Intercultural Language Politeness in International

Proceedings of International Conference on Language, Literary and Cultural Studies (ICON LATERALS) 2016

Widyaloka Auditorium, Universitas Brawijaya, Jl. Veteran, Malang, 29 October 2016

557

DOI:10.217716/ub.icon_laterals.2016.001.1.37

Intercultural Language Politeness in International Business Interaction

Case Study: Aliexpress

Puji Rahayu, S,S.

Faculty of Cultural Studies- Airlangga University

Sidoarjo-East Java, Indonesia

[email protected]

ABSTRACT

Shopping activities in this modern era can be done effortlessly because trading

business nowadays has great deployment with using Internet as one of main marketing

tools. E-commerce is one of the realizations of trading business with using Internet.

Not only local trading, but International trading is also using e-commerce for widely

spread business. There are a lot of International e-commerces such as Ebay, Amazon,

Banggood, Aliexpress, and so on. In this research will try to find out the intercultural

politeness issues in International business interaction which in this case Aliexpress is

chosen as the source of the data taken. Aliexpress is one of e-commerce as retail

division of Alibaba group. Alibaba is the biggest e-commerce company in China which

provides best services for shopping almost all goods and connects China manufactures

with worldwide customers. The researcher will try to randomly send “business

cooperation offer” messages to Aliexpress sellers and each response will be analyzed

using politeness strategies theory to find out how Chinese culture affect its people to

communicate and respond the offer messages from worldwide customers. We will be

informed about the use of language by China people to express their acceptance and

ignorance a business offer using various politeness strategies expression. Small rural,

intermediate, and even big manufactures can sell their products in Aliexpress and

being connected to worldwide customers. The researcher will send messages randomly

to 30 sellers in Aliexpress then analyze the data with relating to the cyberpragmatic

and politeness theory to find out the result of Chinese culture in communication.

KEYWORDS: Intercultural, Politeness, International Business, Communication,

Digital Market, E-commerce, Aliexpress, Alibaba.

Technology is as a marker of the rise of modern era. It brings us modern and

smart living with many big improvements in almost all fields in our life. New

technologies are growing significantly fast and advance. One of the biggest

improvements as early step of modern technology is the creation of computer network

mailto:[email protected]



558

and Internet. Modern technology nowadays is able to ease people work, effective their

activities, support their daily needs, communication, business activities, world

information updates, and even shopping activities with the existence of Internet which

makes unlimited online connection worldwide. One of the most popular phenomena

today is online shopping. People nowadays really excited to try shopping online in

modernly living. It is considered as a very helpful way to effective time for shopping

especially for the one who has limited time and expects the simplest way for

everything. Internet makes everything easy, even for shopping activity, people only

need to click and pay their favorite stuffs, products, tools and everything they wants

through online shop or e-commerce, pay them with credit card then the products will

be sent out to their address without get any difficulties to go to supermall, supermarket,

retail shop with taking their precious time. Just wait it then it will be arrived.

Online shopping is as one of modern lifestyles which is considered as the

simplest way of shopping. It happens not only for local shopping activities, but also

worldwide shopping activities. We can buy something we need directly, locally until

from other countries instantly as easy as buy online product locally. There are many

International online marketplace of e-commerce such as eBay, Amazon, Aliexpress,

Etsy, and many e-commerce which easily accessed using internet to support

International transaction. Online shopping activity in all mentioned e-commerce

platforms above are as an International trade place both national and International basis

to facilitate everyone around the world with excellent shopping online experience.

Interaction in International e-commerce becomes an interesting phenomenon

to be observed deeply using linguistic theories. In this research will try to analyze more

about communication in e-commerce activities and relate them to pragmatics theory

especially for intercultural politeness and politeness strategies. According to Yule



559

(2010) that politeness can be defined as showing awareness and consideration of

another person’s face. This research aims to give us an insight about business

interaction in International digital market. How International business people (seller,

customer, and provider) interact with each other, how is their communication system,

and how politeness roles applied in International interaction which is involving two or

more people around the world which have different culture background and affect

them to have different pragmatic competence to be applied in their communication.

As explained by Taguchi, 2009, p. 1 cited in Mirzaei, et all. (2012) that Pragmatic

competence is “the ability to use language appropriately in a social context” which

involves both innate and learned capacities and develops naturally through a

socialization process.

In order to be pragmatically competent, language learners must map their

sociopragmatic knowledge on pragmalinguistic forms and strategies and be able to use

their knowledge online under the constraints of a communicative situation (McNamara

& Roever, 2006; Roever, 2004 cited in Mirzaei, et all). When we use of language with

knowing its strategies to use in appropriate social context means that we have

mastering sociopragmatic norm. Culture, politeness and language are expressed in our

society can be observed using sociopragmatic theory. As explained by Mirzaei, et all.

(2012) that sociopragmatic aspects of language use vary across different situations,

languages, and cultures.

The importance of politeness in language expression or communication makes

me challenged to observe more about the communication of International business

transaction in E-commerce as a digital market. As we know that communication in

online transaction is a temporal communication which contains many language

expressions expressed by various characters of worldwide customers. Has



560

International business interaction apply politeness norm properly or does it ignored

because the difference of cultural norms.

In this occasion, Aliexpress is chosen as a data source because it is considered

as the biggest International marketplace in China. Aliexpress with its jargon ‘Smarter

Shopping, Better Living’ can be accessed in http://www.aliexpress.com/. As explained

already that Aliexpress is one of e-commerce of retail division of Alibaba group.

Alibaba is the biggest Chinese e-commerce which provides best services for online

shopping complete products and connects China manufactures with overseas

customers. The second important point of why Aliexpress is chosen because it comes

from one country, China. Rather than other e-commerce which has a random system

for the transactions, hundred countries can freely participate as seller and also

customers, different with Aliexpress which has a system that all the sellers and the

products are directly from China. It will ease to compare the politeness culture between

ours and China. The data of communication between China sellers then analyzed using

politeness strategies with aim to find out the dominate politeness strategies expressed

by China people to accept and ignore an offer in business.

RESEARCH METHOD

This research uses qualitative method since the data are fully in written form stored

in text form of interaction. The researcher passed 5 steps in collecting the data. The

steps are as described below:

1) For collecting the data, firstly I create Aliexpress account with following the

directions and use it to know more about Aliexpress with its system.

2) Secondly, I directly put my attention to Aliexpress message system with aim to

widely survey the communication through Aliexpress messages. It allows me to

send directly the messages to the sellers of the products I chose



561

3) Thirdly, after mastering the message system, creating message format then

become the next step. It contains of business cooperation offer message which

shortly ask the seller to cooperate sell the products with offering myself to be their

reseller with drop-shipping system. Here is the message format:

“Hello (shop name), I am a new member and a beginner in joining this e-

commerce. I want to be your reseller because your products really catch my

eyes. I want to ask your permission to sell your products in my shop and do

something like dropshipping (I will buy your items and ship them worldwide

to different addresses for each) and I will buy them continually. If you allow

me and give me permission to be your reseller, please kindly give me

confirmation. Best Regards,”

4) In the next step, surely I sent 30 messages randomly to 30 different Aliexpress

sellers. I chose random seller who has being online at that time to get faster

response. The 30 sent messages have various responses from the seller with

ignorance or acceptance. All responses of the message will be used as data of this

research to be analyzed using politeness theory with aim to find out the dominate

politeness strategies expressed by China people to accept and ignore offer in

business.

5) The last step, capture the data of responses to be attached as appendixes.

All responses will be the data of this research and will be analyzed using

Cyberpragmatics theory and Brown and Levinson’s theory of politeness strategies

with aim to know how China people expressed their acceptance and ignorance with

their politeness strategies in their online business communication. All responses are

listed in the table 3.1. There are two columns of responses which the second respond

column is optional as an additional supporting politeness strategies analysis. The result

then will be related to the culture which is affecting the way of people in China

expressed their acceptance and ignorance with certain strategies of politeness. After



562

all the data analyzed, then conclusion will be drawn from all the findings of the

research.

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

The table shown below is revealing the data findings of the seller’s responses.

All the data findings and the categorization of politeness strategies used are shown in

Table 1 as follows:

Table 1

Data Analysis of Business Messages DN ACCEPT (A)

IGNORE (I)

1ST RESPOND 2ND RESPOND POLITENESS

STRATEGIES

1 A Ok - Baldly on record

2 A Dear, welcome to

our store and thank

you for your

message. I am so

luck that you like

our bags. And if you

order, we can send

to you according

your different

address, and drop

shipping for you, if

you have any other

question, please ask

me. Best Regards

Dear, its my pleasure

and I also think it’s

honor for me to

know you. And I

think we can long-

term business

relationship. And I

will try my best do

serve for you and

hope your order!

Best Regards

Positive

Intensify the

interlocutor’s interests

3 A Best price for you Ok! Best Regards, Off-Record

Indirect with hints

4 A Ok my friend, I like

to cooperate with

you. Please just

place the order with

your shipping

address. I can ship

the parcel to your

customers

Ok. Thanks Negative

Minimize imposition

with firstly showing

great interest before

come to the main points

5 A Ok, no problem Dear my friend, I

think your idea is

good. I hope we can

cooperate together. If

we can cooperate

successfully, I give

you my best price, at

the same time, I will

give you our model

photos and give you

my logo. We send

your goods from

Quanzhou Fujian

Province, of course I

can send your goods

to your customers as

Positive

Maximizing exaggerate



563

DN ACCEPT (A)

IGNORE (I)


STRATEGIES

per your

requirements. Thank

you again. Today is

11 Nov, our business

is very very good.

Best Regards

Frank Liu/ Oliver

Wu

My telephone:

008659522591657

6 A Of course you can,

my friend. I hope we

can be good partners

in business. We do

support drop-

shipping. Welcome

to our store

Hi my friend, we can

only ship it to your

original country,

which is the country

you registered at the

first time. This is

aliexpress rules and

we have to comply

by

Positive and Negative

Using “my friend” to

make closer relationship

with interlocutors but

after that express

disagreement to the

thing

7 A Thank you so much

for your email, it is

ok. You can as

reseller and buy the

item ship to different

address. Thanks and

best regards

Yoyo

- Positive

Showing strong

agreement

8 A Hi friend, thanks for

your time. We are so

sorry reply you so

late. But what do

you mean? Do you

want to buy?

Waiting for your

reply. Alex

Hi friend, how are

you? We are sorry

reply you so late.

And you mean you

want to sell our

product in your store

right? Yes, you can.

But what we can do

for you? Waiting

your reply. Alex

Negative

Express apologize to

indicate reluctance to do

FTA with re-ask unclear

things

9 I Hi, sorry we

currently do not do

authorization on

resell. We will

inform you of our

policy changes in

the future

- Bald on record

Express directly for

disagreement

10 A Dear, glad to hear

from you and

welcome to do as

our dropshipping.

And it is ok for you

to copy our photos

to your store to sell

our products

Dear, when you

make different orders

ship to different

address, just write

the correct address

which you want to

ship, when we can

ship the parcel there

Positive

Welcoming interlocutors

happily and use “dear”

to make warm

relationship

11 A Yes dear Hello dear, Thanks

for you like our

products. I am glad

that we can establish

business relationship

with you. Don’t

Positive with bald record

Strongly agree with

some clear expressions



564

DN ACCEPT (A)

IGNORE (I)


STRATEGIES

worry, we can

provide dropshipping

to many

countries.waiting for

your order! Have a

wonderful day!

12 A Hi friend, welcome

to my shop! We

surely would like to

cooperate with you.

We have many

dropshipping

customs like you.

Please do not worry,

we can ship to

different address

offered by you. But

please tell me which

country your

customers are from?

90% countries are

free shipping.

Thank you also my

friend. Look forward

to your order soon.

Wish you a happy

life!

Negative

Pluralize the person

responsible with mention

as “we” and minimize

the imposition with

softly ask with “but

please tell me…” after

agreement

13 A Well, if you buy, I

will give you a

discount

Can you give me a

destination address. I

will direct shipment

Negative

Minimize the imposition

with expressing “if” and

showing pessimistic

14 A Dear, thanks for you

support, how many

do you need?

Different quantity

have different

discount. We will

fully support you.

Wish you a nice

day!

Dear, very pleasure

reply your letter, we

are all high quality

products, if your

order is sufficient,

we will give you the

most favorable price,

look forward to

working with you. :*

Negative

Showing pessimistic and

add them with some

questions

15 A Ok Bald on record

16 A Dear, yes of course,

it is my pleasure,

you can resell my

goods, thanks. Tracy

- Positive

Warm welcoming to

show agreement

17 A Hi sigit wibowo,

thanks for your

message. I am happy

to cooperate with

you and can provide

dropshipping. My

phone/whatsapp:

+861526860918.

Thanks, keep

contact!

Positive with bald on

record

Strongly agree with

giving contact and

asking directly to

interlocutors to keep

contact

18 I Hello dear, I do not

understand what you

said. What is the

problem you want to

consult?

I am very sorry. No

Negative and Bald on

record

Apologizing firstly

before ignoring offer

19 A Dear, thanks for

your inquiry. Yes, I

can make

dropshipping to you.

Pls do not worry.

- Positive

Showing agreement with

use marker “dear” and

thank



565

DN ACCEPT (A)

IGNORE (I)


STRATEGIES

20 A Dear friend, thank

you for your email.

We are glad to know

that you are

interested in our

products. We can

do dropshipping for

you, but the tracking

number doesn’t

provide specific

tracking

information, it is just

a proof of shipment.

Have a nice day.

best regards,

Dear friend, thank

you for your email

and understanding,

hope everything goes

well for you. Have a

nice day! Best

regards

Positive and negative

Express exaggeration

when agreeing but

showing pessimistic in

the next point

21 A Thank you, yes you

can. We can send

the products to your

customer directly.

Positive

Showing agreement with

thank

22 A After you ordered it,

we will send you the

tracking number,

thanks

You can order it

directly

Negative

Avoid disagreement with

expressing requisite

23 A Dear friend, we offer

dropship. And if you

want a track number,

you need pay us $1

again, is ok for you?

Ok. Thanks

Negative

Avoid disagreement and

express pessimistic with

question

24 A Yes, we could

dropship for you and

will give you the

tracking number

Bald on record

Do nothing to express

agreement

25 A Hi, thank you for

your mail. May I ask

how big is your

shop? Best regards,

Hi, thank you for

your mail, that’s fine,

thanks. Best regards,

Negative

Expressing doubt that

the conditions for the

appropriateness of

interlocutor’s speech

obtain with “may I”

26 A Yes Ok Bald on record

27 I Dear buyer, so sorry

I’m afraid not

Negative

Express ignorance with

apologizing and

pessimistic

28 A Hello, this is no

problem, you can be

my distributor, hope

we can cooperate

happily

Hello, my dear

friend. I will help

you with the quickest

speed

Positive

Noticing interlocutor’s

interest in expressing

agreement

29 A Hello dear, nice to

meet you here. Of

course it is ok to

ship your items to

different address. So

pls do not much

worry

Ok hope hear you

soon

Positive

Noticing interlocutor’s

interest in expressing

agreement

30 A No problem - Bald on record



566

DN ACCEPT (A)

IGNORE (I)


STRATEGIES

No mitigating devices

with clearly answer

agreement

From the data findings, there are 9 responses categorized as bald on record

politeness strategies, one response categorized as off record politeness strategies, 13

responses categorized as positive politeness strategies, and 11 responses categorized

as negative politeness strategy. Positive politeness strategy is dominating to be used

by China sellers to accept and ignore the business offer with the total of 13 responses.

Also we can see from the data, there are 30 responses which 27 responses are accepting

the offer, while only 3 responses are expressed to ignore the offer.

We can relate the highest frequency of politeness strategy used and the amount

of acceptance and ignorance of China people with their culture to find out the effect to

their business communication. China people mostly use positive politeness strategy to

respond business offer Positive politeness according to Brown and Levinson means

being complimentary and gracious to the addressee and really save their face. It shows

that China people are very respecting their customers and really concern with their

satisfaction. If we can relate the result with the position of China as one of the biggest

exporter of whole products in the world and famous with their productivity culture

called “zi qiang” (strengthen yourself) which followed by all China people to create

strong, prosperous and modern country “fu qiang” (To be rich and mighty). They also

use communication theory of business development in global market named

interdependency theory that is interdependent relation which honor cooperation in

physical and economic dimensions to be expected to create their cooperation

encourages world peace and development (Wa Ode Nurul Yani, 2014). It makes

China people have perfect ability to communicate to gain more and more customers.

It shows with their politeness strategy to serve customer with very good service. It is



567

supported by the explanation from Suharyadi, et all that China people has a good

business etiquette with good business systems such as:

China people always allow their customers make their own choices without any

offenses.

Old customers are given best service while new customers are offered with

discount and credit easiness.

It has been proven with the data finding of this research that 80% sellers give

customers the best offer in business that is best price and big discount. They also use

pronoun “We” rather than “I” and call their customers with “dear/my friend” to create

closer communication. They recognize that their customers have a face to be respected.

It also confirms that the relationship is friendly and expresses group reciprocity

From the data finding also shows that 90% sellers accept the offer in business

with 27 sellers accept the offer in business cooperation and only 3 sellers who ignore

it. It shows that China people almost never waste chances in business. It also supported

by the explanation that Asia people including China almost cannot say “NO” directly,

they prefer to say ignorance intricately and complicated. Express their ignorance with

saying “no” directly is considered causing threatening “face” and causing

embarrassment. It is proven in this research that there are only 3 sellers who ignoring

the offer. They really do face saving act to their customers. .

CONCLUSION

The communication through the sellers and the shoppers or customers of

Aliexpress can be analyzed using cyberpragmatics theory since the communication

done digitally. After 30 messages of business cooperation offer sent, they have various

responses from the sellers with ignorance or acceptance. All responses used as data of

this research to be analyzed using politeness theory with aim to find out the dominate



568

politeness strategies expressed by China people to accept and ignore offer in business.

The result shows that 90% sellers accepted the offer, while 3 sellers ignored it. 90%

China sellers strongly agree with the offer and even giving offer of best price and

discount in responding the cooperation offer message. While in accepting and ignoring

business offer, they use different politeness strategies. Most of them use positive

politeness strategy with the total of 13 responses.

The big amount of sellers accepting the offer and their choice of using positive

politeness strategy is affected by China culture that is productivity culture called “zi

qiang” which means strengthen yourself. China people are hard worker in all fields

especially in business since China nowadays become one of the biggest country in

trading. It makes China people have perfect ability to communicate to gain more and

more customers. It shows with their politeness strategy to serve customer with very

good service. Their good service shows with use of positive politeness strategies

dominated found in this research. They also use pronoun “We” rather than “I” and call

their customers with “dear/my friend” to create closer communication. They recognize

that their customers have a face to be respected. It also confirms that the relationship

is friendly and expresses group reciprocity. It makes China become the biggest

American competitor with being the biggest country in business and exporter of whole

products in the world. It starts with the genius way in managing business; one of the

aspects is in the use of language properly to create a good communication in gaining

a trust from their business partners.

REFERENCES

Aliexpress. http://www.aliexpress.com/.

Ari, Donald, & Jacobs, L. Cheser, & Razavieh, A. (2002). Introduction to Research

in Education. Australia: Wadsworth.

Mirzaei. A, et all. (2008). Exploring Pragmalinguistic and Sociopragmatic



569

Variability in Speech Act Production of L2 Learners and Native Speakers. Shahrekord

University. The Journal of Teaching Language Skills (JTLS)

Suharyadi, et all. (2012). Kewirausahaan; Membangun Usaha Sukses Sejak Usia

Muda. Jakarta: Salemba Empat.

Yani, Wa Ode N. (2014). Komunikasi Bisnis Lintas Budaya Di China. Diakses pada

31 Agustus 2016 pada

https://waodenurulyani.wordpress.com/2014/04/06/komunikasi-bisnis-lintas-

budaya-di-china/.

Yule, George. (2010). The Study of Language: 4th Edition. Cambridge.

Documents

Intercultural Language Politeness in International