Application Of Politeness Principle And Its Redressive Strategies In Oprah Winfrey’s Talk Show

Politeness, as a common language phenomenon, has received great attention from linguistics at home and abroad. How to behave polite has been the concern of oration, rhetoric, and later linguistics. With the development of linguistics and its subbranches, researches on Politeness Principle (PP) and its redressive strategies have been done from various aspects. The PP and its redressive strategies, as the fundamental theories in the field of Pragmatics, have been integrated into social life imperceptibly and extensively. The PP talks about what the politeness is while its redressive strategies describe concrete measures to behave polite during the conversation.This dissertation attempts to analyze the application of PP and its redressive strategies in Oprah Winfrey’s talk show from the pragmatic perspective. This dissertation employs two theories, the PP and its redressive strategies. The analytical data for the present study are collected from Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. In order to understand the PP and its redressive strategies better of the hearer and the listener, this dissertation will analyze and investigate from the perspectives of the host and the guest respectively by means of qualitative approach to analyze the Oprah Winfrey’s talk show. The purpose of this dissertation is the application of these two theories in the daily talk, the analysis of how they do Face-Threatening Acts (FTAs).The author hopes that this study can help the audience better enjoy and understand talk show program, and maintain the stable and harmonious relationship in real human interaction. Also, some suggestions will be provided for Chinese talk show. The analytical work in the present dissertation is just a tiny part of politeness, and it is hoped that further studies can be conducted to make more contributions to politeness. Finally, the limitations of this study and suggestions for further studies are provided.