The Realization of Positive Politeness Strategies in Language: The Politeness Theory of Brown and Levinson

Politeness gains a great deal of interest in the past twenty-five years. Much has been written on politeness principle and theories. The politeness theory postulated by Penelope Brown and Stephen C. Levinson was originally published in 1978 and later expanded and republished in 1987 under the title Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage is considered the most important theory that almost all the linguists depend on in their writing on this subject. This work consists of two parts. The first part is their fundamental theory concerning the nature of 'politeness' and how it functions in interaction. The second part is a list of 'politeness' strategies (positive and negative) with examples from three languages: English, Tzeltal, and Tamil. The purpose of the present paper is to tackle the realization of positive politeness strategies in language in English language only.