a compliment on someone s possession may indicate the complimenter s envy to what the addressee has. The recipient of the compliment may also feel obliged to offer the complimented object to the complimenter. As to how the perception differs between men s and women s in Indonesian, there has not been any published research found so far. [Johnson, D.M. & Roen, DH, 1992]. According to Maltz and Borker [1982], who introduced this view which values ??women s interactional styles as different, yet equal to men s, American men and women come from different sociolinguistic subcultures, having learned to do different things with words in a conversation [cited in Freeman and McElhinny1996]. They cite as an example the different interpretations of minimal responses, such as nods and short comments like umhm and yes. For men, these comments mean I agree with you, while for women they mean I m listening to you - please continue Rather than a women s style being deficient, as Lakoffwould believe, it is simply different. Inherent in this position is that cross-culturalmisunderstanding often occurs in mixed-sex conversation, as individuals wrongly interpret cues according to their own rules. [Lakoff, 1975]. Like compliments, apology is also another form of politeness strategy. Holmes [1990] differentiates compliments and apologies as: Compliments focus on the addressee s positive face wants, whereas apologies are generally aimed at face redress associated with face threatening acts (FTA) or offences which have damaged the addressee s face in some respect and can therefore be regarded as what Brown and Levinson called as negative politeness strategies. There have been a number of classification systems of apology devised by many researchers. Holmes [1990] formulated them based on her naturally occurring data in her New Zealand corpus as follows:
An explicit expression of apology
Offer apology, e.g., I apologize
Express regret, e.g., I m sorry
Request forgiveness, e.g., excuse me; forgive me
An explanation or account, an excuse or justification
e.g., I wasn t expecting it to be you; we re both new to this
An acknowledgment of responsibility
Accept blame, e.g., it was my fault
Express self-deficiency, eg, I was confused; I didn t see you
Recognize H as entitles to an apology, eg, you re right; you deserve an apology
Express lack of intent, eg, I didn t mean to
Offer repair / redress, eg, we ll replace it for you; I ll bring you another
A promise of forebearance
e.g., I promise it won t happen again
Holmes found that apologies used more frequently by women in speech to other women, and least frequently in the speech of men to other men. Women apologize more to other women is a mark of positive politeness but it is realized through negative politeness strategy. In unequal and distant relations, men s apologies are to assert the position of social authority, hierarchy and control. Women therefore use more strategies which focus on a harmonious relationship with the other person by expressing lack of negative intent and recognizing the other person s right to an apology.
Tannen [1990] provides much research on the concept of misunderstanding in the dual-culture approach. According to her, the language...
