Politeness and the Perception of Irony: Honorifics in Japanese

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the use in the Japanese language of honorifics (a system of politeness expressions incorporated into the grammar) on the perception of irony in assertives. In Experiment 1, the contents (positive and incongruent with facts vs. negative and congruent with facts) and the style (honorific vs. nonhonorific) were manipulated in utterances directed to addressees to whom the use of honorifics was overpolite. Honorific utterances were judged to be more ironic than nonhonorific ones only when their contents were negative. In Experiment 2, the status relationship between the communicators as well as the style was manipulated. Utterances directed to lower-status addressees were taken to be more ironic when they contained honorifics (overpolite). Those directed to high-status addressees were, however, taken to be more ironic when they did not contain any honorifics (impolite). The results of the 2 experiments suggested that the divergence of politeness levels in either direction (i.e., overpolite or impolite) heightens the perception of irony through pragmatic insincerity.