Description

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This volume looks at politeness phenomena in a culture and country that is becoming the most influential in the world. It is the first book to survey politeness variations across different genres in Chinese and fills a gap in both politeness research in general and in Chinese politeness research in particular.

Unlike existing studies which treat Chinese politeness phenomena as non-varying this study provides systemic evidence for how linguistic polite behaviour varies across genres in China. These intracultural variations which are investigated in the volume include addressing, backchanneling, identity construction and rapport management which are subject to the influence of genre differences such as formality of occasion, media and channel of communication, presence or absence of interlocutor or third party and role-configurations. The volume offers those who read or write Chinese texts or engage in Chinese conversation an enriched knowledge of how politeness as the most important type of interpersonal meaning is communicated in different genres in that language.

About the Author

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Xinren Chen is Professor of English and Linguistics in the School of Foreign Studies at Nanjing University, P. R. China and is co-editor of East Asian Pragmatics. He has published papers in pragmatics and foreign language teaching in journals such as Journal of Pragmatics, Foreign Language Teaching and Research, Modern Foreign Languages and Contemporary Linguistics. The major monographs he authors or co-authors include Contemporary Pragmatics, English Grammar in Use, The Pragmatics of Overinformativeness in Conversation, A Critical Pragmatic Perspective on Public Discourse, Politeness Theories and Foreign Language Learning and Pragmatics and Foreign Language Teaching.