Linguistic Politeness in Britain and Uruguay: A Contrastive Study of Requests and Apologies

248 Pages·2000·0.6 MB·English

by  Rosina Márquez Reiter

LINGUISTIC
POLITENESS IN
BRITAIN AND
URUGUAY:
A CONTRASTIVE
STUDY OF REQUESTS
AND APOLOGIES
ROSINA MÁRQUEZ REITER
John Benjamins Publishing Company
LINGUISTIC POLITENESS IN BRITAIN AND URUGUAY
Pragmatics & Beyond
New Series
Editor:
Andreas H. Jucker (Justus Liebig University, Giessen)
Associate Editors:
Jacob L. Mey (Odense University)
Herman Parret (Belgian National Science Foundation, Universities of
Louvain and Antwerp)
Jef Verschueren (Belgian National Science Foundation, Univ. of Antwerp)
Editorial Address:
Justus Liebig University Giessen, English Department
Otto-Behaghel-Strasse 10, D-35394 Giessen, Germany
e-mail: [email protected]
Editorial Board:
Shoshana Blum-Kulka (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Chris Butler (University College of Ripon and York); Jean Caron (Université de Poitiers)
Robyn Carston (University College London); Bruce Fraser (Boston University)
Thorstein Fretheim (University of Trondheim);
John Heritage (University of California at Los Angeles)
Susan Herring (University of Texas at Arlington); Masako K. Hiraga (St. Paul’s (Rikkyo) University)
David Holdcroft (University of Leeds); Sachiko Ide (Japan Women’s University)
Catherine Kerbrat-Orecchioni (University of Lyon 2)
Claudia de Lemos (University of Campinas, Brazil); Marina Sbisà (University of Trieste)
Emanuel Schegloff (University of California at Los Angeles)
Deborah Schiffrin (Georgetown Univ.); Paul O. Takahara (Kobe City Univ. of Foreign Studies)
Sandra Thompson (University of California at Santa Barbara)
Teun A. Van Dijk (University of Amsterdam); Richard J. Watts (University of Berne)
83
Rosina Márquez Reiter
Linguistic Politeness in Britain and Uruguay
A contrastive study of requests and apologies
LINGUISTIC POLITENESS IN
BRITAIN AND URUGUAY
A CONTRASTIVE STUDY OF
REQUESTS AND APOLOGIES
ROSINA MÁRQUEZ REITER
The University of Surrey
JOHN BENJAMINS PUBLISHING COMPANY
AMSTERDAM/PHILADELPHIA
TM The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
8 American National Standard for Information Sciences — Permanence of
Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Márquez Reiter, Rosina.
Linguistic politeness in Britain and Uruguay : a contrastive study of requests and apologies /
Rosina Márquez Reiter.
p. cm. -- (Pragmatics & beyond, ISSN 0922-842X ; new ser. 83)
Includes bibliographical references (p.) and indexes.
1. English language--Social aspects--Great Britain. 2. English language--Grammar, Com-
parative--Spanish. 3. Spanish language--Grammar, Comparative--English. 4. Spanish lan-
guage--Social aspects--Uruguay. 5. Great Britain--Social life and customs. 6. Language and
culture--Great Britain. 7. Social interaction--Great Britain. 8. Uruguay--Social life and cus-
toms. 9. Language and culture--Uruquay. 10. Social interaction--Uruguay. 11. Speech acts
(Linguistics). 12. Apologizing. 13. Courtesy. I. Title. II. Series.
PE1074.75.M37 2000
306’.44’0941--dc21 00-046780
ISBN 90 272 5102 9 (Eur.) / 1 58811 015 X (US) (alk. paper)
© 2000 – John Benjamins B.V.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, by print, photoprint, microfilm, or any
other means, without written permission from the publisher.
John Benjamins Publishing Co. • P.O.Box 75577 • 1070 AN Amsterdam • The Netherlands
John Benjamins North America • P.O.Box 27519 • Philadelphia PA 19118-0519 • USA
Table of contents
Listoffigures ix
Acknowledgements xi
Introduction xiii
C 1
Politenesstheory 1
1.1 On the history of the term 1
1.2 Politeness: social or individual entity? 2
1.3 Perspectives on politeness 5
1.4 Lakoff’s rules of politeness 6
1.5 Leech’s Principles and Maxims of Interaction 8
1.6 Brown and Levinson’s Theory of Politeness 11
1.6.1 Politeness strategies 12
1.7 Criticisms of Brown and Levinson’s model 16
1.7.1 The principle of rationality 16
1.7.2 Goffman’s notion of ‘face’ 18
1.7.3 The universality of ‘face’ 19
1.7.4 Facework 25
1.7.5 Concluding remarks 29
C 2
Speechacttheoryandpoliteness:Requestsandapologies 31
2.1 Introduction 31
2.2 The speech act of requesting 35
2.2.1 Form and function of requests 36
2.2.2 Indirect requests 41
2.3 The speech act of apologising 44
2.3.1 Form and function of apologies 46
2.3.2 Concluding remarks 54
vi T  C
C 3
Structureofthestudyandmethodology 57
3.1 Introduction 57
3.2 The structure of the study 57
3.2.1 Population 58
3.2.2 The instrument 58
3.3 The pilot test 63
3.3.1 The population of the pilot test 64
3.3.2 The pilot study and the modifications to the instrument 64
3.4 Data collection and procedure 66
3.4.1 Recruiting the informants 66
3.4.2 Other methodologies considered 67
3.4.3 Data collection 69
3.4.4 Methodological considerations: from the discourse completion
test to the open role-play 72
3.5 Data analysis: the procedure 82
3.5.1 Blum-Kulka et al.’s coding scheme for request head acts 83
3.5.2 The coding scheme: request head acts 88
3.5.3 The coding scheme: apologies 94
3.6 Transcription conventions 97
C 4
Thefindings:Requests 99
4.1 Introduction 99
4.2 Request strategies 99
4.2.1 The use of impositives 101
4.2.2 The use of conventional indirectness 104
4.2.3 The perspective of conventionally indirect requests 106
4.2.4 The use of non-conventional indirectness 107
4.2.5 Divergent situations 112
4.3 Gender analysis of the main request strategies 118
4.3.1 Same gender interactions: the case of males 118
4.3.2 Same gender interactions: the case of females 121
4.3.3 Cross-gender interactions 124
4.4 Request modification 127
4.4.1 External modification 128
4.4.2 Internal modifications 134
4.5 Concluding remarks 139
T  C vii
C 5
Thefindings:Apologies 143
5.1 Introduction 143
5.2 Apology strategies 143
5.2.1 Explicit expression of apology 148
5.2.2 Taking responsibility 153
5.2.3 Explanation 157
5.2.4 Offer of repair/restitution 158
5.2.5 Promise of forbearance 159
5.3 Situational parameters and explanatory variables 159
5.4 Gender differences and apologies 165
5.5 Concluding remarks 167
C 6
Conclusion 169
6.1 Introductory remarks 169
6.2 Requests 170
6.2.1 The conventional indirectness category 173
6.3 Apologies 179
6.4 Some pedagogical considerations 181
6.5 Implications for further research 182
Appendix 185
References 203
Subjectindex 223
viii T  C
6.3 Apologies 179
6.4 Some pedagogical considerations 181
6.5 Implications for further research 182
Appendix 185
References 203
Subjectindex 223
List of figures
Figure 1. Percentage distribution of main request strategy types in
twelve situations 101
Figure 2. The use of impositives across twelve situations 102
Figure 3. The use of non-conventional indirectness across twelve
situations 108
Figure 4. The use of impositives in M–M interactions 119
Figure 5. The use of non-conventional indirectness in M–M
interactions 121
Figure 6. The use of impositives in F–F interactions 122
Figure 7. The use of non-conventional indirectness in F–F
interactions 123
Figure 8. The use of impositives in M–F interactions 124
Figure 9. The use of non-conventional indirectness in M–F
interactions 125
Figure 10. The use of impositives in F–M interactions 126
Figure 11. The use of non-conventional indirectness in F–M
interactions 127