(Im)Politeness and Multimodality: Character Interaction in Modern Family

This book examines multimodal (im)politeness in telecinematic fiction and its humorous effects for viewers, offering new insights into the forms, meanings, and functions of (im)politeness in contemporary popular culture and audiovisual media.

The volume develops an integrated analytical framework that brings together models of (im)politeness, the pragmatics of fiction, and a social semiotic approach to multimodality to explore how (im)politeness unfolds in interaction within and across modes (e.g., gesture, touch, music, and speech). Drawing on data from character interactions in the American mockumentary sitcom Modern Family, the volume offers insights into multimodal impoliteness through a fine-grained qualitative analysis, supplemented where relevant by an overview of the dataset. It demonstrates (1) how situated (im)politeness-related meanings (e.g., face, sociality rights, identity, and emotion) are dynamically produced through the interplay of modes in interaction; and (2) how these multimodal ensembles create humour potential for viewers. This volume advances a perspective that moves beyond multimodal description to explain why (im)politeness is realised multimodally, while highlighting the distinct affordances of different modes in (im)politeness communication.

This book will appeal to scholars and students in pragmatics, (im)politeness studies, multimodal communication, and humour research, as well as those interested in fictional and media discourse.