Politeness between Native Speakers of Japanese as seen through Speech Level Control(<Special Issue>Interpersonal Functions in Language and Linguistic Politeness)

Abstract

In order to examine two aspects of politeness: language use based on social norms and strategic language use, the author analyzed the data of 37 pairs of conversations between complete stranger same sex university students to examine their speech level control. One of the most powerful social norms of politeness was to set the same basic speech level when they were paired with a partner of equal social power. Showing "approach", level of formality, etc. by setting the basic speech level or by speech level shift can be considered to be another side of politeness, that of strategic language use.