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Article published In: Pragmatics and Society
Vol. 13:4 (2022) ► pp.625–643

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The performance and relational role of toast intervention in Chinese dining contexts

 | Nanjing University
 | Nanjing University
Published online: 4 November 2022
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ps.19047.li
Abstract
This study explores the performance and relational role of toast intervention in Chinese dining contexts. The analysis of both interactional data and post-event interview data indicates that the detection of moral transgression and moral identification may outweigh the power relationship and social distance in the interactional practice, and that toast intervention, by default, is relationally constructive even in seemingly conflictive situations. As a complement to previous research on ritual communication, such as countering the heckler and bystander intervention which focus on genuine aggression, this study sheds light on the ritual act of toast intervention as ‘mock intervention’, which is a form of ‘mock moral aggression’ similar to ritual teasing. Thus, this study reveals the greater significance of moral identification compared to other contextual factors, and its role in explaining the relational consequences of toast intervention in Chinese dining contexts.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Toast intervention as a form of ‘Mock moral aggression’
  • 3.Methodology
  • 4.Detection of moral transgression as a trigger of toast intervention
  • 5.Relational consequences of toast intervention
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
References (41)
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Cited by four other publications

House, Juliane, Dániel Z. Kádár & Zongfeng Xia
2025. Offering food and alcohol in Chinese and English: a contrastive pragmatic perspective. Journal of Politeness Research 21:1 ► pp. 95 ff. DOI logo
Kádár, Dániel Z., Juliane House, Fengguang Liu & Dan Han
2025. Offering gifts in Chinese: An interaction ritual approach. Journal of Pragmatics 236 ► pp. 60 ff. DOI logo
Li, Jie & Xinren Chen
2025. Interveners’ performance of “identity work” in the context of Chinese bystander intervention. Pragmatics and Society 16:3 ► pp. 421 ff. DOI logo
Wang, Keyuan, Zepeng Wang & Yansheng Mao
2025. Hospitality and ritual: A discursive study of toasting in Chinese dining contexts. Discourse Studies 27:3 ► pp. 438 ff. DOI logo

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