Cortesía y comunicación eficiente en español y alemánanálisis contrastivo de una macrocategoría lingüística

Abstract

This paper presents a research project that deals with politeness from two perspectives: on one hand politeness is considered as part of a culture and on the other hand it is thought of as being relevant for achieving a goal in social interaction. Politeness is not considered a closed category, but rather a varying set of parameters that are activated differently in each communicative situation. In considering politeness as a cultural phenomenon, we assume that the parameters of efficient communication vary across cultures. This assumption motivates the contrastive approach of the research project presented. We conclude that second and foreign language teaching methods should include strategies to educate learners in perceiving those politeness-relevant parameters specific to the foreign culture.