Politeness and effectiveness of english email requests: Taiwanese professors’ perspectives

Abstract

This study investigated Taiwanese professors’ perceptions of an email request to a faculty member. In this study, 13 Taiwanese professors at a university located in southern Taiwan who were proficient English speakers were asked to give their perceptions of the politeness and effectiveness of students’ email writing. Content analysis was conducted to analyze these professors’ perceptions in order to identify what they consider to be a polite and an effective email request to faculty. The findings showed that although Taiwanese professors have a high degree of tolerance toward nonstandard forms in email writing, they still believed that the formal, epistolary type of email writing to faculty is the best email style. In addition, most Taiwanese professors also tend to believe that when making a request to faculty, it would be better for students to give reasons first before they request, which indicated their support for modern standard Chinese information sequencing.