POLITENESS ANALYSIS IN ITALIAN LEARNING DIALOGUE

ANALISI DEL BRANO " MI SEMBRA"

Dialogo  Mi sembra...

Valerio: Allora Alessia, come è questo “Max 79”?
Alessia: Guarda, lasciamo stare, è meglio...
Valerio: Perché?
Alessia: Perché dalla foto che mi ha inviato sembrava un bel ragazzo: giovane, alto, muscoloso, con i capelli lunghi e biondi...
Valerio: E invece? Com’è?
Alessia: Invece all’appuntamento è arrivato un tipo bruttino, di mezza statura, un po’ grasso e quasi calvo. Occhi neri e, cosa che non sopporto, la barba lunga.
Valerio: E di carattere che tipo è? È simpatico?
Alessia: Per niente! È noioso, gli piace solo il calcio... e non mi ha offerto nemmeno un caffè! Non so... la chat rende le persone diverse... poi spesso quando conosci qualcuno di persona rimani deluso.
Valerio: Eh, lo so... Infatti per me è sempre meglio conoscere le persone... “dal vivo”. Comunque, se conosci qualcuno su Internet puoi avere questi problemi...
Alessia: Io, da ora in poi, non voglio più conoscere persone in rete... Ma a proposito di conoscenze: oggi devi uscire con Samanta, vero?
Valerio: Sì, finalmente...
Alessia: Sei contento?
Valerio: Sì, Samanta è molto carina... e poi mi sembra simpatica, aperta e gentile. Poi le piacciono gli animali e per me questo è importante.
Alessia: Bene, se vi piacciono le stesse cose è più facile andare d’accordo. Sono sicura che Samanta è una persona interessante. Suo fratello Marco invece è troppo serio, non mi piace molto.
Valerio: Neanche a me. Ma forse in realtà è solo timido


 This analysis of the politeness linguistic present in the dialogue "Mi sembra"  taken from the transcripts of Edilingua's "Italiano all'Università" will allow us to analyze the mechanisms of formulation of politeness strategies present in this dialogue between two people about a meeting with a boy.

To start the dialogue, Valerio makes a request with the help of a "colloquial-family" language register to avoid making too many costs to pay for Alessia's need for a negative face.
In the request we find a demonstrative "questo" as a way of signaling strong emotional distance with the person of "max 79". "Questo" could be interpreted as a form of threat to Alessia's positive face, which should benefit in answering this question.
Alessia's reply is one that contains a strong degree of imposition in order to avoid paying any costs for her need for a positive face implicit in the possibility of realizing the need to live an emotional relationship with another person. Valerio's reply will be "perché?", In other words a non-ratification of Alessia's need of not paying costs for her positive face in search of recognition through the possibility of having a boyfriend.
Alessia in this way expresses the elements of enhancement for her positive face with the description of the potential boy through a series of adjectives that give the opportunity to enhance the need to obtain benefits for her "positive face" by asserting that this boy had to be "young, tall, muscular, long, blonde hair".
Valerio: is it instead? how? they are questions to seek insights that can be perceived as a form of threat to his need not to pay too many costs in terms of negative politeness.

 Alessia responds by agreeing to incur all the costs of positive face loss by listing a series of adjectives that are proof of her face loss by stating that the boy was "ugly, short stature, fat, bald, black eyes and long beard. long beard is explained that it is the element that bears less and this leads to a greater loss of positive face for Alessia due to the presence of this beard. Valerio continues with his questions of the type "and character. What kind is it? which are ways to continue on the same topic and therefore it can be both a way to offer elements of mitigation but also to make Alessia's positive face pay high costs, who perhaps would not want to continue talking about this topic to minimize interaction costs of this dialogue. Valerio goes on to say: "is he nice?" as a way to try to give benefits to Alessia's positive face or to mitigate the costs incurred so far by this not really beneficial description for the need to enhance Alessia's "person".
Alessia's answer will be "not at all" as a way not to ratify this possibility of reducing the costs for her positive face since the absence of quality of this boy represent very high costs to be incurred for her need for a positive face and to amplify defects is a way to increase the damage suffered for her but at the same time it can be understood as a mitigation element to understand her future linguistic behavior in this domain of "looking for a boy". Alessia claims that this guy is "boring" and therefore does not involve me and therefore pays costs in terms of a positive face because he only talks about football and therefore only seeks benefits for his positive face without giving too much importance to the costs imposed on Alessia in terms of absence of benefits present within this interactional exchange. Alessia signals her absence of generosity because she does not "even pay for coffee" as an act that represents a strong threat to my need for recognition in terms of a positive face. This is a typical element of the gender difference since many girls expect to be treated with "consideration" in broad harmony with their need to enhance their positive face. To mitigate the costs incurred, Alessia tries to obtain some benefit or cost reduction by stating that "chats make people different" and then a "live person" can always disappoint and therefore make you pay high costs in terms of absence of benefits for your "person".

Valerio confirms Alessia's vision initially with an "eh I know" as a way of signaling the close friendship with Alessia by granting benefits to Alessia's positive face.
The conjunction "however" however shows the desire to want to obtain some benefits for Valerio in terms of a positive face and therefore making Alessia's positive face pay costs as Valerio does not contemplate the possibility of getting to know people via the internet.
Alessia, in turn, accepts this vision of reality and to try to obtain future benefits for her positive face, she no longer intends to meet people via the internet. This replica represents a strategy to grant future benefits to your need for a positive face.
Alessia, later, proposed to change the subject by stating "by the way" to move the possibility of offering or denying a positive face during the interactional exchange to the other interlocutor.
For example, the fact that Alessia remembers that Valerio has to go out with a girl named "Samanta" is a way to give Valerio a positive face by already granting many benefits to the other interlocutor. In fact Valerio ratifies with "yes finally", that is after having supported so many costs in terms of negating my need for a positive face, in the end I got this recognition from this girl Samanta. Then Valerio continues with a series of adjectives that perform the function of enhancing his need for a positive face and also allows him to obtain interactional benefits in this dialogic exchange by listing his qualities in this way: "she is nice, open and kind" and loves animals represents a common ground between them.

Alessia grants this need for Valerio's positive face by offering these benefits in her first part of the shift. Alessia intends to strengthen the need for a positive face of her friend Valerio by saying that Samanta "is an interesting person" but at the same time, in order not to exceed the benefits of Valerio, Alessia introduces a mitigation element such as the fact that "Samanta's brother is very serious and she doesn't like it. " This part of the statement represents a way to reduce the benefits for the positive face of Valerio, who subscribes to this part of the statement by agreeing on the antipathy of Samanta's brother. However, in the end Valerio concedes some mitigation element by stating that Samanta's brother is "perhaps" intended as an element to grant some benefit and to reduce the costs of loss of negative face by stating that he is "shy". For the need for a positive face involved in this interaction it is not a positive element for one's need for interactional benefits to know that the brother of the potential girlfriend is unpleasant.