power and solidarity

[Celso Alvarez Caccamo]

Hello,

On Thu, 25 Oct 2001, Kathryn Woolard wrote (quoting from her book
_Doubletalk_):

> 	"The first, which can be visualized as a vertical axis, has been
> most often discussed as prestige, but is variously known as dominance,
> power, status, instrumental movitation, or negative face (White 1980, Brown
> and Gilman 1960, Milroy 1980, Weinreich 1974, Gal 1979, Dorian 1981,
> Gardner and Lambert 1972, Brown and Levinson 1978). The second, the
> horizontal axis, is more unanimously labeled solidarity, although it has
> also been called covert prestige, social bonding, positive face, and
> integrative motivation (Labov 1966, Trudgill 1972, Dorian 1981, Gardner and
> Lambert 1972)"  (1989:5).

Kit (and others), I don't want to complicate the issue, but are you sure
that the power dimension correlates with negative face and the solidarity
dimension with positive face -- at least in P. Brown & S. Levinson's sense
of the terms?  I don't quite get this. +Solidarity typically entails
positive face, yes (camaraderie; your wants are my wants), but on the same
axis we've got -Solidarity, which is distance, that is, which implies
negative face (don't impinge on my course of action and I won't impinge on
yours). Now, the power axis may be connected to doing an FTA,
face-threatening act, that threatens or directly attacks either negative
face (+Power may imply one's imposing a course of action on the other
directly) or even positive face (-Power may imply complying only
reluctantly to an imposed, supposedly commonly shared course of action,
belief, or desire). So, I don't see that the power/solidarity axes
correspond one-to-one to the negative/positive face dimensions of social
relationships. Did I get it wrong?

As to the reduction of Brown & Gilman's model to only one dimension, of
course I agree it's unwarranted. But the fact is that also in my teaching
experience students take their time to grasp B&G's model, maybe because
for them -power is naturally +solidarity in their environment, and they
have a harder time conceiving of social relationships which may be -power
-solidarity. It must be a consequence of the illusion of equality that
invades us.

Peace,

-celso

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Celso Alvarez Caccamo              Tel. +34 981 167000 ext. 1888
Linguistica Geral, Faculdade de Filologia     FAX +34 981 167151
Universidade da Corunha                          lxalvarz at udc.es
15071 A Corunha, Galiza (Espanha)  http://www.udc.es/dep/lx/cac/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~