Hi, welcome to our very last discussion in this MOOC. And very appropriately, this discussion will be about politeness. In the previous video I talked to you about politeness, and we saw that in the linguistic analysis of politeness, the concept of face is very important. And furthermore, that we distinguish between negative face, and positive face. Where negative face is about a person not feeling impeded in their actions, a person feeling free to do whatever they like. Whereas positive face is about a person feeling respected, a person feeling recognized, and maybe even generally happy. When we think about politeness in everyday life, we typically think about politeness towards the person we are talking to, towards the hearer, but in the analysis of politeness. It turns out that also, the speaker is important, that also, actually, the negative, and the positive face of the speaker count. I'm going to discuss this a little bit more with my students, Inge and Marten. >> Now, this final point to me is confusing, so I understand how you can not threaten the negative face of the hearer, for example, when I say, could you please close the door? So, then that's clearly from the hearer's point, but I don't understand how these, how face works for the speaker. >> Oh, I see. Okay. So, indeed. Let's just go through the whole four different possibilities again, right? So, we have- >> Yeah. >> Four possibilities. We have negative face, and we have positive face, and we have the hearer, and the speaker. A negative face, indeed, for the hearer means, I'm not trying to impose anything on you. I'm going to make you feel free, I'm not going to tell you, close the door, but I'm going to tell you something. I'm, well, I'm going to say, what you say, namely, could you please close the door? It makes the hearer a little bit more free because they can say no. I'm not going to close the door, or I can't, or you know, you can be even more indirect in this way, you can say, I'm very cold, that's an example you have already seen, so that's the negative face for the hearer. The negative face for the speaker, well, a clear example of that is in an apology. So, if I apologize to you for something bad I did, it means, I'm less free next time to do the same thing, again, because I just recognized that that's a bad thing to do. >> Hm, >> Similarly, for positive face, well, I can sweeten whatever I say, by calling you my friend, my brother, my love, whatever, and that would contribute to your positive face because you feel recognized. But I can also basically, take away my own positive face, and that will be also very polite, so I would say, well, I'm just such a horrible person. I always feel cold, et cetera, and well, maybe, you know, could you close the door? So, it makes you feel better because I present myself, as somebody being very humble, so that's how this contributes to that, right? >> Yeah. >> So, maybe I think it might be worthwhile to try to explore this little bit more, and just take one concrete example. Some kind of situation we can be in, and then basically, we can see that any of these kinds of different strategies might work. So, we have to think of some kind of situation, where you want to say something, but you also want to be polite. >> Yes, I think, I know one. because yesterday I organized a dinner for a friend of mine, and at some point, it was starting to get quite late. And I thought, okay, this is the time that we might want to stop the dinner, and everyone just goes home. >> Right, exactly. So, that's a good situation to be in. Well, I'm not sure whether, yeah, it's a good situation. It's a friend, and you want a friend to go away, right? So, there is, well, let's first, before we go to any of the politeness strategies in language, what would be the, the politest thing to do in this case? >> I think, the most polite thing to do would be not to anything, right? >> Right. >> We just, I would just stay there all night, wait till my friend says, well, I'll just leave now. >> Exactly. >> Yeah. >> Right. And the reason, why that's the, the politest thing to do is because her negative face is completely saved in that cace, right? She feels completely free, you don't put anything in her way, of staying the whole night. >> [LAUGH] >> If she wants. >> No. >> Actually, you restrict your own negative face because you make yourself less free because you're completely dependent on what she is going to do, right? So, that's one strategy, okay. Another strategy, if you can call it a strategy is to not be polite at all, right? So, that would, what would that involve? >> Well you could just say, go away. >> Yeah. >> Go away. You say to your friend, yeah, it sounds even funny, right? So, it's, We feel that this is something you cannot do, but that would be the, like the straightforward thing. You want to, you give a message to your friend. The message is go away. Well, one thing to do is to say to your friend, go away, but it feels like it is something you cannot do because it is not polite. Well, why is it not polite? Again, it is the negative face mostly, which plays a role here. That person will feel less free to do what she likes because she can now choose only between two options, namely, fighting with you- >> [LAUGH] >> Or going away. Whereas, she's much more free, otherwise, right? Okay. So, now suppose you do say something, and still you try to be polite. Okay. Now, we have the four different strategies, right? So, one is to, as it's called, to do the face threatening act off record, which means, to do it, and save her negative face, as much as possible. To still make her feel free, what do you do then? What do you say? >> Well, I could say, for example, mm, it's starting to get quite late. It's getting dark outside. >> I have to get up early. >> I have to get up early. >> Right, right, so, you say, all these kinds of things. You say, oh, it's starting, I like the, especially, I like this thing of saying, it's dark outside, right? It's not, that's not in any way an order, it's just an observation. It's an observation, which is true, and only by this very complicated calculation, which we have seen before, can she now determine that you are saying this for some reason. Well, maybe the reason is, that that person wants me to go away, but she's, she can still ignore it. She can say, yeah, indeed, it is very dark- >> [LAUGH] >> Outside, and so, she can, she's still completely free to do what she likes, or completely, to a large extent, she's still at least completely free. So, what about my own negative face? How can I do it, while using my own negative face in this kind of situation? So, it means, I make myself less free. >> You can apologize, maybe? >> Yeah, right. It's, actually, this is probably the most difficult one in this particular situation, but you can apologize, and say, well, you know, I really, well, even to some extent if you say, I always go to bed very early, that makes you less free because next time you go to see your friend- >> [LAUGH] >> Okay, you cannot stay all night. Even, you know, because it's, maybe it's very nice, but you cannot stay all night, right? So, what about positive face? Now, so, again, let's take her positive face. How can you say it to, to when you use her positive face to make your request, or order more polite? >> Well, maybe, you can say, it's always very nice to have you, and I really like having you over for dinner, but unfortunately, I- >> Yes, okay, and then, you say, go but unfortunately, go away. >> Go away. >> [LAUGH] >> So, this, this is what, indeed, this is what you do, you say, this is a lovely, this has been such a lovely evening, you're such a great company, but, and then, you say whatever you want to say. Okay. So, the person feels recognized. She feels respected. She's not going to feel that you're sending her away because you don't like her, but she feels, still feels happy about herself. And then finally, you can use your own positive face in this kind of thing. So, what would you do in that case? So it means your own self-respect has to go down, right? So, it's your own position, which goes down. What would you do? You say, something like, oh, I am always so tired so soon and that is very bad for my social life? >> Right. >> [LAUGH] >> So, unfortunately, >> Yes, yes, you start complaining about yourself. >> Yeah. >> You say, I know I'm a horrible host. I feel like a consultant in politeness now. >> [LAUGH] >> If I'm a horrible host, but again, and then you say whatever you need to say- >> Yeah. >> Okay? Right? So, these are, so, all together we have six different options, right? So, you can just be completely polite, which in this case, would be not say anything at all. You can be completely impolite, or even rude, and just say, go away. And then, you can use the negative face, and the positive face of the hearer, and the speaker. And obviously, you can also mix them in some ways. >> Hm, >> Right? So, you can do this thing about the positive face. You can say, you're such a great friend, but, and then you can say, I think it's very late. So, then you combine these two strategies in one single sentence. Is there any other- >> Yeah. >> Issue? >> I think, that these kind of strategies can really change, or differ per culture, I would say. >> Yeah, that's right. Well, we have seen in the previous video, maybe you'll recall, we have seen that in Japanese people use all kinds of different words even for being polite, and you're forced to do that. So, you're, actually those words were about positive face, or they have a verb for eat, which says that the eater is really a great person, which would be the hearer. And you have a verb for eat, which says the eater is really a humble person, which would be typically the speaker. In English, you don't do that. There's, even, actually, there's no way to do that, so if you have a sentence like, I'm going to eat, it's actually quite difficult to make that polite in this way. Of course, I mean, you can always say, I'm going to eat, my dear friend, and then that is something that about your positive face, but in Japanese, you always do it like that. So, politeness is very clearly something which is culture specific. It's also very much situation specific, like say go away to your friend, in certain kinds of friendships, in certain kinds of cultures that's absolutely possible. Actually, it is maybe even the preferred way to do it, to spend a lot of time explaining, making all these apologies, and self-accusations that would, in some cultures that would be considered, actually, then you're not a real friend. So, if you're real friends, you're going to be direct. This is what makes politeness, such a difficult topic. The takeaway message from this video to me seems to be that, there is, that face indeed, is very important. It's a complex topic, it's actually, incredibly complex. Being polite is a very difficult thing. We have to deal with negative, and positive face, and we have to deal with the hearer, and the speaker, and both apply to both. So, altogether we have four different possibilities of being polite, and we combine them. I would actually urge you to look in your everyday life, and look at your own strategies for being polite. They may be different from one culture to the next, that's another thing we discussed. So, how exactly, does it work in your culture? You can also go to our forum, and discuss it with the other students in our MOOC. In the next video, we're also going to look at several politeness strategies, which are used in different cultures by our informants.
