Epistemic independence and speaker roles: Highlighting the role of second speaker and mitigating the role of first speaker

Abstract

Definitions of attenuation tend to place their emphasis on different aspects of the communication process, especially facework, propositional content, illocutionary force and the roles of speech participants. This paper concentrates on the latter of these aspects. Although studies mention the possibility that attenuation applies to more than one participant, the analysis of particular examples within those studies shows that authors tend to refer mostly (or even only) to the speaker's role (e.g., Briz, 1998, 2003; Briz and Albelda, 2013; Villalba Ibáñez, 2016). This study explores the possibility that attenuation of the role of another participant (i.e. a participant other than the speaker who is attenuating) might be rightfully considered a type of attenuation. To do so, it focuses on examples where one speaker (S1) sets forward an idea and the respondent (S2) intensifies the content while at the same time diminishing S1's role in the conceptualization of the idea. Finally, it is argued that attenuating or highlighting speakers' roles can serve different facework-related purposes.