On the role of maximization in verbal politeness

Re-examining politeness, face and the Japanese language

“…Kubota (1993:152), like B&L, claims that the origin of the use of -masu is in the referent honorific with humble value mairasu ('to give': Toyama 1977). The stabilization of that meaning becomes the condition for extending the use of the form to new contexts, which generates a functional shift that is never totally arbitrary (B&L, 1987:277, andHeld, 1989). This is consistent with Matsumoto's (1993:64) assertion that -masu uses originate in 'rankordering', but the etymology underscores the strategic exploitation of an indexing device.…”

“…Many of B&L's negative strategies are easily found in Japanese, but positive politeness strategies have received only fleeting attention (Held 1989;Scollon and Scollon 1983;Kasper 1990: 195), despite B&L's rather provocative claim that the Japanese can be characterized as a 'negative politeness culture' (see Matsumoto 1988:408). However, if positive politeness has to do with the need to be appreciated, there is no reason why this appreciation cannot be generalized to any behaviour that ratifies the hearer's relevant attributes, i.e.…”

Otra vez sobre las funciones de la intensificación en la conversación coloquial

“…Lo atenuado (mediante el empleo del condicional, el argumento de necesidad y el de justificación) es la propia acción de pedir. ha mostrado en los ejemplos de (3) y han destacado varios autores (Kerbrat-Orecchioni 1996;Held 1989;Carrasco Santana 1999;Albelda 2003Albelda y 2005Briz 2007;Barros 2011; Albelda y Barros 2013).…”

A Gender-based Approach to Parliamentary Discourse

“…-as a device -as a pragmatic function -as a strategy Held (1989) considers it a device and speaks of maximisation: 'any kind of verbal utterance which is strengthened, intensified o focused in order to increase the obligations it establishes on the illocutionary and on the interactional levels' (Held, 1989: 168). Other authors have described it in semantic terms, associated with features of quantification (Suñer and Roca, 1997-98;Suñer and Rafel, 1999;Lamíquiz 1991), gradation (Ramos, 1993;Madero, 1983;Martín García, 1998;Portero, 1997) or superlativeness (Lago, 1965-67;Carnicer, 1975;González Calvo, 1984-88).…”