Je Ne Suis Pas Charlie. Metadiscourses of Impoliteness Following “France’S 9/11” in Selected Print Media

Topics in Linguistics - Issue 16 – December 2015

DOI: 10.2478/topling-2015-0010

Je ne suis pas Charlie. Metadiscourses of impoliteness following “France’s 9/11” in selected print media

Milan Ferenčík University of Prešov, Slovakia

Abstract Almost immediately after the Charlie Hebdo shootings of 7 January 2015, some print media made room for alternative opinions of what had happened. The articles and the discussions they inspired are replete with evaluations which lend themselves to analysis using methods and procedures of Politeness Theory. The paper examines an example of a metadiscourse of (im)politeness which questions the “moral orders” underlying the cartoonists’ as well as other participants’ social practices vis-à-vis their ideological foundations, esp. freedom of speech as one of the principal liberties of our society. To that end, the approach to politeness as “social practice” is employed which, while insisting on multiple understandings of politeness, places participants’ evaluations at the centre of politeness research.

Keywords Charlie Hebdo shooting, impoliteness, metacomment, politeness as discursive struggle, politeness as social practice

Introduction aggression which was extensively covered in The quote from my example of a European mainstream mass media and metadiscourse, i.e. a discourse about ultimately invited audiences to take discourse(s), succinctly formulates the positions. The “Charlie Hebdo discourses” position in which many people seemed to almost immediately polarized the European become “trapped” following the deadly populace along two opposing memes: Je suis attacks on Charlie Hebdo’s staff on 7 January Charlie and Je ne suis pas Charlie. While the 2015 and who, while decrying the murders, former sprang out as an immediate and did not approve of Charlie Hebdo’s satirical spontaneous negative evaluation of the journalistic practices which preceded them. infamous violent act and sought to become By drawing our attention to the tension primarily an expression of solidarity with the between the illocutionary force of the victims and identification with the values cartoons depicting the prophet and the which they professed, esp. freedom of social goals which they were perceived to speech, the latter began to express a critical meet, viz. that of a face-attack, the quote position towards this identification by invokes the role of evaluations of others’ pinpointing the fact that freedom is not behaviour, as well as our own, which are without limits. The “Charlie Hebdo made against the background of the norms discourses” which appeared on the pages of that have been established in the print media and in the discussion fora sociocultural groups to which the evaluators underneath the articles are rich in claim to belong. The killings, and the evaluations addressing the ensuing developments over the following (in)appropriateness of this violent act, as months, further aggravated an already tense well as of the Charlie Hebdo practices atmosphere in Europe and added another regarded as having engendered it, and thus layer of discourse about violence and offer possibilities of insight into how societal

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norms are “struggled over” vis-à-vis the expanded the “Be polite” rule by further identities taken up by the actors of these specifying the three sub-rules, viz. “Don’t disputes. The lexical-semantic layer of these impose”, “Give options” and “Make [alter] feel discourses testifies to the actors’ good – be friendly”. Through her ground- metapragmatic awareness and offers breaking study Lakoff delineated many of analysts a wealth of pragmatic data for the future developments in politeness theory scrutiny. My goal in the paper is to use the and practice, especially in its “classic” methods and procedures resulting from period. A similar task of developing Grice’s current approaches within Politeness Theory ingenious remark was tackled by Leech (PT) and to demonstrate their feasibility in (1983), who devised the “Politeness accounting for how debates following a Principle” as a finer system of six politeness major societal disruption lead to a maxims based on several pragmatic scales, reassessment of the underlying system of and placed it alongside Grice’s Co-operative values upon which sociocultural groups are Principle within his more general framework founded. of “Interpersonal Rhetoric”. Both Lakoff and Leech represent the core pragmatic 1. Politeness Theory – an overview approaches to politeness by assuming that In the course of just over forty years the area interlocutors behave rationally, i.e. use within pragmatics known as PT has not only means-ends reasoning to calculate why their gone through an emergence, rapid rise and partners depart from co-operation. For both extensive growth of empirical research but authors, politeness is a constraint on human also through a rethinking of its major tenets behaviour which is motivated by the need to and approaches, until it has stabilized into a minimize conflict and/or confrontation fully-fledged multidisciplinary domain of (Lakoff) and avoid discord/maintain concord social research. It grew in the latter half of (Leech). the past century as a reaction to the The bias towards the “polite” dimension of “pragmatic turn” which brought about a interpersonal relationships also marks the reorientation of research focus from langue third approach to politeness in the triad of to parole and from linguistic to politeness classics, viz. Brown and communicative competence. Ever since, Levinson’s (1978/87) model, which became politeness thinking and practice has been and has remained the most influential, best seen as evolving in three “waves” of known and most widely used ever since it approaches (Grainger 2011). was conceived (1978) and reworked (1987). The concepts they proposed form the 1.1 The first-wave approaches – the conceptual basis of PT and have become classic/pragmatic period widely known outside the discipline. Among Lakoff (1973), the pioneer of politeness them, the social-psychological concept of research, found pragmatic rules of well- “face” (which they took over from Goffman formedness on a par with those of a (1955)) occupies a central place, along with syntactic nature which controlled syntactic other terms such as “positive face”, “negative well-formedness and which, ultimately, face”, “face-threatening act” and several determined the grammatical competence of others. Like Lakoff and Leech, Brown and an ideal speaker/hearer, who was the Levinson also view politeness as the primary focus of interest of Chomskyan strategically planned, rational behaviour of a linguistics. Lakoff used the insight of the “model person”1 aimed at countering a advances in ordinary language philosophy, viz. Austin’s Speech Act Theory and Grice’s 1 In Politeness Theory, the notion of a Model Co-operative Principle, and incorporated Person represents a construct of an ideal them into her model of pragmatic interlocutor who is assigned the capacity to competence. While Grice himself made only rationalize from communicative goals to a passing note that, besides the maxims of expressive means and, when trying to be quality, quantity, manner and relevance “polite”, to use those strategies which there are possibly other maxims in consider the hearer’s face wants. Thus, the operation, such as the politeness maxim, it five politeness strategies as suggested by was Lakoff who was the first to explicitly Brown and Levinson (1987) are the result of formulate the “Be polite” rule as the second the Model Person’s rational means-ends of the two pragmatic rules (the first being reasoning through which he departs from Grice’s Co-operative Principle in the guise of the maximum efficiency, and “sacrifices” the formulation “Be clear”). Lakoff later cooperation (as captured in Grice’s

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potentially adverse impact upon one’s face. (which betrayed a strong Speech Act Theory The face-threat inherent, as they claim, in influence) produced by the speaker and their virtually any type of behaviour is to be emphasis on the production pole of a averted or at least minimized by a strategy communication event, and ultimately, a chosen from an array of choices which possible lack of correspondence between rational users have at their disposal. These theoretical and lay understanding of what unprecedentedly detailed strategies led to an polite behaviour is. Efforts to rectify the upsurge of research into politeness issues problems inherent in the “classic” period of worldwide. politeness research were made in the The criticism levelled at the pragmatic subsequent decades. foundations of the models was principally directed at their Western bias, which was 1.2 The second-wave approaches – the claimed to be present in the rationality- post-pragmatic period based behaviour of an individual and also in In the early 1990s the first seeds of a the conception of individual face2 which substantial shift in politeness theorizing promoted Western values. Brown and were sown and new trends in its scope and Levinson’s claims for universality were methodology were forecast. Watts et al. contested and challenged especially by non- (1992) were among the first to suggest that Western researchers. Other criticism was politeness is a “marked surplus” made about the focus on isolated utterances phenomenon that is identifiable against a background of unmarked, expected (or, as it Cooperative Principle), but whose ultimate was called, “politic”) behaviour. The aim is to maintain “social equilibrium”. suggestion was further developed by Watts (2003) and by Locher and Watts (2005) and 2 Face is generally seen as a “relational elaborated as an approach that came to be construct” which becomes meaningful only known as “politeness as a discursive through the dis/approval of others and is struggle”. The focus on situated evaluations constantly attended to in interaction since it of politeness made by the interlocutors is in the best interests of all interactants to themselves in the course of negotiating their maintain each other’s face: “everyone’s face interpersonal relationship, or “relational depends on everyone else’s being work”, became the major theoretical- maintained” (Brown and Levinson, 1987, methodological shift marking the emergence p.61). O’Driscoll (2011) demonstrates this of the post-pragmatic politeness modelling. reciprocal nature of face through the Its proponents claim that the evaluative presence of “fellow-feeling” among nature of politeness causes it to be a participants who assume a certain share of contestable phenomenon, which engenders responsibility in the situation in which a its variability and relativity, even to a face-threat is performed. As he claims, this (somewhat extreme) degree: “Politeness is fellow-feeling is “built into us as like beauty, it’s in the eye of the beholder” interactants”, and “[i]t is in this reciprocal (Locher and Watts, 2005, p.29). It is to be nature – whereby damage to one person’s noted that the notion of the contestedness face leads to the damage of everybody’s face of politeness evaluations was antedated by – and the repair of that face simultaneously Lakoff herself in her remark that “what is involves the repair of all faces – that the polite for me may be rude for you”; Lakoff, phenomenon of face may be described as 1973, p. 303). Further, (im)politeness ʽrealʼ” (O’Driscoll, 2011, p.19). Hence, a face- evaluations are claimed to be made within threatening act potentially threatens all smaller sociocultural groups called participants’ faces, despite the fact that they “communities of practice” (the concept was may have a different degree of commitment adopted from Wenger, 1998) and are relative to and/or presence in the act (cf. Figure 2). to the value systems these communities This applies both to face-to-face as well as to have negotiated and agreed upon. “dislocated”, i.e. mediated communication, Ultimately, the “classic” dichotomy of since “it is quite possible that we habitually politeness vs. impoliteness is abandoned in behave with an eye to our faces in all modes, favour of a much finer range of evaluations that we project them onto the page, or which members of sociocultural groups have screen or into the mouthpiece.” (O’Driscoll, at their disposal in rich inventories of 2011, p.27) evaluative concepts to judge each other’s behaviour, with “politeness” being only one of such labels. Finally, the notion of

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“facework”, which was seen as too closely Politeness is a social practice […] because it tied with Brown-and-Levinsonian face-threat involves evaluations occasioned by social mitigation, was replaced by “relational actions and meanings that are recognisable work”, which was conceptualized as to participants. [S]social actions and encompassing “all aspects of the work meanings necessarily draw on normative invested by individuals in the construction, practices, ways of formulating talk and maintenance, reproduction and conduct that are understood by participants transformation of interpersonal relationships as doing and meaning certain things. (Kádár among those engaged in social practice” and Haugh, 2013, p.66; original emphasis) (Locher and Watts, 2008, p.96). It is possible to draw attention here to only The radical changes that took place in some of their many interesting observations. politeness research in the 1990s and 2000s First of all, they extend the notion of the brought about a reassessment of nearly variability of politeness to the fact that there every aspect of the previous approaches and are multiple different understandings of can be briefly summarized here: politeness depending on the participation  extending the scope of interest from statuses of those involved in politeness politeness seen as face- evaluations. They offer a much more maintaining/enhancing (harmonious, nuanced array of categories of persons, or conflict-free behaviour) to face- participation footings, which goes beyond aggravating, face-damaging the mere “speaker” and “hearer”. As they see (aggressive, conflicting behaviour), or it, politeness goes beyond the use of impoliteness/rudeness, which grew linguistic forms (usage); it is pervasive and into a strand of “impoliteness permeates all human interactions. Finally, research” in its own right; politeness evaluations are made with regard  studying politeness-related to the underlying set of norms, or “moral phenomena within larger spectrums orders” (MO) which have been negotiated of negotiating interpersonal within specific sociocultural groups. Kádár relationships, such as “relational and Haugh’s (2013) approach, which forms work” (Locher and Watts, 2005; the backbone of my analysis, also draws our 2008), “rapport management” attention to other aspects of politeness, (Spencer-Oatey, 2005), “face- such as the metapragmatics of politeness as constituting theory” (Arundale, an important key to evaluations, layers of 2010); MO as a backdrop of evaluations, cognitive  extending researchers’ interest from and emotional underpinnings of politeness, the theoretical (2nd order) to lay (1st and many others. order) conceptualization of politeness, and from isolated acts to 1.4 A return to the pragmalinguistic roots extended exchanges of turns; of politeness – Leech (2014)  crossing over to related fields of While the major thread of sociopragmatic social science, such as social politeness research over the past two psychology, sociolinguistics and decades has greatly increased our awareness cognitive science, and bridging of the multifarious aspects that need to be politeness research with identity taken into account when studying this construction, emotions and cognition phenomenon, it has in fact not progressed (Locher, 2011). very much in our understanding of what politeness actually is. As a result, the 1.3 The third-wave approaches – the approaches often border on relativism and interactionist period are of limited generalizability and These trends culminated in the 2010s with a predictability. There is little agreement on book-length publication by Kádár and Haugh the “content” of politeness other than it is a (2013) which seems to be the most thorough phenomenon which is contested, variable synthesis and systematization yet of what is and open to evaluation with regard to known about politeness phenomena and the specific norms; politeness thus still remains processes of their emergence and a “slippery” and elusive concept (Watts, evaluation. While offering no original 2003). In order to rectify the situation and politeness model of its own, its merit lies in find firm ground upon which to base our drawing our attention to politeness being a thinking about politeness anew, Geoffrey social practice in its own right: Leech (2014) undertook to rethink his classic (1983) approach and proposed a reworked

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politeness model in which he returns to the and “sociopragmatic” politeness, whereby he language as a starting point in thinking makes a distinction between politeness about politeness as a “constraint observed in attributed to an utterance out of context and human communicative behaviour, in context respectively. While both influencing us to avoid communicative attributions are scalar, pragmalinguistic discord or offence, and maintain or enhance politeness is assessed on a unidirectional communicative concord or comity” (Leech, scale (with a possibility of gradual 2014, p.87). His return to the intensification from non-politeness towards pragmalinguistic roots of politeness has more politeness), and the sociopragmatic brought about a critical reassessment of his politeness scale is bi-directional in that it earlier model vis-à-vis the developments enables context-dependent evaluations of an within politeness research and within utterance as polite or impolite (or even pragmatic thinking in general over the three underpolite, overpolite, rude etc.). Although decades. His understanding of politeness as the degrees of politeness assessed on the “communicative altruism” is both general two scales tend to correlate, i.e. a enough to enable cross-cultural comparison pragmalinguistically im/polite utterance is and flexible enough to accommodate typically also evaluated as a situated evaluations (O = other sociopragmatically im/polite one, in person/people): particular contexts the correlation need not General Strategy of Politeness: In order to be always pertain – people may evaluate a polite, S expresses or implies the meanings certain social action as (sociopragmatically) that associate a favourable value with what “impolite” despite the (pragmalinguistically) pertains to O or associates an unfavourable “polite” form of an utterance. This distinction value with what pertains to S (S= self, between the two sources of politeness speaker). (Leech, 2014, p.90) evaluations is a crucial claim that Leech His General Strategy of Politeness (GSP), raises against the relativist positions of post- which is “directed toward concord and face- pragmatic politeness theorists by his maintenance” (Leech, 2014, p.221), is an maintaining that there is a “default” extension of his original six-maxim politeness value of an utterance which Politeness Principle to a ten-maxim model participants rely on when there is no reason and, relevant to my research, is to think otherwise. complemented by the General Strategy of Impoliteness (GSI) which, contrary to GSP, is 2. Objectives, methodology and data “directed towards discord and face-attack”3 In the paper I attempt to examine a (Leech, 2014, p.221). Another important particular instance of metadiscourse of change which Leech made was replacing his impoliteness which took place in the earlier (admittedly misleading) notions of selected papers dealing with the Charlie “absolute” politeness and “relative” Hebdo attack where the aspects of the politeness with “pragmalinguistic” politeness “moral orders” underlying the social actors’ (satirists’, attackers’, the general public’s) 3 When it comes to participants’ facework in worldviews are raised and whose Charlie Hebdo discourse, I differentiate (ideological) foundations are thus challenged between participants’ intentions and the and/or contested. My main objectives are: outcomes of their acts, between the  to examine the metapragmatic awareness perspective of the producer, whose acts of the participants present in the (cartoons) carry a significant load of face- metadiscourse commentaries and to search threat (as an illocutionary force), and that of for their own (emic) understandings of the receiver’s, who may actually interpret im/politeness by closely scrutinizing their that potential as a face-attack (a im/politeness evaluations; perlocutionary effect); note that for  to demonstrate that the impoliteness O’Driscoll (2011) face-attack can be both an discourses in the examined media are the attempt and an achievement. The two sites of struggles over the values, and perspectives mirror the differing focus on ideological foundations, of the respective the speaker’s intentions and hearer’s moral orders upon which the given interpretations as they emerged in the two sociocultural groups are built; it is through waves of politeness research discussed in the participants’ recourse and/or appeals to 1.1 and 1.2. various layers of moral orders that their value systems are negotiated and reified

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(including their understandings of the value status”, i.e. positions which people adopt in of freedom of expression); relation to talk or conduct which are  to apply Leech’s (2014) model of associated with respective, albeit mutually impoliteness to account for the participants’ related, evaluations of politeness and which evaluations while viewing them from the are subsumed under the broader categories perspective of “politeness as social practice”, of “producers” and “recipients” (which are which upholds the existence of a multiplicity extensions of Goffman’s original folk of perspectives and understandings of categories of “speaker” and “hearer”). Each politeness. category is seen to entail certain participation footings (Goffman, 1979, 2.1 Methodology 1981), viz. roles and responsibilities in In my analysis of the Charlie Hebdo interaction which form mutually aligned sets (meta)discourse (CHHD), Kádár and Haugh’s of “production footings” and “reception (2013) “politeness as social practice” (PSP) footings” and which are encompassed within approach is adopted and complemented by a participation framework of those involved Leech’s (2014) “neo-pragmatic” model to in an interaction. account for (im)politeness evaluations made Given this, it is suggested that in the by the social actors. From PSP the notion of analysed CHHD the following rather complex the multiplicity of understandings of array of participation statuses and (im)politeness is employed as arising from participation footings may be identified (cf. the four perspectives which people may Kádár and Haugh, 2013; Culpeper and adopt to view a particular social action, such Haugh, 2014) (see Figure 2). If we adopt as CHH satirical practices; the four here the perspective4 that the CHH shooting perspectives, or “loci” of politeness which triggered the Je (ne) suis (pas) Charlie evaluations, are summarized in Figure 1 movements, was initiated by the CHH where the centre of the converging satirical practices whose purpose was to perspectives is occupied by CHH practices further intimidate “extremists”, we may (the centre can be replaced by the other two consider, on the production side of evaluative moments analysed in the paper, participation, the CHH staff as occupying the i.e. the Je suis Charlie stance and the attack following footings: an utterer (animator) by on CHH staff). These four understandings producing the cartoons, an author by can be seen as jointly contributing to a more designing them, and a principal by nuanced and holistic understanding of representing their beliefs in the cartoons politeness arising in CHHD. What is more, and assuming responsibility for their they are not equally salient in every account content. On the reception side of of the evaluative moment; none of them is participation, the complementary footings seen as privileged and they are not mutually exclusive as more than one may be present 4 The viewpoint is attested to not only in in one person at the same time. some of the journalists’ opinions in the articles analysed but also in the introductory post in the discussion forum underneath the article (my emphasis): Charlie and co should have known that terrorism is a threat to Europe and civilisation altogether and to fight terrorism you shouldn’t add fuel to the fire and generally insult the faith of millions of Europe who are peaceful and demand respect for their faith like any true adherent of their faith would. This means if the paper wanted to challenge Islamic ideas that are hard to understand, then a rational approach and consistent arguments Figure 1: PSP perspectives in CHH would be far more effective in penetrating discourse (based on Kádár and Haugh, the thick skulls of the people that join such 2013) extreme movements and not polarise them further with hate speech and racist mockery. Next, drawing on and extending Goffman’s http://www.theweek.co.uk/world- notion of “participation framework” (1979, news/charlie-hebdo/62060/seven-reasons- 1981), PSP offers a typology of “participation why-people-are-saying-je-ne-suis-pas-charlie

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occupied by the “Islamic terrorists” are a satirical journalism or, as overhearers, to recipient who receives the message of the follow some parts of it (the remaining cartoons, an interpreter who develops their categories of listeners-in and eavesdroppers understanding of the authors’ message, and are too uncertain as to their membership to an accounter who holds the principal be further detailed in this discussion). The responsible for the content of the cartoons. reception role of an audience can be used as As to the production footing of figure and a uniform category for ratified and non- the reception footing of target, they are in ratified recipients with a differing both cases represented by “Muhammad”, entitlement and/or responsibility to respond who is a character portrayed in the cartoons. or react to the message and who may be Even more complex is the participation seen as (meta)participants who “vicariously” status, or the participants’ reception roles take part in interaction in which participants that arise in this situation, and it “impoliteness” can become a “form of may well be the case that they are not always entertainment” (cf. Kádár and Haugh, 2013, clear and straightforward. What is more, in p.90, 93). Due to the gradual blurring of the the case of mediated forms of distinction between “traditional” and “digital” communication, they may become blurred. forms of communication, the line between In the perspective outlined above, the participation and meta-participation also “extremists” can be seen as ratified becomes increasingly blurred. recipients who are directly addressed by the A simplified version of Kádár and Haugh’s cartoons, hence they are the addressees to (2013) types of participation status and whom the obnoxious and offensive message production and reception footings is is (ostensibly) directed. However, when we presented in Figure 2. It is to be noted that think of CHH as a magazine, it is the readers each of these footings and statuses are (we may see them as assuming the role of sources of particular understandings and ratified side-participants) who are also evaluations of (im)politeness5. expected to receive the message of the cartoons and hold their producers morally accountable for their meaning, and who may 5 Leech (2014) comes close to PSP at least in thus become a source of (im)politeness two ways: first, he makes room for other evaluations (it is noteworthy that the number than the hearer status by using the category of readers grew enormously worldwide as of Other, in which he includes the hearer the circulation of the magazine rose and other third-persons who are recipients immediately following the attack and during of politeness (hence “third-person the weeks that followed). politeness”); and, second, that politeness The rest of the public (in France, Europe, the evaluations are made by both the “speaker” Western world, etc.) could be categorized as and the “hearer”, with both of them unratified recipients with a differing degree following their own paths of problem of involvement and interest in the solving. communication and who, as bystanders, may be expected to be able to follow CHH

Figure 2: Types of participation status and participation footings in CHH satirical journalism (based on Kádár and Haugh, 2013, p.128)

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Besides the (meta)participants’ whose multiplicity engenders a multiplicity understandings of politeness there are three of evaluations. other loci of understandings of (im)politeness evaluations represented by 2.2 Data other social actors involved, or even by the The CHH discourse chosen as the data same actors assuming other perspectives serves the purpose of accessing the from which to evaluate the given social participants’ awareness of the relational actions (cf. Figure 1). First, the analysed aspect of language use, i.e. of how social newspaper article exemplifies a second- goals are met (the “how” aspect of the quote order discourse, viz. “Charlie Hebdo above) along with illocutionary goals (the metadiscourse” in which the journalist “what” aspect of the quote) by looking at the discourses on seven other discourses, i.e. metapragmatic comments which they use to news articles on the attack. From their make (implicit or explicit) appeals to the observer perspective, the journalists can be underlying MO(s) which are occasioned by seen as adopting a “lay-observer” perspective the social actions. These meta-commentaries of (im)politeness and as conceptualizing the of social actions are, by representing both incident in “folk-theoretic” terms. conceptualizations AND understandings Next, as the author of a paper on the and/or evaluations of what had happened, (im)politeness evaluations in CHHD who is are a form of social practice themselves, and attempting to apply the most recent my goal as an analyst is to “tap into the theoretical and methodological findings of reflexive awareness of such evaluative politeness theoreticians, I can see myself as moments on the part of participants (and assuming the “analyst” and the “theoretical” observers) themselves” (Kádár and Haugh, perspective of the social action(s) under 2013, p. 186). The major methodological scrutiny. Using the terminological apparatus problem is that this awareness need not of the approach to politeness seen as social always be clearly articulated, often simply practice, my goal is to search for because participants are not able to do it, (meta)participants’ (emic and etic) and if they are, then the articulateness may understandings of (im)politeness manifested be a matter of degree on a scale between in their use of (im)politeness evaluators. saliency and subtlety6. Using the PSP Finally, as private persons (whether systematically or haphazardly) following the 6 The notion of salience is used here to incident and its aftermath, both the address the fact that in communication, the journalists and myself develop our “lay- making of choices always takes place with observer” interpretations of what happened some degree of participants’ reflexive which are based on our own “folk-theoretic” awareness: while some choices are made on conceptualizations. As members of our a subliminal level, others are more or less respective lingua-cultures (nation states or consciously controlled. Salience is “a larger entities such as the European Union, function of the operation of the reflexive (or, globalized World, etc.), we are all as we call it, ʽmeta-pragmaticʼ) awareness (meta)participants of the events who import involved in language use” (Verschueren, our own emic and/or etic evaluations 1999, p.67). The degree of salience is informed by the respective moral orders to impossible to measure in any precise terms, which we orient into the (meta)discourses we yet its relevance is in some instances of (help) construct on the daily basis. Thus, in language use made more noticeable than in the globalized world interconnected via others. Whenever politeness-related mass-/social media networks it is difficult to evaluations are made, the social acts under disassociate “observer” from “user” evaluation are “socially salient”, i.e. they are perspectives of the same phenomena, since more marked because they are seen as the global audiences are dispersed and less departing in some ways from established clearly demarcated. In fact, we oscillate social norms, or moral orders, within between these two perspectives which may respective social groupings. The be co-present in the same persons, and at metalinguistic evaluators, the “emic” terms any given moment of evaluation neither can and the expressions from the semantic field be completely ruled out, although one may of politeness which form the be more salient than the other. As “metapragmatics of politeness”, are the individuals we are involved, or at least manifestations of this salience, since as implicated, in evaluations through our indicators of participants’ reflexive affiliations with respective moral orders awareness they index their reflexive

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approach, I focus on the four types of valenced in the sense that they are metapragmatic awareness which give a (emotively) charged on the scale of “window into the reflexive layers of the (in)appropriateness; for example, “polite” is moral order” (Kádár and Haugh, 2013, positively valenced. It must be added that p.187): metalinguistic awareness, i.e. not only are evaluators not valenced expressions used to talk about politeness, consistently (besides their occupying meta-communicative awareness, i.e. explicit similar/overlapping conceptual spaces) but commentaries by participants which that in locally situated interactions their represent their interpretations/evaluations valence can be judged differently, or even of social actions, metadiscursive awareness, contrarily to their inherent valence (cf. i.e. social discourses on politeness which Leech’s sociopragmatic politeness). An offer “a persistent frame of interpretation important thing is that the valences of these and evaluation that has become objectified (sets of) mutually related evaluators are not in ongoing metapragmatic talk about made idiosyncratically but are negotiated politeness (Kádár and Haugh, 2013, p.187)”, (i.e. struggled over) over time and space by and metacognitive awareness, i.e. members of social groups who use them as presentations of cognitively grounded states a normative frame of reference, i.e. the (attitudes, expectations, etc.). assumption that other members would As to the structure of MO itself, it is a evaluate the social actions similarly (cf. layered construct consisting of expectations Leech’s pragmalinguistic politeness). It which are grounded in three sets of norms should be mentioned that metapragmatic representing three layers of MO: localized awareness is also manifested through other norms (formed by individuals), group-based linguistic expressions which, rather than norms (shared among sociocultural groups) being inherently polite, “lend themselves to and societal/cultural norms. All three layers individual interpretation as ʽpoliteʼ” (Watts, draw on (im)politeness evaluators 2003, p.168). These “formulaic and semi- (metalanguage) which are conceptualized by formulaic expressions of linguistic members and which we need to investigate politeness” (Watts, 2003) are a frequent in order to access their own (emic, insider) object of attention in analyses of political perspective on a social action. This should discourse, such as hedges in political be, however, complemented by the non- speeches by Miššíková (2007), along with members’ (etic, outsider) perspective(s) as communicative strategies stretching over these are also formulated in the media entire sequences of political discourses, (cf. discourses. It is through the latter Dontcheva-Navratilova, 2007; Rázusová, perspective that we can systematically 2008). investigate the ways the “same” action is The CHHD data for the present analysis is conceptualized across cultures, which is represented by the news article Seven essential in interactions which involve reasons why people are saying ‘Je ne suis members of different cultures with possibly pas Charlie’ which is available on the differing perspectives/evaluations of the internet version of the periodical The Week7 “same” social action. and which has for several months been At the core of metapragmatic awareness are freely accessible as the first English article politeness-related evaluators, i.e. listed when a crude Google search for the metalinguistic expressions used by results of the Je ne suis pas Charlie slogan is participants to conceptualize their politeness carried out. In terms of Google hits (in April evaluations and which belong to the 2015), the Je ne suis pas Charlie discourse semantic field of “politeness”. They are comes second after the Je suis Charlie discourse and before other discourses understandings of “(im)politeness”. In the appended to the related slogans in English, analysis these indicators are discussed with such as I am Charlie; I am not Charlie. As an the point being accentuated that they are the example of a metadiscourse on CHH attack, clues to access the participants’ own the article references seven other articles conceptualizations of what is “(im)polite” reporting on the attack (see Figure 3). since “there is no way of understanding forms of social behaviour without gaining 7http://www.theweek.co.uk/world- insight into the way in which the social news/charlie-hebdo/62060/seven-reasons- actors themselves habitually conceptualize why-people-are-saying-je-ne-suis-pas-charlie what it is they are doing” (Verschueren, 1999, p.196).

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journalist published article title newspaper N/A 14/1/2015 Seven reasons why people are The Week saying ‘Je ne suis pas Charlie’ A1 Roxane Gay 12/1/2015 If je ne suis pas Charlie, am I a The Guardian bad person? Nuance gets lost in groupthink A2 Michael 12/1/2015 The Right and Wrong Reasons Daily Beast Tomasky for Outrage A3 David Brooks 8/1/2015 I Am Not Charlie Hebdo New York Times A4 Brendan 9/1/2015 ‘I AM NOT CHARLIE’: Leaked National Review Bordelon Newsroom E-mails Reveal Al (Salah-Aldeen Jazeera Fury over Global Khadr Support for Charlie Hebdo Mohamed Vall Salem) A5 Robert 8/1/2015 Be glad someone had the Financial Times Shrimsley courage to be Charlie A6 Simon Kelner 13/1/2015 I am no more Charlie than The Independent George Clooney or Helen Mirren is A7 Sam Leith 12/1/2015 Sam Leith: We are not Charlie, London Evening and none of us has totally free Standard speech Figure 3: A survey of the analysed CHH metadiscourse

As to the social semiotics of the cartoons, viewer; or it may present an “offer”, in which two particularly useful approaches are other interacting characters are “objects of available: the grammar of visual design contemplation, impersonally, as though they (Kress and Van Leeuwen, 1996) and the were specimens in a display case” (Kress and Hallidayan framework of language Leeuwen, 1996, p.124). metafunctions (Halliday, 1978). Being If we adopt the familiar Hallidayan multimodal communicative acts, satirical framework (Halliday, 1978) of cartoons can be seen as combining visual communicative metafunctions to trace the and verbal codes which draw on mode- simultaneous presence of the three levels of specific resources and “grammars” and meaning in the cartoons, i.e. ideational, whose particular constellations are employed interpersonal and textual, we can observe to complement and/or reinforce one another that the overall visual design of the cartoon in order to convey a composite (satirical) can be seen as a realization of the textual meaning. Visually, a CHH cartoon represents metafunction by combining visual resources a “picture”, i.e. an “image or text or into intertwined wholes which are combination of image and text that forms a recognisable as instances of the genre of coherent single-framed sign” (Scollon and political satire. The capacity of the textual Scollon, 2003, p.214) whose construction metafunction is also to integrate the other elements, or participants, are arranged to two functions which find their way into the form conceptual or narrative structures, by texts by means of their function-specific representing participants and/or by means: the ideational metafunction presenting unfolding actions. Thus, a CHH constructs particular representation of the cartoon8 may portray the Prophet world through the choice of participants and Muhammad alone uttering a message and, the propositional content of their utterances through eye contact, addressing the (the latter provides the discourse with the its viewers/readers, in which case the image lexical-semantic layer, or “field”), and the realizes a “demand” of something from the interpersonal metafunction constructs the relationships between the cartoon authors 8http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/0 and their recipients, as well as between both 7/charlie-hebdo-cartoons-paris-french- of them and that which the cartoons newspaper-shooting_n_6429552.html represent. The immediate means of addressee involvement is the performance of speech acts, whether linguistic or non-

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linguistic, with their respective illocutionary as perlocutionary effects. Although they are forces and the expected perlocutionary best viewed as mutually overlapping, in the effects conventionally associated with the following analysis the three social actions genre of political satire. In summary, a CHH involved in the metadiscourse and the cartoon can be considered a “single, multi- respective frames (moral orders) of their layered, multimodal communicative act, interpretation and evaluation invoked by whose illocutionary force comes about participants are examined separately. through the fusion of all the component semiotic modes” (Van Leeuwen, 2005, 3.1 The Je suis Charlie stance vis-à-vis p.121). understandings of (im)politeness The first evaluative moment through which 3. Analysis and discussion9 politeness arises challenges the Je suis The analysed CHHD offers an aperture to Charlie stance. At the beginning of the how, through societal-level debates about article, the author underscores the evaluative (in)appropriateness of social actions, social nature of the social action of the CHH attack metadiscourses on (im)politeness emerge. by pinpointing that it elicited two People’s evaluations of social actions index contradictory evaluations on the part of the their multiple understandings of politeness (meta)recipients: while “millions of people” vis-à-vis the normative frames of reference declared Je suis Charlie, “some people” established within the respective social claimed Je ne suis pas Charlie. The body of groups. I suggest there are three such social the article consists of a survey of these latter actions/evaluative moments which are evaluations which come from seven different objects of participants’ evaluation in the journalistic sources and which are presented analysed metadiscourse: (1) the Je suis as “seven reasons” for the disagreement Charlie stance, (2) the CHH journalistic with, and disengagement from, the Je suis practices and (3) the attack on the CHH staff. Charlie stance. The “reasons” are extracted Using the PSP framework, from my from the individual articles and presented by observer’s viewpoint of an the journalist in the form of seven sub- analyst/theoretician, I attempt to analyse the headlines. It is noticeable that all the sub- metadiscourse using Leech’s model of headlines which articulate the journalist’s impoliteness (GSI). The analysed evaluations of the inappropriateness of the metadiscourse is one such example of Je suis Charlie stance invoke particular situated evaluations in which judgements of layers of the MO: (in)appropriateness are made in particular (1) Groupthink makes it difficult to express contexts; this means that a degree of nuance; (2) Intolerance provoked this violent variability reflecting the contested nature of reaction; (3) The hypocrisy of “hate speech”; politeness is expected. (4) “Baiting extremists isn’t bravely defiant”; In the PSP perspective, the evaluative (5) I am not brave enough; (6) Tricky issue moment is a locus of several interrelated cannot be reduced to a slogan; (7) Free understandings of politeness on the part of speech is not a simple good. the journalist who can be seen as the Looked at from Leech’s (2014) producer of the metadiscourse evaluating pragmalinguistic, i.e. decontextualized the evaluations of other journalists and politeness perspective, the proponents of displaying emic, lay-observer and folk- the Je ne suis pas Charlie stance can be seen theoretic understandings of politeness. His as acting “impolitely” by blatantly violating production footing involves the roles and the Agreement Maxim of his GSI, viz. acting responsibilities of the utterer, of the author in accordance with the impoliteness maxim of his own evaluations and of the principal “give(s) an unfavourable/low value to who can be held responsible for these O[ther]’s opinion” (Leech, 2014, p.221). evaluations. The recipients (readers) are not However, viewing it from the directly involved in the metadiscourse (contextualized) PSP perspective we are not although their evaluations can be anticipated in a position to make such a straightforward claim since no immediate feedback from the 9 To distinguish between scientific/technical receivers is available. All we can do is to (2nd order, etic) terms and actually used search for evaluations in the articles layperson’s (1st order, emic) evaluations I use reported on and look for the descriptive double quotation marks (“ ”) and italics, metalanguage which participants use to respectively. conceptualize their social worlds. More specifically, we can focus on those

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expressions through which participants “inappropriate”, or as “impolite” (Leech) is index their evaluation of the social action. In difficult to ascertain without using proper the case of adopting the counter-Je suis methods. One of them is examining the Charlie stance, we look at which “expected discussion forum which accompanies the background features of everyday scenes that article and which is a rich source of data members of a sociocultural group or about sociopragmatic (in-context) politeness relational network ʽtake for grantedʼ” (Kádár evaluations, since it can be assumed that the and Haugh 2013, p.269) are used as commenters joined the forum in order to normative frames of reference to which position themselves with regard to the Je participants are seen to orient themselves suis Charlie stance. Obviously, through their when making their evaluations. These use of linguistic forms and expressions, “features” are certain important aspects of including (im)politeness evaluators, these the MO which they see as being commenters display their evaluations of the compromised by the proponents of the Je other two social actions as well. suis Charlie stance and which they (implicitly) evaluate as “inappropriate”. This 3.2 Charlie Hebdo journalism vis-à-vis evaluation is grounded in all three layers of understandings of (im)politeness the MO. The multiple perspectives of the social First, the Je suis Charlie stance is seen as action assumed by the journalists whose taking some important societal/cultural individual articles are reported on in the norms (3rd layer of MO/; or MO3) to extremes metadiscourse certainly yield multiple or as misusing them: understandings of politeness. As  thinking alike in order to express (meta)recipients, these people may be either solidarity (i.e. “groupthink”) ratified as side-participants by being CHH diminishes room for other opinions readers, or unratified as, for example, (sub-headline/article 1), members of the (global) public at large (cf.  unrestrained exercise of freedom of Figure 2). speech is a form of intolerance and When making their evaluations of CHH can become a source of provocation journalistic practices, the journalists place (sub-headline/article 2), CHH and their addressees into the focus of  as far as public criticism is their evaluations and hold them accountable concerned, double standards exist in with regard to the the layers of the MO (US) society: while offending “Islamic which they invoke. Through this, the terrorists” is tolerated, some home discourses that they engender become critics are “snubbed” (sub- ideologically charged since they address the headline/article 3), principal values upon which the societies are  while the slogan is an exercise of based. More often than not, these freedom, it is an “empty expression” evaluations are to be inferred since they are which simplifies a complex matter implied rather than explicitly stated. (sub-headline/article 6), In her evaluation of the CHH journalism,  free speech is not unconstrained, it is Roxane Gay (A1) invokes all three layers of “de jure unfree” (sub-headline/article the MO: while she personally (MO1) evaluates 7). (some) CHH work (MO2) as distasteful, i.e.  Next, the group-based norms (2nd negatively marked as “inappropriate”, she layer of MO; or MO2) are disputed believes in the authors’ right to be so, even with the claim that CHH journalists, at the expense of expressing an offense, rather than defending the freedom of since she recognizes freedom of expression expression, insisted on their right to as a privileged societal convention (MO3). By be obnoxious and offensive, which implication, on the societal level, CHH offended “millions of moderate satirical journalism as a way of exercising people” (sub-headline/article 4). freedom of speech may be deemed as an Finally, the localized/individualized norms “appropriate” type of behaviour whose (1st layer of MO; or MO1) are invoked when negative, and potentially offensive, portrayal personal hypocrisy and a lack of courage are of the target of satire is an expected, and seen as the motivation for one’s unmarked, form of social practice10. identification with CHH (sub-headline/article 5). 10 Watts (2003, p.260) notes that in certain Whether or not the recipients (readers) types of interaction, such as close-knit family actually evaluate this counter positioning as encounters, competitive political debates,

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Although the three layers of MO are manifestations of intolerance, and a generally understood as reflexively ordered, violation of the MO3 norm. On the other i.e. MO3 expectancies take precedence over hand, by his positioning as I am in total both MO2 and MO1 expectancies, Roxane Gay agreement with them with regard to the reverses them by formulating an ad hoc vulgar portrayals, Bill Donohue’s position norm of a “freedom ... to express offence” may be seen as a demonstration of which is to be applied when certain “politeness” towards “Muslims”, by explicitly (individual or group-based) norms are adhering to the Agreement maxim of breached. However, while she may be Leech’s GSP, viz. “Give a high value to O’s considered to be empathizing with the opinions”; Leech, 2014, p.91). addressees, she evaluates their behaviour as Like Roxane Gay, David Brooks (A3), as a US “inappropriate” by holding them accountable cultural insider, finds the contradiction for violating a supra-local (MO3) moral between people’s orientation to the principle which she formulates as “murder is localized/individualized (MO1) norms and not an acceptable consequence of anything“. CHH’s group-based (MO2) norms as the In a similar vein, Bill Donohue (A2) evaluates reason why they evaluate the latter CHH practices as negatively marked, hence negatively as “impolite” or even “rude”12: “inappropriate/impolite”, by using the most of us don’t actually engage in the sort metalinguistic terms and expressions with of deliberately offensive humour that that negative connotations to conceptualize the newspaper specialises in. In addition to that, precursor of the particular incident (the he makes his non-European outsider/etic vulgar manner in which Muhammad has identity salient and invokes the multiplicity been portrayed) as well as their journalism of the society-level (MO3) norms within the over a longer period of time ([CHH had a] (Western) world which, among other values, long and disgusting record of going way professes freedom of speech: he finds a flaw beyond the mere lampooning of public within the US society’s MO, which is seen as figures). Identified as president of the selective with regard to the implementation Catholic League, i.e. a member of a of this freedom: A lot of people are quick to community marked by conservative opinions “lionise” those who offend Islamist terrorists (which are derived from particular MO2 but are a lot less tolerant toward those who norms), he dismisses CHH’s MO2 norms offend their own views at home. The implied which caused Muslims to be intentionally evaluator of this practice as hypocritical is insulted over the course of many years. By yet another example of the negative raising the issue of the recognition of evaluation of the existing societal ethos. intentionality11 on the part of the Muslims, Another outsider/etic (non-European/non- Bill Donohue underscores the severity of the Western) locus of impoliteness evaluation is face-attack which is built into CHH represented in A4 by Al Jazeera English journalism as its (planned) perlocutionary editor Salah-Aldeen Khadr and reporter effect. From the perspective of his Mohamed Vall Salem. The target of their understanding of politeness, Bill Donohue negative (sarcastic, and thus potentially evaluates the behaviour of the two parties in “impolite”) evaluation is the abuse of free the conflict as “inappropriate”, as speech by CHH, who interpreted the right of free speech as the right to be obnoxious and communities marked by rigid hierarchies offensive. They also draw attention to the etc. face-threatening/damaging acts may be side-participants’ evaluative perspective, i.e. sanctioned or neutralized; as so-called that of the millions of moderate people who “sanctioned aggressive facework”, they may they claim have been offended by CHH be considered expected, and “appropriate”, journalism. Finally, while admitting the forms of social practice. Political satire can legitimacy of the content of the cartoons be included among such types of interaction (the what), they argue against its in which “face-attacking … plays a central interpersonally damaging effects (the how), role, and thus might be said to be ʽnormalʼ” (Culpeper, 2008, p.29). 12 Sometimes a distinction, although not unequivocal, is made between impoliteness 11 Some politeness researchers suggest that and rudeness, based on the presence of the perception of the presence of intention intention in the former (Culpeper, 2008) or is decisive in evaluating certain behaviour as the latter (cf. “marked rudeness”, or face-attacking (cf. Culpeper, 2008). “rudeness proper”; Terkourafi, 2008).

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which is the object of their negative tends to be regarded as the ultimate MO3 “impolite” evaluation: It’s not about what the norm, is only illusionary: The law may not drawing said, it was about how they said it. stop me calling you a n*****, but that One other thing that the article does is to doesn’t mean I take an important stand for point out the “scale-shift” whereby CHH´s liberty by doing so. Also, he pinpoints the MO2 practices are transferred to the societal meta-participatory status of “us” - the (MO3) level, and which they deem as an audience of CHH attack, by underlining the abuse of free speech. vicarious nature of our taking part in it, by Robert Shrimsley’s article (A5) stands out enjoying a nice, self-affirming, essentially from among other articles in that it infantile holiday from difficulty; the implied accumulates positive metalanguage of CHH criticism is in itself an evaluative moment journalism: [they were] maddeningly, which may be interpreted as “inappropriate”, preposterously and – in the light of their or “impolite”. barbarous end – recklessly brave, ready to defy real death threats and firebomb 3.3 The attack on the CHH staff vis-à-vis attacks. This face-enhancing strategy, which understandings of (im)politeness is potentially interpretable as “polite”, can be In contrast with the other two social actions, seen as upholding Leech’s GSP, although the the grave attack on CHH staff may at first motivation is somewhat less altruistic than glance resist any analysis using politeness expected; the author admits the fault in his theory; aggressive physical behaviour individual MO1 when he emotionally and resulting in death may be seen as morally approves of CHH, but what prevents indescribable using the technical vocabulary him from declaring his support overtly is his of “politeness” theorization. Thus the lack of courage to take this kind of risk. question arises whether or not we are What is more, he “scale-shifts” this self- stretching the concept and theorization of assigned negative moral trait to a larger “politeness” to its limits since “it is collectivity of those who sit safely in an problematic to call somebody ʽimpoliteʼ who office in western Europe [...]who would never has harmed a person physically” (Limberg contemplate taking the kind of risks. The 2008, p. 167). Yet as a maximum degree of extension of an individual (MO1) moral trait face aggravation involving physical rather and its attribution to the other layers of the than verbal violence, death as a result of moral order (MO2/3) is in itself an evaluative physical harm may be seen as an extreme moment which may result in a potentially case of the application of GSI: “Give an negative “impolite” evaluation from readers unfavourable value to O’s wants”; Leech, of the article. 2014, p.221). As (im)politeness always Simon Kelner’s (A6) evaluation of CHH involves scales, some extreme types of journalism as “inappropriate” can possibly be conflictual verbal behaviour, which Leech arrived at by drawing an inference from his (2014, p.223) classifies as “naked affront” or saying that it is a tricky and as “rudeness” rather than “impoliteness”, complicatedsituation to which there are no border on physical violence and may lead to easy answers. Also, he takes issue with the an assault. moral integrity of a society (and invokes the Regarding the attack on CHH staff, a MO3 norms) which maintains double noticeable thing is that only three of the standards regarding the application of seven articles are quoted to evaluate the freedom of speech: while implying that it is murders explicitly negatively as “impolite”, tolerant of CHH’s anti-Muslim practices, he with the metalanguage used varying between casts serious doubt on whether it would mild and heavy criticism to: not acceptable equally tolerate a display of extreme right- (A1), violent (A2), heinous (A4). In addition to wing beliefs. Similar to Roxane Gay (A1), the use of evaluative language, these Simon Kelner endorses the exercise of the journalists are seen as trying to rationalize freedom of speech as the ultimate liberty the action by calling to attention the fact within the society’s moral order. that the victims could have anticipated the Finally, Sam Leith’s (A7) negative evaluation attack on them, as in Baiting extremists isn’t of CHH practices as “inappropriate” is bravely defiant (A4), and neither should we implied by his maintaining that free speech tolerate the kind of intolerance that is both de jure and de facto unfree on the provoked this violent reaction (A2). A special societal, group and individual levels. He case of evaluation is Roxane Gay’s (A1), further implies that the CHH satire as an which, in addition to condemning the exercise of freedom, the value of which killings by suggesting that Murder is not an

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acceptable consequence for anything among those who positioned themselves invokes the existence of a trans- “against” this interpretation and who societal/cultural layer of moral order, or suggested that Je suis Charlie is too MO4, which she construes as one in which simplistic, and as a shorthand for a life is seen as an absolute value. Another mutilayered identity, conceals more than it thing which underscores the multiplicity of reveals. Hence, the emerging Je ne suis pas understandings of politeness is when she Charlie platform offered a voice to identify expresses empathy (and “politeness”) with for those who found it reasonable to towards the murderers by defending their disassociate themselves from the right to express offense, which she sees as official/mainstream identity. The analysed falling within the scope of the same moral metadiscourse offers seven such sources of order which guarantees freedom of this disassociation which are all based on expression: Yet it is also an exercise of the journalists’ positioning themselves freedom of expression to express offense at against particular layers of moral order. In the way satire like Charlie Hebdo’s my analysis I have tried to explain how characterises something you hold dear – like authors as participants in the (im)politeness your faith, your personhood, your gender, considerations evaluate the appropriateness your sexuality, your race or ethnicity. of three social actions by orienting to the Here she draws attention to the value expectancies relative to the respective moral structure of a group-based moral MO2 in orders which they explicitly or implicitly which faith, personhood, gender, sexuality, invoke and through which they hold others race, ethnicity are revered, and how their accountable for their actions. My basic claim interference by an exercise of broader is that the methodology of “politeness as societal (MO3) norms such as freedom of social practice” is capable of elucidating the expression – a “scale shift” – may engender processes of evaluation and the means negative evaluations, which, in this case, is which people use in making such evaluations offense. by focusing on their own, i.e. emic understandings of politeness demonstrated Conclusion by their metapragmatic awareness and Je suis Charlie was a stance which was manifested by the use of (implicit and spontaneously created by an individual explicit) evaluative resources. Ultimately, my person13 through which he displayed his aim is to demonstrate that evaluation of evaluation of the fatal attack on CHH staff social actions is an omnipresent activity of and demonstrated his solidarity with the social actors and represents a social practice victims; in politeness terms, by orienting to in its own right through which the moral and Leech’s GSP rule, he acted in a “polite” way. ideological foundations of sociocultural This momentary expression of individual groups are permanently reified. identification with CHH values and group- based norms was subsequently taken up by Note: This publication is supported by the other individuals and groups and became a KEGA 030PU-4/2014 grant scheme. collective and societal declaration of adherence to CHH practices (MO2) which Abbreviations: were endorsed by the society-based norms CHH Charlie Hebdo CHHD Charlie (MO3) in which freedom to act (and speak) Hebdo (meta)discourse independently is an ultimate value. This GSP Grand Strategy of Politeness GSI “scale shift”, whereby group-based norms Grand Strategy of Impoliteness became transferred to wider debates about MO moral order MO1 first layer of the the (in)appropriateness of behaviour at a moral order societal level, can be seen as a reason why MO2 second layer of the moral order MO3 CHH staff were also considered to be victims third layer of the moral order of the exercise of this freedom of speech, PSP politeness as a social practice PT rather than of their own group-specific Politeness Theory practices. However, an alternative position began to form itself simultaneously from

13 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Je_suis_Charlie

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Author’s address and contact details Milan Ferenčík, doc., PhDr., PhD. Inštitút anglistiky a amerikanistiky Filozofická fakulta Prešovskej univerzity Ul.17. novembra 1 080 01 Prešov Slovak Republic Phone: +421 51 75 70 801 E-mail: [email protected]