Theories of Politeness

1.       Delimiting the concept of politeness

·         Politeness as a real-world goal

·         Deference vs politeness

·         Register

·         Politeness as a surface level phenomenon

·         Politeness as a pragmatic phenomenon

a.       Politeness as a real-world goal

Politeness has no place within pragmatics. It is difficult to access to the speakers’ real motovation for speaking as they do, and discussion as to whether one group of people is ‘politer’ that another. We only can curiously to what speakers say and to how their hearers react.

b.      Deference vs politeness

Deference à NON INTENDED RESPECTS

The speaker has no choice as to whether to use deferent     form or not. It is built into the grammar of languages

e.g.

1.  The cadet responds to the Academy Sergeant Major :               

      “Yes, Sir!”

 - Show politeness by holding a door open to allow someone else to pass through

e.g.

2. French, German and Russian,

Choice of a second person pronoun

T/V system

Tu/vous,

Du/Sie

TbI/BbI

Gestureà CODE SWITCHING DUE TO SOCIAL SITUATION

e.g.

A lecturer of a University asks question to his student:

        “I wonder if I might ask you to answer the last question!”

Politenessà INTENDED RESPECT

e.g.

A student is answering to his respected lecturer:

                                                   “Yes, Sir”

c.       Register

Register refers to “systemic variation in relation to social context” (Lyons 1977) or the way in which the language we speak or write varies according to the type of situation (Halliday, 1978, in Thomas 1995, p. 154)

It is primarily a sociolinguistic phenomenon : a description of the linguistic forms which generally occur in a particular situation.

e.g. If you decided to disrupt a stuffy meeting by using language not normally associated with that particular type of event, such as cracking jokes or making fun of the person chairing the meeting

d.      Politeness as a surface level phenomenon

Much early work in the area of politeness focused on utterance level realization (Walter, Rintell, Fraser)

Investigate how much politeness could be squeezed out of speech act alone.

Investigate by using a standard lexical context.

e.g.    Listing the proper forms of request:

              (would you.., could you..); this way is more sociolinguistics

PRAGMATICS : look at how a particular form in a particular language is used strategically in order to achieve the speaker’s goals. It requires context.

e.      POLITENESS AS A PRAGMATIC PHENOMENON

Politeness : a strategy employed by a speaker to achieve a variety of goals. It To promote and maintain harmonious relations.

2. Politeness explained in terms of principles and maxims

Politeness is as crucial in explaining ‘why people are often so indirect in conveying what they mean’ and rescuing the Cooperative Principle (CP) in the sense that it can satisfactory explain exception to and apparent deviations from the CP (Leech (1980 [1977] 1983a)). He introduces Politeness Principle (PP). There are two concepts dealing with the principles, namely ambivalence and politeness.

         Leech defines politeness as a type of behaviour that allows the participants to engage in a social interaction in an atmosphere of relative harmony.

·         Ambivalence and Politeness

        To be more politeness, ambivalence has more than one potential pragmatic force. It is possible to convey messages which the hearer is liable to find disagreement without causing undue offence. It is left the reader to decide;

(a)    What the precise force of the message is

(b)   Whether or not it applies to them

E.g. 9. (Thomas, 1995, p. 159)

In relation to potentially very offensive speech act (Requesting people not to steal!)

Notice in the Junior Common Room, Queens College, Cambridge.

These newspaper are for all the students, not the privileged few who arrive first.

·         Pragmatic Principles

Minimize (all things being equal) the expression of impolite beliefs; Maximize (all things being equal) the expression of polite beliefs.

The principles explain ‘the relationship between sense and force in human conversation’

The main maxims are:

1.        tact,

2.        generosity,

3.        Approbation,

4.       Modesty,

5.       Agreement and

6.       Sympathy

1.       CONVERSATIONAL MAXIMS VIEW PRAGMATIC PRINCIPLES:

•          THE POLLYANNA PRINCIPLESà To put the best possible gloss on what we have to say

•          e.g.

Finding something positive to say about rotten egg (but I had to look back 100 years to find it!)

Situation:

A young curate is having breakfast with his Bishop

2.       CONVERSATIONAL MAXIMS VIEW: PRAGMATIC PRINCIPLES:

THE TACT MAXIM

a. Minimize the expression of beliefs   which imply cost to other

b. Maximize the expression of beliefs which imply benefit to other

Tact Maxim aspects are

·         IMPOSITION, e.g. e.g. a. minimizing to reduce the implied cost to the hearer by saying: - Hang on a second!

- I’ve got a bit of a problem.

·         Optionality, e.g. a. Mitigating the effect of a request

- Chinese host chose dishes without consulting you.

·         Benefit Scale, e.g.  If something is perceived as being to the hearer’s benefit, it can be expressed without employing indirectness

- Have a chocolate!

THE MODESTY MAXIM

a.       Minimize the expression of praise of self

b.      b. Maximize the expression of dispraise of self

Situation:

A and B were giving a series of lectures in a foreign country where decent coffee was uncertain comodity. At the airport A had bought a good supply of ground coffee and a gadget for percolating it. She makes a first attempt as using it. Firstly, (A) minimize the expression of prise her gadget, then she maximize the expression of adore her ground coffee.

e.g. A: “This isn’t bad, is it?”

B: “The coffee? It’s very good”

A few hours later she makes some more:

B: “This coffee is very good”

A: “Not bad, is it?”

THE APPROBATION MAXIM

a.       Minimize the expression of beliefs which express dispraise of other

b.      Maximize the expression of beliefs which express approval of other .

All things being equal we prefer to praise others and if we cannot do so, to sidestep the issue, we can give sort if minimal response,

e.g. in commenting a process of lecturing, we maximize in approve someone, or minimize the expression dispraise.

THE AGREEMENT MAXIM

a.       Minimize the expression of disagreement between self and other

b.       Maximize the expression of agreement between self and other.

e. g.  Of (b) Mrs. Sharma allows her daughter to join her preference of extra class

A: So.. Should I let my daughter to choose her interest?

B: Yes, of course you’re right, your decision might make her very overwhelmed .

Situation: Example of (a) e.g. 18  & 19

Speaker A is Mr. Sharma, the Indian-born father of one of the pupils attending school.

Speaker B is Mrs. Green, the deputy head teacher of a school   (a British woman). They are involved in a major disagreement concerning the courses Mr. Sharma’s daughter will take the following year.

        e.g. 18,  (Thomas, 1995, p. 165)

A: … I don’t want my daughter to do CSE, I want her to do ‘O’ level.

B: Yes, but Mr Sharma, I thought we resolved this on your last visit

e.g. 19, (Thomas, 1995, p. 165)

A: Nehemulla is ideally suited to the class she’s in and this class will do CSE in two years’ time.

B: No, my dear, no, no, it’s wrong!

THE GENEROSITY MAXIM

a. Minimize the expression of benefit to self

b. Maximize the expression of cost to self .

For indicating generosity, sometimes it is fine to directly expressed invitation even obviously regard as a force to maximize the benefit to other or somehow in generally speaking in your own party or peculiar home we do unmodified imperative to minimize benefit to self, allowing other as if the part of us (owner)

THE SYMPATHY MAXIM

a.       minimize antipathy between self and other

b.       maximize sympathy between self and other.

This includes a small group of speech acts such as congratulation, commiseration, and expressing condolences –all of which is in accordance with Brown and Levinson's positive politeness strategy of attending to the hearer's interests, wants, and needs.

e.g.  (b) In maximizing sympathy of someone whose father has already passed away by saying ”I am sorry to hear about your father. “

The speaker makes an effort to minimize the antipathy between himself and the addressee.

E.g. (a). Despite very serious disagreement with you on a technical level, we have done our best to coordinate our efforts in reaching on agreement. But have so far not been able to find any common ground

Problem with the Leech’s Approach

a.       There appears to be no motivated way of restricting the number of maxims, it would be possible to produce new maxim to explain every tiny perceived regularity in language use,

b.      The theory is at worst virtually unfalsifiable,

c.       There is no explain cross-cultural differences in the perception of politeness and the use of politeness strategies.

FACE MANAGEMENT VIEW

(Thomas pp. 168)

“They’ve got to safe face. Saving face is the strongest motive in the world” General idea of politeness: fixed concept of social behavior/etiquette within a culture, involves certain general principles as being tactful, generous, modest, sympathetic towards others. (Brown and Levinson, 1978, 1987) Narrower concept of politeness within an interaction:

face = the public self-image of a person (emotional and social sense of  self one has and expects everyone else to recognize)

Negative face : need to be independent, to have freedom of action, not be imposed on by others

Positive face : need to be accepted/liked, to be treated as a member of the same group, to know that wants are shared by others.

Face wants

Within everyday social interaction people generally behave as if their expectations concerning their face wants (i.e. public self-image) will be respected

•       face threatening act (FTA)-Brown and Levinson

   : speaker says something that represents a threat to another    individual's expectations regarding self-image

•       face saving act

   : speaker says something to lessen a possible threat

STRATEGIES FOR AVOIDING ‘FTA’

PARAMETER  OF FTA :

-          POWER (P)

-          DISTANCE (D)

-          IMPOSITION RATING (R)

Politeness STRATEGIES for avoiding FTA:

A.      ON RECORD SUPERSTRATEGY

                1) Bald-on record

                2) Positive Politeness

                3) Negative Politeness

B.   OFF RECORD SUPERSTRATEGY

Politeness Strategies for Avoiding ‘FTA’

                A. 1) Bald-on record:

                it is directly address the other person to express your needs using imperative forms is known as bald on record

                e.g: I want some beer.

                A. 2)  positive politeness

                                A face saving act concerned with the person's positive face will tend to show solidarity, emphasize that both speakers want the same thing and have a common goal.

                e.g: hey buddy, is it OK for me to have a beer?

                A. 3) Negative politeness

                                A face saving act oriented to a person's negative face tends to show deference, emphasizes the importance of the other's time or concerns and may include an apology for the imposition

                e.g:   I hope it's not too forward, but would it be possible for me to have a beer?

                B. Off record:

                 statements not directly addressed to another person

                e.g: It's so hot. It makes you really thirsty.

Criticism Brown and Levinson

•       FTA implies act is threatening to the face of either the speaker or the hearer in fact, many acts can be seen to threater the face both S and H simultaniously.

e.g. An apology, threatens the speaker’s face in obvious way, but can also be the source of considerable embrassment to the hearer

•       Brown and Levinson claim that positive and negative politeness are mutually exclusive, but in practice, a single utterence can be oriented to both positive and negative simultaneously (e.g. Ex 27-29 in Thomas, 1995, p. 171)

Source:

Thomas, J. 1996. Meaning in Interaction: An Introduction to Pragmatics. New York: Longman Group Limited