Call For Papers
Im/politeness on the Big Screen
Friday 1st December 2023, University of Naples L’Orientale
Im/politeness is an integral part of the language, aesthetic value and cultural significance of cinema. The conference seeks to analyse the languages of im/politeness in a variety of cinematic texts (shorts, featurettes and feature films). Pragmatics, stylistics, multimodal analysis, characterization, and conversation analysis are particularly relevant for investigating im/politeness as conversational behaviour in cinematic discourse. With a focus on areas such as banter, mock-politeness, irony, humour, and related phenomena, the conference will explore the interconnections between these linguistic and social practices across cinematic texts.
We welcome proposals for 20-minute papers (in Italian or English) on a broad range of topics related to im/politeness in cinematic discourse. While we encourage submissions on the following themes, we also welcome related contributions:
- Im/politeness and characterization in cinema;
- Innovative approaches to analysing linguistic and multimodal im/politeness;
- Banter, pseudo/mock-politeness and similar phenomena (irony, humour, etc.);
- Impoliteness and storytelling in cinema;
- Further methodological considerations regarding analysis of film dialogues;
- Taboo language;
- Audio-visual translation and Im/politeness Theory.
Overall, this conference aims to provide a platform for interdisciplinary discussion on im/politeness strategies in cinema. We welcome contributions from scholars across various disciplines, including, among others: linguistic pragmatics, stylistics, film and media studies, and sociolinguistics.
Abstracts (250 words max.) should be sent as email attachments in .doc or .docx format to abeville@unior.it and emma.pasquali@uniecampus.it by 16/06/2023.
Abstracts should include:
➔ full name;
➔ academic position;
➔ affiliation;
➔ contact information (email);
➔ up to 5 keywords;
➔ up to 5 key references.
Notice of acceptance will be sent by 31/07/2023.
A selection of papers will be proposed for publication in a collection of essays.
Organising and Scientific Committee
Aoife Beville (University of Naples L’Orientale)
Emma Pasquali (eCampus University)
Selected bibliography
Androutsopoulos, Jannis. 2012. “Introduction: Language and Society in Cinematic Discourse”. Multilingua 31 (2–3): 139–54.
Bousfield, Derek. 2007. “‘Never a Truer Word Said in Jest’: A Pragmastylistic Analysis of Impoliteness as Banter in Henry IV, Part I”. Pp. 209–20 in Contemporary Stylistics, edited by M. Lambrou and P. Stockwell. London; New York: Continuum.
Brown, Penelope, and Stephen C. Levinson. 1987. Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge; New York: Cambridge University Press
Chepinchikj, Neda and Thompson, Celia. 2016. “Analysing cinematic discourse using conversation analysis”, Discourse, Context & Media, 14:40-53.
Culpeper, Jonathan. 1996. “Towards an Anatomy of Impoliteness”. Journal of Pragmatics 25(3):349–67.
Culpeper, Jonathan. 2001. Language and Characterisation: People in Plays and Other Texts. Harlow England, New York: Longman.
Culpeper, Jonathan. 2011. Impoliteness: Using Language to Cause Offence. Cambridge University Press.
Dynel, Marta. 2011. “‘I’ll Be There for You!’ On Participation-Based Sitcom Humour”. Pp. 311–34 in The Pragmatics of Humour across Discourse Domains, edited by M. Dynel. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Dynel, Marta. 2016. “Conceptualizing Conversational Humour as (Im)Politeness: The Case of Film Talk”. Journal of Politeness Research 12 (1): 117–47.
Dynel, Marta. 2017. “(Im)Politeness and Telecinematic Discourse”. In Pragmatics of Fiction, edited by Miriam A. Locher and Andreas H. Jucker, 455–88. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
Janney, Richard. 2012. “Pragmatics and Cinematic Discourse”. In Lodz Papers in Pragmatics 8.
Kádár, Dániel Z., and Michael Haugh. 2013. Understanding Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kress, Gunther, and Theo van Leeuwen. 2006. Reading Images: The Grammar of Visual Design. Second Edition. London: Routledge.
Leech, Geoffrey. 1983. Principles of Pragmatics. London: Longman.
McIntyre, Dan. 2008. “Integrating Multimodal analysis and the stylistics of drama: a multimodal perspective on Ian McKellen’s Richard III”. In Language and Literature 17(4): 309-334.
Nørgaard, Nina. 2010. “Multimodal Stylistics: the Happy Marriage of Stylistics and Semiotics”. In Semiotics: Theory and Applications, edited by S. C. Hamel, 255-260. Nova Science Publishers.
— . 2014. “Multimodality and Stylistics”. In The Routledge Handbook of Stylistics, edited by Michael Burke, 471-485. Oxon: Routledge.
Piazza, Roberta, Monika Bednarek, and Fabio Rossi. 2011. Telecinematic Discourse: Approaches to the Language of Films and Television Series. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Toolan, Michael. 2014. “Stylistics and Film”. In The Routledge Handbook of Stylistics, edited by Michael Burke, 455–69. Routledge.