December 14th – 15th, 2026 – University of Naples L’Orientale
The conference continues the tradition of previous events on linguistic (im)politeness hosted by the Argo Research Centre. Following the respective conferences on cinema, TV series and theatre, this year’s edition aims to investigate (im)politeness in fictional and scientific texts that use the page as their medium from a philological, linguistic and literary point of view.
Since the idea of textuality has gradually encompassed a wide spectrum of written forms, the term “page” is understood as any material medium bearing written language. The purpose of the conference is to adopt a cross-disciplinary approach to non-book media, such as urban spaces, the human body, and digital environments.
In light of these conceptual horizons, while the methodological frameworks of (im)politeness have been traditionally applied to textual forms related to dialogue (drama, screenplays, spoken language), the conference addresses underinvestigated textualities: fictional prose, scientific-argumentative texts, forms of urban writing (textual graffiti), lettering and quotations in tattoos, acronyms and abbreviations, online written interactions and comments.
We invite proposals for 20-minute presentations. The main topics of interest include, but are not limited to, (im)politeness phenomena in:
- Prose fictional texts (novels, short stories, comics, fanfictions, etc.);
- (Im)politeness within narratives and narratological frameworks;
- Scientific treatises and specialised texts (legal, administrative, contractual documents, etc.);
- Linguistic (im)politeness across heterogeneous writing supports (walls, the web, the body, etc.);
- Linguistic “economies” (acronyms and abbreviations) as forms of exclusion, identity markers, or demanding shared prior knowledge from the addressee;
- Linguistic (im)politeness in/of translation.
Abstracts should not exceed 300 words (excluding title, bibliography, and keywords) and should be sent as e-mail attachments in .doc or .docx to roberto.esposito@unior.it, m.mirto@unior.it, and a.marino105@unior.it by 10/05/2026 30/05/2026.
Proposals should include:
- full name;
- academic position;
- affiliation;
- e-mail address;
- keywords (5 max.);
- references (5 max.).
Notice of acceptance will be sent by 30/06/2026.
No fee registration.
Scientific and Organising Committee
Bianca Del Villano, Giuseppe Balirano, Roberto Esposito, Mariaconcetta Mirto, Alessia Marino, Chiara Ghezzi, Aoife Beville, Emma Pasquali.
Selected references
Bousfield, D. (2008). Impoliteness in Interaction. John Benjamins.
Brighenti, A. M. (2010). At the Wall: Graffiti Writers, Urban Territoriality, and the Public Domain. Space and Culture, 20(10), 1-18.
Brown P. & Levinson S. C. (1987 [1978]). Politeness. Some universals in language usage. Cambridge University Press.
Bruti, S. (2013) La cortesia. Aspetti culturali e problemi traduttivi. Pisa University Press.
Carver, E. H (2018) Graffiti Writing as Urban Narrative. Literary Geographies, 4(2), 188-203.
Chmielewska, E. (2007). Framing [Con]text: Graffiti and Place. Space and Culture, 10(2), 145-169.
Culpeper J. (1996). Towards an anatomy of impoliteness. Journal of Pragmatics 25, 349–367.
Culpeper, J. (2001). Language and Characterization: People in Plays and Other Texts. Longman.
Culpeper, J. (2011). Impoliteness. Using Language to Cause Offence. Cambridge University Press.
Culpeper, J., Haugh, M. & Kádár, D. Z. (2017). The Palgrave Handbook of Linguistic (Im)politeness. Palgrave Macmillian
Goffman, E. (1967), Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face to Face Behaviour. Penguin.
Kizelbach, U. (2023). (Im)politeness in McEwan’s Fiction: Literary Pragma-Stylistics. Palgrave Macmillian.
Jucker, A. H. (2020). Politeness in the History of English: From the Middle Ages to the Present Day. Cambridge University Press.
Short, M. (2013 [1996]). Exploring the language of poems, plays and prose. Routledge.
Vandendorpe, C. (2009 [1999]). From Papyrus to Hypertext. Toward the Universal Digital Library. (translated by P. Aronoff & H. Scott). University of Illinois Press.