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thesis entitled

Social Class Ethos in a Northern U.S. City:
A Quantitative Study of
Politeness Behavior

presented by

Brian Kleiner

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SOCIAL CLASS reros IN A NORTHERN u.s. crrv
A QUANTITATIVE smov or Poureness BEHAVIOR
IN LANGUAGE

By
Brian H. Kleiner

A THESIS
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of Linguistics

1 993

ABSTRACT

SOCIAL CLASS ET HOS IN A NORTHERN U.S. CITY
A QUANTITATIVE STUDY OF POLITENESS BEHAVIOR
IN LANGUAGE
BY

Brian H. Kleiner

This paper provides a sociolinguistic study which lends
quantitative support to the notion that politeness emphases are
variable across social classes. This difference is shown to be
encoded linguistically in ordinary usage, within the genre of
direction-giving. Interpretation of the data collected is based here
on Brown and Levinson's 'Politeness Theory' (1978,87). The data
give evidence that middle class speakers are more likely to make
use of the more elaborated negative politeness strategy, with
suggestions being issued in an indirect way. On the other hand,
working class speakers tend to choose the 'baId-on record'
strategy, suggesting directions in the form of direct bald
imperatives. The choice of strategy is ultimately based on speaker
assessment of three sociological factors-- distance, power, and
ranking of imposition. It is shown in this paper that variable
speaker perception of distance across the two classes gives the
results found in the data.

TABLEOFCONTENTS

I Introduction

2 On politeness

2.1 Face

2.2 Rationality
2.3 FTA's

2.4 Strategies
2.5 P, D, and R
2.6 Ethos

2.7 Linguistic realizations
2.7.1 Be conventionally indirect
2.7.2 lmpersonalize S and H
2.7.2.1 Avoiding 'you'
2.7.2.2 Generic 'you'
2.7.2.3 Tense shifting
2.7.3 Minimize imposition

3 On the data

3.1 Direction—giving genre
3.1.1 goals and setting
3.1.2 internal structure

3.2 Data collection

3.3 On the variable

3.4 Text count/methodology

3.5 Results

4 Interpretation

5 Other issues
5.1 social network
5.2 Are P, D, and R exhaustive?
5.2.1 audience design
5.2.2 'liking' factor
5.2.3 formality

6 Conclusion

7 Appendix: Data and Text Count

Table 1:
Table 2:
Table 3:
Table 4:
Table 5:
Table 6:

Table 7:

Table 6:

Table 9:

LIST OF TABLES

Variable across social classes, in
percentages ................................. p.36

Variable across social classes; token

count. ....................................... p.36

Negative politeness forms, across social
classes ............................ p.38

Use of non-bald imperatives, by gender and
class ............................ p.39

Use of non-bald imperatives, by race and
class ................................. p.40

Use of non-bald imperatives, by age and

class ................................... p.41

Conjoined verses non-conjoined

clauses ............................................... p.42

Use of non-bald imperatives, with third party
present .................. p.50

Use of non-bald imperatives, in and out of home
environment....p.52

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: Possible strategies for doing
Fl'A's ........................................... p.6

Figure 2: Chart of strategies for negative
politeness ........................... p.11

vi

INTRODUCTION

Variation of form in language use provides a platform from
which to view the interrelationship between language and society.
Such variation is often attributed to the social identity of
speakers, and in this way social differentiation is seen to be
reflected in language. Furthermore, variation also springs from
social interaction and reflects the influence of social relationships
as well as situational factors on language use. The phenomenon of
politeness in language arises from social interaction. Its
motivation lies in the desire of interactants to insure a smooth
carrying out of purposes in an effort to get things done in the social
world, while at the same time paying heed to the positive public
self-image that all people‘(in all cultures) wish to maintain (Brown
and Levinson, 1978).

According to Brown and Levinson (henceforth B&L), the
linguistic realizations of politeness in interaction are principled,
and diverse. They follow from speakers' estimations of the amount
of 'face-threat' which verbal actions entail in specific contexts.
Estimates of face-threat lead to the rational choice of certain
strategies which modify constructions in ways that either do or do
not soften the force of face threatening acts (FTA's).

In this way, some variation in the form of utterances may be

explained as a result of general politeness behavior and the choices

2
such behavior demands of linguistically different acts on the part

of speakers. Politeness is rooted in the nature of social
relationships, specifically with regard to such sociological factors
as distance and power. In addition, it can be argued that
individuals have varying perceptions of these social factors and
that these perceptions may have a variable effect on politeness
behavior. Social groups comprising individuals with shared
tendencies are then expected to show variable politeness emphases.
B&L argue that their model can be used as a tool to investigate
'ethos' (or the quality of interaction) across cultures or
subcultures. They hypothesize that ethos will vary across social
strata in hierarchical societies and that this should be manifested
linguistically in politeness behavior. In particular they predict that
higher status groups will more heavily emphasize negative
politeness (characterized by relatively more elaborate linguistic
strategies which pay special attention to the rights of a hearer not
to be imposed on) than lower status groups will. B&L suggest that
this is motivated by the tendency of higher status speakers to
perceive greater social distance between themselves and others and
that such distance is one of the causes of ‘more polite’ behavior .

l have carried out a quantitative study using natural language
data which tests the validity of B&L's hypothesis by comparing
variable linguistic output across two social classes and by
attributing the class preferences to differing politeness emphases.
The variable investigated is the form of suggestions in the giving of
directions, which may alternatively be issued directly as bald

imperatives or indirectly as non-bald imperatives. B&L's

3
hypothesis predicts that, in this case, higher status speakers will

prefer the more elaborated, indirect constructions of negative
politeness, while lower status speakers will prefer more direct,
efficient forms in giving directions to a stranger.

The following section will review B&L’s 'Politeness Theory’ in
some detail, with particular emphasis on those aspects of their
model relevant to the purposes of this paper. The second section
will present the experimental part of this study, introducing the
genre of direction-giving, describing data collection, the variable,
text count, methodology, and results. The final section will
interpret the results, discuss other problems and issues, and show

that B&L’s hypothesis is supported.

2 On Politeness

2.1 Face. Underlying Brown and Levinson's politeness
theory (1987) is the assumption that every competent adult of a
society has a desired public self-image called ‘face,’ which

consists of a negative and positive aspect;

a) negative face: the basic claim to territories, personal
preserves, rights to non-distraction — i.e. to freedom of
action and freedom from imposition

b) positive face: the positive consistent self-image or
‘personality’ (crucially including the desire that this self-
image be appreciated and approved of) claimed by interactants
(61)

4
Face is made up of sets of ‘basic wants,’ which are universal.

Negative face may be considered the basic want to not be imposed
on by others. Positive face is the set of basic wants to be ratified,
approved of, liked by others; it is, as well, the desire that one's
wants be wanted by at least some others. Each person assumes that
others share these basic face wants and that, given the mutual
vulnerability of face, it is in the best interests of interactants to
maintain the face of others, since threatening another person‘s face
may result in threat in return. To avoid social breakdown and to
keep the potential for conflict to a minimum, therefore, people

usually cooperate in paying heed to the face wants of others.

2.2 Rationality. A second assumption behind politeness
theory is that of the rationality of interactants, in the ‘particular
consistent modes of reasoning from ends to means...’ (61). Given
that people often aim to protect the face of others, they achieve
this by rationally employing appropriate means to this end. This
mode of ‘practical reasoning’ is applied by choosing strategies and
linguistic devices which may achieve the goal of minimizing face
risk to some degree. Understanding the intention of a speaker
involves rationally reconstructing ends from means. Although the
term ‘rationality‘ implies conscious decision making on the part of
interactants, it should rather be understood as a reasoning process

which normally occurs below the level of conscious awareness.

2.3 FTA's. Although participants interacting are heedful of

each other‘s face wants, there are many verbal actions which

S
inherently threaten the face of speakers and/or hearers (e.g.—

requests, offers, promises etc). If a speaker (S) wants to do such
an action despite the possible face loss to a hearer (H), there are
linguistic means available for ‘redressing’ or minimizing the face
damage. That is, S may signal linguistically that he/she recognizes
the threat to H‘s negative or positive face and in this way satisfy
some of H's wants. The elaborateness of the linguistic reflex is
normally covariant with the intensity of the FTA; consider the

following sentences:

1) Do you have a match?
2) Excuse me, and I really hate to bother you like this, but
would you by any chance have twenty dollars?

The threat to H's face in (1) is minimal since it involves a
request for ‘free goods,’ something anyone should expect to receive
in public without fear of debt (80). The linguistic elaborateness of
(1) is slight in relation to that of (2), where the imposition on H is
probably perceived by S as very great. In most circumstances, to
use a form like (2) to request a match or other ‘free goods’ would

appear bizarre or overly polite.

2.4 Strategies. Speakers therefore select specific
linguistic means which are appropriate to the perceived level of
face threat of. verbal acts. These means follow from certain
strategies which are employed in deciding how to encode an FT A,

where the choice of strategy is based on the assessment of the

6
seriousness or ‘weightiness’ (Wx) of the FT A1 . According to 8&L‘s

schema, Wx of an FTA will determine the choice of strategy. with

the higher numbered strategies reserved for higher weighted FTA’s:

1. without redressive action, baldly

on record 2. positive politeness
/ \
Do the FT A with redressive action
\ \
4. off record 3. negative politeness

5. Don’t do the FTA

Figure 1. Possible strategies for doing FTA's

The first juncture one reaches is deciding whether or not to
do the FTA at all. If the FTA is extremely heavy, the speaker may
simply choose not to go through with it (#5). On the other hand, it
may be deemed necessary or desirable to do the PTA, and so S moves
on to the next juncture. Here it is decided to either go “off record’
(#4) or ‘on record.’ If the former is selected, 3 performs the FM in
such a way as to not commit to one, unambiguous intention. This
leaves S‘s meaning negotiable and provides a face-saving line of
escape for H. Hints are a good example of this strategy. However,
if S prefers to be more direct and unambiguous in intent, S may go

on record, in which case 8 moves to the next juncture.

 

1summonum'megy'isamvenimiabemmranmimaicmmmm
adinlflymhephccuacmscimnkvd,binncvamclcesaeopcnmimospecfim(85).

7
Here S may perform the FTA ‘without redressive action,

baldly’ (#1), or with redressive action. Employing the bald-on
record strategy essentially involves speaking in the most direct and
efficient manner possible. In such cases, the threat to H‘s face is
usually small (e.g., between intimates) or irrelevant (e.g., in urgent
situations), so that S will choose the bald-on record strategy where
the desire for efficiency overrides any desire to redress H‘s face.
If the threat is greater, however, S may decide to redress H’s face
, by employing either the negative or positive politeness strategy
(#2 and #3 respectively).

The bald-on-record strategy is clearly in line with the
conversational principles known as Grice’s Maxims, assumed to
underlie every interaction. The maxim of Quality requires
truthfulness and sincerity. The Quantity maxim requires that the
appropriate amount of information be provided. The maxim of
Relation (or relevance) requires contributions to be relevant, and
the Manner maxim requires clarity and lack of ambiguity. An
important feature of BaL's work is the claim that any redress is

signaled linguistically by divergence from Grice’s maxims:

The whole thrust of this paper is that one powerful and
pervasive motive for not talking Maxim-wise is the desire to
give some attention to face... Politeness is then a major
source of deviation from such rational efficiency, and is
communicated precisely by that deviation. (95)

Any inferences drawn by H that face redress is occurring are
arrived at by assuming the continued cooperation of 8. That is, in

order to understand that face redress is occurring, H assumes that

8
S is not simply violating Grice's maxims, but rather being polite. H

is further able to search for and discover a meaning or intention
behind S’s divergence from efficient speech. This ability will be

discussed below in the section entitled Conventionally indirect

speech.

2.5 P, D and R. The politeness strategy chosen will result
from the perceived amount of face threat posed by an FT A. For 88L,
‘ the perceived seriousness of an FTA is based on a speaker's
assessment of three broad social factors: distance (D), relative
power (R), and ranking of imposition (R). Wx is a numerical value
representing the estimated degree of threat posed to both the
speaker and hearer by an FTA. It is composed of the values assigned
to D, P, and R:

Wx - D (S,H) + P (H,S) + Rx

These sociological factors are taken to be essential and
exhaustive in calculating the weightiness of FTA’s, and work
following B&L’s original proposal, surveyed in the preface to their
monograph edition, shows these factors have considerable cross-
cultural validity.

D is a context-specific measure of the perceived social
distance between S and H. A D value will vary depending on S's
perception of the similarity/difference between S and H, based on
‘stable social attributes’ (77). Judgments 'of similarity and

difference may be influenced by frequency of interaction.

9
P is a measure of the relative power of H over S. The

relationship between S and H along this social dimension is
asymmetrical. That is, the degree of power of H over S entails a
corresponding degree of lack of power of 8 over H.

R is a measure of culture-specific ranking of an imposition,
to the extent that it is considered to interfere with someone’s
wants of self-determination or approval (77).

P, D, and R are independent factors, so it is possible to isolate
. a single factor by holding the others constant. Consider the

following example from B&L (80):

3) Excuse me, would you by any chance have the time?
4) Got the time, mate?

(3) differs from (4) in that (3) uses a lower risk strategy and is
more elaborated for negative politeness than (4). In these two
cases, suppose that the P and R are held constant: relative power is
equal (8 and H are strangers), and the imposition is small (asking
for the time - part of the list of free goods). The only factor which
varies then from (3) to (4) must be D. Apparently S in (3) perceives
greater social distance from H than S does in (4). The higher D
value for (3) then results in the use of a lower risk strategy

(negative politeness).

2.6 Ethos. In so far as all speakers in all cultures
determine Wx of an FTA by way of D, P, and R, there is a

universality in politeness behavior. However, it is also the case

 

10
that individuals may assign different values to D, P and R in a given

context by virtue of idiosyncrasy or group membership. Given that
within each group or society, types of social relationship are
repeated and stable, it is possible to generalize from the acts of
individuals to the quality of relationships most common throughout
the group (243). For example, individuals belonging to a group with
an egalitarian emphasis will maintain lower P values than
individuals in groups preoccupied with status distinctions.
Variable D, P, and R assessments across groups or cultures are
therefore revealing of different underlying emphases, which are
manifested in interaction at least in part linguistically.

8&L call this group variability ‘ethos,’ and they gloss it as
‘the affective quality of interaction.’ In the rest of this paper,
B&L‘s theory will be applied to data as an ethnographic tool to trace
the variable use of linguistic forms in negative politeness back to a
variable ethos across two social classes. This work has
implications for social class ethos in the Northern US and supports
B&L‘s claim that higher-status groups are negative politeness
cultures; that is, they appear to experience more social distance

between themselves and others.

2.7 Linguistic Reelizetions. If negative politeness
emphases vary across social strata, then this may be reflected
linguistically in interaction. This section will review some of the
linguistic means available to speakers wishing to signal negative
politeness in the performance of an FTA. There are various

linguistic options available for satisfying the negative face wants

11
of others. These are arrived at via a hierarchy of strategies, from

the highest level ‘superstrategy’ to progressively lower level
strategies, and finally to ‘output’ strategies:

Sills“:

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we |. combo—u
Inked—Hm
3.4.zoeo‘tu-n-d-nu—oouull'um-ub A 1. “a.”

.......... .w/]

 

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list-“:11. 1 ."

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Ids-Hz

m mac-comm “an“

"new... K'.Uvd—“* S. cheddar-u

5.4.4 CW S’I not ‘ a”.

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1. “I‘mbm
mash-n- -mT-‘W'
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410. Gee-mum-
fun-“ulna MUQQWI

Figure 2; chart of strategies for negative politeness

All of the negative politeness realizations in English involve
some divergence from the maximally efficient speech suggested by
Grice's maxims. The degree of divergence from these maxims
signals to H the degree to which S desires to satisfy H‘s negative
face wants. Three output strategies from B&L‘s schema are
particularly relevant to the arguments of this paper, because their
respective linguistic realizations are represented in the data.
These will be discussed here in some detail since they serve to

make up the dependent variable in the quantitative analysis which

12
follows. Conventionally indirect speech will be considered first,-

because this device provides a good illustration of how politeness
may be implicated in apparent violations of Grice’s maxims. The

other output strategies will be discussed in turn.

2. 7.1 Conventionally indirect speech. According to 88L,
conventionally indirect speech is motivated in large part by the
negative politeness strategy. It is constructed as a compromise
satisfying the want to be direct and the want to avoid coercing H by
leaving H an ‘out.’ However, before discussing conventionalized
indirect speech, it is necessary to explain the basic mechanics of
indirect speech itself, and its connection to Grice’s maxims.

While it is the case that the traditional identities of some
sentence forms correspond to what is actually done by their
utterance (i.e., their illocutionary force), it is often the case that
such force of an utterance does not derive simply from its form.
Three traditional sentence forms of English — the imperative,
interrogative, and the declarative may correspond to their
associated forces, respectively ordering, questioning and stating.
However, indirect speech acts diverge from these literal
associations, and a hearer grasps the intended force of an utterance
with only the partial aid of semantic and/or syntactic clues. In
these cases, an inference is required with the additional aid of
contextual clues, background knowledge, and the cooperative
principle and its maxims.

According to Grice's principle of c00peration, people act so as

to participate in a constructive, efficient way in verbal exchange;

13

Make your conversational contribution such as is
required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted
purpose of direction of the talk exchange in which you are
engaged (1975:45)

The maxims which result from this principle (quality, quantity,
relation, and manner) have been listed above. Grice (1975, 46)

defined these maxims as follows;

Quantity;

a. Make your contribution as informative as is required (for
the current purposes of the exchange).

b. Do not make your contribution more informative than is
required.

Quality;
a. Do not say what you believe to be false.
b. Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence.

Relation;
a. Be relevant.

Manner;

a. Avoid obscurity of expression.

b. Avoid ambiguity.

c. Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity)
d. Be orderly.

I will illustrate the importance of this notion further by
considering an apparent breach of the maxim of relation (relevance).
In such an offer as Can I get you some coffee?, the literal question
posed by the speaker about his or her own ability seems to be
irrelevant (at least in a normal situation). The hearer then has the

choice of rashly accusing the speaker of making a pointless remark

 

14
or can suspend doubts and continue to assume the cooperation of S

by searching for sbme further point.

For Grice, implicatures arise from such calculations. In
short, indirect speech acts involve implicatures calculated on the
condition of an apparent violation of a maxim of cooperation
alongside the continuing assumption that the cooperation principle
is still in effect. In the offer Can I get you some coffee?, the
literal force (a questioning of the speaker’s ability) flies in the
face of the maxim of relevance, so the hearer infers an indirect
force, namely an offer.

Indirect speech occurs when certain felicity conditions
governing a speech act are mentioned. These conditions must be
satisfied for the act to be carried out successfully. Each
illocutionary act brings with it it's own set of felicity conditions.
Searle (1976) proposes five general types of speech acts, each of
which subsumes particular speech acts and carries with it
particular felicity conditions. For example, one of these types is
directives. This category subsumes such illocutionary acts as
requests, orders and suggestions — actions which cause others to do
some action. In broad terms, for an utterance to function as a
directive, certain felicity conditions must be satisfied. Following

Labov and Fanshel (1977), these are as follows:

1) Need
a) X should be done
b) Addresses would not do X unless asked

2) Ability
Listener has the ability to do X

15

3) Addressee willingness/obligation
a) Addressee is willing to do X
b) Addressee is obliged to do X

4) Speaker obligation
Speaker has the right to tell addressee to do X

If one overtly questions or asserts one of these conditions,
indirect speech results. Consider some examples from the data,
which involve the assertion of felicity conditions in making

(direction-giving) suggestions:

5) You can take that for quite a ways

6) From Kalamazoo, you want to go east

7) You have to take 496 over here...

8) You need to go all the way down to Harrison

(5) asserts the condition that H has the ability to carry out
the action. (6) asserts condition 3a, that H is willing to do X. In
(6), moreover, S asserts that H is not merely willing, but also
‘wants‘ to do X. This can be understood as a result of the context of
suggesting directions, in which H has expressed the desire to arrive
at some destination. Thus, in this context, there is an addressee-
based felicity condition that H wants to do X. By asserting this
condition, 8 issues the suggestion indirectly.

In (7) and (8), S asserts the condition that X should be done.
In direction-giving, S prescribes a sequence of events which must
be followed in order for H to successfully achieve his goal. Here, a

condition for suggestions to be felicitous is that it is required of H

 

16
that he or she perform each action of the series to completion. ‘You

have to...‘ and ‘you need to...‘ assert the condition that an act needs
to be done. '

In each of these examples, some felicity condition has been
mentioned by S, and the result is indirect speech. H is called on to
infer the intent of 8, due to 8'5 departure from maximally efficient
speech and apparent violation of one or more of Grice's maxims. Of
course, the reason why 8 bothers to be indirect stems from the
desire to be polite. Such indirectness serves to soften or mitigate
the force of an FTA and is a way of signaling respect for H‘s
negative face wants.

It may be claimed that direction-giving suggestions require
little or perhaps no inference on the part of H. Although it is
difficult to determine in any instance how much inferencing is
necessary, it is the case that some indirect speech requires little
or no such work but seems to be conveyed directly. Such acts are
idiomatic and have become conventionally associated with their
indirect form. What must have been at one time fresh, calculable
implicatures have moved towards becoming conventionalized and
arbitrary. These are cases where implicatures are so routine that
they are ‘short circuited,’ and the logical chain connecting the
purpose of a usage to its means of expression is lost or obscured
(Morgan,1978). It is plausible that cases like 5-8 above are
conventionalized to some extent, and their illocutionary forces are
fairly transparent.

For 88L, conventionally indirect speech serves the purposes

of negative politeness in that it satisfies the conflicting desire of

17
S to go on record by being direct (unambiguous) but at the same

time pay token respect to H‘s negative face wants. All of the forms
reviewed above, then, are considered reflexes of the 'Be
conventionally indirect' output strategy (#1 in Figure 2). These
forms account for 48% of all non-bald imperative clauses counted
in the data.

2. 7.2 Impersonalize H and S. The second output strategy
reviewed here is that of impersonalizing H and S (#7 in Figure 2). In
English, this involves various linguistic means for avoiding the
singular pronouns ’l' and ‘you'. The motive for this lies in the
negative face threat which overt first and second person singular
pronouns may incur, since these explicitly attribute responsibility
for an action to either S or H; an overt pronoun may pin down 3 or H
so that he/she alone is held responsible for or obligated to perform
an action. On the other hand, omission of ‘I‘ leaves open the
possible interpretation that 8 may not be completely responsible
for his/her action, and omission of 'you’ indicates that it may not be
H or H alone who is obligated to do something. So avoiding 'l' and
‘you' may provide an out for S and H respectively.

2.7.2.1 Avoiding ’you'. One way of avoiding the singular first
and second person pronouns is to eliminate them altogether, but to
avoid the bald imperative. This strategy is productive in the data.
It often involves stating a suggestion without the use of overt

singular ‘you’. For instance;

18

9) Best thing is to go to Kalamazoo

10) I guess the best way would be to go up to the first traffic
light

11) The easiest way that I know is to get on the expressway

Such clauses in the data uniquely occur either at the beginning
of a sequence of directions delivered by S or where S self-corrects
and begins a revised set of directions. These seem to function as
introductions to the sequence of events which follow in the
discourse. In these cases, absence of overt 'you’ serves to
impersonalize H by diverting attention to the action itself.

In these cases and others, other output strategies might also
be involved, for there is no reason to assume that strategies cannot
be mixed. In (10) above, S makes use of the hedge ‘I guess‘ (which
addresses Grice‘s quality maxim). This quality hedge may imply
that S does not take full responsibility for the truth of his
utterance. So (10) may be compounding several output strategies —
’Impersonalize H/S‘ and ’Hedge' (#2 in Figure 2). In addition, 8 in 9-
11 seems to be making use of the 'Minimize Imposition‘ strategy
(#4 in Figure 2), by stating the ease with which the directions may
be carried out (as in 11), or else by assuring H that the directions
given will minimize necessary effort on H‘s part (as in 9 and 10). I
will return to a fuller discussion of this specific output strategy
shortly.

2. 7.2.2 Generic 'you'. A further way to avoid the second
person singular in English involves the use of generic ’you‘. Generic
’you‘ is neither singular nor plural in that the referent is not

specified; 'you' in these cases can refer to anyone, including the

19
speaker. Since the referent of this pronoun is indefinite, the use of

generic ’you' may soften the force of an FTA by allowing H an ’out'
and may signal respect for H‘s want to not be impeded in action.

For example, contrast the following pairs of clauses;

12) Get out of here.
13) You get out of here.

14) Get on 496, and follow that...
15) You get on 496, and follow that...

The command in (13) is even more face-threatening than the
command in (12), and the utterance may be considered an
imperative construction. This indicates that ‘you' in (13) is
interpreted as definite.2 On the other hand, the opposite seems to
hold for (14) and (15). I suggest that the directive in (15) is more
polite than that in (14), indicating that the construction is not an
imperative, and that the ’you’ in (15) should be interpreted as
generic. In fact, it is plausible that this interpretive distinction is
at least a partial means of distinguishing commands from,
suggesfions.

Stress placement on the pronoun above could also serve to
signal the type of directive intended. It seems that emphatic stress
is obligatory for definite ‘you' in commands such as (13) above, and
therefore phonetic reduction may not occur. On the other hand,

generic ’you’ can be reduced phonetically, and does not obligatorily

 

28mph lShmtacdngmMitmvflesammmpkmmmmmecmm
equalsgrcstcrpolitcness. However,saying 'mae’inagivmhmcisnotmflyfapolitcwss
proposes.andthcscannficsofanuttcmncemightmakcitimpofitcdcspitcmymmnlofmdrmig;
'Wo‘lldmmindtcrriblymovingymruglycar?‘

 

20
receive stress. In this way, a reduced second person pronoun in

(15) might be a phonetic feature of ‘generic you’, and this may help
in interpreting (15) as a suggestion.
Consider the following possible responses to requests for

advice or suggestions;

16) You go down to the light, and you make a left.
17) You take that pencil out of your pocket, and you write this
down.

(17) is clearly more face-threatening, and this could in part be due
to the interpretation of ‘you' in (16) as generic/indefinite, and ‘you'
in (17) as singular/definite.

Generic ‘you’ is one of the most common means for expressing
negative politeness in the data (38% of all non-bald imperatives).

Consider the following examples:

18) You go down, you go underneath the railroad track...
19) You follow those roads back, and it takes you to the zoo.

I will claim here that the instances of 'you' above, and similar ones
in the data, are (or are open to interpretation as) generics, given
the direction-giving context in which they occur. The fact that H is
aware that S's suggestions are intended specifically for him does
not remove the face redress S achieves. The use of the generic
pronoun pays token respect to l-l's negative face wants by providing
(at least in spirit) an out for H. It is assumed that such instances

of generic ‘you‘ are so interpreted by H on the basis of contextual

21
and linguistic clues, including, perhaps, the ‘stress rule’ referred

to above. They may serve, therefore, as reflexes of the
’lmpersonalize S and H' output strategy, since they avoid specific
reference. I

2.7.2.3 Tense shifting. Another means of impersonalization
distances H and S from the action by manipulating tense or mood.
This set of potential exploitations are referred to by B&L as ‘point
of view operations' (204). These involve encoding a shift away
from the speaker’s present coding time. For instance, in making
requests in English, it is common to use the past tense for
politeness purposes (’I was wondering...’, ‘I was hoping you would...‘,
etc.). In a similar way, suggestions may be softened with the use of
the conditional or the future tense. In the data, many clauses seem

to exploit this impersonalization strategy. For instance;

20) ...If you follow that for about 3 or 4 miles, it‘ll go...
21) You’ll go down there underneath the railroad viaduct
22) If you’re gonna go this way, then you gotta cut over

The use of the future tense as in (21) and (22) serves to
distance H from the action which he will undertake sometime in the
immediate future (a time often encoded in English in the simple
present, already discussed above as a most direct strategy — e.g.,
‘You go down there...‘). Koike (1992, p.75) argues that the further
away from the temporal deictic center of a speaker’s present coding
time, the more polite an utterance will seem. It is for this reason
that the conditional mood is perceived as more polite than the

future tense — the conditional denotes a time frame furthest

22
removed from the present, in a hypothetical reality which may or

may not come to pass; it does not predicate the future action of the
addressee. The use of ‘if-clauses‘ in (20) and (22) above serves the
purposes of negative politeness by constructing a hypothetical
action in an indefinite time-frame, in which H is given the option to
perform the action or not. Perhaps (22) above is perceived as more
polite than (20) and (21) because it compounds both an 'if-clause'
and the future tense, is less conventionalized, and therefore seems
to allow H a real option.

I assume here that in both ‘if-clauses' and utterances in the
future tense within the data, the pronoun ‘you' is being used in its
generic sense. That is, for example, 'you' in 'you’ll take...’ is as non-
specific as ’you' in ‘you take...‘, or in ‘if you take...’. Such clauses
may be considered compounds of separate devices used for
impersonalizing S and H. In sum, there are many examples in the
data which manifest the ’lmpersonalize H and 8‘ output strategy.
Some involve eliminating the second person pronoun 'you'; others
involve the use of the generic 'you‘ pronoun, while others involve

the manipulation of tense to distance 8 and H from an action.

2.7.3 Minimize imposition. Another way of showing negative
politeness is to minimize the imposition of R. This strategy was
mentioned in the previous section with regard to forms like ’the
best way...’ or ’the easiest way'. Another means of applying this
output strategy in English is with the use of the word ’just’, in the
sense of ‘merely‘ (176). Take for instance, the following clauses
from the data;

23

23) Just walk right down to that next corner...
24) Just turn right...

25) Just take it all the way to Pennsylvania...
26) ...you'll just go like one block... '

In these cases, 'just’ seems to minimize the imposition by
indicating the ease with which the action may be carried out. This
slight deviation from maximally efficient speech signals to H that
his negative face wants are respected. B&L suggest that making
low R values explicit in this way implies that either D or P values
may be high and therefore may indicate deference to H.

Unlike the other output strategies discussed so far,
minimizing imposition with ’just' does not necessarily result in a
non-imperative form. Strictly speaking, the clauses in 23-26 are
still imperatives, but for the purposes of this paper, clauses such
as these will be counted along with the non-bald imperatives, since
they evidence negative politeness and are slightly more elaborated
than bald imperatives. 16% of all non-bald imperatives counted in
the data make use of the 'minimize imposition‘ output strategy.

The output strategies reviewed above were detailed because
their linguistic reflexes are evidenced in the data; they are the
main linguistic means made use of in redressing negative face
within the genre of direction-giving. They may occur in isolation,
or they may be compounded provided there is no grammatical
conflict is doing so. The extra effort put into more elaborated

clauses signals a higher degree of politeness. That is, the greater

24
the divergence from Grice’s maxims, the greater the function of

face redress is being served.

The presence of these forms in the data allows a path to be
drawn back through higher level strategies to the negative
politeness superstrategy and even further back to assessments of
Wx based on P, D, and R values. In addition, these linguistic
realizations of negative politeness are amenable to quantification
and so may provide empirical support to theoretical claims. A
major claim defended in this paper is that higher status groups are
more likely to apply the negative politeness superstrategy than
lower status groups. This can be empirically tested by counting
those linguistic forms which realize negative politeness output
strategies verses those which are ’bald on record' and then

comparing the results of both groups.

3 On The Data

The activity of direction-giving usually involves
communicating information in a potentially face-threatening way,
since the information predicates the future actions of H and thus
may be perceived as restricting H‘s freedom of action. The speech
acts involved in direction-giving will be called ‘suggestions' here.
They fall under the more general category of directives — those
speech acts that function to move someone else to action (e.g.,
requests, commands). That these suggestions are only mildly face-

threatening is evident in the fact that directions can be given

25
baldly on record without appearing offensive or impolite. This is

because in asking directions, H presumably wants to be guided and
therefore temporarily suspends negative face wants.

Therefore, S’s chosen politeness strategy in suggesting
directions will be reflected linguistically in the use of imperatives
(bald on record) verses indirect or hedged statements (negative
politeness). Characterizing and counting these forms in the data is
the task of this section. The first part will describe the genre of
direction-giving, how it is managed at the discourse level, and how
it is internally structured. The second part will show how the data
was collected and will introduce the variable linguistic forms to be
focused on. The third part will present the methodology used here,

with discussion of the text count.

3.1 Direction-giving genre. The genre of direction-giving
generally is managed within certain parameters such as
speaker/bearer goals, setting, and internal structure. The rules
appropriate to this genre are known and shared by communicatively

competent interactants3.

3.1.1. Goals and setting. The activity of giving directions
typically arises where a hearer is uncertain about how to arrive at
some destination and requests guidance from a presumably more
knowledgeable interlocutor. Ordinarily, the destination is located

somewhere in geographical space, unseen to both interactants.

 

3MSM1985;4,'gm'isnkcnhaembcsmnnedcommmicedvcm withmutuslly
Mums-admitted: allowableconuibutions.

26
Directions may be written and may involve a goal which is not

spatially oriented (e.g. — recipes). Here, however, I take direction-
giving to involve a spatial goal, to be spoken, and to take place
between two interactants, a speaker and a hearer. The goal of the
speaker in direction-giving is to provide sufficient information to
guide the hearer to some destination.

Directions are usually solicited in public settings, although
they may occur privately. The stereotypical case of direction-
giving involves strangers on the street, where H is unfamiliar with
the surroundings. Getting directions is part of the list of ‘free
goods'; they may be requested without fear of rejection or
indebtedness. There are few restrictions on when and where the
genre can occur. The physical distance between the interactants
and the proposed destination may vary from a few blocks, to a few
miles, to thousands of miles.

In direction-giving, it is the direction seeker who opens the
encounter with some request for information. Thereafter, it is
usually the direction-giver who holds the floor, while H suspends
tum-taking rights, waits and absorbs the information. Although the
direction-giver dominates the exchange, this one-sidedness may be
interrupted by requests for clarification, repetitions, and back-

channel cues from the receiver.

3.1.2 Internal structure. Direction-giving prescribes events
which might or ought to take place in the future for H to achieve
his/her goal. It essentially provides a sequence of steps or actions

to be followed in order to arrive at some destination. Each step

27
must be followed to completion before the next may take place. For

H to be successful, no step may be omitted in executing the
directions. As an illustration, consider the following sequence of
clauses; 'Go south down Washington Ave, make a left onto Mt. Hope,
after three stop lights turn left on Pennsylvania, and follow that to
Potter Park“. All of the preceding clauses are highly relevant for
getting H from point A to point B. The omission of any clause will
prevent H from achieving his/her goal.

Directions in practice, however, are not normally so concisely
stated. In addition to these necessary steps, directions usually
provide supporting information concerning setting or landmarks.
This kind of information is secondary in that it does not prescribe
steps for H to get from point A to B, but rather describes features
along the route which might serve as helpful cues. This kind of
stage setting is not usually strictly necessary for H to achieve
his/her goal.

These distinct types of information in the direction-giving
genre may be characterized as either foregrounded or backgrounded.
Foregrounding is a means of highlighting information which a
speaker deems most relevant to achieving some communicative
goal. In terms of processing limitations, grounding allows hearers
to distinguish clauses which require immediate sequential
processing from those which may only require ‘future reference or
concomitant access’ (Hopper and Thompson, p.282). Those

sequenced, necessary clauses in direction-giving provide

28
foregrounded information. Those clauses containing supporting

information are backgrounded.4

The purpose of making this distinction with regard to clauses
in direction-giving is to justify the selective treatment in the
analysis provided later of only those clauses in the data which are
foregrounded. It is only foregrounded clauses which contain
linguistic reflexes of the negative politeness superstrategy.
Therefore, for the purposes of this paper, backgrounded clauses are
irrelevant — they give no evidence of variation between the bald-on
record and negative politeness strategies. Since foregrounded
clauses, on the other hand, do present variable use of these
strategies. I will consider only them below when I discuss the text

count

3.2 Data Collection. The data were gathered on two
successive weekday afternoons in Lansing and East Lansing,
Michigan. Subjects were approached by the interviewer at random
and whenever possible. They were asked for directions and were
not aware of their being recorded. A portable recorder was
concealed in a coat pocket. It was covertly turned on and off before
and after each encounter. Hidden recording seems justified since

the anonymity of all subjects is respected, and, in fact, none of the

 

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Transitivity is taken to be a global Imperty of clauses which reflects the intensity and efi'ectiveness of an
actionasitistransferredbetweenpanicipants. uremifivityofaclauseisbasedmcompormtpans
which relate todiffetent aspects of theaction transferred (e.g.- kinesis, volitionality, agency, etc.).
ApplyingtheHopper/Thompson scaleofcomponents forcodingandmcaaningthemsitivityof
classesmdirectim-giving,merenmsmeasexpected~faegmmdedclausesscaehighaformfivity
Mbmkyumdedchtmsmkina,l991);uufisamfi§canysiyfifiwnmhfimbawem
vadmddndixmfmmrofmmdingmuBgmofdirecfion-giving. Thispi'ovides
mmmmmormmmmmwcmmmm

29
respondent’s names is known to the interviewer. Moreover, the

content of the exchanges was in- no way of a personal nature.

The same interviewer (the author of this paper) played the
role of direction-seeker for all 76 subjects/direction-givers. I
wore the same clothes for all of the interviews (blue jeans-casual).
54 of the 56 Lansing subjects were asked for directions to Potter
Park, a park and public zoo southeast of the Capital building, which
is in the center of Lansing. Two Lansing subjects were asked for
directions to the Capital Building, and a third was asked for
directions to Washington Ave. 19 of the 20 East Lansing subjects
were asked for directions to Spartan Village, a student apartment
complex southwest of the center of the Michigan State University
campus. One East Lansing subject was asked for directions to the
Student Union, which is located on the MSU. campus. All subjects
were interviewed at roughly 1/2 to 3 miles from the proposed
destinations. 95% of the people asked were able to provide
directions with some degree of confidence and accuracy. The other
5% who were not able to give directions were not included in the
data.

After the encounters were over, I walked in the expected
direction so as not to disconcert the subject. When I was out of
sight, I made note of the subject‘s sex, race, approximate age and
status. The subject‘s status was determined to be either working
class or middle class. These impressionistic judgments were based
on visual clues, neighborhood and speech. The dress of the subjects
was an important factor in determining status, as well as whether

the neighborhood/place where the interview was conducted was

30
mostly populated with working class or middle class people. Many

working class neighborhoods, near the General Motors factory, are
located south of Grand River, which bisects the city of Lansing. All
of the 38 working class subjects were interviewed in this area. 18
of the subjects deemed middle class were interviewed near the
Capital Building, an area which hosts many government and
professional offices and banks. The 20 other middle class subjects
were interviewed on the MSU. campus.

It is assumed here that with a sensitive eye and ear, one can
with some proficiency make rough assessments of a stranger's
socioeconomic background after only a few minutes spent with
him/her. The gap between the working and middle classes is large
enough to permit impressionistic distinctions along these lines, and
work by sociolinguists shows that even nonlinguists and
nonsociologists are very accurate at such assessments, based on
even minimal linguistic clues (with no supporting visual evidence)5

Of the 76 subjects, 62 were white and 14 were black, 42 were
male, and half were working class. 25 subjects fell into the
’young' age group (15-29), 24 fell into the ’middle’ group (30-49),
and 27 fell into the ’old' group (50-). All of the subjects were
native English speakers.

The recorded data was later transcribed. The level of detail
of the transcription was sufficient for the purposes of this paper's

analysis. Since the linguistic variable focused on is syntactic,

 

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negation of [r] deletion, in listening to recordings in which only the number of post-vocalic [r]’s varied.
Whenaspcakerprmomcedall[r]'s,shewasratedasa(3)(receptionist)mascalefrun1-10,with1
mattingtlnmostpestigiousoccuptationjutwhmshedcletedmlyoneh] hermkingsanktoa(4)
(switchbou'dopenmr). Respmdantswaesensifivemdfisbw-Ievdvuifimmmmreflected
WWW)WOIMWIMW

31
phonetic as well as paralinguistic detail was ignored. The initial

request of the interviewer for each encounter is included in the
transcription, but later interviewer comments are not, since it is
not believed that the interviewer's back-channel cues and
repetitions had any significant effect on speakers' use of the

variable.

3.3 On the variable. When the data was originally collected,
it was not yet known by the interviewer what particular variable
was going to be focused on, so that it is fair to say that the
interviewer could not have biased the results. The linguistic
variable counted in the data occurs at the syntactic level; the
foregrounded clauses selected for analysis are either constructed
as bald imperatives or as non-bald imperatives (other). These
syntactic variants are easily distinguishable, given the following
criteria. Bald imperatives are those constructions which lack an
overt subject before the main verb of a matrix clause.
Alternatively, Others (or non-bald imperatives) either contain an
overt second person pronoun or the word ’just‘ before the main verb,
or else some other device which relegates the verb to a subordinate

clause;

27) Go down to the light, make a left

28) You go down to the light, you (can) make a left

29) Your best bet is to go down to the light, you‘re gonna have
to make a left

The linguistic form of bald imperative clauses in the data is

invariant. The linguistic forms of the non-bald imperatives in the

32
data are diverse but categorizable. The examples which follow are

representative of the range of forms present in the data, and their
respective negative politeness output strategies from Figure 2 are

noted:

i) lmpersonalize H and S
e.g.-- a) You make a right (generic ‘you')
b) The best is walk along the river
c) If you follow that for about 3 or 4 miles,...
d) On Pennsylvania, you're gonna turn right
ii) Be conventionally indirect
e.g.-- a) You can take that for quite a ways
b) You want to go east
c) You have to turn right
iii) Minimize Imposition
e.g.-- a) Just walk in that direction
b) The quickest way for you to go is go...

All of the forms in i-iii involve some divergence from the
more efficient bald imperative alternative. The forms in (1)
represent the ‘lmpersonalize S and H‘ strategy. The forms in (ii)
realize the ‘be conventionally indirect' strategy, and the forms of
(ill) illustrate the ‘minimize imposition’ strategy. It is claimed
here that any of these types of direction-giving statements can
optionally be constructed as bald imperatives, without disturbing
their function or changing their meaning in any way. Conversely, any
direction-giving bald imperative can alternatively be constructed
as one of the forms given above.

Combinations of strategies are not only possible but
common in the data:

33

30) It'd be easiest if you went... (i + iii)
31) if you can go this way... (i + ii)
32) you just have to walk... (ii + iii)

There may, however, be semantic or syntactic constraints

preventing certain combinations:

?33) If you have to turn right...
‘34) You're gonna can turn right...

3.4 Text Count and Methodology. In counting these
variants in the data, one criterion was applied; count only those
(foregrounded) clauses which could have been expressed in an
alternative way, while preserving the function of suggesting
directions. Consider the following pairs. In each set, the first
clause is an actual instance drawn from the data, and the second

provides a possible alternative;

35a) On Pennsylvania, you’re gonna turn right
b) On Pennsylvania, turn right

36a) You can take that for quite a ways
b) Take that for quite a ways

37a) You want to go up to Cedar
b) Go up to Cedar

38a) If you follow that for about 3 or 4 miles, it’ll go to
Pennsylvania

b) Follow that for about 3 or 4 miles, (and) it‘ll go to
Pennsylvania

39a) You’ll hang a right
b) Hang a right

 

34

40a) Quickest way for you to go is go straight...
b) Go straight...

41a) Go all the way down this street
b) You go all the way down this street

In 35-41 each of the first clauses of the pairs could
alternatively have been constructed or paraphrased as their
respective second clauses. All of the statements in 35-40 could
have been issued as bald imperatives, with the omission of
everything preceding the main verb, and without any significant
change in meaning. A direction-giving imperative as in (41) could
be alternatively constructed as some type of statement, as in (41b)
where the pronoun ‘you' is overt. The clauses in 35a-40a, therefore,
count as single tokens of non-bald imperatives, while (41a) is
counted as a token of a bald imperative. Now contrast 35-41 with

the following pairs;

42a) You‘ll see where everybody jogs
?b) See where everybody jogs

43a) You‘ll run into Pennsylvania
?b) Run into Pennsylvania

44a) You’re gonna go to the zoo
?b) Go to the 200

45a) If you go under the underpass, you passed it
?b) Go under the underpass, (and) you passed it

35
The statement in (42a) does not allow a plausible bald

imperative alternative in that (42b) would not serve as a
foregrounded clause in direction-giving — no one would say (42b)
other than as a question. Similarly, it would be odd for someone to
say (43b). (44b) is improbable in the context of giving directions to
a zoo and simply does not serve the function of direction-giving.
(45b) does not function as a direction-giving imperative because it
does not prescribe an action to be taken but one to be avoided. It is
more likely that some ellipsis is involved here with the conditional
meaning of the ‘if‘ clause left implicit. In all of the preceding
cases, the declaratives in the pairs do not allow an optional
foregrounded, direction-giving bald imperative form and so are not
counted as tokens in the text count.

In some other cases, bald imperatives may not be constructed
as alternatives to non-bald imperatives without resulting in

ungrammaticality. Such clauses are not counted as tokens:

46a) There's the ah. the riverwalk too you can take right to it
’b) There's the ah. the riverwalk too take right to it

47a) ...cause you just go straight through
*b) ...cause just go straight through

48a) In fact, there’s a riverwalk that you can follow
*b) In fact, there’s a riverwalk that follow

In 42-48, the first clause of each pair could not have been
produced as an imperative counterpart without resulting in
ungrammaticality or the absence of the semantic/pragmatic

function of suggesting directions. It is claimed here that this is

36
because 42a-48a are not foregrounded clauses, and it is only

foregrounded clauses which allow the optional construction of bald
imperatives from Others and Others from bald imperatives in
direction-giving. The criterion followed in the text count is a
useful tool for distinguishing foregrounded from backgrounded
clauses, and it provides a relatively easy means for selecting the
clauses to be counted in the data.

There is a small number of clauses in the data which are less
easily handled given the criterion. These involve clauses with
verbs like 'get’ and ‘head‘. Such verbs may be used with two
different meanings, one where the agent acts volitionally and

another where no volition is involved:

49a) ...walk straight down that way, and you’ll head right to it
?b) ...walk straight down that way, and head right to it

50a) Head all the way down to Pennsylvania, make a left...
b) You’ll head all the way down to Pennsylvania, make a left

51a) Go straight till the very end. When you get to the very end,
make a left...
?b) Go straight till the very end. Get to the very end, and make
a left...

52a) ...get on 496 east and get off on Pennsylvania
b) you get on 496 east and you can get off on Pennsylvania

The verbs ‘head’ and 'get' in direction-giving seem to be used
with two senses, one where the agent willingly initiates an action
(as in 50 and 52), and another where the agent is carried along by an

action already in progress (as in 49 and 51). Such non-volitional

37
clauses in the data are not counted because they do not qualify as

foregrounded information — they are not necessary steps for
carrying out directions. Rather, they provide supporting
information. For example, the second clauses of (49) and (51) above
could be omitted without making it impossible for H to achieve
his/her goal. One the other hand, the clauses with ‘head‘ and 'get’ in
(50) and (52) could not be omitted. In addition, the ‘volitional’ uses
of 'head' and ‘get' as imperatives intuitively sound more natural and
appropriate than the ’non-volitional‘ uses. In sum, only those uses
of volitional 'head‘ and ‘get' in the data are counted.

Further issues arise in coding the data for the variable. For
instance, how are fragmented clauses, conjoined clauses, and
repetitions to be treated? The criterion used for whether or not to
count a fragmented or incomplete clause depended on whether or
not a main verb was present. Each token counted had a main verb,

so that, for example, (53) was counted, whereas (54) was not:

53) Yea, you go down to... I‘m sure it's Pennsylvania
54) You can... actually I‘m going there...

The reason behind this is that the presence of the main verb
gives evidence that the fragmented clause was intended to be
foregrounded before it was interrupted. Without the main verb, it
is less certain that the fragment would have been issued as

foregrounded information.

38
Tokens within conjoined clauses are treated as independent of

each other, since it is not necessary for variants to be identical

when strung together within a larger construction:

55) ...your best bet is to go down by the river, and follow it all
the way down, and you’ll go through the gardens, and then um
turn left.

In this excerpt, bald imperative clauses alternate with Others
in a natural way. The first and third clauses are counted as Others,
while the second and fourth are counted as bald imperatives.

In a similar way, repetitions are treated as separate tokens
since the repeat could have been constructed in an alternative way.

(56) below is an example from the data:
56) You'll look for the overpass okay.. look for the overpass.

Thus, (56) contains two tokens, one counted as a non-bald

imperative and the other as a bald imperative.

3.5 Results. The text count reveals a large difference
between the working and middle classes in the percentage of use of

the bald imperative and the non-bald imperative variants;

Table 1: Variable across social classes; in percentages

Bald Imperatives Other
ND 29.9 71 .1
\M: 69.1 30.9

39

The working class speakers were far more likely to construct
foregrounded clauses in direction-giving directly and efficiently as
bald imperatives. On the other hand, the middle class speakers
were much more likely to issue directions in a less direct way by
employing negative politeness strategies. The actual count of

tokens is as follows;

Table 2: Variable across social classes; token count

Bald imperatives Other Total
M3 52 128 180
WC 125 56 181

. The difference between the classes is statistically
significant; a Chi-square test (with Yate’s correction) shows a
significance of .0001. B&L’s suggestion that a different ethos in
politeness strategies may be evidenced by members of different
status groups is strongly supported by these findings.

It was stated earlier that the negative politeness strategy
used by direction-givers in the data was more or less elaborated
linguistically and that the greater the divergence from bald
imperative form, the greater the face redress achieved. Some of
the forms used for negative politeness were less elaborated —

these involved the presence of generic ’you' and the presence of

40
'just’ before the verb. Other forms were more elaborated and

involved more complex constructions. Contrast (57) and (58)

below:

57) You take Kalamazoo to Pennsylvania...
58) Quickest way for you to go is go straight...

(58) is more elaborated for negative politeness than (57)
because it is more effortful, more complex syntactically, less
efficient, and perhaps more indirect (requires greater inference on
the part of H).

It is possible to roughly divide these forms used for negative
politeness into categories ranging from least to most elaborated.
Two broad categories were chosen here. The first is composed of
forms used for the ‘impersonalize H/S‘ and the ’minimize
imposition’ strategies. The second category is composed of forms
which are more elaborated for negative politeness and may be the
product of one or more of the three output strategies considered in

this paper;

Less Elaborated
1) generic 'you’ only (impersonalize S and H) or
'just' only (minimize imposition)

Most Elaborated

2) All other non-imperative clauses:
'you want to...‘, ‘you need to...’, 'you can...‘
(be conventionally indirect) or

'the best is...‘, ’the quickest is...‘,
(minimize imposition) or

41

'you're gonna...‘, ‘if you go...‘
(impersonalize S and H) or
some combination.

Comparing the types of negative politeness forms utilized

across the two classes yields the following results:

Table 3: Negative politeness forms, across social classes

.1. 2
M3 46 - 38% 84 - 72% 130 - 100%
“C 39 - 60% 27 - 40% 66 - 100%

The text count shows cross-class preferences for particular
types of negative politeness forms. The MC speakers show a
greater preference for more elaborated forms, while the WC
speakers show a preference for less elaborated forms.

These results support the notion that degrees of negative
politeness elaboration reflect a range of Wx values. Suppose, for
instance, that all calculated values of Wx between 5 and 12 lead to
the choice of the negative politeness superstrategy. Those
assessed values closest to 5 would result in less elaborated forms
(less perceived face threat). Those closest to 12 would require
greater elaboration (more perceived face threat). The results
above, then, reflect overall higher Wx values for the MC speakers
and comparatively lower Wx values for the WC speakers.

With respect to the variable, patterns found among the other

three social dimensions of gender, age, and race should be discussed

42
here, since it is conceivable that the distribution of subjects along

these lines within the two classes could have skewed the results.
For example, if most of the WC subjects were male and most of the
MC subjects were female, gender could be the actual factor
responsible for the variation. It will be seen in this section that
there is no such skewing and that the factors of gender, age, and
race do not significantly contribute to the variation at hand. In
addition, the linguistic environment of whether clauses are
conjoined or not will be excluded from the list of potential skewing
factors.

Gender. It is interesting that women from both classes

perform almost identically to men of their own class;

Table 4: Use of non-bald imperatives, by gender and class

“C M 43/137 31.4% n-25
F 13/44 29.6% n-13
NC M 61/85 71.8% n-17
F 67/95 70.5% n-19

The slight percent differences between the WC and MC men
and women is not significant. We can conclude from these results
that sex is not a significant factor in the variation (A VARBRUL
treatment of these data did not select sex as a significant factor

group; significance in VARBRUL studies is set at .05.)

43
Ethnicity. Percentages indicate that middle class African-

American speakers are slightly more likely to make use of the
negative politeness strategy than white speakers from the same

class, while the opposite holds for the working class;

Table 5: Use of non-bald imperatives, by race and class

“C B 8/29 27.6% n=9
W 48/152 31.6% n-29

ND B 25/29 86.2% n-5
W 1 03/1 51 68.2% n-33

However, according to VARBRUL analysis, the factor of race
is not a statistically significant influence on the variable. The
results from both the gender and race dimension serve as
counterevidence to B&L's hypothesis that dominated groups use less
negative politeness than dominating groups. In both cases, these
groups traditionally considered to be dominated groups (women,
African-Americans) are not using less negative politeness. Perhaps
the hypothesis is too broad and should refer more specifically to
dominated and dominating status groups, so that negative
politeness emphases are differentiating across social classes but
not across gender or race lines.

Age. Another social dimension where domination does not

seem to come into play is that of age. The distribution of forms

44
across the three age groups reveals only a slight age grading

pattern among the MC and WC speakers:6

Table 6: Use of non-bald imperatives, by age and class
Y (15-29) M (30-49) 0 (50-)

28.6% n-7 32.1% n-14 30.8% n-17

55

71.3% n-18 77.8% n-10 63% n-10

The difference between the three age groups is not selected
as a statistically significant one by the VARBRUL program. In sum,
it is clear that the factors of sex, race and age are not contributing
to any skewing of the results. The only social factor (among those
considered) which is significantly influencing the variation of bald
imperatives and non-bald imperatives in the data is that of status.

‘ Conjoined clauses. It is conceivable, however, that
surrounding linguistic context might be exerting some influence on
the distribution of forms. One aspect of the linguistic environment
which requires consideration is whether conjoined clauses give
different results from non-conjoined or initial clauses.
Conceivably, polite forms might only be necessary in initial
clauses, where encoding politeness again within a conjoined clause
could be redundant (of course, there is a sense in which any

politeness after a first offering is redundant). It appears from the

 

5mmmgkaplnmmmdfingfimnmemflmeofmsodaflvdmmmof
difl‘erentages.Middleagedspeakus,whop|esmnablyaremaelikelymbeapanoftheworkingworld,
uemaehnfluanedfinguisficaflybydtestandardwhereesyomgerandoiderspeakersmelesseflectedby
mmmmmtt Sincenon-impaativesinthedatamprmntstanMusageoheym
mednmbyMCqJeakas),mepmanscviduwedwiduegmdtoagcareexpected.

45
data, however, that conjoined clauses preceded by ‘and' do not show

different tendencies from other clauses; non-bald imperatives are

just as likely to occur after ‘and' as before it, within each class:

Table 7: Conjoined verses non-conjoined clauses
conjoined clauses initial clauses

Bald Imperatives Other Bald imperatives Other
WC 26/42-61 % 16/42-39% 103/138-79% 42/138-21 %
MC 16l50-32% 34/50-68% 36/131-27% 94/131-71%

These results show that MC speakers use a slightly higher
percentage of bald imperatives in conjoined clauses than in initial
clauses, while the WC speakers use a slightly lower percentage of
bald imperatives in conjoined clauses than in initial clauses. The
results are equivocal and are not statistically significant. It is
unlikely, therefore, that clauses which are conjoined are influenced
by the linguistic context.

In general, then we may be satisfied that the principal
determining factor in the variation reported here is as stated above

— social status.

4 Interpretation
The focus of this study has been the variation in English of
certain forms which are issued in the genre of direction-giving.

Foregrounded clauses functioning as suggestions may be

45
constructed syntactically either as direct bald imperatives or as

something else. It is claimed here that this variation may find an
explanation in terms of politeness behavior which manifests itself
linguistically within social interaction. The forms chosen are
motivated by speakers’ estimations of the seriousness of FTA’s, and
their subsequent choice of politeness strategies. Suggestions
elaborated for negative politeness reflect a higher estimation of
Wx, and the subsequent choice of a lower risk strategy.
Suggestions delivered directly with no elaboration reflect lower
assessed values 0f Wx, and consequent application of the higher
risk bald-on record strategy.

The ensemble of foregrounded constructions used to suggest
directions fall into two major categories; bald imperatives and
non-bald imperatives. Bald imperatives are the mast efficient,
direct means of performing suggestions. They represent conformity
to principles of conversational cooperation. For instance, they
respect the quantity maxim, saying no more than is strictly
necessary for the purposes of communicating some speech act. The
manner maxim is also respected, since bald imperatives make
illocutionary force transparent, require little or no inference on the
part of H, and so are unambiguous in intent.

Imperatives normally occur where face redress is deemed
unnecessary in the context of the situation. The bald imperatives in
the data reflect speakers' momentary assessments of the situation,
such that Wx is low in value and the pressure towards efficiency
overrides concern for redressing H‘s face. In the context of

direction-giving, this is understandable, because H has requested

3D
ba
IIll

inli

gal
Ion
H's
im;
SGI
'OIl

Slra

Slra

47
the information, suspending negative face wants, and presumably

will benefit from S's suggestions. The bald imperatives in the data,
therefore, give evidence for speaker choice of the bald-on record
strategy. 177/361 clauses (49%) counted in the data realize this
strategy.

On the other hand, 184 of the 361 clauses (51%) deviated in
some way from the direct bald imperative form, and it is claimed
here that these clauses are reflexes of the negative politeness
superstrategy. All of these deviations have something in common;
they violate some maxims of cooperation. They ‘flout‘ the quantity
maxim in that they could have been more succinctly stated as
imperatives. They also flout the manner maxim in that they require
H to do some inference work, since S's intention is not immediately
apparent in the meanings of his/her words — S‘s departure from
bald imperative form opens the door to misunderstanding (although
the more conventionalized departures clearly require less
inferencing on the part of H).

Nonetheless, what S loses in clarity and efficiency, he/she
gains in face redress. The deviations from maximally efficient
form seen in the data serve as signals to H that S is paying heed to
H's negative face wants. The greater the divergence from bald
imperative form, the greater the inference that politeness is being
served. The various constructions in the data falling into the
’Other‘ category are reflexes of the negative politeness output
strategies. All of these forms, furthermore, can be traced back to
the negative politeness superstrategy by way of intermediate level

strategies. The choice of this lower-risk, negative politeness

48
superstrategy follows from speaker estimation of higher Wx values

in context. Wx is perceived as serious enough to require some face
redress. In sum, the bald-on record strategy evidenced in the data
results from a lower estimate of Wx, while the negative politeness
strategy results from a higher Wx estimate.

The results of this study give evidence for strong social
class preferences for one strategy over the other. The WC speakers
preferred the bald-on record strategy, using bald imperatives 69.1%
of the time in suggesting directions, compared to 28.9% for the MC.
On the other hand, the MC speakers tended to choose the negative
politeness strategy (71.1% compared to 30.9% for the WC). Given
what has been said so far, it appears to be the case that, within the
same context of direction-giving, MC speakers assign higher values
to Wx than WC speakers. This higher value motivates the choice of
the lower risk negative politeness strategy.

Recall that Wx is composed of the summative values assigned
by S to the three independent social factors D, P and R. 8’8
perception of the seriousness of an FTA is determined by S’s
assessment of the social relationship existing between S and H (D
and P) as well as S's assessment of the amount of imposition
his/her act entails (R). The variation seen in the data results from
fluctuating estimates of Wx, and since Wx is based entirely on the
values assigned to D, P and R, it must be one or more of these
factors which is causing the variation. I claim here that in the
context of giving directions to a stranger, the factor of social

distance is the only one subject to fluctuating values from one

49
class to another, and therefore variable D values lead to the

quantitative results of this study.

In the context of direction-giving to a stranger, both P and R
are held constant across classes. P values are assumed to be low
for all subjects, because the interviewer was a stranger to all of
them — a higher P value would require S‘s perception of H as more
powerful and of higher status. Given that the interviewer is from
the middle class and assuming that he was perceived as such, one
might then expect the WC subjects to assign a higher value to P
than the MC subjects with relation to the same hearer.

However, the data argue against this line of reasoning, since
higher P values assigned by WC speakers would lead to opposite
results — a greater negative politeness emphasis. The directness of
WC forms in direction-giving indicates low P values. Furthermore,
if the WC is assigning low P values in relation to a MC speaker, it
is unlikely that MC speakers will be assigning higher P values with
relation to that same speaker. For these reasons, it is assumed
that P values are consistently low across social classes in the
context of giving directions to a MC stranger.

An alternative interpretation is available with regard to how
P is assessed across classes. It is possible that WC speakers in the
context of giving directions perceive greater situational power over
H, with normal status-based power relations temporarily
suspended. It could be argued that this temporary suspension of
status roles allows the reversal of asymmetrical power in S‘s
favor. Perhaps WC speakers are more likely to seize the opportunity

to take the power role, whereas MC speakers are normally invested

50
with such power and are not as tempted to take advantage of the

same opportunity.

This interpretation is somewhat bizarre and, in fact, is not
tolerated by B&L’s theory because P values are determined by S‘s
perception of H's power over S, not vice-versa. That is, if H has no
power over S, than low values will result. S‘s power over H is
irrelevant, since the same low values result. B&L do not allow for
negative values in assessing P, and so power over H is not effective
in calculating Wx of an FTA. If this is true, than whether S
perceives greater situational power over H is insignificant. What
matters is that H does not have power over S. In the context of
direction-giving, this results in low P values for all speakers. P,
then, can be excluded as a contributing factor in the variation seen
in the data.

In addition, we may exclude R as an explanatory factor. Since
the giving of directions has been requested by H and the information
is of benefit to H, R values are assumed to be low for all speakers.
It is unlikely in this culture that a speaker from any class would
rank direction-giving suggestions as high in imposition.

This leaves only one factor to account for the variation in the
data — social distance. It is supposed here that variable D values
result in the rational choice of different strategies and their
respective linguistic realizations. The MC preference for the
elaborated negative politeness strategy points to overall higher D
assessments. WC preference for bald-on-record speech points to
overall low D values. In other words, MC speakers tend to perceive

greater social distance between themselves and a stranger than do

51
WC speakers, and this difference manifests itself linguistically in

politeness behavior.

B&L hypothesize that in complex, stratified societies
dominated (lower status) groups have ’positive politeness cultures',
while dominating (higher status) groups have ‘negative politeness
cultures' (245). Furthermore, they suppose that the factor which
motivates more negative politeness in higher status groups is that

of social distance;

If we find more reciprocal negative politeness in higher
strata than in lower strata, then this must signify that there
are higher D values in higher strata, and lower D values in
lower strata. (246)

The results of this paper‘s study provide empirical evidence in
support of B&L‘s hypothesis. The higher status MC uses more
negative politeness than the lower status WC in the same situation.
Further, it was shown to be the case that the variable social factor
is D. The results point to the correctness of B&L‘s hypothesis but
are not conclusive, since they represent variable politeness
behavior in a very limited sphere — the genre of direction-giving
within a northern U.S. city. Other genres, regions and cultures must
be investigated along the same lines for the hypothesis to be
adequately justified. Nonetheless, the quantitative results of this
study provide a piece of evidence that there is a 'class ethos‘ in
American society (at least in central Michigan), and this difference

in ethos results from differing perceptions of social distance.

52
5 Other issues

Some other issues need to be addressed. One involves the
possible role of social network membership as an explanation of
varying perceptions of social distance across classes. Another
involves the possibility that D, P, and R are not exhaustive factors
in determining the seriousness of an FTA. These issues will be

considered in turn.

5.1 Social Networks. One explanation for why perceptions
of social distance vary across social groups is that members of
different classes belong to social networks of varying density
(246). WC speakers generally belong to denser social networks than
MC speakers (Milroy, 1980) One could argue that density of social
network correlates with frequency of interaction between
members. It IS plausible then that part of the WC ethos results
from participation in dense social networks where low D values are
cultivated. Conversely, MC ethos may result from participating in
loose-knit networks where member interaction is less frequent and
D values are higher.

The social networks explanation for variable perceptions of D
makes it possible to understand the results with respect to gender
and race; there is no reason to assume that the black or female
subjects belong to looser or denser networks than white or male
subjects from the same class. One reason for this is that since all
interviews were conducted during the workweek, in the daytime and
in public, most subjects were probably either employed or else

students. There is no great difference then, in the data, between

53
men and women, blacks and whites, because the density of networks

across these lines are not significantly different. Further research
should be done to test the effects of social network membership on

politeness behavior.

5.2 Are P, D and Fl exhaustive? B&L concede in their 1987
revision that P, D and R may not be exhaustive in calculating the
weightiness of an FTA (16). The residue of factors not covered by
P, D and R are the presence of an audience, the 'liking' factor, and
aspects of situational formality. It will be argued here that none of

these residue factors had any influence on the results.

5.2.1 Audience. B&L note that the original 1978
presentation of ‘Politeness Theory‘ underplayed the importance of
third parties. This factor has to do with an interactional feature,
rather than the social identities of participants — what Alan Bell
(1984) calls ‘audience design.’ Clearly, the presence of parties
other than S and H might influence politeness behavior. To avoid
this condition, all of the 76 interviews reported on so far involved
the same audience design; a speaker, a hearer, and no others
present.

15 additional subjects were interviewed under the same
conditions, except where at least some third party was present, and

the results for these subjects are as follows;

54
Table 8: Use of non-bald imperatives with third party present

“C 17/36 46% n-10
M) 5/23 21% n-5

The number of tokens is quite small, and so these results
should not be taken too seriously. There is, however, an interesting
reversal of preference between the classes. The WC speakers used
the negative politeness strategy 27% more than the MIC. Perhaps
the presence of a third party alters a speaker's perception of the
social relationship between S and H. A further study similar to the
present one could be done to examine the effects of audience design

on politeness in verbal interaction.

5.2.2 Liking. B&L accept in their 1987 revision that 'affect'
should be an independent factor alongside D, P, and R (p.16). They
contrast affect with familiarity (distance), following the work of
Slugoski (1985), and note that these separate factors may yield
opposite results; people might use greater politeness for friendly
relationships and less politeness for familiar relations (low D
values) — “intimates don‘t necessarily like each other" (p.16).

With regard to the context of giving directions to a stranger,
it is unlikely that affect comes into play in speakers‘ assessments
of the weightiness of FTA's. Assuming that 'liking’ is assessed in
values as the other factors are, it is doubtful that values for liking

for any subject will be high in relation to a stranger.7 Therefore,

 

7 mnammmamdm'mupuyammm'mwma
sum.

55
this ‘residue‘ factor can be excluded as a possible contributing

factor to the variation examined in this paper’s study.

5.2.3 Formality. In addition to audience and liking, B&L
recognize in their revision the potential influence of kinds of
situation and setting on the assessment of Wx of FTA‘s. For
example, whether one is in church, in school, or at the ballpark
might influence FTA assessment. Also, the spatial/temporal
setting could have some effect on the perceptions of Wx. For
instance, a request on a city street from a stranger made at night
could be perceived as more threatening than if it were made in the
day.

Could situation or setting be exerting some influence on
cross-class variation in direction-giving? Although this
consideration is fraught with complexity due to the innumerable
aspects of- ‘formality’, it is claimed here that such situational
factors have been controlled for, for the most part. All of the
subjects were interviewed in public places, during the week, in the
daytime. It appears that the only differing setting condition was
the neighborhood where the interviews were conducted.

It is conceivable that this factor might have influenced the
variation across classes. One may speculate along the following
lines; WC subjects were probably interviewed within their own
home neighborhoods, whereas Lansing MC subjects in all likelihood
commute into the inner city for work. The majority of East Lansing
subjects (all MC) were presumably students and live on or close to
campus (16 out of 20 were between 16 and 25 years of age).

56
Perhaps being in one's home environment effects one's perception of

face-threat and results in lower Wx values.

This notion may be tested given the data and the distribution
of MC subjects. The prediction is that the East Lansing MC subjects
will be more direct than the Lansing MC subjects because they were
interviewed in a ‘home environment’. However, the data do not

confirm this prediction;

Table 9: Use of non-bald imperatives in and out of home
environment

M) Lansing 71/98 - 72.4% n-18
East Lansing 57/82 - 69.5% n-20

Of the 18 Lansing subjects, bald imperatives were used 27.6%
of the time, while for the 20 East Lansing subjects, bald
imperatives were used 30.5% of the time. The place of interview
therefore, was not a significant factor between Lansing and East
Lansing speakers. This still leaves open the possibility that
neighborhood has a strong effect on WC speakers' perceptions of
FTA threat. This issue requires further research.

Finally, it should be considered whether the direction-giving
destination presumed by subjects in this study had some effect on
the variable. The results given above serve to disconfirm this,

because there is no significant difference between MC Lansing and

57
East Lansing groups who were asked for directions to distinct

destinations (Potter Park and Spartan Village respectively).

In sum, although there may be residue factors in assessing the
weight of FTA’s. the ones conceded by B&L do not seem to be
contributing to the variation of bald imperatives and non-bald
imperatives in the data. Variable assessments of the D factor

across classes remains the most plausible explanation available.

6 Conclusion

One might argue that the distinct class preferences for
different kinds of linguistic form are simply characteristics of
separate social class varieties. In this view, separate varieties
have historically developed to their present state and linguistic
output therefore is in large part shaped by the codes of the
varieties. If this is true, then the variation seen in this study
requires no more than acknowledgment of distinct social class
varieties in use.

This line of reasoning is inadequate for several reasons.
First, the fact that there is variation in the data within classes and
within the speech of individuals shows that speakers are proficient
in producing either of the variants. They all have available to them
the choice of forms. Saying that groups or individuals simply
prefer certain forms is merely descriptive and sheds no light on
why such forms are preferred. B&L’s theory provides a framework

and tool for understanding such preferences. Social forces, it is-

58
claimed, exert an influence on language usage, in part by way of

politeness behavior;

For us then, the social valence of linguistic form has
two especially important sources: the intrinsic potential
impact that a specific communicative intention may have on a
social relationship, and the ways in which by modifying the
expression of that intention participants seek to modify that
impact -- such modification measuring for participants the
nature of the social relationship. (281)

So linguistic forms in use are not simply handed down by code
but rather may be determined by context specific perceptions of the
social situation and of the potential threat of certain verbal
actions. Variable usage, therefore, may be determined by variable
politeness emphases as they spring from social interaction.8

The results of the quantitative analysis provided in this paper
show distinct preferences across two large social classes for bald
imperatives verses non-bald imperatives in the genre of direction-
giving. A plausible explanation for the preferences evidenced in the
data is that ethos, or quality of interaction, varies from one group
to the next. The same situation is perceived differently by
speakers from the working class and the middle class. More
specifically, it is the factor of perceived social distance which is
variable across classes. This results in greater or lesser speaker
estimation of the weightiness of an FT A (a suggestion). Higher Wx

values then result in the choice of a lower risk politeness strategy

 

8ItismggestedbthILLa-tQthatBanstein’s(1971)distinctionbetween’clttbtl'itterl’ltrl'tcstricted’codet
(ohmmmedwimhighamdbwammmmpxfivdywmmacmmbemibuedm
Mghammsnegadvepohnneascmphasesmdlowampoddvepofiwnessunphases.

59
(negative politeness), while lower Wx values lead to the choice of

the higher risk bald-on record strategy. These strategies in turn
are realized by linguistic means which serve their purposes.

Further studies are needed to provide more support for B&L's
hypothesis that higher status groups are negative politeness
cultures, while lower status groups are positive politeness
cultures. This paper has not addressed the latter part of this
hypothesis. Future work should look at other natural language
phenomena, in other cultures, and with focus on other linguistic
variables. Also, the roles of audience design, neighborhood, and
social network with relation to politeness and class ethos require

greater consideration.

APPENDIX

APPENDIX

Middle Class Data

Male/40 years old/ Black/ subject not (7/7)

[Do you have any idea how I can get to Potters Park from here?]
Potters Park, You're gonna go to the 200. Are you walking or are you
driving? I‘ll tell you, it’s a little bit far then. Well I don't know how
you, you are to walking. Best thing to go.. is to go to
Kalamazoo. which is south of here. From Kalamazoo you want to
go east. it’ll be to your left. you take Kalamazoo, to Pennsylvania.
Okay, on Pennsylvania, you’re gonna turn right, which is south.
you go down, you go underneath the railroad track viaduct, Potter
Park is. on the left.. It’s right off Pennsylvania. I’m trying to think
if you can take. the best is walk along the river all the way to the
park, I know they were working on buildin it all the way to the park,
I'm not sure. but that way I gave you is guaranteed

Female/45 years old/ White/ subject noZ (7/7)

[00 you have any idea how I can get to Potters Park from here?]
um it's quite a ways. are you walking? okay, it is quite a ways.
okay, um.. it’s on Pennsylvania Ave.. which is. is um let's see, one,
two, three, it’s about four streets over, main streets over, and um,
If you walk down let’s see this is Washington, if you walk down
there you gonna walk. it's a long way. it's probably.. three
quarters, no maybe a mile, more than that down to Pennsylvania.
and then once you get to Pennsylvania you go right, but then it's

down probably. another good mile and a half.. okay you don’t mind
60

61
walking. Yea it is a nice day. I think that’s the easiest way to get

there that I can tell you. the river. riverwalk might make it to
there, but I'm not sure.. and the riverwalk is as you're walking down
here you come to a bridge that goes over the river. you get to the
other side, there’s an entrance down onto, and there’s a riverwalk, a
wooden walk along the river which is nice, you can take that for
quite a ways. and I’m not sure if it takes you all the way to Penn, er
to the park or not but it might. okay? good luck.

M60Wno3 (5/6)

[Can you tell me how I can get to. to Potters Park?] you walkin?
that's quite a ways.. ah.. I'd go down here to main street.. you
gonna have to walk over a bridge you gotta go all the way to
Pennsylvania. and you turn right, and it’s about. about St Joe, a
good mile.. after you hit Pennsylvania. south. yes you can't miss it..
Just before you come. to a bridge, a little bridge. it should be on the
lefthand side. Go right down here to St. Joe Street, it’s a light down
there, and you turn left, and uh. [something]

F50Wno4 (1/3)

[Do you know where I can find Potters Park? how I can get
there?] Yes.. You could take, Kalamazoo street right here.. down
um to Pennsylvania. mm right and go under the bridge, the railroad
bridge, it’s right directly to your left.. It’s right off of
Pennsylvania. You’re walking it? [Is it far?] No, I run out there
practically every day.. so uh it’ll take you twenty minutes, twenty
five minutes.

62
M35Wno$ (6/6)

[Excuse me. Do you know how to get to Potters Park?] yea I think
50.. That’s where the creek is and the zoo and all that stuff? Yea.
you go down to um.. Michigan I. I’m not from here. are you gonna
walk? oh jeez kindalongway... yea it’s um, you go down to uh.. not
this road, it's Michigan? Is that right? Michigan goes that way I’ve
been there. Tell you what, if you go down the road here, and you’re
gonna go south.. and it’s on Michigan, if there's a big road going
that way. called Michigan, that'll be the road. and you go maybe five
miles or something, it's a long way... it's down there on your left
you should get it fine, it’s pretty much that way, it’s south, it’s a
big road I think it's Michigan, and you go. that way, it’ll be about
five miles [something] good luck.

FZOW

[..how I can get to Potters Park from here?) from here I think. I
think it's actually on Kalamazoo, I think what you have to do is is..
I'm not familiar with this area. either um... I really don’t know. I
mean maybe... [something] oh this is my boss right here, he'll know...

M30Wn06 (IO/11)

[continued; last subject leaves] Potters Park? It is, okay you
wanna go up to Cedar, okay and hang a right. and um.. you'll go. or
no I’m sorry not Cedar. Pennsylvania. and that’s.. let’s see up over
the railroad tracks that way... to the next light. You’ll go through
this light, you'll go through another light, another light, so it’s the
fourth light is Pennsylvania, and you'll hang a right. and you'll

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go... it's right off Pennsylvania it’ll be on your left hand side.. it’s

real easy to find. Yea, you’ll see. cause there's like an overpass type
of thing. yea railroad track overpass. and it’s just as you get by
that. it's on your left hand side.. [Is it far?] No not too far, are you
walking? yea, cause actually there’s the ah. the riverwalk too you
can take right to it... the riverwalk. I’m trying to think where you
catch that. So if you go up to Michigan here, it's just there.. Do you
know where Michigan's at? okay yea you'll go that way to Michigan
and you’ll hang a right, and you’ll just go like one block, and
there's like stairs... Have a good walk

M30Wno7 (1/2)

[Do you know where. how I can get to Potters Park from here .7]
oh yea it’s a distance. Your best bet is. is the riverwalk. right after
you get to the river you’ll see where everybody goes joggin.. get on
the riverwalk, I think it’s about three mi it's a three mile walk.
cause I go joggin there all the time.. that’s the river right there.
that’s Grand River. and there‘s a walkway where everybody jogs. and
if you follow that for about three or four miles it’ll go right to
Potter Park..[three or four miles?] at least...

F40Wn08 (0/4)

[Do you know how I can get to Potters Park.7] ooh yea. try and
think the best way.. go up here to Cedar 5 er to Pennsylvania, and go
directly south let’s see it’s about. be about four streets up four
main streets up.. gg downtown maybe and catch a bus out that way..
[I don't know. It's a nice day out] I know. It‘s hard to ignore the day.

64

F258n09 (2/4)

[excuse me. Do you know the way to Potters Park? ] Potters
Park? It’s on. ooh what is that? [it wasan insect] It's on
Pennsylvania Street. you can't walk.. shit it's a long way! Um I’m
trying to think of the easiest. the easiest way to go that I
know is to get on the expressway. I don’t really know an easy way
to get there walking. The way I would go is I would turn right
down there and get, on 496 East and gej, off on Pennsylvania. I’m
not sure how to get there walking.

M35WnolO (2/3)

[Do you know the way to Potters Park.7] uhh. the zoo. uh yea it's a
ways away. you gotta go down there to Pennsylvania Ave which is
about. half mile down. and then it’s up about. boy a mile or two. Yea
it‘s a ways.. yea okay, good luck, gg down there to.. let me see, is it
Pennsylvania? Yea you go down to... I'm sure it’s Pennsylvania. Like
I say, it’s down there across the river,and up a couple more blocks,
it’s about a half mile that way and then it’s probably about a mile
and a half or so south. Yea down Pennsylvania.

M45Wnoll (3/3)

[excuse me sir. Do you know how I can get to Potters Park?]
Potters Park? ooh boy, that’s quite a ways from here.. um.. the best
way is. [something] um... Potter Park, I think it’s off of
Pennsylvania. Do you know where Pennsylvania Ave is?
Pennsylvania is probably about.. ah ten or twelve blocks that way..

65
it runs this way.. I would suggest go down. where are you parked?

You’re not okay. Oh you’re on foot! oh okay. Ask for better directions
than I'm going to give you. So you don’t go in the wrong. I think you
can get to it on Pennsylvania, probably if you went down
Kalamazoo probably [something], but get better directions. If you’re
walking I don't want to send you the wrong way. But it's that way.
You’re looking at at least a mile, a mile and a half...

F50Wnolz (2/5)

[00 you know where Potter Park is?] On Pennsylvania Ave..
[Where is that?) uh. It runs north and south, and it’s um, I’m trying
to think how many blocks. oh it’s gotta be four five blocks east..
well you can take any of these streets if you can go. east. right
see this is east, gg east and take, it to Pennsylvania Ave. mu
right t’south, and it's down there on the left, it’s just just past the
viadock, there's a viadock with a train track that runs over top.. the
entrance is just past that...

F40Wnol3 (5/7)

[Can you tell me where Potters Park is?] oh yea. you’re way far
away from it.. um. it's off Pennsylvania Ave, south Pennsylvania, so
if you took Michigan, which is one block over yet, and take that
this way. this is east, you’ll run into Pennsylvania, and then you'll
want to go to the right, you’ll go south. It’s a long, it’s a long yea,
you can, in fact there's a riverwalk that you can follow, [something]
If you go down Michigan there’s a riverwalk. along the way that
you can get there. I mean people walk it on their lunch hour. It’s a

66
few miles.. I don’t do that. but .. but it’s probably [something] three

miles... You're gonna take Michigan to Pennsylvania. and [Lead
south....[noise override]

F25Wnol4 (5/7)

[Hey, um, do you have any idea how I can get to Potter Park from
here?] Yea, um... Let me think... How well do you know the area?
[well, pretty well] Okay, if you get b-- right back on 496... and
take the Pennsylvania exit, there’s like one for Cedar street and
Pennsylvania, and you go past that, and mm, right onto
Pennsylvania, and you‘re gonna go up about... six, eight block... I
think you’ll pass three lights and Potter Park is you, you'll go
under a bridge, under a viaduct that has a flashing light that says
’low' for trucks. right on your immediate left is Potter Park... [okay]
it’s like- and you won‘t you won’t go- if you get to Mt Hope you‘ve
gone too far. It"s between. 496 and Mt Hope.

M60Wn015 (2/6)

[excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Potter Park from
here?] Potter Park? Sure. fig up here to this first light. ]'_u_r_n
left. fig down to.. the.. one. two. third light it’s about ah six blocks
that way. It’s Pennsylvania Ave. Ium right. Just keep going. You’ll
see Potter Park on the left. You'll go down there underneath the
railroad viaduct, and Potter Park’s right on the left.

F65Wn016 (3/4)
[Excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Potter Park from

67
here?] Potter Park. Wait a minute. um.. it’s on ah Pennsylvania. You

know where Pennsylvania is? [umm. not quite sure] Trying to think
how you get to Pennsylvania from here... You would have to go
down urn. Kalamazoo to Pennsylvania. and tum right.. This is
Kalamazoo, you take it down to Pennsylvania and you turn right.
and that‘ll take you down to Potter Park.

F60Wnol7 (4/5)

[Excuse me, do you know how I can get to Potter Park from
here?) Potter Park, oh dear, it’s a walk but it- you walking? It’s
that way. Uh gg down... it’s like on Pennsylvania. But you gotta
walk.. like. miles [really?] yea. [okay] but if you go down this
way.. and. there’s a boardwalk and you can walk along the river
and that‘ll take you to Potter Park or you go down to Pennsylvania
and that’ll take you. [okay good] you're gonna be walking!

M65Wn018 (6/8)

[Excuse me, do you know how I can get to Potter Park from
here?] um. you’re driving? [yeah] okay.. you gotta pick up a one-
way.. gg down- the next street down. one block just opposite going
this way.. okay cro- past the bridge crossing the river? Okay,
that’s Kalamazoo Street. 11kg Kalamazoo... You want to go to
Pennsylvania which is ah... You take Kalamazoo and that'll be a
one-way going south after the bridge, then a one-way going north,
then you cross a railroad tracks, and a lumber yard on your right-
up a hill is a stop light and that's Pennsylvania. You take
Pennsylvania south. okay. you'll go under a railroad overpass, and

68
then immediately left, right there, that's it. [okay. allright then]

okay but it’s about.. after you cross the railroad y- say it’s about
three blocks, actually three lights, at the third light make a right,
that’s Pennsylvania.

F20Wno19 (1/2)

[Do you have any idea where the Union is?] It’s... you might
probably want to go down this way and then it's that way. like gg
all the way down towards Grand River. it’s right on Grand River. Yea
it’s just a little further down.

FZOWnOZO (6/8)

[ Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from here ?]
Spartan Village? It’s about. You’re quite a ways from there though..
um... your best bet is to go down by the river, and fgflgw, it all
the way down, and you'll go through the gardens, and then um turn
left and you’ll see Sparty, and you'll want to go to the right of
Sparty, and you just keep walking. um you’ll be walking
southwest. It’s kind of, Spartan Village is, you just have to walk
diagonal through campus. It’s probably a good three quarters of a
mile...

F208n021 (5/5)

[... can find Spartan Village from here?] Spartan Village is like
is way over by the south side of campus. it’s past there.. and it's
like you have to. if you go-straight down this road you hit
Harrison, and then you turn left.. it’s straight down. it's like across

69
f. do you know where the MSU credit union is? the main. the main

one? yea Harrison Road, you turn left, you go south, you can’t miss
it cause there’ll be a sign that says Spartan Village.

FZSWnozz (1/3)

[do you know how I can find Spartan Village from here ?] km
going that way.. urn it’s urn actually it’d be easiest if you went
up here to Shaw. and then to Wilson.. and then all the way.. you’ve
got two directions of Shaw and then Wilson's the next one.. north..
so either way you know gg all the way to the west edge of the...
[how far is Spartan Village from there? from the comer or the edge]
I’m making sure I’m thinking of the right one.. the. cause I get Cherry
Lane er whatever those are over there. yea um it's on the other side
of Harrison...

M35WnoZ3 (1/4)

[excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from
here?] Spartan Village? uh. well it’s way back off campus that
direction. .. get the bus [Is it that far?) It‘s a long ways. gg down to
Harrison Road. you go left.. and it's gg down there past the railroad
tracks on the right..

F20Wno24 (1/1)

[Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from here?] I
figure it’s far away.. it’s um like beyond campus [ can I walk?] sure
but it’s you have to keep on going like straight through heading
north. past here. but if you ask for directions from somebody else

70
once you get a little bit closer, that might help...

FZOWnoZS (9/9)

[Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from here .7] oh
wow. you got a hike and a half. you have to go all the way to the
other side. Do you know where south campus is? Like Case Hall and..
okay you want to go around. wait... quickest way for you to go
is go straight this sidewalk, and you'll want to go to the right.
you’re gonna pass a bunch of tennis courts, you'll come to like
[something] it'll be like James Madison College and what's it Case
Hall or Wunders.. you wanna keep going that direction and it’s a
good another like half mile all the way down Harrison Road. you
might want to catch a bus. yea it‘s a good mile from here at
least. So you probably want to grab a bus. if you can. it'll take
you up there.

FZOWnOZG (4/4)

[Do know how I can get to Spartan Village from here?] um It’s
that way.. um it’s a little bit of a walk.. you have to go all the way
down to Harrison. you turn left.. yea, it's a big it's like a fourlane
wide road, it‘s divided. and you take a left and be on the righthand
side, you ha. you’re gonna walk down a little ways.. it's a little

ways away.

F25Wno27 ("6)
[Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from here] Yes I
do.. okay um what you have to do is. I kinda take [something] you’re

71
walking? This’ll be the quickest way.. fig all the way down this

street to Harrison. It'll be about three and a half more blocks then
take, a left and 11]]; past the railroad tracks until you see
Crescent Road. and you'll be right at Spartan Village. Crescent Road
like contains Spartan Village. [okay. so it's like a twenty minute
walk?] yea. maybe about twenty twenty five minutes. so you walk
straight and take a left then gg straight past the railroad tracks,
and it’ll seem like it's taking you longer than it should but it's on
um the right Crescent Road...

MZOBnoZ8 (8/10)

[excuse me. Do you know where Spartan Village is] that’s um..
well. you can take actually.. this road right here and then gg
straight down to urn where you get to Case. and just make a. well
actually let me tell you the best way.. just take straight down
here Shaw. you take Shaw. fig straight down Shaw Lane till you get
to Harrison. and you make a left on Harrison. and you go straight
down, and it’s gonna be past urn Quality Dairy and that’s
Trowbridge.. so you go past there and you‘ll see um Spartan
Village. and you just like make a right on the street.

F20WnoZ9 (0/1)

[Sorry to bother you. Do you know where I can find Spartan
Village?] oh jeez. That's way other comer. [On that side?] uhuh.
keep going that way.. Yea you got a ways.

F208no30 (3/3)

72
[Do you know where I can find Spartan Village from here ?] um

It’s a walk. you can't walk there. you have to catch the bus..
Spartan Village is.. opposite end of the campus. you have a map?
[no. ldon’t. I‘wish I did] I couldn't tell you cause I don‘t catch the
bus see I go. like you know where Shaw is? Yea but you know wh,
you know where the bus stops? you have to catch.... if you
caught the Spartan Village that’ll take you right there..

M25Wno3l (2/5)

[Say. Do you know the way to Spartan Village from here?]
Spartan Village? I know. you’re gain the right way goin this way
because isn't it next. off of Harrison? Thing is. do you know if y.
Have you been in there? cause if you go in there and ask one of the
people that are downstairs, they can probably give you a map, like
in the bookstore, they can probably just give you a map of it.. Well
tell you the truth wait a sec. I've got a map of it.. I know it’s just
off of Harrison. All right.. bad map... There’s Spartan Village right
here.. and we are. right.. I’m a screwed up. and here‘s ah Harrison. 50
you just go take this. all the way till you get to Harrison which is
the big road. and then take a left. gg over the tracks and it‘ll be on
your right side.. [looks like a little walk] yea it is a walk..

MZOWnOSZ (2/2)

[Say. excuse me. Do you know how to get to Spartan Village from
here?] Spartan Village? It’s like way down that way.. Just. basically
just keep heading this way. Just ask more people as you go along.
cause if I give you directions now you'll probably get lost like half

73
way.. [it’s pretty far?) ah.. bout three quarters of a mile to a mile...

FZSWn033 (4/4)

[00 you know the way to Spartan Village from here?] Spartan
Village? um it's way on the other side of Campus. Are you looking.
Are you sure you’re not looking for Cedar Village? ...lt’s way over
there.. Just walk in that direction. you might want to take the
bus. [Do you know where the bus is?] you want to go up to Shaw..
It’s up there, and then, like there’s probably like a busstop right
behind that building there in yellow.. and you better look for a
sign. for the bus. [it's too far to walk isn’t it?] It's a long. you can
walk, it’s just a long walk.. I mean if you have time go ahead...

F25Wno34 (3/3)

[Do you know the way to Spartan Village from here?] um Spartan
Village is all the way on the opposite side of campus. Best way
would be to go down. Bogue are you driving. oh you have a very
long walk.. it's. do you know where urn. like Holden, Wilson, Case
Hall? it's past that. Do you know. it’s past the stadium It’s. do you
know where um.. Goodrich Shoprite is? over on Trowbridge? um It’s
on Harrison Road. Lemme show you a map.. it’s easier.. Spartan
Village and we are right there.. So I guess there's not really an easy
way to go, but you need to go all the way down to Harrison, urn Do
you want me to make a copy of this for you? okay.. yea and then
just keep walking and yea. yea there’s a. this is a big shopping
center, Goodrich shoprite's right there, and there's a Mobil station
[something]

74

MZSWn035 (2/3)

[Excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from
here?] um... let’s see... I never remember which is Spartan Village
and which is University housing... um... You would.. go out to ah...
Harrison [okay] and ah. mg left. and you gotta go over the
railroad tracks. and it’s on the right. It's a long way.

M55Wno36 (4/4)

[Excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from
here?] Oh boy. It's quite a long way. [is it?] yea. I’ll just tell you
how far it is. You go to the end of this road right here.. You gotta
take Shaw Lane all the way to ah Harrison. and then you go south
on Harrison. and you pass some railroad tracks and it’s on the
righthand side. But you’re talking about a total walk of.. a mile and
a quarter... at least.

M55Wno37 (1/2)

[excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from
here?] uh... yeah.. You’d have to go over to ah. ah.. Harrison and
take a left and Spartan Village is on the both sides of Harrison
further down. ldon’t know what part you need to go to...

M55Wn038 (1/3)

[say. Do you know how I can get to Spartan Village from here ?]
yeah but it’s far away from here, you walking or driving? [I'm
driving] You’re driving. okay. any: to the end of this road which

75
will be Harrison, okay, and at Harrison you take a left, and gg

down about a half of a mile. and there’ll be a big sign there for
Spartan Village, it'll be on the righthand side.

Working Class Data

M35Wnol (1/2)

[excuse me. Do you have any idea how I can get to P0 tter Park?]
Potter Park? Do you know where the river walk is? Right over here?
Right down here, you’ll come to um. there's a river walk that goes
right to Potter Park. Just walk right down this street and the
river‘s right down there just past Jake's plumbing. The river walk
starts right on the other side of that. It follows the river. and ah it
goes right to Potter Park. Don’t go into town. gg the other way.

MZSWnoZ (0/5)

[Do you have any idea how I can get to Potter Parkfrom here?]
Right across the river there’s a. a walkway. It’ll take you right to it.
fig up here to this [pushpoint?], an a right and g over this bridge
right there. then gg right down the bridge. and stay on the walkway.
it’ll take you right to Potter Park

M608no3 (0/3)

[I'm trying to find Potter Park. Can you tell me how I can get
there?] Potters Park? Okay... gg right down the railroad tracks... you
come. the next. the first over there is Potters Park. Right. Right
there. Oh you gotta go down all the way in the park. you going w the

76
animals right? Okay... gg right here gg right down the railroad

tracks. next street over. which is ah. Pennsylvania. you come out
about far from the entrance of Potter Park as the end of that
sandbeach. [thanks for your help] you welcome

M258no4 (0/0)

[Do you have any idea how I can get to Potter Park7] You’re on it
right there.. at the end of the block. you can see it. you can see the
block

MZSWnos (0/3)

[continued-- subject 4 leaves] where you gotta go man? Potter
Park? fig down to the road. fig down the light. hang a left. and it’s
about half a block down on the right hand side.. Matter of fact. from
that park right there. it's right across the street from it. There you

go.

F25Wno6 (0/0)
[Do you have any idea how I can get to Potter Park from here?]
Potters Park? It's just right straight down here. Yup right straight

down.

M30Wno7 (0/3)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park from here?] Yea.
fig straight up. the next light. that'll be Pennsylvania and mm left.
take it straight down. you’ll run right into Potters Park.

77
F45Wn08 (3/6)

[Excuse me.. Do you have any idea how I can get to Potters Park
from where we are here?] Um Uh. right down here to the light. Ceder
Street er. no wait. gg to the second light, which is Pennsylvania..
yea it's around Mt. Hope right here. you hit one light and gg to the
second light which is Pennsylvania, take a left. on Pennsylvania,
and it's down probably.. equivalent to about six blocks, and Potter
Park is to your right. It was before you get to there's a railroad
bridge you can see a railroad bridge as you're coming up on it.. well
then there's an entrance dual entrance there just go keep to your
right... [Do you know where zoo is in relation to the park?) Yea it's
within the park. you'll go through to the ah. the park is before you
get to the zoo. It's all actually all one combination there..

F60WnoS (0/3)

[Sony to bother you. Do have any idea how I can get to Potters
Park from here?] fig to the second traffic light that way. an a a
left and you're probably.. gg down probably ten blocks. [and the 200
is in there somewhere?] yup you'll you can't miss it as you're

heading. as you're heading north on Pennsylvania

MBOWnolo (0/6)

[Can you tell me how I can get to. to Potters Park?] Ium right
here right at this red light. gg down next red light gg through it gg
down the next red light, that's Pennsylvania. Lug left gg right
straight down there about two blocks it's over on your right hand
side. [And the 200's in there?] the 200's there. yea you can't miss it.

78
there's a sign th all over on Pennsylvania

M35Wnoll (014)

[Excuse me sir. Do you have any idea how I can get to Potters
Park?) Yea. fig back down this way to Pennsylvania. m that way
on Pennsylvania and you'll see a big overpass. the park's right there
[and the 200's in there?] Yup. it's about a mile and a half that way.
m down here to Pennsylvania, gg left, and it's down about a half
a mile. You'll see a big sign out there.

momma (1/5)

[Excuse me. Can you tell me where I can find um how I can get
to Potters Park from here?] Yea. Just go straight up ah ah to the
end of the street here. ah makg a little jog left, 11kg ah Baker
Street. walk straight down to ah where it ends at Pennsylvania.,
and take a left about a block and it's there

M35Wnol3 (1/4)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park from here?] Um
fig over to Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania straight down. That's it.
Shouldn't be.. let's see. No you go back this way. up Pennsylvania
and back this way about... tell you what... fastest way.. g to this
light that's Baker.. 11kg it all the way till it hits Pennsylvania..
ends on Pennsylvania Potters Park's right across the street

M308nol4 (0/4)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park from here?] Yea.
that's easy. you see this street right here where that truck is right

79
there? fig straight till the very end. When you get to the very end,

make, a left and gg about uh. about a half a block I think. and you'll
see the uh, the entrance. This is a place you ride to a park.. That's
not Potters Park. Know what I'm saying? But there's another park
right next to it. fig over a little bridge. once you go over that little
bridge, that's Potters Street.

MGOWnols (5/21)

[Excuse me. Can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park from
here?] Lemme show you a short way. Are you walkin? All right you
could here, go out here, gg down, or, you can go right here, the
light, gg right straight down.. that's a rough part of town I'm
sending you through. I should not send you through the roughest part
of town but. or you can go right here. [some sentence].. [something]
might be closer.. be closer.. [something] be closer going this way
here.. ggnng down here. ah second light.. the second light hear?
tum right.. gg down to.. kggg walking like you're going over
towards that street there. but when you go across the bridge when
you get close cross the bridge, mm right right there other side of
the bridge there bicycle trail. Walk right down there walk right to
Potter Park.. [something] unless you wanna go this other route.. I
say this way is faster... It makes more sense [something] this route.
And you'll like and you'll like this you'll like this view here. Oh real
nice.. I go down that bicycle trail all the time. it's a six mile drive..
you ride your bike a lot? Well you'll like it [something]. Well you
need to go down there, show your bicycle that old guy they got a
bicycle trail there where I'm puttin you on. um goes right back

80
thataway across the street, goes all the way down to.. Shawassee,

comes all the way back thisaway, goes right to about Potters Park.
and when you get to Potters Park walking back, Potters Park, you
can't miss it.. there'll be a bridge there you can't see it back to your
left you see the trial there, Potter Park and not only that going
across Potter Park you can go all the way there, to ah. Kalamazoo.
six mile six mile mm. long ride. ride it all the time. and my wife.. oh
yea but at night it's good riding you know, nobody fool with you
[something] they ain't got lights all way y they just gotta finish em
[something] but they ain't got lights you know but nice view, you'll
like it there. just go down that second light, tum right, or you
can go the first light here you ought to, g the first light here,
mm right, see that yellow building there? gg down th next street,
then m left, gg up there first street, you'll see the bridge down
make a right there.. don't go back to the left. you'll be goin towards
Shawassee. and the Civic Center.. [something] him right come by
[someming] back around Potter Park. You'll like it that way better..
Be good interviewing. It goes all the way around. well you could
walk or ride the bike... You'll like it down there. You'll like that view

M30Wn016 (SllO)

[Can you tell me how to get to Potters Park from here?] Just
go down Mt. Hope, just, you wanna get on Pennsylvania, it's a big
ah, gg right here to Mt. Hope, [something] gg right here the light..
are you driving or walking? Just go right here the light, take. a
left, “kg it right down to ah, Pennsylvania, when it gets to
Pennsylvania do you wanna go right or left? It's only a block one

81
way or the other.. Yea. when you get there you'll be able to see it.

You'll look for the overpass okay. Logk for the overpass.. and when
you see the overpass it's right there.. I'm just backwards from in
here. but whe just take it over to Pennsylvania, When you get right
there you can see it

M60Wnol7 (0/3)
[Excuse me sir. Can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park
from here?] fig up d. to the light and mm right. turn left..

MSSWnol 8 (0/3)

[could you ah tell me how I can get to Potters Park from here?]
fig straight down there. bout eight blocks just over the bridge and
to your right [how about the zoo. is it in there?] yup that's right
kgeg right going to the right. you get right to the zoo at the other
end of it. You'll see it, just over the bridge. railroad bridge, river
bridge there, and mm right. It's down about eight blocks here.

M30Wn019 (4/5)

[Do you have any idea how I can get to to Potters Park from
here?] Just walk right down to that next comer, take, a right,
just keep walking down that way and you go underneath a small
viaduct right there and you'll see a riverwalk, you can cross over
there.. [how far is it?] oh probably.. maybe a mile..

FBSBnozo (0/0)
[Do you know how I can get to Potters Park?] Potters Park?

 

82
Right down the road there. It's about a mile down the road, it'll be

on your lefthand side.. Just. right down Pennsylvania here. you going
to [interruption], yes, Pennsylvania.. it's just straight down. about a
mile. probably'not even that far.. just beyond the bridge there. onto
your left. You'll see a big old sign Potters Park.. [Is the zoo right in
there?] yea the zoo right in there. [okay thanks] you welcome

F55WnoZl (3/3)

[Do you know how I can get to Potters Park from here?] Okay,
you go right straight down Pennsylvania, you go through one, two,
and then two lights, and then Potters Park is just on the other side
of that railroad track that's over. over the. over Pennsylvania. that
you go under, and Potters Park is on your left hand side. [the 200's
somewhere in there?] Yea, well you follow those roads back, and
it takes you to the zoo.. [thank you. have a good day] you too.

F60WnoZZ (4/8)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Washington Ave?]
Whereabouts on Washington Ave do you want to be? well Washington
is. is ah. about three big streets behind us. actually two big ones.. I
guess the best way would be go up to the first traffic light
here, and tum to your right. and walk right straight across till you
get to Washington ave. and turn right again... It's right basically
behind us.. but you can't walk the freeway cause the police'll have
you so. yea so the best way is go out the first traffic light.
just turn right, and it'll take you right over to Washington Ave..
and then you'll have to turn right and walk back about a block...

83

M658n023 (0/5)

[excuse me sir. Do you know how I can get to the Capitol from
here? The capital building?] yup. I'll tell you how to get there...
You're going down to the capitol? fig straight up this road. 11kg
that street there.. fig to Michigan Ave.. [something] and when you get
to Michigan. gg left.. If you miss the capitol building you know what
to do? you tear it down. cause you run straight into it.. you can't
miss it. see gg up this street here. s'bout.. uh freeway is two blocks
from here, then you got. about three more blocks. that'll be
Kalamazoo, and you got two more blocks. that be Michigan Ave.. so in
other words you got one, see that light right there, one, two, three,
four, five lights the fifth light, you'll see a car wash down the glass
company there at Michigan Ave.. you can't miss it man...

M558n024 (3/5)

[excuse me sir. Do you know how I can get to Potters Park] yea.
let's see the easiest way. well let me see.. you can go over this
way here.. kggg going straight down until you get to Pennsylvania.
let me see. no. yea you can go straight down here till you get to
Pennsylvania.. take Pennsylvania back. it's about.. about where them
tracks come out. 0 off Pennsylvania. Or you can walk down the
tracks!

M45WnoZS (2/3)
[I was wondering if you can tell me how I can get to Potters
Park] [something] it's that way. it's almost straight directly across..

 

84
it's on Pennsylvania.. take this street right here.. uh it'll jog around.

but it'll go to Pennsylvania.. and I think you gotta hang a right.
but it's right close right in here somewhere. but you gotta get on

Pennsylvania.. it's. Cedar's next one. then Pennsylvania..

M50WnoZB (3/3)

[sorry to bother you. C'teII me how I can get to Potters Park?]
Potters Park. I think that's the one over here.. That's by the zoo,
ain't it? All right. just right.. cross that street right through
there it'll take you right straight to it.. it's the next street after.
Cedar. it's Pennsylvania.. [okay. and it's off of Pennsylvania?] yea..
allright lf you go across this stoplight there. the next stoplight
down. is Pennsylvania.. you stay right on Baker Street.. and it's a
little bit to the left...

F50Wno27 (0/7)

[say. can you tell me how I can get to Potters Park?] Potters
Park? okay. gg down here to Mt Hope let's see. no. better yet... um. I
can send you back down here to Bakers Street.. takg Bakers Street
right straight through and you'll run right into Potters Park.. but the
area is not too good.. so. if you want it's gonna take you a ways out
of your way and gg down here to Mt Hope.. and makg a left and gg to
Pennsylvania and make another left. and ggmg back.. But Baker
Street is a little. a little bit of a problem beyond Cedar, between
Cedar and Pennsylvania. so it's up to you whatever way you wanna

go..

85
MSOWnOZB (13/24)

[Do you know how I can get to Potters St? uh Potters Park?] not
this light, next light down, you turn that way. okay and kgeg going
straight down. Then ah. just keep going straight down and you'll
see the Potters Park on that side. There's a bridge there. there's a
thing you can walk across. Potters Park is right in there. Best I can
tell you. [something] Just go down straight, not that light there.
the next light down, there's a church on this side.. and you turn.
you go up on this side and m that way. and you go straight down
and you keep going straight [something] till the road ends. and
you'll see a road goes this way and one goes this way. [something]
[Is there any way I can take Mt. Hope?] Yea you can go down this
way here. and gg thataway then gut all the way straight down .....
and kggg goin. and gg ah ah straight down. and then you ah. then
you turn. and Potters Park's right there.. yea instead of going this
way, if you're gonna go this way then you gotta cut over.. so
you ‘just go.. I've been there before.. and ggstraight down that
way, g to the light, and kggg going straight.. you'll see you'll see a
road gg this way like I told you.. and you turn. this way. and walk
straight down. that way, and you'll head right to it..

F45Wn029 (0/3)

[Excuse me. Do you know how I can find Potters Park?] fig right
straight down Pennsylvania to.. ah gg down. I'm sorry. Mt Hope till
you get to Pennsylvania. gg left on Pennsylvania. and it's probably
about three blocks down. down Pennsylvania on the right. This is Mt
Hope.. Mt Hope to Pennsylvania, and then down Pennsylvania about

86
thr three or four blocks down [okay and the 200's in there?] yes

uhuh.

M608n030 (2/4)

[What's the best way to get to the Capital Building from here ?]
fig straight up here. let's see.. one red light. one, two, three, four,
the fifth red light and you [stutters] could you'll see the fifth red
light that's right straight down. and then gg down. that should take
y that should be [something] you can see it. [stutters] you'll know it
if you see the high rise one. But you just go up straight Logan
here.. till about the fifth red light.. and then you'll turn

F30Wno31 (0/2)

[Do you know how I can get to Potters Park?] Five lights down,
that's Pennsylvania, tum right and it's about a half a mile on the
lefthand side of the road.. [so I go down this road?] umhuh Five
lights to Pennsylvania and tum right. yep and then it's just like a
half a mile down.. [but to the right] well it's on the lefthand side..
but when you come right up Pennsylvania, it's right off
Pennsylvania..

FZSBno32 (3/4)

[Say, Do you know howl can get to Potter Park from here?] um
fig down k- um.. Baker Street right there, right, right where that
light at? Not this light but the next light? and you turn right. and
you go all the way down, then when you get to a light down there
on Baker Street, you turn left.

87

MZSWno33 (Oil!)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Potter Park from here?] Let
me think about where I'm at.. fig down the second, one, two, third
light's Pennsylvania.. Iakg a left and gg down about... five six
blocks and you're there with no problem. [inaudible] on your right
hand side and just pass that on the right.. Third light- third light
take a left. four blocks on your right hand side. That's the park.

F653n034 (0/4)

[excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Potter Park from
here?] Potter Park.. uh.. gg down um... it's on Pennsylvania.. Do you
know how to get to Pennsylvania? [No] fig up here to ah. Mt Hope..
11kg Mt Hope all the way to Pennsylvania. and make a left on
Pennsylvania, and then Potter Park is about two or three blocks
down on the right.. So you will see it

M65Wno35 (0/3)

[Sir? Can you tell me how I can get to Potter Park?] Potter
Park. Yea- fig.. are you acquainted with Lansing at all? 'fi_g
straight back down here to ah... Pennsylvania. 11kg a left on
Pennsylvania, it's down there a block and a half on the right.

F30Wno36 (0/2)
[Do you know how I can get to Potter Park from. here?] Um.
yeah. fig straight up Mt Hope to Pennsylvania, tum left, and it's up-

88
it's a little ways down on your right I'd say.. It's a big huge sign..

there's like a bridge.. right next to it that you'll see.

FSOWn037 (0/2)

[Can you tell me how I can get to Potter Park from here?]
Potter Park? fig straight down here to ah Pennsylvania. Ium... left
on Pennsylvania. [okay. and that'II take me there?] {Confers with
another cashier] It'll be on the righthand side.

M20Wno38 (2/4)

[excuse me. Do you know how I can get to Potter Park from
here?] yeah it's over there on Pennsylvania. I'm pretty sure um...
take 49- let's see here, okay, actually... you have to take 496
over here till you see south Cedar uh uh Larch and uh Pennsylvania
Ave. fig], off at that exit which is a few miles up there. and then
what you want to do is you want to head uh south on
Pennsylvania Ave. and then you'll come across it. It'll be- it'll be
on- heading south it'll be on your lefthand side, and then you should
see it. If you don't [something] it's around there somewhere, I'm
not- I can't tell you exactly but I know it's on Pennsylvania Ave
south.

LIST OF REFERENCES

UST OF REFERENCES

Bell, A. 1984: Language style as audience design. Language and
Society 13,145-204.

Brown, P. and Levinson, S. 1987: Politeness: Some UniversaIs in
Language Usage. Cambridge University Press.

Grice, H.P. 1975: Logic and conversation. In P. Cole and J.L. Morgan
(eds), Syntax and Semantics 3: Speech Acts, New York:
Academic, 41-58 (reduced version of William James Lectures,
Harvard University, 1967).

Hopper, P.J. and Thompson, SA. 1980: Transitivity in Grammar and
Discourse. Language 56. 251-299.

Kleiner, B. 1992: Transitivity in Direction-giving. Unpublished
paper, Michigan State University.

Koike, D. A. 1992: Language and Social Relationship in Brazilian
Portuguese: The Pragmatics of Politeness. Austin; University
_ of Texas Press.

Labov, W. and Fanshel, D. 1977: Therapeutic Discourse. New York:
Academic.

Labov, W. 1972c: Sociolinguistic Patterns. Philadelphia: University
of Pennsylvania.

Milroy, L. 1980: Language and Social Networks. Oxford.

Morgan, J. L. 1978: Two types of Convention in Indirect Speech Acts.
ln Syntax and Semantics, vol. 9, ed Peter Cole, 261 -280. New
York: Academic Press.

Preston, D. 1989: Sociolinguistics and Second Language Acquisition.

Searle, J.R. 1976: The classification of illocutionary acts. Language
and Society 5, 1-24.

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Swales, J. 1985: A genre based approach to language across the
curriculum. Paper delivered at the RELC Conference,
Singapore. Cited in Preston, 1989; 51.

General References
Austin, J.L. 1962: How to do thing with words. Oxford: Clarendon.
Geertz, C. 1960: The Religion of Java. Glencoe, Ill.

Goffman, E. 1979: Footing. Semiotica 25, 1-29.

Irvine, J. T. 1975: Wolof speech styles and social status. Working

papers in sociolinguistics, no. 23. Southwest Educational
Development Lab, Austin, Texas.

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