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Negotiating the culture order in New Zealand workplaces

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 February 2018

Janet Holmes
Janet Holmes*
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand
*
Address for correspondence: Janet Holmes, Department of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington 6140, New Zealandjanet.holmes@vuw.ac.nz
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Abstract

In many societies the relative social status of different social and cultural groups results in hegemonic relationships or an ‘order’ which manifests itself as sets of taken-for-granted societal norms or ideologies which influence behavior, including linguistic behavior. I label this concept the culture order, and propose it as a potential sociolinguistic universal. Drawing on the research of the Language in the Workplace Project (LWP) team, I provide evidence of some of the complex components of the New Zealand culture order. Using a social realist theoretical framework, and an interactional sociolinguistics approach, I identify a number of areas of contrast in the discourses instantiating the Māori and Pākehā culture orders (e.g. meeting norms, ways of criticising others), as well as discourse norms apparently shared by both groups (e.g. the Modesty Maxim; see Leech 2014). The complexities of these similarities and differences are discussed as well as their implications for hegemonic relationships. (Culture order, workplace discourse, sociolinguistic universals, egalitarianism, meeting norms)*

Type
Articles
Information
Language in Society , Volume 47 , Issue 1 , February 2018 , pp. 33 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to all those who have allowed us to record their interactions. I also owe a big debt to the Language in the Workplace team, and especially Meredith Marra and Bernadette Vine, for invaluable advice and support. Mary Boyce, Julia de Bres, Keely Kidner (LWP Associates), and Emily Greenbank and Māmari Stephens also provided valuable advice, feedback, and assistance. Finally, I am especially indebted to the constructive comments of the two reviewers and the editor which pushed me to make my arguments more explicit.

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