Theorizing impoliteness: a Levinasian perspective

Abstract

Despite the fact that impoliteness research has spanned over three decades, it has been conceptualized persistently in terms of politeness as its binary opposite. In this paper, we endeavor to provide a theoretical framework for studying impoliteness as significant communicative practice. We aim to introduce Levinas’ face as an alternative to Goffman’s face and identify impoliteness with Levinas’ face for the reason that Levinas’ face, featuring absolute difference, can only be expressed through the discourse of resistance which manifests in various phenomena commonly categorized as impoliteness. We also argue that impoliteness is essentially the discourse of the authentic Self whose uncompromising difference, though potentially resulting in conflictive phenomena, facilitates understanding between individuals, not as actors, but as unique beings with their individualities and differences. We further contend that impoliteness is ethical in that the discourse of resistance does not aim for power but calls for respect for individual difference as well as responsibility for the Other in an effort to seek equality in human relations which are fundamentally power-laden and unequal. We also provide a case study to apply our theoretical construction of impoliteness to a literary classic, namely, Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” to illustrate our main points.