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The Social Dynamics of Pronominal Systems: A comparative approach
Edited by Paul Bouissac
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 304] 2019
► pp. 35–56

Chapter 2
When we means you

The social meaning of English pseudo-inclusive personal pronouns

| Macquarie University

This chapter uses qualitative and quantitative analysis of interactions collected in a New Zealand rugby team to analyse the way in which pronominal choice impacts upon the social dynamics of leadership discourse. In particular, the pseudo-inclusive first person plural pronoun is examined in terms of its solidarity enhancing effect and mitigation of leadership-focused speech acts. Pronominal use is analysed with reference to the sociolinguistic concept of stance alignment and how this can mitigate potential face-threat. The discussion considers that by including themselves with the addressees of an interaction, leaders can attenuate the illocutionary force of speech acts such as directives and criticism, whilst maximising the directness of their expression, and goes on to question the social function of pseudo-inclusive compliments.

Keywords: clusivity, leadership, speech acts, stance, illocutionary force
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature
    • 2.1Stance
    • 2.2Clusivity, stance and the pronominal system
    • 2.3Control acts, compliments and criticism
  • 3.Methodology
  • 4.Qualitative analysis
  • 5.Quantitative analysis
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 23 July 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.304.02wil
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