Politeness: a relevant issue for relevance theory

A Benchmark for Politeness

K. Allan () Monash University, Melbourne, Australia e-mail: [email protected] Abstract (Im)politeness is never a depersonalized, decontextualized absolute but always a perception or judgement of appropriate behaviour on a given occasion—what one expects oneself and others to do in a particular social interaction. Nevertheless, it is normal for most tabooed words and phrases to be castigat...

Is Relevance Relevant?

Introduction In a plenary session at last year's IMP conference a number of academics, of which I was one, debated the issue of relevance. This was not the first time that such a debate has occurred and it is clear that it will not be the last since opinions are divided, often sharply. In this paper I attempt to examine the issue from a broader perspective than is usual in the IMP group or in t...

Functional relevance of the precuneus in verbal politeness.

Non-competitive and non-threatening aspects of social hierarchy, such as politeness, are universal among human cultures, and might have evolved from ritualized submission in primates; however, these behaviors have rarely been studied. Honorific language is a type of polite linguistic communication that plays an important role in human social interactions ranging from everyday conversation to in...

Title Functional relevance of the precuneus in verbal politeness

Non-competitive and non-threatening aspects of social hierarchy, such as politeness, are universal among human cultures, and might have evolved from ritualized submission in primates; however, these behaviors have rarely been studied. Honorific language is a type of polite linguistic communication that plays an important role in human social interactions ranging from everyday conversation to in...

Three levels in politeness theory and practice