Cover not available

Article published In: Pragmatics
Vol. 31:3 (2021) ► pp.382–405

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF

Taking it too far

The role of ideological discourses in contesting the limits of teasing and offence

ORCiD logo with link | The University of Queensland
ORCiD logo with link | The University of Queensland
ORCiD logo with link | National Taiwan Normal University
Open Access logo
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.
Published online: 21 April 2021
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.20003.cha
Abstract
While teasing can cause offence, participants on television variety or game shows are generally expected to tolerate it. In this paper, we examine comments posted on YouTube in response to reports of a leaked recording of a television host in Taiwan swearing at and insulting a guest who teased the host about his “inability to take a defeat”. In so doing, we examine both the perceived limits of teasing (i.e. what is considered allowable and what goes too far), and the perceived limits of taking offence in response to teasing (i.e. what ways of indicating offence are considered allowable and what goes too far). We conclude that instances where there are disputes about whether taking offence is warranted by the teasing in question provides us with a useful lens to examine the role ideological discourses play in (re-)constituting the underlying moral fabric of social interaction.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Teasing, offence and morality
  • 3.Data and method
    • 3.1Data
    • 3.2Analytical approach
  • 4.The role of ideological discourses in construing teasing and the taking of offence as moral breaches
    • 4.1Discourses about intergenerational discord
    • 4.2Discourses about moral character
    • 4.3Discourses on moral culpability
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (45)
References
Bergmann, Jörg R. 1998. “Introduction: Morality in Discourse.” Research on Language and Social Interaction 31(3–4): 279–294.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bolander, Brook, and Miriam A. Locher. 2014. “Doing Sociolinguistic Research on Computer-Mediated Data: A Review of Four Methodological Issues.” Discourse, Context and Media 31:14–26. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bou-Franch, Patricia, and Pilar Garcés-Conejos Blitvich. 2014. “Conflict Management in Massive Polylogues: A Case Study from YouTube.” Journal of Pragmatics 731:19–36. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Charmaz, Kathy. 2000. “Grounded Theory: Objectivist and Constructivist Methods.” In Handbook of Qualitative Research, edited by Norman K. Denzin and Yvonna S. Lincoln, 509–535. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Culpeper, Jonathan. 2005. “Impoliteness and Entertainment in the Television Quiz Show: The Weakest Link.” Journal of Politeness Research 1 (1):35–72. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2011. Impoliteness: Using Language to Cause Offence. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Culpeper, Jonathan, and Oliver Holmes. 2013. (Im)politeness and Exploitative TV in Britain and North America: The X-Factor and American Idol. In Real Talk: Reality Television and Discourse Analysis in Action, edited by Nuria Lorenzo-Dus and Pilar Garcés-Conejos Blitvich, 169–198. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Davies, Bethan. 2018. “Evaluating Evaluations: What Different Types of Metapragmatic Behaviour Can Tell Us About Participants’ Understandings of the Moral Order.” Journal of Politeness Research 14 (1):121–151. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Drew, Paul. 1987. “Po-faced Receipts of Teases.” Linguistics 251:219–253. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dynel, Marta. 2014. “Participation Framework Underlying YouTube Interaction.” Journal of Pragmatics 731:37–52. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Eelen, Gino. 2001. A Critique of Politeness Theories. Manchester: St. Jerome.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Garfinkel, Harold. 1967. Studies in Ethnomethodology. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Glasser, Barney, and Anselm Strauss. 1967. The Discovery of Grounded Theory. Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Günthner, Susanne. 1995. “Exemplary Stories: The Cooperative Construction of Moral Indignation.” Versus 70/711:147–175.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haugh, Michael. 2015. “Impoliteness and Taking Offence in Initial Interactions.” Journal of Pragmatics 861:36–42. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2016. “‘Just kidding’: Teasing and Claims to Non-Serious Intent.” Journal of Pragmatics 951:120–136. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2018. “Theorising (Im)politeness.” Journal of Politeness Research 14(1):153–165. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haugh, Michael, and Wei-Lin Melody Chang. 2019. “‘The Apology Seemed (In)sincere’: Variability in Perceptions of (Im)politeness.” Journal of Pragmatics 1421:207–222. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haugh, Michael, and Danielle Pillet-Shore. 2018. “Getting to Know You: Teasing as an Invitation to Intimacy.” Discourse Studies 20 (2):246–269. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haugh, Michael, and Valeria Sinkeviciute. 2019. “Offence and Conflict Talk.” In Handbook of Language in Conflict, edited by Jim O’Driscoll and Lesley Jeffries, 196–214. London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haidt, Jonathan, and Selin Kesebir. 2010. “Morality.” In Handbook of Social Psychology (5th edn), edited by Susan Fiske, Dan Gilbert and Lindzey Gardner, 797–852. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Huang, Chun-chieh. 2014. Taiwan in Transformation. Retrospect and Prospect (2nd edn). London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jayyusi, Lena. 1991. “Values and Moral Judgement: Communicative Praxis as Moral Order.” In Ethnomethodology and the Human Sciences, edited by Graham Button, 227–251. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kádár, Dániel. 2017. Politeness, Impoliteness and Ritual. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2020. Capturing Injunctive Norms in Pragmatics: Meta-Reflective Evaluations and the Moral Order. Lingua 2371: 102814. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kádár, Dániel, and Michael Haugh. 2013. Understanding Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kádár, Dániel, Puyu Ning, and Yongping Ran. 2018. “Public Ritual Apology – A Case Study of Chinese.” Discourse, Context & Media 261:21–31. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kienpointner, Manfred, and Maria Stopfner. 2017. “Ideology and (Im)politeness.” In Palgrave Handbook of Linguistic (Im)politeness, edited by Jonathan Culpeper, Michael Haugh and Daniel Kadar, 61–87. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lorenzo-Dus, Nuria. 2009. “‘You’re Barking Mad, I’m Out’: Impoliteness and Broadcast Talk.” Journal of Politeness Research 5 (2):159–187. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Luckmann, Thomas. 1995. “On the Intersubjective Constitution of Morals”. In The Prism of the Self, edited by Steven G. Crowell, 73–91. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mills, Sara. 2003. Gender and Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2017. English Politeness and Class. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Parvaresh, Vahid, and Tahmineh Tayebi. 2018. “Impoliteness, Aggression and the Moral Order.” Journal of Pragmatics 1321:91–107. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pillet-Shore, Danielle. 2016. “Criticizing Another’s Child: How Teachers Evaluate Students During Parent-Teacher Conferences.” Language in Society 45 (1):33–58. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rawls, Anne Warfield. 2010. “Social Order as Moral Order.” In Handbook of the Sociology of Morality, edited by Steven Hitlin and Stephen Vaisey, 91–121. NY: Springer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sinkeviciute, Valeria. 2017a. “What Makes Teasing Impolite in Australian and British English? ‘Step[ping] Over Those Lines […] You Shouldn’t Be Crossing’.” Journal of Politeness Research 13 (2):175–207. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2017b. “‘Everything He Says to Me It’s Like He Stabs Me in the Face’: Frontstage and Backstage Reactions to Teasing.” In Multiple Perspectives on Language Play, edited by Nancy Bell, 169–198. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Spencer-Oatey, Helen, and Dániel Z. Kádár. 2016. “The Bases of (Im)politeness Evaluations: Culture, the Moral Order and the East-West Debate.” East Asian Pragmatics 1 (1):73–106. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Spencer-Oatey, Helen, and Jianyu Xing. 2019. “Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Interpersonal Relations and the Evaluation Process: Culture, Norms, and the Moral Order.” Journal of Pragmatics 1511:141–154. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Su, Hsi-Yao. 2019. “The Metapragmatics of Taiwanese (Im)politeness: Conceptualisation and Evaluation of Limao.” Journal of Pragmatics 1481:26–43. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Taiwan Network Information Centre. 2019. Taiwan Internet Report 2019. Taipei: TWNIC.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tayebi, Tahmineh. 2016. “Why do People Take Offence? Exploring the Underlying Expectations.” Journal of Pragmatics 1011:1–17. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Verschueren, Jef. 2012. Ideology in Language Use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yu, Ning. 2016. “Spatial Metaphors for Morality: A Perspective from Chinese.” Metaphor and Symbol 31 (2):108–125. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (8)

Cited by eight other publications

Haugh, Michael & Rosina Márquez Reiter
2025. (Un)intended offence. Pragmatics & Cognition 32:1 ► pp. 8 ff. DOI logo
Ran, Yongping & Jiabei Hu
2025. How public discourse functions to restore moral orders. Pragmatics. Quarterly Publication of the International Pragmatics Association (IPrA) DOI logo
Zhao, Linsen
2025. Revisiting respect and politeness: Insights from metapragmatics of zunzhong in Chinese public spaces. Journal of Pragmatics 240 ► pp. 109 ff. DOI logo
Zhu, Weihua
2025. Complaints in Travel Reality Shows: A Comparison Between Korean and Chinese Speakers. Languages 10:7 ► pp. 171 ff. DOI logo
Haugh, Michael
2024. (Im)politeness as object, (im)politeness as perspective. Journal of Politeness Research 20:1 ► pp. 201 ff. DOI logo
Haugh, Michael
2024. Online public denunciation as recursive social practice. Internet Pragmatics 7:1 ► pp. 161 ff. DOI logo
Lee, Cher Leng & Daoning Zhu
2022. “Our show is so twisted”: comparing impoliteness in Taiwan and Mainland China talk shows. Global Chinese 8:1 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Sinkeviciute, Valeria
2022. Teasing. In Handbook of Pragmatics [Handbook of Pragmatics, ], ► pp. 156 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 30 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue