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Part of
It’s not all about you: New perspectives on address research
Edited by Bettina Kluge and María Irene Moyna
[Topics in Address Research 1] 2019
► pp. 253–280

Address negotiations in Dutch emails

This chapter presents a qualitative analysis of address forms in a small corpus of Dutch emails/email chains, in particular their strategic use in moving from a more formal, distant relation between correspondents to a more familiar one. In addition to pronominal address forms, it also considers other linguistic features, including salutations and signing off formulae, and style. Adopting a discursive approach, the chapter identifies a number of different strategies in negotiating address, including avoidance of address forms and the use of the plural familiar pronoun jullie as a transitional form between formal and familiar address. The chapter makes an original contribution to the (currently rather limited) research on address in computer-mediated communication (CMC) and comments on the hybridity of email.

Keywords: address forms, second person pronouns, Dutch, politeness, computer-mediated communication, email, hybridity, discursive approach
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Address in computer-mediated communication
    • 2.2Address in Dutch CMC
  • 3.Methodology for data collection and analysis
  • 4.Address negotiation strategies
    • 4.1Address avoidance
    • 4.2V as opening gambit
    • 4.3 Jullie and asking permission
    • 4.4T as opening gambit
    • 4.5Implicit negotiation
  • 5.Discussion and conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Published online: 28 November 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/tar.1.10vis
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