A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS OF SYNTACTIC AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE USED IN CONVERSATIONAL SITUATIONS BY HOTEL RECEPTIONISTS IN DA NANG CITY, VIETNAM
 I. INTRODUCTION
 1. RATIONALE.
Nowadays, language is universally acknowledged as the most powerful and vital means of communication. We cannot imagine what would happen if language disappeared from the social life of human beings. This vitality can be clearly shown in such a rising industry, namely the “Hospitality Industry” or the “Hotel Service”, where various languages are used to serve the most demanding customers and where right English and Vietnamese seem to be the most useful tool of all.
A well-organized hotel system not only fulfills customers’ needs but also ensures the hotel of a steady flow of guests into their properties to reach their targeted daily occupancy rates and after all, hospitality for all guests and profitability for the hotel. In this process, receptionists are the key figure to create the opportunities for a face-to-face contact between the hotel and the guest. The kind of language, or more often, what to mean here – in Vietnam - the type of Communicative English and Vietnamese they are to use has its own features to ensure a whole enjoyable visit during the stay. However, influenced by Vietnamese customs and styles and due to differences between the two cultures, English and Vietnamese for Hotel Staff may not be properly used. Such utterances as “May I help you?”, “Would you please give me your name?” or “Who is calling, please?” may sound familiar to us but themselves reveal their interesting structures and pragmatic features which, if comparatively analyzed and made the most of, will bring back the best outcomes to its users.
 
For the above reasons, it is necessary to do a research on the similarities and differences of syntactic and semantic features of English and Vietnamese used by hotel receptionists in Viet Nam .
2. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES
2.1.AIMS:
          This study aims at showing the syntactic and semantic features of  English and Vietnamese  used in conversational situations by Hotel Receptionists, typically the hotel receptionists in Da Nang in Vietnam and later on, drawing the similarities as well as differences between them.
2.2.OBJECTIVES:
     This study aims at:
- Describing the basic requirements for a hotel receptionist to communicate with foreign tourists in hotels.
- Collecting the most frequently used structures of English and Vietnamese used in conversational situations by Hotel Receptionists in Vietnam .
-  Describing the syntactic features of English and Vietnamese used by Hotel Receptionists in Vietnam .
- Describing the semantic features of English and Vietnamese used by Hotel Receptionists in Vietnam .
- Analyzing similarities and differences in the syntactic and semantic features of English and Vietnamese used by Hotel Receptionists in Vietnam .
- Working out the implications of the findings and some possible ways to use the structures mentioned effectively.
- Giving suggestions for improving the languages and structures mentioned above.
3. DEFINITION OF TERMS
4. SCOPE OF THE STUDY
     - This study mainly focuses on the syntactic and semantic features of  English and Vietnamese used by Hotel Receptionists in Vietnam .
 5. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY.
     - This thesis directs to the most important purpose that is to improve the languages and structures in English and Vietnamese in hotels for receptionists to use them properly and effectively.
 6. ORGANIZATION OF THE STUDY
  Chapter 1, Introduction, consists of the rationale, the aims and objectives, definitions of terms, scope of the study, significance of the study and organization of the study.
Chapter 2, Literature and theoretical background, provides a brief literature review and theoretical background for the matters of study.
  Chapter 3, Method and Procedure, presents the research design and methods, the research questions, description population and sample which contains subjects, procedure, data collection and analysis.
  Chapter 4, Findings and discussion, discusses in the result of the data analysis.
  Chapter 5,  Conclusion and implications.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
Up to now, a lot of researches have been done on the structures of languages in hotels. Each of these is employed for different purposes in acquiring the target language.
          In English, the book title “Highly Recommended”(1980),Trish Stott and Rod Revell pointed out the language study which is very useful for receptionists, they also gave some structures to practice.
          In the book “English for Tourism”(1982), Benedict Kruse and Bettijune Kruse presented the structures of languages used in hotels for receptionists.
          Another book “English for the travel and tourism industry”(1985), Leo Jones pointed out the advices for receptionists when communicating with customers.
          In Vietnamese, “Tieng Anh chuyen nganh nghiep vu le tan”, (2000) So Giao Duc va Dao Tao  stated out the step and step of languages used in hotels to help receptionist use the right structures effectively.
          In “Thuc hanh nghiep vu le tan” (2000) the writer showed how to communicate with customers in hotels.
However, up to now, no research among above have focused their studies