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“People confuse respeto ‘respect’ with terms of address”: an analysis of online metacommunication about politeness and second-person pronoun use in Peninsular Spanish

  • Daniel Chornet

    Daniel Chornet PhD, is the Communication Program Director at Saint Louis University, Madrid Campus, Spain. His research areas include Spanish cultural and intercultural communication, dialogism, and discourse analysis. His research has been published in the Journal of Intercultural Communication, the International Journal of Intercultural Relations and Discourse & Communication. Dr. Chornet regularly teaches Ethnography of Communication, Intercultural Communication, Theories of Persuasion, Communication Theory, and Public Speaking to a multicultural student population in Madrid. Dr. Chornet currently serves in the editorial board of the Journal of International & Intercultural Communication, the Journal of Intercultural Communication, and The Journal of Undergraduate Ethnography.

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Published/Copyright: April 15, 2022

Abstract

This article investigates online metacommunication about politeness and second-person pronouns in Peninsular Spanish. I propose a framework that integrates a discursive approach to politeness, speech codes theory, and dialogism to capture emically the contested nature of politeness at the cultural level. The analyses show two oppositional codes of address: Las formas ‘manners’ presumes that the use of usted (formal-second person pronoun) is the default polite way to enact respect towards societal hierarchical structures. El tuteo ‘the act of addressing somebody as you[tú]’ presumes that respect is not inherent in terms of address or an obligation towards hierarchy; instead, respect is owed to all people and earned through one’s actions. These codes co-exist in tension and their respective meanings stem from how they articulate with each other. I conclude that online metacommunication provides new affordances to study politeness and speech codes.


Corresponding author: Daniel Chornet, Department of Communication, Saint Louis University, Madrid Campus, Avda. del Valle 34, Madrid, Spain, E-mail:

About the author

Daniel Chornet

Daniel Chornet PhD, is the Communication Program Director at Saint Louis University, Madrid Campus, Spain. His research areas include Spanish cultural and intercultural communication, dialogism, and discourse analysis. His research has been published in the Journal of Intercultural Communication, the International Journal of Intercultural Relations and Discourse & Communication. Dr. Chornet regularly teaches Ethnography of Communication, Intercultural Communication, Theories of Persuasion, Communication Theory, and Public Speaking to a multicultural student population in Madrid. Dr. Chornet currently serves in the editorial board of the Journal of International & Intercultural Communication, the Journal of Intercultural Communication, and The Journal of Undergraduate Ethnography.

Acknowledgments

I thank Kristine Muñoz, T. Ryan Day, and the anonymous reviewers for their feedback.

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Received: 2019-10-05
Accepted: 2020-12-02
Published Online: 2022-04-15
Published in Print: 2022-07-26

© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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