Discourse Analysis Of Impoliteness In Chinese Familial Conflict Talk

Family has been the major unit of Chinese society in all ages,and harmony in family is strongly advocated in Chinese culture.However,no one can prevent conflict from happening between parents and children in reality.Therefore,conflict talk is a common part of talks among family members.The impoliteness theory(Culpeper,1996)is adopted in this study as the theoretical framework to examine the conflict talks in a Chinese sitcom Kids at Home.The features of parent-child conflict talk are analyzed and the impoliteness strategies used by the two parties in different stages of conflict talk are identified.Based on the research findings,the causes of the conflict talks are discussed from the cultural angle.The study finds that the parents use strategies more frequently in the initial stage,especially the strategy of criticizing.The frequency of employing strategies in the arguing stage is similar between the two parties.However,there is a big difference in the choice of certain strategies.Parents tend to use the strategies of frightening and criticizing while children are inclined to challenge and disassociate from parents.Seven types of ending patterns are observed in the terminating stage where children tend to quit or compromise.Factors including power imbalance between parents and children,stereotype,gender difference,and role difference work together to contribute to the differences.Finally,the thesis gives some suggestions of how to smooth and decrease parent-child conflict talk to promote the harmonious atmosphere in family.