AN ANALYSIS OF POSITIVE POLITENESS SUB-STRATEGIES AND THE CONTEXT IN THE MOVIE THE GLASS CASTLE

Abstract

The research aims at describing the positive politeness strategies and the context that influences the use of the politeness strategies. The source of the study is the movie The Glass Castle. The movie is based on true story taken from the memoir of Jeanette Walls in 2005. The writer applies the theory of politeness strategies by Brown and Levinson (1987) and the theory about context according to Jacob Mey (1993). Meanwhile the method of research is descriptive method. Based on the analysis, from fifteen positive politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson, the writer finds thirteen strategies. They are 1) Notice and attend to H, 2) Exaggerate, 3) Intensify interest to H, 4) Use in-group identity markers, 5) Seek agreement, 6) Avoid disagreement, 7) Show common ground, 8) Joke, 9) Show S knowledge and concern for H’s wants, 10) Offer and promise, 11) Be optimistic, 12) Include both S and H in the activity and 13) Give gifts to H. Only Tell or ask for reason and Assume reciprocity that the writer cannot find. In addition, all of the contexts are also found: 1) linguistic, epistemic, physical and social contexts. The most frequent used positive politeness strategies is Use in-group identity markers such as mountain goat, little lady, kiddo, sweetie, son and big shot. Furthermore, the contexts often used are linguistic and epistemic context.
Keywords: positive politeness strategies, context.