Admonishing

Abstract This paper examines the pragmatic properties of what we define as a ritual act ‘admonishing’. We argue that admonishing represents historically embedded realisation type speech Suggest. explore in ancient Chinese political and governance texts dated before 2nd century BC. The results our analysis show often not only affords but even triggers paradoxical behaviour. paradox stems from fact that, many historical linguacultures like Chinese, was directed at recipient, most typically ruler, who more highly ranked than admonisher himself. While this context normally precluded threatening recipient’s face, realised frame which such face threat deindividuated. In pragmatics, research gap exists study admonishing, so current fills knowledge gap.