Dr. House and the Language of Offence
Résumé
If in 2008, it was possible to write that the concept of impoliteness was “the long neglected ‘poor cousin’ of politeness” (Bousfield & Loucher 2008, 2) it is certainly less true today, and the term “impoliteness” comes with a wide range of preconceptions and theoretical frameworks. The aim of this chapter is neither to reconsider these theoretical frameworks, nor to add another definition to the term “impoliteness”, nor to study how such language and behaviour work within a specific context and how they can
even be used to create humour. In examining these points, I will suggest a different way of viewing impoliteness that is based on theories of interpretation and context models.
The corpus chosen for study is the TV series House, an American medical drama set in a large New Jersey hospital and centred around the principal character of Dr. Gregory House (played by Hugh Laurie), and his team of junior doctors. The advantage of choosing a television series to study offensive language is that it is possible to study the language over a period of time, within a changing context. My contention throughout this chapter will be that the language of offence can only be considered as such within a specific context.