Some Notes on Linguistic Politeness in Italian and English Business Letters
Some Notes on Linguistic Politeness in Italian and English Business Letters

Summary/Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to point out the multidimensionality of politeness. As a specific aspect, we have chosen to deal with the problem of linguistic politeness in the Italian and English business letters. Duranti’ s three paradigms of politeness represented the theoretical frame of the argumentation. A comparative analysis between the two letters was performed at micro-textual level. It was revealed that there are some stylistic and rhetorical differences between the two letters, differences that are directly related to the concept of linguistic politeness, which is somehow slightly different from language to language. More deferential ways of addressing and a higher degree of emotive tonality in the Italian business letters were underlined as compared to the English business letter. Some aspects related to linguistic politeness in these letters were considered to be of interest for the didactics of these languages.

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