Linguistic politeness and face‐work in computer‐mediated communication, Part 1: A theoretical framework

Abstract

Our daily social interaction is anchored in interpersonal discourse; accordingly, the phenomenon of linguistic politeness is prevalent in daily social interaction. Such linguistic behavior underscores the fact that linguistic politeness is a critical component of human communication. Speech participants utilize linguistic politeness to avoid and reduce social friction and enhance each other's face, or public self-image, during social interaction. It is face-work that underlies the interpersonal function of language use and encompasses all verbal and nonverbal realizations that bring forth one's positive social value, namely, face. Face-work is founded in and built into dynamic social relations; these social and cultural relations and context directly affect the enactment of face-work. Analysis and a subsequent understanding of sociointerpersonal communication are critical to the fostering of successful interaction and collaboration. Linguistic politeness theory is well positioned to provide a framework for an analysis of social interaction and interpersonal variables among discourse participants inasmuch as it is applicable not only to face-to-face social interactions but also to those interactions undertaken through online communication.

Assessing intercultural communication: Testing technology tools for information sharing in multinational research teams

“…Asynchronicity is an important ICT feature for actively supporting non‐native English users in Asia (Guo & D'Ambra, ), particularly to better explain meaning and to “save face” with native English message receivers (J.‐r. Park, ). The I‐CHET analysis found that asynchronous textual communication via e‐mail, Facebook, and online discussion groups allowed non‐native English speakers to better craft their messages to other team members, particularly native English speakers, as supported by some Lao interviewees in Ward () and previously reported in Olson and Olson ().…”

On-record politeness in trans-cultural writer-reader communication in academic discourse: A case of a reply to article

“…B&L's (1978/1987) model was originally designed and applied to spoken discourse analysis, however it has been successfully used in the study of written texts as well, including academic discourse (e.g. Bremner 2006;Ermida 2006;Gil-Salom and Soler-Monreal 2009;Graham 2007;Hatipoǧlu 2007;Jansen and Janssen 2010;Myers 1989;Park 2008a;2008b;Pilegaard 1997;Walkó 2007). Fundamental to any (im)politeness theory is the concept of face (Goffman 1967) which constitutes an issue in every interaction, including interaction between writers and readers.…”

On the Politeness Strategies in Chinese Internet Relay Chat Communication

“…Pariera (2006) investigated the politeness strategies in Email discussion group about taboo topics and found that email is developing a unique set of politeness strategies different than those used in face-to-face communication. Park (2008) analyzed the pragmatic tactics employed in a synchronous online discussion forum dealing with mathematics. In addition most of the studies on politeness strategies in CMC context are based on western cultures and there is lack of studies in other languages and cultures.…”