Analysis of linguistic politeness and cultural dimensions present in Rocco Scotellaro's poetic text "Noi che facciamo?"

The poem of Rocco Scotellaro submitted to the analysis is called "Noi che facciamo?"

The tools used to perform this analysis are those of linguistic politeness with the use of the concept of negative and positive face present in the works of Brown and Levinson (1987) as well as the works of Hofstede (2011) in order to identify the cultural dimensions present inside of the text of Rocco Scotellaro.


This poetic text begins with the pronominal particle "ci" as an element present in a society with a strong social distance between its members and various social groups. This "  ci" allows us not to say "them" to speak of the bosses as "out-group" and the "cross" as a metaphor for sacrifice in Catholic culture represents a total adaptation to the cultural dimension of "restrain" dimension as an indelible feature of the proper skin.

In this beginning of poetry one could denote a parallelism between the world of the "cross" and the "bosses" who push to accept one's life condition in consonance with a cultural dimension of the "short-term temporal orientation" where people are always equal,  the traditions are sacrosanct and there is good and bad in every life situations. This beginning of poetry offers a cultural framework in which a strong feeling of social distance as a cultural trait prevails because power does not feel the need to legitimize its choices because in that given society there is a considerable economic gap between human groups. This social distance brings power to be autocratic in all its manifestations and is based on co-optation as a way of reproducing power. People live in full adhesion with a cultural dimension of "strong avoidance of uncertainty" while power largely prefers to live in shelter within the dimension of "weak avoidance of uncertainty". In other words, the population fights threats of uncertainty with great force by living without giving weight to their well-being and with a certain intolerance towards different ideas. People are used to looking after themselves in extended families, others are considered as "in-group" or "out-group" members just as our opinions are dictated by our world of belonging. Maintaining good relationships is important within this world especially with one's "in-group" but also with other "out-groups" in order to try to reduce the impact of probable threat towards the negative face of the most fragile.

 Basically it is a "masculinity" typology of society because women and men have historically had different social and emotional roles, in which it was the father who managed the facts and the mothers managed the emotions related to the decisions made. In a social context with scarce economic resources, the temporal orientation as a cultural dimension is almost always in "short-term" as a cultural horizon because the relevant facts in people's lives are often placed in the past and the life of family often has its imperatives. Furthermore, the poorest population is accustomed to adhering to the cultural dimension of " constraint" because the parameter of "being happy" almost does not exist and things do not depend on my will, freedom of speech has never been important (except in some historical moments of rebellion suffocated in repression), little importance for leisure and little inclination to remember positive emotions. Surely this dimension can be turned upside down for those who adhere to a dimension of social closeness with power in harmony with a "satisfied" cultural dimension with a feeling of control over one's life and with a tendency to remember positive emotions. At the beginning of the poem we see the verb "shouted ( gridata)" as a verb with considerable illocutionary force as well as a strong degree of imposition in terms of linguistic politeness or better to say of possible linguistic  impoliteness towards those who are deprived of all protection towards their negative face, understood as the right to protect and preserve an intimate space of dignity and autonomy from other "out-groups".

The "cross" represents the perfect symbol of one's cultural condition totally inserted in the cultural dimension of  "constraint" because it is not allowed to be happy because "everything that happens" is attributed by the bosses to the farm hands as a way to adhere to a dimension cultural with "strong avoidance of uncertainty" towards these people perceived as "out-group". In an exemplary way, we see how in the poetic text the guilt is attached to the farm hands even in the case of natural disaster in harmony with a "collectivist" cultural dimension because it is always the fault of the others "out-groups" but also as a form of response by the divine in harmony with a cultural dimension where strong social distance also represent the relationship with the divine.

The poet Scotellaro often uses a rhetorical question such as "what are we doing ( noi che facciamo)?" in which "we" becomes a way to emphasize belonging to a certain "in-group" in terms of "collectivism" type with the addition of the verb "do ( fare)" as a way to get out of immobility. The verb "to do" becomes the motor to reverse all the cultural parameters mentioned above. Scotellaro highlights throughout the poem a description capable of highlighting the many costs incurred without any form of repair to the need of the farm laborers to protect their negative face.

Scotellaro mentions "All’alba stiamo zitti ( at sunrise we are silent " to indicate how the days start very early, with the silence in the squares to be "bought", ie the condition of "day laborer" represents a form of slavery perpetrated in the " square o Piazza" where we usually hear the noise of life as in the "squares" of the country. Instead the peasants offer silence as an answer to the fact of being "bought", that is to say being excluded from the human comunity because of a total acceptance of their "restrained" destiny.

The difficulty of this situation is described when in opposition to dawn we have the description of the evening in these terms: "the evening is the return in the ranks escorted by men on horseback" (la sera è il ritorno nelle file scortati dagli uomini a cavallo, ).

This description makes it clear that the farm laborers are "escorted" as if they were criminals through the image of being in "file" which suggests the bosses understanding the dangers coming from the laborers because of too many costs incurred in their need for dignity . In terms of linguistic politeness, dignity can be translated as the possibility of exercising our right to autonomy and protection of one's own intimate space as a person even in front of "out-groups" who are scarcely interested in our material and spiritual well-being. Scotellaro later changed the notion of person of the laborers making them become "comrades" as a way to indexicalise the social context differently, showing the similarity between the peasant condition and that of the laborers reduced to pure "animality" because they were forced to "lie down in the cold  with the sheep" ( coricati all’addiaccio con le pecore ). This description of the real represents a set of perlocutive linguistic acts (understood as the consequences of the bosses actions) which are very severe in terms of loss of negative face and total obligation to adhere to a culturally "restrain" type of life. Their only way to obtain some form of positive face, understood as a form of recognition for their person, is through "massing and singing, reading the printed sheets where they are written well about us"  ( ammassarci a cantare, neppure leggerci i fogli stampati dove sta scritto bene di noi! ). These are perceived by bosses as very dangerous costs for their need  in term of negative face as well as their desire to stay in line with a cultural dimension of "weak avoidance of uncertainty". With these acts they find themselves "the bosses" in the dimension of "strong avoidance of uncertainty". The poet Scotellaro, part of this "in-group" of farm laborers, describes a "we are the weak of the distant years" (Noi siamo i deboli degli anni lontani). In other words, our "constrained" cultural condition dates back to the past as the result of a context in full adherence to a cultural dimension of "short-term temporal orientation" due to a "castle" as a metaphor for talking of the bosses who literally set fire the villages of the "farm laborers". In this description it is clarified how the maintenance of this social distance has been possible with the violence with the burning of the villages to obtain the continuation of this society in term of "collectivism" where there are "in-group" and "out-group "who must remain forever inside the cultural dimension of "costrained" in order to live according to the traditions of the place where the rich are rich and the poor must accept their "cross ". The "Castle" as a metaphor represents the power of the masters who does not feel the need to legitimize his work because the social hierarchy is equivalent to an existential inequality between people. Scotellaro continues his description by speaking of "we are children of fathers reduced in chains" (Noi siamo figli dei padri ridotti in catene), that is to say, the faults of the fathers for their immobility are paid by the children because "the fathers who live in slavery" carry a very heavy weight for the denied need in term of the "positive face" inherent for the children. Scotellaro's poem emphasizes a "we" always emphasize the need to belong to a certain "in-group" where the day laborers-peasants become "comrades" as a possible operation only after reading "the printed sheets".
Scotellaro highlights his rhetorical question "what are we doing  ( Noi che facciamo?) as if it were yet another sign of adherence to this cultural dimension of" restriction" where our living is not in our hands. For example, when the poet points out that "they still call us brothers in churches but you have your noble chapel from where you look at us" (Ancora ci chiamano fratelli nelle Chiese ma voi avete la vostra cappella gentilizia da dove ci guardate). In this further description, the farm laborers pay very high prices for their need to protect their negative face when they are called "brothers in the churches" by these "out-group" members, clearly highlighting how the religious space has been used as a space to legitimize the social relationships present in that given community described by Scotellaro. In essence, the religious space becomes the place where the "symbolic" reduction of the social distance is granted because "we are all children of God" offering a possibility of reducing the costs inflicted on the negative face of the farm workers. This attempt is rejected by the poet because it highlights how the "bosses" have their "noble chapel" as a perpetual repeated way of signalling that they are always in any case "out-groups". The chapel as a space of distinction also in the "ultra-earthly" world as a way to signal the perennial existential inequality also in the cemetery world in order to make more clear and regulate for future generations the nature of the social relations present in that given local community. Very interesting is the analysis of the ocular "habitus" (Bourdieu, 1980) of the master class described very effectively by Scotellaro "And stop that eye, stop the threats, even the herds flee the snow" ( E smettete quell’occhio smettete la minaccia, anche le mandrie fuggono l’addiaccio per qualche stelo fondo nella neve ). In this description, the relationships of social distance and the will to ignore the need for protection of their negative face by the farms workers is exemplified with the gaze and the threat, which represent the way of the "dominant" masters to adhere to a dimension of "strong avoidance of uncertainty" showing their intolerance towards the well-being of others and in the face of the "presumed" incompetence of the  working farmers. This gaze must emphasize existential inequality. These threats aimed at the negative face of the hand farmers find a limit with the comparison with the "herds" ( le mandrie) as a form of docile "out-group" which at some point refuses to pay further costs for its need to defend its negative face, to say their dignity in this case. The poet continues putting forward as "you would feel our hard part on that day that we were hardened in that same saddened castle" (Sentireste la nostra dura parte
in quel giorno che fossimo agguerriti in quello stesso Castello intristito. ). For Scotellaro this search for a possible dignity with the struggle would lead to a real strengthening of our positive face with our ability to be "fierce" as a way to reduce the social distance between social bodies and to reduce the costs of living always and in any case within the "constrained" cultural dimension.

To take this step, the hand laborers will have to live with little fear as a momentary adhesion to a dimension of "weak avoidance of uncertainty" because it is precisely the fear of uncertainty that pushes people to accept a certain type of life. For once, the poor must live at ease in ambiguity and chaos if they intend to "do something" to change the course of their human condition.

Becoming "hardened" ( agguerriti) for Scotellaro is a way to create a long-term temporal orientation because traditions are modifiable and make it possible to finally reduce that feeling of abandonment because things do not depend on my will. However, the fundamental operation is to reduce this social distance with their feeling of existential inequality with their historical irrelevance as "laborers" who have always been exploited. Note how the "Castle" is referred as "saddened" twice in the text as to signal that the world of the "masters" is sad and therefore with little inclination to remember positive emotions while the laborers in the evening "sing" as way to remember the positive emotions by adhering at that moment to a "satisfied" cultural dimension. In fact, Scotellaro warns that the hand workers reach a limit understood as "herds that are armed with the bosses' anger" (Anche le mandrie rompono gli stabbi per voi che armate della vostra rabbia). The anger expressed by the bosses is the combination of two cultural dimensions, namely a strong avoidance of uncertainty as well as the short-term orientation that re-emerges in moments of crisis between the class relationships between laborers and bosses. Anger is the consequence of intolerance towards the divergent ideas of the laborers who come into conflict with the primary interests of the bosses, who react by increasing their nervousness and their way of looking the laborers as incompetent (unable to understand their good) . At the same time the values ​​linked to a short-term temporal orientation re-emerge because there are universal lines to be respected in situations, traditions are sacrosanct and the life of one's "in-group" is guided by imperatives.

The poet continues to use his rhetorical question "what are we doing?" to continue his description of the facts when he says "let's sing your redemption", that is, the possibility of saying "satisfied" and adhering to a cultural dimension of "weak avoidance of uncertainty" in which freedom of speech becomes important fact and with the will to feel good through the "liberation" of the other forced to live without being able to remember positive emotions because of his unjust behaviour, which pushes him to live in the cultural dimension of "constraint".

 So for the working farmers, the social distance imposed by the bosses leads to a feeling of adhesion to a "constrained" dimension despite their condition of material ease.

 The direction of events desired by the " bosses" represents an "abyss, the edge", that is, a limit, an unbearable boundary for the last chance to defend one's negative face available by the hand farmers.

For Scotellaro, the farm labourers are "the wise sheep of our masters" (Noi siamo le povere pecore savie dei nostri padroni ) as they are bound within a collectivism that lives within a short-term temporal dimension with its ability to live perpetually and stoically (savie) all these costs inflicted on their negative face without historically ever obtaining any form of reparation or benefits.

This "sine qua non" condition of living is strongly denounced in this poetic text, in which the poet's desire is to overcome this condition of social iniquity through a class awareness on the part of the labourers.

Noi che facciamo? di Rocco Scotellaro

Ci hanno gridata la croce addosso i padroni per tutto che accade e anche per le frane che vanno scivolando sulle argille. Noi che facciamo? All’alba stiamo zitti nelle piazze per essere comprati, la sera è il ritorno nelle file scortati dagli uomini a cavallo, e sono i nostri compagni la notte coricati all’addiaccio con le pecore. Neppure dovremmo ammassarci a cantare, neppure leggerci i fogli stampati dove sta scritto bene di noi! Noi siamo i deboli degli anni lontani quando i borghi si dettero in fiamme dal Castello intristito. Noi siamo figli dei padri ridotti in catene. Noi che facciamo? Ancora ci chiamano fratelli nelle Chiese ma voi avete la vostra cappella gentilizia da dove ci guardate. E smettete quell’occhio smettete la minaccia, anche le mandrie fuggono l’addiaccio per qualche stelo fondo nella neve. Sentireste la nostra dura parte in quel giorno che fossimo agguerriti in quello stesso Castello intristito. Anche le mandrie rompono gli stabbi per voi che armate della vostra rabbia. Noi che facciamo? Noi pur cantiamo la canzone della vostra redenzione. Per dove ci portate lì c’è l’abisso, l’ì c’è il ciglione. Noi siamo le povere pecore savie dei nostri padroni. (1949)

Rocco Scotellaro - Tutte le poesie 1940-1953, a cura di Franco Vitelli; introduzione di Maurizio Cucchi. Mondadori Editori, 2004.  

Rocco Scotellaro (Italian poet, 1923-1953).

Lucano di Tricarico (MT) and humble origins (his father was a shoemaker and his mother was a housewife), Rocco Scotellaro was the best poetry interpreter of neorealism. At 21 he founded the section of the local Socialist Party, was later elected mayor and actively committed to reaffirming the dignity of the rural populations of the South. His works retraced the moments of his existence and began very early to write poetry, short stories and journalistic articles . In 1950 he was unjustly accused of fraud and criminal association by spending 45 days in prison. Then he left the political activity to devote himself only to the literary one. The publisher Vito Laterza suggests that he carry out a book-inquiry on the culture of southern peasants, and Scotellaro works assiduously with Southern peasants; book that, however, fails to complete. A fulminating heart attack catches him very young while he is in Portici to carry out an assignment at the local Observatory of Agricultural Economy.
All his books will be published posthumously. The unfinished sociological investigation of "Contadini del Sud" and the poems of his most important volume It is day, edited by his friend Carlo Levi, in 1954; in 1955, instead, the sketch of the novel L'Uva puttanella.
Corrado Alvaro, one year after his death, remembers him in the Corriere della Sera as one who "left a legend to his country and the example of how generous a genius can be in southern Italy"