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PERIODYK NAUKOWY AKADEMII POLONIJNEJ 32 (2019) nr 1
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POLITENESS PHENOMENON
Yevheniia Kornielaieva
PhD, Odessa National Maritime University,
e-mail: kornelaeva2017@gmail.com, orcid.org/0000-0001-9516-1963, Ukraine
Abstract. The present article deals with the problem of human interaction which serves
the subject of such sciences as linguistics, pragmatics as well as psychology, sociology,
anthropology, so on. Human interaction is also studied within Politeness Theory once
developed by P. Brown and St. Levinson. Politeness Theory has become quite influential as it
is aimed at redressing of offences to a person’s self-image, or face, by face-threatening acts.
According to P. Brown and St. Levinson, politeness is a universal concept. It is the powerful
means that helps the speaker to express his intentions and mitigate face threats carried by his
face-threatening acts to the listener. Therefore, politeness makes it possible for the speaker to
save his own face and the face of his partner of communication. In other words, politeness
ensures the rights of communicants not to be interfered with and to be approved of. These
rights make up positive and negative face of a communicant. Positive face implies the
interactant’s desire to be appreciated and to be approved of while negative face presents the
want to be unimpeded by others. These two related aspects determine the strategies of positive
and negative politeness that are aimed at reinforcing the positive image of a communicant and
at preserving their independence. On the whole, politeness provide mutual comfort and
harmonious flow of human interaction. The same idea is supported by G. Leech, G. Kasper,
B. Fraser, P. Grice who develops Cooperative Principle of polite communication. Being a
universal concept politeness is realised through a set of strategies. The author of the article
calls such point of view on politeness “western-oriented”. As for Russian and Ukrainian
linguists, they see politeness as speech etiquette which is released in speech formulae.
Choosing this or that speech etiquette formula, communicants establish, support and terminate
the contact in accordance with socially accepted rules of conversation, thus, making their
interaction pleasant and friendly. Politeness is not regarded as a set of strategies, but only as
politeness formulae.
Keywords: face; face-threatening act; negative politeness; politeness; positive
politeness; speech etiquette; strategy.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.23856/3212
Introduction
Human interaction is regarded as one of the most significant human activities. It serves
the subject matter of different sciences such as psychology, sociology, anthropology,
sociolinguistics, pragmatics, conversation analysis, etc. At present, it generates numerous
researches concerned with interpersonal communication. Politeness makes up an obligatory
component of interaction that provides its smooth felicitous and conflict-free flow.
Introduction of politeness phenomenon into linguistics is related to English and American
investigations of the second part of the XX century. In 1960s and 1970s the works of Erving
Goffman, Penelope Brown and Steven Levinson devoted to the study of polite communication
were published.
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Western studies (Brown, Levinson, 1987; Fraser, 1990; Kasper, 1990; Leech, 2014)
are concerned with the development of Politeness Theory as this phenomenon is considered to
be of perennial importance since it raises questions about the foundations of human social life
and interaction. It is believed that 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, Levinson, 1987:1). In
this perspective politeness has a sociological significance altogether beyond the level of table
manners and etiquette books; politeness, like formal diplomatic protocol, presupposes that
potential for aggression as it seeks to disarm it, and makes possible communication between
potentially aggressive parties (Goffman, 1971; 1972: 90). So, politeness is a kind of semiotic
system that is responsible for the shaping of much everyday interaction, and in so shaping it,
constitutes a potent form of social control.
Sociological speculations on politeness differ from those of linguistic pragmatics. The
latter deals with the mismatches between what is “said” and what is “implicated” which is
also attributed to the politeness phenomenon, so that the concern with the “representational
functions” of language should be supplemented with attention to “social functions” of
language, which seem to motivate much linguistic detail.
Thus, politeness phenomenon draws attention not only of linguistics but of many other
sciences aimed at proper investigation of the interactional basis of social life and progress in
human conflict-free communication.
Politeness researches used to be sentence-based. Presently, the focus of attention turns
to the study of politeness within discourse (Mills, 2003).
As for politeness phenomenon in Ukrainian and Russian linguistics, it has not been
paid much attention to until the end of the XX century. Now, the interest to the problem of
speech behaviour, norms of communication and behaviour patterns in cultural context are
subjected to numerous investigations. Linguists tend to study socially adequate behaviour of
communicants as well as to show how culture influences the speaker’s behaviour and other
aspects of behaviour competence such as politeness and respect.
Description of separate aspects of politeness phenomenon, considering the viewpoints
of English and American scientists, is presented in the works of Ratmajr (2003),
Formanovskaya (2005; 2007), Larina (2009), Karasik (1991), Zemskaya (1994), so on.
Due to this, the aim of our paper is to analyse the politeness phenomenon taking into
consideration the achievements of English and American linguists, on the one hand, and
Russian and Ukrainian scientists, on the other, and compare them. To fulfil the aim of our
investigation the following tasks have been set:
1) to describe the approaches to study politeness of foreign linguists;
2) to analyse the understanding of politeness of Russian and Ukrainian scientists;
3) to analyse and compare “western” and “eastern” oriented viewpoints on politeness.
Data and methodology
The material subjected to analysis includes definitions of politeness given by foreign
and native linguists. The methodology applied in the study is based on the essentials of
Politeness Theory (P. Brown and St. Levinson). This research involves the methods of
observation and description. Both methods allow us to observe and describe, generalize and
sum up the peculiarities and differences of politeness phenomenon in language suggested by
foreign and native linguists.
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Politeness phenomenon in foreign linguistics
Recently, pragmatics has become enriched with numerous definitions of politeness
which we offer to split into four groups:
1) politeness as conflict-avoiding behaviour aimed at felicitous communication (Brown,
Levinson, 1987; Lakoff, 1973, 1975; Leech, 2014; Marquez-Reiter, 2000; Usami,
2006);
2) politeness as behaviour that corresponds to social norms (Meier, 1995; Fraser, 1990);
3) politeness as consideration of people’s feelings (Hill, Ide, 1986; Sifianou, 1992);
4) politeness as the addresser’s assessment of the speaker’s behaviour as polite (Mills,
2003).
The most wide-spread definition of politeness is the one according to which it is
understood as behaviour aimed at avoiding conflicts and providing felicitous communication
between communicants. In this respect, politeness is regarded as a set of tactics that help
people to establish harmonious relations and that serve the major aim of politeness –
improvement of communication process (Haugh, 2004: 89).
According to the second definition, politeness implies the behaviour that corresponds to
social norms and standards. As B. Fraser states, politeness fits into the established
“conversational contract” (Fraser, 1990: 233). In other words, conversational contract
correlates with certain norms that correspond to the communicants’ expectations. Some of
such norms are imposed by society, others are determined within interaction. Thus, this
definition of politeness explicits the normative and conventional nature of politeness.
The third approach to defining politeness implies consideration of other people’s
feelings. During interaction, it is essential to express care about the social status of the other
communicant and social relations, to establish convenient distance, keeping in mind social
norms (Haugh, 2004: 89).
The last decade of the XX century has brought the fourth approach to understanding
politeness. Politeness is defined as the hearer’s assessment of the speaker’s behaviour as
polite. In other words, the decisive factor that influences the choice of politeness formulae in
conversation is the hearer’s evaluation of the speaker and not his behaviour / deeds.
Further, we are going to analyse the distinguished approaches and give definitions of
politeness within the framework of each of them.
The complex study of politeness phenomenon is presented in the work of P. Brown and
St. Levinson. The scientists describe politeness as rational behaviour aimed at the strategic
softening (or mitigation) of face-threatening acts. The focus in their definition is clearly on the
speaker. Moreover, P. Brown and St. Levinson suggest that politeness can be either positive
or negative.
Positive and negative politeness are presupposed by two speaker’s intentions: the first
one is not to be interfered with and the second one is to be approved of. These wishes
determine general human behaviour strategies aimed at threat mitigation of face-threatening
acts.
Positive politeness reinforces the positive image of a communicant: the speaker
expresses his affection and solidarity with the hearer. Attention, compliments, creation of the
in-group identity atmosphere, eagerness to avoid disagreements are the examples of positive
politeness manifestations. In general, positive politeness is regarded as a kind of social
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acceleration, where speaker, in using them, indicates that he wants to “come closer” to hearer
(Brown, Levinson, 1987: 101-2).
Negative politeness serves to preserve the speaker’s independence and basic want to
maintain claims of territory and self-determination. This kind of politeness implies the
existence of social distance which may sometimes provoke certain awkwardness in
communication. Self-restraint, officiality and courtesy are the examples of negative
politeness. Negative politeness strategies are likely to be used whenever a speaker wants to
put a social brake on to the course of his interaction (Brown, Levinson, 1987: 129-130).
Strategies of positive and negative politeness are aimed at achieving by the
communicants’ their interaction goals. At the same time, they serve to save the
communicants’ face, or the public self-image that every member wants to claim for himself,
consisting in two related aspects:
- negative face: the basic claim to territories, personal preserves, rights to non-
distraction, i.e. the freedom of action and freedom from imposition. Otherwise, it is the
want of every “competent adult member” that his actions be unimpeded by others;
- positive face: the positive consistent self-image or “personality” (crucially including
the desire that this self-image be appreciated and approved of) claimed by interactants.
In other words, it is the want of every member that his wants be desirable to at least
some others (Brown, Levinson, 1987: 62).
G. Leech (2014) defines politeness almost in the same way as P. Brown and
St. Levinson. The scientist states that politeness is “strategic conflict avoidance” and “the
establishment and maintenance of comity”. Moreover, he suggests that politeness “can be
measured in terms of the degree of effort put into the avoidance of a conflict situation”.
Leech’s viewpoint turns politeness into a set of strategies for the avoidance of conflict.
Following P. Brown and St. Levinson, G. Kasper concludes that communication should
be seen as “a fundamentally dangerous and antagonistic endeavor”. So, she sees politeness as
a set of strategies “to defuse the danger and to minimalise the antagonism” (Kasper, 1990:
194).
Hill at el. define politeness as “one of the constraints on human interaction, whose
purpose is to consider other people’s feelings, establish levels of mutual comfort, and promote
rapport”. Once again, politeness is defined as behaviour which promotes such positive
interactional qualities as “mutual comfort” and “rapport” (Hill, 1986).
R. Lakoff suggests the same opinion on politeness: “politeness is developed by
societies in order to reduce friction in personal interaction” (Lakoff, 1973, 1975).
Linguistic literature also suggests such notions as “on-record” and “off-record”
politeness.
“On-record” politeness does not imply any efforts on the part of the speaker to decrease
the impact of face-threatening speech acts, as his intentions are not vague (Blum-Kulka,
House, 1989: 126-127). Applying “on-record” politeness, the speaker rather shocks the
addressee, making the latter feel embarrassed. This kind of politeness is usually observed
between well-acquainted people, e.g., relatives, friends.
“Off-record” politeness consists in avoiding imposition on the hearer. This kind of
strategy is aimed at emphasizing one’s own significance, preserving one’s face and avoiding
interference with the addressee.
There exists another understanding of politeness in linguistics. Unlike P. Brown,
St. Levinson, G. Leech, G. Kasper, R. Lakoff, some scientists (Watts, Ehlich, Ide, 1992)
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describe politeness as a normative, moral concept. They make a distinction between first-
order and second-order politeness (Watts et al., 1992: 19).
Watts et al. take first-order politeness to correspond to the various ways in which polite
behaviour is perceived and talked about by members of socio-cultural groups. Second-order
politeness is defined as a theoretical construct, a term within a theory of social behaviour and
language usage (Watts et al., 1992: 3).
Another interesting view on politeness belongs to P. Grice. He develops the so-called
Cooperative Principle which is aimed at clarifying the politeness notion. The scientist
suggests four maxims of polite behaviour: Maxim of Quality; Maxim of Quantity; Maxim of
Relevance; Maxim of Manner.
Cooperative Principle claims the following: “Make your contribution such as is
required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk
exchange in which you are engaged” (Grice, 1975: 43).
To sum up the western-oriented (or “eurocentric”) understanding of politeness, it
should be noted that both British and American linguists see politeness as a consequence of
social goals such as maximising the benefit to self and other, minimising the face-threatening
nature of a social act, displaying adequate proficiency in the accepted standards of social
etiquette, avoiding conflict and making sure that the social interaction runs smoothly.
Politeness strategies acquire various forms of language structure and usage which allow the
members of a socio-cultural group to achieve their goals.
Politeness phenomenon in native linguistics
If foreign linguists study politeness within the frames of pragmatics, taking into
consideration extralinguistic situation and numerous maxims / strategies of politeness,
Ukrainian and Russian scientists see politeness as an ethic category.
According to N. I. Formanovskaya, politeness is an integral multi-aspect category that
consists of socially accepted notions about ethic norms of behaviour, including speech
behaviour. To be polite means to give the social role to the partner of communication that he
is eligible for (Formanovskaya, 2005: 50-51). The significance of politeness in society is quite
high, and very often, a person’s qualities are measured by his polite deeds. Thus, to
Formanovskaya’s viewpoint, politeness serves as a kind of indicator that characterises a
communicant positively. Its main pragmatic function is to express deference to the addressee
by means of lingual / speech units (Formanovskaya, 2005: 51).
On the communicative level politeness is released in speech etiquette formulae, i.e.
socially accepted national specific regulating rules of speech behaviour in situations of
establishing, supporting and terminating contact between communicants in accordance with
their status and role relations in official / unofficial atmosphere of communication. The major
function of speech etiquette is to establish contact, i.e. to involve and support a speech contact
with the partner of communication by means of elements of speech etiquette. In such a way,
speech etiquette concerns the sphere of friendly relations between the communicants,
implying cooperation (Formanovskaya, 2007: 183).
Moreover, N. I. Formanovskaya draws attention to such peculiarity as the standard
nature of speech behaviour patterns. She says that speech etiquette is an example of highly
expressed standardised speech behaviour (Formanovskaya, 2007: 182), when a speaker does
not experience any emotional or evaluative nuances. Still, if there are no expected signs of
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deference such as greeting, apology, gratitude, etc., it is painfully perceived (Formanovskaya,
2007: 184).
V. I. Karasik believes that the essence of politeness consists in deference to the other
individual. Investigating politeness within the context of status-evaluative behaviour, the
scientist understands it as preferential care about the communicative partner’s image. As far
as we can see, this definition is quite close to P. Brown and St. Levinson’s theory of face and
positive / negative politeness. The aim of polite behaviour is to persuade the hearer in friendly
attitude towards him and evoke the same positive reaction in him towards the speaker
(Karasik, 1991: 53).
As far as etiquette concerns, V. I. Karasik states that it is a sort of standard official
behaviour of people that serves as specific means of expressing social status of an individual
and includes verbal and non-verbal means and manifests itself in behavioural and normative
aspects (Karasik, 1991: 68).
Ukrainian linguists S. D. Abramovych and M. U. Chikarkova define politeness in the
following way: “cultural, built according to grammar norms, literary language like a beautiful
fair hand-writing has been long considered politeness, or deference to the one you are talking
to” (Abramovych, Chikarkova, 2004: 24).
According to another Ukrainian linguist, F. S. Batsevych, politeness is manifested in
speech etiquette. The latter is seen as a system of standard stereotypic verbal formulae, once
accepted in accordance to social roles of communicants and moral norms of people’s
behaviour in society and used in everyday situations such as greeting, apology, invitation,
farewell, etc. (Bacevych, 2004: 224).
Etiquette speech formulae do not express any new logical information; they only
function to express the so-called “contact-establishing” information. As a rule, such
information shows the speaker’s social status, his attitude to the hearer (Bacevych, 2004).
Etiquette formulae and phrases make up the significant component of an individual’s
communicative competence. Their knowledge is a sign of a high level of language
proficiency.
Ukrainian linguist O. Selivanova defines speech etiquette considering the specifics of
language means of communicative code realization (or the system of principles and rules) that
are followed by the communicants during conversation and which regulate their
communicative behaviour. She says that “realization of communicative code implies
following speech etiquette, i.e. socially, culturally and ethically determined stereotypic rules
of speech behaviour, that are reflected in certain language utterances and combinations,
paraverbal means <…> to establish, support and terminate the contact between the
communicants taking into consideration their social roles and official / unofficial sphere of
communication. Following rules of speech etiquette is always aimed at communicative
cooperation” (Selivanova, 2011: 220).
Unlike British and Americans scientists, Russian and Ukrainian linguists have the
same view on politeness. They see it as speech etiquette. In other words, politeness is such a
category which is released in speech formulae. The latter help the interactants to establish,
support and end the contact according to the socially accepted rules of conversation and make
their interaction pleasant and friendly. Politeness is not regarded as a set of strategies, but only
as politeness formulae.
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Conclusions
To sum up, having focused our investigation on the notion “politeness”, we have
analysed numerous theories and definitions of foreign and native linguists and have come to
the following conclusion: politeness phenomenon by its very nature is reflected in language.
Societies everywhere, no matter what their degree of isolation or their socioeconomic
complexity, show that once offered principles of human interaction work; yet what counts as
polite may differ from group to group, from situation to situation, or from individual to
individual. We believe that politeness is a universal communicative category which makes up
a complex system of national specific strategies aimed at harmonious conflict-free
communication that corresponds to the communicants’ expectations. In our research we
emphasize the universality of politeness category and the national specifics of linguistic
realization of politeness which is seen in speaker’s choice of speech etiquette, paraverbal
means that the communicative situation requires. And definitely, the main aim of politeness as
either some special strategy or speech etiquette formulae is provide conflict-free and felicitous
interaction that allows the interactants to achieve their goals and save their self-image.
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