Formality & Hierarchy within Language

An essay

Every once in a while I like to share things I’m writing for school.

(Yes, I am getting my BA as an almost 36 year old human. After years of taking occasional classes for fun, I was finally bullied into getting a degree to hang on my wall as if I were a real adult. And actually, I will be applying for an accelerated PhD program after my graduation in the fall, because I am slightly insane.)

This particular essay will also be in this month’s Digital Zine - which I had hoped to have out this week… but final projects and a sudden medical emergency have me a bit at the mercy of poor timing. Interestingly, it actually means more is coming than I think I anticipated.

Including, but not limited to, a look at formality and hierarchy within language and the ways this allows us to undermine systems. As always, all my content is free. If you enjoy this, consider commenting or subscribing. If your needs are met and you want to help an artist, me, Malialani, meet mine, consider becoming a paid subscriber or purchasing my artwork.

Other than that?

Enjoy the fruits of my educational labor.

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Formality and Hierarchy within Language

Hierarchical social institutions are often reinforced by formality within language. However, because these systems rely on formality within communication to consistently reestablish themselves, they inadvertently provide a unique opportunity to challenge structures through language subversion. Dependence on linguistic formality through grammatical structure or honorifics to uphold or strengthen order within a society is a normalized part of many language groups and even nation-states. This reliance leaves societal structures vulnerable because language as a whole is a learned part of culture that can change over time, rather than frozen. Conflict can be a natural consequence of this when interactions between different language speakers occur, especially if there is a lack of awareness around cultural norms of one or the other’s linguistic styles. It can also intentionally occur when formality or informality is utilized to point out hypocrisy, expose oppression, and subvert systems. While institutions may desire for formalized language to uphold them, it “does not automatically support stability and conservatism unless the social relations it articulates are fully agreed on by everyone and admit no alternatives”.

Formalized language is a common method utilized to maintain hierarchical systems. A classic example of formality within language might be the formal and informal “you” found in many Romance languages, such as French or Spanish, that are used when speaking to friends versus figures of authority or perhaps a person younger versus older than the speaker. In some Asian languages, such as Japanese or Korean, formality may be considered even more complex with specific honorifics and styles of speaking dependent on age, gender, class, social status, etc. Broadly, formality limits what is and is not acceptable speech and/or behavior within a society, which automatically creates/reinforces class structure if there is not equal opportunity or access to education. Within English, formality may not seem as structured, but is still employed to reinforce hierarchy not only for speakers, but also for listeners. Martin Joos points out in The Five Clocks, “formal code-labels inform each hearer that he is in a formal frame, and is not to make insertions but must wait until authorized to speak”. Within the United State Congress, for example, specific language must be utilized, turns must be taken, time limits must be respected, and any deviation can result in the speaker being censured or cut off. This is not exclusive to the United States, but typical in most Western Nation States, which can be witnessed through MP Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke’s intentional disruption of Parliament in Aotearoa.

As Maipi-Clarke’s calculated interruption of formalized speech shows, reliance on individuals adherence to formal speech patterns as a method of upholding hierarchy leaves institutions vulnerable. Judith Irvine writes that “if members political ideologies… differ, there can scarcely be a situation in which such differences become more apparent than in formal meetings”. Formality requires a level of detachment as well as continuity, which are both easily disrupted. The exploitation of this flaw in maintaining power structures is not one taken lightly, as seen through the censure of MP Maipi-Clarke after her haka. Interruptions of formal meetings in the United States have recently resulted in arrests, validating the argument that stability is only solidified through formalized speech when it is agreed upon by all parties without other options. Expectation of a single style of formalized communication can create conflict that not only challenges hierarchy, but confuses it.

Cultural norms of formal speech vary from one linguistic style to another, which can lead to unintentional conflict between individuals in a society. Conflict that does not expressly support or challenge social institutions, confuses them. Hierarchies rely not only on placement within a system, but also knowing one's place within that system. If formalization is not consistent, it is not performing its purpose. Benjamin Bailey examines one such inconsistency between Black customers and Korean immigrant shopkeepers within a 1997 study, asserting that “even when good intentions seem to be present, respect is not effectively communicated and understood. The problem is that, in a given situation, there are fundamentally different ways of showing respect in different cultures”. Situations like this make it impossible for formal speech to uphold a hierarchy due to miscommunication. However, they also put confused individuals at risk of participating within a hierarchy and making agreements they do not understand, placing them in marginalized positions. While unintentional, this can undermine institutions just the same as intentional methods do, but at a greater risk.

Intentional uses of formal and informal speech to subvert systems are not only done in places of governance, but can be found woven throughout society. Poetry is one such avenue. Judith Irvine attempts to claim that “the structured discourse of poetry… does not automatically have a special relationship to the social establishment”, however, Toni Cade Bambara disagrees:

“The task of the artist is determined always by the status and process and agenda of the community that it already serves. If you’re an artist who identifies with, who springs from, who is serviced by or drafted by a bourgeois capitalist class then that’s the kind of writing you do. Then your job is to maintain status quo, to celebrate exploitation or to guise it in some lovely, romantic way. That’s your job…

As a cultural worker who belongs to an oppressed people my job is to make revolution irresistible. One of the ways I attempt to do that is by celebrating those victories within the [B]lack community. And I think the mere fact that we’re still breathing is a cause for celebration. Also, my job is to critique the reactionary behavior within the community and to keep certain kinds of calls out there: the children, our responsibility of children, our responsibility to maintain some kind of continuity from the past. But I think for any artist your job is determined by the community you’re identifying with.

But in this country (US) we’re not encouraged and equipped at any particular time to view things that way. And so the artwork or the art practice that sells a capitalist ideology is considered art and anything that deviates from that is considered political propagandist, polemical or didactic, strange, weird, subversive, or ugly.”

Language is always politically charged, formal language especially so, whether in support of the systems in place or against them. Neutrality does not exist, it simply sides with the dominant socio-economic power. This is why it is vital to develop an understanding of formality and its relationship to hierarchy, because without one, we make agreements that do not necessarily benefit us or our communities.

Irvine’s contention that formalized speech does not necessarily support security for hierarchy unless agreed upon implies, but leaves out, several important clarifications. Firstly, it creates a clear vulnerability for institutions that rely on formality for reinforcement. Secondly, when outside one’s cultural context, misunderstandings surrounding styles of formality can occur, resulting in conflict. Thirdly, the confusion resulting from that conflict can mean that individuals are agreeing to something they don’t understand by attempting to utilize a style of formality that is foreign or unnatural to them. And, lastly, systems can in fact be destabilized through intentional use of formality and/or informality. The relationship between formality and hierarchy is one that should be examined and understood before one attempts to engage in civil discourse by the standards imposed by polite society, in case it reinforces or even uplifts harmful systems of oppression.

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Bibliography

Archie, Ayana. 2024 About 200 people protesting Gaza war arrested in congressional building, police say. NPR. https://www.npr.org/2024/07/24/nx-s1-5050443/capitol-building-gaza-protests-arrests

Bailey, Benjamin

2009 Communication of Respect in Interethnic Service Encounters. Pp. 114-136 IN Linguistic Anthropology, second edition, edited by Alessandro Duranti. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Bonetti, Kay. 1982 Interview with Toni Cade Bambara.

Irvine, Judith T. 2009 Formality and Informality in Communicative Events. Pp. 172-187 IN Linguistic Anthropology, second edition, edited by Alessandro Duranti. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Joos, Martin. 1967 The Five Clocks: A linguistic excursion into the five styles of English usage. New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace & World Inc.

Rata, Arama. 2024 Ten things to know about Hana’s haka. Peoples’ Dispatch. https://peoplesdispatch.org/2024/11/20/ten-things-to-know-about-hanas-haka/

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