Universitt zu Kln

Englisches Seminar 1
Essay Writing II- K. Maye-Saidi
SS 2015
Alexander Kals
04.07.2015

Essay Question: Discuss the relationship between politeness and address term usage in
the English language.
"Thanking you for your advice, which was not required, Mr Browdie, returned Miss Squeers
with laborious politeness, have the goodness not to presume to meddle with my Christian
name." - Charles Dickens, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickelby
Addressing somebody is one of the most common parts of speech in everyday language.
However, the quote above illustrates that there are many pitfalls when choosing the correct
term of address. In the course of this essay, it will be shown that politeness is the governing
factor when choosing a term of address and how different strategies of negative and positive
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politeness and impoliteness are at play whenever an address term is used. To do so, a short
theoretical overview on both politeness and terms of address will be given, while a third
section will try to illustrate the relationship between the two concepts.
Based on previous work by Ervin Goffman and Robin Lakoff, politeness theory was
first proposed and established by Brown and Levinson in 1978 and later, in 1987, in their

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seminal work "Politeness: Some of the universals in language usage". Research on the subject
of politeness has uncovered many intricacies of social interaction and has spawned a wide
array of studies and other publications. In the following paragraphs, only a brief overview on
a few core principles, especially those directly related to address term usage will be given.
Those aspects that do not lend themselves to the study of address terms, such as mitigating

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devices or pre-sequences among others, will be omitted.

In the center of politeness theory lies the concept of face. Face is defined as the
"public self image of a person" (Yule 1996). Face is inherent to a person, and every individual
expects their face to be recognized and respected. The concept is usually divided into two
aspects: positive face, the need of a person to be liked and accepted and negative face, the

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need of a person to be unimposed by the action of others. Another way of describing the two
aspects would be that positive face is the wish of a person to be connected, while negative
face is the wish to be independent. These needs and wishes are also called "face wants" (Yule
1996).
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Many speech acts, especially directives (requests or orders among others) are
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potentially contrary to the face wants and can be seen as face-threatening acts. When having
to perform a face-threatening act, speakers often employ strategies of either positive or
negative politeness to mitigate the problem. When choosing a strategy of positive politeness,
a speaker will try to appeal to the positive face of the interlocutor, trying to communicate and
emphasize solidarity and thus reducing the impact of the face-threatening act. Employing a

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strategy of negative politeness on the other hand, the speaker will try to show deference to the
interlocutor, i.e. by offering the other person ways to easily deny a request.
Unmitigated and deliberate attacks on an individual's face are often described as
impoliteness. Here the speaker aims to hurt or anger his addressee. Just like politeness, what
is deemed impolite is highly context-sensitive, i.e. it depends on the setting, the culture, the

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people etc. Impoliteness can be achieved by, among other possibilities, insults or threats,
dismissals, sarcasm or by simply not being polite.
Terms of address are terms which directly address a person. This rather trivial remark
is necessary, as it differentiates address terms from references. Although the address of a
person can have the same form as a reference to a person, in Pragmatics address and reference

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are usually treated separately.

The inventory of address terms is generally divided into pronominal address terms and
nominal address terms. Concerning pronominal address terms, Modern English is limited to
exactly one pronoun: you. This has not always been the case. From the 13th to the 17th
century, English had a T / V distinction, which is of course still found in many languages,

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including French and German. The inventory of nominal address terms on the other hand is
very large. Most common among them are names, which can occur in English in several
ways: as Christian name alone, as a hypocoristic form of a Christian name, as surname alone,
as a combination of one of the two former with the ladder or as a title in combination with one
of the names above, usually with the surname. Titles are another category of nominal address

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forms. They can be titles of courtesy (Sir, Madam), professional titles (Dr., Father), or
aristocratic titles (Lady, Your Highness). Furthermore, there are kinship terms (Mum, Son),
terms of endearment (Honey, Buddy) or terms of abuse (...) (Mazzon 2010).
Terms of address and their system of usage are often analyzed by certain parameters.
Most importantly, a wide array of variables which determine address term usage have to be

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taken into account. These variables include age, gender, social status (by birth, by merit, by
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wealth etc.), or kinship, but also the social context of the utterances, the familiarity with
customs and micro-pragmatic considerations such as the mood of the interlocutors.
Considering these variables, one way to look at address term system is to identify
whether certain address terms are used reciprocally or non-reciprocally within social
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interaction. This is also called symmetrical vs. asymmetrical usage. One can also analyse
address terms by differentiating unmarked usage from marked usage, whereby unmarked
usage represents usage that complies with the norm of an address term system, while marked
usages are "deviations" which "have to be accounted for" and "convey some special meaning"
(Taavitsainen/Jucker 2003). Another important method to study address term systems is to

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assess address term usages on scales of distance vs. intimacy and/or power vs. solidarity. In
both, it is tried to classify the inventory of address terms in an address term system on a scale
from the most distancing / power indicating terms of address (e.g. a title, Your Majesty) to
the most intimate / solidarity indicating terms of address (e.g. hypocoristic names or a terms
of endearment).

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At this point, the relationship between politeness and address term usage becomes
obvious. In English, nominal address terms can either be positively or negatively (im)polite.
Those address term that are categorized on the far ends of the scales of distance vs. intimacy
and power vs. solidarity presented above correspond to those which are employed in positive
or negative politeness strategies. Thus a face-threatening act could be mitigated by either

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employing a very intimate address term to convey solidarity, or choosing a very distal address
term to convey deference.
It is safe to say that a very large percentage of address term usages are unmarked, i.e.
conform with the norm of the address term system. This does not mean that these utterances
of address terms are not part of politeness strategies. On the contrary, each unmarked usage of

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an address term reinforces an address terms system that has been set up according the
principles of politeness presented above. Hence, very few address term usages constitute a
face threatening act in themselves. But(!) as soon as an address term becomes marked, it is
also almost inevitably a face-threatening act. Marked usage of an address term, if not the
result of intercultural misunderstanding or ignorance, is usually made on purpose and can

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have great effect. These face-threatening acts via address terms usage are part of impoliteness
strategies. A mother reprimanding her child could switch from her usual address term (maybe
the hypocoristic form of the child's name or a term of endearment) to the child's full name,
employing a more distal address term to emphasize the imposing nature of her speech act. In
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a dispute between professional colleagues, one interlocutor could switch from the usual
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address term (most likely title plus last name) to last name alone, which in modern English
society would be a more intimate address term, thus not showing the expected deference and
threatening face.
One of the most interesting phenomenon of address term usage is when a usually
marked and face-threatening usage becomes part of a positive politeness strategy. In 19th

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century Britain, schoolboys in public schools were addressed by their teachers by their
surname alone, according to an asymmetric address term system that emphasized the power
relationship between teachers and students. But when those schoolboys grew older, they still
sometimes addressed each other by last name alone, in what has now become an attempt to
emphasize the solidarity between the two interlocutors. Equally, it is often observed that

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friends, usually among young people, address each other by terms of abuse, turning a facethreatening act into one of solidarity and intimacy.
In sum, it has been shown that politeness and address term usage are highly
intertwined. Address terms are mostly used unmarked, according to the rules of society, thus
reinforcing established politeness strategies. When address terms are used which violate the

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established system, it is often a purposeful attempt to threaten someone's face, hence it is part
of a strategy of negative politeness.
Literature:
Mazzon, G. 2010. Address Terms, In: Jucker, A. H., and I. Taavitsainen (eds.). Historical
Pragmatics. Berlin: de Gruyter Mouton, 351-378.

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Taavitsainen, I., Jucker, A.H (eds.). 2003. Diachronic Perspectives on Address Term Systems.
Amsterdam: John Benjamins.

Yule, G. 1996. Pragmatics. Oxford: OUP