Linguistic Politeness and Impoliteness Analysis

科技俯息O高校讲坛OSCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY INFORMATION2008年第21 期Linguistic Politeness and Impoliteness AnalysisYantao Zhang(Department of Foreign Languages,fliliation Qingdao Ocean Shipping Mariners College)[Abstract]This paper aims to itrogute the rlationhip betwen politenes and impolieness for pragmaties study. Away from the modelwhereby individual speech acts are considered to be inherently. polite or impolite, one argument is that stereotypes of gender may play B role in thedecisions that suchcomnunities make about politess.[Key words Iliesipolitenesesangument1.Introductionrole in certain types of interaction:At a university departmental party a new male staff “A" who hadand impliteness simply in terms of the differential linguistic behavior of not Imales and females as groups which can be concluded in Brown and the party wa well underway, Bome form of appropriate phatic communionLevinson model ";we need to be able to analyze the various srategies should be made. Banter was not an option since "B" did not know thewhich gendered, raced and clased women and men adopt in particular person. Since “A" is kind ofapoetso“B" asked: “What sort of poetrycircumstancee and with particular goals and interests. In terms of the do you write?" to which A replied,“Name me six poets".analysis of politeness and impliteneas, several analytical changes ane3.2.2.The Analysis about the Caseded.A departmental party is usually an arena where a certain amount of2.The ollitenessbanter between social equals occurs; banter seems to be a genre which is2.1.The Politeness Principlecoded by many women as a masculine way of interacting. but whichCeofrey Leech a well -known linguist at the Univernity of female members of sal may alo engge in equally "Howeve, as ClareLancaster, believed that, apart from coperation, there must be something walsh has shown, women often use style of speech in their interventionselse that interactants all value and fllw in conversations. This made in the public sphere which are coled出masculine, but they run the riskhim think hard and come to conclude that politenes is a notion that of being judged a trnsesive or abnomel for enging in tem.4plays a vital role there to help people to smooth a conversation.As Cameron states, gender is potentially relevant (to understandingAccordingly, his ideas were framed under the Politeness Principle.conflitalk) to the extent that it ffects the context-specifc assumptions2.2.Conteting Brown and Levinson's Model of Politeness2.2.1.Model of Politenessanother's utterances.n In this case, the conflict seeme to involve theBrown and Levinson's model of polieness has influenced almostall ascements ceach of the salfs made as to the level and sincerity ofof the toreical and analyical work in this field. They argue for a politeness on the one hand, and to the overnll relevance of the uterancepragmatie analysis of politenes which involves a concentation on the to the conversation as a whole on the other. These asesments andwork' which individual speakers have to perform in intepetations of the interaction are inlcted with gender stercotypingtheir uterances to counteract the force of potential threats to the 'face'ind assumptions.of the hearer. Brown and Levinson state 'fance is something that is4.Conclusionsemotionally invested, and that can be lost, maintained or enhanced, andTo sum up, diferent from some theory that individual epeech actsmust be constantly attended to in interaction.'"are considered to be naturally polite or impolite, politeness is a general2.2..The Criticismsway of behaving幽well a an ssessment about an individual in aMany theorits have criticized Brown and Levinson's model of particular inteaction. Furthermore, what was interpreted a impolitenesspolitenes, mainly for its overgeneralising of Eurocentric norms; severalon a paurt is condoned more, since this fits in with the stereolypes ofhen analyzing plitenese and impolitenes,of the term face' in Brown and Levinson's use.Awhat must be focused on is the gendered domains of speech acts likeBrown and Levinson's model can further be criticized for the fact politenes and the perceived norms of the community of practice.租that it assumes that it is possible to know what a polite or impolite act●means. This paper would argue that it is only individuals interacting(References]within communities of practice who will be able to asses whether a [1]Browm,P& Levinson.S. (1978) "Universala in language uage:polienesparticular act is polite or impolite, and even then, such interpretationsphenomena' Pp.6 -311.in ed.CGoody,E.Questions and Politene: Strategies inSocial Interaction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Pre.[2]Leech,C.(1983)Principles of Pragnatics.London:Longmen3.The Impoliteness[3]Ma,L(1994)" Beyond politeness theony: ' fcererisited and renewed'. pp.451-3.1.The Impoliteness Principle486, in Jourmal of Pragmatics,21/5.Much of the thinking about lnguistice politenes has focused on [4]abo.W. (1972) Languge in the Iner in.hildelphinr University ofpolitenes in isolated speech acts, without considering those acts in Pennsylvani Presesrelation to what would constitute impoliteness. As politeness is an entity [5]Walsh.C (000)Gender and Mediatised Dicoumse, unpublished PD thesis.which is very dificult to define or describe, focusing on impoliteness mayShefrelLUK.ShefieldHalamUniversitySefledsShefefedd Halam Uniesiybe slighuly easier, since nomally at least some of the participants are [6]Liandaware when a breach of perceived norms has taken place.theisShefield.UKSheffeld Hallam University.Indeed, a great deal of interactional work goes into the assment of中国煤化工perpow end pemae*impolite acte, involving rellig anecdotes and inwiting judgments of the Pp.435 4excessiveness of the impolitencee, in order to bolster the sense that one's:THC N M H G任青岛远洋船员学院外语8s8c88ment of the impoliteness is juslifed or not.部教师,王安从争大于关而、轮机无伊、工同西理守时究。3.2.Casc Study of lplienes3.2.1.The Case[责任编模:田瑞鑫]This case study serves to demonstrate that gender plays an important199