1. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
1
Face-Threatening Acts (FTA) in EFL Teaching:
How to Elicit Students’ Language Politeness in the Classroom
By
Susilo
Mulawarman University
Email: Olisusunmul@yahoo.com
Introduction
Teaching foreogn language is not only a matter of enabling students to speak in target
language but also tranferring values, cultures, and norms during the process of learning in
the classroom. Values, cultures and norms are things with which all human beings should
concern to nobly behave in a society otherwise they cannot be well accepted by members
of the society. Therefore it is quite wise if students should also be equipped with such
quality.
Indonesia is one of the expanding circles, according to Kachru, where English is not
used as a lingua franca; as a consequence, it should be taught in schools as a foreign
language. As nonnative speakers of English, it might be very hard for Indonesian students
to manisfest language politeness in verbal interaction when they negotiate their intentions
in the conversation since English is not their mother tongue. What often happens in EFL
class is that teachers as well as students focus the learning more on language forms instead
of language function. This results in the lack of paying attention to social context in the
process of teaching and learning English in the classroom. If this happening goes ahead in
a long time in EFL class, students might be very fluent in speaking English but they cannot
perform good communication in an appropriate contexts.
Karl Burler introduced “organon model” to describe how language should meet
context as the verbal instrument in society. According to him, there are three signs in
relation with using language in a society, i.e. 1) a symptom (appeal function) - as a sign
says something about a sender, for example, whether a sender is female or male; 2) a
symbol (reference function) - as a sign refers to objects and state of affairs; and 3) a signal
(expression function) - as a receiver must interpret the sign or react to what has been said.
Meanwhile, the social context, according to Halliday, concerns the Field (what is going
on), Tenor (the social roles and relationships between the participants), and Mode (aspects
of the channel of communication, e.g., monologic/dialogic, spoken/written, +/- visual-

2. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
2
contact, etc.). Language politeness resides in the function of language in which context
plays a very important role. Thus, language politeness should be explicitly taught and be
elicited from the students in the classroom in order that the students finally can perform
better communication in English instead of only being very fluent in speaking English.
What is politeness, then? To average people, being polite means showing good manners
and thinking about other people’s feelings. However, for sociolinguist, politeness means
the way that people choose to speak and how their listeners react to what they say. In this
paper, the term ‘politeness’ refers to the sociolinguistics’ terms.
It is most likely the final impact of teaching and evaluating language politeness that
the students can internalize universal values in social communication, i.e. courtesy, which
will gradually build the students characters. This concern is quite important not only in the
context of learning English as a foreign language in Indonesia, but also in equipping
students with strong character internalization through education in order that they can live
together with other people in international neighbourhood. Courteous people as citizens is
now extremely needed in the context of building Indonesian young generations’ characters
in the future. As is stapulated in the “UU No.20/2003 Sistem Pendidikan Nasional Pasal 3,
the final end of Indonesian educational efforts is “Mengembangkan kemampuan dan
membentuk watak serta peradaban bangsa yang bermartabat dalam rangka mencerdaskan
kehidupan bangsa”. This implies that in the process of EFL teaching, building students’
characters is a must. Therefore, politeness in EFL might obviously be important.
Etymologically, the English word ‘polite’ is originated from the Latinate past
participle ‘politus’, meaning ‘polished’ or ‘smoothed’. However, scientifically, politeness
can be understood from many different models, each of which can be traced back to
general notions on sort of civilized or courteous activity. There are many different models
of politeness concept, for example, Grice’s maxim of politeness, Lakoff’s rules of
politeness, Leech’s politeness principles, and Brown and Levinson’s universal model of
politeness. In this paper, I would refer politeness as any concept proposed by Brown and
Levinson because this is the most comprehensive one. They defined politeness as “the
public self-image that every member [of a society] wants to claim for himself ”. According
to them, during social interaction a speaker must rationally assess the nature of a face-
threatening act (FTA). In this concept of politeness, there are three indicators to assess the
politeness, i.e. the social distance (D) and social power (P) between a speaker and a hearer,
and the absolute ranking (R) of impositions in a particular culture. Social Distance means

3. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
3
degree of familiarity or solidarity which the speaker and hearer share; relative Power refers
to degree to which the speaker can impose his/her will on hearer; and absolute ranking of
impositions in the culture is the right of the speaker to perform the act, and the degree to
which the hearer welcomes the imposition.
In addition, FTA concerns with the relation between politeness and interlocutor’s
face. In an interaction, politeness can be defined as the means employed to show awareness
of another person’s self-image. For example, the expression “give me that!” is a direct
speech act that can give the impression that speaker has a social power over hearer in a
communication. If it happens that a speaker says that expression to a hearer, it can mean
that the hearer will lose his/her face because it runs an assumption that the speaker’s power
is higher than the hearer’s. While the expression “could you give me that?” is an indirect
speech act that can be used in the conversation to remove the assumption of power; thus
the risk of hearer’s face loss can be reduced. The former expression seems to be ‘order’
which might strongly threaten hearer’s face and the latter one, which is ‘request’ might less
threaten hearer’s face. In short, there is a continuum of room where the speaker in a
conversation can fill in to variably put any expressions which imply degree of politeness.
Making Language Politeness-Embedded Materials
Since English is not lingua franca in Indonesia, so it is not spoken in everyday
activity. Students must learn language politeness through the process of learning English.
This implies that teachers should make balanced between focusing language forms and
functions in teaching English. Obviously, context is really important in every single
exercise. In other words, giving authentic meaningful practices with real contexts should
always be done in the process of EFL teaching. Teachers, in this case, should always
remember Halliday’s three terms, i.e. field, tenor and modes when teaching.
Preparing materials for EFL class is an important part of teaching. It is most likely
that teacher should make materials before teaching. Here is the example of materials which
is politeness-embedded.

4. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
4
Materials for Role Play
Genre : Request
Level : Advanced
Situation:
You are undergraduate student in FKIP and are taking a course of Morphology this semester. You
haven’t missed this class once this semester and consider yourself a diligent student. So far you
have a good average in the class, not because it is easy for you, but because you have worked
very hard. Among your classmates, you have a reputation for taking very good notes. The lecturer
has just announced that the midterm is next week. One of your classmates, who is taking class
with you for this semester and who has frequently missed the class, asks you for your notes. You
didn’t often interact with him/her outside the class, but have occasionally done small group work
together in class. When the class ends, he/she approaches you for your notes, but you don’t want
to lend them to him/her.
Example of the possible Dialogue:
Adi : Lend me your lecture notes!
How about letting me have a look at your lecture notes?
Could you please lend me your lecture notes?
I didn’t take any notes for the last lecture.
....no words but he silently looks at your lecture notes.
You : I’d like to but....
Sorry I don’t want to lend my notes to anyone.
What if you ask the lecturer’s?
Even I cannot read my notes, I am affraid....
Don’t borrow my lecture notes
Teaching procedure:
- Ask the students to read the dialogue and discuss every possible expressions stated by
both interlocutors.
- Discuss in brief the field, toner and mode of the conversation with the students
- Ask the students to make their own dialogues which is politeness-embedded
Teaching evaluation:
- Discourse completion task
- Politeness Daily Routines Portfolio
Eliciting Language Politeness in EFL Class
There is a number of evaluation forms that can be used in EFL teaching, but these
following two forms are, in my opinion, appropriate for evaluating EFL teaching focusing
on politeness: 1) Politenes Daily Routines Portofolio, and 2) Discourse Completion Task.
Politeness Daily Routines Portofolio (PDRP)
In this kind of evaluation, students are supposed to make a daily account of any
conversations in any situation. Teachers should design a natural English conversation task

5. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
5
to students together with the possible contexts. When they are doing the task, they make
the account, and at the same time they fill in a checklist or questionnaire to elicit the
politeness embedded in the conversations.
An example of PDRP model:
Transcript taken from real-life conversation:
.....................
......................
Speaker :......................
Hearer :......................
Situation :......................
Reflection on Politeness:
No
.
Speech Act
(speaker)
S
Optional Response
(hearer)
H
Politeness indiators of Assessment
Social
Power
Social
Distance
Absolut ranking
of imposition in
a particular
culture
1 Meet me at 9 o’clock
tomorrow!
Whatever you said.
S+, H- S+,H+ N/A
2 What if you meet me
at 9 o’clock
Sorry, I have to attend
the class at 9
S -, H- S-,H- N/A
.....
Discourse Completion Task (DCT)
It is scripted dialogues representing socially differentiated situations. The dialogues
should be preceded by a short description of situations, specifying social distance and
relative power of the interlocutors. In the situations, students are asked to give response to
each situation according to how they believe they would respond in a real-life situation.
An example of DCT:
Instruction:
Read this dialogue, identify the situation, and fill in the blank space!
Dialogue 1:
Situation:
In a meeting, when a man who is the boss of the place where the meeting takes place felt
uncomfortable when he just sat. The women, who is the secretary, sit next to him. This is what he
said:
Man : This chair is really uncomfortable!
Woman : I think that chair is designed for someone taller than you.
Man : (.......................................) Psychological State of the man: the man intends to
change the chair
The answer: Give me the new one.
Dialogue 2:
Situation:

6. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
6
In a party, when a man sits next to a women. They did not know each other before.
Man : This chair is really uncomfortable!
Woman : I think that chair is designed for someone taller than you.
Man : (....................................) Psychological State of the man: the man intends to change
the chair
The answer: Why don’t you change your chair

7. Paper presented in EFL seminar “Innovation in English Language Teaching” hosted by UPT Balai Bahasa Universitas
Mulawarman, on 24 Mei2013
FTA in EFL Teaching
7
Bibliography
Huang, Yan. 2007. Pragmatics. Great Clarendon Street, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Leech, Geoffrey. 1996. Principles of Pragmatics. New York: Longman Group Liminted
Grundy, Peter. 2008. Doing Pragmatics. Euston Road, London: Hooder Education
Felix-Bradefer, J Cesar. 2008. Politeness in Mexico and United States. Amsterdam,
Netherlands: John Benjamins Publishing Co.