Negative Politeness Strategies Used by Characters in Twilight Movie Script.

NEGATIVE POLITENESS STRATEGIES USED BY CHARACTERS IN “TWILIGHT” MOVIE SCRIPT

GEDE ANDI SETIAWAN 1118351060

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT FACULTY OF LETTERS UDAYANA UNIVERSITY

DENPASAR 2016

ACKNOWLEGMENTS

I dedicate my sincere appreciation and thanks to Ida Sang Hyang Widhi Wasa for blessing me in completing this paper entitled “negative politeness strategy used by the characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script”. In this opportunity, I would to express my sincere gratitude to Prof. Dr. Ketut Artawa, M.A as my first supervisor and Ni Made Ayu Widiastuti, S.S., M.Hum as my second supervisor, for their invaluable guidance and advice enabling me to complete this paper. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to Prof. Dr. Ni Luh Sutjiati Beratha, M.A., the Dean of Faculty of Letters and Culture, Udayana University and Dra. Ida Ayu Made Puspani, M.Hum, the Coordinator of Non-Regular Program of English Department for the recommendation and suggestion during my study.

My deepest appreciation and gratitude are also addressed to my family, my beloved Father and Mother, and my sister Irma. Finally, my gratitude is also due to my colleagues and my class mates, Arya, Kodok, Dedek, Asti, Gustia. They have been very helpful in assisting me to provide the data to complete this paper.

I realize this paper is far from perfect. Therefore comments and constructive suggestions are needed to improve this paper. I hope this paper will provide further information about politeness especially negative politeness.

Denpasar, April 2016

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ... i

TABLE OF CONTENTS ... ii

ABSTRACT ... v

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION ... 1

1.1 Background of the study ... 1

1.2 Problems of the study ... 2

1.3 Aims of the study ... 3

1.4 Scope of discussion ... 3

1.5 Research method ... 3

1.5.1 Data Source ... 3

1.5.2 Method and technique of collecting data ... 4

1.5.3 Method and analyzing data ... 5

CHAPTER II REVIEW OF LITERATURES, CONCEPTS, AND THEORITICAL ... 5

2.2 Concepts ... 10

2.2.1 Politeness ... 10

2.2.2 Face and face threatening acts... 12

2.3 Theoretical framework ... 13

2.3.1 Negative Politeness ... 13

2.3.1.1 Strategy 2: Question, hedge ... 15

2.3.1.2 Strategy 3: Be pessimistic ... 15

2.3.1.3 Strategy 4: Minimize the imposition ... 15

2.3.1.4 Strategy 5: Give deference ... 15

2.3.1.5 Strategy 6: Apologize ... 16

2.3.1.6 Strategy 7: Impersonalize S and H ... 17

2.3.1.7 Strategy 8: State the FTA as a general rule ... 19

2.3.1.8 Strategy 9: Nominalize ... 19

2.3.1.9 Strategy 10: Go on record as incurring a debt, or as not indebting H ... 19

2.3.2 Social factors impacting politeness ... 20

CHAPTER III NEGATIVE POLITENESS STRATEGIES USED BY THE CHARACTERS IN “TWILIGHT” MOVIE SCRIPT ... 24

3.1 Negative politeness strategies used by characters in TWILIGHT movie script ... 24

3.2 The social factors affecting negative politeness used by the characters ... 43

CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION ... 49

BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 51

ABSTRACT

The title of this paper is “Negative Politeness Strategies Used by characters in Twilight Movie Script”. This paper aims at finding out the strategies of negative politeness and the social factors affecting negative politeness used by The Characters in Twilight Movie Script.

The data was collected by watching movie which as the data base and read the script to know about the context of situation in Twilight Movie. It was analyzed by using quantitative and descriptive method. The data collected were classified based on negative politeness strategy proposed by Brown and Levinson (1978:131-211). Then they were analyzed according to the theory proposed by Holmes (1992) combined with Brown and Levinson (1987: 74 – 84) to describe the social factors affecting negative politeness.

Based on the result of the analysis, it is found that negative politeness strategies applied by the characters according to negative politeness are Strategy 1 (Be Conventional Indirect), Strategy 2 (Question, Hedge), Strategy 3 (Be Pessimistic), Strategy 4 (Minimize the Imposition), Strategy 5 (Give Deference), Strategy 6 (Apologize). In this analysis, the characters in Twilight Movie Script use the negative politeness strategies especially Strategy 2 (Question, Hedge) to interact between the character and politeness is applicable in whole conversation and becomes priority. The social factors affecting negative politeness used by the Characters are participant, setting, topic, social distance and gender from the character in Twilight movie.

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the study

Politeness is one way of showing appreciation from one person to another, but it is not a simple thing. Being polite is a complicated thing in any language. It is difficult to learn because it involves understanding not just the language, but also the social and cultural values of the community.

There are two types of politeness according to Brown and Levinson (1978:75). The first is positive politeness and the second is negative politeness. Positive politeness is usually seen in groups of friends, or where people in the given social situation know each other fairly well. It usually tries to minimize the distance between them by expressing friendliness and solid interest in the hearer’s need to be respected meanwhile in negative politeness assume that there might be some social distance or awkwardness in the situation.

Negative politeness strategy is often implemented in our daily lives as one of the ways to conduct activities that relevant to social life and interact with other people for example in romance love, friendship, family, and work industry or business. The data source in this study (Twilight Movie Script) has the occurrence with negative politeness that many such interactions in love and friendship. Negative politeness is one way we can socialize well in our environment. In other hand, some studies people usually communicate their ideas through conversation which consists of speakers(s) and hearer(s) or addressee(s). A speaker is person who speaks particular words. A hearer is person who hears the words spoken by the speaker. The addressee is person to whom the words addressed. In a conversation, the addressee must be the hearer too, but a hearer

is not always the addressee. It depends on the amount of people involved in the conversation. In having conversation, people are advisable to be careful in using strategy in order to maintain the communication. They also must be aware of the politeness strategy to make their communication more acceptable by the others. Negative politeness strategies are oriented towards the hearer’s negative face and emphasize avoidance of imposition on the hearer. These strategies presume that the speaker will be imposing on the listeners and there is a higher potential for awkwardness or embarrassment than in bold on record strategies and positive politeness strategy.

Finally this paper considers to analyze negative politeness strategies used by characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script. Twilight is a film with a love story with the background of a vampire characters that comes from the past, a blend of romance story and characters who spoke with modesty from old generation and life in the modern era make the story of this film is relevant with this study to analyze Negative politeness strategies use by the characters.

1.2 Problems of the study

Based on the background above, some problems found related to this topic are

1) What are the negative politeness strategies used by the characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script?

2) What social factors affecting negative politeness used by the characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script?

1.3 Aims of the study

1) To describe the negative politeness strategies used by the characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script.

2) To analyze social factors affecting negative politeness are used by characters in “TWILIGHT” movie script.

1.4 Scope of discussion

The current study is focused on the negative politeness strategy used by the characters in TWILIGHT movie script and analyze the social factors affecting negative politeness are used by characters. Two of aims above will be the main discussion in this study.

1.5 Research Methods

In this section, there are three points of discussions covered including data source, method and technique of collecting data, method and technique of analyzing data.

1.5.1 Data Source

The data in this study was taken from the script, act, and condition of the movie “TWILIGHT” which has been published in the internet or sold by video shop that is used as primary data. The movie script is chosen as the primary data source in this study due to the script is more specific to show the conversations between the characters. Here with detail from the data source :

1. Twilight movie script written by Melissa Rosenberg, 2. Based on novel by Stephenie Meyer,

3. Written on February 11, 2008.

5. Taken from Website: http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Twilight.html

. The movie script will be also used in this study as written data in order to support the analysis.

1.5.2 Method and technique of collecting data

The data of the study was collected by documentation method in order to find out the negative politeness strategy is used by the characters in “Twilight” movie script. These are the steps that were used in collecting data:

1) Watching Movie, watching movie to seeing the conditions and the situations of the characters when they communication with the other.

2) Reading the script of the movie thoroughly, this step was primary technique to collecting the data.

3) Note taking for the data from the script, after watching the movie and reading one by one the conversation in the script this step will be the last step before write in this study.

1.5.3 Method and technique of analyzing data

Collecting data was analyzed in qualitative method, it means that the analysis is not counting numbers. The data is described in a way narrative. In order to analyze the data, the conversation was investigated based on politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987). According to these linguists, there are ten strategies of negative politeness, and the conversation was checked which strategy it belongs to. Then the data was analyzed according to the theory proposed by Holmes (1992) to classify the social factors that affecting negative politeness.

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF LITERATURES , CONCEPTS AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

2.1 Review of Literatures

In order to get further understanding and comprehension in the theory of politeness strategy, especially of negative politeness, it is important to reconsider several graduated theses and two journals from valid sites. Some journals from sites are necessary to consider and read as the reference to enrich knowledge about negative politeness strategy.

The first thesis that has relation with this study is Mudiartini (2011) in her paper entitled “Politeness Strategy used by male and female characters of Letters to Juliet movie”. She triying to analyze and to discuss the politeness strategy used by male and female characters of letters to Juliet movie and the comparison of the politeness strategy applied by male and female characters of letters to Juliet movie. She applied the theory of politeness maxim to find out the comparison of politeness strategy occurred on the conversation which is proposed by Leech (1983) and she also referred to Brown and Levinson’s (1987) theory to classify the types of politeness strategy. She used qualitative and descriptive method to analyze the data. She only explains a little about Bald on Record used by male characters. In my study the discussion is limited in movie script, and the current study includes maxim politeness and negative politeness used by main male character in movie of “TWILIGHT”.

The second paper is written by Puspitawati (2009), entitled “Politeness used by Women in 19th _{Century with Special Reference to Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice”. The study}

The data was taken from conversation occurring between woman in the novel of ”Pride and Prejudice” by Jane Austen. By using the theory of politeness maxims proposed by Geoffrey Leech (1983) and politeness strategies by Brown and Levinson (1978), she analyzed the type of utterance of the speaker in talking to the hearer. In this study she found the use of five politeness maxims and four politeness strategies applied in the utterance of woman characters in the novel. The woman in the novel used two bald on record strategies, nine of positive politeness strategies; a) notice, b) attend to H (his interest, wants, needs, good), c) exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H), d) use in group identity markers, e) seek agreement, f) assert or presuppose S’s knowledge of and concern for H’s wants, g) offers or promise, h) be optimistic, i) give (or ask for) reasons. In term of the negative politeness strategy there were four strategies found, those are; a) be conventionally indirect, b) hedge, c) be pessimistic, d) apologize. And in term of record strategy, there were only found three strategies found, they are; a) use tautologies, b) be ironic, and c) be ambiguous. In this study the discussion is not only female characters but also focus on negative politeness strategy used by the all characters.

Meikasari (2002) also did a research in politeness. Her study is entitled “Positive Politeness Strategies in Verbal Communication in a drama “Gaucho” by Gloria Gonzalez. The study is mainly aimed at investigating the use of positive politeness strategies by the author in written text, particularly a drama entitled Gaucho. The concept of politeness strategies applied in this study is proposed by Brown and Levinson (1978). Scollon’s theory about face solidarity system is also applied to analyze the concept of solidarity. The finding s of this study showed that in general, the drama was full of positive politeness strategies. The characters applied those strategies in order to show solidarity or intimacy or to get closer to each other by reducing social distance and social power between them. On the other hand, the similarity between my study and

his study is used theory by Lakoff (1975) to find out the women linguistic features and their function, and also theory of women language by Coates (1986).

It is generally agreed that politeness is an essential feature of social life. By now, politeness studies have grown into an important line of inquiry, as evidenced by the publication of numerous pertinent books and articles, There is a sociology journal that was published in 2008 by Prof. Dr. Nguyen Van Do from Thang Long University and the title is “A study of politeness strategies in the conventional activities of the course book “New Headway”. This journal focused on positive and negative politeness strategies in conversations, with an aim to help the students at Thang Long University to improve their awareness of positive and negative politeness strategies in conventional activities in the course book mentioned above, then apply these strategies in their everyday conversations in English.

Politeness is really an important part in all social interactions. The author of this journal aims to investigate and draw out the important role of positive and negative politeness strategies in conversational activities. He applies the theory proposed by Brown and Levinson which contains politeness is interpreted as repressive action taken to counterbalance the disruptive effect of face threatening acts (Brown & Levinson. 1987 : 4)

Delleman (2008) from University of Birmingham, in his journal entitled Question Tags and the Sociolinguistic Factors Determining Linguistic Politeness, Delleman intended to examine, some of the factors that might influence English speakers’ use of linguistic politeness, comparing with a small scale empirical study of data from radio broadcasts, to study how these influences affect the participants’ use of question tags. He presented an overview of Brown and Levinson’s (1987) politeness theory looking more deeply into the contextual issues of politeness and Holmes on the functionality of question tags

.

He also present the research and data collected

on the use of question tags by radio presenters, correspondents, interviewees and other guests on the British Broadcasting Company Radio Five Live’s Breakfast programme.

From those three theses and two journals, this study has the same idea about politeness strategy that is one way of showing appreciations from one person to another, but it is not a simple thing. However, what makes this study different from those three writings is that the problem discussed in this study it is not only the politeness strategy but only focus on negative politeness strategy used by characters in TWILIGHT movie script and the factors are influencing negative politeness used by the characters in TWILIGHT movie script. All of the theses support this thesis because there are many theories that are useful as references, and especially the research methods of the first reviewed thesis, due to there are similar concepts however this study focuses only in negative politeness.

2.2 Concepts

In order to avoid the confusion of using some terms of Politeness Strategies in this paper, it is very important to understand the basic concepts of those terms, which are used many times in this paper. The miss understanding of those terms could make wrong interpretation and wrong perception while discussing politeness strategies phenomenon.

2.2.1 Politeness

In doing a conversation or interaction with other people, someone should pay attention on several rules or factors in order to achieve the goal of conversation. One way to establish a smooth and meaningful conversation is by applying such a politeness consideration. Politeness

as a part of linguistic research is closely related to the name of Lakoff (1973, 1975), Leech (1983), and Brown and Levinson (1987).

Politeness is the expressions of the speakers intention to mitigate face threats carried by certain face threatening acts towards another. Brown and Levinson (1987) proposed that the basic strategy of politeness is to minimize the threat to an addressee’s negative face and enhance their positive face as much as possible. Positive face refers to a person’s desire to be liked and understood while negative face refers to a person’s desire to act freely.

A. Positive politeness is a strategy that seeks to create a positive relationship with the hearer. B. Negative politeness is a strategy that seeks to minimize the threat to the hearer’s face.

Both positive and negative politeness can be restated as they want that every member to be liked at least by some others ( positive politeness ) and the want of every member that his actions be unimpeded by others ( negative politeness ).

Perhaps the most through treatment of the concept of politeness is that of Penelope Brown and Stephen Levinson, which was first published in 1978. Brown and Levinson also argue that in human communication, either spoken or written, people tend to maintain one another’s face continuously, for themselves and the people they interact with, add up to politeness.

2.2.2 Face and Face Threatening Acts.

Central to Brown and Levinson theory of politeness is the concept of face. This is defined as the public self image that every member wants to claim for himself , consisting of two related aspects :

A. Negative face: the basic claim to territories , personal preserves , right to non distraction – i.e. to freedom of action and freedom from position.

B. Positive face: the positive consistent self image or personality ( crucially including the desire that this self image be appreciated and approved of ) claimed by interact ants. In other words, it can be said that positive face is the desire of every member to be liked, admired, ratified and related to positively , noting that one would threaten positive face by ignoring someone. While negative face can be characterized as the want of every member that his actions be unimpeded by others.

According to Brown and Levinson, positive and negative face exists universally in human culture and naturally there are utterances which can threat the face called Face Threatening Acts (FTA’s). Face Threatening Acts (FTA’s) are acts that infringe on the hearers need to maintain his / her self esteem, and be respected. Most of these acts are verbal.

2.3 Theoretical Framework

Generally speaking politeness involves taking account of the feelings of other. A polite person makes others feel comfortable. The major theory which is used to analyze the data presented in this study of sociolinguistics namely politeness theory, which is proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987).

According to Brown and Levinson (1978:70), politeness strategies are developed in order to save the hearers’ “face”. Face refers to the respect that an individual has for him or herself, and maintaining that “self-esteem” in public or in private situations. Usually you try to avoid

embarrassing the other person, or making them feel uncomfortable. Face Threatening Acts (FTA’s) are acts that infringe on the hearers’ need to maintain his/her self esteem and be respected.

There are several ways of being polite; however, this study is focused only on negative politeness. In order to analyze the data, the basic theory applied in this study to proposed by Brown and Levinson (1978) and this theory which specifically focuses on negative politeness strategies as one of the goal – oriented strategy verbal communication

2.3.1 Negative Politeness

A person generates negative politeness in order to show that he cares and respect the negative marks in the face of his addressee. He assures that he does not intend to impede on their freedom of action by humbling or not showing off, being formal and restraining himself. If he did or would do a Face Threatening Acts (FTA), he will want to minimize the impact of the FTA by using deference , hedges and other play down strategies (Brown and Levinson, 1987)

Negative politeness is usually used to show that speaker’s cares and respect the negative face of interlocutors. Unlike positive politeness which function to minimize social distance, negative politeness is used to indicate that the speaker is aware and respect the social distance between him or her and the hearer.

Negative politeness strategies are oriented towards the hearer’s negative face and emphasize avoidance of imposition on the hearer. These strategies presume that the speaker will be imposing on the listener and there is a higher potential for awkwardness or embarrassment than in bald on record strategies and positive politeness strategies. Negative face is the desire to remain autonomous so the speaker is more apt to include an out for the listener, through distancing styles like apologies. Example from Brown and Levinson include:

A. Strategy 1: Be conventionally indirect

In relation to this strategy, Brown and Levinson (1978:137) state that there are two tensions that a speaker faced in this strategy: to desire to give H an out by being indirect and the desire to go on record. In order to solve this problem, the use of phrases and sentences that have contextually ambiguous meaning which are different from their literal meaning is very helpful. The S wants to communicate his desire to be indirect even though in fact the utterance goes on record also claimed by Brown and Levinson.

Example : Can you shut the door please? (Brown and Levinson,1987:133) B. Strategy 2: Question, hedge

It consist of the way of, make minimal assumption about H and this is the primary and fundamental method of disarming routine interactional threats.

Example : You are quite right. (Brown and Levinson,1987:145) John is a true friend (Brown and Levinson,1987:145) C. Strategy 3: Be pessimistic

This strategy give redress to H’s negative face by indirectly expressing doubt that the conditions, for appropriateness of S’s speech act obtain.

Example : Will there be a cigarette on you right? (Brown and Levinson,1987 : 174)

I don’t suppose there’d be any chance of you right? (Brown and Levinson,1987 : 174)

D. Strategy 4: Minimize the imposition

Speaker redress the seriousness of the FTA to pay hearer deference. ‘Just’ conveys both its literal meaning of ‘exactly’ and ‘only’

Example : I just want to ask you if I can borrow a tiny bit of paper. (Brown And Levinson,1987 : 177)

Just a second (Brown and Levinson,1987:177)

E. Strategy 5: Give deference

Speakers humbles himself, his capacities and possessions.

Example : I think I must be absolutely stupid but I simply can not Understand this map (in asking help). (Brown and Levinson,1987:185)

A show of hesitation may accompany many FTA, also seems to be self humbling.

Example : I think you should attend to your flies. (Brown and Levinson,1987 : 187) F. Strategy 6: Apologize.

Speaker can indicate his reluctance to impinge the H’s negative face, by apologizing. It will also redress the impingement. Brown and Levinson proposed four ways to communicate regret or reluctance to do FTA, they are as follows:

a) Admit the impingement. Proposed by Brown and Levinson. Speaker simply admit that he is impinging on hearer’s face.

Example : I know you must be very busy but…. (Brown and Levinson,1987:188)

b) Indicate relocate. Brown and Levinson argue that speaker can attempt to show that he is reluctant to interrupt on Hearer by using hedges.

c) Give overwhelming. Brown and Levinson declare that Speaker can claim that he has compelling reasons for doing the FTA, therefore implying that normally he would not dream of infringing H’s negative face.

Example : I can not think of nobody else who could…

d) Beg forgiveness. Brown and Levinson note that Speaker may be for forgiveness or at least for ‘acquittal’.

Example : Please forgive me if…. G. Strategy 7: Impersonalize S and H

One way indicating that S does not want to impinge on H is to phrase the FTA as if the agent were other than S. This strategy deals with the avoidance of ‘I’ and ‘you’ as claimed by Brown and Levinson (1978:195)

a) Performatives. Brown and Levinson (1978:195) Avoiding the use of ‘I’ and ‘you’ may be such a basic desire that helps to explain the very general loss of overt reference to the subject and indirect object of the highest performative form.

Example: I tell you that it is so

b) Imperative. Brown and Levinson (1978:196) claim that in the direct expressions of one of the most intrinsically face threatening speech acts commanding most languages omit ‘you’. In English it is marked as aggressively rude.

Example: You take that out.

c) Impersonal Verbs. Brown and Levinson argue that it is not allowed to do agent deletion; not only in imperatives but also in other verbs forms that encode acts which are intrinsically FTAs.

Example : It seems (to me) that..

d) Passive and circumstantial voices. According to Brown and Levinson (1978:199), the means par excellence in English of avoiding reference to persons involved in FTAs is the passive coupled with a rule of agent deletion. It may be used to remove direct reference to the S.

e) Replacement of the pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’ by definite. Many languages have some standardized impersonal versions of pronouns which may serve FTA purpose to good effect (Brown and Levinson,1978:202) as in English; “One might think”, rather than “You might think”

f) Pluralization of the ‘you’ and ‘I’ pronouns. Brown and Levinson (1978:203) say that the pluralization of ‘you’ will provide a conventional ‘out’ of hearer.

g) Address terms as ‘you’ avoidance. Brown and Levinson (1978:208) declare that note the rudeness of ‘you’ as an address form in attention getting phrase.

Example: Excuse me, sir

h) Reference terms as ‘I’ avoidance. According to Brown and Levinson (1978:209), the speaker distances himself as an individual from acts he would rather have attributed to the responsibilities and rights.

i) Point of view distancing. This strategy use the point of view mechanism is to distance S from the particular FTA.

Brown and Levinson (1978:211) argue that by state the FTA as an instance of for regulation, obligation or social rule. S and H can be disassociated from the particular imposition in the FTA also as a way of communicating that S does not want to impinge by the circumstances.

I. Strategy 9: Nominalize

Brown and Levinson (1978:212) nominalizing the subject in order to make the sentences more ‘formal’. It shows formality which is associated with the noun end of the continuum, which begins from verb through adjective to noun.

J. Strategy 10: Go on record as incurring a debt, or as not indebting “H”

This strategy is just the opposite of strategy 4. Brown and Levinson (1978:215) reveal that by referring explicitly to the difficulty of H’s complying, S implicitly put himself in dept to H for causing him the difficulty. S find it difficult to speak because he is about to impose heavily on H. S can disclaim any indebtedness of H, by offering or requesting.

Example : I will never be able to repay if you help me 2.3.2 Social Factors Affecting Politeness

Sociolinguistics is a term that refers to the study of the relationship between language and society, and how language is used in multilingual speech communities. Sociolinguists are

interested in explaining why people speak differently in different social contexts. And the effect of social factors such as (social distance, social status, age, gender, class) on language varieties (dialects, registers, genres, etc), and they are concerned with identifying the social functions of language and the way they are used to convey social meanings.

In their theory, Brown and Levinson (1987), there are three most common factors affecting the politeness of an utterance are social distances, power and rank of position. Social

distancerefers to the relationship between the interlocutors. If two people are very close, they would have a low degree of social distance. Two strangers would typically have a high degree of social distance. In most varieties of Spanish, higher degrees of social distance result in the use of more formal language. Powerrefers to the power relationship between two interlocutors. You will typically find yourself in three types of power relationships. In the first, you would have equal power with the person you are talking to (e.g., a friend or colleague). In the other two, you would either have more power (e.g., as a boss, instructor) or less power (e.g., employee, student) than the person you were talking to. Rank of impositionrefers to the importance or degree of difficulty in the situation. For example, in requests, a large rank of imposition would occur if you were asking for a big favor, whereas a small rank of imposition would exist when the request is small

Holmes (1992) stated that some social factors such as participant, setting and topic related to the users of language. The participants factor is important, that is who is speaking and whom are they speaking to. For example: husband – wife, boss – workers. The setting is also relevant factor, that is where are they speaking. For example: church, school and house. Then, the purpose of the interaction that is what is being talked about maybe important. Although not all factors are relevant to any context but in any situation linguistics choices reflect the influence of one or more of the factors because they are basic components of why people do not speak in same way all the time.

Holmes (2001:8) also stated that Social status depends on a number of factors such as social rank, wealth, age, gender and so on; therefore the person with the higher social status has the choice of using formality or informality (solidarity) when addressing other persons of lower

social status. But the person with the lower social status uses only formality when addressing a person of higher social status.

This research uses combination of social factors mentioned by Brown and Levinson (1987: 74 – 84) and Holmes (1992:97). The social factors are participant, setting and topic.

Formality increases between participants (speaker and hearer) when the social distance is greater. Informality (Solidarity) increases when the social distance is little between participants (speaker and hearer).

Regarding social factors, Holmes (1992) also mentions about different language characteristic about men and women .In western societies, women and men whose social roles are similar do not use forms that are completely different, but they use different quantities or frequencies of the same form. For example: women use more standard forms than men, and men use more vernacular forms than women / women use more ing-forms than men and fewer ing -forms in words like coming or running. But in western communities, such differences are also found in the speech of different social classes, therefore the language of women in the lower and higher classes is more similar to that of men in the same group.

Gender related variability seems to be associated with the difference approach, while the dominance approach is supported mainly by variability on the basis of power. Power, on the other hand, is derived from social, economic and sociohistorical status. The question whether variability must be explained in terms of gender or status, however, cannot be answered conclusively on the basis of the literature discussed so far.

Holmes (1995:67) stated that women are more polite than men. Although with hindsight this conclusion can be seen as a rather sweeping generalization, the importance of Holmes’s statement cannot be denied as it sparked much sociolinguist debate. He derived this rather

sweeping conclusion from two premises: firstly, that politeness is an expression of concern for the feelings of others and secondly, that women’s utterances show evidence of concerns for the feelings of the people they are talking to. The essence of this distinction lies in the way that women, according to Holmes, use language to establish, nurture and develop personal relationships, as opposed to men who see language more as a tool for obtaining and conveying information (Holmes 1995:2). This is labeled as the affective function of language and the referential function respectively (Holmes 1995:3).

c) Give overwhelming. Brown and Levinson declare that Speaker can claim that he has compelling reasons for doing the FTA, therefore implying that normally he would not dream of infringing H’s negative face.

Example : I can not think of nobody else who could…

d) Beg forgiveness. Brown and Levinson note that Speaker may be for forgiveness or at least for ‘acquittal’.

Example : Please forgive me if…. G. Strategy 7: Impersonalize S and H

One way indicating that S does not want to impinge on H is to phrase the FTA as if the agent were other than S. This strategy deals with the avoidance of ‘I’ and ‘you’ as claimed by Brown and Levinson (1978:195)

a) Performatives. Brown and Levinson (1978:195) Avoiding the use of ‘I’ and ‘you’ may be such a basic desire that helps to explain the very general loss of overt reference to the subject and indirect object of the highest performative form.

Example: I tell you that it is so

b) Imperative. Brown and Levinson (1978:196) claim that in the direct expressions of one of the most intrinsically face threatening speech acts commanding most languages omit ‘you’. In English it is marked as aggressively rude.

Example: You take that out.

c) Impersonal Verbs. Brown and Levinson argue that it is not allowed to do agent deletion; not only in imperatives but also in other verbs forms that encode acts which are intrinsically FTAs.

Example : It seems (to me) that..

d) Passive and circumstantial voices. According to Brown and Levinson (1978:199), the means par excellence in English of avoiding reference to persons involved in FTAs is the passive coupled with a rule of agent deletion. It may be used to remove direct reference to the S.

e) Replacement of the pronouns ‘I’ and ‘you’ by definite. Many languages have some standardized impersonal versions of pronouns which may serve FTA purpose to good effect (Brown and Levinson,1978:202) as in English; “One might think”, rather than “You might think”

f) Pluralization of the ‘you’ and ‘I’ pronouns. Brown and Levinson (1978:203) say that the pluralization of ‘you’ will provide a conventional ‘out’ of hearer.

g) Address terms as ‘you’ avoidance. Brown and Levinson (1978:208) declare that note the rudeness of ‘you’ as an address form in attention getting phrase.

Example: Excuse me, sir

h) Reference terms as ‘I’ avoidance. According to Brown and Levinson (1978:209), the speaker distances himself as an individual from acts he would rather have attributed to the responsibilities and rights.

i) Point of view distancing. This strategy use the point of view mechanism is to distance S from the particular FTA.

Brown and Levinson (1978:211) argue that by state the FTA as an instance of for regulation, obligation or social rule. S and H can be disassociated from the particular imposition in the FTA also as a way of communicating that S does not want to impinge by the circumstances.

I. Strategy 9: Nominalize

Brown and Levinson (1978:212) nominalizing the subject in order to make the sentences more ‘formal’. It shows formality which is associated with the noun end of the continuum, which begins from verb through adjective to noun.

J. Strategy 10: Go on record as incurring a debt, or as not indebting “H”

This strategy is just the opposite of strategy 4. Brown and Levinson (1978:215) reveal that by referring explicitly to the difficulty of H’s complying, S implicitly put himself in dept to H for causing him the difficulty. S find it difficult to speak because he is about to impose heavily on H. S can disclaim any indebtedness of H, by offering or requesting.

Example : I will never be able to repay if you help me 2.3.2 Social Factors Affecting Politeness

Sociolinguistics is a term that refers to the study of the relationship between language and society, and how language is used in multilingual speech communities

.

Sociolinguists are

interested in explaining why people speak differently in different social contexts. And the effect of social factors such as (social distance, social status, age, gender, class) on language varieties (dialects, registers, genres, etc), and they are concerned with identifying the social functions of language and the way they are used to convey social meanings.

In their theory, Brown and Levinson (1987), there are three most common factors affecting the politeness of an utterance are social distances, power and rank of position. Social

distancerefers to the relationship between the interlocutors. If two people are very close, they would have a low degree of social distance. Two strangers would typically have a high degree of social distance. In most varieties of Spanish, higher degrees of social distance result in the use of more formal language. Powerrefers to the power relationship between two interlocutors. You will typically find yourself in three types of power relationships. In the first, you would have equal power with the person you are talking to (e.g., a friend or colleague). In the other two, you would either have more power (e.g., as a boss, instructor) or less power (e.g., employee, student) than the person you were talking to. Rank of impositionrefers to the importance or degree of difficulty in the situation. For example, in requests, a large rank of imposition would occur if you were asking for a big favor, whereas a small rank of imposition would exist when the request is small

Holmes (1992) stated that some social factors such as participant, setting and topic related to the users of language. The participants factor is important, that is who is speaking and whom are they speaking to. For example: husband – wife, boss – workers. The setting is also relevant factor, that is where are they speaking. For example: church, school and house. Then, the purpose of the interaction that is what is being talked about maybe important. Although not all factors are relevant to any context but in any situation linguistics choices reflect the influence of one or more of the factors because they are basic components of why people do not speak in same way all the time.

Holmes (2001:8) also stated that Social status depends on a number of factors such as social rank, wealth, age, gender and so on; therefore the person with the higher social status has the choice of using formality or informality (solidarity) when addressing other persons of lower

social status. But the person with the lower social status uses only formality when addressing a person of higher social status.

This research uses combination of social factors mentioned by Brown and Levinson (1987: 74 – 84) and Holmes (1992:97). The social factors are participant, setting and topic.

Formality increases between participants (speaker and hearer) when the social distance is greater. Informality (Solidarity) increases when the social distance is little between participants (speaker and hearer).

Regarding social factors, Holmes (1992) also mentions about different language characteristic about men and women .In western societies, women and men whose social roles are similar do not use forms that are completely different, but they use different quantities or frequencies of the same form. For example: women use more standard forms than men, and men use more vernacular forms than women / women use more ing-forms than men and fewer ing -forms in words like coming or running. But in western communities, such differences are also found in the speech of different social classes, therefore the language of women in the lower and higher classes is more similar to that of men in the same group.

Gender related variability seems to be associated with the difference approach, while the dominance approach is supported mainly by variability on the basis of power. Power, on the other hand, is derived from social, economic and sociohistorical status. The question whether variability must be explained in terms of gender or status, however, cannot be answered conclusively on the basis of the literature discussed so far.

Holmes (1995:67) stated that women are more polite than men. Although with hindsight this conclusion can be seen as a rather sweeping generalization, the importance of Holmes’s statement cannot be denied as it sparked much sociolinguist debate. He derived this rather

sweeping conclusion from two premises: firstly, that politeness is an expression of concern for the feelings of others and secondly, that women’s utterances show evidence of concerns for the feelings of the people they are talking to. The essence of this distinction lies in the way that women, according to Holmes, use language to establish, nurture and develop personal relationships, as opposed to men who see language more as a tool for obtaining and conveying information (Holmes 1995:2). This is labeled as the affective function of language and the referential function respectively (Holmes 1995:3).