Abstract

MESTRE DE CARO, María del Pilar. Verbal greetings in French: theoretical and pragmatic regards. Leng. [online]. 2022, vol.50, n.2, pp.370-395.  Epub July 27, 2022. ISSN 0120-3479.  https://doi.org/10.25100/lenguaje.v50i2.11978.

Verbal greetings express courtesy and benevolence towards the interlocutor when engaging in or closing a conversation. In spite of being learned in early childhood (for French-as-a-first-language speakers) or in basic levels of education (for French-as-a-second-language speakers), the internalization of their use is not restricted to the simple learning of verbal routines.

On the contrary, the mastery of these acts of speech implies taking into account independent variables such as age, sex, the socioeconomic and educational level of the interlocutor, as well as the degree of formality of the communicative situation. These factors play a key role in the understanding and choice of these words. In order to better understand this problem, this article reviews theoretical and empirical works dedicated to the origin, evolution and pragmatics of greetings (diachronic and synchronic approaches).

Based on the literature of courtesy manuals, as well as on ethnographic, sociolinguistic and interactionist studies, the aim is to adopt a relevant theoretical approach to apprehend the functioning of French greetings in context. Furthermore, the study also analyzes two authentic linguistic corpora and a cinematographic dialogue, in which it appears that the inadequate uses of the greetings or forms of address can create communicative problems. The pragmatic variables greetings, forms and pronouns of address are then discussed to offer useful insights for teachers and students of French as a Foreign Language.

Keywords : verbal greetings; verbal politeness; forms of address; FFL.

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