Alle Publikationen
2018
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(2018): Die feinen Unterschiede. Kritik der gesellschaftlichen Urteilskraft. Unter Mitarbeit von Bernd Schwibs. 26. Auflage 2018. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp (Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch Wissenschaft)Keywords: Bourdieu, Bourdieus Habitustheorie, Einkommen / Beruf, Familiengeschichte, Favoriten, feine Unterschiede, Feld, Geschmack, Gestik/Mimik, Good manners, Habitus, Klasse, Kleidung, Körperhaltung, Macht, Modelle/Theorien, Rollen, Soziale Angemessenheit, Soziologie, Sprache, Status / biologische Marker
2017
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(2017): Accelerating Progress. A New Era of Research on Character Development. In: Journal of youth and adolescence 46 (6), S. 1240-1245. DOI: 10.1007/s10964-017-0681-9
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28470439 Abstract: Adolescent character development is a high priority for educators, policymakers, and front-line youth workers. To meet this growing demand, and as exemplified in the five articles in this special section, character development scholars are drawing from a range of academic disciplines to push beyond the traditional boundaries of the science of character development. These articles highlight important trends in character research, including the co-development of a subset of character strengths, the articulation of developmental trajectories of character, the use of advanced methodological approaches, and the implications for education. Studies such as these are critically important for establishing the research base that will be used to design the character development programs of tomorrow. Adolescent character development is a high priority for educators, policymakers, and front-line youth workers. To meet this growing demand, and as exemplified in the five articles in this special section, character development scholars are drawing from a range of academic disciplines to push beyond the traditional boundaries of the science of character development. These articles highlight important trends in character research, including the co-development of a subset of character strengths, the articulation of developmental trajectories of character, the use of advanced methodological approaches, and the implications for education. Studies such as these are critically important for establishing the research base that will be used to design the character development programs of tomorrow.
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Ehrhardt, Claus; Neuland, Eva (Hg.) (2017): Sprachliche Höflichkeit. Historische, aktuelle und künftige Perspektiven. Tübingen, Germany: Narr Francke Attempto
Abstract: Sprachliche Höflichkeit ist ein breit diskutiertes Thema in Wissenschaft und Öffentlichkeit. Oft wird ein Mangel an Höflichkeit oder gar deren Verfall beklagt. Neue Medien und die zunehmende Interkulturalität scheinen das Problem zu verschärfen. In der Sprachwissenschaft greifen zahlreiche Ansätze solche Fragen auf und versuchen eine wissenschaftliche Klärung und Einordnung in neuere theoretische und methodische Entwicklungen. Der Band dokumentiert ausgewählte Beiträge einer internationalen Fachkonferenz. Er präsentiert aktuelle Entwicklungen in der deutschen Sprache und neue Ansätze in der Höflichkeitsforschung, auch in kontrastiver Perspektive und in verschiedenen Anwendungsfeldern. Kulturhistorische Einschätzungen über Ursprung und Entwicklung von Höflichkeitskonventionen sowie Ausblicke auf künftige Herausforderungen runden den Band ab.
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(2017): From dictators to avatars. Furthering social and personality psychology through game methods. In: Social and Personality Psychology Compass 11 (12). DOI: 10.1111/spc3.12368
Abstract: From football to the ultimatum game to chess to World of Warcraft, games have been used in social and personality psychology research for decades. Games are a unique and powerful method: They are engaging and have the potential to both manipulate and measure psychological constructs. In fact, researchers have used physical games, board games, behavioral economics games, and digital games to study a range of individual differences, interpersonal processes, and social cognitive processes. Furthermore, researchers have the opportunity to create their own games that can be targeted directly toward their topic of interest. Our review provides a primer for social and personality psychologists interested in using existing games or creating new games for their research as a method for understanding attitudes, behaviors, emotions, cognitions, and perceptions.
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(2017): Conceptualizing politeness in Japanese and Greek. In: Intercultural Pragmatics 14 (4), S. 525-555. DOI: 10.1515/ip-2017-0024
Abstract: The main aim of this paper is to investigate how Japanese and Greek female students conceptualize politeness and then compare the findings in order to tease out any cross-cultural similarities and differences. The data is drawn from a questionnaire filled in by two hundred female undergraduates (one hundred from each group). The results show that there are significant similarities as well as some differences. Although research on im/politeness has concentrated almost exclusively on linguistic performance, a significant similarity between the two groups is that politeness is conceptualized as primarily non-linguistic action. Another major similarity is that both groups conceptualize politeness mainly as "consideration to others" and "appropriate behavior," the former expressed mostly non-linguistically and the latter involving both linguistic and non-linguistic manifestations. Most participants view politeness as conveyed through attentiveness/helping others, respect and empathy. Differences were located mostly in the numbers of participants who mentioned the various subcategories. For example, more Greek participants related a broad sense of "respect" to politeness, whereas more Japanese participants related it to "empathy" and only Japanese participants mentioned "honorifics." Our participants' understandings of politeness appear to be in contrast to earlier politeness theories which view politeness as strategic concern for conflict avoidance and closer to current approaches which view it as relational, expressing concern for the needs and feelings of others.
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(2017): Competition and conflict between communicative norms. In: Journal of Argumentation in Context 6 (2), S. 220-246. DOI: 10.1075/jaic.6.2.05hop
Abstract: When engaging with each other, discussants navigate a complex set of communicative norms that aim at very different goals. Within argumentation theory naturally the most studied set of norms are those aiming at reasonableness, of which I take the pragma-dialectical rule set to be a representative example. They are however far from the only norms that guide communicative behavior. This paper offers an analysis of the areas of intersection and potential conflict of reasonableness (as understood by pragma-dialectics) with other communicative norms in general and rules of politeness (as presented by Geoffrey Leech) in particular.
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(2017): Conventionalized Politeness Structures. Empirical Evidence from Hindi/Urdu. In: Journal of Politeness Research 13 (2), S. 243-279. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2015-0001
Abstract: This paper discusses the results of a survey undertaken to investigate conventionalized politeness structures in Hindi\Urdu, with specific focus on the ability of native speakers to view politeness as a scalar phenomenon across different utterances vis-a-vis each other. The speakers were provided with utterances that encoded systematic differences in lexical choice (High Perso Arabic\High Sanskritic\neutral native) and construction choice (suggestion\request\ subjunctives, etc.), but nevertheless performed the same act so as to be possible to rank on a politeness scale as realizations of the same speech act. The paper focusses on the correlation between High\formal registers and politeness as well as the correlation between different grammatical structures and politeness to argue that linguistic structures are conventionalized for possible politeness effects.
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(2017): Perception of (im)politeness and the underlying cultural conceptualisations. In: Pragmatics and Society 8 (2). DOI: 10.1075/ps.8.2.04sha
Abstract: The present study sets out to investigate the role of 'culture' as one of the many important factors that influence the evaluation of (im)politeness in Persian from a Cultural Linguistics perspective. The paper argues that Cultural Linguistics, and in particular the notion of cultural schema, has the potential to offer a robust analytical framework for the exploration of (im)polite use of language. We elaborate on this proposal by presenting examples of data from Persian in which speakers interpret impolite behaviour in light of a number of Persian cultural schemas. The study also offers a novel three-layered approach for the analysis of (im)politeness data that combines metadiscourse analysis with the ethnography of cultural conceptualisations, while highlighting the importance of the notion of 'heterogeneous distribution' of cultural conceptualisations, a pivotal theoretical concept in Cultural Linguistics which accounts for the variations in speakers' evaluation of (im)politeness.
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(2017): The Brown and Levinson theory revisited. A statistical analysis. In: Language Sciences 62, S. 66-75. DOI: 10.1016/j.langsci.2017.03.006
Abstract: The Brown and Levinson (1987) theory posits that the combination of social distance, power ratio, and task imposition determine politeness weightiness perception regardless of the culture. In order to test the effects of culture, I conducted statistical analyses using subjects with American, East Asian, and Latin American cultural backgrounds. The results reveal that task imposition does not have a statistically significant impact on the speaker's determination of politeness weightiness in East Asia while it does in the US and Latin America. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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(2017): The Neural Basis of Changing Social Norms through Persuasion. In: Scientific reports 7 (1). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-16572-2
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29176682 Abstract: Social norms regulate behavior, and changes in norms have a great impact on society. In most modern societies, norms change through interpersonal communication and persuasive messages found in media. Here, we examined the neural basis of persuasion-induced changes in attitude toward and away from norms using fMRI. We measured brain activity while human participants were exposed to persuasive messages directed toward specific norms. Persuasion directed toward social norms specifically activated a set of brain regions including temporal poles, temporo-parietal junction, and medial prefrontal cortex. Beyond these regions, when successful, persuasion away from an accepted norm specifically recruited the left middle temporal and supramarginal gyri. Furthermore, in combination with data from a separate attitude-rating task, we found that left supramarginal gyrus activity represented participant attitude toward norms and tracked the persuasion-induced attitude changes that were away from agreement.
Keywords: Beeinflussung der Bewertung moralischer Urteile, Bewertung von sozialem Verhalten (/sozialer Angemessenheit), Disziplin, Einfluss von Medien, Good manners, Neurowissenschaften, Normen, Normenwandel, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Postkasten, Psychologie, Soziale Angemessenheit, Wandel von Normen -
(2017): Individual Differences in Good Manners Rather Than Compassion Predict Fair Allocations of Wealth in the Dictator Game. In: Journal of personality 85 (2), S. 244-256. DOI: 10.1111/jopy.12237
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26691600 Abstract: One of the most common tools for studying pro-sociality is the dictator game, in which allocations to one's partner are often described in terms of altruism. However, the motivations driving these allocations may represent either emotional concern for others (compassion), adherence to social norms regarding fairness (politeness), or both. In this article, we apply personality psychology to the study of behavior in the dictator game, in which we examine the discriminant validity of distinct pro-social constructs from the Big Five and HEXACO models in relation to allocations of wealth. Across four studies (Study 1: N = 192; Study 2: N = 212; Study 3: N = 304; Study 4: N = 90) utilizing both hypothetical and incentivized designs, we found that the politeness-but not compassion-aspect of Big Five Agreeableness, as well as HEXACO Honesty-Humility, uniquely predicted dictator allocations within their respective personality models. These findings contribute to a growing literature indicating that the standard dictator game measures "good manners" or adherence to norms concerning fairness, rather than pure emotional concern or compassionate motives, and have important implications for how this paradigm is used and interpreted in psychological research.
Keywords: Adolescent, Adult, Dictator Game, Disziplin, Empathy/physiology, Entwicklungspsychologie, Female, Games, Experimental, Good manners, HEXACO, Humans, Individuality, Male, Middle Aged, Personality/physiology, Postkasten, Psychologie, Social Behavior, Social Conformity, Soziale Angemessenheit, Spieltheorie, Umgangsformen, Young Adult -
(2017): Politeness and Compassion Differentially Predict Adherence to Fairness Norms and Interventions to Norm Violations in Economic Games. In: Scientific reports 7 (1). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-02952-1
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28611410 Abstract: Adherence to norms and interventions to norm violations are two important forms of social behaviour modelled in economic games. While both appear to serve a prosocial function, they may represent separate mechanisms corresponding with distinct emotional and psychological antecedents, and thus may be predicted by different personality traits. In this study, we compared adherence to fairness norms in the dictator game with responses to violations of the same norms in third-party punishment and recompensation games with respect to prosocial traits from the Big Five and HEXACO models of personality. The results revealed a pattern of differential relations between prosocial traits and game behaviours. While norm adherence in the dictator game was driven by traits reflecting good manners and non-aggression (the politeness aspect of Big Five agreeableness and HEXACO honesty-humility), third-party recompensation of victims-and to a lesser extent, punishment of offenders-was uniquely driven by traits reflecting emotional concern for others (the compassion aspect of Big Five agreeableness). These findings demonstrate the discriminant validity between similar prosocial constructs and highlight the different prosocial motivations underlying economic game behaviours.
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(2017): When Fair Is Not Equal. In: Social Psychological and Personality Science 8 (8), S. 847-857. DOI: 10.1177/1948550616683018
Abstract: Growing evidence has highlighted the importance of social norms in promoting prosocial behaviors in economic games. Specifically, individual differences in norm adherence—captured by the politeness aspect of Big Five agreeableness—have been found to predict fair allocations of wealth to one’s partner in the dictator game. Yet, most studies have used neutrally framed paradigms, where players may default to norms of equality in the absence of contextual cues. In this study (N = 707), we examined prosocial personality traits and dictator allocations under salient real-world norms of equity and need. Extending on the previous research, we found that—in addition to politeness—the compassion aspect of agreeableness predicted greater allocations of wealth when they were embedded in real-world norms. These results represent an important step in understanding the real-world implications of laboratory-based research, demonstrating the importance of both normative context and prosocial traits.
2016
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(2016): Good manners. Signaling social preferences. In: Theory and Decision 81 (1), S. 73-88. DOI: 10.1007/s11238-015-9527-7
Abstract: Certain messages, even when not directly payoff relevant, can be a credible form of communication in light of natural social preferences. Social image concerns and other-regarding preferences interact to create incentives to communicate about how one feels about other people. Recognizing the prevalence of the incentive to communicate about one's social preferences suggests that many social and economic phenomena-from norms of etiquette to cooperation to gift exchange-should be seen, in part, as forms of signaling. These behaviors may be surprisingly robust to material costs, yet sensitive to context.
Keywords: altruistische Handlungen, Disziplin, economics, Favoriten, Good manners, Kosten-Nutzen, manners, Modelle/Theorien, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Preferences, Signaling social preferences/ Social signal processing, Soziale Angemessenheit, Umgangsformen -
(2016): Democracy online. Civility, politeness, and the democratic potential of online political discussion groups. In: New Media & Society 6 (2), S. 259-283. DOI: 10.1177/1461444804041444
Abstract: The proponents of cyberspace promise that online discourse will increase political participation and pave the road for a democratic utopia. This article explores the potential for civil discourse in cyberspace by examining the level of civility in 287 discussion threads in political newsgroups. While scholars often use civility and politeness interchangeably, this study argues that this conflation ignores the democratic merit of robust and heated discussion. Therefore, civility was defined in a broader sense, by identifying as civil behaviors that enhance democratic conversation. In support of this distinction, the study results revealed that most messages posted on political newsgroups were civil, and further suggested that because the absence of face-to-face communication fostered more heated discussion, cyberspace might actually promote Lyotard's vision of democratic emancipation through disagreement and anarchy (Lyotard, 1984). Thus, this study supported the internet's potential to revive the public sphere, provided that greater diversity and volume of discussion is present.
Keywords: civility im Kontrast zu politeness, cyberspace, Debattierhaftigkeit, Digitalisierung, Diskurs, doppelter Treffer, Good manners, Höflichkeit, Informations- & Kommunikationstechnik, Internetportale/Blogs, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Politische Sphäre, Realtechnik, Situationsbedingter Kontext, social media, Soziale Angemessenheit, soziale Medien, Sprachgebrauch, Technik -
(2016): Polite like an Egyptian?. Case Studies of Politeness in the Late Ramesside Letters. In: Journal of Politeness Research 12 (2), S. 149-153. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2016-0007
Abstract: The Late Ramesside Letters, a corpus of over 70 personal communications written in Late Egyptian, form one of the most complete letter collections from ancient Egypt (c. 1099-1069 BCE). A key feature of ancient Egyptian letter writing is the adherence to the social positions of, and relationships between, the interlocutors, allowing scholars to reconstruct the hierarchical network of individuals directly and indirectly included in the corpus. From this understanding, how can modern scholars discern what was considered to be 'polite' communicative behaviour within these relationships and how can developments in historical politeness help us do this? This article will explore three case studies surrounding different aspects of politeness research: first-order politeness, facework, and discernment politeness in order to explore the phenomenon of 'politeness' in Late Egyptian and reflect on the suitability of current politeness frameworks for the analysis of the Late Ramesside Letters.
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(2016): Special Issue: Case studies in historical politeness (ancient languages): Introduction. In: Journal of Politeness Research 12 (2), S. 149-153. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2016-0020
Abstract: The collection of papers included in this Special Issue represents the first contribution of its kind to the study of politeness, bringing together studies from across many different historical disciplines to collectively assess and challenge the concept of ‘politeness’ in the ancient world. Here, the authors of the papers experiment with modern politeness frameworks, assessing the different ways in which historical politeness can be understood and pursued. What becomes clear in these studies is that the modern concept of ‘politeness’ needs to be better defined when it is applied to the ancient world, especially if the culture or language system under study has no direct terminology or understanding of ‘politeness’ as it is defined today.
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(2016): Digital Social Norm Enforcement. Online Firestorms in Social Media. In: PLoS one 11 (6). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0155923
DOI: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27315071 Abstract: Actors of public interest today have to fear the adverse impact that stems from social media platforms. Any controversial behavior may promptly trigger temporal, but potentially devastating storms of emotional and aggressive outrage, so called online firestorms. Popular targets of online firestorms are companies, politicians, celebrities, media, academics and many more. This article introduces social norm theory to understand online aggression in a social-political online setting, challenging the popular assumption that online anonymity is one of the principle factors that promotes aggression. We underpin this social norm view by analyzing a major social media platform concerned with public affairs over a period of three years entailing 532,197 comments on 1,612 online petitions. Results show that in the context of online firestorms, non-anonymous individuals are more aggressive compared to anonymous individuals. This effect is reinforced if selective incentives are present and if aggressors are intrinsically motivated.
Keywords: Aggression/psychology, Anonymität, Beeinflussung sozial angemessenen Verhaltens, Crime/legislation & jurisprudence, Digital Norms, Disziplin, Favoriten, Firestorms, Good manners, Humans, Internet/legislation & jurisprudence, Mensch-Technik-Relationen (MTR), Modelle/Theorien, Motivation, Natur & Genese von Normen, Normen, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Politics, Social Media/legislation & jurisprudence, Social Norm Theory, Social Norms, Social Norms Marketing, Social Theory, Soziale Angemessenheit, Soziale Normen, Soziologie, Technik -
(2016): Table manners. How to behave in the modern world and why bother. First edition. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Abstract: "An authoritative and witty guide to modern table manners for all occasions by one of the world's most acclaimed chefs and restaurateurs Table Manners is an entertaining and practical guide to manners for everyone and every occasion. Whether you are a guest at a potluck or the host of a dinner party, a patron of your local bar or an invitee at a state dinner, this book tells you exactly how to behave: what to talk about, what to wear, how to eat. Jeremiah Tower has advice on everything: food allergies, RSVPs, iPhones, running late, thank-yous, restaurant etiquette, even what to do when you are served something disgusting. With whimsical line drawings throughout, this is "Strunk and White" for the table"--
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(2016): Social norms, costly punishment and the evolution of cooperation. In: Journal of Economic Interaction and Coordination 11 (2), S. 313-343. DOI: 10.1007/s11403-015-0146-8
Abstract: Both laboratory and field evidence suggest that people tend to voluntarily incur costs to punish non-cooperators. While costly punishment typically reduces the average payoff as well as promotes cooperation. Why does the costly punishment evolve? We study the role of punishment in cooperation promotion within a two-level evolution framework of individual strategies and social norms. In a population with certain social norm, players update their strategies according to the payoff differences among different strategies. In a longer horizon, the evolution of social norm may be driven by the average payoffs of of all members of the society. Norms differ in whether they allow or do not allow for the punishment action as part of strategies, and, for the former, they further differ in whether they encourage or do not encourage the punishment action. The strategy dynamics are articulated under different social norms. It is found that costly punishment does contribute to the evolution toward cooperation. Not only does the attraction basin of cooperative evolutionary stable state (CESS) become larger, but also the convergence speed to CESS is faster. These two properties are further enhanced if the punishment action is encouraged by the social norm. This model can be used to explain the widespread existence of costly punishment in human society.
Keywords: Bestrafung, Disziplin, economics, Favoriten, Genese von Normen, Good manners, Kooperation, Modelle/Theorien, Natur & Genese von Normen, Normen, Observablen/Kriterien für sozial angemessenes Verhalten und dessen Bewertung, Ökonomische Theorie sozialer Normen, Soziale Angemessenheit, Soziale Normen, Voraussetzungen für sozial angemessenes Verhalten, Wandel von Normen 2015
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(2015): (Un)expected behavior. Some general issues and a papal example. In: Journal of Pragmatics 86, S. 19-24. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2015.06.008
Abstract: The definitional debate as to which concept - politeness or appropriateness - it to be chosen as the superordinate one is far from over in politeness studies. In this paper I will raise the question of whether unexpectedness could be a candidate as the encompassing category. I will also tackle two related issues: that of unexpected behavior as a marked choice in a given context, and that of the relevance of the emotive aspects of interaction to the construction of the context. To this end, I will advance the hypothesis that the following notions can together help understand interaction functioning: (a) the interplay/co-variance among different interactional parameters (Caffi, 2001, 2007), (b) the divergence of different kinds of expectations from anticipatory schemata (Caffi and Janney, 1994), and (c) the notion of interactional temperature (an extension of Watzlawick et al.'s, 1967 thermostat metaphor). After some preliminary remarks meant to illustrate the above-mentioned points, I will discuss an example of unexpected behavior, Pope Francis's first greeting after his election. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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(2015): The landscape of impoliteness research. In: Journal of Politeness Research 11 (2), S. 329-354. DOI: 10.1515/pr-2015-0013
Abstract: This article attempts to give a state-of-the-art picture of impoliteness studies and to indicate a few prospective research directions to enrich them. It critically surveys a number of theoretical and methodological problems (impoliteness vs. rudeness; intention; sanctioned face-threat; and impoliteness strategies), as well as the paramount topics of investigation (such as disagreement; arguments; insults, taboo words; or sarcasm), and discourse domains in which impoliteness can be found. Importantly, this paper brings to focus a selection of notions central to impoliteness, albeit not yet widely recognized in the scholarship on impoliteness. These include: slurs; pejoratives; and a number of phenomena promoted by computer mediated communication (e.g., flaming or trolling).
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(2015): Creating social orientation through language. A socio-cognitive theory of situated social meaning. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Pub. Co. Online verfügbar unter http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/celcr.17
Abstract: This monograph develops a new socio-cognitive theory of sense-making for analyzing the creative management of situated social meaning. Drawing on cognitive-linguistic and social-interactional heuristics in an innovative way, the book both theorizes and demonstrates how embodied cognizers create complex situated conceptualizations of self and other, which guide and support their interactions. It shows how these sense-making processes are managed through the coordinated social interaction of two (or more) communicative partners. To illustrate the theory, the book draws on two distinct data sets: front-desk tourist-information transactions and online-workgroup discussions. It scrutinizes how the communicative partners use verbal humour as a powerful strategy to creatively establish a situated social image for themselves. This book addresses specialists and advanced students in the areas of cognitive linguistics as well as interactional approaches to language. Moreover, it will be of great value to readers interested in verbal humour, business communication, and computer-mediated communication.
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(2015): Interpersonal pragmatics and its link to (im)politeness research. In: Journal of Pragmatics 86, S. 5-10. DOI: 10.1016/j.pragma.2015.05.010
Abstract: In light of the fact that politeness research has been on the map since the 1970s, this paper revisits some of the more recent developments. The scope of analysis has been widened from face-maintaining and face-enhancing data to instances of conflictual and face-aggravating behaviour. There is an increase in discussions about appropriate methodological and theoretical approaches to politeness, and we see a tendency to creatively draw on approaches from other fields (such as identity construction research). These trends have made the field an especially vibrant one that is currently witnessing a struggle to (re)define its focus. Two connected issues (clarifying and refining the scope of our research questions and efforts of developing an interdisciplinary approach within interpersonal pragmatics) are particularly discussed in an endeavour to outline potential research paths. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
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Locher, Miriam A.; Bolander, Brook; Höhn, Nicole (Hg.) (2015): Relational work in Facebook and discussion boards/fora. International Pragmatics Association
Abstract: This paper functions as the introduction to the special issue on ‘relational work in Facebook and discussion boards’. We position our research endeavors within interpersonal pragmatics (see Locher and Graham 2010), by reviewing literature on politeness, impoliteness and relational work in the context of computer-mediated communication. Foregrounding the relational aspect of language, we are particularly interested in establishing the connections between politeness, face and linguistic identity construction. We then position the four papers that form this special issue within this field of research. Two papers contribute to the study of relational work on discussion boards (Kleinke and Boes; Haugh, Chang and Kádár) and two deal with practices on Facebook (Theodoropoulou; Bolander and Locher).