CHAPTER INTRODUCTION
This chapter discusses about
background of the study, research problems, objectives of the study, scope and limitation,
significance of the study, and definition
of the key terms. Each step discusses as follows: 1.1
Background of the Study Politeness is a strategy of people in being
polite to build a harmony in term of
communication. Lakoff in Elen (2001: 2) defines politeness as “a system of interpersonal relations designed to facilitate
interaction by min imizing the potential
of conflict and confrontation inherent
in all human interchange.” In other words,
politeness helps us to avoid conflict which possibly happens in our daily lifes. Therefore, it is very important to
understand the norm of politeness and apply
it well when we are conversing with others.
Moreover, as human beings, people
need language for interaction in their community
to transfer their ideas without any misunderstanding between them.
However, it seems impossible for
people to interact with others without language in their daily life. By language, people can
express their feeling, opinion, ambitions,
willing etc. in other words; it means that language is one of ways to explore people’s idea that relates to the real
life in their daily communication.
Therefore, in case of
communication, people need politeness strategy in order to get a good respons from the hearers. Holmes (1992: 296-297)
states that being polite involves
speaking to people appropriately in the light of their Create PDFfiles without this message by
purchasing novaPDF printer (http://www.novapdf.com) relationship to us, understanding
the social values of a society, and understanding the dimension of formality. For example, if
someone wants to refuse his friend who
invite him to his party, he could say, “it sounds like a good idea exactly, but
unfortunately I am really so busy
nowadays, maybe it will be next time”. This kind of refusal will keep the face of the
hearer since the speaker uses reason and promise strategy of positive politeness.
On the other hand, as being
suggested by Brown and Levinson (1978) that recognizes what people are doing in verbal
exchange (e.g. requesting, offering, criticizing,
complaining, etc) not so much by what they overtly claim to do as in the fine linguistics details of utterances. In
sum, the theory above means that when somebody
has a conversation, he also has to pay attention on the hearer’s feeling.
It is because; beside the good
way of speaking that we must have, to understand others’ feeling is also an important point of
communication. Therefore, using politeness strategies while having conversation
with someone is one of the ways to make
them comfortable with the topics.
Moreover, Allah has been giving
us direction in being polite when we converse with others. There are some verses of
the Qur’an that tells us about the way
of talking. For example in the verse of Al Baqoroh; 263.
“Kind Words and forgiving of faults are better
than Sadaqah (charity) followed by
injury. And Allâh is rich (Free of All wants) and He is MostForbearing.” Create
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(http://www.novapdf.com) That verse indicates that the good way of
communication is by choosing the good
words and always forgiving when a mistake occurs. Therefore, both of people who are in a conversation do not feel
embarrassed or even injured each other.
This kind of way is by being polite exactly.
Furthermore, being polite is
actually not an easy thing to do, because it is not only emphasizing on the way of people
communicate with others but also the social
and the cultural value of with whom they interact. According to Holmes (1992: 296) being polite is a complicated
business in any language since it involves
understanding not only the language but also the social and cultural values of the community. Moreover, Brown and
Levinson (1987: 15-17) states that there
are three sociological factors which are crucial in determining the level of politeness. They are ‘social distance’,
‘power’ and ‘imposition’. The level of politeness
in terms of consideration of the risks involved in choosing each of these strategies: positive politeness precedes
negative, and negative precedes off record.
Besides, language can not be
separated from the community of the user.
Moreover, when we are in a
conversation with someone, we must pay attention with the social context of the speaker. Grundy
(2000: 146) states that the important
characteristics of the social context of the person spoken to, and in particular, the role relationship and relative
status of the participants in a discourse.
It means that the status of people influence the way of communication.
For example, when we have a
conversation with somebody who comes from an equal rank, automatically, the communication
will go smoothly and relax without any
pressure. But, it will be different when the status of the speaker and the
hearer Create PDFfiles without this
message by purchasing novaPDF printer (http://www.novapdf.com) is not in the
same rank, the conversation will be more formal and not relax, such as the older to the younger. Therefore, we
need to know more about politeness strategies
to build the harmony of our communication.
According to Brown and Levinson
(1987: 68), politeness strategies are developed
in order to save the hearer’s “face.” Face refers to the respect that an individual has for him or herself, and
maintaining that “self -esteem” in public or in private situations (Brown an d Levinson,
1987: 61). In some cases, we are supposed
to avoid embarrassing the other person, or making them feel uncomfortable. Face threatening Acts (FTA’s)
are acts that infringe on the hearers’
need to maintain his/her self-esteem, and be respected. Politeness strategies are developed for the main purpose
of dealing with these FTA’s. In addition,
there are four types of politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson that sum up human “politeness”
behavior: Bald on Record, Negative Politeness,
Positive Politeness, and Off-Record-indirect strategy. Each strategy is used differently depending on the situations.
Bald On record is a condition
where someone wants to do the FTA with maximum
efficiency more than he wants to satisfy the hearer’s face, even to any degree (Bolinger in Goody, 1986: 100). It means that the
speaker expresses his need directly and
usually in imperative forms. For example, when a student forgets to bring his pen and he wants someone
sitting next to him lend him a pen, the
student could say “Give me a pen.” Positive politeness is an action which is
oriented toward the positive face of hearer,
the positive self-image that the hearer claims for them. Its approach Create
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(http://www.novapdf.com) based is usually in the form of treating the hearers
as a member of an in group, a friend, a
person who wants and personality traits are known and liked etc. For example, the student will say “Hey Buddy, I’d
appreciate it if you lend me one of your
pen because I missed my pen at home”. Here, the speaker tries to intimate and treats the hearer as a close friend by
addressing the hearer using “Buddy”.
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