike for him to ride away. Uhwhen he has gone for a while these kids see the hat. Seeing the hat, so (they) pick the hat up,and call to the boy to return the hat. Umm after that the boy carries the basket away. And thethree boys continue their way, and pass by the farmer who is picking pears. At this point, uh,the farmer has come down, and sees that one basket is gone, and sees that three kid go byeach eating a pear, and does not know what happened. (It) ends there.
Speaker 10Ờ có một cái ông ơ làm công-việc thu-lượm trái quả lê.Uh there one CL old-man uh do job collect CL CL pearÀ ông ấy leo lên trên cây để ông ấy hái quả trên cao.Uh old-man that climb up on tree to old-man that pick fruit on highCó ba cái giỏ để ổng thu quả,There three CL basket to that-old-man collect fruit
ổng để dưới đất thế.that-old-man put under ground there
Ống ấy [laugh] ống ấy a hái được đầy túi rồi,That-old-man that that-old-man that uh pick get-pos full pocket already
ống ấy leo xuống,that-old-man that climb downống đổ vào giỏ,that-old-man pour into basketống lại leo lên.that-old-man again climb up
Thế-là có cái a có rất nhiều người đi qua.So there CL uh there very many person go byCó ông dẫn con lừa đi qua.There old-man walk CL donkey go byCon lừa nó cũng không ăn.CL donkey PRO-3rd also not eatNhưng-mà có cái thằng-bé trẻ-con,But there CL young-boy little
nó đi cái xe-đạp qua,PRO-3rd go CL bike bythì nó bê cả giỏ đi.R/M PRO-3rd carry whole basket away
Thế-là nó đi giữa đường,So PRO-3rd go middle road
nó lại gặp cái cô-bé khác đi xe-đạp đi ngược chiều.PRO-3rd again meet CL young-girl different go bike go opposite direction
Thế-là nó đụng vào cái hòn đá trên đường đi thế,So PRO-3rd collide into CL CL rock on road go there
xong rồi nó đổ mất cái giỏ lê.
103
finish then PRO-3rd pour lose CL basket pearSau đấy thì nó lại lại nó bị ngã xe.After that R/M PRO-3rd again again PRO-3rd get-neg fall transportationThế-là nó lại gặp cái nhóm trẻ-con khác đi ngược đường lại thấy So PRO-3rd again meet CL group kid different go opposite way back seethằng này ngã,CL this fall
thì nó lại nhặt lê vào,R/M PRO-3rd again pick pear intorồi nó nó giúp cậu này lại chở lê đi tiếp,then PRO-3rd PRO-3rd help CL this again transport pear go continuenhưng mà câu ý không đi được,but CL that not go get-poscậu ý dắt xe thế.CL that walk transportation there
Nó đi bọn trẻ-con nó đi được một đoạn,PRO-3rd go group kid PRO-3rd go get-pos one passage
thì nó lại đi tiếp đường của nó.R/M PRO-3rd again go continue way of PRO-3rd
Nó đi được một đoạn,PRO-3rd go get-pos one passage
thì nó thấy cái mũ rơi,R/M PRO-3rd see CL hat fallnó gọi cậu kia lại để nó,PRO-3rd call CL that back to PRO-3rd
à không nó thực-ra nó gọi lại,uh no PRO-3rd in-fact PRO-3rd call backnhưng-mà nó đi lại gần,but PRO-3rd go back nearthế-là nó đưa lại cái mũ thế.so PRO-3rd give back CL hat there
Thằng kia nó cho lại đền-ơn lại vài quả lê.CL that PRO-3rd give back pay-back back few CL pearSau đấy thì à ba cái cậu ờ cái nhóm giúp-đỡ đấy lại đi về phía cái gốc After that R/M uh three CL CL uh CL group help that again go toward direction CL footcây mà ông kia ống ý hái-lượm,tree that old-man that that-old-man that collect
thì đúng lúc đấy ống ấy ống ấy xuống cái lượt tiếp-theo,R/M exact time that that-old-man that that-old-man that down CL turn followingđể ống ấy đổ vào cái giỏ,to that-old-man that pour into CL basketthì ống ấy thấy mất một cái giỏ.R/M that-old-man that see lose one CL basket
Mà đúng lúc ấy lại thấy ba thằng kia đang cầm quả lê đi ăn chóp-chép điThat exact time that again see three CL that PRES hold CL pear go eat smacking-noise goqua.
104
byHết rồi.End already
Uh there is a man whose job is picking pears. Uh he climbs up the tree to pick pearsup high in the tree. There are three baskets for him to put pears in which he leaves on theground. When he fills up the pocket, he climbs down to put into basket, then climbs up again.So there are a lot of people going by. There is a man leading a goat going by. The goatdoesn’t eat the pears either. But there is a boy, he rides a bike by, he takes the whole basketaway. So when he is on his way, he sees another girl riding a bike from the oppositedirection. So he hits the rock on the road. After that he falls over. So after that he meets agroup of kids walking from the opposite direction who see this boy fall, so they help pick upthe pears into the basket for him to go away, but he cannot ride it, he walks it. He goes, uhthe kids go for a short distance, they see the hat, they call that boy back to uh no actually theycall him but that go back to give the hat. That boy gives back some pears as thanks. After thatthe helping group go back to the pear tree where that man is picking, so exactly at that pointhe comes down the next time to put pears into the baskets, so he sees that one basket is lost.And right at that point (he) sees the three kids going by eating the pears. The end.
Speaker 11Câu chuyện này á kể về một cái người đàn-ông a làm ở trong nông-trại á.CL story this there tell about one CL CL man uh work in in farm thereỔng đi hái trái-cây để bán.That-old-man go pick fruit to sellThì ổng đang hái được tới cái rổ thứ-ba rồi,So that-old-man PRES pick get-pos arrive CL basket third already
thì ổng leo ở trên cái thang ổng hái.so that-old-man climb on on CL ladder that-old-man pick
Thì trong lúc ổng hái,So in time that-old-man pick
thì có một người đi qua dắt theo một con à bê nhỏ,so there one person go by walk follow one CL uh calf littlethì đi qua nhìn-thấy cái đó,so go by see CL thatrồi họ đi luôn.then they go right-away
Rồi đến có một thằng-bé,Then arrive there one young-boy
nó chạy xe-đạp,PRO-3rd run bikethì nó đi tới,so PRO-3rd go arrivenó thấy.PRO-3rd see
Mới đầu nó định lấy một trái thôi,Early first PRO-3rd intend take one CL only
105
nhưng-mà nó thấy ổng ở trên cao ổng không nhìn-thấy nó,but PRO-3rd see that-old-man on on high that-old-man not see PRO-3rd
nên nó à mới lấy nguyên một cái rổ,therefore PRO-3rd uh just take whole one CL basketbỏ lên cái xe-đạp,put up CL bikerồi chạy đi.then run away
Thì trên đường nó chạy đi á thì có một con-bé nó đi ngược lại So on way PRO-3rd run away there R/M there one little-girl PRO-3rd go opposite backnó a.PRO-3rd uhVì đi ngược lại,Because go opposite back
nên cái gió nó thổi á,therefore CL wind PRO-3rd blow therelàm cái nón của thằng-bé nó bị rớt ra.make CL hat of young-boy PRO-3rd get-neg fall out
Thằng-bé nó để-ý cái nón,Young-boy PRO-3rd pay-attention CL hat
nên nó không để-ý đường.therefore PRO-3rd not pay-attention road
Nó đụng nó vấp phải hòn đá,PRO-3rd collide PRO-3rd trip into CL rock,
ngã xuống,fall downthì mấy cái trái mà trong cái rổ á văng ra hết,R/M few CL fruit that in CL basket there cast out allthì nó bị té đau,R/M PRO-3rd get-neg fall hurtthì nó ngồi,R/M PRO-3rd sitnó xoa chân.PRO-3rd rub leg
Thì có một đám bạn ờ một đám đi đường không phải là bạn của nóSo there one group friend uh one group go road not yes be friend of PRO-3rd
nhưng-mà cũng bằng cũng trạc tuổi nó,but also equal also same age PRO-3rd
thì thấy nó té như vậy,R/M see PRO-3rd fall like thatthì tới giúp,R/M arrive helpđứa thì dựng xe lên,CL R/M set-up transportation upđứa thì ờ coi cái vết-thương có bị gì không,CL R/M uh look CL injury have get-neg what not
106
còn đứa thì ờ lượm mấy cái trái bỏ vô trong rổ lại cho thằng-bé.and CL R/M uh pick few CL fruit put into in basket back for young-boy
Thì trong lúc mà tụi nó lượm á,So in time that group PRO-3rd pick there
thì tụi nó hay à vội-và tụi nó giấu,R/M group PRO-3rd keep uh quickly group PRO-3rd hidetụi nó lấy mỗi đứa một trái,group PRO-3rd take each CL one fruitxong rồi tụi nó đưa cho cái à dẫn thằng đó đi.finish then group PRO-3rd give for CL uh walk CL that go
Thằng đó đi rồi á,CL that go then there
thì tụi nó mới lấy ăn.R/M group PRO-3rd just take eat
Trước khi tụi nó lấy ra ăn á,Before when group PRO-3rd take out eat there
thì tụi nó đang đi ngược lại hai đứa đi ngược hướng nhau,R/M group PRO-3rd PRES go opposite back two CL go opposite direction each-otherthì nó thấy cái nón thằng-bé rớt,R/M PRO-3rd see CL hat young-boy fallthế-là nó huýt-sáo cho thằng-bé quay lại lấy cái nón.so PRO-3rd whistle for young-boy turn back take CL hat
Xong rồi tụi nó đi tiếp.Finish then group PRO-3rd go continueThì cái ông a tụi nó đi về cái hướng mà cái ôngSo CL old-man uh group PRO-3rd go toward CL direction that CL old-manông ấy đang hái trái-cây áold-man that PRES pick fruit there
thì cái ông đó ổng đi xuốngR/M CL old-man that that-old-man go downthì ổng thấy, “ủa sao kì dzậy còn có hai trạ hai cái rổ”R/M that-old-man see, “oh why strange like-that left there two CL two CL basket”ổng nhớ hồi nãy là ba rổ mà sao giờ còn hai rổ that-old-man remember while before be three basket but why now left two basketthì ổng thấy ba tụi đó tụi nhóc đó đi ngược lại so that-old-man see three group that group little that go opposite backthì mà tụi nó vừa đi vừa ănso but group PRO-3rd simultaneous go simultaneous eatổng đứng ổng ngạc-nhiênthat-old-man stand that-old-man surprise
Ổng hổng hiểu là không biết việc chuyện gìThat-old-man not understand that not know business story whatkhông biết là ai lấy cái đónot know that who take CL thatDzậy thôi.Like-that only.
107
This story is about a man who works in a farm. He picks and sells fruits. So when heis picking the third basket, so he climbs up the ladder to pick. So while he is picking, there isa person going by walking a little calf, so (he) goes by and sees that, then they go right away.Then there is a boy, he rides a bike, he arrives, and he sees. At first he intends to take onefruit, but he sees that the he is up high he cannot see him, so he takes a whole basket, puts iton the bike, and runs away. So in his way there is a girl going back toward him. Becausegoing opposite ways, so the winds blows, which makes the boy’s hat fall off. The boy paysattention to the hat, so he doesn’t look his way. He hits uh trips n a rock, falls down, so thefruits in the basket cast out, so he falls hard, so he sits rubbing his leg. So there is a group offriends uh of kids going by, not his friends, but of the same age, so (they) see that he fallsdown, so (they) come to help, one sets the bike up, one looks up his injury, the other pick thefruits back into the basket for the boy. So while they are picking, they quickly hide each afruit. When the boy has walked away, they take them out to eat. Before they eat the fruits,when they are walking back, uh to the other direction, they see the hat of the boy, so theywhistle for the boy to come back to take the hat. Then they continue to walk away. So theman uh they go toward the man who is picking fruits, so that man comes down, so he notices“oh why is it so strange? There’re only two basket left.” He remembers before there are threebasket but now why there are only two, so he sees the three the group going back, but theyare walking eating, he is standing there surprised. He doesn’t understand uh doesn’t knowwhat happened who took that. It is just like that.
Speaker 12À thì bộ phim chỉ về một buổi sáng.Uh so CL film only about one CL morningXong rồi à trên một cái cánh đồng,Finish then uh on one CL CL field
không biết cánh đồng hay cánh rừng nữa,not know CL field or CL forest alsothì có một người đàn-ông à leo lên một cái cây,R/M there one CL man uh climb up one CL treehình-như cây lê để hái trái.probably tree pear to pick fruit
Thì ổng giống-như ổng định hái để đem về nhà chắc.So that-old-man like that-old-man intend pick to bring back home probablyThì ổng có một-số cái rổ cao-cao á để đựng cái đấy vô.So that-old-man have a-few CL basket fairly-high there to store CL that intoXong rồi ổng đang hái trên đó,Finish then that-old-man PRES pick on there
thì trong lúc ổng hái,R/M in time that-old-man pickthì giống-như có nhiều có những có một-vài người đi qua đi lại vậy R/M like there many there PLU there a-few person go by go back like-thatthôi,onlythì có một đứa-nhóc nó à nó đạp xe-đạp đến.
108
R/M there one kid PRO-3rd uh PRO-3rd ride bike arriveThì lúc đầu á thì Hoa tưởng là nó là à giống-như con ổng haySo time first there R/M Hoa thought that PRO-3rd be uh like child that-old-man orgì-đó đến để lấy đồ đi.something arrive to take thing awayÀ thế nó đạp đến.Uh so PRO-3rd ride arriveXong rồi nó ngừng trở-lại.Finish then PRO-3rd pause returnXong rồi nó ờ giống-như thấy nó nhìn nhìn,Finish then PRO-3rd uh like see PRO-3rd look look
nó nhìn lên ổng coi ổng có đang làm gì trển hông,PRO-3rd look up that-old-man watch that-old-man yes PRES do what up notthì thấy ổng đang hái,R/M see that-old-man PRES pickổng đang lúi-húi hái trên cây.that-old-man PRES busy pick on tree
Thì nó mới xách một giỏ bỏ lên xe-đạp của nó,So PRO-3rd just carry one basket put up bike of PRO-3rd
rồi nó đi,then PRO-3rd gonó bỏ đằng trước.PRO-3rd put side front
Ờ nó thì nhỏ mà cái xe-đạp thì cao.Uh PRO-3rd R/M little but CL bike R/M highỜ nó bỏ đằng trước,Uh PRO-3rd put side front
xong nó đi cái nó lại đạp đi.finish PRO-3rd go then PRO-3rd again ride away
Thì lúc đó nhìn xong lúc đó,So time that look finish time that
thì mới biết là nó đến để nó chôm cái đó của ổng. [laugh]R/M just know that PRO-3rd arrive to PRO-3rd steal CL that of that-old-man
Xong rồi thì nó đạp đi một hồi nó đi một hồi,Finish already R/M PRO-3rd ride away one while PRO-3rd go one while
thì trên dọc đường á mấy trái một-vài trái gì-đó nó rớt xuống R/M on along road there some fruit a-few fruit something PRO-3rd fall downđất.ground
Thì đi một hồi,So go one while
thì nó thấy một à đứa-bé khác đạp xe ngược trở-lại màR/M PRO-3rd see one uh little-kid different ride transportation opposite return thatlà con-gái,be femalethì nó lo nhìn,
109
R/M PRO-3rd busy lookcái thành-ra lúc mà đạp ngang giống-như hai đường đi ngang qua,then turn-out when that ride by like two way go pass bythì à cái nón của nó mới rớt xuống.R/M uh CL hat of PRO-3rd just fall down
Xong rồi nó lo nhìn á,Finish then PRO-3rd busy look there
cái thì nó không có để-ý đường trước,then so PRO-3rd not yes pay-attention way frontthì nó mới vấp phải cục đá,R/M PRO-3rd just trip into CL rockxong rồi cái xe nó đổ à đổ xuống,finish then CL transportation PRO-3rd fall uh fall downthì à lê nó rớt đầy ra đường á.R/M uh pear PRO-3rd fall full out road there
Thì trong lúc đó thì có ba đứa-bé khác đứng gần đó mới thấy,So in time that R/M there three little-kid different stand near there just see
thì nó lại nó giúp thằng này à bỏ lê vô rổ lại,R/M PRO-3rd come PRO-3rd help CL this uh put pear into basket backxong rồi bỏ lên xe-đạp để thằng này đi.finish then put up bike to CL this go
Thì cái hai đứa thì thằng này cứ tiếp-tục đi ờ,So then two CL R/M CL this keep continue go uh
nhưng-mà nó bị đau chân hay gì-đó,but PRO-3rd get-neg hurt leg or somethingthành-ra nó không có đạp xe được nữa,turn-out PRO-3rd not yes ride transportation get-pos any-moremà nó chỉ dắt chiếc xe-đạp đi.but PRO-3rd only walk CL bike go
Xong ba đứa-nhóc kia thì đi hướng ngược lại ờ,Finish three little-kid that R/M go direction opposite back uh
giống-như nó đi lên đây,like PRO-3rd go up herethì ba đứa-nhóc đi đây… ờ thì ba đứa-nhóc đi ngược lại,R/M three little-kid go here… uh R/M three little-kid go opposite backthì nó thấy cái nón của nó à nãy… thấy cái nón,R/M PRO-3rd see CL hat of PRO-3rd uh before… see CL hatmà hồi nãy nó làm rớt á,that while before PRO-3rd make fall therecái mới lật lên,then just flip upđem trả cho nó,bring return for PRO-3rd
thì nó mới tặng mỗi đứa một trái lê ờ.R/M PRO-3rd just present each CL one CL pear uh
Xong rồi cái cái cảnh đó thì thằng-nhóc mà chôm lê nó cứ đi thôi.
110
Finish then CL CL scene that R/M little-boy that steal pear PRO-3rd keep go onlyXong ba đứa kia thì đi ngược lại hướng mà cái có cái ôngFinish three CL that R/M go opposite back direction that CL there CL old-manmà đang hái lê á,that PRES pick pear there
thì lại lại thì đi ngang qua.R/M again again R/M go pass by
Cái lúc đó thì cái ông hái lê ổng hái xong lê xongThen time that R/M CL old-man pick pear that-old-man pick finish pear finishơ xong cái đợt đó,uh finish CL round that
thì ổng lại đi xuống để ổng bỏ vô cái rổ củaR/M that-old-man again go down to that-old-man put into CL basket ofổng,that-old-manthì ổng thấy mất hết một cái cái,R/M that-old-man see lose all one CL thenổng mới lẩm-nhẩm ổng đếm,that-old-man just mumble that-old-man countổng chắc-là chắc-là giống-như ổng nghĩ là,that-old-man probably probably like that-old-man think that“hồi nãy có ba cơ sao giờ còn có hai cái rổ.”“while before there three there why now left there two CL basket”
Cái trong lúc ổng đang hổng biết là chuyện gì xảy-ra,Then in time that-old-man PRES not know that story what happen
thì ba thằng-nhóc kia nó cầm mỗi đứa một trái lê ăn á đang ăn.R/M three little-boy that PRO-3rd hold each CL one CL pear eat there PRES eat
Thì nó đi ngang qua lại,So PRO-3rd go pass by back
thì ổng nhìn-thấy,R/M that-old-man seecái ổng chưng-hửng.then that-old-man surprise
Xong rồi ba đứa nó bỏ-đi,Finish then three CL PRO-3rd go-away
nhưng-mà ổng hông nói gì-hết rồi … but that-old-man not speak at-all then…
Chỉ dzậy thôi.Only like-that only.Hết rồi.End already.
Uh so the movie is just about a morning. So uh on a field, (I) don’t know if it is afield or a forest, so there is a man climbing up a tree, perhaps a pear tree to pick fruits. So itlooks like he intends to pick and bring them back home. So he has a few baskets that arefairly high to store them. So then he is picking up there, while he is picking, it looks like
111
there are some people uh just going by, so there is a kid riding by. So at first Hoa thought heuh like his child or something who comes to take the stuff away. Uh so he comes. Then hestops. Then he uh like he looks, he look sup at him to see what he is doing up there, so (he)sees that he is picking, busy picking. So he carries one basket and puts it on his bike, then hegoes, he puts it on the front. Uh he is little yet the bike is high. Uh he puts it on the front, thenhe goes, then he rides away. So after (I) see that, (I) know that he comes to steal that fromhim. Then he has rode for a while, so when on his way a few fruits drop down on the ground.So when he has rode for a while, he sees another kid riding a bike toward him who is a girl,so he is busy looking, so when (they) pass by so uh his hat falls off. Then he is busy looking,so he doesn’t pay attention to the road ahead, so he trips on a rock, so then the bike fallsdown, then the pears drop all out. So at that point there are three other kids standing nearbywho see that, so they come and help this boy to put pears back into the basket, then put it onthe bike for him to go. So the two uh this boy keeps going, but probably his leg is hurt orsomething, so he can’t ride any more, but he just walks the bike and goes. Then the otherthree kids walk in the other direction, like he goes this way, the three go this way… uh so thethree kids go back, so they see the hat he dropped off before, so (they) pick it up and returnit, so he give each one of theme a pear uh. Then after that scene, the boy who steals pearskeeps going. Then the other three go back toward the man who picks pears, so (they) go pastthe man. Then that time, the pear picker finishes that round, he comes down to put them intohis basket, then he sees that he has lost one whole basket, he starts counting, probablythinking that “there were three before, why are there two now?” Then while he still doesn’tknow what happened, the three boys, each carries a pear to eat. So they go past, and he seesthem, then he is surprised. Then the three walk away, but he doesn’t say anything, then…Just like that. The end.
Speaker 13Ây thì … ồ thì cái video này á là về một… bối-cảnh là một cái làng nọ,Uh so… uh so CL video this there be about one… setting be one CL village that
mọi-người ờ toàn người-ta hổng phải là làm người-ta làm ruộng,people uh all people not yes be work people work fieldà người-ta trồng cây ăn trái ờ,uh people grow tree eat fruit uhngười-ta trồng cây ăn trái để kiếm sống.people grow tree eat fruit to earn live
Thì à thì người dân làng này thì rất-là thật-thà.So uh so CL citizen village this R/M very honestNgười-ta ơ rất-là tôn-trọng lẫn-nhau.People uh very respect each-otherThì thì cái cái chuyện thì cái chuyện thật-ra hông có gì.So so CL CL story so CL story actually not have whatChỉ là chỉ để ờ cho-thấy cái điều thật-thà của cái người trong đó thôi.Only be only to uh show CL CL honest of CL person in there onlyThì mở-đầu câu chuyện là cái cảnh ơ cảnh của một người đàn-ôngSo open CL story be CL scene uh scene of one CL manờ tên là Tom đang đang hái mấy trái lê.uh name be Tom PRES PRES pick some CL pear
112
Thì ờ khi mà ổng đang hái ấy,So uh when that that-old-man PRES pick there
thì có người đi ngang qua ờ người dân đi ngang qua.so there person go pass by uh CL citizen go pass by
Người-ta người-ta thấy ổng hái,People people see that-old-man pick
người-ta cứ mặc-kệ,people keep ignorecho-dù ổng để rất-là nhiều lê dưới đất,even-though that-old-man put very many pear under groundphải hông?right not?
Xong rồi người-ta cũng đi bình-thường.Finish then people also go normalNgười-ta chỉ nhìn thế thôi.People only see like-that onlyRồi khi mà sau đó thì đứa con của ổng đếnThen when that after that R/M CL child of that-old-man arriveơ để mà lấy lê đem về nhà,uh to that take pear bring back home
thì trên đường nó đi ơ trên đường nó đi á,R/M on road PRO-3rd go uh on road PRO-3rd go therethì à nó a lảng-vảng chuyện gì-đấy.R/M uh PRO-3rd uh stuck business something
Thì nó vấp phải cục đá,So PRO-3rd trip into CL rock
và muốn muốn té.and want want fall
Thì vì té như vậy thì cái mấy trái lê nó đang mang theoSo because fall like that R/M CL few CL pear PRO-3rd PRES bring alongcũng bị rớt ra tùm-lum.also get-neg fall out all-overThì những đứa-nhóc không-những không-những những người-lớnSo PLU little-kid not-only not-only PLU adultmà những đứa-nhóc đi xung-quanh người-ta cũng không có abut PLU little-kid go around people also not yes uhcũng không-những không lấy lê,also not-only not take pear
mà cũng vô phụ nó để mà dọn lê ngược trở-lại,but also come help PRO-3rd to that collect pear back returndọn lê bỏ vô cái a cái thố để đem về thì ờ.collect pear put into CL uh CL basket to bring back then uh
Xong rồi khi đi được một đoạn thì nó cũng tìm được cái nón của nó,Finish then when go get-pos one passage R/M PRO-3rd also find get-pos CL hat of PRO-3rd
và cũng đem trả lại.and also bring return back
113
Thì không-những cũng trả lại lê,So not-only also return back pear
mà cũng trả lại nón thì như vậy,but also return back hat so like thatnó mới cho mấy đứa này ờ mấy trái lê để ăn ờ để đền-đáp.PRO-3rd just give few CL this uh few CL pear to eat uh to pay-back
Dzậy thôi.Like-that onlyMà thì ờm thì đoạn cuối thì… đoạn cuối câu chuyện thì không có hiểu lắm.But so umm so piece last so… piece last CL story so not yes understand muchNhưng-mà đoạn cuối của câu chuyện thì mấy đứa-nhóc này sau khi giúp nóBut piece last of CL story R/M few little-kid this after when help PRO-3rd
rồi thì đi ngược trở-lại chỗ mà cái ông ơ ba của nóalready R/M go opposite return place that CL old-man uh dad of PRO-3rd
lúc nãy đang a hái lê,time before PRES uh pick pear
thì ba nó thấy mấy đứa này đang ăn lê,R/M dad PRO-3rd see some CL this PRES eat pearthì à thì nhìn mặt có-vẻ nghi-ngờ ờ,so uh so look face seem suspect uhthì hông biết là tụi này có lấy lê của thằng-nhóc kia khôngso not know that group this yes take pear of little-boy that nothay là chuyện gì,or that matter whatmà tại-sao mà nó lại có lê của mình mới dzừa hái xong.that why that PRO-3rd again have pear of self just just pick finish
Thì cái đấy thì làm-cho ờ thì không hiểu phần đó lắm.So CL that R/M make uh so not understand part that muchNhưng-mà đấy là nội-dung của câu chuyện.But that be content of CL story.
Uh so uh this video is about… the setting is that village, whose people do not work onthe field, but they grow fruit trees, they grow fruit tree to earn a living. So uh the citizen isvery honest. They respect each other. So the story is actually nothing special. Just to showthe honesty of the people in there. So the opening of the story is a scene of a man namedTom who is picking pears. So when he is picking pears, there are people going by. They seethat he is picking, they just ignore that, even though he leaves a lot of pears on the ground,right? Then uh they walk by as normal. They just look, that’s all. Then when uh after that hischild comes to take the pears home, so on his way he has some troubles or something. So hetrips on a rock and want to fall down. So because (he) falls off, the pears he brings with himfall down all over. So the kids uh not only adults but also the kids around, not only do theytake the pears, they even help him to collect the pears back into the basket to bring home.Then uh after going for a short distance, they find his hat and return it too. So not only thepears but also the hat, so he gives those kids some pears to thank. Just like that. But uh theending (I) do not understand much. But the ending is that the kids, after helping him, walkback to the man uh his father who picks pears, so his father sees them eating pears, so it
114
looks like he suspects, (he) does not know if these kids take pears from the boy or not, orsomething, now that they have the pears he just picked. So that makes (me) not understandthat part. But that’s the content of the story.
Speaker 14Okay cái câu chuyện là nó bắt-đầu ở cái một vùng giống-như-là một quê á.Okay CL CL story R/M PRO-3rd start in CL one CL like one country thereÔng này ổng đang à ở ngoài cái con đường nhỏ.Old-man this that-old-man PRES uh in out CL CL road smallNó là giống-như-là hoang-dại giống rừng ấy.PRO-3rd be like wild like forest thereNhưng-mà hông phải,But not right
tại-vì hình-như là có cái làng gần ở đó,because seem that there CL village near in therecó nhiều người đi qua lại lắm.there many person go pass by very-much
Ổng hái cái trái lê [clearing throat] ờ.That-old-man pick CL CL pear uhỔng hái được ba rổ.That-old-man pick get-pos three basketMột lát có người giống-như trong làng,One while there person like in village
họ đi ngang qua,they go pass bymà họ hổng có a người-lớn đi trong trong làng ớ,but they not yes uh adult go in in village therehọ đi dẫn mấy con dê mấy con gì đi ngang qua,they go walk some CL goat some CL what go pass bymà họ hổng có ăn-cắp đồ của ông.but they not yes steal stuff of old-man
Một lát nữa có thằng-nhóc nó chạy xe-đạp nó đi ngang qua.One while more there little-boy PRO-3rd ride bike PRO-3rd go pass byNó thấy ba cái rổ lê nhiều quá.PRO-3rd see three CL basket pear many tooCái nó thấy ổng đang đi hái trái-cây,Then PRO-3rd see that-old-man PRES go pick fruit
mà ổng không có để-ý tới.but that-old-man not yes pay-attention at
Cái nó xuống xe-đạp.Then PRO-3rd get-down bikeCái a nó lấy a cái cái rổ lê của ổng,Then uh PRO-3rd take uh CL CL basket pear of that-old-man
nó bỏ lên xe-đạp,PRO-3rd put up bikenó nó chạy đi.
115
PRO-3rd PRO-3rd run awayNó chạy đi một lát nữa,PRO-3rd run away one while more
thì nó chạy đến cái đường mà để dẫn dzô làng hay sao-đó.R/M PRO-3rd run arrive CL road that to lead into village or something
Cái có một ờ đứa học-sinh khác đi ngược lại.Then there one uh CL student different go opposite backCái a làm-cho nón của nó bị sút ra.Then uh make hat of PRO-3rd get-neg loosen-up outCái nó quay lại.Then PRO-3rd turn backThì đằng trước nó có một cục đá.To side front PRO-3rd there one CL rockCái xe-đạp của nó cán lên.Then bike of PRO-3rd trip onCái nó bị vấp té.Then PRO-3rd get-neg trip fallCái nó đổ hết nguyên cái rổ lê ra.Then PRO-3rd fall all whole CL basket pear outCái xong rồi ở gần đó có mấy đứa ơ nhỏ khác à đang chơi,Then finish then at near there there some CL uh little different uh PRES play
cái thấy dzậy lại giúp nó để bỏ lê dzô cái rổ.then see that come help PRO-3rd to put pear into CL basket
Ờ nhưng-mà nó hông ơ mỗi đứa thì cái con-nít nó thấy lê dzậy,Uh but PRO-3rd not uh each CL R/M then kid PRO-3rd see pear that
lát nữa nó nó giấu mỗi đứa một trái.while more PRO-3rd PRO-3rd hide each CL one CL
Xong rồi thằng này bỏ đi ơ. [clearing throat]Finish then CL this leave away uhNhưng-mà thằng này còn quên lại cái nón,But CL this still forget left CL hat
xong rồi cái đi được đoạn rồi,finish then then go get-pos passage alreadytụi này nó kêu lại,group this PRO-3rd call backcái nó đưa cái nón cho nó.then PRO-3rd give CL hat for PRO-3rd
À mà hông phải nó đưa cái nón cho thằng đó,Oh but not right PRO-3rd give CL hat for CL that
cái thằng đó hình-như là cho mỗi đứa một trái lê.then CL that seem that give each CL one CL pear
Rồi .Then.Xong rồi cái thằng này nó lại đưa mỗi đứa một trái lê.Finish then CL CL this PRO-3rd again give each CL one CL pear.Cái ba đứa này nó đi trên cái con đường đó,
116
Then three CL this PRO-3rd go on CL CL road thatquay ngược lại cái ông kia,turn back to CL old-man thattại nó hông có biết.because PRO-3rd not yes know
Cái nó đi ngang qua ổng.Then PRO-3rd go pass by that-old-manNó vừa ăn mấy trái lê đó,PRO-3rd simultaneous eat some CL pear that
nó vừa đi ngang qua ổng.PRO-3rd simultaneous go pass by that-old-man
Lúc trong lúc đó thì-là ổng xuống,Time in time that R/M that-old-man get-down
thì ổng thấy “ủa sao mất một cái rổ rồi.”R/M that-old-man see “oh why lose one CL basket already”
Cái ổng nhìn ba đứa đó,Then that-old-man look three CL that
mà ổng hông biết là nó ăn-cắp hay là,but that-old-man not know that PRO-3rd steal or thatổng chắc-là nghĩ là nó ăn-cắp.that-old-man probably think that PRO-3rd steal
Thế xong rồi cái phim đó.So finish already CL film that.
Okay the story starts in a country. This man is by a small road. It looks like uh it iswild like a forest. But it’s not true, because it seems like there is a village nearby, there are alot of people going by. He picks pears uh. He has gotten three baskets of pears. A while laterthere are people perhaps from the village going by, but they do not uh adults from the villageuh, they walk some goats past by, but they do not steal his stuff. A while later there is a boyriding by. He sees that there are a lot uh three baskets of pears. SO he sees that he is pickingpears, and he doesn’t pay attention at all. Then he gets down from the bike. Then he takes thebasket of pear, he puts it on the bike, he runs away. After he runs for a while, he gets to theroad that leads to the village or something. Then there is uh another student going backtoward him. That make his hat fall off. Then he turns back. So in front of him is a rock. Thenhis bike trips on. Then he falls down. Then he uh all of the basket pours out. Then after thatthere are some kids playing nearby, then (they) see that, (they) come to help him pick pearsback into the basket. Uh but he uh they kids see the pears, so a while later they hide each onea pear. Then after that this boy leaves. But he forgets his hat, than after (he) leaves for awhile, those kids call him back, then they give him his hat. Uh no they give him his hat, thatboy perhaps gives them back each a pear. So. Then after that this boy gives them each a pear.Then these three go on the road, back to that man, because they don’t know. Then they gopast him. They walk by eating those pears, they go past him. So during that time he getsdown, so he notices “Oh why is one basket gone?” Then he watches these three, but he doesnot know if they are thieves or, he probably think that they have stolen his pears. Then that’sthe end of the film.
117
Speaker 15Vào một buổi sáng sớm thì có một ông ông ấy đang hái lê ở trên cây.On one CL morning early R/M there one old-man old-man that PRES pick pear on on treeXong là xong đầu-tiên thì có một ông dắt một con lừa,Finish then finish first R/M there one old-man walk one CL donkey
đi qua ở bên ơ các cái đi qua các cái giỏ lê để bên dưới gốc cây,go by at side uh PLU CL go by PLU CL basket pear put side under foot treethì ông này ông ấy không không ăn-trộm không lấy quả nào cả.R/M old-man this old-man that not not steal not take CL any at-all
Thế xong đến lúc có một cái cậu trẻ-con nhỏ-nhỏ đi qua,So finish arrive time there one CL CL kid fairly-small go by
thì táy-máy nổi lòng tham,R/M thieve emerge CL greedythế-là thấy có một giỏ lê ở đấy không có ai ở đấy,so see there one basket pear in there not there who in therethế-là cậu bỏ giỏ lê lên xe-đạp,so CL put basket pear up bikecậu đi.CL go
Thế-là cậu đi đến giữa đường,So CL go to middle road
cậu nhìn-thấy cô-gái xinh-xinh,CL see young-girl fairly-cutecậu liếc mắt cậu nhìn,CL glance eye CL seethế cậu đâm cái xe vào hòn đá,so CL crash CL transportation into CL rockthế-là lê nó bị đổ ra.so pear PRO-3rd get-neg pour out
Thế đổ ra,So pour out
nhưng-mà cậu lại gặp mấy đứa nó tốt,but CL again meet some CL PRO-3rd niceba đứa trẻ-con khác nó rất-là tốt,three CL little different PRO-3rd very nicenó ra nó nhặt lê các thứ lên cho cậu lên xe.PRO-3rd go-out PRO-3rd pick pear PLU thing up for CL get-up transportation
Cậu này thì đau chân không nhặt được,CL this R/M hurt leg not pick get-pos
xong rồi nó để lên xe cho cậu ấy dắt đi.finish then PRO-3rd put up transportation for CL that walk away
Thế đi một đoạn,So go one passage
thì nó ba đứa kia ba cái đứa nó tốt-bụng,R/M PRO-3rd three CL that three CL CL PRO-3rd kindnó lại nhìn-thấy cái mũ,
118
PRO-3rd again see CL hatnó lại ra nó đưa cho,PRO-3rd again go-out PRO-3rd give fornó quay-lại nó đưa cho,PRO-3rd return PRO-3rd give forthì hình-như là cái cậu mà ăn-trộm cậu ấy cho lại ba quả.so seem that CL CL that steal CL that give back three CL
Thế-là cái cậu cậu ấy cậu ăn-trộm lê ấy thì cậu ấy đi tiếp.So CL CL CL that CL steal pear that R/M CL that go continueCòn ba cậu kia đi ngược chiều lại,And three CL that go opposite direction back
thì quay lại cái gốc lê ấy,so return back CL tree-foot pear thatthì lại gặp cái cái ông kia ông ấy cái ông mà hái lê.so again meet CL CL old-man that old-man that CL old-man that pick pear
Ông ấy xuống,Old-man that get-down
thì ống ấy lại thấy mất mất một giỏ lê,R/M that-old-man that again see lose away one basket pearvà cậu lại nhìn đúng quả lê của ống ấy có ba đứa đang ăn thế.and CL again see exact CL pear of that-old-man that there three CL PRES eat there
Chắc-là ống ấy nghĩ là mấy cậu kia ăn-trộm.Probably that-old-man that think that some CL that stealChắc-là mấy cậu kia là có vấn-đề với ống đấy.Probably some CL that R/M have matter with that-old-man thatThì chuyện này thì có-thể thì kết ngắn lại một câu giống-như của Việt-NamSo story this R/M able R/M summarize short back one sentence like of Vietnameselà kiểu làm phúc phải tội. [laugh]R/M kind-of do good get punishĐấy thế thôi.There like-that only
On an early morning there is a man who picks pears in a tree. Then uh at first there isa man walking a donkey passing by, (he) goes past the baskets under the tree, so this mandoes not steal one pear. Then after that comes a boy, who gets the idea of stealing, so (he)sees that there is a basket of pears there without the owner, so he put it on the bike and goesaway. So when he gets to the road, he sees a cut girl, he glances over, so he crashes into arock, so pears pour all over. So (they) pour all over, but he meets some nice kids, three otherkids who are very nice, they come to help him pick up the pears. This boy is hurt in his leg,so (he) cannot pick pears, then they put it on the bike for him to walk away. So after goingfor a short distance, he uh the three are very nice, they see the hat, they return to give back tohim, so it seems like the boy who steals pears give them three pears. So the boy who stealspears continues his way. And the other three boys go the other way, so back to the pear tree,so (they) see the man who picks pears. He comes down, so he notices that he has lost onebasket, and he sees exactly his pears being eaten by the three kids. Perhaps he thinks that
119
those boys are thieves. Probably the kids is in trouble with him. So this story uh can besummarize with a saying in Vietnam, like “no good deed go unpunished.” There, that’s it.
Speaker 16Ờ thì là cái đoạn phim ngắn này nó kể về là một cái ông đó ở.Uh so that CL piece film short this PRO-3rd tell about that one CL old-man that inỔng đang như-là ờ hái cái trái,That-old-man PRES like uh pick CL CL
em nghĩ là em nghĩ là trái lê.I-younger think be I-younger think be CL pear
Rồi xong rồi thì thì ổng hái trái lê xong,Then finish then R/M R/M that-old-man pick CL pear finish
ổng bỏ vô túi,that-old-man put into pocketxong ổng xuống,finish that-old-man get-downổng để ổng chất vô hai cái sọt nằm ở dưới.that-old-man put that-old-man pile into two CL basket lie in under
Thì đoạn phim tới cái đoạn thì có một cái ông đó,So piece film arrive CL piece so there one CL old-man that
ổng dẫn một con dê đi ngang.that-old-man walk one CL goat go by
Rồi sau đó có một thằng-bé,Then after that there one little-boy
nó tới nó,PRO-3rd arrive PRO-3rd
nó chất hết một cái ơ tất-cả những quả lê lên một cái sọt,PRO-3rd pile all one CL uh all PLU CL pear up one CL basketrồi nó bỏ lên xe-đạp,then PRO-3rd put up bikerồi nó chạy để ờ nó chở về nhà.then PRO-3rd run to uh PRO-3rd transport back home
Thằng-bé chắc-là con của ổng hay-là ai-đó.Little-boy probably child of that-old-man or someoneĐến trên đường nó chạy về thì-là nó chạy trên đường xe-đạp,Come on road PRO-3rd run back R/M PRO-3rd run on road bike
thì nó gặp một cái cô-bé chạy ngang,R/M PRO-3rd meet one CL little-girl run bythì ảnh mới ngoái đầu ảnh nhìn á,so that-boy just turn head that-boy look therethì rớt cái nón,so fall CL hatthì cái xe-đạp nó vướng vào một cái cục gạch,so CL bike PRO-3rd stuck into one CL CL brickhay-là một cái miếng sắt gì-đó,or one CL CL iron something
120
thì ảnh té,so that-boy fallthì lê nó đổ hết ra ngoài đường,so pear PRO-3rd pour all out out roadthì đó bị trầy chân nữa.so there get-neg scratch leg also
Xong lúc đó có ba thằng-bé nó đi tới,Finish time that there three little-boy PRO-3rd go arrive
thì nó thấy vậy,so PRO-3rd see thatnó giúp bỏ lên sọt,PRO-3rd help put up basketrồi nó chất lên xe lại.then PRO-3rd pile up transportation back
Xong rồi ờ thằng-bé kia đi tiếp,Finish then uh little-boy that go continue
nhưng-mà vẫn bỏ quên cái nón trên đường.but still leave forget CL hat on road
Rồi xong bé bé mấy đứa-bé kia nó thấy,Then finish little little some little-kid that PRO-3rd see
thì nó kêu lại đưa cho cái nón,R/M PRO-3rd call back give for CL hatthì thằng-bé này mới cho ba trái lê.so little-boy this just give three CL pear
Thì ba thằng-bé này cầm ba trái lê ăn,So three little-boy this hold three CL pear eat
thì đi ngang cái chỗ cái cây của cái ông kia mà đang hái trái lê á.so go by CL place CL tree of CL old-man that that PRES pick CL pear there
Thì ổng đi xuống,So that-old-man go down
thì ổng nhìn vô cái sọt,R/M that-old-man look into CL basketthì có một sọt còn đầy một sọt thì nó bị rỗng.so there one basket still full one basket R/M PRO-3rd get-neg empty
Thì lúc đó thì ổng không biết là có ai tới So time that R/M that-old-man not know that there who comeđể-mà lấy cái sọt lê chưa.to take CL basket pear yetChắc có-thể nhiều khi đứa-bé tới lấy,Probably able many time little-kid come take
mà không có nói cho ổng biết,but not yes say for that-old-man knowthì ổng không biết,so that-old-man not knowmà ổng nhìn-thấy ba đứa này thì cầm ba trái lê,but that-old-man see three CL this R/M hold three CL pear
121
thì ổng đang ngạc-nhiên là chắc-là,so that-old-man PRES surprise that probably“ba đứa này là [laugh] lấy đâu ra ba trái lê ở đâu-đó để ăn vậy.”“three CL this be take where out three CL pear in somewhere to eat like-that”
Đoạn phim nó kết-thúc ở chỗ đó.Piece film PRO-3rd end in place that
Uh so this short film is about that man in uh. He is like picking, uh I think pears. Thenafter he picks pears, he puts them into his pocket, then he gets down, he piles them up intotwo baskets under the tree. So the film is uh to the part where there is that man who leads agoat passing by. Then after that there is one boy who comes to pile up all the pears into onebasket, then he puts it on the bike, then he runs uh carries them home. The boy is probablyhis child or someone. So on his way he sees a girl riding by, so he turns his head to look ather, so the hat drops off, so the bike trips on a brick, or a piece of iron or something, so hefalls downs, so pears pour all out, so his leg is scratched. Then at that point there are threeboys coming, so they see that, they help put them pears into the basket, then they put it on thebike. Then that boy continues, but still forgets his hat on the road. Then the other kids seethat, so they call him back to give him the hat, so this boy give them three pears. So thesethree boys carry the pears to eat, so (they) go by that man who is picking pears. So he comesdown, so he looks into the basket, so there is one full basket and one empty basket. So at thatpoint he does not know if there is someone to come and take the basket or not. Perhaps thekid came to take it, but didn’t let him know, so he doesn’t know, but he sees these three kidsholding three pears, so he is surprised, perhaps “where do these three get the pears to eat likethat?” The film ends there.
Speaker 17Tức là bộ phim á nó diễn-ra,Mean that CL film there PRO-3rd happen
em nghĩ là ở một cái vùng nông-thôn ờ,I-younger think that in one CL CL country uhnói chính-xác hơn là ở cái vùng thảo-nguyên.say exact more be in CL CL prairie
Ờ thì có một ông,Uh so there one old-man
ổng đứng ổng hái lê ờ.that-old-man stand that-old-man pick pear uh
Nói-chung-là ổng nâng-niu những cái trái lê,In-general that-old-man care PLU CL CL pear
sản-phẩm của ổng tạo-ra á thì ổng nâng-niu.product of that-old-man create there so that-old-man care
Ổng hái,That-old-man pick
thì có một trái lê thì rớt xuống chỗ cái cái ổ ổ gà.R/M there one CL pear R/M drop down place CL CL nest nest chicken
Dạ thì khi mà ổng hái xuống,Yes so when that that-old-man pick down
122
ổng cứ bỏ vào hai cái rổ.that-old-man keep put into two CL basket
Ổng có hai cái hai cái rổ to,That-old-man have two CL two CL basket big
cần-xé hả,deep-bamboo-basket yeskhông biết ngoài Bắc gọi là cái gì,not know out North call be CL whattrong Nam gọi là cần-xé.in South call be deep-bamboo-basket
[thế là được dùng từ Nam là được rồi] [like-that be good use word South be good already][laugh]Em hông biết.I-younger not know.Nha.ThereThì ổng bỏ vào hai cái cần-xé.So that-old-man put into two CL deep-bamboo-basketThì vô-tình thì có thì trên cánh đồng thảo-nguyên đóSo unintentional R/M there R/M on CL field prairie thatthì có nhiều người ê có ít người đi qua lại,R/M there many person oh there few person go pass by
thì có một một ông,R/M there one one old-manổng dẫn một con dê thì đi đi ngang qua hai cái giỏ lê đó,that-ol-man walk one CL goat so go go pass by two CL basket pear thatthì con dê nó cứ giống-như nó muốn mà ăn,so CL goat PRO-3rd keep like PRO-3rd want that eatem nghĩ vậy,I-younger think thatnhưng-mà đó thì ông ông đó ổng kéo đi.but there so old-man old-man that that-old-man pull away
Xong rồi sau đó có một thằng-bé,Finish then after that there one little-boy
thằng-bé đạp xe-đạp nhìn rất-là cute, [laugh]little-boy ride bike look very cuteđạp xe-đạp chạy qua thì, [clearing throat]ride bike run by sonó lấy một cái cần-xé lê đó,PRO-3rd take one CL deep-bamboo-basket pear therenó lấy luôn.PRO-3rd take immediately
Xong rồi nó bỏ lên xe đó,Finish then PRO-3rd put up transportation that
nó chở đi chở đi.
123
PRO-3rd transport away transport awayThì đi trên đường thì nó gặp một cô-bé đi xe-đạp ngược lại. [clearing throat]So go on road R/M PRO-3rd meet one little-girl ride bike opposite backThì cô-bé đó thì hai đứa đụng nhau,So little-girl that so two CL crash each-other
thì thằng-nhóc này rớt cái mũ ra.R/M little-boy this drop CL hat out
Lê hình-như-là đổ lung-tung ra hết.Pear seem-like pour all-over out allThì xong rồi cái cô-bé này cổ cũng chạy luôn. [laugh]So finish then CL little-girl this that-little-girl also run immediatelyỜ thì lúc đó có ba ba đứa ba đứa con-trai,Uh so time that there three three CL three CL male
em nghĩ chắc-là ba anh-em,I-younger think probably three brotherstại-vì nhìn từ nhỏ đến lớn ba đứa.because look from little to big three CL
Thì ba đứa này nó mới lại nó giúp thằng-nhỏ nàySo three CL this PRO-3rd just come PRO-3rd help little-boy thisbỏ lê vào cần-xé đó,put pear into deep-bamboo-basket that
rồi đi.then go
Thì khi thằng nhỏ này dựng xe lên,So when CL little this set-up transportation up
bỏ cần-xé lên,put deep-bamboo-basket upchuẩn-bị đi,prepare goba đứa nhóc này nó cũng đi.three CL little this PRO-3rd also go
Xong rồi nó thấy thằng nhóc này rớt cái mũ,Finish then PRO-3rd see CL little this drop CL hat
cái nó lượm cái mũ,then PRO-3rd pick CL hatnó đưa lại cho thằng này.PRO-3rd give back for CL this
Thì lúc nó đưa cho thằng này thì nó lấy ba trái lê. [laugh]So time PRO-3rd give for CL this R/M PRO-3rd take three CL pearXong rồi cái nó đi nó chia nhau mỗi thằng một trái,Finish then then PRO-3rd go PRO-3rd share each-other each CL one CL
thì ba thằng này nó mới đi lại ngay cái chỗ mà cái ông hái lê.R/M three CL this PRO-3rd just go back right CL place that CL old-man pick pear
Thì ông này ổng xuống,So old-man this that-old-man get-down
thì ổng thấy hai cái cần-xé,
124
so that-old-man see two CL deep-bamboo-basketmột cái là trống,one CL be emptyvà một cái là có lê.and one CL R/M have pear
Mà em ngạc-nhiên cái là lúc hồi nãy là em thấy But I-younger surprise thing that time while before that I-younger seehai cái cần-xé đótwo CL deep-bamboo-basket thatlà thằng-nhóc nó lấy một cái cần-xé còn một cái,R/M little-boy PRO-3rd take one CL deep-bamboo-basket left one CL
mà sao giờ lại có hiện hai cái một cái có lê một cái không có…but why now again there appear two CL one CL have pear one CL not have…tự-nhiên em cứ bị [laugh] dính chỗ đó luôn stick chỗ đó.suddenly I-younger keep get-neg stuck place that immediately stick place that
Ba thằng nhóc này đi,Three CL little this go
nó có một cái giống-như-là cái binh-boong cái đánh table tennis,PRO-3rd have one CL like CL ping-pong CL play table tennisthì nó cứ cầm nó đánh trái lê lên.so PRO-3rd keep hold PRO-3rd hit CL pear up
Ông này ổng cứ đứng nhìn tụi nó. [laugh]Old-man this that-old-man keep stand look group PRO-3rdTức là ổng cứ tưởng…Mean that that-old-man keep thoughtEm em cảm-giác là ổng nghĩ tụi nó lấy,I-younger I-younger feel that that-old-man think group PRO-3rd take
nhưng-mà ổng không có cái bằng-chứng nào,but that-old-man not have CL evidence whatmà để nói tụi nó lấy.that to say group PRO-3rd take
Thì ba đứa này nó đi,So three CL this PRO-3rd go
một thằng nó cứ cầm cái đó đánh cái trái lê lên,one CL PRO-3rd keep hold CL that hit CL CL pear upcòn hai thằng kia thì nâng-niu trái lê.left two CL that R/M care CL pear
Thì ổng cứ nhìn theo tụi nó đi cho hết cánh đồng đấy luôn.So that-old-man keep look follow group PRO-3rd go for end CL field that also.Hết.End
So the film happens I think in the country, more exactly on a prairie. So there is aman who picks pears. In general he takes very good care of the pears, his products that hecreates so he is very careful with them. So he picks pears, so there is a pear that drops downon the chicken’s nest. So when he finishes, he comes down and puts them in two baskets. He
125
has two big baskets, or beep bamboo baskets, (I) don’t know what to call them like in theNorth, but in the South they are deep bamboo baskets. I don’t know. There. So he puts theminto two deep bamboo baskets. So there are a lot uh no a few people going by on that prairie,so there is a man who leads a goat by those two baskets, so the goat seems to like to eat, Ithink, but that man keeps pulling. Then after that there is a boy who looks pretty cute on abike riding by, he takes one basket of pears, he takes it all. Then he puts it on the bike andcarries it away. So on his way he sees a girl riding back toward him. So the girl uh the twobump into each other, so this boy drops off his hat. Pears seem to pour all out. Then after thatthis girl rides away. Uh at that point there are three uh three boys, I think probably threebrothers, because (they) look like from young to older to old. So these three come to help thisboy t put pears into the basket, and go away. So when this boy sets the bike up right, puts thebasket on, and prepares to go away, these three also go away. Then they see that this boydropped the hat, then they pick up the hat, they give it back to the boy. So when they give tothe boy they takes three pear. So then they share with each other, each has a pear, then thesethree go back toward the pear picker. So this man gets down to see that the two baskets, oneis empty, the other has some pears. But I’m surprised that a while ago I saw two baskets, thatthe boy took one leaving one, but why are there two again, one empty one not… suddenly Igot stuck there. So the three boys go, they have something like a table tennis uh ping-pong,they hits the pear up. This man uh stands watching them. That means he thought… I have afeeling that he thought they take them, but he doesn’t have any evidence to say that they tookthem. So these three keep walking, one boy keeps hitting the pear, the other two are carefulwith their pears. So he keeps watching them toward the far side of the field. The end.
Speaker 18Xong rồi đúng không?Finish already right not?Cậu chuyện có một ông già.CL story have one old-man oldÔng ấy đang hái ổi.Old-man that PRES pick guavaThì à ông ấy hái được hai rổ ổi đầy rồi.So uh old-man that pick get-pos two basket guava full alreadyỐng ấy trèo lên cây ống ấy hái rổ ổi thứ-ba.That-old-man that climb up tree that-old-man that pick basket guava thirdThế-là trong lúc ống ấy đang hái,So in time that-old-man that PRES pick
thì một thằng trẻ-con nó chạy qua đi bằng xe-đạp chạy qua,R/M one CL little PRO-3rd run by go by bike run bynó thấy một rổ ổi to,PRO-3rd see one basket guava bignên-là nó nó thích quá,therefore PRO-3rd PRO-3rd like too-muchnó chở rổ ổi đi,PRO-3rd transport basket guava awaythì cái ơ nó ăn-trộm của ống ấy rổ ổi.so CL uh PRO-3rd steal of that-old-man that basket guava
126
Thế nó chạy.So PRO-3rd runThế nó trên đường nó lái xe rất-là vội-vội-vàng-vàng,So PRO-3rd on road PRO-3rd ride transportation very fast-and-carelessly
thì nó nó đâm phải hòn đá,R/M PRO-3rd PRO-3rd crash into CL rockthế-là nó ngã ra,therefore PRO-3rd fall outthì làm-cho rổ ổi tung-tóe.so make basket guava scatter
Thế-là ba thằng trẻ-con nó đang chơi ở xung-quanh,So three CL little PRO-3rd PRES play in around
ba thằng trẻ-con này rất-là tử-tế,three CL little this very nicenhìn-thấy rổ ổi thằng này ngã,see basket guava CL this fallthì chạy ra giúp,so run out helpà sau đó thì giúp thằng thằng này nhặt ổi vào trong rổ,uh after that R/M help CL CL this pick guava into in basketà sau đó thì đi.uh after that R/M go
Thì để trả-công thì thằng thằng trẻ-con thằng ăn-trộm nó cho ba thằng trẻ-conSo to pay-back R/M CL CL little CL thief PRO-3rd give three CL littlemỗi thằng một quả ổi.each CL one CL guavaSau đó nó chạy đi mất.After that PRO-3rd run away loseThế-là ba thằng trẻ-con thì đi ngược lại.So three CL little R/M go opposite backTrên đường đi thì đi qua chỗ ông già đang hái ổi.On road go R/M go by place old-man old PRES pick guavaĐúng lúc ấy ông già từ trên cây xuống,Right time that old-man old from on tree get-down
ờ thì ông già thấy mất một rổ ổi,uh so old-man old see lose one basket guavathì nhưng thấy ba thằng trẻ-con này nó ăn ổi.so but see three CL little this PRO-3rd eat guava
Thế-là ông già à đoán là ba thằng này đang đã ăn ổi của ông ýSo old-man old uh guess that three CL this PRES PAST eat guava of old-man thatđã ăn-trộm ổi,PAST steal guava
và đánh ba thằng. and hit three CL
Hết.End
127
It’s alright now? The story is uh there is an old man. He is picking guavas. So he hasgotten two full baskets of guavas. He climbs up the tree to pick the third basket. So while ispicking, there is a boy riding by on a bike, he sees one big basket of guavas, so he likes it alot, so he carries it away, uh he steals his basket of guavas. So he runs away. So on his wayhe rides very fast and carelessly, so he bumps into a rock, so he falls down, which makes thebasket pour all out. So the three boys who are playing nearby, these three are very nice,seeing the basket this boy drops, so (they) come to help, uh then help this boy pick guavasinto the basket, then go away. So to pay back this boy who steals pears gives the three boyseach a guava. Then he runs away. So the three go back. On their way (they) pass by the oldman who picks guavas. Exactly at that point the old man comes down, uh so he sees that onebasket is gone, but he sees that these three boys are eating guavas. So the old man guessesthat these three boys stole his guavas, and hits them. The end.
Speaker 19Rồi, bắt-đầu.Then startỪ àm câu chuyện kể về một người đàn-ông trong mùa thu-hoạch lê.Uh umm CL story tell about one CL man in season harvest pearÀm trong khi mà ông-ta đang mải-miết leo lên cây để hái lê,Um in while that that-old-man PRES busy climb up tree to pick pear
thì ở dưới gốc cây khi ông đã thu-hoạch được một cái giỏ đã đầy,R/M in under foot tree when old-man PAST harvest get-pos one CL basket PAST fullthì có một đứa trẻ-con đi xe-đạp đến gần,R/M there one CL kid ride bike come nearvà nó nhìn lên cây thấy khi mà ông ý đang mải-mê để hái lê,and PRO-3rd look up tree see when that old-man that PRES busy to pick pearnó tranh-thủ,PRO-3rd take-advantagenó đã ăn-trộm mất cái giỏ lê của ông-ta.PRO-3rd PAST steal away CL basket pear of that-old-man
Trong khi mà nó đã ăn-trộm mất cái giỏ lê,In while that PRO-3rd PAST steal away CL basket pear
thì nó rất-là lo-lắng.R/M PRO-3rd very worry
Mặc-dù là nó không bị phát-hiện ra,Even-though that PRO-3rd not get-neg discover out
nhưng-mà nó cũng vẫn lo-lắng,but PRO-3rd also still worrylà nếu-như ống ý phát-hiện ra,that if that-old-man that discover outống có-thể đuổi theo,that-old-man able chase followcho-nên nó phóng xe-đạp rất nhanh.therefore PRO-3rd race bike very fast
À trong khi mà nó phóng xe-đạp nhanh,
128
Uh in while that PRO-3rd race bike fastthì nó không để-ý đến mọi người xung-quanh,R/M PRO-3rd not pay-attention to all person aroundthì có một cô-gái cũng đi xe-đạp ở hướng ngược lại,R/M there one young-woman also ride bike in direction opposite backvà nó đã ờ hai người đã đâm vào nhau.and PRO-3rd PAST uh two person PAST crash into each-other
Thì à cô-gái thì ok,So uh young-woman R/M ok
cho-nên là đã đạp xe đi-khỏi.therefore R/M PAST ride transportation away
Còn cậu-ta thì đã bị ngã ra à cùng với giỏ lê văng ra khắp nơi.And that-CL R/M PAST get-neg fall out uh with with basket pear cast out all placeThế-là ờm trong khi mà cậu-bé bị ngã xuốngSo um in while that little-boy get-neg fall downthì có ba đứa-trẻ khác đi ngược hướng đến gần,R/M there three little-boy different go opposite direction come near
và nó đã giúp cậu-bé nhặt lê cũng như-là nâng cậu-ta dậy.and PRO-3rd PAST help little-boy pick pear also like set-up that-CL up
À không một lời cảm-ơn.Uh not one word thankThì à ba đứa-trẻ đi đi khỏi,So uh three kid go go away
và cậu cậu-ta cũng lên xe-đạp để đi.and CL that-CL also up bike to go
Thì khi mà ba đứa-trẻ đi được một quãng,So when that three kid go get-pos one passage
thì nó nhìn-thấy cái mũ của cậu-bé bị rơi,R/M PRO-3rd see CL hat of little-boy get-neg fallthì nó có gọi cậu-bé lại.R/M PRO-3rd yes call little-boy back
Thì để trả-công cho cái việc giúp đấy thì cậu-bé cậu ấy đưa ba quả lêSo to pay-back for CL CL help that R/M little-boy CL that give three CL pearcho ba đứa-trẻ.to three kidỜ ờm sau khi mà nhận được lê thì chúng rất-là vui-mừng,Uh um after when that receive get-pos pear R/M they very happy
và bắt-đầu ăn.and start eat
Chúng đang tiến về cái hướng mà người đàn-ông đang hái lê,They PRES approach toward CL direction that CL man PRES pick pear
thì cùng lúc đó cũng là lúc mà cái túi để đựng lê ở trên người đàn ôngR/M same time that also be time that CL pocket to store pear on on CL manđã đầy,PAST fullvà ông-ta đã xuống dưới gốc cây.
129
and that-old-man PAST get-down under foot treeỐng ấy rất ngạc-nhiên,That-old-man that very surprise
vì một giỏ lê đã bị mất,because one basket pear PAST get-neg losevà đồng-thời ngẩng lên,and simultaneous raise-head upthì nhìn-thấy ba đứa-trẻ đang tiến đến cùng với lê ở trên miệng ờ.so see three kid PRES approach come with with pear in on mouth uh
Cái đấy làm ông-ta rất-là băn-khoăn,CL that make that-old-man very wonder
vì ông ấy không biết là ai là kẻ-trộm,because old-man that not know that who be thiefvì ông-ta không thể đoán được. [laugh]because that-old-man not able guess get-pos
Hết chuyện.End story.
So, let’s start. Uh the story is about a man in the pear harvesting season. Um while heis busy climbing up the tree to pick pears, and he has one full basket under the tree, there is aboy riding a bike approaching, and he looks up the tree and when the man is busy pickingpears, he takes advantage of it and steals his basket. While he steals the basket uh he is veryworried. Even though he is not discovered, he is still very worried, that he may chase along,so he races his bike very fast. Uh while he is racing the bike, he doesn’t pay attention topeople around, there is a girl riding a bike toward him, and he uh the two crash into eachother. So uh the girl is okay, therefore she rides away. And he falls over with the basket ofpears casting all over. So um while the boy falls own, uh there are three other kids walkingtoward him, and they help the boy pick the pears as well as set him up right. Uh no thanks atall. So the three kids go away, and he uh he also gets on the bike to rides away. So when uhthe three kids have gone for a while, they see that hat the boy dropped, so they call the boyback. So to pay back that deed the boy gives three pears to the three boys. Um after gettingthe pears they are very happy and start eating. They are approaching the pear picker when atthe same time the pocket storing pears on the pear picker is full, and he comes down on theground. He is very surprised because one basket has gone, and raises his head up to see thatthe three kids are approaching with pears in their mouth. That makes him wonder a lotbecause he does not know who is the thief, because he cannot guess it. The end.
Speaker 20Ờ bây-giờ thì…Uh now so…Câu chuyện kể về một người thu-hoạch lê.CL story tell about one person harvest pearMột người đàn-ông đi thu-hoạch lê.One CL man go harvest pearXong ông ý rất-là chăm-chú với việc thu-hoạch của mình.Finish old-man that very concentrate with CL harvest of self
130
Thế xong rồi-là ờ thế-là khi mà ông ý cái thu-hoạch ấy,So finish then uh so when that old-man that CL harvest that
có ba sọt ba sọt lê để dưới gốc cây á thế.there three basket three basket pear put under foot tree there so
Thế xong-là cứ cái sọt này đầy,So finish when CL basket this full
thì tiếp-tục sọt tiếp-theo.R/M continue basket next
Thì ông ấy đang tiếp-tục sọt thứ-ba thế.So old-man that PRES continue basket third thereThế-là khi mà ông ấy làm-việc rất-là chăm-chú đến độ,So when that old-man that work very concentrate to point
có một người đàn-ông dắt con dê,there one CL man walk CL goatđi qua,go byvà tạt qua đó,and pass by thatnhưng ông-ta cũng không để-ý.but that-old-man also not pay-attention
Và tiếp-theo là có một cậu-bé cậu ấy đạp đạp xe đi qua.And next R/M there one little-boy CL that ride ride transportation go byThế-là cậu ấy mới dừng-lại,So CL that just stop
và thấy ông ấy không hề chú-ý đến ba sọt lê ở dưới,and see old-man that not at-all pay-attention to three basket pear in undernên cậu ấy mới nhấc một sọt,therefore CL that just pick-up one basketcậu ấy mang đi.CL that bring away
Cậu ấy đạp xe đi thế.CL that ride transportation away thereTrên đường đi thì cậu gặp một cô-bé đi ngang qua.On road go R/M CL meet one little-girl go pass byVà thế-là chẳng may cái mũ của cậu ấy đội trên đầu rơi xuống.And so not fortunate CL hat of CL that wear on head fall downThế-là cậu ấy mất tập-trung,So CL that lose attention
và cậu ấy đâm phải hòn đá đổ bị ngã ra rất-là đau.and CL that crash into CL rock fall get-neg fall out very hurt
Thế xong rồi ngay tại lúc đó,So finish then right at time that
thì có ba cậu-bé đang chơi ở gần đấy,so there three little-boy PRES play at near therethấy cậu bị ngã thế,see CL get-neg fall there
131
mới ra lại giúp cậu dựng xe,just out come help CL set-up transportationvà nhặt lê vào sọt cho cậu,and pick pear into basket for CLvà thế-là cậu ấy rất-là cảm-kích.and so CL that very grateful
Thế cậu ấy đi,So CL that go
thì ba cậu kia mới nhìn-thấy cái mũ của cậu rơi,R/M three CL that just see CL hat of CL fallmới gọi lại,just call backvà đưa cho cậu-bé cái mũ,and give to little-boy CL hatvà cậu cũng rất-là cảm-ơn bằng cách là cho ba cậu-bé mỗi cậu một quả lê.and CL also very thank by way be give three little-boy each CL one CL pear
Thế-là cậu-bé a ba cậu-bé cầm lê vừa đi vừa ăn thế.So little-boy uh three little-boy hold pear simultaneous go simultaneous eat thatThế-là cậu ba cậu-bé đi qua cái cây lê mà ông già đang thu-hoạch.So CL three litte-boy go pass CL CL pear that old-man old PRES harvestThế trong lúc ông ấy ống bắt-đầu xuống So in time old-man that that-old-man start get-downđể đưa lượt lê thứ-hai tiếp-theo vào sọt lê thứ-ba,to carry turn pear second next into basket pear third
thì ông ấy phát-hiện ra rằng sọt lê đầu-tiên bị mất,R/M old-man that discover out that basket pear first get-neg losethế-là ông ấy mới tần-ngần không hiểu tại-sao bị mất.so old-man that just bewilder not understand why get-neg lose
Thế-là tình-cờ thì ba cậu-bé vừa đi vừa gặm lê đi qua.So accidental R/M three little-boy simultaneous go simultaneous munch pear go byThế.ThereĐấy thế-là câu chuyện kết-thúc.There so CL story end
Uh so now… The story is about a pear picker. One man goes picking pears. Then heconcentrates on his harvesting job. Then after that when he is collecting, uh there are threebasket of pears under the tree. So after one basket is full, (he) continues with the next one. Sowhen he is working on the third basket, there is a man leading a goat passing by, but he doesnot pay attention to it. And next, there is a boy riding by. So he stops, and sees that he doesnot pay attention to the three baskets under the tree, so he takes one basket to bring it away.He rides away like. On his way he meets a girl going by. And unfortunately his hat that he iswearing falls off. So he loses his attention, and he bumps into a rock and falls off very hard.So then right at that time there are three boy playing nearby who see that he has fallen off, so(they) come to help him set the bike up right and pick up pears to put into the basket for him,so he is very grateful. So he goes away, the three other boys see his hat, call him, and give
132
him the hat back, so he thanks by giving them each a pear. So the boy the three boys hold thepears going and eating. So he uh the three boys go by the pear tree where the old man isharvesting. So while he uh he starts coming down to put the next round of pears into the thirdbasket, he discovers that the first basket is gone. So suddenly the three boys go by munchingon the pears. There. There, the story ends.
133
APPENDIX B
AMERICAN “PEAR” STORIES
134
Transcripts of twenty American narratives that were used in Chafe’s (1980) projectare presented here for easy reference. They are reprinted here with permission from MaryErbaugh (http://www.pearstories.org/). Some transcription conventions are as follows.. sentence-final falling intonation? sentence-final level or rising intonation, clause-final but not sentence-final intonation/X/ X may not be an accurate transcription/?/ portion unintelligibleay indefinite article pronounced to rhyme with “say”thee definite article pronounced to rhyme with “see”-- lengthened segment.. break in timing too short to be measured as pause[X] pause lasting X seconds[X [Y] a--nd u--m [Z] ]
a sequence lasting a total of X seconds, consitsting of a pause of Y seconds,“a--nd u--m,” and a pause of Z seconds
Speaker 1Okay. [2.O[.75] U--m [.75] the s the scene opens up [.5] with [.2] um [1.45] yousee atree, k Kay? And there's [.l] a ladder coming out ..o of the tree, and there's a man at the topof the ladder, you can't see him yet.[2.4[.9]A--nd[.95]]then ..it shifts, and you seehim, plucking a pear from the tree.[.4] And you watch him pluck a few pears, and he'd dropthem into his [.25]thing, but I don't ..he's wearing like an apron with huge pockets.[.5]But Idon't think you see the apron at first. I don't know if that's important or not.[3.3[.85]A--ndu--h[1.5]]and then he gets down out of the tree, and he [.3]dumps ail his pears into thebasket, and the basket's full, and one of the pears drops down to the floor, and he[.65]picks it up,and he takes his kerchief off, and he [.5] wipes it off, [.45 + and [.45]]places it in in the basket which is[.25]very full. [.74]That's why it fell off in the firstplace.[1.3[.95]A--nd u--m]then he climbs back up the ladder,[.35] and he [.3]and he ..startspicking pears again.[.65]And then while he's up in the ladder,[.9]let's see is it while he'sup in the ladder? Or ..or before.[2.3[1.l]U--m[.55]]anyway, a guy comes by leading a goat.[.85]And the goat's aaarrr but ..and they don't talk to each other, they don't..I don't thinkthey even look at each other, and ..the guy ..walks by. And you watch the goat, disappearingall the way, [.4?and then [2]]then you're back to the man in the tree. And he's up there in thetree.[95[.4]And then[25]] definitely when he's up there, ..a kid comes by on a bicycle.[.7]From the direction where the goat man left, okay? [2.45[.75]A--nd..U--m[.75]]the bicycle'sway too bigfor the kid.[.45]I'm giving you all these details. I don't know if you wantthem.[1.2[.6] U--m[.2] ]the ..the reason I'm giving you the details is cause I don't knowwhat the point of the movie was.[5]Okay? So maybe you can see {laugh begins }somethingthat {laugh ends}I didn't.[.7]Okay? [1.65[.35]U--m [.75]]g a kid comes by on a bicycle, ..hestops,[.5]he gets off his bike,[2.9[.95] u-- m[.65]]the movie was in color.[.6]And the moviehad sound track.[.4]It's important. And then the mo the whole movie started with a acock crowing.[.25]And then you see /?/. Anyway. [5]I just remembered that. [2.2[.35]Anyway, so u--m [.6]]the kid on the bicycle, ..gets off the bicycle, [.45]I think he [.85]hepicks up the b-asket of pears, and he puts it on his blcycle, ..on the front? [.25]And he rides
135
off. [4.75[.75]A--nd[3.2]]you see him, [.35]riding off and the next scene you see him,[.4]like [.25]at a at a distance, a pan shot. [.35]And he's riding on a lane, [.35] riding on abicycle and they [.3]cro you know. [.35]Cross paths. [.5]And he kind of watches her go by.[.6]And ..because he's watching her, [.45]he when he turns around his hat flies off. [.2]Okay? [2.]And then he bumps into a rock. [3.0[1.6]A--nd..u..m[.35]]falls down, and ..the..pears all s--pray all over the place, [3.5?and [.25]]and then ..you see him fall down, and hegets up, and brushes himself off, ..and he goes ..you know {brushing gesture}[.6]and thenyou see three other boys about his age. He's like maybe ..what, ten or something?.. Twelve?I don't know. [1.85[.65]A--nd]and you look at them, and and they see him, and they comeup, [1.35[95]a--nd]without saying anything, there's no speech in the whole movie. [.6]without saying anything, [.6]they..u--m..help him ..put the pears back in the basket. Onlythey don't wipe them off first. Just pick them up, ..and pour them in. [.35]And they--helphim get his bike u--p, and one kid takes the rock that he tripped on and he throws it off to theside of the roa--d, [1.0?and [.75]]and they set him upright, ..and they ..and then he ..youknow they I don1they don't say thank you, he just[.25]splits. [.6]And then ..they walk..the three boys walk down the road and they see--..the kid's hat. [.35]And so one of themwhistles. [.3]And the kid on the bike turns around, [.35]and then he brings his hat to him,[.5]and the g guy on the bike [.2]gives [5] the other kids [.5]gives the kid that returns hishat ..three pears to share with his buddies. [1.35[.75]So--[.25]and then he splits. [.35]With his hat, with his pears, everything. [4.2[.8]A--nd um [24]I just remembered anotherdetail. [.35]Before he meets the girl? [.l]One of the pears,.. It's a bumpy road little dirt road,one of the pears ..flies out. [.3]Whatever. [3.85[.2]A--nd U--m [2.8]]then you don't see thekid with the bike with the pears anymore. And the three kids that are walking, one of themhas a .. what do you call those little[1.15?um [.85]]paddleball? You know, with a ball on ayuh/??/?..chong chong chong chong. [.6]So they're walking along, and they brush off theirpears, and they start eating it. [.35]Then they walk by--[.35]the man who was picking thepears. [.55]Who looks like a Mexican-American if that's important? [2.4[.6]U--m[.25]]and he's ge he's getting down out of the tree, and fucking with the ladder. [1.65[.7]A--nd [.45]]he sees..and and there's one[.25]full basket of pears there, and and an emptybasket. [.4] And the other full basket is gone. [.65]And he goes ..{counting gesture}[2.7]And he sees the kids walking by and eating their pears... And he and he looks afterthem, and they disappear, [.6]and that's the end of the movie. [.85]And there's no [.55]nolanguage, ..used, ..throughout the whole thing.
Speaker 2All right, well--, the first scene is about [.9]there's a man up in the tree. It's a pear tree..andu--h it shows him ..he's[.35] picking the pears. [1.l[.7]A--nd]he's not really ..doesn't seemto be paying all that much attention [.55?because [.45]you know the pears fall, and..hedoesn't really notice, [1.6?and [.5]]anyway, he comes down with a load of pears, andhe[.25]puts them into the basket, [.6]and then he's..going back up into the tree, it's likehe's..been doing this all day, and ..it's just a monotonous kind of thing for him. [.75]And aman comes along with a goat, [.7]and the goat obviously is interested in the pears... But theman just..walks by with the goat. And the man up in the tree doesn't even notice. [.25]Sohe's not really paying attention to ..you know just kind of[.75]picking the pears, and is doinghis thing. [2.6[.6]And uh[.35]then, [.4] he's up in the tree, and y you see [.65?that [.45]]thatwithin his [.75]view you know from his viewpoint, [.55]he c he could possibly see this little
136
boy coming on a bicycle. [.5]At least ..it seems to me that ..you know he would notice thisboy if he was really[.3]interested, but he-s not thinking about his ..vision is very much youknow ..kind of..{gestures tunnel vision}he's very bored. [1.25[.85]A--nd ]this little boy--,[1.2]the scene [.3]focuses on this little boy, .. going long--, [.4]obviously, [.9]well, [.4]youknow he, [.95]because of the goat, [.4]your idea is on the pears. And you think ‚ÄúWow,this little boy's probably going to come and see the pears, [.4?and [.3]]he's going to take apear or two, and then ..go on his way.‚Äù [1.3[.75]U--m]but the little boy comes, [1.8?..a--ndu--h[1.0]]he doesn't want just a pear, he wants a whole basket. [.55]So he puts the--[.2]bicycle down, and he [.25]you wonder how he's going to take it with this. [.4]He just hasthis [1.0]I don't know, I wonder how the hell he's going carry this basket. [.3]But okay... Hemanages. He takes the pears, [.7]and he ..puts it on the bicycle, and the man up in the treedoesn't even [.5]doesn't notice anything. He didn't hear the little boy, he didn't /right/.[1.05]So then the little boy goes off on his way, ..and you think “Aha. [2.05[.5]uh[.85]]Arewe gonna go back to the man over there?” But no..[.3]you never [.85]The man's just stillpicking his pears, and the little boy's going along, [1.95[.55]and um[.6]]then you see thislittle girl. [.55] Coming on a bicycle in the opposite direction, [2.15[.75a—nd U--h [.75]]youwonder how she's going to figure in on this. [3.05[.75]A--nd 11..h[1.4]]they come, you seethe scene's like this, and you see them both coming coming coming and you think, youknow “Are they going to collide, what's going to happen,”[1.05[.55] and uh]it turns outshe [.7]from what I could understand she grabbed his hat. [.5]Ail right, and then he ..crashesinto a rock. [1.4[75]And uh..]pears go out all over the place. [2.l[.65]And then u--rn[.5]]he's[.75]fixing himself up, [.6 and [.6]]then all of a sudden you see these threelittle boys who're[.4]saw this whole thing. [.7] And they come down, and then [1.l5]I don'tknow, I thought [.15]here was this little boy just stole the pears and these other little boyscome and they're helping him, and they're very helpful, [.5]and they [.95]put all the pears inthe basket, [2.3[.55]a--nd u--m [.75]]you know this little ..other little boy just has to goon... He's kind of crushed, and I don't know[.55]you know [.4]I think his ‚Äòsgo was hurt.{laugh}You know really [.35]bruised all over. [.6]And the other little boys, one boy has alittle ..bat, [.35]and a ball, [.3]and they're just[.8]they're kind of just [.75]I guess they're justenjoying the afternoon and they go walking off, ..and they see his hat, [.35]and they [.7]bringthe hat back, [.95+[.25]and u--m[.7]]find the little boy, ..who had the stole the pears,[2.55[.65]u--m[1.2]I thought “Why didn't he think of it before.” But he finally gives these..three boys, ..each a pear. [2.95[1.2]A--nd u--h [.95]]then you know “Aha. It's all beginningto come together now.” [.75]You just know that those little boys are going to go back,[.35]to where the pear tree was, and you just know that old man's going to see [.45]theselittle boys coming and say “Ha...you're the ones who stole the pears.” [1.9][.7]But u--h[.35]]still.../It / comes back to the old man, [.3]up in the pear tree, he's still picking the pears. Hedoesn't..he doesn't even notice that the pears are stolen yet. [125] And then he comes downfrom the [.4]from the tree, [.35]the little boys start /walk/[.95]walking down, [2.95[.75]andu—h [1.3]]suddenly you see [.85]he begins to notice that ..something's not right. [.9]Andhe's going {gestures counting}/and/he's counting them, [.15]and he's[.6]really slow youknow. [1.35[.75]Anyway, [.15]]so then finally he figured out ..something [.35]you knowsomebody's stolen the pears. [.6]And the little boys [.5]come walking down and they'reall eating their pears, ..and they just walk by. They both [.65]little boys don't even sayanything to the old man or anything. [2.0[.45]A--nd u--m[.75]]but the old man, [.15]youdon't know quite what he's thinking. Either, [.95]first thing I thought was [.75]that they
137
they're the ones that stole the pears. [.45]Or, [.6] “Hm. Whoever stole the pears is downthere-And he's passing the pears around.” [1.15]So he's standing there kind of scratchinghis head, and the little boys just walk off. [.3]That's it.
Speaker 3Okay,[2.05..u--h[1.1]]the movie is basically about uh[.2]u--m[.85]a number of [.45]individuals, [.6]uh a guy who's picking pears, [2.l[1.0]u--m[.6]]and a kid on a bicycle.Basically those are the two ..protagonists in this. [2.8[1.05]And ..um [.6]]the guy who ispicking pears. [3.15um[2.35]um [.35]]picks the pears and puts them in a[.45]in um[.4]thesebaskets that he has. [1.6[.9]U--h..]and he's picking the pears, [1.0?and [.45]and um..]alongcomes a man with a donkey. Uh uh a don uh a goat. [.45]And he comes along ..by..youknow, [.4]passes him. [.4]And then this kid comes along with a bicycle. [.55]And he ripsoff.-one of the[1.0] baskets of..of pears that he has. [.8]So the Ki the the um.. the boy goesalong, and he has [1.4..um[.8]]he's riding his bicycle, a--nd he looks at ..a girl, that wascorning the other way- riding a bicycle, [.9[.7]uh]he loses his hat, a—nd ..there's a stone inthe way, so his bicycle falls over, ..and the pears get [3.5[1.65]um[.85]um[4]]fall down onthe ground. [.75[..U..m[.5]] there's some kids, there are three other boys, ..who are there.[.35]They help him,..get straightened out, ..put the pears back, [.55]in the basket, straightenout his bicycle, and so forth. [.85]And he goes on his merry way. [125?..But then..um[.35]]the boys realize that he's forgotten his hat. [.55]So one of the boys whistles tohim, [.45+and [.45]]stops him, [.2+and [2] ]gives him his hat back. [3.55[1.5]And then ..um[1.l]]the boy with the pears ..gives [.55]the boy who just gave him his hat[l.85[.7]um[.75]]three pears to..divide among his friends. [1.9? [1.0]And ..then ..]the boysgo ..um.. walking along, eating their pears. [2.9[1.l]And um[1.0] ]then the man [.25]uh..who was picking pears, [.6]comes down from his--[2.45[.35]um[1.65]]his ..ladder,[.65]where he's been picking these pears, [.5]and he's goes to empty out the ones that he'sjust picked. [.6]And he notices that [.35]instead of the three baskets that he had before.[.4]there are only two. [.8]And ..so ..he's puzzled, [.45]and ..just when he realizes that[.45]one basket is ..gone, [.45]the three boys come along, [.8]eating their pears. [.75And[.65]]you're left with this ..dilemma, [4]what does this guy {laugh}you know what does thisguy really think. I guess he thinks that [.95] “I wonder if those guys ripped off with mypears or what.” He just doesn't know. [.35]He was up in the tree when ..the boy on thebicycle ripped off the uh/?s/..the pears. Okay?
Speaker 4Okay. The movie seemed very [.25] sound oriented. [.4]Even though there weren't[.6]therewas no dialogue. [3.15[1.5]A--nd[1.3]]the first [.75]thing I noticed ..was ..the sound of theman picking ..pears. [.8]And of course there was a[.7]a man there standing on a ladder in apear tree, [.75]and it was very visual... But you k..you kind of noticed the sounds more..than[.6]what you're seeing. [.55]And then he dropped a pear, and I heard it drop,[1.4[.55{laugh}]...a--nd [.35]]he walked down the ladder, and he emptied pears into baskets.And I heard the pears [.35]being emptied into the baskets. [.7]And when he walked backup Iheard [1.3]the ladder creak, as he stepped on ..each rung, [1.55[.65]and [.7]]before the filmstarted, ..see there's a rooster crowing. [1.6[55]So [.6]]immediately I felt that it was going tobe sort of[2.35]a film oriented towards hearing ..rather than a visually oriented film.[1.05]And later on, [.25]as he was picking pears a man came along with a goat, [1.85[.9 and
138
[.5]]the goat was bahying or whatever goats do, [2.1?{laugh}...]what do goats do.[.4+{laugh}[.4]]/Baeing hrnm/..Bae. [2.95{laugh}[5] A--nd [.65]then ..]I heard the [.5]bellon the goat's neck, [1.35[.95]a--nd..]someone [.4]let's see. [.3]Someone came by on a bicycle[.7]you could hear the bicycle, ..wheels going round. [3.3[1.25]A--nd[1.45]]someonestopped, and picked up ..a basket of pears that the man had picked and while he wasn'tlooking, [.71took the whole basket away on his bicycle. [.75]So he's going down the road, heapproached a girl on a bicycle. And looked up at the girl and his bike got caught on the rock.[1.45[.95]And [.6]he fell over, and all the pears ..spilled ..all over. [.4] Three boys came out,[.75]helped him pick himself up, [.55]pick up his bike, pick up the pears, [.55]one of themhad [.6]a toy, which was like a clapper. [2.4[1.1]A--nd[1.1]] I don't know what you call itexcept a paddle with a ball suspended on a string. [.25{breath}]So you could hear himplaying with that. [225[.8]A--nd[.95]]then he rode off, but he forgot his hat. [1.7[.55]So[.75]]one of the boys whistled to him, [1.85[1.05]and then, [.4]]he went and gave him the hat,[.2]and in return, [.8]the boy that lost the hat, [.4]gave his friend, [.55]the boy, ..three pears,..to give back to his friends, [.9]and they went off, ..eating the pears, [.15]and they walked bythe p[.8]the pear tree, ..the man was picking pears... And he looked down, ..saw that [1.05]hewas missing a basket... And he looked at the boys walking off, eating the pears, [1.6 [.6]and[.7]]I think it ends there {laugh}.
Speaker 5Okay, well, [.3]it starts out [1.2]it's [1.4]the setting looks like it's a place [.4]maybe--[.4]inCalifornia, the Santa Barbara area, .. or something like that. [.65[.2U--h]]there was [.35]thisorchard surrounding him. [.15]l guess what he's picking is pears. [.15]There's a--uh[.4]farmlaborer, a Mexican farm laborer picking pears and he has three baskets, ..filled with[.8]andhe's filling them with pears. [2.65And[1.15]um[1.0]]in the course of him picking, [.2]amangoes by with a[2.4]tsk goat, [.75]and that's the last you see of him, [2.45[1.0]and then[.85]]this [.7]little boy [1.5]is riding by on his bicycle. And he sees ..the pears, so he stopsto take a pear, [.85] then he decides [.5]since ..the ..farm laborer ..isn't watching, to takethe whole bushel. So he takes the bushel, puts it on his bike, and starts to ride away.[1.45[.75]And [.25]]on his way, ..riding, he comes across another [.3]bicyclist, [.25]bicyclist,it's a young woman, [2.2[.5] and [1.15]]for some reason she catches his attention, andhe's[.4]turning his head, ..behind him, looking at her, [.35?and [.2]]there's a rock in the rroad, and he [.25]hits it with his bike, ..and falls. [2.55[.8]A—nd then [.7]]his um[1.15]pearsgo all over the road. [1.15]And then there's these three little boys, who are walking,[.45]they're around [.65]they're little boys. [.65]They're [.7]from nine to twelve years old.[.2]/And that [.2]the little boy is like approx about ten years old/. And they see, [.7]him onthe ground, with all these[.5]pears strewn out all over the road, ..and so they decide[.8[.65]/like/..]there's no spoken ..communication at all... Going on... Throughout the wholemovie, and they just[.6]pick up his basket. [5+[.5]A--nd]no word is exchanged. [.35]It'sreally kind of neat. [1.05[.6]And then [.15]]they start walking away, [.3]and they ..get himall set up on his bike, [.3+and then [.3]]start walking away, and the ..they find his hat, [.5]onthe road, and then w..one of them comes back, [1.2]and this one's.. playing with one ofthose[1.6]those wooden things that you hit with a ball. [1.l]And he [.15]he comes back, andgives him his hat, and so he gives him [.6]s--ome[.9]pears, [.8]and so they walk off, ..eatingth/e/se pears. [.65]And then they pass by where the farm laborer is, and ..while this is goingon, the farm laborer realizes that a whole basket's missing. [.9]And he's wondering where it
139
is and he sees these three boys approaching, and they're eating pears, [1.2+ [1.2]a--nd]theywalk off, ..into the distance, and he's sitting there, [.35]with a puzzled look on his face.[15]That's it {laugh}.
Speaker 6Okay. We--ll, [3.l[.75]let me see. [1.5]] It opens with [.9?u--m[.4]]I guess a farm worker,[1.2] picking pears, [.75]in a tree. [435[l.0]A--nd u--m[2.6]]you see him taking--picking thepears off the leaves, and putting them in a .. white apron, [.5]and he walks down the[.75]ladder, and dumps the pears Into a basket. [3.2[1.2]U--m [1.2]tsk]then you see himgoing back up in the tree. [6.4[.75]and [.9]u--m[1.2]let me see. [.8]]In the ba..and ..you seea guy leading a goat, ..past the tree where he's picking the pears. [355[.95]Then u--m[1.5]]alittle boy on a bicycle, [1.15]comes riding past the tree, [1.45[.75]a--nd[.2]]sort of goes pastthe pears[.3]the [.2]pears in the baskets and then stops [1.0]and looks up at the guy in thetree, he's still on the ladder, and he's not .. watching him, so he [1.0] st .. puts his bike[.6]down, [.85]he walks over, a--nd he picks up a[.2]the whole basket of pears, [.9]and puts iton the handle [.2]no, on the [.4] front[.15]fender of his bike. [.6]And holds on toit.[1.1?[45]And /??/..]as he's holding on h] the handlebars he t takes off with them.[635[l.l]U--m[.7]then [.4]u--h[2.l]] a..girl on a bicycle, [1.15]comes riding towards him, ..inthe opposite direction. [.9]And as they pass, [.45]he sort of turns, and looks at her, [.6]andhis hat flies off, [2.l[.2]a--nd[1.2]]his[.3]bicycle hits a rock... Because he's looking at thegirl. [.75]Falls over, 1.35]uh]there's no conversation in this movie. [.6]There's sounds, youknow, like the birds and stuff, but there..the humans beings in it don't say anything. [1.0]Hefalls over, and then these three other little kids about his same age come walking by.[3.05[.6]And ..um [1.3]]I don't know, I guess they've been playing or something, the guy hasa paddle with a ball attached to this [.5]with a string that kind /of you know/. [.7+[.7]A--nd]they see that he's[.8]fallen off his bike, [.3]and his pears [1.4] have scattered, [2.25[.45]a--nd uh[1.0]]they walk over to help him, [.6]they g[.25]gather all the pears and put them inthe basket, [1.8[.8]a--nd[.15]]one of the guys, helps him brush off the dust, [.9]and anotherguy picks up the rock, and he throws it out of the road, [.4+and[.4]]he gets all situated again,and he ..takes off, [.15]and the [.5]boys [.4]keep walking in their direction,2.15[1.l]uh[.35]]then they ..they come across his hat on the road. [.5]And one of the guyspicks it up, [1.2[.15]and [.6]]whistles ..to the ..g..boy on the bicycle to catch his attention.[.65]And he turns around, and he runs up [l]to him, [.95]and gives him back his hat.[1.8[.9]A--nd] the boy who's stolen the pears, [.4]gives..three pears to the boy who gave himhis hat. [3.2 [1.25A--nd[l.25]]the boy [.l5]walks back to his two companions, and he handsa pear to each of them. [1.6[1.0]Um[15]]and they start eating them. [.15]And then they walkpast the[.35]the tree, [1.l]where the picker, ..was picking the pears, [3.05[.9]a--nd u--h[.9]]hehas already come down from the ladder, [.65]to deposit his [.4]more of the pears that hepicked in the basket and then he notices that there are only two baskets instead of three.[.9]And he sort of [.75] /visually/[.25]counts them with his fingers. [2.95[.8]A--nd[1.6]]leans back-up against the tree. [1.2]I guess, [.55]wondering ..what happenedto [1.3]the missing basket. [1.9[.8]A--nd[.5]] right at that moment the three boys comewalking ..by, munching on the pears, [.5]that he had picked, [.9]and go walking, ..past him,and he just sort of looks at them. [2.9[1.2]A--nd [.95] that's it {laugh}.
Speaker 7
140
I'll try. [2.15[.5]U--m[.6]tsk[2]well, [.25]]there was--[.25]a man, [.2]who was picking pears,[2.0[.55]a--nd[.9]]it was in ay uh[2.2...tsk...]large open field, it wasn't a pear orchard, [.2]oranything like that. [4.45[.9]A--nd[2.5]]I don't know. [.4]Something that I noticed aboutthe /movie/ particularly unique was that the colors .. were [.35] just [.5] very strange.[.6[.2]] Like [.3]] the green was a [2.2] inordinately bright green, [.55] for the pears, [.4..and[.25]] these colors just seemed a little [.5] kind of bold, almost to the point of [1.15] beingartificial. [2.25[.6] tsk [.1] A--nd [.75]] he-- [.35] was going up and down the ladder, [1.1[.9]tsk..] picking the pears, [.8[.25]and[.25]]depositing them in [.35]three baskets, [.7]thatwere down below. .1 [3.85[1.2...tsk...]A--nd[1.95]]there's.. one ..sequence right there[1.15+that [1.15]]that I've forgotten. [2.5...tsk...]Oh.[.3]A..man with a goat [.9]tsk comesby, [1.5[.75]a--nd [.15]] you can kind of hear the goat mewing in the background, [.15]andthey get up, [.2]and approach, [.2]and just kind of walk off. They don't really seem to havetoo much to do, [.6]with ..what's going..on. [1.55[.3]A--nd[.7]]the man goes back up into thetree, [.3]to pick some more pears. [1.9 ‚Ķ tsk ‚Ķ] Along comes--..a young boy, .. aboutseven years old, [.2] eight years old, [.6] on a bicycle that's way too big for him, and her'sriding it through this great open field. [1.4 [.85] A‚Äînd [.15]] he [.35] sees this three pear[.2] these three baskets of pears, and then sees this man up in the [.5] tree, and decides [.45]that he'd like some pears. And at first looks like he's going to take one or two. [.6] Thendecides that he'd [.15] much rather take a whole basket, [.55] puts the basket on the bike,[1.45?[.9]tsk a--nd..]kind of struggle/??/cause it's much too big for him. And the bike ismuch too big for him.[.8+[.8]A--nd..]gets on the bike, [.2+and [.2]]rides off.[2.7[1.85...tsk...]Then--[.2]]hts riding ..across this.. great [.25]expanse, [1.15+and [1.15]]agirl comes, [.4]riding a bike in the opposite direction, [1.35[.55]and [.4]]you can see themriding [.65]towards each other, and you wonder if there's going to be a collision.[.85?[.7]But ..]instead they just ...kind of ..brush ..by each other and she knocks the hat thathe's wearing off on the ground, [3.75[l.4...tsk...]a‚Äînd[1.7]]he's..um[.35]kind of lookingback [.2]at her ..and the hat, [.2]and doesn't see that he's going to run into a rock, .. which hedoes, [.25]and the pears all [.45]spill on the ground, and he falls down and he skins his kneeor something. [1.85[.4...tsk...]A--nd[1.l]]and then you hearth is-- [.7]kind of rhythmic..thud/ding/[.35]sound, [1.4[55]a--nd[.4]]and you look up, [.3]or the boy looks up.[1.95[1.l]tsk.. A--nd[.45]]there are three [.15]other boys standing there one of them has apaddleball, [.4]type thing which was /???/ sound, [2.l?[1.8]a--nd ]they look [.25]kind ofominous at first, .. like they might [.5]steal his pears and run off or something but insteadthey [.15]help him [.45]pick up all the pears, [.6]one boy goes over and helps him brush--[.75]his pants off, [1.3?/and then [.5]]then/another one [.35]/I don't know/picks up thebicycle I think, [.15]or they just all put the pears back in the basket, [.2]they set the basketback on the bike, [.3+and[.3]]and /they g/[1.25]they go on their way walking down the road/and/he rides ..off. [1.05[.7]A--nd]they come across his hat, .. that he neglected [.55]to pickup he forgot the hat. [1.2]So one of them whistles ..to him, [.5]he was saying, [.15] “Hey youforgot your hat.” [.65?and [.5]]he stops, [.3+and [.3]]one of the ..three boys brings the hatback, [2.4[.9...tsk...]a--nd[.85]]he gives th [.4]that boy three pears. [l.3[.65]tsk Fo--r[.2]]youknow kind of as a gesture of thanks. [.7[.35]tsk[.15]]He rides off. [1.15[.6]A--nd]the boyskeep walking back [.3]the way the first boy came. [1.35+[1.35] Meanwhile ..]the manwho's picking pears, [.35]comes down from the tree, [.35]and starts emptying [.5]his..um[.95]load of pears into [.8]one of the two /remaining/baskets, [.75]he notices that thethird basket is gone. [1.9[1.l]A--nd[.3]]the[.6]/ at/..just about this time, he's just kind of
141
looking a little [.55]/um/[55]kind of visibly a little upset. [2.15[1.3...tsk...]A--nd[.35]]thesethree boys [.9]go walking by, and they each have a pear in their hands, so he's..kind oflooking at them, trying to make a connection wondering [.35]how they got the pears, .. and..if they were his pears, ../you see/how this is just all what [.6]what you're projecting onthe man. [2.3[1.l]And [.75]]I think that was it. [.75]/It was neat/. Speaker 8 Okay, [.3+u--h[.3]]there's a--..man, [.45]picking pears, in a pear tree, out ..somewhere in the country,[1.l+[1.l]u--h]he looks [.95]like your uh[.2]typical ..farmer, [.3+or [.3]]whatever, kind ofplump, [.95and [.7]]moustache, and he wears a white apron, [1.55[1.3]to ..]hold the pears in.[.6[.l]A-nd]he [1.0] fills his--..thing with pears, and comes down, and there's a..basket he putsthem in. [.65[.2]A--nd]you see--[1.25]passerbyers on bicycles and stuff go by. [2.2[1.15]A-nd [.l]]then a boy comes by, [.l]on a bicycle, the man is in the tree, [.9]and the boy gets offthe bicycle, and ..looks at the man, [1.5?and then [.9]uh]looks at the bushels, and he ..starts tojust take a few, and then he decides to take the whole bushel. [.9]And he puts it on his[.35]b--icycle rack in front, [.4]and /he/rides off, [1.75[.95]a--nd[.2]]passes um..a girl,[1.25]like this on the road, [.7[.1]a--nd]his hat falls off, and he turns, and he runs into a rock,[1.0[.5]a--nd]he falls, the bicycle ..and all the [.75]pears fall out, [2.6[.15]a--nd[1.3]]someboys --come out, ..and they're s standing around, help turn pick it up. [2.5[1.7]As--][1.15]then he--'s ..about to forg[.65]forget his [.15]u--h[.5]hat, [1.05and [.65]]boy walksback, gives him his hat, [.25]he gives the boy some pears, and they go off, [.65]eating thepears, [.3]and they walk by, [.95]the ma--n[1.15[.8]tsk[.15]]who--'s [1.8u--h[1.3]]wellhe's..befo..he comes down the tree first, [.3]and /you see he notices that the bushel's missing,and counts them, [.3]can't figure out what's happening, and then he sees the three ..boys,[.75]walking by, eating pears, [.4] and he still can't [1.0]figure it out, and that's where themovie [1.l]ends {laugh}.
Speaker 9Okay. [4.4[.8{sniff}[2.5]{throat clearing}[1.55]tsk [.35]There's [.65]a farmer, [.l5]he lookslike ay uh..Chicano American, [.5]he is picking pears. [4.85[.25]A--nd u--m[3.35]]he's justpicking them, he comes off of the ladder, [.35+[.35]a--nd]he--u--h[.3]puts his pears intothe basket. [1.0[.5]U--h]a number of people are going by, [.35+and [.35]]one ..is [1.15..um]/you know/I don't know, I can't remember the first thing that ..the first person that goes by.[.3] Oh...a l u--m..a man with a goat [.2]comes by. [.25]It see it seems to be a busy place.[.l]You know, fairly busy, it's out in the country, [.4]maybe in u--m[.8]u--h the valley orsomething. [2.95[.9]A..nd um[.25]{throat clearing}[.35]]he goes up the ladder, and pickssome more pears. And he's up there picking, [.4]and a little boy comes on his bicycle.[1.35[.95]A--nd he sees ..u--m.. that there are baskets of pears there. [1.l]T so he gets anidea that maybe he'll get off his bicycle, and get one. [.4] And he gets off his bicycle,[2.45[.6]a--nd u-h[.6]]he he takes one, and then he says “well wait a minute.” Well, he says itto himself. There's no language in it. [1.15[.55U--h[.15]]he says u--h “/Well/maybe I'lltake the whole basket.” So he [.4]picks up the basket, .. and makes sure [.3]that the--..farmerisn't looking at him, [4.3?[.6]a--nd u--m [1.3]tsk[.8]u--h]takes it over to his bicycle, andgets on his bicycle and I don't know how he does it, but he puts the ..the big basket of pearson his bicycle, and when he drives off, [.5]/the farmer doesn't know anything about it. [.8]Sothe little boy the [.25]story ..focuses on the little boy now. [.55]And he's driving along theroad, [.2+[.2]{throat clearing}..]a--nd becomes up[.8 [.l ] u‚Äîh[.2]]oh. There's anothergirl, [.35]driving on a bicycle, about his age, [.25]on the road, [1.2 [.7]a--nd u--h]they come
142
across, and they [.25]you know go like that {possible gesture}, he..sort of [.2]takes a secondlook at her, [.5]and he bumps into a rock, [.65][.4]and ..has a little accident. [3.4[1.0]tsk A--nd u--m[12]]the pears fall all over, okay. [.5[.2]Meanwhile], there are three little boys,[.15]up on the road a little bit, and they see this little accident. [l.6[.55] A--nd u--h]theycome over, and they help him, [.4?and [.2]]you know, help him pick up the pears andeverything. [2.7[1.0]A--nd[1.15]]/the/one thing that struck me about the--[.3]three littleboys that were there, is that one had ay uh[.4]I don't know what you call them, but it's apaddle, and a ball--, [.2]is attached to the paddle, and you know you bounce it?.. And thatsound was reai1y prominent. [4.55well anyway, [.45]|so--u[.l]{throat clearing}[.45]tsk[l.15]] all the pears are picked up, and ..he's on his way again, but his hat fe.. is u--h[.55]is on the [.2] okay, wait a minute.[1.05]The boy who has the pears', [.3]hat, ..is wayback on the road, so when the ..boys are the--..three boys ..are walking down the road,[25]after they've helped him, and ..the other one's on his way, [.7]one of them ..whistles backto the guy on the bicycle, “Here's you hat.” [.35]Or he [.4]I don't know, andhe goes and takes it, .. and the little boy gives..him three pears ..sort of to thank [.7]thethree boys for helping him. [2.25[1.7]A--nd u--h]then he goes off, .. and that's the end of thatstory, but then ..it goes back to the farmer. [.6]Finally he comes down from his tree,[2.4[1.2]a--nd u--h[3]]he looks at the baskets, and there's one missing, and he counts them,[2.15[.85]a--nd u--h[.4]]he doesn't know what's happened at all. [.8]And the ..three boyswho--..helped the other one on the bicycle, .. comes up uh..come up [.3]to near where thefarmer is, and they're eating pears. [.6]And the farmer sort of looks at them like “Hmmm,how did they get those pears {laugh during ‘pears'}.” [.35]And that's the end of the ..story.
Speaker 10Okay. [2.5[.8]U--h[.3]]there's no [.25]to begin with, there's no[.65]spoken[.5]speech[.4]in it.The most that you hear like [.45]you hear noises, [.35]in the background.[.2]Somebody willwhistle, [1.l[.5]o--r[.2]]noises of like a bicycle kind of thing, but there's no spoken [1.85]language kind of communication. [.65]And it opens up ..probably about around noon,[.65] sunny day, in uh[.15]it would be difficult [.6]to get some idea of the country, I wouldbe hard to say that [.3]it opens up in a country scene... In a[.55]setting [.2]outside of thecity and all, [.5]dirt roads, [l.3[.6]u--m[.25]]there's a ma--n..who appears to be ..you would..might guess of like ..some sort of [.65]Spanish or Mexican [.35]descent, [.95]who isum[.4]picking pears. [.55]They seemed pretty[.2]green. I don't know what[.45]I wasn't sureat first if they were apples, or if they were pears, [l.3[.l5]but [.7]um..]he's picking pears,[.95]at a fairly lei--surely pace. [.25] There's nothing [.45]doesn't seem to be very..hurried.[.45]In the movie. It's fairly [.5]slow, [.65]he's picking the pears, [4.15[.85]u--m[2.8]]he hasan apron that he puts them in, and then he'll..he'll stuff them in that, and then he'll walk downthe ladder, a--nd put them in a couple of[.25]barrels, that he's got down there. [1.45]{creakyonset}As he's doing this-- [.95uh[.5]]somebody comes by with a[.65]walks by with a goator something... Kind of thing, just meandering by... And there doesn't seem there's nocommunication between the two of them, [.85]or anything, [1.4[1.0]and the--n][1.9um[1.5]]just ..how.. I mean how picky do you want. Like he [.45]he um[1.5]drops ..hedoes a thing and he comes down to[.9]he drops a pear, when he's picking it, [.65]up in thetree, and he comes back down, [1.l?[.7]a--nd]he's putting the rest of the pears away, and hepicks this pear up, and polishes it up, and everything else. [.95]Then he goes back up, andhe--'s[1.05]continues to pick ..the pears ..at a very leisurely pace. [1.75 [1.15]The--n
143
uh..]after the[.6]person ..leading the goat has gone by, [.3]a boy probably about [.8]I don'tknow, .. eight or nine, [.5]comes up on a bicycle. [.75]He's going by on a bicycle, on this dirtroad, [.5]and stops and looks at the pears, and apparently decides “Aha.It would be nice tohave [.4]one of the pears.” [.6] But he just doesn't [.3] just take ..one of them. He stops,[.35]they he had like wicker baskets, about this tall. [.65]And this is something that l don'tknow you might notice when you see or not, [.9+but [.9]]I would have sworn almost thatthere were two baskets at the foot of the[.65]the tree. [.85]When the kid came by. [.35]AndI don't know if thi--s [.6]really is important, that [.75]I'm not sure if I noticed it. [.2]And I'm[.2]not sure that's the way it was, [.75+but [.75]]it appears that he had been [.2]puttingthings into two baskets. [2.05[1.55]Well if[.3]]the boy comes by, [.35]and the man is still upin the tree, [4.2[.8]and uh[2.8]] he picks up, [.3]one of th[.65]the con ..the full baskets, andput it on the front of his bicycle, [1.0[.75]and ..]heads down the road. [1.4]All sort of on thesly. The man doesn't know that any of this has been done. [.3]So he heads down this dirtroad, [.35]on the bicycle, [.65]and there's just this scene where he's coming this way, ..onthis dirt road, and there's hills in the background, it's like[.7]it might ..almost look [.3]sortof like southern California. [.25]Inland. [.75]Sort of thing. Not [.45]obviously notdesert,..but..sort of that [.25]kind of a[.2]of an area. [1.45] And he's heading ..you see ascene where he's.. coming on his bicycle this way, [.5]and there's a girl coming on a bicycle,[.2]this way. [.75]And then also, [.5]you see somebody walking on a hillside. [.2]Backbehind them. [.5]But he's[.2]coming on a bicycle, and they ..they cro..they pass, [.5]andapparently he [.9]I think by the breeze, ..his hat sort of gets[.7]blown off his head so he sortof turns around, [.2]to look at it, [.45]and runs into a rock, [.8..and[.6]]crashes over.[.95]And all the ..pears a--nd the basket and everything goes [.7]goes uh[.35]flying. [.4]Orall spills all over the ground. [1.55[1.2]A--nd]So he sort of gets up, and he's [.7]checks hisleg to make sure [.6]to see if he's got any [.25]bruises or anything. [1.5[.5]A--nd uh[.6]]threeboys, probably about the same age, [.85]{creaky onset}are walking by, [2.15[1.35]anduh[.3]]I don't /know/, ..for some reason I remember one had a blue shirt on, one had a redshirt on, /and/one had a yellow shirt on. [2.8[1.8]A--nd[.55]]one of..they were probably[.3]the two /there/were [.3]see ..two that seemed about ..to /be/ about his age, and one maybea little bit younger or something. [.55]And they come by, and see what's[.45]what'shappened... And the/n/one of them is ..playing like with [.4]I don't remember, I used to playwith /it/when I was a kid, [.9but [.75]]it's like a..wooden paddle[.6[.3]that[.15]]there's anelastic string attached to and there's a ball, [.3]you know that that kind of thing that you[.4]you [.15]1..don't remember the name of them [.35]but I played /with them/for hours.[1.0[.6]U--m..]and he's..paddling, [.55]playing around with this. [.55]So they see what'shappened, so one of them[.5]one of the..the people picks the kid up, [.5]and sort of dusts himoff,..and another one picks up the bicycle, and another one [.45]loads the pears, [.7]back on[.15]into three [.45]the wicker basket, [.7]a--nd puts it on the [.35]the bicycle, [.8?and[.25]and ..]no [.3]communication or anything. [.4] During the time, [.95]and so the kid head[.95]the kid with the bike, ..heads off down this way [.85] And the thee /oth/..the three[.25]kids head back down, [.35]the way they were going [.55] And the one kid is stillhitting ..playing with the[.35]the thing. [.35]And they run across his hat that's been [.4]thatwas blown off.[.8] And one kid, I think it was the kid who was playing with theeuh[1.7]with ..the whatever it was, [.9]stops and picks it up and whistles. [.5]And the kidturns around, and he goes and takes the hat to the kid, [2.2[.85]a--nd um[.65]]the kid giveshim three pears. [1.6[1.25]A--nd]so the ..the other kid comes back to his two friends and
144
gives them each a pear, and then they[.4]continue to meander on down the road.[1.75[.85]And so[.3]] about this time,.. well the next scene you see, it's switched to the manwho's been picking[.3]the pears. [.85]And he has come down, [.4]and then this is the thingthat I'm not sure if this happened or not [.4]or it's just [1.2]but I thought that he had had twobaskets. [1.05]And then that the kid had come and taken one. [.5]I'm not sure. You mightwant to look when you see the film. [.4]But anyway, when he comes back down the tree,there are two baskets there, [1.45]you know and I don't know--[.15]/like I say/I don't know ifI[1.6]saw that wrong, [.3+or [.3]or what.[.6] It doesn't matter, to the story, but it's just one ofthose things. [1.2]And becomes down and notices that one of them's full and the other oneis empty. [1.4]Which also doesn't really make much sense. [2.15]Because the kid took abasket, he didn't just take ..the [1.25]the pears. [1.0]Then when he comes back down and henotices this, and he's standing there scra--tching his head sort of like wondering what[.55]what's gone wrong, or where[.25]obviously he's missing some pears somewhere.[.95]And about this time, the three kids that are munching on the pears, [l.45]sort of meanderby--, right in form of him, and he's sort of [.3]jus--t[.55]kind of puzzled, wondering how--[.25]in the short space of time that the pears that were here, apparently, [.5]they're comingback at him now, [.3]being eaten by.. by three different kids. [.6]And so they just sort ofmeander in front of him, and he doesn't say anything, or doesn't do anything. [2.9[1.l]Bu--tum [1.35]]that seems to be about it. [.9]It's ju--st urn[.5]like I said, [.9]sort of a scrub.. kindof an area, with trees, and some fruit, [.7]fruit trees, [1.75]difficult to say [.3]what country, or[.5] ascribe some sort of nationality to it. [.95]Because the ..the kid.. a lot of the kids acouple of them were blonds. [1.0]I mean it's just ..it wasn't ..I didn't get a specific feelinglike this is [1.8[.95]u--m[.5]]this is Mexico, or this is [2.3[1.2]u--m[.6]the southern pan of theUnited States. or anything like that. [1.0]Clear weather, [1.0]nice day, [.95]kind of thing.[1.7]But, . .that's about it.
Speaker 11[4.75?[4.25]Um [.15?]]it starts out ..there's uh [3.3tsk...]well, [1.45]the--landscape is likeu--h a f-- [2.35]sod of peasant landscape but it isn't really farmland, it's like an orchard.[.6]It's like a small orchard, [2.2[.65]a--nd u--h[.55]]it's green. And there's this sort of [1.75]Latin..looking..middle- aged man ..who's [.95]um[.75]climbs up the ladder, [1.4]uh| that'sleaning against a tree,. and picks pears, [.95]puts them in ..his apron, [.4]climbs down theladder, [.75]and empties the pears ..into [.55]big..baskets. [1.15]There's like three basketssitting there and he's already got two baskets full...He does this a couple of times. [7.05[255lUm[4.05]]the thing I noticed all the way through is that ..there's [.5]there's no--..dialogue inthe film, but there ..is [1.0]a lot of sound effects. [1.l]Which are not [.55]totally u--m[1.45]consistent. I mean ..sometimes they'll be really loud, [.35]Has anybody told you that before?Or r you're not supposed to tell me that. [1.2]Sometimes he'll put a pear down, it'll gobla)...Really loud. Bla)...And sometimes he'll put a pear down, and there won't be any noiseat all. I don't know if [1.7]that's on purpose. [2.O[1.2]U--m[.4]]and the[.8]the ladder creakswhen he goes up and down it. [3.55[.6]And then u--m[2.l]]you hear the sound of a.. sheep,..neighing, /and/ you don't know what it is ..and then the camera goes to the side, 12.3 and thisman is pulling ..a goat/h/. [.3]It's a goat. [.25]Pulling a goat, [1.6]on a rope... And he pullsthe[.8]tsk goat by the guy who's up in the tree, [.9]and disappears. [4.35[.9]A--nd[2.9]]thenext people ..who come by, [.9]/and there's/ a little boy on a bicycle ..who comes by from theother direction,.. he's riding a bike,.. it's a little too big for him, [2.05[1.15]a--nd[.4]]he rides
145
by,.. and then he stops, [2.2]tries to ..take a pear,.. a--nd the he [.35]he can't reach it... So heputs down his bike, [.9]he sort of takes a pear, and then he decides he wants the wholebasket... So he takes the whole basket,.. and puts it near his bike,.. lifts up the bike,.. putsthe basket on ..the front part of his bicycle, [.5]/n/rides off. And all this time the guy's up inthe [.6]tree,.. and he doesn't notice it. [.9]However the sounds are extremely loud.[1.95{cough}[1.3]]/So/..it's kind of funny. [6.1..And then [5.2]tsk so-..]then we switch to theboy riding on the bicycle, and he's riding down the gravel ..path. [3.3[1.4]{clear throat}A--nd [l.0]]we see it,.. the gravel path, from his point of view, [.8]and then we see ..a girl ridinga bike, coming the opposite direction. [.9]And then ..the camera's backed up and you seethem going like this... And then you see it from his point of view again. [.5..And [.3]]his hatblows off, [.55]when they cross, [1.2[.25]and [.65]] his bike hits into a rock,.. and he fallsdown, the bike falls down, and all the pears scatter. [3.3 [.95]So --then [1.5]]/I guess/the girlkeeps going on, [.75..and [.6]]he--..um[.85]he's fallen down,.. and he sits up,.. and he[1.25]he wipes the ..dirt off of him, and /he/sort of [1.l] {breath}holds onto his leg,.. which ishurt, [.55]and then the [.6]camera goes up, and you see three boys. [3.l[1.05]A--nd u--h[1.15]]one of them..is [2.15]tsk has this toy,.. which is like a ping pong paddle witha[.7]ball on an elastic string /?/go like that, [1.6?[1.l]a--nd u--h.]it's making [.45]loud noisesinconsistently. [105{laugh}[.8]A--nd u--m [1.3]]it wasn't a really funny film,.. it wasjust..that ..that sound part/was really neat/. It was funny. [1.55]They u--h [3.35] they sort ofcome over,.. to the boy, and brush him off, [2.3+[2.3]a--nd]walk away. He ..holds up hisbike, and starts limping, [.75]down the road,.. carrying [.55]pushing his bike, and they findhis hat, [1.25?[1.05]{breath}]and whistle to him. [.65]tsk one of the boys. And one of theboys runs back,.. with the hat, and puts it on his head, and the guy give [sic]him [1.45]threepears..for each of his friends. [2.35]So the guy goes limping off with his bicycle, and theother boy comes back and gives the pears to his friends,.. and they go off. [.55]And on theway back, they pass [.9]the guy who was up in the tree, [.5]collecting pears, and he justcomes ..he's just come down, [2.15+[2.15]and ..]he discovers that there's one basket missing.[.85]And he sort of [.75]counts them,.. and realize [sic]that there's a.. basket missing.[1.75[75]A--nd[.45]]then he sees these three boys go by with pears in their hands. [.85]He'sa little[.45]bewildered...And it ends.
Speaker 12Certainly. [1.3[.6]uh [.35]]The opening scene,.. was ..uh..a--y[1.8]kind of middle-agedround, [1.0]Possibly, he looked like he was made up[.25]to be[.2]a Mexican, [.7]or th[.95]that [.45]kind of person, [1.0]picking ..pears from the tree, and he had three basketsbeneath the tree, there was w--one was full, one was half-way full, and one was empty,[.6]and he had a ladder up ..to the tree, and it was [.75]the rooster crowed in thebeginning, so [.35]it didn't look like morning,[.45]and it looked like [.45]it was filmed inCalifornia, those dusty kind of hills that they have out here by Stockton and all, [.9+[.9]so..]it's very funny to make this [.35]telling. [3.15[.9]A--nd u--h[1.25...tsk]]he was pickingpears. [1.45]Just rather slowly, and he did it [.55]/so that/you could hear the sound of thepears being[.45]torn from the [.95]tree, and heput them in an apron /that he had/, [.85]/the whole idea/he picked pears came down theladder, [.5]put them [.2]one by one ..into this basket. [.85]He [1.l]y you got [.2]the feelingthat he pretty much liked his pears,.. because he was so ..gentle with them /???/.[2.05[.35]A--nd u--h [.9]put them in /the/basket. [1.5]Any man with a goat, [1.05]was in the
146
distance and walked by. [1.lHe--[.55]the goat [1.5]just[.2] he was kind of pulling him.[.35]And the people looked very funny, because they [.8]were suppo-sed, [.95]tobe--[.4]far-mer-ish, [1.1]and really just had [.4]clothes like a person with like[.5]storelevis, and [.9]a n--ew red bandana around his neck and a[.5]things like [.15]so a man with agoat [.35]went by, [1.2...tsk...]and the goat .25] balked, [.9+a--nd[.9]]was [.35]pulled alongby this [.35]w--one fellow who just disappeared. That was a--ll that you saw of the man withgoat. [.85]went up ..across ..the hill, the setting was ay [1.25]geographically there wasa[.35]hill that kind of went down, the tree was [.6] halfway up the hill. [.7] The man withthe goat went that way. [1.4[.8]Then-,..]a young boy,.. he went back up in the tree, and was[1.65]picking,.. I thought ..that the goat ..would eat the[.3]pears. as they went by. That's [.2]Idon't know whether you're supposed to think that or not. [3.l[.75] A--nd[.45]then[1.15...tsk...]]he [.45]the goat [.25]and the goatman.. disappeared.[.55]A young boy on abicycle, [.45]that was much too big for him, [1.35]rode[.45]thee ..from the[.2] direction inwhich the goat [.25]person had come, [.8]towards the man picking the [.75] thepearpicker[3.0[1.45...tsk...]a--nd[1.25]]stops. [1.3]Beside the baskets. [.5]While the manwas upsta he had gone up the tree. [.35]The man is in the tree, and the boy[.45]parked hisbicycle here, [3.55+[1.25]a--nd [2.3]]got off the bicycle, [2.5]got off the bicycle, [.55and[.4]furtively went and felt a pear. [2.05]To s while ..watching the man to see whether he was..seeing [.45]whether the boy was stealing the pears but he wasn't he was just involved in[.55]picking ..more pears, [1.0]and he decided not just to take one, [.9but [.7]]move thewhole ba full basket [3] onto the front of th lifted up his bike, and then put the basket on thefront of the bike. [.55]And made off with the whole basket of pears. [1.3+[l.3]tsk..] Whichthe man, [2.5]the pearpicker.. man, did not notice... Because he was busy picking pears.[1.4]Came dow..oh no. that didn't happen yet. [.8]So--[.55]the sequence is funny ..if youdon't really [.7]remember. [1.7[1.l]U--h[.2]]he rode away, [.25]on his bicycle. [.2]And yousee him riding away,.. and then ..into the screen ..comes [55]just the girl--, [.4]riding[.55]on another bicycle, [55]in an opposite direction, [.15]where they pass.[3.95[1.0]A--nd[2.45]]he--..looks at her, [1.0[.4]a-- nd[.15]]is involved in looking at herriding this bicycle, [.3]bumps a rock, don't say yes, because you don't you've never seen that/??/. All right. Okay. [2.55[1.1]Uh[1.0]]he rides /ba/and looking at her, bumps into arock...a large rock.[2.5]Upsetting his bicycle, upsetting the pears.. [1.5]she rides past.[.65]That was all that ..you saw of her in the movie. [1.05]So he's..the /baw/the thief[.15]boy has ..taken ..the pears, and ..bumps [.4]up.[.9]So instantly,.. the film ..flashes to[2.0[1.45]u--h[.l]]there are three little boys. [.95]Also about the same age not reallynecessarily, one real little, one [.55]medium sized, and one about [.25]my height five two?[.7]Young boys. [.2]Ten, eleven years old. [1.35]And they ..help. They see that this[.25]other boy has fallen down, [.8]also,.. before he fell over, [.2]his hat blewoff.[.25]while he was still looking at the girl. [.65]This comes later. [1.15]So he'sf..a..the pears/VW fallen off, [7.2[.45]a--nd[3.7]u--h[2.4]]and they help him pick up thepears, and they kind of toss them back into the [.5]basket, where ..he--has had them,[1.l]a--nd he [.3]gets up, [.7]uprights his bike, they put the basket on, and ..send him onhis way. [2.05[.85]A--nd u--h [.25]]they walk this way, and one has a ping-pong p paddle.[.7]Those bouncy bail things ..with a great big.. if this is for gestures, this is a greatmovie for gestures. [2.2[.85]Because [.95]] of all the things involved. [3.95[.9]A--nd[2.45]]they walk this way, [.3]the other boy walks this way. [1.0]The o--ne boywith the ping-pong paddle, notices [25]a hat,.. his hat, [.25]the thief's hat lying in
147
the..ground. [.75] The road,[.6[.15]and [.2]]picks it up, and whistles [.3]{whistle}[l.0]whichis one of about four sounds that you hear in the movie, [1.2]and the ..boy with the bicyclewho's now walking the bicycle, not riding it, turns around, [.55]and sees that he's forgottenhis hat. [2.5[1.4]A--nd[.6]] the boy with the ping-pong paddle brings the hat to the bicycleboy, [.95]who gives him[.45]three pears. [1.95...tsk...]For ..bringing back his hat. Puts thehat on, [25]and that's the last you see of the bicycle thief, [1.l]but no--w, [.95]the--[1.3]threeboys, who now are eating /the/[.2] polished have polished and /are/eating their pears, [.3]arewalking back towards.. the pear picker's [.35]area, [4.45[.95]a--nd[2.9]]just eating theirpears, walking along, [.5]nobody talks during the whole movie there's no dialogue.[1.8]Didyou know that? No.[5.l5{laugh}[.45]A--nd u--h[2.55]he has just clambered down, [.35]fromhis ladder, [.8]and notices[.4] “Whoa-[.45] My[.3]pear my basket is gone.” And goes..one, [.55]two, [1.35]and the ..third one is missing. [.55] Then he sees the three little boyschewing on pears,.. walking his way [.75]and l--ooks at them, like they're [55]verysuspiciously, and they walk off into the distance, and that's it.
Speaker 13Okay, well, [.4]there.. is [.2]ay uh[.5]there's a man, [1.2?[.6]who--]looks of Latin descent,[1.55[.75]a--nd[.25]]he-- is-- on a ladder he's rather large. [1.95[.7]A--nd.. u--m[.25]]he's[.45]on a ladder,.. picking pears, [.15]from a tree, and putting it in his.. apron, [.25]sortof. [2.2[.4]A--nd.. u--m[.85]]and you watch him and the sound is just[.55]is [.55]is reallyintensified /well/[.3]from what.. it.. usually.. would be, I think.[1.35..|[.65]U--m[.35]it's like they have a microphone right {laugh begins} next to the branch so youcould hear him picking off thee[.35]{laugh ends}the--.. pears. [1.75[.7]A--nd u--h[.15]]so—that that's really sort of intensified. [1.45[.45]A--nd u--m]something that you notice rightaway about the film is[.l]no one is talking. [1.2]It's [.l5]and.. and [.15]sort of[.4]whichmakes the sound even more intense of[.2]of what's [.4]going on, like the picking of the pear--s, or whatever. [.35]And it shows him sort of tumbling them into a..in a[.4]in a basket, andthere's three baskets on the ground.[.9[.5]A--nd] two are full and one is [.45]is sort of empty.[1.45[.55]A--nd u--m..]so he's emptying them ou--t, [.45]and then he.. starts going back[.55]up his ladder, [1.55a--nd u--m[1.2]oh. [.75]The film starts off,.. with just[.4]sort ofa scene [.15]of the country,.. and a path. [.7]And you hear ..a rooster crowing. [.25]Andthen it.. it.. pans into this man. [2.15[.8]And the--n u--m[.3]]then you hear, [.15]whilehe's[.6]putting the pears inside the.. basket, [1.75[.55]u--m [.7]]a noi.. an animal noise,[.2]which turns out to be /a/goat. [.35]Cause when he goes back up the ladder you see thisma--n, dragging this goa--t, [1.l?and you know[.5]]past the scene, [.9 [.45] a--nd]then youstart hearing this other.. intensified noise, which turns out to be a bicycle,.. some ..alittle boy, [.5]on a.. bicycle who's coming by. [3.85[.55]A--nd.. u--m[1.3] so--..um[.25]]he starts coming by--, [.25]and he ends up [.45]stopping where the pears are, andlooks up at [.4]at the man who's up the ladder and the man doesn't know that the little boy isthere.[2.55[.8]U- -m[1.2]] which[1.l]it was sort of funny, in certain parts of the movie itseemed like sounds--[.6]that [.8]should be intensified just to keep with the [.3]the norm ofhow the movie was going,.. it went silent sort of. [2.0[1.35]And like[.25]]so the man didn'thear the little boy, [.7..you know[.4]]being there, [.2]a--nd he--[.15]ended up.. u--m[.95]swiping.. one of his baskets of pears, and putting it on his [.35]on his bicycle, on the frontof his bicycle, and.. and riding off. [2.15[.9]A--nd the--n um]as he's riding,.. there'su--h.. a girl, [.4]coming on a bicycle in the opposite direction. [1.0]A--nd they--..they're
148
going /like/you know [.95+..and then [.95.../{creaky:4/..]]they come really close /towardea/..each other, and she brushes off this little hat that he has on, [.7]and so his hat..comeso--ff, [.5]and then he turns his head back looking at it,.. and he's riding along /and/he hitsa rock.[1.35[.8]A--nd s..]and so the bike.. falls over, and the pears all go /khp)/.[1.3[.4...tsk...]And then, [.2tsk]]all of a sudden,.. three boys come alo--ng, [1.l]tsk andone has one of those.. paddles with a.. a ball on it that goes {gesture?}[.45]you know,.. oneof those things? [2.2[.25]tsk A--nd anywa--y, [.45]u..m[.15]]the--y [.35]help him up, they..dust him off,.. and put all the pears back in the ba--sket, and.. put the basket back on thebicycle, and he starts on his merry way again, [.3]and the boys walk in the opposite direction.[1.2[.5]And the--n, [2]]one of the boys, [.4]u--h[.4]finds the hat,.. lying on the road.[.5]And then he whistles at the boy at the bicycle, and..the boy on the bicycle s [.45]stops,[2.15[.75] u--m[.8]tsk..]]he was walking it at that time,.. he didn't[.55]he didn't ride it.[2.35[.7]A--nd the--n u--m[.2]]he whistles out at him,.. and takes the hat.. back, [.25]tohim, [.2]and in exchange,.. the boy gives him three pears. [.15]One ..for each of the boys.[.7]And then,.. he goes off again, and the three boys..start walking down the path,[2.65[.8]a--nd u--m[1.0]]by that time the man who was [.55]taking the pears off, [.4]comesdown,.. he starts to empty out his apron, and he notices one of his baskets is gone. [25]Hestands up, looks back, and counts, let's see {voiceless vowels}, o--ne, two--, and the thirdone's gone. [.7] And then.. he sees these three walking around, crunching on pears{laughter}, {laugh}..and he can't,.. and he sort of just[.45]what?[4.15{laugh}[.4]A--ndu--m[1.5]tsk[.2]]let's see--, was that it?.. Yeah, I think s.. I think so,.. I think that wasabout it.
Speaker 14The movie opened up on this[.3] nice scene, [.35]it was in the country,.. it was oaks,..it/was/seemed like West Coast...Maybe it wasn't. [.25]But it was hills and dry grass,[2.7[1.l]um[1.15]]and scrub. [.95]But there was pear trees in it,.. and that was odd. [.5]Andthere was this man with a moustache, and a hat, picking[.45]unripe pears, [2.4?[2.0]urn]andhe was in this[.25]he went up the ladder, [.25]in the tree, [.75]cause the tree was high, itwasn't pruned, [.3+[.3]like..] they usually are, [.35]to keep them prostrate, [.45]but it was[.25] it had a large[1.05[.25] uh[.55]] tall trunk, [1.0]and he's {tense ambiguous}pickingunripe [.2]unripe pears. [.15]And what I noticed [.25]first off,.. was that all the noises in themovie, [.5]were u--m[1.8] out of proportion. [1.4]Like you could hear the[.15]the creaking[.35]of the[.4]ladder, [.8]and the picking of the pears, and then from a long way off[.35]theyzoomed in on a[.35]/on a/[.2]a[.2]child on a bicycle, and you could hear the [.4]the gears onthe bicycle going round, more than [.25]it was [.15]way out of proportion of everything else.[4.l[1.9]And u--m[1.35]]this man came by, [.3] walked by, and he's leading a goat,.. thatdidn't want to go with him, [1.0[.65]ae[.15]]and this first [.15]okay, [.2]let me see.[3.25]Theman climbed down out of the tree,.. and put the pears in the basket, and it looked like hewas[.35]giving birth. [.85]It did...He was just kind of..{creaky voice}[.65]rolling them out ofhis pouch, in his [.35]in his apron, [3.75[.75]and u--m[2.25]] then this--he came /back/down,.. and put the pears in the basket, [.6]and he went back up the ladder, and you couldhear the creaking,.. and then you could hear the goat [.15]a long way off,.. and it wasbraying. [.45]But it was [.2]a very.. like.. a lo--ng drawn out bray, like the movie[.2]the..sound track had been slowed down, so it was b***{creaking voice on last word}.[3.05[1.5]Um[1.05]]and he went [.15]and he went by, [.45]and there was two baskets of..
149
pears there, and one empty one, [.55]and then this little kid came by, [.55]and you could hearthe gears in the [.l5]on the bicycle, [.75]and you could hear the crickets,.. andthe...grasshoppers, [.5] and the little kid came by, and he /si/[.4]and he [.25]hesitated, butthen he stole,.. one of the baskets of pears,.. and put it on his [.6]bicycle and rode off.[.9]And as he was [.45]riding down the r[.15]this [.5]this uh..dirt road, [.6]/it/ was full ofrocks,.. you could hear the ..the rocks creak underneath, [2.8[1.0]u--m[1.3]]thisother little girl in pigtails,.. black pigtails, [.35]rode by, [.55]and he tipped his hat toher, [.3]and as he did that,.. lost his hat,.. and ran into a b--ig rock, and the [.15]pearsspilled all over. [.65]Out of nowhere, [.65]he looks up, and out of nowhere, [.6]everyoneelse,.. even the viewers are s[.4]there's[.2]three other little boys, one's playing with this[.15]pongo? [.6]A little [.3]paddle?.. And a ball with it on /the/end of the elastic?[.6]And you could hear this paddle-ball going, [2.75[.95]a--nd u--h[1.15]]and they help himpick up the [.75]pears, and put them back on his bicycle, and dust him off, [3.35[2.4]a--ndu--m[.3]]then he goes off, and ..nobody ever smiles in the movie, there isn't any emotion onany /of/boy's faces. [2.75[1.8]A--nd]then they /nowt/..they were walking down the road,they notice his bicycle was there, [.4]I meam his hat was there, [.75]so they picked up hishat, and whistled to him, [.35]and they ran back, and you could hear the running... And itwas just so much out of proportion, it was [.85]..easy to notice. [2.7[.9]U--m[1.4]]andthey gave him his hat,.. and the [.25]the little ..boy that fell off the bicycle gives him[.45]gives him three-- ..pears,.. and they went back, [1.55[.95]and [.15]]then you switchback to the ma--n, that's [.4]climbing down out of the tree, again with another ..pouchfulof..of pears. [.75]And he kneels down to put the pears in the..third empty basket, [.8]andhe s [.3]scratcheshist1ead, [2.7 and [.55]u--m[1.6]]he goes ..one two three, [.6]and butthere isn't a third one there, and he scratches his head some more, and looks, and theselittle ..three little boys go by, [.9]just walking, not paying any attention,.. no--tpaying any attention to the man, [.35+/and/[.35]] eating these pears... And that's the endof the movie.
Speaker 15[.6]Okay. [.7[.l]Uh..]the movie opened. [1.4]And ay [1.4man, [1.7[.65]uh[.7]]I would sus..Iwould suspect that he's Latin, [1.9[1.l]um[.45]]since you associate Latin people withpicking fruit, [1.0]was picking pears, [2.6[1.55]a—nd u--m[.15]] he was dropping somedown on the ground, .. on a straw mat. [l.55]And he was filling some up... And he[.7[.25]but [.2]]I didn't n I didn't notice this at first, [.15]but he was also he also had anapron on and he was filling /those/up. [2.65[1.4] A—nd [.8]]he went down the ladder,[.3]and he dumped them in the ..dumped them in the bucket, [1.15]and ay man with ayuh[.4]a goat, .. I couldn't tell whether it was a male or female. [2.65[1.55]A--h]would youlike to know what [1.l] the goat looked like?/Thee uh/? I hate to take away the suspe--nseor anything. [1.65[.7]U--m[.4]]it was a[1.05]1 wou[.35]I had a..I have a friend who wouldknow what breed it was, [1.6?but uh[1.45] ]/it was/short-haired, [1.35]I don't know, whiteface, and dark eyes, [.45+and [.45]]stripe down the mi ..kind of a.. white and ..white anddark stripe down the middle, [1.0]well he walked by, [.9[.5]A--nd]he didn't uh[1.6]he didn'tbother with the pears at all. [.25]The man was picking pears. [.1]They were green, [.7]so Isuspect they were going to sell them to Safeway. [3.35 [1.05]{laugh}[1.3]Um]they weregreen pears, [3.15[.8]a—nd uh[1.65]]then a little kid happened by on a bicycle. [2.l]/Thenthe for some reason I go/[.15] “His father probably owns the o..probably owns the
150
orchard.” [2.6?[1.0]Um[.4]mm ..]he pick ..he /wo)/..he stops by, [.5]the man is still pickingthe pears, and he doesn't notice [1.6]the kid there, [1.7[.6]and [.85..{creaky sound}..]]the kidstops, ..at the three baskets of pears, [.4]/and/he picks one up, and ..he only wants to stealone, but then he decides he's gonna [.15]he's gonna take the whole basket. [3.5[1.4]U--m[1.45]]then he drives a[.5]h--e-- rides away on his bicycle. [3.45 [1.l]A--nd[1.9]]ohgoodness. [.6]And he's as he's riding through an open field, [1.O]um hills in the background,and ..stuff like that, [.9]he--[1.8?un[1.45]a girl [.3]with long pigtails, [1.6] happens by, goingthe other way, [1.l]on a bicycle, and there's a long shot, [.35]you see both of them,..converging, and you see him. .1 [.4]He's more interested in [.45]the girl going by, [1.55[.9]than [.3]]taking care of.. making sure the basket doesn't do anything weird. [.8]And he seesthe girl going by,.. he doesn't see the rock,.. it's right in front of him, [.65]and the bike stopsin the rock, [1.15?and..u--m[.45]]he piles over, and ..all of the pears come out, [.8]and hechecks[.3] and his hat flies off also. [.65]He checks to see that [.25]his knee is okay, [.9]pullsup his pants, [.6]pulls /it/down, [.7]oh goodness what else. [1.25] And then three boyshappen by. [.65]Three boys, three different sizes, three different colored shirts, [1.55]ohgoodness.[1.15U—m /b/[.15] ]and they help him pick up the pears. [.8]One guy's playing[.25]/you/remember those? I don't know what they're called, they had a little ball?[3.2...Um..]you know like a paddleball. [.85?] We used to see {Pat responds in thispause}how many we could do. I could u I used to do one or two. [3.6[.7]A--nd he--[.7]u--m[.2]and[.25]]he kind of helps,.. but his two fr../mi)/..the two guys that are with him. [.6]domost of the major..end of the work. [.5/And/[.4]]they help him up. [1.95[.8]A--nd [.7]]theyhelp him get the basket up. [.3]And they're..and he [.l]the little boy drives off, [.4]drives[.2]rides his bicycle off. [1.3[.8]A--nd ..]they find a uh[2.05]they find his hat... The threeboys find the hat down the road, [.65]and he gives him the hat, [1.0] and ..th..they whistle for/him/.There's no dialogue in the whole movie. [1.0]They whistle for him. [.75]And hecomes back...And he w[.2]and he stops...And the guys walk up and give him the hat.[.95[.65]And [.15]]he looks /in/..and the little ..and the boy looks [.4]in the basket ../for/[1.0]for three pears to give to the kids. [1.8[.75]And [.75]]the pears that you saw at the beginningwere bi--g. [1.05..A--nd..]they were ..they were almost perfect. [.75[.15]/m/ [.4]]whateveryou can call a pear to be perfect. [4.9[1.2]A--nd[2.4]but[.35]]he gives them the three pears,[.15]and as they're walking, [.35]as the guys were walking off up the road, I could see thatthe pears weren't the best of the bunch. [1.2?[.9]That ..]there wa.. there were ..bruises. youcould only see it [.l]like in a side shot from under here. [2.9[1.05]U--m [1.25]]and theywalked by eating the pears, and the guy.. in the meantime[.35]the ..the shot changes to[1.0]|the man coming down the ladder. [.6]And he disco ..and he's dumping the pears that he hasin his apron, [.4]into the basket. [.8[.55]And..]they discover[1.75]and he discovers that hisbasket is gone. [.9[.65]And ..]he just kind of sits there. [.9..And [.7]]he doesn't really doanything. [.55]The three boys happen by eating the pears. [1.15]I don't kn..I can't rememberwhether they saluted him or not, [.25]you know, [.55]gave him a any kind of a salutation,[.6]but he [.3]the three boys walk off, [1.0]and the man jus-sits there[.25]sits there on theladder, [2.15 [1.6u--m[.15]]kind of like this, and jus-t[.35]watches the three boys go off.[1.75]And that's.. the end of the movie.
Speaker 16Oh. You want to know what happened in the movie. [.4]Okay, [5.3..u--m[4.65...]]a man waspicking pears in [.45]what seemed to be his orchard, [2.55[1.1]a--nd[.8]]came along
151
first,../someone/came along first. [4.7]Someone came along before the kid on the bicycle,but l don't remember who it was. [.45]Then a kid came along on a bicycle, and parked thebicycle, [1.2 [.85]a--nd]checked the tree to make sure the man wasn't looking, and he wasabout to steal.. a--y pear,.. but he /t/he.. he.. picked up a basket, [.2]lnstea--d, [1.85[.9]a--nd[.3]]went riding along [.45]the road,.. on a bicycle. [1.2[.6]A--nd]he passed [1.3]a..little girl on a bicycle, [.7?..and[.35]]turned his head,.. and hit a rock, [.65]and fell over, andspilled the pears all over the [.7]road. In the meantime,.. some other little kids came along, a--nd helped him pick up the pears,.. a--nd brushed him off, [1.5[.9]a--nd]that sort of thing,[1.6[.65]a--nd[.45]]he went on walking and one of them stopped him, [.85]cause he hadforgotten his hat. [1.6[.85] A--nd] took him his hat,.. and he gave them [1.5]um[.9]he gavethe three kids each a pear. [.45]They were walking back in the direction, [1.5[.7] uh[.25]]toward the man[.7]who was picking pears in the pear tree, and ..about the time,.. he camedown, [.85]the pear tree,.. and discovered [1.2]that a basket of pears was missing,.. he sawthe three kids eating pears, as they were[.4]walking up the road. [.7]For some reason hedidn't stop them or ask them where they got the pears. [1.95]Was that it? I think that was it.[.3]That's all I remember. You should have caught me[.15]ten minutes ago when Iremembered. Who passed the [1.0]the man before the kid on the bicycle, I don'tremember. [1.3]Anyway. Okay.
Speaker 17Well, first thing you see, is--..u--h.. the landscape is--..u-- m[.9......]sort of an agricultural..area, it's quite green, [.35]and a lot of trees around. [1.05[.5]A--nd] you see a middle-aged[.2]u--m[.15]Chicano man, [.55]who's wearing..a--y..navy blue shirt, [.5]and a bright red[.2]kerchief around his neck, [.4]and a white apron.[1.3[.6]A--nd[.3]he-- climbs a ladder, andis [.15]all right, /ei/either that or he's on a ladder, already, and he's picking [1.0] pears, offa tree, and they look to be--[.4]not quite ripe yet. They're still quite gree--n,.. and theylook [.35]still hard.[1.95[.7]A-- nd[.65]]he's[.15]it..the..camera spends a lot of time watchinghim [.55]pick these pears, [.45]putting them in his apron,[1.05?[.35]and the--n..u--m..]going..down off the ladder, and putting them into these/buh/..bushel baskets. [2.4[1.15] tskU—m [.85]]so that's[.25]part of the activity of the[.25] the first [.5]portion of the film. [.4]Then you see another,.. younger, [.5]more..this man is[.35]the..first man I described is rather[.15]portly. [.35]/This/[.15]you see a younger Chicano man, [.4]coming acrosst[.7]u--m[.3]from the back of the[.2]of the [.3]picture frame, [1.7[.45]a--nd u--m [.25]he's..leadinga[.5] brown and white goat. [.45]And this ma--n ..is--[.4]u--m dressed in sort of a faded,[.25]navy blue, [.25]denim top, and jeans. [.4] And he's got a hat on, [.4]so does the firstman that I described. [1.45[.65]A--nd[.25]]he just walks through the picture, not payingmuch attention to the other man,.. who's [.35]picking pears, [.4]and goes off in the distance,leading his goat.[.7] Then the third person that comes in the scene is a little boy about [.7]ten years old. [.4]And he's white.[1.3[.6]A--nd]he's wearing a hat, [.5]and he's[.7]dressed insort of faded..red clothing. [.5]And he's[.7]riding his bicycle, [.5]and he stops, [.5]at the[.15]bottom of the tree, [.7]tsk 1ooks up at the man who's picking the pears, [.4]andseeing that he's preoccupied,[.35]with[.35]u--m[1.0]you know, his business, he decides[2.2[.85]to--[.45]u--h]steal a bushel basket full of pears. [1.35[.6]So--[.35]he--[.55]picks upthe basket, and all the while looking up sort of furtively at the man who's ..you know,.. tomake sure he's not going to get caught. [.4]But he's very brazen. I mean there's o).. they'reonly about three feet apart. [1.2[.4]A--nd uh]he puts the b—ushel basket on the front of
152
his[.3]bike,.. and he drives off with it. [3.4[.75]U--m[.75] no—w [.65]tsk]he's drivingalong this road that's uh it's not paved, it's just sort of a dirt road, and it's sort of jutty.[.45]And so,..he's driving along, [.45]a--nd riding his bike along, and he sees another[.45]person coming [.35]toward him,.. and it's another little white girl. [.35]With long[.15]braids. [.4]Brown hair. [1.55[.6]A--nd[.35]]he's paying attention to her, as she--[.35]passes him,.. and isn't ..watching too much where he's going, [.35]and hits a rock inthe road,.. falls down, [2.6[.45]a--nd[.3]u--m[.6]tsk]all the pears fall off. [.5]In the[.3]youknow the bushel basket falls off, and all the pears fall off, and everything. [.7]Now threelittle boys are ..a little b--it away from him. [5]And they see what's happened. [.2]One boy..is.. um[1.4] hitting one of those bounce- back things,.. you know, the little thing that hadelastic, and it has a ball, and /then it's/a paddle. [.35]He's playing with that. [.25]Andthey're sort of various sizes, I'd say from ..maybe [.3]six to twelve years old. [1.3[.65]A--nd]they see what's happened to the l.. little boy, and they come over sort of very calmly,[.5+[.5]a--nd].. help him get on his feet, pick up his pears for him, [1.l?[.6]a--nd..]put themback in the basket, [.15+[.15]and..]brush him off,.. and everything, [2.5[.55]a--nd u--m[.7]tsk] then they[.9]u-- m[1.2]put him[1.5]tsk u--m[.15]back on his bike, and he goesoff.[.35] The little boy {creaky sound}..that was on the bike, had been wearing a hat.[1.3[.55]And[.3]]in the [.55]i--n passing the little girl, it had..fallen off. [1.55[.5]Andso,..u--m]he still doesn't have his hat, when he [.15]starts [.35] uh.. bicycling off.[.4]Andthen he picks up [.4]uh the li.. the three little boys sort of go in the opposite direction,down the road, [.85[.45]a--nd]one of the little boys, [.55]sees his hat. [.25] And he picks itup. [.25]And he--whistles to the boy that's on the bicycle. [.6]/A--nd s/[.45]you know,motions that he has his hat. [.95[.55]So--..]the little boy that has the hat, comes and meetsthe boy on the bicycle. [5.35[.9]A--nd [.6]u--m[2.1...tsk...]then [.l]]they excha.. he gives..the little boy that picked up the hat,.. gave it to the boy on the bicycle, [.3]and the boy thatwas on the bicycle, [.2]gives [.3]him three pears. [1.25[.55]A--nd[.l]]the little boy, [.4] who..fetched his hat, [.25]took [.45]the pears, [.2]and goes back, [.2]to his friends, and /they/ each[.25]gives them each a pear. [.4]And then the other boy rides off, and they [.2]continuewalking in the [.15]in the-- ..the direction they were walking in. [.4]And they start eatingtheir pears. [1.l[.45]A--nd[.15]]in the meantime,.. the scene flashes back to--[.35]the--[.2]man.. who.. was pick..the /ori/[.15]initial man who was picking his pears. And he getsdown, [.7]from.. the--.. u--m[.5]tree,.. off the ladder, [1.3[.4]a--nd[.5]]i--s about ready tounload his cape, [1.2[.4]whe--n[.2]]he notices that one of his bushel baskets is gone andhe registers [.55]a--y u-- h[.9]tsk[.15]an expression.. of dismay,.. you know and anger, andthat sort of thing. [1.5[.5]A‚Äînd [.45]] as he's sitting there, the three little boys, [.45]comeby, [.4]eating the pears. [.35]And he looks at them, [.9?u--m[.6]]sort of [.75]impassionately,like[.35] I knew that it was leading up to this,.. and I thought maybe that there was going tobe a big dramatic moment, [.55?where [.2]]he's going to accuse the little boys who'dactually been like.. good Samaritans, of stealing his pears. [.35]But he just sort of watchesthem,.. as they walk by, and they don't pay any attention to them [.3]to him, he's.. they'rejust eating their pears, and.. you know playing with their[.25]paddle, and everything. [.4]Andthat's how it ends.
Speaker 18Okay, [2.2 [.3] U--m [1.0]] let's see. [1.85[1.1...tsk...]U--h]the first part of the..m [.45]movie,[.4[.2]uh well], the..the--..the basic action, [.5] i--s that there's--[.2]a rnan [.4] uh--on a
153
ladder, [.55]uh picking pears from a pear tree. [1.7[1.05] A--nd] he's[2.2[u--h [1.55]]y..youget this idea that he's[.2] he's sort of chubby--, [1.1?and u--h[.7]]sort of [.6..4{creaky}..]notinclined [.15+to--[.15]]to do a lot of work, [1.8?[.8]a—nd u--h]sort of [5..4{creaky}]a littlebit slow mentally. [.6...4--{creaky}..]He's very deliberately [.55]plucking the..the um [.45]the pears off the tree, [.55?and[.45]]you know you hear this[.65]s-- sharp little crunch as..ashe pulls each one off, and he's doing it..very slowly, and putting them in [.7...{breath}...]his apron. [1.4[.9] tsk And then..] climbing very carefully..down the[.2]the ladder, andplacing them in baskets, and he'd never make it as a fruit picker. .1 [2.1[.55]{laugh}]Hewou1d starve. .1 [2.6{breath}[.l]A—nd u--h[.25]]different people go past him. .1[4.0[1.0]A--nd u--m [1.75...4 {creaky}..]]I don't know, oh...somebody went past him witha goat...I don't know why. [.4]You know, but I guess [.95...4{creaky}]an [.74{creaky}]sortof..audience anticipation..of [.45]well this guy's going to go past with the goat and the goat'sgoing to break off the leash and eat all the apples. But what does happen, is this little boygoes past on the bicycle that's[.7]almost too big for him to handle. [.6]And he picksup..not..just one..or two pears,.. but the whole basket of pears. [1.05? + [.75] A--nd ] drivesoff down the [.25] the road with the-- u--h[.25]with the..pears, and ..on the road [.6]hemeets-- u--h a-- [.5..44{creaky}].. girl..coming on a..bicycle, in the opposite direction,[1.6?and u--m[.7]]they [.9]go very close past each other, so that his [.6]his hat fliesoff.[2.0[1.3]A-- nd]he--looks around for the hat, [.4]doesn't watch where he's going,[1.5?[.45]a--nd[.3]u--m..]hits a big rock in the road,.. and..all the pears fall down. [.5]Andthen there's a shot of u--m[.45]uh three kids, [.3]sort of [.15]u--h standing, [.65] by theroadside,.. a--nd you don't know at first whether they're hostile or not, /and/you get a shot,[2.05[.8]/the--n/u--m[.35]]they're sort of [.5]standing there, grinning, [3.2 and uh[1.1] tsk..--h[1.5]]it could..4{creaky}that look could be interpreted as a menacing grin, ora[.5]4{creaky}or a friendly grin, or just the way kids are, [.4+and [.4]]u--h they go over tohim, and the--y..the-y u--h help him, [.35]they start brushing him off, and ..picking up thepears for him, [.5+and [.5]]hold the ..basket, while he gets on.. onto the bicycle, [1.3+and[1.3]]are generally very helpful. They walk down the r..he [.2]g--ets back on the bicycle,rides off,.. gets u--m[.85+[.85]a--nd]they walk down the road, [2.45[.5]a--nd u--m[.75]tsk]they find his hat, [.55] farther..m[.7]farther down the road, in the direction they're going, andhe's going in the opposite direction. [.7]So one of them goes back with the hat. .1[.4+[.4]A--nd]says..u--h[.6] uh.. doesn't say anything,.. but gives him back the hat.[.4+[.4]So--]he--r.. reaches into the basket, takes out three pears, [1.05and[1.1]u--h[.2]]givesthem to the[.3] the-- other kids. [2.75[.9]A--nd[.55] so--..]these kids are walking,.. in thedirection from which the boy came. [.l5] So that eventually they will go pas--t the [.4]theman,.. who's been picking [.15]the pears,[.75] who-- [.15]in the meantime, has ..comedown from the ladder, [.6]and looks, [.3]and sees that he's[.15]u--h[.55]he's missing a basketof pears. [1.0]And these--..u--h three kids come past, in the opposite direction, eating pears,[.5]and he's trying to figure out, [3.5well,[.15]]how..how did that happen. [.4]It's--a[.2]there's just this look on his..his face of bewilderment. 1.9[1.0]A--nd]at first you ..you sortof think [1.6?..well---you know u--m [.6]]he's going to accuse them. [.25] Of having takenhis pears. [1.5 Bu--t u--h[.65]]the he s[.15]he sees them coming, and watches them going,and he's just totally confused [1.75]{laugh}. Speaker 19 All right, [.35] it [.8]starts, [.15]itseems to be morning. [.8]In the countryside. In rolling hills, [1.7] it's bright and sunny, [1.2]and you hear roosters[.2]crowing... So it's a very pastoral setting. [.35]There's some trees...An orchard.[.6]And a ma--n, [.5]is [.75]picking pears. [1.6] In the trees. [.55]On/a/ladder.
154
And he comes down,.. from the ladder, [1.l]and he's wearing an apron, that holds the pears,in deep pockets. And he dumps them [.45] into some baskets.. that he has. [.35]Sitting..atthe bottom of the tree/s/. [2.2]And then you hear some sound, [.5]in the distance, [.2]approaching, [.45]and a man comes by leading a goat. [.45]They walk past the pears,.. andthe goat looks at them, but ..goes on, with the man. [1.0]And the other man continuespicking pears. [2.35[1.55]Then, [3.5]]another sound is heard, a clanky sound, and a boycomes by riding a bicycle. [1.05]And he sees the pears, [.55]and he stops. [.6]Gets off hisbicycle,.. hesitates as to just how to put it down, [.75]then he..takes a pear, [1.3[.6]after [.2]]careful1y watching the man in the tree. [.35] Who's still picking... Doesn't see the boy.[.45]Then the boy decides not to take the pear, but to take the whole basketfu1. [1.7{laugh}[.5]]And gets back on his bicycle, has/this/[.65]some trouble loading the basket. [1.55]Which is large. [1.25]And he rides off, [1.55]with the basket, [.3]in front of his handlebars,[.8]balanced,.. and he hits some bumps, and a few pears spill out. [.85]He goes on down theroad, [.75]and he passes a girl on a bicycle, [.35]and in passing her, his hat comes off,[.55]and he turns his head, and looks back, [.5]then his bicycle hits a rock in the road, and hefalls over,[.2]spills his pears,.. hurts his leg {laugh}. [1.4]And at that time, [.55] three [.25]boys[.35]appear, [1.8?[1.6]um]one's playing with a paddleball. [1.7?[1.3]A--nd..]they stop,[.45+[.45]and..]two..the other two boys,.. help him,.. pick up.. himself,.. pick up the pears,[.3]and they throw them into the basket. [1.55]And then they walk on, [1.0]and the boy onthe bicycle proceeds..in the direction he was going. [.8]While the boys that [1.15]helpedhim, find his hat, further down the road, [.9] and they pick it up, [.25]and one boy goes back,[.9]and gives[.8]the boy who fell, his hat.[1.2] And..in exchange, takes[.5]three pears.[1.05]And the boys continue walking, [.3]in.. and the one riding in opposite directions.[.65]The boys who've taken the pears, [.4]walk past the tree where the man is stillpicking{laugh}..picking pears, but he's comes down, [.25]and has[.25] noticed that one of hisbaskets..of pears is missing... And he can't find{laugh}..can't discover {laugh}where it couldhave gone. [.5]Then these three boys walk past[.4]all of them eating pears, {laugh}andhe..just kind of scratches his head, and wonders /uh/[.25] end of film {laugh}.
Speaker 20Sure. There was a ma--n, picking--, [1.3[.9]u--m[.l]]a Latin looking man, /and/ he waspicking pears, [1.0]in an apron--, [.25]that..he had baskets..for. [.6]So he didn't have to godown to the ground, [.65]to put the pears in the baskets. [.35]He just kept /trae/. [.7]And aman walked by with a goat, and nothing happened and he kept on going, [.3]and then a littleboy, [.35] /about/[.l5]a bic a red bicycle, that was too big for him, [.8]he stopped, ..took apear, and then on second thought he decided [.6] to take the entire basket... So he picked itup, and he put it /up/on [.65] there was a little platform on top of the front wheel, [.25]herode away. [2.0[1.l]A--nd..]he's riding down the road, ..and he had a hat on. [1.25[.85]A--nd]he--..almost ran into a girl, [.35+and [.35]]somehow she took his hat... Not on purposebut [.8]it came off. [.3]So he goes /nnnd/looked around, and he ..hit a rock... And he fell.And all his pears fell. [.4]And she kept on going. [.6]And there were three[.45]other boyswalking down the road. [.3]/And/that walking towards where he had come from. [.8]And..they looked sort of mean, one was[.25]had a little[.55]paddle with a ba--ll, and they lookedlike bullies, I thought they were going to take[.8] away [.3]mmm {This sound was ahesitation and also something to take the place of an unuttered NP.} But instead they helpedhim, [1.2]tsk they set his basket up, and got him going, and he didn't give them anything.
155
[.65]And he kept going, and they kept going, and then one of them[.35] found his hat, so theywhistled back at him,.. and one of them gave him his hat, and he gave[.55] him [.25]threepears back, [.8]which..he kept one and gave the other two to his friends, [.7]and he and hisfriends continued walking, and they [.4]and in the meant Okay. Then the man comes down,[.3]from the tree, and he notices the basket's missing, and then the [.2]and then the three boyswalk by, each eating a pear, [.6]and he just kind of looks at them [.4+and [.4]]doesn't doanything. [.l]And they keep on going. [.l5]And then it's over.
