Language use as principle:
The politeness principle
Shaozhong Liu, Ph.D. (Pragmatics) /
Ph.D. (Higher Education)
College of Foreign Studies,
Guilin University of Electronic Technology
Homepage: www.gxnu.edu.cn/Personal/szliu
Blog: cyrusliu.blog.163.com
Email: shaozhong@hotmail.com
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The problem
• Why do people speak indirectly or directly,
which they both do? Examples:
1) Take a look at this.
2) Clean up the kitchen.
3) Pass the salt.
4) Have some more cake.
5) Peel these potatoes.
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More examples
6) Set the table.
7) Can you set the table?
8) Could I possibly ask you to set the table?
…
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The literature gap
• Austin, Searle, Grice, none addressed the
above question: why do people speak
directly or indirectly? How to explain the
above discreet utterances in terms of the
CP, or SAT?
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Synopsis
1. The Principles of Pragmatics
2. With the CP already, why the PP?
3. What is the PP?
4. The explanatory adequacy of the PP
5. Foundations of the PP
6. Issues of the PP
7. References
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1. The Principles of Pragmatics
• In 1983, with R. H. Robins (University of
London), and G. N. Leech (University of
Lancaster) as General editors, Longman
Publisher Ltd published Longman
Linguistics Library series which consists of
30 titles, including The Principles of
Pragmatics.
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• Here’s the Contents of The Principles of
Pragmatics:
1. Introduction ( 1.1 historical preamble, 1.2
semantics and pragmatics, 1.3 general pragmatics,
1.4 aspects of speech situations, 1.5 rhetoric)
2. A set of postulates (2.1 semantic representation
and pragmatic interpretation, 2.2 rules and
principles, 2.3 convention and motivation, 2.4 the
relation between sense and force, 2.5 pragmatics
as problem-solving, 2.6 conclusion)
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3. Formalism ad functionalism (3.1 formal and
functional explanation, 3.2 biological,
psychological, and social varieties of functionalism,
3.3 the ideational, interpersonal, and textual
functions of language, 3.4 the ideational function:
discreteness and determinacy, 3.5 examples of
‘overgeneralization’, 3.6 conclusion)
4. The interpersonal roles of the Cooperative
Principle (4.1 the CP and the PP, 4.2 maxims of
quantity and quality, 4.3 maxim of relation, 4.4 the
hinting strategy and anticipatory illocutions, 4.5
maxim of manner)
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5. The Tact Maxim (5.1 varieties of illocutionary
function, 5.2 Searle’s categories of illocutionary
acts, 5.3 Tact: one kind of politeness, 5.4
pragmatic paradoxes of politeness, 5.5 semantic
representation of declaratives, interrogatives and
imperatives, 5.6 the interpretation of impositibves,
5.7 pragmatic scales, 5.8 tact and condescension)
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6. A survey of the Interpersonal Rhetoric (6.1
maxims of politeness, 6.2 metalinguistic aspects
of politeness, 6.3 irony and banter, 6.4 hyperbole
and litotes, 6.5 conclusion)
7. Communicative Grammar: an example (7.1
communicative grammar and pragmatic force,
7.2 remarks on pragmatic metalanguage, 7.3
some aspects negation and interrogation in
English)
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8. Performatives (8.1 the performative and
illocutionary-verb fallacies, 8.2 the speech act
theories of Austin and Searle, 8.3 illocutionary
performatives: descriptive and non-descriptive
approaches, 8.4 illocutionary performatives and
oratio obliqua, 8.5 the pragmatics of illocutionary
performatives, 8.6 the performative hypothesis,
8.7 the extended performative hypothesis, 8.8
conclusion)
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9. Speech-act verbs in English (9.1 locutionary,
illocutionary, and perlocutionary, 9.2 a survey of
speech-act verb classes, 9.3 is there a separate
class of performative verbs? 9.4 a semantic
analysis of some illocutionary verbs, 9.5 assertive
verbs, 9.6 conclusion)
10. Retrospect and prospect
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• Notice that this book is about principles of
language use, implying there are many apart from
the CP and the PP. Among them are the Irony
Principle (p.79-83), the Banter Principle (p. 144).
But Leech chooses to elaborate on the
relationship between the CP and the PP and how
these two can be combined to form a robust
pragmatic theory.
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2. With the CP already, why the PP?
1) Please appreciate Leech’s Preface as an abstract
of his book.
2) Leech’s definition of pragmatics:
Pragmatics can be usefully defined as the study of
how utterances have meanings in situations.
(Preface)
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3) Leech’s purpose in The Principles of
Pragmatics:
Present a complementary view of pragmatics
within an overall program for studying
language as a communication system,
namely studying the use of a language as
distinct from, but complementary to, the
language itself seen as a formal system
treated in grammar.
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To do this, it is necessary to develop theories and
methods of description peculiar to pragmatics
itself and show that these are different from those
appropriate to grammar. In this way, it is hoped
that the domain of pragmatics is delimited from
grammar and at the same time the two fields
combine within an integrated framework for
studying language. (Preface)
To postulate principles and maxims to explain the
relation between sense and force in human
communication (p.131)
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4) Pragmatic framework: Literature review
• Up to the early 1980s, there were little literature
on the development of pragmatic paradigms.
• Austin-Searle formulated a view of meaning in
terms of illocutionary force.
• H.P. Grice formulated another view of meaning
in terms of conversational implicature.
• These are the strongest influences on the
formation of pragmatic theories.
• But Leech tried to be novel, creative and original.
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5) With the CP already, why the PP?
• Pp.79 onward, 4.1 discusses the need of the CP
and meanwhile the insufficiency of the CP, in
interpersonal communication.
• We need the CP to help account for the relation
between sense and force, and this kind of
explanation is particularly welcome where it
solves puzzles which arise in a truth-based
approach to semantics.
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• However, the CP can’t explain: i) why people are
often so indirect in conveying what they mean;
and ii) what is the relation between sense and
force when no-declarative types of sentence are
being considered.
• Grice himself, and others who have invoked the
CP, have understandably reflected the logician’s
traditional concern with truth, and hence with
propositional meaning; whereas Leech in
interested in a broader, socially and
psychologically oriented application of pragmatic
principles.
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• Objections to Grice’s CP on the grounds that it
doesn’t stand up to the evidence of real language
use:
1) Conversational constraints such as the CP don’t
work because most declarative sentences don’t
have an information-bearing function (Larkin &
O’Malley, 1973).
2) Maxims of the CP are not universal to language,
because there are linguistic communities to
which not all of them apply (Keenan, 1974).
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• Leech: My first observation on these criticisms is
that they are not necessarily so damning as they
look. To reject the CP on purely quantitative
grounds would be to mistake maxims for statistical
norms—which they are not. And no claim has been
made that the CP applies in an identical manner to
all societies. Indeed, one of the main purposes of
socio-pragmatics, as I envisage it, is to find out how
different societies operate maxims in different ways,
for example by giving politeness a higher rating
than cooperation in certain situations, or by giving
precedence to one maxim of the PP rather than
another.
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So it must be admitted that the CP is in a weak
position if apparent exceptions to it can’t be
satisfactorily explained. It is for this reason that
the PP can be seen as not just another principle to
be added to the CP, but as a necessary
complement, which rescues the CP from serious
trouble. (p.80)
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6) Leech’s hypothesis or thesis:
Pragmatics as well as communication is problemsolving or goal-oriented and evaluative.
A speaker or communicator has to solve the
problem: ‘Given that I want to bring about suchand-such a result in the hearer’s consciousness,
what is the best way to accomplish this aim by
using language?’
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A hearer has another kind of problem to solve:
‘Given that the speaker said such-and-such, what
did the speaker mean me to understand by that?’
(Preface)
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7) Method of study: rhetorical approach to
pragmatics, whereby the speaker is seen as trying
to achieve his aims within constraints imposed by
principles and maxims of ‘good communicative
behavior’, which embody, among others, Grice’s
CP, and others such as politeness and irony
principles. (Preface)
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3. What is the PP?
1) Far from being a superficial matter of ‘being
civil’, politeness is an important missing link
between the CP and the problem of how to relate
sense and force (p.104).
2) Politeness concerns a relationship between two
participants whom we may call self and other. In
conversation, self will normally be identified
with s, and other will typically be identified with
h and other third-person pronouns.
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3) The maxims of the PP tend to go in pairs as
follows (p. 132):
(I) Tact maxim (in impositives and commissives)
(a) Minimize cost to other [(b) Maximize benefit
to other]
(II) Generosity maxim (in expressives and
commissives)
(a) Minimize benefit to self [(b) Maximize benefit
to other]
(III) Approbation maxim (in expressives and
commissives)
(a) Minimize dispraise of other [(b) Maximize
praise of other]
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(IV) Modesty maxim (in expressives assertives)
(a) Minimize praise of self [(b) Maximize praise
of other]
(V) Agreement maxim (in assertives)
(a) Minimize disagreement between self and
other [(b) Maximize agreement between self and
other]
(VI) Sympathy maxim (in assertives)
(a) Minimize antipathy between self and other [(b)
Maximize sympathy between self and other]
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4. The explanatory adequacy
of the PP
• Tact maxim: examples on pages 104-130.
• Other maxims: Pages 131-151.
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5. Foundations of the PP
1) Rhetoric
2) The CP, especially Grice’s suggestion to try
other factors including politeness and relevance,
etc..
3) Criticisms of the CP
4) Brown and Levinson’s (1978) study of politeness,
face, and FTA
5) Cross-cultural communication studies (pragmatic
failure (Thomas, 1982)
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6. Issues of the PP
1) Too many maxims
2) Short-circuitedness of the PP maxims in crosscultures or languages
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7. References
H. P. Grice: Logic and conversation. In Grice
(1968/1975): Studies in the way of words.
Harvard University Press.
G. N. Leech: Principles of Pragmatics. London:
Longman.
P. Brown and S. Levinson: Universals in language
usage: politeness phenomena. In E. N. Goody
(ed.) (1978): Questions and Politeness:
Strategies in Social Interaction. Cambridge:
CUP.
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