PERSONAL-ORIENTED VS. STATUS-ORIENTED COMMUNICATIVE STYLES: BRITISH AND PERSIAN FAMILY SETTING

Abstract. Politeness, in many perspectives, is a universal phenomenon. However, through several cross-cultural studies, it has been strongly endeavored to show that understanding of politeness as well as norms of politeness differ culture to culture (Culpeper J., & et al., 2017, Leech, 2005, 2014, Leech & Larina, 2014, Larina, 2008, 2009, 2015, Reiter, 1999, 2000, Sifianou, 1992 among many others). Cultural values make communicative styles through which people find the way of constructing communication. The aim of this study is to illustrate how British and Persian cultural values shape the style of interpersonal interactions between parents-children and children-parents in family setting. We analyze the norms and politeness strategies by concentrating on two speech acts of “addressing” and “requesting” which are regularly used through people’s daily interactions. The material for the study was collected from a discourse completion task (DCT) filled in by 120 British and Persian objects which are affirmed by our ethnographic observations. The obtained data has been analyzed based on (im)politeness theory, speech act theory, cross-cultural pragmatic and discourse analysis, research on identity construct and politeness influence on communicative styles. Established on our results, in British family, communicative styles in top-down (parents-children) and bottom-up (children-parents) contexts are direct, succinct and personaloriented. Meanwhile, in Persian family, due to a high index of power distance in this culture, communicative styles are direct and succinct in top-down context and indirect and elaborate in bottom-up context. Our findings reveal that in Persian family, communicative styles in top-down context are status-oriented.

Keywords: politeness, communicative styles, personal-oriented, status-oriented

Neda Kameh Khosh

Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (RUDN University) Moscow, Russia e-mail: Kamekh_khosh_n@pfur.ru

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