A SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDY OF POLITENESS EXPRESSION IN IGBO: A CASE STUDY OF ERQ XLQ SPEECH COMMUNITY (
ABSTRACT
The main thrust of this study is to identify the politeness expression and strategies used in Erq xlq speech community. The study examines the concept of politeness. It discusses politeness expression strategies as they occur in Erq xlq speech community. It explains the various ways of expressing politeness in Erq xlq speech community.
It finally highlights the sociolinguistic implications of adopting politeness strategies during speech in Erq xlq speech community.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Linguistics politeness is the way people choose to speak and how the hearers react to their speech.
Udosen (2006) observes that languages is a social instrument without which our human interaction would suffer.
The most universal forms of language behaviour are those used to show our routine needs, professional and social. No one is free to say just what one likes in whatever form of discourse. Rather, our conversation is a prescribed ritual in which an individual generally says what his fellow men expects him to say, observing the pragmatic rules, though unconsciously. In our societies today, living in harmony with nature, conforming to the norms of our common experience is the right conduct of interlocutors and politeness is that aspect of social behaviour which promotes harmonious living with nature and conformity to the norms of our common experience.
Coulmans as cited in Dioka (2009) claims that being polite is not an attribute of language but it depends on the interlocutors in a given speech situation. Politeness is socially determined, it is linked with social differentiations with making appropriates choices which may not be the same for everybody. Politeness criteria are not the same in different cultures, sometimes speaking indirectly is considered more polite than speaking directly like the Erq xlq dialect of Igbo.
1.1 Background to the Study
According to Yule (1995), Politeness, in an interaction can then be defined as the means employed to show awareness of another person’s face. In this sense politeness can be accomplished in situations of social distance or closeness. Showing awareness for another person’s face when that other seems socially distant is often described in terms of respect or deference.
