Bald on Record Payoffs
62 Meanwhile, the example of the results showed that the relative power did
not influence the speakers in using the politeness strategies. Utterance 2 showed Obama
‘s utterance. Utterance 2
Obama : You know, the Ellen dog bowls are somewhere, I am sorry, but… NP
Audience laughing. Transcript 3, p. 83
Utterance 2 showed that Obama was talking about Ellen‘s dog bowls.
Obama gave his apology to Ellen when he talked about the dog bowls by saying ―I am sorry, but…‖. It indicated that Obama was aware that his utterance might
threaten Ellen ‘s negative face. At that time, Obama was the president of United
State of America. It meant that he had higher power than Ellen who was a host of the talk show. However, Obama ignored his status and power as president, so he
used the negative politeness strategy to be more polite towards Ellen. Utterance 6 showed Hillary
‘s utterance that consisted of negative politeness.
Utterance 6 Hillary : Can I tell you about that? NP This is hard to believe, but there was a
law passed so that if you were married, or you were a single woman, you would be legally entitled to a credit card. So I applied to credit
card.
Transcript 2, p. 80 Hillary was talking about gender quality in U.S. and she wanted to add
some information about the fact of the situations at that time. Before Hillary continued to share the facts, she immediately said ―Can I tell you about that?‖
63 towards Ellen. In this case, Hillary was aware that her utterance can threaten
Ellen‘s negative face. However, Hillary used the negative politeness strategy instead of the other politeness strategy which had lower power. Hillary ignored
her status and power as president candidate to tell the hearer baldly. By using the negative politeness strategy, Hillary respected Ellen as the host and minimized the
status distance between Ellen and her.