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atification and support of unique, autonomous, or individuated selves. At its
extreme, negative alignment would result in the differentiation of selves to the
point of total incommensurability and a loss of grounds for commonality and
solidarity. As with positive alignment, this, I would argue, is seldom, or if so, only
briefly realised due again to the normative regulating mechanisms of sociable
conversation (see Chapter 6).
Thus, conversational facework is essentially a matter of selves-work.
Fundamentally, it is a matter of alignment of selves, ones essentially operating
on an underlying positive-negative continuum which underlies not only sociable
conversation per se but more specifically both Goffman's and Brown and
Levinson's approaches.
These propositions when considered in the light of, not the
conversational content of the self as player or image (see Chapter 7) but rather
the positive and negative status of the seff in talk point to the analytical
purchase afforded by the second conceptual i sati on of the self informing this
study, that is, the self-construal (see Chapter 1). In such a conceptual isation the
self can be conceived of as being surrounded by various boundaries, starting
with the individual as the locus and expanding to include variously the selves of
others. Cross-cultural work addressing facework practices has identified certain
salient cultural differences in how the self is perceived in terms of these
boundaries and thus how face is perceived. Fundamentally, work has shown
that the culturally predominant status of the self in terms of the self-construal
directly affects communicative style in that particular culture and forms the basis
for normative facework practices (see Chapter 1).
This cultural reading of the self as a culturally varying construal can I
believe help consolidate the seeming fluidity of the self across the positive and
negative flow of conversation. First, I am employing the term self in a way
similar to the Goffman's comprehensive conceptual isation. That is, the self can
be regarded as an enacted and enacting entity, contingent on recognition,
ratification, and support by others. This conceptual isation was used as the basis
for the discussion in the previous chapter. Second however, I would argue that
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