POLITENESS

. Politeness
The speakers have to know the ways how they are speaking. Wardhaugh (1998: 255) states that people have to make a choice of many different kinds: what they want to say, how they want to say it, and the specific sentence types, words, and sounds. Politeness is one of the ways to employ the expression. To see how to use the politeness in their expression, the speakers can see the face of the hearer. Using politeness is also used to employ the refusal expression. They have to save the hearer’s face because the refusal expression is one of dispreferred responses
Saving the hearer’s face is important for the speaker because from the face the speaker will see the hearer’s feeling. Goffman (1967) states that there may be several reasons why people want to save their face. They may have become attached to the value on which this face has been built, they may be enjoying the results and the power that their face has created, or they may be nursing higher social aspirations for which they will need this face. However, face is also called as self-image which face means the public self-image of person (Yule, 1996: 60). Besides, Brown and Levinson (1987: 66) states that face is something that is emotionally invested, and that can be lost, maintained, or enhanced and must be constantly attended to in interaction. It is possible that the speakers give an alternative action to save another’s face which is called as face saving act (Yule,
1996: 61). Yule (p.62) also divides face into two types.
a. Positive face
Positive face is the wish that someone wants to be desired by others, by either the speaker or the addressee, or both. A person’s positive face is need to be accepted, even liked by others, treated as the member of some groups and to know that his wants are shared by others.
b. Negative face
Negative face is the desire not to be imposed upon by others, the need to be independent or to have freedom of action, not impeded or imposed on by others.
Yule (1996: 60) gives a definition of politeness that is an interaction to show awareness of another person’s face. From the interaction the speakers have to respect for keeping their public self-image. Based on Brown and Levinson (1987) speakers have to acknowledge and show an awareness of the face, the public self-image, the sense of self, of the people that they address. Yule (1996: 64) proposes two kinds of politeness, positive politeness and negative politeness.
Similarly, Brown and Levinson, propose some various linguistic devices employed to realize different communication strategies.
a. Bald on-record (no effort to minimize threats to the hearer’s face)
b. Positive politeness (recognize the hearer’s desire to be respected)
1) Claiming common ground (indicate that the speaker and the hearer belong to the some group, have similar needs, etc)
a) Attending to the hearer (his/her interests, wants, needs, goods)
b) Exaggerating approval, sympathy, etc
c) Intensifying interest to hearer
d) Using in-group identity markers (address form, use of in-group
language or dialect, use of jargon or slang, contraction and elipsis)
e) Seeking agreement (safe topics, repetition)
f) Avoiding disagreement (token agreement, pseudo-agreement, white lies, hedging opinions)
g) Presupposing/ raise/assert
h) Switching personal focus
i) Joking
2) Conveying cooperation between the speaker and the hearer
a) Presupposing the hearer’s feeling or wants
b) Offer/promise
c) Being optimistic
d) Including both the speaker and the hearer in the activity
e) Giving or asking for reason
f) Assuming or asserting reciprocity
g) Giving gifts to hearer (goods, sympathy, understanding, cooperation)
c. Negative politeness (recognize the hearer’s desire not to be imposed upon)
1) Being conventionally indirect
2) Avoiding to make presumption or assumption (question, hedge)
3) Avoiding coercing the hearer
a) Being pessimistic, uncertain
b) Minimizing the imposition
c) Giving deference
4) Communicating a desire not to impose on the hearer
a) Apologizing
1) Admitting imposition
2) Indicating reluctance
3) Giving over helming reason
4) Begging forgiveness
b) Impersonalizing
c) Using passives
d) Using indefinites
e) Pluralizing pronouns
f) Using distance
g) Stating general rules
h) Nominalizing
d. Off-record (indirect strategies)
1) Giving hints
2) Understanding
3) Overstating
4) Being ironic
5) Using rhetorical questions
6) Being vague or ambiguous
The politeness strategies above have relation to refusal expression. The use of bald on record strategy exists when the refuters use physical departure or say “no” directly. The use of positive politeness strategy appears when the refuters state a promise, a reason, or gratitude. Commonly, negative politeness strategy is used for stating regret, apology or being indirectness. Off record strategy also appears when the refuters refuse with the indirect statement.
Brown and Levinson in Cutting (2002: 45) state that the speakers should respect each others’ expectations regarding self-image, take account of their feelings, and avoid “face threatening act” (FTA). These acts impede the freedom of actions (negative face), and the wish that one’s wants be desired by others (positive face)- by either speaker, or the addressee, or both. Holtgraves (2002: 40) states that requests potentially threaten the addressee’s negative face because they may restrict the addressee’s freedom to act according to his/her will. In other words, refusals may threaten the addressee’s positive face because they may imply that her or his statement is not favored by the speaker.