POLITENESS/IMPOLITENESS IN CONFLICT DIALOGICAL DISCOURSE: PROSODY ASPECT

Abstract

The given article presents an experimental phonetic investigation, which deals with a comprehensive analysis of English-language formal and informal conflict dialogues. It focuses on the study of various types of the investigated conflict dialogues intonational structure.The basic criteria of the practical material classification are: 1) the degree of relations formality between the collocutors and 2) politeness/impoliteness. According to these criteria the investigated conflict dialogues were classified as formal polite, formal impolite, informal polite and informal impolite. The recorded speech was investigated with the help of computer and statistical analyses which allowed to reveal those elements of prosody which actualize politeness/impoliteness in various types of the investigated conflict dialogues. The prosodic means that most clearly differentiate the investigated dialogical units are the pitch and intensity range, the pitch peaks, the average syllable duration, the average duration of the emphatic centre, the pause volume, types of pauses between the key remarks. The pitch and intensity peaks that coinside with the emphatic centre of a dialogical unity are greatly important for actualizing emphasis. The speech of collocutors who try to remain polite in a formal conflict situation is characterised by a normal tempo with the tendency to slowing down, a mid loudness, a mid pitch range that is due to the formal and official speech situation that forces the interlocutors to follow status subordination. An impolite formal conflict is characterized by a greater degree of emotionality than a polite formal one, as collocutors do not always follow the rules and standards of a formal situation behaviour being rude and harsh with their speech partners. At the prosodic level it is expressed by a faster tempo, a greater loudness and a wider pitch range than in the polite formal communication. The polite informal conflict communication is more emotional and natural than the polite formal one, but less emotional and natural than the impolite informal one. On the one hand the informal situation gives complete freedom to choose emotions and ways of their realization but on the other hand the desire to be polite in order not to offend the speech partner forces the collocutors to restrain their negative feelings in the polite formal conflict communication. The impolite informal conflict is the most emotional and uncontrolled. Expressiveness and uncontrollability in the impolite informal conflict are caused by the the speech situation informality, unwillingness and no need to restrain, complete freedom of choice of verbal and nonverbal means. At the prosodic level this type of conflict interaction is characterised by a high loudness, an accelerated tempo and a wide pitch range of the voice. The conducted research enabled us to state that conflict dialogical discourse represents a peculiar type of speech with a specific prosodic structure.