Politeness Strategies in Gichuka Request Expressions

Gichuka is a Bantu language of the Niger Congo family spoken by the Chuka people of Tharaka- Nithi County, Chuka Igamba-Ng'ombe Constituency. The aim of this study was to analyze the politeness strategies used in Gichuka request expressions, as politeness is a social norm that is expected in any society and it is important in maintaining cordial relationships in everyday life. However, its expression varies from culture to culture. The study was guided by the Politeness Theory by Brown and Levinson and the Communicative Principal of Relevance by Sperber and Wilson. It utilized the descriptive research design to study social events conducted in Gichuka. Six Gichuka social events were purposively sampled and recorded using a voice recorder. They were transcribed into guiding cards while contextual information was recorded using an observation schedule. One hundred and twenty seven request expressions were identified from the Gichuka communicative events. The study established that Gichuka request expressions conform to Brown and Levinson Theory of Politeness and the most commonly employed strategies of requesting in Gichuka social events are negative politeness strategies, followed by positive politeness strategies. This study significantly enhances the analysis of the Gichuka language variety and adds to the existing knowledge on pragmatic analysis of politeness in requests in various languages of the world, and other Bantu languages