Politness in Pragmatics - Term Paper Example

Choose one model of Politeness (e.g. Brown & Levinson, Leech, Watt, etc.). Explain the key points of the model selected, and examine its ability to explain politeness in more than one language. Introduction This paper takes as its theme one of the most famous accounts of politeness namely that of Brown and Levinson (1987). The key points of the Brown and Levinson model are explained and a number of examples from different languages are given to show how it can be applied in practice. Finally some reactions to the Brown and Levinson model are cited from the growing literature in the field, and a conclusion is reached regarding the on-going importance of the model for scholars in linguistics. Key Points Of The Brown And Levinson Model Brown and Levinson’s book (1987) on politeness examines one small area within the large amount of variety that exists in the way that language is used in daily life. This means that it rests upon the branches of linguistics that are concerned with social relations (sociolinguistics) discourse, and pragmatics. The concern here is not so much about the basic rules and structures of language as they are studied in fields like phonology and syntax, but much more with the choices that people make when they form utterances in a particular context. The first important point to stress is that language, and especially spoken language, takes place in a community and the members of that community all relate to each other in predictable ways according to unwritten rules of behaviour. People have a certain status depending on factors such as age, gender, nationality, social class, level of education etc. and they play many different roles in life including private roles within the family, formal roles at work, or in school, and many assumed roles which they fulfil temporarily such as for example being a customer in a shop, or being a patient in a hospital. The social norms of the group are very important for keeping human relationships smooth and efficient but there is a potential area of difficulty in this because human nature is, at times aggressive, and this can be both a harmful and a useful quality: “the problem for any social group is to control its internal aggression while retaining the potential for aggression both in internal social control and, especially, in external competitive relations with other groups” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p.1). According to Brown and Levinson the mechanism which is used to maintain this control is politeness, and they see this as a necessary feature which can be found in every human language, although of course there are many different ways of expressing it, depending on the language and culture in question. The authors assume that all people tend to be very polite to people whom they do not know, or who are outside their immediate circle of family and friends. In the terminology of Brown and Levinson this is called the social distance effect. A professor is socially distant from a first year student, and so both parties tend to be polite to each other. Two classmates sharing a flat with each other are likely to have developed more trust in each other, and will be less concerned about offending each other and so they can afford to use jokes and insults, or expletives and impolite expressions. The emotional aspects, also called “affect” in their relationship, are also factors which influence just how polite the individuals need to be in any given situation. One of the most important concepts in the book is what the authors call face. This is defined as “the public self-image that every member wants to claim for himself” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p. 61) within the larger context of the group, however that might be structured at any one time. This concept applies only to individuals who regard themselves and are regarded by others as a “competent adult” and who are capable of behaving in a rational manner (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p. 61). Small children and people who are extremely ill or very drunk, for example, are not able to or not willing to monitor their own public self image, or accurately judge the effect of their behaviour on other people and are therefore excluded from this otherwise this universal concept of politeness. Politeness is a skill which takes time to learn, and children acquire it in interaction with other people, as they see the effects of their speech and actions, and as they are trained by parents and teachers to be considerate about other people and to look out for their own face. It is important to note that the notion of face must be seen as a two way concept, in which the speaker and the addressee both have face, and both are concerned about their own face and the other party’s face at the same time. There are two kinds of face in this model: negative face and positive face. (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p. 61). Negative face is defined as “the want of every competent adult member that his actions be unimpeded by others” while positive face on the other hand is defined as “the want of every member that his wants be desirable to at least some others” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, p. 61). Negative face is all about protecting a person’s territory and autonomy while positive face is concerned with how a person thinks other people will perceive him or her. Another important concept is that of the face threatening act or FTA. Any speech act could potentially be a face threatening act, since it can interrupt someone who would rather be left alone, or it could reveal embarrassing details about the speaker, or it could introduce any number of other elements into the situation which can cause upset or offence. Some kinds of statement can be deliberately threatening to either the speaker or the addressee’s face, some can be accidental, and some are highly ambiguous. The reason for this variation is that the FTAs are highly context dependent. This means that researchers have to understand the culture that the two speakers share (or on some occasions do not share) and the context in which they are speaking before it is clear exactly what kind of FTAs are likely to be occurring. Misunderstandings occur more often between members of very distinct groups such as nations who are in a state of tension over some political issue than between members of the same group who can at least build on a shared experience to work out what the undercurrents of meaning are behind any FTAs that occur. The more different the two groups are, the more difficult it is to decode the hints that are in the language. This model of politeness assumes that very direct statements will be more face threatening than more indirect statements. If someone wants another person to close a window, for example, the act of making this desire known threatens the addressee’s negative face because it implies that the person making the request is in a superior position of being able to compel the other to act. This applies even if there is no actual authority or superiority on the part of the person expressing this wish. The person being addressed is therefore likely to suffer negative consequences from that FTA even when it only vaguely implies such superiority in the speaker. Examples from English Examples from English can be used to illustrate how this model works, and at the same time how difficult it is to map linguistic criteria on to these discourse- related phenomena. Sometimes the intention behind a statement can be quite different from the primary meaning that the words actually carry. The statement I am sorry, but would you mind letting me past? for example, uses a very clear apology formula I am sorry but it is not really functioning as an apology. In fact it is used pre-emptively here to indicate deference, offering up the speaker’s own face to scrutiny and in so doing enhancing the addressee’s face in relation to the speaker. The phrase Excuse me! on the other hand, can be described as command in terms of grammar, since it uses the imperative form of the verb and it could be described as being both bald and on the record in Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory terminology. In function however it draws attention to some error or fault in the speaker, and so obviates the need for the addressee to react in a defensive way. In daily use it is often modified by phrases such as please, or honorific titles such as Sir or Madam when the speaker wants to make it clear that the function is to minimise the effect of an incident on the face of the addressee. These interchanges involving FTAs are subtle, and grammar or even lexis may not be consistent with the message that is being conveyed. It is the context in each case which helps the participants to work out what is intended. This same phrase Excuse me! declared in a somewhat loud and aggressive manner by someone who has just been pushed aside in a rush to grab some sales goods in a shop, for example, is not at all intended as an apology. It is a reminder to all around that someone in the vicinity needs to pay more attention to the speaker. This example shows that politeness strategies cannot be tied to particular expressions, or particular grammatical forms, but that the whole social context, tone of voice, body language and the various roles of the interactants also play a part in how these strategies operate and are understood. A direct statement such as Shut that window! is an unmistakable command due to the imperative form of the verb and the tone of voice used. In Brown and Levinson’s terminology this would be referred to as on the record and baldly done and is the most impolite way of making the wish known. On the other hand, a request such as Could you shut the window for me please? would also be described as on the record, because it makes the wish explicit, but it is more gently and indirectly phrased, in the form of a question, with the result that that the addressee’s face is not damaged as much. In this example the speaker abases himself and leaves the addressee the option of refusing. There are also a great many off the record ways of conveying the same basic desire through ambiguous remarks, or humour, oblique references to the situation which they would like the other person to alter etc., all of which still threaten the face of the addressee, but they do not make the FTA so explicit. Someone could say It’s really stuffy in here with the intention of prompting the addressee to get up and open the window to let some air in, for example. This is a very indirect way of expressing the wish that the other person should open the window. FTAs occur all the time in spoken situations and the point of politeness theory is to explain how these events are handled by interactants. Some kinds of utterance try to pre-empt the negative effects of a FTA by emphasising some positive feature of the addressee. Flattery is an example of a tactic that can achieve this aim. Other utterances let the FTA run its course, and then try to make up for the negative effect that has already happened. An apology can be used in such an instance. Languages offer many combinations of and choices which provide an almost infinite choice of directness and politeness. Examples from Japanese Japanese is often cited in studies about politeness because it contains an especially rich range of possibilities for expressing various degrees of formality and/or intimacy. An explanation for the emphasis on politeness in Japanese language can be traced back to the national culture. There is a system of reverence for older people, partly as a result of the Shinto religion, which involves a form of ancestor worship. This can be seen in the disciplined and regulated style of institutions and in the willingness of Japanese people to conform to group norms. The country is also rather small, with a large population mostly living in very crowded city environments, and so politeness is used to counteract the practical impositions that come from having to live and work so closely together with other people. A major part of the politeness system in Japanese is communicated in the form of a complex set of honorifics. These are parts of speech which have the function of making explicit where exactly each individual stands in relation to a rigid hierarchy and also where individuals stand in relation to each other. The word san after a surname is neutral, whereas the word ko is used with children and the word sensei (meaning teacher) is used when a person looks up to another person as an older and wiser adult. Foreigners who are not used to this hierarchical way of viewing the world sometimes have difficult in working out which level of politeness to use, but Japanese people accomplish very fine grades of politeness as second nature. In Brown and Levinson’s model, these honorifics show a negative politeness strategy, since they give deference to the other person (Fukada and Asato, 2004, p. 1991). There are three main parameters in this system, and all three can apply at the same time, making it a tricky operation to work out exactly when each one needs to be used. These three parameters are: “Superior vs. inferior (i.e. relative status) In-group vs. out-group (i.e. group membership) Male vs. female (gender)” (Coulmas, 2005, p. 312). The role of silence is very important in Japanese society, also, and this illustrates very clearly Brown and Levinson’s (1987, p. 29) theory that silence relates to power and control. Women, children and people of low status in a group are expected to say very little on formal occasions, and even when they do speak there are differences in the forms of address that are used, from the type of language used by high status people. There are differences in some of the grammar and lexis that males and females choose, and women are expected to talk in quiet tones, with body language that looks submissive. Women are generally more polite than men because of patriarchal structure of Japanese society. Of course there are individual differences which can modify these patterns to some degree, but in general politeness rules are very well entrenched in Japanese language. The following example of a student exchange in Japanese illustrates very clearly the whole point about face threats and face saving being a two-way interaction in which speakers are aware of both their own and the other’s person’s actual or potential loss of face: “Tanaka: Gomen osoku nat-ta Sorry late become-Past (Sorry I’m late) Suzuki: Iya iya, maa kooyuu koto mo aru yo No no well this kind of thing also exist M (No, no, anyway, this kind of thing happens) “ (Haugh and Hinze, 2003, p. 19) In this exchange the verb forms are at a normal level of politeness, as befits a conversation between two persons of equal status. If one or other had been more senior in age or status, then more elaborate verb endings would have been used by one, or other, or both of the speakers. As it is Tanaka is keen to apologise for his lateness, so that Suzuki does not think it signifies disrespect. In return, Suzuki reassures him by implying that this could happen to anyone, indicating that he does not take it personally, and repairing the loss of face that Tanaka has suffered by acknowledging his error. The small “yo” at the end of the sentence is a particle reserved for males in Japanese. This underlines their common gender. The use of a moderate level of politeness here emphasises the insider status of both parties, and the mutual attention that each speaker pays to the other’s face maintains their balanced and equal group membership. The importance of Brown and Levinson Model The work of Brown and Levinson has been very influential in changing the way that scholars think of politeness. Thanks to the careful definitions and categorisations of their politeness theory they have brought together complex aspects of human psychology, language and social behaviour: “Politeness is an extremely broad phenomenon existing at the interface of linguistic, social and cognitive processes. It refers (roughly) to the way one puts things and the way one puts things is a result of a speaker’s cognitive assessment of the social context” (Holtgraves, 2002, p. 38). A key claim that Brown and Levinson (1987) made was that their model was universal. Scholars have used cross-language studies to test out this aspect of their theory and to check whether indeed all speakers in all languages follow the Brown and Levinson model. One comparative study of Hebrew and English requests (Blum-Kulka, 1987) found that there was a great deal of evidence in both languages to support the main model devised by Brown and Levinson (1987). It identified also one intriguing point in which both languages differed from that model: it seems that Levinson and Brown’s hierarchy of directness/indirectness and impoliteness/politeness does not work in quite the straightforward way that Brown and Levinson suggested. This research (Blum-Kulka, 1987) found that some indirect utterances are less polite than Brown and Levinson predict on the grounds that they are so oblique that they become pragmatically unclear. This lack of then in itself becomes a FTA and so this shows that indirectness is not necessarily the same as politeness. Conclusion The work of Brown and Levinson (1987) has undoubtedly helped linguists and sociologists to understand the mechanisms that govern politeness in human speech. Later scholars have challenged some small parts of their model, and have suggested minor amendments and improvements, but overall the key concepts of face and FTAs, along with hierarchies of on and off the record, as well as directness and indirectness have stood the test of time. References Blum-Kulka, S. (1987) Indirectness and politeness in requests: Same or different? Journal of Pragmatics 11, pp. 131-146. Brown, P. and Levinson, S.C. (1987) Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Coulmas, F. (2005) Linguistic etiquette in Japanese society. In R.J. Watts, S. and L. Ehlich (Eds.), Politeness in Language: Studies in Its History, Theory and Practice. Second edition. The Hague: Mouton de Gruyter, pp, 299-324. Fukada, A. and Asato, N. (2004) Universal politeness theory: application to the use of Japanese honorifics. Journal of Pragmatics 36, pp. 1991-2002. Haugh, M. and Hinze, C. (2003) A metalinguistic approach to deconstructing the concepts of ‘face’ and ‘politeness’ in Chinese, English and Japanese. Journal of Pragmatics 35 (10/11), pp. 1581-1611. Available at: http://www98.griffith.edu.au/dspace/bitstream/handle/10072/4160/29184.pdf?sequence=1 (pp. 1-29). [Accessed 20 April 2013]. Holtgraves, T. (2002) Language as Social Action: Social Psychology and Language in Use. Mahwah, NJ@ Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Read More