|| Language and Gender ||

|| WHY CONVERSATION WORKS ||

Grice's "Logic of Conversation"

Communication is a Co-operative activity, and when people communicate, it's in their intrests to make the communication go as smoothly as possible in order to achieve their aims.

1. Quality
When someone speaks to us, we assume they are telling the truth.

2. Quantity
When someone Speaks to us, we assume that they give us all of the information we need, but not too much.

3. Manner
When someone speaks to us, we assume thry are speaking as clearly as possible.

4. Relevance
When someone is speakng to us, we assume that what they say is relevant to the conversation.

|| THE GRICEAN MAXIMS ||

1.Be True
2. Be Brief
3. Be Clear

4. Be Relevant

|<Not interesting, but it's what you expect. However, rules are sometimes made to be broken.>

NOT FOLLOWING THE MAXIMS:

A speaker can choose to:

• 'Violate' a Maxim, and choose to be intentionally misleading
• 'Opt out' of a Maxim and refuse to co-operate

|| POLITENESS ||

<If we really want co-operation, we also need to be polite;>
Trait of Female Language

GOFFMAN'S FACE

"Co-operation is vital to conversation, but without politeness, all is lost"

Goffman saw that without politeness, conversation didn't work and that need for politeness was rooted in 'Saving Face'

Brown and Levinson then Developed Goffman's ideas:

NEGATIVE FACEAll the things we say to aviod imposing our demands with others, eg:

• 'I'm sorry to bother you, but...'
• 'Could I please borrow...'
• 'Might you be interested in...' 

The expressions underlined are called 'Mitigating devices'.


POSITIVE FACE
Everything we might say to show that we agree with, respect and like someone.

• 'I was just admiring your car, it looks great!'

We may also use strategies to emphisise our solidarity with the hearer, using Shared Dialect, Slang, Nicknames and use of "we" to link the speaker and the hearer.