Politeness involves evaluations and attitudes which are closely connected to the assessment of actions. Politeness investigations in presidential debates enables voters to assess the candidates’ behavior to make well-informed decision during the election. The present study investigated politeness strategies in two different presidential debates within the United States electoral context: the Democratic party and the final presidential debates. Data were analyzed by adopting the coding scheme in Brown and Levinson’s frameworks. The overall result indicated that both presidential debates used more positive politeness strategies than the negative politeness. PPS-10 (offer and promise), PPS-12 (include both speaker and hearer in the activity) and NPS-2 (hedge) were more frequently used in both types of debates. PPS-3 (intensify interest to hearer) was frequent in the democratic debate alone. Meanwhile, PPS-15 (give gits to hearer) was frequent in the final presidential debate alone. The findings imply that the use of the politeness strategies can shape the candidates’ positive political images in the presidential debates.
Politeness is paramount in human interactions and plays an essential role in the way that we communicate with one another and define ourselves. Politeness mostly deals with typical interpersonal behaviors (Ryabova, 2015) in which our relationships are explored and maintained which is not only restricted to conventional aspects of linguistic etiquette. It is generally accepted that politeness deals with evaluation and attitudes which are closely connected to assessing the actions of a person, situation or event.
Political debate is a significant source of information about candidates because mostly it is the constituents’ only opportunity to look at candidates interacting on stage without campaign affairs (Siepmann, 1962). Furthermore, the discourse of the political debate is one of the richest wellsprings of campaign information for audiences. Jamieson (1987) suggested that political debates offer some benefits for viewers looking for information about candidates in the way that it enables audiences to disclose the candidates’ communicative competence and habits of thinking, increase the accountability of candidates, and check out the manipulative tendency of candidates. Political debates also provide an opportunity for the audiences to examine how the candidates respond to the challenges of the dispute. Viewing the performance, they can gather information about how the candidates will behave in office.
Investigating debate and how politeness theory might influence debate practices can give insights to argumentation and rhetoric pedagogy. Debate instructions are considered to serve effective pedagogical tools to boost students’ argumentation skills.
El Majidi et al. (2021) claimed that debate instructions can enhance the quality of students’ argumentation skills in both written and spoken language as well as the ‘structural components’ of their arguments. Producing high quality of arguments is not only critical to debate winning regardless of the contexts and stages as in political debates, classroom debate competitions, TV shows, etc. Mercier (2011), and Mercier and Sperber (2011) argued it is also important as predictor of good critical thinking skills. Teaching the politeness strategies in such debate and argumentation classrooms can also facilitate students to be aware of intercultural communication aspects so as they need to gain pragmatic competence.
Given that political debate naturally involves conflicts between at least two parties or candidates, it is highly possible that they are in face threatening situations. The common assumption is that face threats are more likely to happen in competitive situations such as political debates rather than in any normal interactions (Fracchiolla, 2011). Strategically speaking, the candidates need to break down their rival’s opposing views. Through their strong arguments and face-threatening acts, the audiences’ attention is drawn to the debates. This way, the candidates can gain support and votes from their supporters. At the same time, both parties are likely to save their faces and concurrently strive to reach their goals, and derive maximum benefit at the expense of their rivals. Therefore, it can be assumed that the candidates tend to use as many politeness strategies as possible during the debates.
Hinck and Hinck (2002) argued that in political debates, good abilities of candidates to persuade people to view their faces in quite positive light can be a decisive factor in winning the debates. Therefore, the present study makes an assumption that the use of politeness strategies in political debates such as presidential debates might enable the constituents to assess the candidates’ behaviors and performances under particular circumstances. Thus, it helps them draw a better picture of the candidates who will run for the office.
In the political context of the United States, prior to the presidential debate, which is commonly known as the final stage of the campaign, the candidates need to compete in their own Party; for instance, Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama’s competition in the Democratic Party in 2008. This stage is considered crucial in helping constituents assess the candidates’ fitness for presidential candidacy. The researchers’ preliminary analysis indicates that the debate at this stage is quite different from the final one due to its higher stake, which deserves further analysis and discussion with regard to the use of politeness strategies. However, there is a lack of literature concerning how particular candidates behave during the debates at different stages. Given that the circumstances, the face wants, and face threats could be different from one to another, it is worthwhile to investigate what sorts of politeness strategies have been used in such debates.
Concept of politeness has long existed in the literature since 1967 pioneered by Goffman through the notion of face. Face is associated with the notions of social-emotional embarrassment or humiliation (Goffman, 1967). In many kinds of human interactions, a common tendency is that face can be lost, maintained or enhanced. In general, when people are involved in interactions, they may tend to save each other’s’ face. They do not only attempt to maintain their own face, but also save others. Because to some extent, face can be vulnerable. In nature, everyone needs to keep their face and their partners’ face. In other words, no one wants to be in the situation of being embarrassed and humiliated.
Based on Goffman’s (1967) construct of face, Brown and Levinson (1987) advocated a more detailed concept of face. Face can be classified into both positive face and negative face. Positive face refers to one’s desire for the approval of others. On the other hand, negative face is one’s desire that his or her activities be unimpeded. An act that violates either kind of face is considered as face-threatening act (FTA). Although we do not want to cause any FTA when we interact with each other, FTA is still unavoidable. Generally speaking, when an interlocutor causes an FTA, the interlocutor tends to use some strategies to mediate or minimize face damage in the process of FTA.
Brown and Levinson (1987) asserted that any act performed towards satisfying another’s positive face refers to positive politeness, and towards satisfying one’s negative face refers to negative politeness. Instead, positive politeness focuses on face-saving acts concerning others’ positive face. Meanwhile, negative politeness refers to maintaining the negative face of others. Thus, the strategic use of positive politeness and negative politeness can be categorized into positive politeness strategies and negative politeness strategies, depending on the perspective of the face that interlocutor wants to save. Following Brown and Levinson’s concept of politeness, the present study explores the use of politeness strategies in presidential debates in American contexts.
Debate refers to the process of inquiry and advocacy. It is a strategy for reaching a reasoned judgment on a proposition (Freeley & Steinberg, 2005). The use of debate to persuade people with arguments is not new. It has been a long tradition since the periods of Plato and Aristotle which was known as rhetoric (Brummet, 2018). Debate enables people to reach decisions in their own minds or to bring others around to their way of thinking. Debate requires the audience and the opposing parties to be involved to compare and evaluate decisions and options that will be taken. In modern and scientific societies, a few effective methods and procedures to make a decision are arranged. One of them is debate. For instance, the court and the legislature are formed to utilize the debate as a means of decision making.
Freeley and Steinberg (2005) defined presidential debate as a sort of debate which is highly distinctive from judicial and parliamentary debate because it is carried out under particular rules agreed upon by the debaters. This kind of debate is most commonly associated with political figures and their campaign. In the United States political arena, debates between the presidential candidates are well established. They were initially held in 1960 between Kennedy and Nixon. Presidential debate is regarded as highly important in the presidential election because it serves as the focal point of the presidential campaign and is one of the determining factors to predict the winner of the presidential election (
Up till now, little research had been done to explore further how politeness strategies are used in presidential debates.
The given review indicates that the previous studies adopted a general concept of politeness strategies as framework their analysis rather than had a more detailed discussion of subcategories of politeness strategies. Besides, most of the studies focused on the investigation of only one genre of presidential debates. They did not compare and contrast to figure out similarities and differences between the presidential debates genres.
To fill the gap, the present study attempts to carry out a comparative investigation of the two kinds of debates which could help readers, particularly the debate viewers, gain an in-depth insight into it. Therefore, the objectives of the present study are to investigate how the presidential candidates used politeness strategies in both the democratic and the presidential debates, and also to compare and contrast the politeness strategies used in the two different debates.
In line with the given objectives, a few inquiries are put forward in this study: namely, 1) What kinds of politeness strategies do the presidential candidates use when they participate in democratic political party debates? 2) What kinds of politeness strategies do the presidential candidates use when they participate in the final presidential debates? and 3) What are similarities and differences of the politeness strategies used in the two kinds of debates?
Data source consisted of two transcripts of the 2008 US presidential debates: democratic and final presidential debates. The first transcript was the final presidential debate between John McCain and Barack Obama in Hempstead, N.Y on October 15, 2008. The second transcript was democratic presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in the National Constitution Center, Philadelphia on April 16, 2008. Transcripts of the two debates were downloaded from the website of The New York Times. The first transcript consisted of 16,408 running words whereas the second one had 19,234 running words.
To analyze the transcript, a coding scheme is adopted from
| Positive Politeness Strategies (PPS) | Negative Politeness Strategies (NPS) |
| 1.Notice and attend to H (his interests, wants, needs, goods). Showing that the S is attending to what the H has said or wants | 1.Be conventionally indirectImposing indirectly on the reader by relying on Gricean principles that check for the “felicity” conditions of a request |
| 2.Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H)Using exaggerated intonation, stress, and other aspects of prosodic | 2.HedgeUsing words to indicate that the S is not assuming that the H will want to comply or agree with the S |
| 3. Intensify interest to HUsing words that make one’s own comment more interesting by exaggerating or overstating facts | 3.Be pessimisticSaying that the S doubts that the conditions apply for even imposing on H |
| 4. Use in-group identity markersUsing any of the innumerable ways to convey in- group membership: address forms, language or dialect, jargon or slang and ellipses | 4.Minimize the impositionUsing words to imply a lesser imposition on H than it seems |
| 5. Seek agreementSaying what the S believes H will agree with by repeating or by seeking a safe topic | 5.Give deferenceUsing words to abase the S, or to raises H’s status |
| 6. Avoid disagreementSaying something to soften disagreement, or hedging one’s opinion, or being vague so as to seem to agree | 6.ApologyUsing words to indicate that the S is reluctant to impinge on H |
| 7. Presuppose/ raise/ assert common groundShowing interest in H by starting a message with small talk, greetings, or unrelated topics | 7.Impersonalize S and HRequesting or imposing on H indirectly using general words |
| 8. JokeUsing humor to indicate shared connections with H and putting H “at ease” | 8.State the FAT as a general rule Referring to an underlying principle or document that regulates the H and S |
| 9. Assert or presuppose S’s knowledge of and concern for H’s wantsUsing language to show that the S knows what H wants and is willing to fit his/her wants or needs in the H’s | 9.Nominalize Using a nominalized form to make the request or tostate the imposition instead of using a verb |
| 10. Offer and promiseSaying that the S will help the H obtain the H’s wants | 10. Go on record as incurring a debt or as not indebting HStating that the S will feel grateful for help that H may in the future provide |
| 11. Be optimisticUsing optimistic words to show the S hopes that imposition on the H is not much | |
| 12.Include both S and H in the activityUsing first person plural pronouns to refer to S only or R only | |
| 13. Give (or ask) reasonsGiving/asking for reasons for an imposition on the reader | |
| 14. Assume or assert reciprocityShowing the S has acted so as to now obligate H | |
| 15. Give gifts to H (goods, sympathy, understanding, cooperation)Giving praise and statements of appreciation and gratitude |
| Presidential debates | Message | Politeness Strategy |
| Final | And the fact is, it's gotten pretty tough. And I regret some of the negative aspects of both campaigns (John McCain). | NPS-6 |
| Democratic party | I will make it very clear that we will do so in a responsible and careful manner, because obviously, withdrawing troops and equipment is dangerous (Clinton Hillary). | PPS-10 |
As aforementioned, the researchers analyzed the debate transcripts using the adopted coding scheme in
| Positive politeness strategies | Final presidential debate | Democratic presidential debate | ||
| n | % | n | % | |
| PPS-1 Notice and attend to H | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-2 Exaggerate | 1 | 0.72% | 6 | 4.26% |
| PPS-3 Intensify interest to H | 2 | 1.45% | 48 | 34.04% |
| PPS-4 Use in-group identity makers | 4 | 2.90% | 2 | 1.42% |
| PPS-5 Seek agreement | 5 | 3.62% | 3 | 2.13% |
| PPS-6 Avoid disagreement | 0 | 0% | 1 | 0.71% |
| PPS-7 Presuppose/ raise/ assert common ground | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-8 Joke | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-9 Assert or presuppose S’s knowledge of and concern for H’s wants | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-10 Offer and promise | 26 | 18.84% | 35 | 24.82% |
| PPS-11 Be optimistic | 10 | 7.25% | 8 | 5.67% |
| PPS-12 Include both S and H in the activity | 52 | 37.68% | 36 | 25.53% |
| PPS-13 Give (or ask) reasons | 4 | 2.90% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-14 Assume or assert reciprocity | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| PPS-15 Give gifts to H (Goodness, sympathy, understanding,cooperation) | 34 | 24.64% | 2 | 1.42% |
| Total | 138 | 100% | 141 | 100% |
The presidential candidates in the Democratic debate frequently used the positive strategies of “intensify interest to hearer” (PPS-3). Concerning the gender difference, the female candidate in Democratic presidential debate tended to be more cooperative than the male counterpart. Hillary confirmed that her ideas were in line with Obama’s ideas and American people’s hopes. Both candidates were shaping a good political image that they were good partners for the candidacy of the Democratic Party. This result is in agreement with
The first is more related to entertainment whereas the latter is political and with its nature is competition. Yet, the face threats are likely similar in the way that both contestants didn’t not attempt to attack face of their rivals rather they maintain harmony.
The next positive politeness category which was commonly used in both debates is the strategy of “offer and promise”. The analysis shows that all candidates regarded that “offer and promise” (PPS-10) was central important as it enabled them to stress and claim that the hearers’ (opposing partner and public) wants were similar to the candidates’ wants.
The strategy of “include speaker and hearer in the activity” (PPS-12) in both democratic and final debate is to express that the candidates were highly close to the debate’s viewers that American people and them were in the same boat. Excerpt 1 shows how Hillary used PPS-12 in response to Obama. The candidates attempted to claim that they were the representatives of American people in achieving the common goals.
You know, I am here, as is Senator Obama. Neither of us were included in those original documents. But in a very real sense, we demonstrate that that promise of America is alive and well. But it is at risk. (Hillary Clinton in Democratic debate) The distribution percentage of “give gifts to hearer” (PPS-15) in the final debate was about 24% meanwhile it was found only 1% in its counterpart. It showed that candidates wanted to give their praises or statement of appreciation and gratitude to hearers in order to show that they were not mean and harsh. Instead, they respected and appreciated others and gave their positive comments. It helps to establish a positive, friendly, polite political image toward the American citizens.
“Hedge” is the only most used strategy in both debates. This current result is consistent with
This strategy was used in order to sound not rude. Simultaneously, both candidates wanted to be perceived as not harsh and had good behaviors as politicians. However, this result is in contrast with
The findings conclude that negative politeness was less preferably used and has been less taken into account as proper rhetorical skills in the debates. Negative politeness is considered to have less substantial role in the political debates since the rules format as commonly agreed by the candidates determined who can speak under what circumstances and for how long imposed by a moderator in order to keep the candidates from any immediate interruptions (Hinck et al, 2005).
| Negative Politeness Strategies (NPS) | Final presidential debate | Democratic presidential debate | ||
| n | % | n | % | |
| NPS-1 Be conventionally indirect | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-2 Hedge | 24 | 61.54% | 5 | 83.33% |
| NPS-3 Be pessimistic | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-4 Minimize the imposition | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-5 Give deference | 9 | 23.08% | 1 | 16.67% |
| NPS-6 Apologize | 6 | 15.38% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-7 Impersonalize S and H | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-8 State the FTA as a general rule | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-9 Normalize | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| NPS-10 Go on record as incurring a debt or as not indebting the H | 0 | 0% | 0 | 0% |
| Total | 39 | 100% | 6 | 100% |
This study sets out to disclose the American presidential candidates’ use of politeness strategies and compare and contrast when the strategies are used in different stages of presidential debates. The results indicate that candidates in both debates adopted higher number of positive politeness strategies than the negative politeness strategies. PPS-10, PPS-12 and NPS-2 sequentially are more frequently used in both debates. PPS-3 is only frequently used in the democratic debate, meanwhile, PPS-15 is only frequent in the final debate. The analysis shows that the selected strategies shaped their positive political images in the presidential debates. Having these positive images is considered to be critical importance in determining the winning of the election. However, several limitations of the present study need to be acknowledged in ord er to give insights into future exploration. First, the data sources were restricted to two presidential debates. Future research might need to increase its data size to be more representative and transferrable. Second, there is no inclusion of non-verbal language in the analysis. Non-verbal aspects such as body movements and facial expressions can be further investigated to reveal the aspects of politeness by the candidates. Third, little attention was given to gender differences on the use of politeness strategies. Therefore, future research can discuss further gender differences in the presidential debates across political parties and cultures.
This study also yields some pedagogical implications to teaching both debate and argumentation skills. First, information on politeness strategies can be important inputs while designing relevant debate materials concerning linguistic and rhetoric strategies for the learners. Second, having knowledge of politeness strategies can facilitate learners to achieve pragmatic competence and avoid misunderstanding in cross-cultural communications. Third, teaching pragmatic knowledge enriched from the literature can facilitate the learners to improve their rhetorical and argumentation skills while learning to organize ideas and noticing the alternatives that they can adapt to sound polite in order that they convincingly establish their claims and arguments. Fourth, instruction of how to well-structure good arguments can inform how to teach critical thinking to the learners.
The researchers of the present study express their deep gratitude to the faculty at the School of Foreign Languages, Suranaree University of Technology, Thailand for their continuous substantial comments and constructive suggestions during the critical stages of the research as well as manuscript writing.
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