Home / Special Issue / JSSH Vol. 30 (S1) 2022 / JSSH(S)-1535-2022

 

A Socio-Cultural Study of Face and Politeness Conceptions in the Kazakh Context

A. A. Muldagaliyeva, S. A. Urazgaliyeva, M. B. Tleulinova, K. A. Zhyrenshina, S. S. Duisenbayeva, A. R. Khalenova, Kursat Cesur and G. K. Kassymova

Pertanika Journal of Social Science and Humanities, Volume 30, Issue S1, December 2022

DOI: https://doi.org/10.47836/pjssh.30.S1.02

Keywords: behavior, communicative, face, harmony, im/politeness, interaction, socio-cultural, strategies, survival

Published on: 22 December 2022

This study investigates the issues related to some aspects of the Kazakh concept of face and politeness, the perceptions of politeness, and politeness and impoliteness strategies. The principal means and mechanism guide and predetermines the social conduct that guarantees the harmony of the relationships between people. Kazakh politeness, as part of people’s communicative behavior, is a component of national culture and is governed by national customs and traditions based on deep historical roots. Historically nomadic, the Kazakhs had to develop a pattern of interaction rules within the community and outside that helped them to adapt successfully to the harsh conditions of the steppe. The only guarantee to successfully survive in the vast steppe, arid nature, and nomadic way of life was to maintain benevolent relations between people and, at any expense, prevent conflict and aggressive situations. An online survey was conducted in which 100 first-year al-Farabi university students participated. The survey data obtained provided valuable insight into the young people’s beliefs about politeness and impoliteness and how the concept of politeness affects their moral values and shapes their ethnocultural behavior in modern times. The respondents’ answers showed a surprising uniformity in defining the politeness principles in the Kazakh context. With Kazakh young people, politeness is nestled in respecting others, especially older adults, appropriate behavior, maintaining smooth and harmonious interpersonal relations, good manners, and adhering to societal rules and norms.

  • Aimoldina, A., Zharkynbekova, S., & Akynova, D. (2015, June 8-10). Polite Requests vs. Socio-Cultural Context in Kazakh. Russian and English Business Correspondence in Kazakhstan. In Proceedings of SOCIOINT15- 2nd International Conference on Education, Social Sciences and Humanities. (pp. 865-870). Istanbul, Turkey. http://www.ocerint.org/socioint15_epublication/papers/347.pdf

  • Aubakirova, S. S., Akhmetova, G. G., Kudysheva, A. A., Ismagambetova, Z. N., & Karabayeva, A. G. (2016). Tolerance as an ethical indicator of Kazakh mentality and traditional culture. Global Media Journal, S3:11.

  • Balpanov, N., Ismagambetova, Z., Karabayeva, A., Mirzabekova, A., & Rysbekova, S. (2018). The problem of religious tolerance in Kazakhstan: Past and present. Space and Culture, India, 6(2), 17-33. https://doi.org/10.20896/saci.v6i2.318

  • Bargiela-Chiappini, F. (2003). Face and politeness: New (insights) for old (concepts). Journal of Pragmatics, 35(10-11), 1453-1469. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0378-2166(02)00173-x

  • Brown, P., & Levinson, S. (2009). Modelling linguistic politeness (II): Brown and Levinson and their critics. In R. J. Watts (Ed.), Politeness (pp. 85 – 116). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511615184.005

  • Brown, P., & Levinson, S. C. (1987). Politeness: Some universals in language usage. Cambridge University Press.

  • Brown, R., & Gilman, A. (1989). Politeness theory and Shakespeare’s four major tragedies. Language in society, 18(2), 159-212.

  • Formanovskaya, N. I. (1998). Communicative-pragmatic aspects of communication units. Moscow: Institute of the Russion Language.

  • Fraser, B. (2005). Wither politeness. In R. T. Lakoff & S. Ide (Eds.), Broadening the horizon of linguistic politeness (pp. 65-83). John Benjamins Publishing Company.

  • Furlong, A., & Cartmell, F. (2007). Young People and Social Change (2nd ed.). Open University Press.

  • Goffman, E. (1955). On face-work: An analysis of ritual elements of social interaction. Psychiatry, 18(3), 213-231. https://doi.org/10.1080/00332747.1955.11023008

  • Goffman, E. (2017). Interaction ritual: Essays in face-to-face behavior. Routledge.

  • Hill, B., Ide, S., Ikuta, S., Kawawsaki, A., & Ogino, T. (1986). Quantitative evidence from Japanese and American English. Journal of Pragmatics, 10(3), 347-371.

  • Hill, G. D., & Burtt, E. S. (1986, August 15-22). The effect of growth stage on yield and nutritional quality of Lupinus angustifolius when grazed by lambs. In Proceedings of the Fourth International Lupin Conference. Geraldton, Western Australia

  • Holmes, J. (2006). Politeness strategies as linguistic variables. In E. K. Brown (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Language & Linguistics (pp. 684-697). Elsevier

  • Ide, S. (1982) Japanese sociolinguistics: Politeness and women’s language. Lingua, 57(2-4), 357–385. https://doi.org/10.1016/0024-3841(82)90009-2

  • Ide, S. (1989). Formal forms and discernment: Two neglected aspects of universals of linguistic politeness. Multilingual, 8(2-3), 223-248. https://doi.org/10.1515/mult.1989.8.2-3.223

  • Janney, R. W., & Arndt, H. (1993). Universality and relativity in cross-cultural politeness research: A historical perspective. Multilingua - Journal of Cross-Cultural and Interlanguage Communication, 12(1), 13-50. https://doi.org/10.1515/mult.1993.12.1.13

  • Kydyrbayeva, G., Stambekova, A., Svetlana, U., Gulsim, N., & Gulvira, M. (2021). Preparing future primary school teachers for trilingual teaching with CLIL technology. World Journal on Educational Technology, 13(4), 617-634.

  • Lakoff, R. T. (1973). The logic of politeness: Or, minding your p’s and q’s. In Proceedings from the Annual Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society (Vol. 9, No. 1, pp. 292-305). Chicago Linguistic Society.

  • Lakoff, R. T. (1990). Talking power: The politics of language in our lives. Glasgow. Language in Society, 18(2) 159-212. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047404500013464

  • Larina, T. V. (2015). Pragmatics of emotions in an intercultural context. Russian Journal of Linguistics, 1, 144-163.

  • Laver, J. (1981) Linguistic routines and politeness in greeting and parting. In F. Coulmas (Ed.), Volume 2 Conversational Routine (pp. 289-304). Berlin, New York: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110809145.289

  • Leech, G. (2007). Politeness: Is there an East-West divide? Journal of Politeness Research: Language, Behaviour, Culture, 3(2), 167-206. https://doi.org/10.1515/pr.2007.009

  • Liu, L. (2016). Different cultures and social patterns matter in English and Chinese. Literacy Information and Computer Education Journal (LICEJ), 7(3), 2342-2346. https://doi.org/10.20533/licej.2040.2589.2016.0310

  • Meiirbekov, A. K., Elikbayev, B. K., Meirbekov, A. K., & Temirbayev, B. A. (2015). Sociolinguistic aspects of speech act of greeting in the Kazakh and English languages. Medtteranian Jornal of Social Sciences, 6(6). https://doi.org/10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s2p267

  • Muldagaliyeva, A. A., Gumarova, S. B., Issabayeva, B. K., & Zhirenshina, K. A. (2015). The socio-cultural functions of Kazakh kinship terms. Asian Social Science, 11(16), 80-87. https://doi.org/10.5539/ass.v11n16p80

  • Nurysheva, G., Amrebayeva, Z., & Amrebayev, A. (2019). The Kazakh ethical tradition and anti-nuclear ethics. In G. Bombaerts, K. Jenkins, Y. A. Sanusi & W. Guoyu (Eds.), Energy Justice Across Borders (pp. 69-87). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-24021-9_4

  • Richard, J. W., Sachiko, I., & Konrad, E. (1992). Politeness in languages: Studies in its history and theory and practice. Mouton de Gruyter.

  • Ryssaldy, K. T., & Utepova, A. N. (2018). Lingocultural peculiarities of concept “Politeness” in Kazakh and English languages and its influence and its influence on forms of politeness. Seria Obshestvennykh I Gumanitarnykh Nauk, 2(3).

  • Shadkam, Z., & Paltore, Y. (2018) Linguocultural characteristics of guest hosting traditions of Kazakh and Turkish people. Turkish Culture & Haci Bektas Veli Research Quarterly, 86, 169-185.

  • Wardhaugh, R. (2006). An Introduction to Sociolinguistics (5th ed.). Blackwell Publishing.

  • Watts, R. J. (2003). Politeness. Cambridge University Press.

  • Wei, L. (2010). The functions and use of greetings. Canadian Social Science, 6(4), 56-62.

  • Xie, C., He, Z., & Lin, D. (2005). Politeness: Myth and truth. Studies in Language. International Journal sponsored by the Foundation “Foundations of Language”, 29(2), 431-461. https://doi.org/10.1075/sl.29.2.07xie

ISSN 0128-7702

e-ISSN 2231-8534

Article ID

JSSH(S)-1535-2022

Download Full Article PDF

Share this article

Recent Articles