Revisiting the Drawbacks of Brown and Levinson’s Politeness Theory* Abstract: Although Brown and Levinson’s politeness theory has been one of the most influential theories in the pragmatics field, its universal claims and other aspects are called into question by some scholars. There are problems with the concept of face, positive face and negative face, redressive strategies for doing FTAs and the formula for calculating the weightiness of an FTA in their theory. Since the concept of face as the starting point of the theory does not hold water, the other aspects inevitably have some drawbacks. Therefore, when politeness is explored in pragmatics field, social and cultural factors should not be lightly treated. Key words: face positive face negative face redressive strategies formula for calculating the weightiness of an FTA
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