14 do with good manners, such as saying “Please” or “Sorry”. As a conclusion,
being linguistically polite simply means paying attention to others’ feelings
3. Positive and Negative Faces
According to Holtgraves 2002, the term “face” is formerly derived from Goffman’s theory 1967 of face and face management p. 38. Further, Brown
and Levinson 1987 define face as the “public self-image that a person wants for himself p. 61-62.” Since it represents what a person wants, face can actually be
lost or maintained by one of the interactional parties involved, either speakers or hearers. In addition, Wardhaugh 2010 states that when people interact with
others, both speakers and hearers must be aware of the notion of face p. 292. Therefore, the speakers and the hearers normally cooperate in maintaining each
other’s face in their communication. Brown and Levinson divide face into two notions, namely positive and
negative faces. Brown and Levinson 1987 define positive face as “public self- image that a person wants for himself p. 61-62.” Positive face covers one’s
desire to be liked, admired, and approved positively by others in their community. It, sometimes, refers to self-esteem. On the other hand, according to Brown and
Levinson 1987, negative face is “the want of every ‘competent adult member’ that his actions be unimpeded by others” or “the basic claim to territories,
personal preserves, rights to non-distraction—i.e. the freedom of action and freedom from imposition p. 61-62.” It simply refers to one’s freedom to act.
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4. Face Threatening Acts FTAs
Goffman 1967: 5 as cited in Holtgraves 2002 defines face as the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself during a particular
contact p. 38. Further, Brown and Levinson 1987 suggest that everyone has two types of face: negative and positive faces p. 63. When people communicate
and interact with others, speakers and hearers want to maintain their positive face as well as the negative one. On the other hand, sometimes faces cannot be simply
maintained as what one interactional party wants. The speakers and hearers’ faces are usually threatened by one another to varying degrees. As a result, the speakers
and the hearers do an act that damages the face of others in opposition to their face-saving and desire. This act is called Face Threatening Acts FTAs. Brown
and Levinson 1987 define FTAs as “acts run contrary to the face wants of the hearers andor the speaker p. 70.” FTAs are usually done within verbal
communication, through utterances for instance. However, tone, intonation, and other non-verbal communication can also cause FTAs as well.
5. Politeness Strategies
Brown and Levinson 1987 propose four politeness strategies to minimize the possibility of face-damaged, namely Bald-On Record, Positive Politeness,
Negative Politeness, and Off-Record p. 65. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
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Figure 1: Politeness Strategies Proposed by Brown and Levinson 1987: 60
Speakers can choose one of those four politeness strategies when they want to do the FTAs in which the degree may vary. The more speakers want to use “higher-
numbered” strategy, the more polite it is. The elaborations of each strategy as well as the examples are presented as follows.
a. Bald-On Record Strategy
According to Brown and Levinson 1987, Bald-On Record strategy is “a direct way of saying things p. 74.” It does not lead hearers to misunderstanding
and misinterpretation. The utterances are spoken in a direct, clear, unambiguous, and concise way. This strategy is applied without any minimization to the
impositions to the hearers. Further, Brown and Levinson suggest that direct imperative is a clear example of Bald-On Record. The utterance: “Tell me how
the meeting goes” as an example of a direct imperative form uses Bald-On Record strategy. It attempts not to minimize the threats to the hearers to perform
actions. This strategy is commonly applied when both speakers and hearers have PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
