Politeness Strategies of Anglo Expatriates in Indonesia: A Sociopragmatic Analysis of Directive Speech Acts
Abstract
Politeness strategies in speech acts are essential for Anglo expatriates navigating Indonesia’s hierarchical, high-context culture. This study investigates how expatriates from the US, UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand apply politeness in directive speech acts, shaped by intercultural interactions and local power structures. This research employs a qualitative approach, with data collected through a Discourse Completion Test (DCT) administered to 26 expatriates in Jakarta, Bali, and West Java; the data are then analysed using Brown and Levinson's Politeness Theory and Searle's Speech Act Theory, focusing on hierarchy, social distance, and power. The results indicate a shift in the application of Brown and Levinson's Politeness Theory in the Indonesian context, showing Anglo expatriates from low-context cultures adapt to high-context norms in their directive speech acts through modified politeness strategies. Negative politeness predominates, particularly among British, Canadian, and American expatriates, while Australians and New Zealanders adopt a more blended approach, reflecting flexible deployment of politeness strategies according to cultural and regional norms. In Jakarta and Bali, politeness strategies are applied most casually, whereas in West Java they are expressed most formally, demonstrating how expatriates navigate hierarchical and high-context communication patterns. Positive politeness and culturally attuned lexical choices further signal heightened sociopragmatic awareness and reconfigured face management, especially via pronoun-based markers. Given the limited empirical research on expatriate politeness in Indonesia, particularly among Anglo expatriates, we believe this study offers significant novelty by providing rare, context-specific evidence that extends intercultural pragmatics through grounded insights into politeness adaptation in a high-context sociocultural setting in Indonesia.
Keywords: Anglo; expatriates; politeness; directive; Indonesia
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