Politeness strategies in informal memorandum

Abstract

Getting someone to do something is possibly threatening to the hearer’s face by restricting the person’s freedom (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Furthermore, making an appointment with a professor is a possible threat to the hearer’s negative face. This study therefore aims firstly, to investigate the politeness strategies used by a group of university students through informal memoranda communication with a professor and secondly, to compare those strategies by focusing on the sex variable. The findings reveal that in this face-threatening act, the students mostly rely on bald strategy. By contrast, on-record strategy giving options to the hearer, and the combination of bald strategy and on-record strategy giving options to the hearer are the least frequently used strategies. Regarding the sex of speakers, the results show that both male and female students mostly rely on similar strategies. The sex variable seems not to affect politeness strategy choices in this study.