Chapter One  Introduction

1.1 Background

Politeness and impoliteness are both very important aspects in social communication. But compared with politeness, the study of impoliteness is rather inadequate. With the development of pragmatic theories, especially Grice’s CP, Brown &Levinson’s Face-saving Theory, Leech’s PP, Conversational Analysis Theory and Verschueren’s Adaptation Theory, politeness and critical researches on politeness have always been one of the focuses of study in the field of sociolinguistics, cognitive linguistics as well as pragmatics. However, impoliteness, the contradictory of politeness, which occurs also quite often in daily communication and should have equally been studied as politeness has, has been largely ignored. In fact, impoliteness in conflictive talk is not marginal human phenomena. It happens in our real life everyday. After being valued in pragmatics, the research on impoliteness has been fully developed recently.

As for the pragmatic identity construction, it has been made some products in the past twenty years. According to its emphasis, the study of identity construction can be divided into three stages: the first stage, it mainly focus on the pragmatic signs and the type of identities. Such as the institutional and professional identity（Van De Mieroop，2007）constructed in the conversation. The second stage came to the relationships between identity construction and face or (im)politeness. Spencer-Oatey(2007) analyzed the identity and face base on Simon’s theory of Social Psychological (2004). The third stage paid the attention on constructing the identity under the frame of (im)politeness theory. Many scholars believed that the identity was constructed by the speaker and the hearer. Garcés-Conejos Blitvich(2013)pointed that the identity in communication could cause the comment on (im)politeness. And with out the testify of the identity ,there is no comment on (im)politeness. This study belongs to the third stage, and the author wants to explore how identity constructed through impoliteness. The previous researches on this subject mainly based on the Adaptation Theory, here the author also adopts this theory as well as Face Theory, because these theories have vfully developed nowadays.

Being one of Austine’s famous novel, Pride and Prejudice has been studied by many scholars from different perspectives since it was published in 1813. And it has been produced in to many versions of films, then some scholars made some comments on these versions of films. However, few scholars have analyzed the film Pride and Prejudice in a way of identity construction. The conversations in this film mainly happens in daily life. By analyzing the identities and impoliteness in this film will present a new perspective for better understanding and appreciation of this film as well as a better understanding the impoliteness in our real life.

1.2 Objective of the Present Study 

   In this study, the data are collected from the film Pride and Prejudice. In order to analyze the pragmatic identity constructed by these impolite utterances in characters’ daily conversation. Here the author will focus on the three factors. Firstly,  the author wants to find the realization of impoliteness in the conversations of Pride and Prejudice,based on the strategies classified by Culpeper (2006) and Bousfield( 2008a). Secondly, this study will pay attention to the procedure of pragmatic identity construction. Thirdly, this study is also going to analyze the pragmatical functions behind the identity construction by using the impoliteness.

1.3 Significance of the Study

   The present study is of great significance for its theoretical contribution to the existing impoliteness and identity construction researches and its practical application in interaction.

   Firstly, theoretically speaking, this study differs from the previous studies in that

it has investigated dynamics of impoliteness in extended discourses. In other words, it

seeks to account for the triggering, responding and final resolution of impolite  exchanges, which extends the scope of impoliteness study from the traditional micro discourse level to the macro discourse level. And the present study tries to give a clear explanation of identity construction from a pragmatic perspective. The previous studies of identity mainly focus on its constitutive nature, but fewer on the systematic analysis of its generation and interpretation. This study will have a new explanation of the extensive usage of Linguistic Adaption Theory, Conversational Analysis Theory, and Face-saving Theory. In a word, this study is an interdisciplinary research, which will provide a wider perspective and, fascinating insights for the existing research. It is hoped that the present study would broaden the scope of identity research.

    Secondly, from the view of practical use, this study aims to explore the pragmatic identity constructed by using impoliteness utterances in the conversation from the film Pride and Prejudice. Findings of the study will help those people who are the targets of impolite utterances. Alter analyzing the data, this study will find out the strategic realizations of impoliteness to construct identity, which may be used and the effective linguistic defense options that are available. These findings will equip one with a powerful tool in defending face and moving an impolite exchange towards a peaceful resolution. Thus, one will find it easier lo maintain one's identity when facing with a confrontational, inharmonious situation. What's more, this research will help people have a better understanding of the film in a new way.

1.4 Overview of the Study 

This study is composed of five chapters.

Chapter One is the introduction of this study. In this chapter, the background, objectives and significance of the present study will be introduced, and then a terminology will be described.

Chapter Two is the literature review about the research on impoliteness and identity construction and the previous study on Pride and Prejudice will also be introduced. In addition, the related theories such as linguistic adaption theory, conversational analysis theory and social construction view are also elaborated in this chapter.

Chapter Three is something about the research design and methodology. In this chapter, three research questions are introduced and data collection , data description and data analysis will also be analyzed.

Chapter Four is the major part of this study. It is going to analyze these data collected in Pride and Prejudice based on the theories of linguistic adaption theory, conversational analysis theory and Face Theory. During this process, firstly , the writer will pick out these impoliteness utterances based on the strategies classified by Culpeper (2006) and Bousfield ( 2008a). And the author will analysis this procedure on the guidance of conversational analysis theory. Then, the author will analyze these collected conversations based on the Linguistic Adaption Theory. In this part , what and how the pragmatic identity constructed will be illustrated. Lastly, the pragmatic functions will be analyzed in detail.

Chapter Five will be the conclusion of this study. In this chapter, a summary of the present study, the major findings and the limitations and suggestions for future research will be further described.

1.5 Terminology 

1)Impoliteness: Impoliteness is a kind of speech act, occurring in a specific context, utters by speaker, intently or not, to attack the hearer’s face and identity. And the hearer judged his /her face was threatened then accept or counter the offense.

2)On-record impoliteness: It is kind of impoliteness strategy, by using impoliteness utterance directly. Such as using critical or aggressive words, taboo words, threatening, avoiding agreement, interrupting and so on.

3)Off-record impoliteness: It is kind of impoliteness strategy, by using impoliteness utterance indirectly. Such as using sarcasm, rhetorical devices, withholding of politeness, shifting topic, implying and so on.

4)Identity : Simply it means who or what sb/sth is. In this paper, the identity also  refers to a person’s family background and position.

5)Pragmatic Identity: Language user constructs his or her social identity in a contextualized situation intentionally or not. It is not the original identity of the speaker, but a kind of identity constructed temporally.

Chapter Two  Literature  Review

2.1 Research on Impoliteness

2.1.1 Definition of Impoliteness

    As an emerging theory, the study will first begin from its definitions. By surveying the thesis and monographs that studies on impoliteness in recent years, we can find that there is no agreement on its definitions. The following definitions (1), (2),(5) and (6), which I extract from the papers, are the same as the ones that collected by Culpeper in his book Impoliteness: Using Language to Cause Offence (Culpeper 2011: 19-21).

    1) [rude behavior] does not utilize politeness strategies where they would be expected, in such a way that the utterance can only almost plausibly be interpreted as

intentionally and negatively confrontational (Lakoff 1989:103).

2) … rudeness is defined as a face threatening act (FTA) – or feature of an FTA such as intonation – which violates a socially sanctioned norm of interaction of the social context in which it occurs (Beebe 1995:159).

    3) … impoliteness, the use of strategies that are designed to have the opposite

effect that of social disruption (Culpeper 1996: 350).

4) ... impoliteness has to be seen as an assessment of someone’s behavior rather

than a quality intrinsic to an utterance (Mills 2003: 122).

5) … impoliteness, the use of communicative strategies designed to attack face, and thereby cause social conflict and disharmony (Culpeper 2003:1546).

6) Impoliteness comes about whe, n (1) the speaker communicates face attack intentionally, or (2) the hearer perceives and/ or constructs behavior as intentionally

face-attacking, or a combination of (1) and (2) (Culpeper 2005:38).

    The followings from (7) to (13) are excerpted from the book of Bousfield and Locher (2008) Impoliteness in Language: Studies on Its Interplay with Power in Theory and Practice and which coincide with Lowe’s book review: Impoliteness in Language: Studies on Its Interplay with Power in Theory and Practice (Lowe 2009:1866). And where the sentence is short of a subject, that is the word “impoliteness”.

    7) … communicative behavior intending to cause the ‘face loss’ of a target or perceived by the target to be so (Culpeper 2008:36).

    8) … impoliteness occurs when the expression used is not conventionalized relative to the context of occurrence; it threatens the addressee’s face but no face-threatening intention is attributed to the speaker by the hearer (Terkourafi 2008:70).

    9) ‘impoliteness’ should be seen as a first order concept, i.e., a judgement made by a participant in an interaction with respect to the appropriateness or inappropriateness of the social behavior of co-participants (Locher & Watts 2008:77).

    10) the issuing of intentionally gratuitous and conflictive face-threatening acts (FTAs) that are purposefully performed (Bousfield 2008: 132).

    11) uttering a threat in a confrontation beyond appropriate conduct and deliberately attack the other person’s face (Limberg 2008:167).

    12) linguistic behavior motivated by some personal sense of spite (Archer 2008:191).

    13) infringing the norms of appropriate behavior that prevail in particular contexts and among particular interlocutors (Schnurr et al.2008: 216).

14) Impoliteness is a negative attitude towards a specific behaviors occurring in specific contexts. It is sustained by expectations, desires and /or beliefs about social organization, including, in particular, how one person’s or a group’s identities are mediated by others in interaction. Situated behaviors are viewed negatively – considered ‘impolite’ – when they conflict with how one expects them to be, how one wants them to be and/ or how one thinks they ought to be. Such behaviors always have or are presumed to have emotional consequences for at least one participant, that is, they cause or are presumed to cause offense. Various factors can exacerbate how offensive an impolite behavior is taken to be, including for example whether one understands a behavior to be strongly intentional or not (Culpeper 2011: 23).

The following two definitions (15) and (16) are from Chinese researchers Zhang Damao (2009) and Zhou Dan (2011).

    15) 不礼貌言语是与一定条件下言语规范相违背的话，是基于交际双方所推定的彼此之间语用距离的一种不适应性，是动态的且具有相对性，可体现反面也可体现正面的交际价值 (Impolite speech is the utterance which violates the norms under the certain context and the inadaptability of pragmatic distance which the

interactants perceive. It is dynamic and has relativity. It can both reflect the negative

and the positive communication value.)(Zhang Damao 2009:205)。

     16) 不礼貌是说者有意或无意给出冒犯听者的或者违反社会规范的话语,而且听者确定认为自己的面子受到威肋，从而引起显性或隐性的社会矛盾或不和谐

的言语行为 (Impoliteness is what the speaker utters, intently or not, to offend the hearer or violate the social norms, and the hearer confirms that his own face is threatened, thus, cause either overt or covert social contradiction or disharmonious speech act.)(Zhou Dan 2011:128)。

    From the definitions we can clearly and easily see the process of studying on impoliteness. Early years in the 70-80s of 20th century, the research focused on aggression/ aggressive behavior, or rudeness/ rudeness behavior. And it was Culpeper who first used the word “impoliteness” in his first paper Towards an anatomy of impoliteness in 1996 and then it has been used until now. And Culpeper (2008) also differentiates the word “rudeness” from “impoliteness”. In China, “bulimao (不礼貌)”, as Chinese characters of “impoliteness”, is used by most scholars, like Ding

Chongming (2001), Yang Zi & Yu Guodong (2007), Yang Zi (2010), etc. And there are other similar Chinese characters like “feilimao (非礼貌)” (Xie Shijian, 2009),

“shili (失礼)” (Yang Chaojun, 2010), etc. Culpeper (2011: 24) lists the reasons why he uses the term “impoliteness (不礼貌)” which I agree with. His reasons are: “(1) it provides an obvious counterpoint to the field of politeness studies, and (2) it has almost no currency in the English language, and thus is ripe for appropriation as a technical term.” Besides the above two reasons, I also have my point of view. First, I hold the view that aggression and rudeness are two kinds of impoliteness and in the sub-degree of impoliteness, which is different from the standpoint of Archer (2008: 188) that “impoliteness” is a sub-category of “verbal aggression”. Second, there are other behaviors which are not seemed as aggressive or rude are also impoliteness in the certain context. If we use these two terms to definite, the realm of studies is too narrow. Third, the word“impoliteness (不礼貌)”, other than other synonyms like bad manners, boldness, …,rudeness…(Culpeper, 2011, p. 24), “feilimao (非礼貌)”, “shili (失礼)” etc., just named a few for examples, is easy for recognizing and memory. So in this paper, I will continue to use the word “impoliteness (不礼貌)”.

    Impoliteness, which is usually mentioned as the opposite of politeness, generally describes the behavior that violates the social norm or conventions. The first definition on impoliteness comes from Fraser & Nolen (1981) but defines it under the

concept of “conversational contract”. From above definitions, we can see that: no definitions on impoliteness has reached an agreement. Here we will not make any comment on other terms, just impoliteness. And in this study, my own definition as following: Impoliteness is a kind of speech act, occurring in a specific context, utters by speaker, intently or not, to attack the hearer’s face and identity. And the hearer judged his /her face was threatened then accept or counter the offense.     

    According to the angles of the definitions on impoliteness, we categorize the definitions into several groups, which we can distinctly analyze it from the following

chart.

Fig.1A summary of the definition of impoliteness

2.1.2 Categories of Impoliteness

    The categories of impoliteness vary from person to person. The following part will show different points of view on category of impoliteness.

1) Lachenicht’s model of aggravation strategies 

Lachenicht is the first one to suggest that ‘aggravating language’,i.e. a rational attempt to hurt or damage the addressee, is not an impoverished system and that it is possible to study such a language from single consistent viewpoint (Lachenicht 1980: 607-610). For this purpose, he extended Brown and Levinson’s model to include abusive language. Lachenicht argues that, occasionally’ the speaker does not wish social interaction to proceed smoothly for the hearer. Thus, the speaker will access the risk he can take in aggravating his hearer, and select an aggravation strategy of the required weight.The aggravation strategies that can be presented are, in order of threat, as follows:

(I)Off-record: ambiguous insults, insinuations, hints and irony. This strategy is of much the same kind as the politeness strategy, and is designed to enable the insulter to meet the aggrieved challenge from the injured person with an assertion of innocence.

(II) Bald on record; directly produced FTAs and impositions of the same kind as in the politeness strategy.

(III)Positive aggravation: an aggravation strategy that is designed to show the addressee that he is not approved of, is not esteemed, docs not belong and will not receive cooperation.

(IV)Negative aggravation: an aggravation that is designed to impose on the addressee, lo interfere with his freedom of action, and to attack his social position and the basis of his social action.

As noted by Bousfield, Lachenicht’s work is the first comprehensive and theoretically-grounded framework for the description of impolite or aggravating behaviors (Bousfield 2008: 162). Its chief contribution is that it provides an extensive review of the different linguistic strategics that may be used lo aggravate face. There are, however, some problems with this model. For instance, Lachenicht’s model is based on and describes constructed examples, and written materials from a number of dictionaries of insults. No real-life data are utilized.

2)Austin’s model of impoliteness

    The second model is Austin's. Her model of face attack differs from Lachenicht’s in that it is a more hearer-based account of how utterances can be interpreted as offensive. Thus, her model is intended to show that “what causes utterances to be interpreted on the dark side is the context in which they arc produced”(Austin 1990: 277). She distinguishes the following impoliteness strategics:

(I) Bald on record

(II) On-record threats to positive lace

(III) On-record threats lo negative face

(IV) On-record with inappropriate redress to positive face

(V) On-record with inappropriate redress to negative face

(VI) Off-record

    Apart from the four strategics outlined in Lachenicht, she also includes on-record

strategies with inappropriate redress. These consist of examples where redress is used

in circumstances that render such redress inappropriate. The redress can be oriented towards either the hearer's positive or negative face.

3)Culpeper's model of impoliteness strategies

    Culpeper (1996) proposes a model which consists of four superstrategies in relation to it. He considers it not just an extension to Brown and Levinson's politeness model, but a model of parallel structure which differs only in terms of orientation to face (i.e.instead of maintaining or enhancing face, impoliteness superstrategies are designed to attack face). Later, Culpeper et al. (2003:1554-1555) revise it and add the fifth superstrategy. The superstrategies are summarized below:

(I) Bald on record impoliteness --- the FTA is performed in a direct, clear, unambiguous and concise way in circumstances where face is not irrelevant.

(II) Positive impoliteness --- the use of strategies designed to attack the addressee's positive face wants.

(III) Negative impoliteness — the use of strategies designed to attack the addressee's negative face wants.

(IV) Sarcasm or mock impoliteness --- the use of strategies that are obviously insincere, and thus remain surface realizations.

(V) Withhold impoliteness — keep silent or fail to act where politeness work is expected.                          

    Culpcper in extending the Culpeper's model (1996) do consider the inleractants' responses to impoliteness, and they map out the basic of responding to impoliteness.

Fig. 2.A summary of response options (Culpeper ,2003: 1563)

    As is illustrated above, when recipients of an ulterance lace an impoliteness act, they have two choices: they can either respond or not respond (i.e. stay silent). If responding, recipients have further theoretical choices: they can either accept the face attack or counter it. If the recipients of the impoliteness act choose to counter back, they have two strategics in terms of whether the strategies arc offensive or defensive. The offensive strategics “primarily counter face attack with face attack”, while defensive strategics primarily counter face attack by defending one’s own face’(Culpeper et al, 2003: 1562).

4)Bousfield’s model of impoliteness

    On the basis of politeness theories and impoliteness theories, especially the impoliteness model and strategies of Jonathan Culpeper (1996, 2003, 2005), Bousfield(2008) proposed his own impoliteness framework which is a much more simplified one compared with that of Culpeper’s (2005). According to Bousfield (2008), since negative and positive face strategies are found to regularly combine in interaction (see Culpeper,Bousfield and Wichmann, 2003; Harris, 2001). Derek Bousfield (2008) revised Culpeper’s (2005) impoliteness model which consists only two impoliteness tactics: (1) On-record impoliteness and (2) Off-record impoliteness with (a) Sarcasm and (b) Withhold politeness included. According to Bousfield (2008: 91), research into impoliteness should not unduly concern itself with the discovery of additional linguistic output strategies but should be concentrated upon how the discourse builds up, how context affects the generation of impoliteness and how the dynamism of impolite illocutions is dealt with. One important work that Bousfield has done is that not only he tests all the Culpeper’s impoliteness strategies in his collected data, adding some more impoliteness strategies like Criticize, Hinder/Block, Enforce role shift, Challenges, but also he has improved the impoliteness theory by putting it into a dynamic investigation at three dimensions, specifically, at the utterance level, at the discourse level, and in the turn taking system in his book Impoliteness in Interaction (Bousfield, 2008).

    In China, Li Yuansheng (2006), Yangzi (2005), Yangzi & Yu Guodong (2007), also give their understanding of categories on Impoliteness. Li Yuansheng (2006) sees impoliteness as pragmatic strategy and categories. Chinese impolite speech acts into strategic and non-strategic verbal impoliteness. And he further divides the above two types into intentional and unintentional impoliteness from the speaker’s standpoint. Yangzi (2005), Yangzi & Yu Guodong (2007), from the view of ways of realization, targets of impoliteness, speaker’s intention and speaker’s degree of perceiving, classify impoliteness into three types: (1) non-strategic impoliteness, (2)strategic impoliteness, (3) impoliteness due to Pragmatic failures.In this paper, the author will analyze the data based on Bousfield’s category .

2.1.3Previous Study on Impoliteness

2.1.3.1Study on Impoliteness Abroad

    The previous study on impoliteness abroad has been lasting many years and a lot of products have been achieved. Here we will have a review from two factors.

1)research on impoliteness speeches

a)impoliteness speeches in a specific context

    Context is an important concept in pragmatics. And it is an indispensible part in studying impoliteness speeches. Many scholars have studied impoliteness from different perspectives. Different cultural background varies different in understanding the politeness and impoliteness. Many scholars study the impoliteness in a, personal interaction, Mills( 2009) thought that is insufficient, and we should study it in a cross-cultural aspect. Marlangeon( 2008)did a comparative analysis in institutional and non-institutional context. The result shew that the realization of impoliteness speeches were different in institutional and non-institutional context. It is generally to see the impoliteness happens in a court defense. Kryk-Kas-tovsky( 2006) analyzed the impoliteness happened in court defense in the early modern English from a historical perspective. What’ s more, he also had a detail explanation on the impoliteness mode from the structure, semantics and pragmatics. He pointed out that we shouldn’t judge the impoliteness simply from their structure or semantics. What the most important is that we should judge them from the speaker’s intention and the influence on the hearer, which is an enlightenment for us to judge the impoliteness.

    One of the most important standard to measure impoliteness is the degree of face threat. Stewart( 2008) had a study on natural language aimed to testify that the modes provided by Brown and Levinson are a powerful structure to analyze impoliteness. Except for the impoliteness researches happens in English, Perelmutter( 2010) based on the Russian complains data to analyze the silent in an unending conversation, and which was thought as one feature of impoliteness.

b)study on one specific impoliteness speech act

    Culpeper( 1996) thinks that impoliteness strategies can be classified into Bald on record impoliteness, Positive impoliteness, and Negative impoliteness, in each strategy, there are many specific speech acts,such as taboo language, swearing,threats and so on. Limberg( 2009) believed that threat was an purposely impoliteness speech act. He also proved his thought by the method of experimental observation to analyze the responds to threat. Among which, included responds and non- responds. And in the responds, there were verbal and non-verbal methods. Jay ＆ Janschewitz( 2008) analyzed swearing as a highly impoliteness. In his research, swearing dependent on the relationships between the speaker and the hearer and the special context. And at last, he also told us that we should learn when and where to use the swearing correctly.

2)Study on impoliteness theory

    Janathan Culpeper and Derek Bousfield were the two basic scholar to study the impoliteness theory. In 2008, the born of “Impoliteness in Interaction” written by Bousfield, which is mainly talked about impoliteness. In this book, based on the three kinds of data collection in parking conflicts, military police training and kitchen conflicts, he pointed out the theory on impoliteness, and he also tested the dynamic of impoliteness speeches. This book also analyzed the impoliteness strategies which we have talked above. Culpeper，Bousfield & Wichmann( 2003) stressed that we should not only view the impoliteness from vocabulary and grammar, but also from the aspect of prosody. In their research, the prosody played an important role in impoliteness expressions. What’s more, Culpeper( 2010) had a explanation on conventionalised impoliteness. In this research, the author firstly had a study on whether impoliteness was the same as politeness in people’s language expression. At the end, the answer was positive, which has  provided an operating system for further study.

    From the above studies,we can see that, the impoliteness researches abroad have a broad and systematic analysis. The study not only including the impoliteness speeches but also the strategies and theories on impoliteness. These researches have made a good example and provide basis for the further study.

2.1.3.2 Study on Impoliteness at Home

    The study of impoliteness at home is just starting and almost no specialized publications can be found up to the present. However, among those relatively few researchers on impoliteness, Si Jianguo (2005) investigates the dramatic conflicts of the Chinese drama Thunderstorm in terms of the Conversational Analysis (CA) in his“Dramatic Conflict in Thunderstorm from the Perspective of Politeness Principles.” In this study, a selection from Act One of the play is examined in four aspects: interruption of turns, change of addressees, speech acts and dispreferred responses. His analysis indicates that the dramatic meaning derives not only from what characters say, but also from how they say, or from the mechanism of the conversation and CA works well in interpreting Chinese dramas. Closely related to impoliteness, Ran Yongping (2009, 2010) and some of his students are making researches on conflictive discourse, focusing on implicit repairs in interpersonal conflicts, conflict management in verbal interaction, and the divergence orientation of conflict utterances. Under the guidance of Ran Yongping, Gong Shuangping (2009) gives a critical introduction to Bousfield’s (2008) newly published book entitled Impoliteness in Interaction, claiming that the greatest advantage of this book is that it expands the scope of impoliteness study from the micro single utterance level to the macro extended discoursal level, creating a new field for pragmatic study. Meanwhile, the inadequacy of this book is also pointed out, which is mainly about the seemingly mixing up of two concepts in the book, namely, “impoliteness” and “conflict”. Mitigating context is not clearly defined in the book, either. Some journal articles related to impoliteness and conflict have been found in recent years. Li Yuansheng (2006) defines impoliteness as the speech act which are probably face damaging to the interactant in interpersonal interaction and which may make the interactant feel unhappy. He classifies impoliteness into two categories: strategic verbal impoliteness and non-strategic verbal impoliteness. He also argues that the act of impolite speech by the speaker should be adapted to the speaker and hearer’s psychological, social and physical world. Yang Zi (2007) makes her study on verbal impoliteness in Chinese in her article “On Verbal Impoliteness in Chinese Language — From the Perspective of Adaptation.” She argues that according to the ways of realization, receivers of impoliteness and the speaker’s intention and the hearer’s acceptance, impoliteness phenomena can be categorized into three categories: non-strategic impoliteness, strategic impoliteness and impoliteness due to pragmatic failures. She further analyzes the reasons for the generation of various impoliteness based on Verschueren’s Adaptation Theory and tries to discover some fundamental ways to solve the problem of impoliteness. Zhang Damao (2009) gives his own definition and categorization of impoliteness. He claims that impoliteness might be caused, firstly, by the contents of exchange such as taboo language in different nations or religious groups; secondly, by pragmatic distance; and thirdly, by certain contexts. He classifies impoliteness into intentional, informational and strategic verbal impoliteness and non-strategic verbal impoliteness. Generally speaking, the study on impoliteness at home is mainly about theoretical exploration, especially how to define, categorize and solve the problem of impoliteness within the framework of the Adaptation Theory. Researches on the application of impoliteness theories or models are rare. The present study tries tentatively to adopt the impoliteness model proposed by Bousfield (2008) into the analysis of the dramatic texts of Pride and Prejudice , and testify the interpretive power of this model to dramatic texts.

2.2 Research on Pragmatic Identity Construction 

2.2.1 Study on Pragmatic Identity Construction Abroad

In recent years, many scholars have investigated the study of pragmatic  identity from various perspectives. It is well known that all aspects in life could shape the identity, and they are the combination of a person’s social and personal experiences. Experts of different domains have studied this concept. As a psychologist, Erikson (1950, 1968) paid much attention on the formation of identity and the process of identity formation. Besides, according to the theory of Erikson, Marcia (1966) shifted his focus to the cognitive-behavioral makers. Based on the study of Marcia, it was of critical significance during the process of establishing a stable identity. From his point of view, there was a possibility that a person adopts some certain identity formation strategies so as to adapt to the social world. And a typology was developed by Cote and Levine (2002) to explore individuals’ various manners of behavior. We will review the previous study on identity construction in the following approaches.

1)Ethnographic Approach

    Considering the investigator as an active member participated in the situation, the ethnographic study on identity construction gave priority to the interpretation of the operation of discourse identity in context. According to previous studies, social and cultural factors, such as cultural identity, national identity, ethnic identity, racial identity and so on, were of critical significance in identity construction in the domain of ethnography. As a social entity, individual needs to be recognized and perceived the surrounding environment, thus identities could help them to achieve this purpose. Collins (2003) paid his attention to the Quaker meeting and explores ethnographic fieldwork among British Quakers. He tried to interpret the relations between the local

construction of self and the narrative quality of daily interaction. Three modes of discourse were adopted to depict the social identity of individual participants, which were respectively the individual or the prototypical, the canonic and the vernacular. The canonic texts as well as the vernacular texts were employed by individuals for responding to their enlarging familiarization so as to present and reconstruct their autobiographical selves, thus participate in the meeting. From the review above, we could have a clearly understanding on the ethnographic approach. Identity construction is regarded as an important notion which could be affected by some cultural and social factors. It seems that the study of identity construction within the ethnographic approach takes its specific place in the socio-cultural context.

2)Sociolinguistic Approach

    The magnificent generality of languages in the world has aroused the interest of the sociolinguistic scholars to explore the common union of the languages and the social identity construction. Among those classical studies, according to Bauman, “identity is a sudden construction and the inevitable outcome of rhetoric and the contextualization of the interpretation. In this process, communicators are forced to make linguistic choice for the sources that is being acknowledged and additional by all the members in a community. Besides, the language users transform these signal resources into other people’s interpretation” (Bauman, 2000). Consequently, identity construction could be viewed as a continuous and dynamic process in the daily social communications. According to the sociolinguistic researchers, identity is the necessary outcome of the language exchange and the social involvement exchange. According to Schiffrin (1996), many sociolinguistic researches had put emphasis on oral narratives for oral narratives stress on personal experience. In her point of view, how we communicate with other people not only showed who we are, but helped to collect various facets to construct an identity. She also made a deeper exploration into in what ways various facets of language construct identities at different levels and different perspectives. Eckert (2000) believed variation had something to do with funny social meaning. She was deeply attracted into the essence of the social meaning and its vital role in language changes. She also proposed the idea we, as speakers, have our distinct identities for ourselves by grouping different sociolinguistics variables. In this way, the identity construction process could be regarded as discursive practice which is characterized with dynamic, negotiable and multiple. Ochs (1993) regarded social identity as an upper term that covers various social characters which consisted of social status, social powers, social roles, social relationships and other identities that people might want to distinguish himself from other people that do not belong to the community. He believed that we, as the speakers, all want to establish our social identities for ourselves by certain social acts through verbal communications. From the sociolinguistics approach, it is easy to find the identity construction is based on the carrier of language. Identity construction is achieved through personal utterances and it’s dynamic in the interactions. The final goal of the construction of identity is to reinforce the consistency of behaviors, thus extruding the unique identity of a certain people.

3)Critical Discourse Analysis Approach

Critical discourse analysis (CDA) provides a view which pays much attention on practical social issues, “CDA sees discourse-language use in speech and writing-as a form of ‘social practice’, which implies a dialectical relationship between a particular discursive event and the situations, institutions and social structures which frame it”(van Dijk 1997:258). So under the guidance of CDA the studies of identity construction have attracted many critics’ attentions. Based on the critical discourse perspective, Wodak, Cilia, Reisigle and Liebhart (1999, 2009) discussed on the discursive construction of national identity, at the mean while, by the way of description and analyzing the phenomenon which bears some hints under the surface of the discursive production of national identity in the concrete American language environment. The analysis of the three-dimension consists of contents, strategies and means and forms of realization had been figured out. In the content layer, they made clear distinctions of the five main theme fields. To be more specific, the five main them fields included the language construction of the Austrains, the descriptions and the fabrication of the political life that passed by, the language construction and the shared culture, the language construction of the past and the future of the common political opinions, the construction of the country group. They held the view that both the discourse strategy and the language mechanism could be employed to construct the national identities. Ricento’s (2003) focus was the American national identity construction during the Americanization movement from the year 1914 to the year 1924(Ricento, 2003). He employed the pragmatic rhetoric approach within the discourse-history proposed by Wordark (2001). He analyzed various discourses of different periods and describes the social behaviors of Americanism in American public discourses. As the pioneer in Critical Discourse Analysis, the three-dimensional scaffold of discourse analysis proposed by Fairclough(1992,1995b)was providing some hints for further studies. In the Critical Discourse Analysis researches, Hylladay’s (2000) systemic-functional linguistics was one of the approaches those were frequently adopted by the scholars. He advocated that the transitivity system was the foundation of language expressions and it could also be viewed as a powerful analysis tool to provide different interpretations for the same event. Under his influences, Hernández (2008) adopted Halliday’s transitivity system to analyze how Gibraltarian people construct their identity through languages. Identity construction under Critical Discourse Analysis reflects the dialectical relationship between the identity construction through language and social consciousness. Identity has the characteristic of being constructed and has a great impact on the order of discourse.

2.2.2 Study on Pragmatic Identity Construction at Home

In China, identity has been used more and more frequently in pragmatic studies in recent years (Ren Yuxin 2007; Chen Xinren 2009; Yuan Zhoumin 2011). According to Ren (2008),face and impoliteness are two main topics in pragmatics,which have been investigated by many scholars from different perspectives. However,several articles in Journal of Pragmatics (2008; 24) focused on the study of impoliteness and face from a new perspective of identity. Ren reviews the researches presented in the special issue and summarizes the major contributions and implications for the further study. Zhu Linna (2010), studied identity construction and its adaptability in everyday verbal communication; Luo Sha (2010),Ju Lin (2011) studied the construction of discourse identities in political discourse and discussed the mechanism of discourse identities by employing Verschueren's Linguistic Adaptation Theory. Their studies delineated identity construction as a dynamic choice-making and adaptation process, and proposed the construction of discourse identities is the result of the dynamic adaptation between contextual and structural correlates of adaptability. Yuan Zhoumin (2012) believed that the speaker’s foregrounding of certain identity，being the result of her adaptive choice，is a pragmatic act to mark her identity through which her communicative needs are realized.It also proposed that pragmatic identity construction and meta-pragmatic features of self address forms as identity markers could be further studied under the pragmatic act theory.Chen Xinren (2013) thought that communicators have multiple social identities prior to communication. However, they chose from a particular one to enact the particular utterance in the dynamic context, which is by nature a pragmatic process. Chen qian &Ran yongping(2013) discussed the identities constructed by intentional impoliteness. Owing to the constraints of rapport-challenge orientation in interpersonal interaction，intentional impoliteness is likely to be deliberately adopted as a pragmatic strategy so as to construct identities，during which the hearer's face and equal association rights can be threatened or challenged．Chen Xinren (2014) argued for exclusive attention to the communicative property of identity instead of its social property, pinpointed some key issues associated with pragmatic studies of identity on the basis of existing research, and outlined a few important approaches accordingly. Yuan Zhoumin (2014)believed that speakers’ identity is not passively and linguistically represented. Instead,it is dynamically constructed by strategic negotiation with the interlocutors．Hehe&Chen Xinren(2015) found out that the relational identities constructed by the shop owners and the motivations behind this construction by focusing on the address forms in Taobao merchandise descriptions. The findings showed that the owners adopted 8 categories of address forms and constructed 3 kinds of relational identities: the default identity, the variant identity and the transitional identity, among which the variant is the most chosen, and the default the least. Li chengtuan &Ran yongping (2015)summarized the main research topics about interpersonal relations, attitudes and emotions, and evaluations of identity construction, with the aim to provide new directions for investigating identity construction in pragmatics.

The above studies on identity construction at home and abroad have suggested a growing trend away from static to dynamic, from structure to construction. On the one hand,some of the structural social attributes in identity have been recognized and followed; and on the other hand scholars are more concerned about how identity is to be constructed in practice,especially how identity in verbal interaction is to be constructed by the choice of language. Besides, many scholars began to study the varying and fluid identities' construction in verbal process from the perspective of pragmatics. However, the studies on dynamic identity construction are not systematic and lack of the unified explanatory framework. Moreover, the studies on communicators pragmatic identity are insufficient. Furthermore, the existing researches of academic discourse mainly focus on academic writing, but pay less attention to spoken discourse. Some scholars both at home and abroad began to apply Adaptation Theory on identity in recent years. As to the value of Adaptation Theory in identity construction, the previous studies propose that the construction of discourse identity is a process of the continuous making of linguistic choices in forms and strategies, which gives us some references on identity construction for the present study.  

2.3 Linguistic Study on Pride and Prejudice

As a classical literary work, Pride and Prejudice has been studied by many scholars from different perspectives since it was published in 1813. In this paper, we will focus on those studies from the linguistic perspective.

2.3.1Previous study on Pride and Prejudice Abroad

The early reviews on Pride and Prejudice merely deal with the“loveliness of the characterization and the vigor of the writing in it(Southam 1968:6),Which simply displays the outline of the love story and its character accounts. Norman (1972)focuses on Austen’s language in his The Language of Jane Austen. In this book, Norman claims that the dialogue in Pride and Prejudice belongs to that category of speech which is ,written to be read as if heard (Norman 1972:119). Besides,Norman probes into the use of direct speech and indirect speech in the novel and finds out that Direct speech is only one method, though the commonest, of suggesting the exchange of conversation, In direct or reported speech may be used to suggest the difference between two speakers (Norman 1972:121). His typical analysis is the analysis of dialogues between Mr.Bennet and Mrs.Bennet. For example, when Mr.Bermet presses her unwelcome conversational attentions upon her husband, his coolness is suggested by the indirect form, like the silence.

2.3.2 Previous study on Pride and Prejudice at Home

    One distinctive feature of Pride and Prejudice is the conversation which is used to portray the personalities of its characters.With the development of Pragmatics, lots of studies have been made on Pride and Prejudice under the frame work of Pragmatics. Most of the studies from pragmatic perspective focus on the irony in the novel. Zhu Xiaozhou(2002) applies Speech Act Theory to the analysis of irony in the novel, which is conducted from both macro-angle and micro-angle. The former probes into the ironic speech acts carried out by the author in communication with readers, while the latter deals with ironic speech acts performed by the characters. It is proved that there is no great difference between irony in literary works and that in natural language. Also,it is feasible to employ speech act theory in literary criticism. Tang Xuan(2004) analyzes the conversation of characters under the framework of Speech Act Theory, demonstrating how speech acts performed by characters create ironical and humorous effect and other literary effects. Chen Hui(2008) interprets the irony in Pride and prejudice based on the Relevance Theory, aiming at testing its explanatory power on various language phenomena such as metaphor and irony on one hand and providing a new perspective for literature appreciation on the other hand. A few scholars attempt to analyze the conversational implicature in the novel, for instance, Wang Dongmei(2009)analyze the conversational implicature in character's conversations and prove the importance of Cooperative Principle in understanding conflicts between characters, promoting the development of the plotsand revealing the inner world of characters. Xia Houfusheng(2009) explores the polite speech acts of the main characters in the novel and further reveals the ways and culture of communication between upper classes in Britain in the late 18^th century to 19^th century. Xu Fen (2010) in her thesis studies dialogues of characters from perspective of Adaptation Theory and finds its explanation power for understanding literary text. Zhao Hong(2011) analyzes a relevance theoretic framework for verbal irony, especially the ironic utterance in literal text, which making a significant attempt to the combination of cognitive pragmatics and literal criticism.

   Based on the theories of Systemic Functional Grammar, some scholars have done useful researches with the novel. Among a few which have extended their researches to Pride and Prejudice, Li Fang (2003) in her thesis investigates the function of two systems of Mood and Modality system in the novel and concludes their significance in the reflection of author's attitudes, characterization and the revealing of relationship change among characters. Cui Xiaoyun(2004) examines the chapter nine of the novel based on the theory of Transitivity. Cui's study gets the findings that characters’ deviation in their utterances from contexts produces comic effects and also serves the function of thematization. Zhou Yanchun(2007) compares modality expressions in Pride and Prejudice and those in its Chinese version. It is found that there is no total equivalence between two versions, which is attributed to the two different language systems as well as different cultures. Zhou’s study sheds some light on both the literature appreciation and fiction translation. Zhao Xia, Chen Li (2011) adopts the attitude system to analyze Elizabeth's utterances in order to explain why Elizabeth, the heroine, has held prejudiced attitude towards Darcy, the hero. The study proves that the appraisal materials contribute to the realization of interpersonal meaning, characterization, etc.

2.3.3 Comments on the Previous Study 

     From the previous study we can see that although many scholars from the perspectives of pragmatics and Systemic Functional Grammar to study the Pride and Prejudice, and they have bore well. However, seldom scholars have ever paid their attention on the impolite utterances and the identity construction researches on Pride and Prejudice. We know that, the tone through out the whole novel is irony, which can provide a better chance for us to explore the impolite speeches in it. And the film can be more vivid and we can see the characters expressions clearly.

2.4 Summary 

In this chapter, the author presents the previous study on impoliteness and the identity construction. What’s more the study on Pride and Prejudice from different aspects are also introduced.

Chapter Three  Related Theories 

    In this part, the author will introduce the theories used in this paper. 

3.1Conversational Analysis Theory

    Conversational analysis stems from ethnomethodological traditions and is developed by Harold Garfinkel (1967), which is a branch of sociology concerned with“orderliness of everyday life”. Liddicoat from the viewpoint of Sack’s approach. Harvey Sacks and his assistant Emanuel Schegloff are two important persons from the prospective of improving the theory of conversational analysis. The theory emphasizes that the specific behaviors and details should be respected and paid attention to during the communication. Conversation analysis transfer system, very useful in conversations, is created by Gail Jefferson. The system transforms sounds of utterances to words and by marking these words we can get silence, intonation and drawl in the utterances. That’s to say, it is very helpful to capture the features of utterance and time characteristics.

    Conversational analysis includes two kinds of messages, one is the broad meaning and the other is the narrow sense. The broad meaning refers to all researches of conversational phenomenon. However, the narrow sense specially refers to a school of studying conversations in America, which studies conversational structure and regularity deeply on the basis of conversations in natural situation. Therefore, a set of methods to study conversation are put forward by Ten Have and the seven steps are in the following:

    (1)Recording people’s daily natural conversation with a sound or video recording;

    (2)Transferring these records to tape materials, and marking them;

    (3)Choosing the useful materials as the research objects;

    (4)Analyzing conversational segments with common sense;

    (5)Understanding the upper step more completely;

    (6)Supporting the above analysis by other means;

    (7)Examining the credibility of these analysis by comparative ways.

    It is a time-consuming and very difficult job for researchers to transfer sound records to tape materials. However, the most real analytic materials can be gotten in this way. With the help of the system, it not only can get some characters like rhythm, pause, stress, intonation of the utterance, but it also records some non-verbal patterns, i.e. gesture, expressions in one’s eyes, posture, facial expressions and so on.

Conversational analysis may be employed when we study impoliteness, so researchers can study it from three different aspects: conversation strategy, conversation structure and conversational style. Conversation structure refers to the natural structure that the communicators should obey in the process of interaction and turn-taking is the main aspect of it. Conversational style distinguishes the different types of speech from men to women. Conversation strategy mainly researches daily dialogues with two different ways, verbal and non-verbal utterances in interaction. The verbal language includes the natural pause, stress, intonation of speech, and non-verbal language refers to the gesture, facial expressions, and posture. In this paper, the author analyzes the data from the aspect of convers, ation strategy.

3.2 Linguistic Adaption Theory

3.2.1Making Choices in Language Use

    Verschueren (2000: 55) indicates that employing language is a result of making choices continuously in a conscious or unconscious way. His illustration about it can be stated below.

First, making linguistic choices happens at any level of structure. Second, language users communicate with each other by choosing forms as well as strategies. Choosing a strategy of deference, for example, requires making choices specifically on a various structural levels, such as language, style, lexicon, and so on. Third, choices must be a sort of conscious activity, which may lead to misunderstanding. Actually, not all the language users make language choices in a conscious way, sometimes, they choose language very automatically. Fourth, making choices is involved in producing and explaining speech. Also, the two kinds of choices are both important for the success of communication. Fifth, a speaker is not free to choose language. What she or he can do is to decide, to make use of language or to button up his or her mouth. Sixth, making choices is not equivalent, which is inevitable. Finally, making choices always causes or accompanies with other alternatives. Remembering the introductory remark mentioned above, we should further make clear of the meaning of ‘making choices’ in order to answer the question about what people do when making use of language. However, knowing three notions is very important to interpret the course of ‘making choices’.

3.2.2 Three Notions in Language Use 

Language, a communicative tool, needs to adapt to different communicative intention. According to Verschueren (2000: 58), language use is a process of choice-making for the fact that language has three properties. They are variability, negotiability and adaptability, which are a great help to further understand the process of making choices in language use.

1)Variability

    Variability, a property of language, determines all the range of possibilities from which choices are made (Verschueren, 2000: 59). According to Hymes (1974: 75), in course of studying language as an action, variation is a key clue. Here, variation refers to various possible expressions in which choices can be made when language users attempt to convey special information. For instance, there are a number of expressions applied to forbid smoking, such as “no smoking”, “non-smoking area”, “Thanks for not smoking”, and so on (He Ziran, 2007: 70). As far as variability is concerned, the range of language choices is not stable, but dynamic. There are always some new expressions which take the place of the old ones. The changing of public signs is especially a good example.

2)Negotiability

Negotiability is a property of language that explains the fact that making choices of language is based on some principles and strategies which are highly flexible instead of being made in a mechanical or fixed way. The various expressions of forbidding smoking listed above are good examples. It seems that all of the expressions accord with grammar, but there is no rule that tells us when to choose “no smoking”or“non-smoking”. So a specific choice does not rely on grammar but depends on motivation and the actual communication context. In this sense, negotiability involves uncertainty of making choices.

3)Adaptability

Adaptability is the core of Adaptation Theory because it enables human beings to make choices which are negotiable from various ranges of possibilities in such a way as to satisfy the basic communicative needs. First, the phrase ‘communicative needs’ does not mean that all the needs served by language use have to be ‘communicative’ in the strict sense. Second, it does dot means the general needs either, but the specific ones since it merely arise in context. Of course, this term is not supposed to be interpreted as precluding the possibility of communication failure.

 In a word, the three notions mentioned above require some attention, all of which well illustrate the dynamic nature of language. On the one hand, the three notions are essentially inseparable. On the other hand, there is no content of adaptability without the other two notions. Therefore, adaptability belongs to a property at a higher level. Employing adaptability as a starting point, we can establish four clear angles for a better pragmatic depiction and explanation. In the following sub-section, the four tasks concerning. Adaptation Theory are introduced since they are helpful and important for the author to do this research.

3.2.3Four Angles of Investigation

Taking the higher-order notion of adaptability as the starting point of language study, Verschueren assigns the following four angles to pragmatic descriptions and explanations.

1)Contextual correlates of adaptability

    According to Verschueren (1999: 66),the contextual correlations of adaptability “potentially include all the ingredients of the communicative context with which linguistic choices have to be inter-adaptable.” The context consists of two parts: the communicative context and the linguistic context. The linguistic context which mainly includes three aspects: the contextual cohesion, the inter-textuality and the sequencing. The communicative context includes; the language users (the utter and the interpreter), the physical world (such as time,space,physical appearance, physical conditions, biological property, etc.),the social world (such as social settings, communicative norms, culture, social roles, social distance, power relations, etc,),and the mental world (covers the speaker’s and the hearer’s psychological states, such as personality, emotions, beliefs, wishes or desires, and motivations or intentions,etc).   

2)Structural objects of adaptability

The structural objects of adaptability range over all possible levels of linguistic structure that show variability of any kind. The first level of choice making includes language, code and style. The second level includes the elements to construct the utterance which range from sound to clauses, sentences and proposition. Furthermore, utterances, the clusters of utterance and the rules of constructing utterance are also involved at this level (Verschueren 1999: 66). Besides,choices at these levels are highly inter-adaptable or interdependent (Verschueren 1999: 143). That is to say,choice-making at different levels of structure and based on varying principles is always interdependent and interadaptable.

3)Dynamics of adaptability

The dynamics of adaptability assumes that the process of adaptation is the dynamic inter-adaptability of context and structure, i.e. the dynamic generation of meaning in communication. It is supposed to be the central task of pragmatic analysis to account for the dynamics of meaning generation, in which “communication principles and strategies are used in the making and negotiating of choices of production and interpretation”(Verschueren 1999: 66).

4)Salience of adaptation processes

    Salience of the adaptation processes means the status or perceptibility of those processes in relation to the cognitive apparatus (Verschueren 1999; 67). Salience of the adaptation processes issues that the mental ‘work’ goes into processes of meaning generation in language use. This “work” takes place in a medium of adaptability, ‘mind in society.’ This kind of mental processes can contribute to linguistic choice-making, i.e. perception and representation, planning, and memory, interacting with categorization schemes and scripts, and manifested in processes of recognition and recall. Together, these four angles formed an overall framework of a pragmatic perspective on language phenomena. Their contributions are not only complementary; they have different functional loads to convey within the overall framework of pragmatic perspective.

3.3 Brown and Levinson’s Face-saving Theory

In contrast to universality of Leech’s Politeness Principle, Brown and Levinson put forward an approach - Face Saving Theory (FST), which is slightly different from Goffman’s but may be more specific. FST has been the best known of all the approaches to politeness which takes three basic notions into account, namely, face, face-threatening acts (FTAs) and politeness strategies. Among the three notions, face is the core. Before defining“face”, Brown and Levinson presume a Model Person (MP) which refers to a person who is rational and has face want, especially the want to be unobstructed and the want to be approved of in certain aspects (Brown & Levinson, 1987: 58). Then they name face as the public self-image that every member wants to claim (Brown & Levinson 1987: 61). After a while, they subdivide face into two positive face and negative face (Brown & Levinson 1987: 62). Positive face means the want of each member whose wants should be desirable to at least some others. Negative face refers to the want of every“competent adult member”whose actions should be unimpeded by others. Then, when it comes to FTAs, we should notice that it has a strong correlation to the notion of face. Brown and Levinson have held that many utterances we uttered are potentially face-threatening, for instance, advising, promising, ordering, offering and criticizing, which can be regarded as“certain kinds of acts that intrinsically threaten face”are face-threatening to some extent (Brown & Levinson 1987: 65). FTAs can be classified into four kinds: acts that threaten the hearer’s positive face; acts that threaten the hearer’s negative face; acts that threaten the speaker’s positive face; acts that threaten the speaker’s positive face.

Chapter Four  Research Design and Methodology

In this chapter, three research questions of the present research are presented at first. Then something about the data information are introduced, such as data collection,data description and data analysis are explained in detail. In this present study, the author collected the conversations from the film Pride and Prejudice. As these conversations happened in the character’s daily life. They may show these characters’ personage to some extent,which is benefit for them to construct their identities.

4.1 Research Questions 

The present study is designed to answer the following three questions:

   Question one: What are the specific realization of impoliteness strategies in Pride and Prejudice?

   Question two: What and how do the main characters construct their identities through impolite utterances in Pride and Prejudice?

   Question three: What are the pragmatical functions in constructing these identities?

In order to get answers of the three questions above, the author collected conversations happened in the film of Pride and Prejudice. 

4.2 Corpus Description 

Film is justifiably viewed as a kind of exact speech act which carries its own conditions in appropriate manner. The data used for the present study are mainly taken from the conversations happened in the film Pride and Prejudice, which has been released in 2005. It is a combination of classical elegant literature and modern commercial blockbuster. There are many kinds of versions have deduced the novel Pride and Prejudice before the version of 2005. However, the 2005 version is the best to respect for the original novel. It not only gets rid of the same character and scenery appearance in the version of 1995, but also the conventional simple narrative style in the version 1940. The author, in this paper, may center on the micro speech acts, aiming to expatiate on language materials in the film Pride and Prejudice in a better way. Micro speech acts mean the communication among characters by employing the form of dialogue in a literary work. As to the film, on a micro level, the interaction between the communicators, especially the interaction between Elizabeth and the people around her seems the dominant feature of the film. Dialogues are the direct reflection of characters’ ideas and thoughts. In Pride and Prejudice, based on various dialogues between characters, the story is processing, which perhaps shows the characters’ personage and exposes their identities. And these dialogues can reflect the contradictions between the upper class and the middle class.

4.3 Data Collection 

   The conversations in the film pride and prejudice are naturally happened in real life. In order to get the data for this study, the author will do the following tasks.

First of all, the author will download the film with English captions, which has been released in 2005. And then the author will watch it carefully. During this process, the author will pay attention to the impolite utterances used by the main characters and then pick them out. Here the main characters are not only refers to the protagonists in this film, but also the prominent characters who can represent his or her class. In this study, the author divides these main characters into four groups: noblewomen(Lady Catherine; Miss Bingley) noblemen(Mr.Darcy; Mr.Bingley)  ordinary women( Elizabeth; Mrs.Bennet) and ordinary men( Mr. Bennet; Mr. Collins).

The second step, after picking out these impolite utterances, the author will examine them carefully to make sure each impolite utterance is related to one of the 10 impoliteness strategies categorized by the author. Here the 10 strategies are based on the classification of Bousfield’s impoliteness strategies(Bousfield 2008a). These strategies are (1) on-record impoliteness: using critical or aggressive words; using taboo words; threatening; avoiding agreement; interrupting. (2)off-record impoliteness: sarcasm; using rhetorical devices; withholding of politeness; shifting topic; keep silent.

Impoliteness strategies and examples in Pride and Prejudice

4.4 Data Analysis 

   In order to explore the impoliteness applications among different male and female characters, and the difference between the higher class and the lower class, this study is going to combine quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis.  

In the following part, three research questions will be solved accordingly. The three research questions will be answered one by one, because each theory will serve one research question. And only the former research question has been solved, the later one can be answered. The detailed analysis procedures are as follows:

Data to answer the first question: the realization of impoliteness in the conversations of Pride and Prejudice. Based on the Conversational Analysis Theory, the first step is to recording people’s daily natural conversation with a sound or video recording, as these data are collected in the film Pride and Prejudice, there is no need to do this job. The author just have to transfer these records on the film, and marks the impolite speeches happen in their conversations, then chooses the useful materials suit for this study. Here the impolite speeches are choosing in line with the following categories. (1) on-record impoliteness: using critical or aggressive words; using taboo words; threatening; avoiding agreement; interrupting. (2) off-record impoliteness: sarcasm; using rhetorical devices; withholding of politeness; shifting topic; keep silent. According to theses ten impoliteness strategies, the author will pick out all the impolite utterances in this film. And in that way, the first question will be solved.

Data to answer the second question: mainly about the process of identity construction. The author will answer it based on the Adaption Theory by Verschueren (1999). Human beings are continuously making linguistic choices in the production of language use, which can be regarded as a dynamic process of adaptation. The productive process of discourse identity is without exception. The characters in this film choose to construct discourse identity through impoliteness strategies, which can be realized as adaptation to variables of the identities. After analyzing each identity constructed through impolite utterances by these characters, the author will also have a system analysis on the main characters’ dynamic identities constructed in this film. The author tries to analyze these collected data from two aspects: characters in the   same social class and the different social class. And the author puts three differ gender groups into these aspects: woman-woman; man-man; man-woman.   

In the first group, the author choosees the conversations between Mr. Bennet and Mrs. Bennet; Mr. Bingley and Mr.Darcy; Elizabeth and Mrs. Bennet and other two couples of conversations. These characters are relatives or friends so that there is no social distance or relative power between them.                                                                                                                                                                    

Example 1:

Mrs. Bennet:Oh. single, my dear, to be sure! A single man of large fortune; four or five thousand a year. What a fine thing for our girls!

Mr. Bennet:How so? How can it affect them?

Mrs. Bennet: “My dear Mr. Bennet,” replied his wife, “how can you be so tiresome? You must know that I am thinking of his marrying one of them.

    In this conversation, Mr. Bennet likes to tease Mrs. Bennet. He pretends not to know her intention of marring one of the daughters to Mr. Bingley and employs rhetorical questions with the answer already in mind. The implicature indirectly exhibits his sarcasms on Mrs. Bennet’s purpose of visiting Mr. Bingley just for a wealthy husband. His implied meaning is understood by his wife immediately and is given an attack in response. It is also a rhetorical question which apparently delivers her irritation and reproach. However by means of rhetorical questions, the FTA is performed indirectly and the face damage is reduced to some extent. Here the utterances of Mr. Bennet shows the formal model of male. The males pay much attention on his social status and respects. And their words are more directly, thus the utterances of males are more threatening.

 Example 2:

    Mr. Bingley: Come, Darcy. I must have you dance. I hate to see you standing    about by yourself in this stupid manner. You had much better dance.

Darcy: I certainly shall not. You know how I detest it, unless I am particularly acquainted with my partner. At such an assembly as this, it would be insupportable ?

The conversation occurs when Bingley is trying to persuade Darcy to dance. As is seen, there exists noncooperation in their conversations. In giving suggestions, Bingley doesn’t employ any negative politeness strategies. Instead, he does it in the most direct, clear and concise way. Words like “come”,“must” and “hate” definitely threatens both positive and negative faces of Darcy. Also, Darcy shows his noncooperation through direct refusal. However , they are friends, the impoliteness between them doesn’t affect their friendship.

 After analyzing these examples above, the author will make a statistical table to find out which and how many kinds of impoliteness strategies are adopted by the male and female characters in their conversations.

In the second group, the author choose the conversations between Mr.Darcy and Elizabeth; Lady Catherine and Elizabeth whom are not belong to the same social class. To some extent, the social distance and relative power are obviously, especially when they construct their identities through impoliteness.

Example 3:

Lady Catherine:Has your governess left you?

Elizabeth:We never had any governess.

Lady Catherine:No governess! How was that possible? Five daughters brought up at home without a governess--I never heard of such a thing, Your mother must have been quite a slave to your education.

When Lady Catherine knows that Elizabeth has no governess, her response is to

blame Elizabeth’s mother instead of showing any Pity on this. She chooses the word

“slave”to describe Elizabeth’s mother in case of no governess.This is very impolite if the interlocutors are equal during the communication. However, Lady Catherine tends to remind others of her superior social status and likes to establish a powerful identity to control relationship on others during the communication. Therefore, she chooses to respond like a person with authority to make any random evaluation on this case. She maintains and shows her power through arrogance and dominance in front of the lower status person. From the perspective of the Adaptation Theory, her linguist choice is obviously adaptive to her social world.

Data to answer the third question: the pragmatic functions. According to the Facing-Threaten Theory, here the author will have a detail explanation on the pragmatic functions. Communicative subjects use impoliteness strategies to construct the above identities. These identities are a kind of face threaten or challenge to the hearer. This pragmatic tendency will arise disharmony among the communicators. If the communicative subjects intend to challenge the harmonious relationship when they construct their identities, they will adopt to offensive impolite utterances. What’s more, the applying of impolite utterances can show both the communicators’ position, emotion and any other oppositions.

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