4. Norms governing the number of people who talk at once:

The fourth social norm governing speech is the number of people who can talk at once.

In America, it is usually one person at a time, each person must wait their turn to enter the conversation. If there are too many people trying to speak at once, the conversation will almost certainly end—and on bad terms. This is in contrast with Antiguan society, where anyone can enter the conversation at anytime and everyone speaks at the same time

ASK STUDENTS: How many people are allowed to speak at once in Ukrainian society?

5. Norms governing the number of interruptions

The fifth and last social norm we will discuss is the number of interruptions that can happen in a conversation. In American society, it is rude to interrupt someone who is talking. If you do it more than a few times, they will certainly be offended and will likely quit talking to you.

Again, in Antiguan society, it is quite different. Interruptions are the norm and do not require an explanation or apology.

What about in Ukraine?

SUMMARY:

So, in summary we have talked about 5 Speech Norms:

1. Norms governing what can talk about.

2. Norms governing non-verbal communication.

3. Norms governing the quantity of speech produced (how much you can talk).

4. Norms governing the number of people who talk at once (one person at a time?).

5. Norms governing the number of interruptions.

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SOCIAL IDENTITY

Now, I want to move on to the next topic: speech and social identity. All that being said, it should come as no surprise to hear me say that speech is in essence very skilled work—you have to know the rules to do it well, and to do that it takes practice and studied, learned knowledge. Speech requires effort, and its degree of success depends on the effort that is made.

Thus, speech is more successful at some times than others and some people are better at it than others. There is no doubt about this, sometimes we just cannot say what we mean, our tongues, lips, and mouths won’t work, and no matter how hard we try, we can’t think of the words we need or want.

If speaking takes so much work, and energy, and indeed we have all, I’m sure, felt a little tired after a long conversation, especially if we are using our second languages, why do we bother to do it? And why are we willing to follow the constraints of our societies rules for communication?

FACE-WORK

One answer to this is the theory of FACE-WORK (THIS IS IN YOUR BOOK). The linguist Erving Goffman, first discussed this theory and it has remained popular.

“Face” in this theory means something like self-respect or dignity.

The idea behind this theory is that in any social interaction we have the potential either to lose face or to save face. Our face is a very fragile thing that others can easily damage, so we lead our lives according to the “golden rule” (do unto others as you would have done unto you.) by respecting and looking after other people’s face in the hopes that they will do the same to us.

ASK STUDENTS: Think about how you would feel if someone insulted you. Now think about how you would feel if they insulted you in public, in front of all your friends. That is losing face.

Face is something that other people give us, which is why we have to be so careful to give it to them.

Before we go any further, I want to define two key concepts: POWER AND SOLIDARITY

Power: Power is not easy to define. In most cases it is the ability to influence or control what people do or think, or the ability to achieve something or make something happen—for yourself or someone else. In social interactions, power can be equal or it can be unequal. A father usually has more power than his son. A boss has more power than an

employee, etc.

PAUSE

You have the power to do and say what you want according to the norms of your society and your status within that society.

Solidarity: Not surprisingly solidarity is also difficult to define, but it at its essence it concerns the social distance between people—that is how much experience people have shared; how many social interactions people have had; how many social characteristics people share (for example a shared religion, social class, sex, age, region of origin, race, occupation, interest etc); and how close to each other people are willing to get. The best way to think about this, in my mind is to view it simply as a “we are in this together,” relationship.

Now using these terms, power and solidarity, face can be divided into two MAIN types each main type of face requiring a particular kind of politeness:

Solidarity-face and Solidarity-politeness:

Solidarity face is the kind of respect we show someone for who they are. We give them social approval and acceptance of their values and behavior.

We can say it more clearly as: I respect you for…

In showing solidarity-politeness we use intimate forms of address such as, mate, love, darling, etc.

Power-face and Power politeness:

Power-face shows respect for the person’s right to do and be as they are. We give them the go ahead to do what they want to do.