POLITENESS AND INTERACTION

Things to discuss:

• Politeness
• Face wants
• Negative and positive face
• Self and other: say nothing
• Say something: off and on record
• Positive and negative politeness
• Strategies
• Pre-sequences
Why do we need to learn it?
 Linguistic interaction = a social interaction.

 For interaction to be successful (i.e. what is said is

understood) the interactants need to consider and
(sometimes) negotiate factors related to social distance
and closeness.
 External & internal factors
Why do we need to learn it?

 External & internal factors

+ Social distance => an external factor (determined prior
to the interaction (as being known to both interactants).)
Example: Mr Adams, Dr Dang…(Title + last name)
+ Closeness => an internal factor (negotiated during the
interaction)
Example: degree of friendliness/familiarity (first name)
What is politeness?
Politeness is the means employed to show awareness of
another person’s face. (Yule, 1996)

To the average person:

Being polite means showing good manners and thinking
about other people’s feelings.
For the sociolinguist:
Being linguistically polite involves speaking to
people appropriately in the right place and at the right time
 Examples of politeness

1. A student to teacher:
Student: Excuse me Mr. Buckingham,
but can I talk to you for a minute?

2. Friend to friend
Hey, Harry, got a minute?
 What is politeness and who named it?
The study of politeness relies on the concept of face, introduced by
social psychologist Ervin Goffman (1956).

 Politeness can be defined as showing awareness and consideration

of another person’s face. (Penelope Brown & Stephon Levinson
1987)

According to Brown and Levinson 1987 everyone has self public

image which has relation to emotional and social sense of self and
expects everyone else to recognize.
 This theory forms a term FACE.

Politeness (Brown and Levinson:1987) in interaction can

be defined as the means employed to show awareness of
another person’s face
 FACE

FACE = Someone’s public self-image

& Each individual has a desired self-image, a way
we want to be seen.

This concept comes up with two types of face.

 Positive Face
 Negative Face
FACE WANTS
 FACE WANTS
Within the everyday social interactions , people generally
behave as if their expectations concerning their public self-
image, or their face wants, will be respected.
Meanwhile if some actions might be interpreted as a threat to
another’s face, the speaker can say something to lessen the
possible threat, this is called face saving act (FSA).
If a speaker says something that represents a threat to another
individual’s expectations regarding self-image it is described
as face threatening act (FTA).
 FTA AND FSA
Face Threatening Act = is an act which challenges
the face wants of an interlocutor. According to Brown and
Levinson (1987), face-threatening acts may threaten either
the speaker's face or the hearer's face, and they may
threaten either positive face or negative face.

Face saving act = speaker says something to lessen a possible

threat or to maintain a good self-image.
 FTA AND FSA
SITUATION: Young neighbor is playing loud music late at
night. Older couple can not sleep.

A: “I am going to tell him to stop that awful noise right

now!”

B: “Perhaps you could just ask him if he’s going to stop soon
because it’s getting a bit late and people need to get to
sleep.”
 KINDS OF FACE SAVING ACT

Negative and Positive face

Negative face is the need to be independent to have a freedom of
action and not to be imposed by others.
Example: Your friend asks for a ride to the airport
Negative face needs: you think, this is not favorable, I don’t feel
like driving to the airport. I have other stuff that I could be doing ,
like sleeping, or saving the gasoline in my car. He can find his own
ride ( Goffman: 1967).
EXAMPLES OF SAVING THE NEGATIVE FACE:

 Do you mind washing the dishes ?

 Could you take the dog out for a walk, please ?
 Would you mind cleaning the bathroom ?
 Please do your homework.
These sentences sound polite and imply the same
social power. They show concern about imposition.
 POSITIVE FACE

 Positive face is the need to be accepted , even liked by

others, to be treated as a member of a group and to
know what his or her wants are shared by others.

 Example: Your friend asks for a ride to the airport.

 Positive face needs: you think, I better take him

because I want him to like me, and I want a reputation
of being a reliable person (Goffman: 1967).
For example
When someone asks to get a pen from someone else, he can use
two ways.
Firstly, if he wants to apply negative face, he can say: ‘Could
you lend me a pen?’.
In this case, the speaker prefers to give a freedom action to the
hearer by using the word Could you.
Secondly, if he applies positive face, he can say ‘How about
letting me use your pen?’.
In this case, the speaker wants be approved by using the word
letting to the hearer.
 CONCLUSION

We can say negative face is the need to be

independent and positive face is the need to be
connected.
POLITENESS STRATEGIES According to Brown
and Levinson (1987:91-225), there are four strategies
for doing FTA:
1. Bald on Record
2. Positive Politeness
3. Negative Politeness
4. Off Record
 SELF AND OTHER ; SAY NOTHING
Many people seem to prefer to have their needs to recognized by
others without having to express those needs in language.
EXAMPLE: you arrive at an important lecture pull out your
notebook to take notes, but discover that you do not have anything to
write with. You think that the person sitting next to you may provide
the solution. In this scenario you are going to be “SELF” and people
sitting next to you is going to be “OTHER”
SELF: look into bag
OTHER: (offers pen) here use this.
 SAY SOMETHING: OFF AND ON RECORD
Even if you decide to say something, you do not have
actually to ask for anything. You can (perhaps after you
search through your bag) simply produce a statement
below:
A : “UH, I forgot my pen.”
B : “Hemm, I forgot where I put my pen.”
The example above is the example of OFF RECORD =>
utterances not directly addressed to the other.
 ON RECORD
In contrast, if the speaker directly addresses the other as a mean of
expressing the speaker needs, it means the speaker uses ON RECORD
technique EXAMPLE :
A : “Give me a pen.”
B : “Lend me your pen.”
=> utterances directly addressed the other to express self needs.
Using imperative forms is known as bald on record .
 MITIGATING DEVICES
Used to soften the demand:
A : Would you..
B : Please..
Situation: If you are having dinner with your boss and you need salt, you
are less likely to say (1) than (2) below:
1. “Pass the salt”
2. “Please pass the salt.”
Here the word “please” softens or mitigates the request, making it
more polite.
 POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE POLITENESS

Positive politeness strategy leads the requester to appeal to a

common goal, and to avoid giving offense by highlighting
friendliness.
A : How about letting me to use your pen ?
B : Hey, buddy, I’d appreciate it if you’d let me use your pen.
➢The positive politeness strategy is usually seen in groups of
friends, or where people in the given social situation know
each other fairly well (Watts, 2003:87)
NEGATIVE POLITENESS

 Negative politeness strategies are oriented

towards the hearer’s negative face and
emphasize avoidance of imposition on the
hearer (Watts, 2003:88)
 It typically uses a modal verb.
Example :
A : “Could you lend me a pen?”
B : “I am sorry to bother you, but can I ask
you for a pen or something ?”
 STRATEGIES

 Solidarity strategy is the tendency to use positive

politeness forms, emphasizing closeness between speaker
and hearer.
 Linguistically, it includes personal information, nicknames,
even abusive terms (esp. among males), shared dialect/slang
expressions, and it is marked via inclusive terms (we, let's ).

Example: “Come on, let's go to the party. Everyone will be

there. We'll have fun.”
 STRATEGIES

A deference strategy is the tendency to use negative

politeness forms, emphasizing the hearer’s right to freedom.
It is involved in ‘formal politeness’ which is more
impersonal, and include expressions that refer to neither the
speaker nor the hearer, emphasizing the hearer's and the
speaker's independence.
Example: “There's going to be a party, if you can make it. It
will be fun.”
PRE-SEQUENCES
One way of avoiding face risk is to provide an opportunity for the
other to halt the potentially risky act by using pre-sequences.
THANK YOU