9._Solidarity_and_politeness.ppt

1 “What” and “How” we speak? When we speak, we must constantly make choices of many different kinds: a. what we want to say; b. how we want to say it; c. the specific sentences types, words, and sounds that best unite the what with the how. How we say something is at least as important as what we say. One way of looking at this relationship is to examine a few aspects of communication: a. pronominal choice between tu and vous forms in languages that require a choice; b. the use of naming and address terms; c. the employment of politeness markers. Tu and Vous 1 The T/ V distinction began as a genuine difference between singular and plural. Tu and Vous 2 A classification of a semantic contrast in the pronominal systems of different languages: Language type T-form V-form Latin tu vos Greek esi esis English thou you French tu vous Russian ty vy Italian tu lei German du sie Spanish tu usetcd Mandarin Chinese ni nin Japanese omae / kimi anata Common practices in using T/ V distinction: a. Giving T but receiving V, the asymmetrical T/V usage symbolizes a power relationship. b. Symmetrical V usage became “polite” usage. c. Symmetrical T usage was always available to show intimacy, and its use for that purpose also spread to situations in which two people agreed they had strong a feeling of solidarity. d. This mutual T for solidarity came to replace the mutual V of politeness, since solidarity is more important than politeness in daily communication. Tu and Vous 3 In 1960, Brown and Gilman published the thesis of The pronoun of Power and Solidarity and opened the research in address forms and pronouns of sociolinguistics through making a study of developing process of European languages’ pronouns symmetrical pragmatic system, one is power 权势语义 and the other is solidarity 等同语义 . ◆ V — respect and politeness; T — familiarity and informality. Researches on T/V distinction and their results: Brown and Gilman’s study of how upper-class Fr