Some Considerations Regarding the Popularity of the Linguistic Means of Weakening the Illocutionary Force in Japanese Youth's Conversational Interactions
Abstract
The study focuses on Japanese youth's use of several selected linguistic means of weakening the illocutionary force in the situations when they communicate their beliefs, attitudes, emotions, feelings or factual information about themselves. It outlines the main functions of the selected means of weakening the illocutionary force in the studied contexts, briefly reviews the traditional Japanese norms and values regarding social interactions, and attempts to delineate Japanese youth's attitudes towards friendly relationships and communication.
The analysis suggests that the use of the selected means of weakening the illocutionary force in the studied contexts clearly reflects the traditional Japanese preferences with regard to interpersonal relationships and communication as well as Japanese youth's attitudes towards friendly relationships and the values they seek to pursue in their conversational interactions. It is argued that since the functions of the selected means of weakening the illocutionary force - and, as a result, the meaning of the utterances they modify - seem to be quite clear to the Japanese young speakers, rather than, as often assumed, constituting an example of vagueness, they form communication strategies which might be regarded as conventionalized indirectness.
Moreover, it is suggested that with regard to the fact that the young Japanese speakers' primary motivation for the use of the studied forms appears to be their wish to be polite, such linguistic behaviour might be considered an example of the so-called new politeness (新丁寧語, shinteineigo).