Projects per year
Abstract
Given the contested notion of culture, intercultural (im)politeness represents an understudied area of research. Yet, (im)politeness research should examine broader social forces. Drawing upon data from five focus group discussions and their dialogical discourse analysis, my study relies on the discursive approach and relational work (Locher and Watts, 2005). My study shows that cultural outsiders reported adhering differently to cultural politeness norms as resources. As such, a reported low tolerance for pragmatic variation in the Finnish and French cultures appears to carry two consequences. First, Finnish and French participants reported changing their adherence to cultural politeness norms in order to follow behavior that better corresponds to the expectations framed by the target culture, and to avoid negatively marked behavior judged as impolite/inappropriate. Second, participants who reported adhering less to the politeness norms of their culture of origin found a better match between their behavior and the dominant politeness norms in the target culture, which carried positive consequences related to constructing their identity. Finally, the close link between relational work and identity construction demonstrated that although participants reported adhering to the politeness norms of the target culture, they emphasized teaching their children the politeness norms of their culture of origin. (C) 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Original language | English |
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Journal | Journal of Pragmatics |
Volume | 155 |
Pages (from-to) | 177–192 |
Number of pages | 16 |
ISSN | 0378-2166 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - Jan 2020 |
MoE publication type | A1 Journal article-refereed |
Fields of Science
- 6121 Languages
- Intercultural
- (im)politeness
- Culture
- Frames of expectations
- Face
- IMPOLITENESS
Projects
- 1 Finished
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Politeness in Finland and France
Isosävi, J. (Project manager)
01/01/2017 → 31/12/2019
Project: Research project
Activities
- 1 Organisation and participation in conferences, workshops, courses, seminars
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Journée d’étude internationale: Approche comparative de la politesse linguistique en français et dans des langues et cultures éloignées
Isosävi, J. (Speaker: Presenter)
25 Jan 2020Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Organisation and participation in conferences, workshops, courses, seminars