The Vietnamese of second generation speakers in Australia

Abstract

This article presents a pragmatic transference in Vietnamese spoken by the second igeneration speakers in Australia. Specifically, the investigation mto their speech act of refiisal and their lack of knowledge or incorrect usage of Vietnamese idioms and proverbs shows a shift from indirectness to directness in the pragmatic performance of the language. As a result, the Vietnamese of second generation speakeis lacks tactilil face-saving methods. The fmdings have ilmplications for heritage language maintenance, for language change, and for imderstandmg trends in the multi-lingual society of Australia.