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As is well-known, conflict analysis is performed in many disciplines
(psychology, linguistics, social sciences, etc.). Each of them has worked out a
definition of conflict which should be operationalized in a specific investigation
with specific scientific aims. Some disciplines (like psychology) are, among others,
interested in finding solutions and reconciliation strategies, while other disciplines
(like linguistics) attempt to develop a reliable method for the description and
analysis of conflict, and thus to explicate the underlying conflict mechanisms at the
level of the dynamics of a communicative interaction. From the pragmalinguistic
perspective, the investigation of conflict is focused on the “action-leading” character
of speech acts, i.e., on three dimensions related to the performed acts: (a) doing
something while saying something (the locutionary dimension , what is said ), (b)
doing something in saying something (the illocutionary dimension , what is meant ),
(c) doing something by saying something (the perlocutionary dimension , which
effects in the world are caused by linguistic utterances), as Austin 2 put it. Both
impoliteness and verbal aggression end easily in conflict because in both cases
they lead to a limitation of freedom of action of one interlocutor to the other
interlocutor's advantage, who in turn claims interactional power (interactional
rights) for himself/herself. We will try to show that the central event in conflicts
caused by impoliteness and verbal aggression is not only the threat to face (the
actual loss of face or the danger of losing face) and the reaction to it, but rather the
process of a redefinition of interactional balance between interlocutors.
The notion of face used in our model is a dynamic one. In pragmalinguistic
studies on politeness and impoliteness based on E. Goffman's notion of face
(Goffman 1967 ), later developed by P. Brown and S.C. Levinson in a second-order
framework, the face of a person is supposed to be a static element according to
the classic definition: “The term face may be defined as the positive social value
a person effectively claims for himself by the line others assume he has taken
during a particular contact. Face is an image of self delineated in terms of approved
social attributes [ ::: ]” (Goffman 1967 :5).Theterm face-work designs the behavior
that every participant in social encounters has to assume in order to maintain both
his/her face and the face of others (Brown and Levinson 1987 : 61ff.), according to
the two fundamental human needs: the need to be appreciated ( positive face ) and
the need not to be limited ( negative face ) (Brown and Levinson 1987 : 101ff. and
129ff.). Politeness is seen as a regulative system of ritual behavior, which has a
2 See Austin ( 1962 ): 94: “consider from the ground up how many senses there are in which to
say something is to do something, or in saying something we do something, and even by saying
something we do something.” From the point of view of pragmalinguistics, it is not possible to
analyze a conflict exclusively at the locutionary (lexical) level, because every utterance (even
an insulting one from the point of view of the lexical meaning) can be used in a supporting
way(s.MateoandYus 2013 : 94). Furthermore, the analysis of the sole locutionary level
proves unsatisfactory in the analysis of cold and hidden aggression and tacit conflicts (see “acid
speech acts” in Poggi and D'Errico 2013 ). The phenomenon can be investigated empirically as a
perlocutionary effect of communicative behavior (verbal and nonverbal behavior), which is, or is
not, intended as conflictive.
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