ABSTRACT
The actual misunderstanding Jan refers to in this example was in itself relatively minor. Marama had not turned up as expected to a meeting with another organisation and so Jan, the section manager, had been left to contribute to a discussion where she did not have all the information she needed. There are a number of possible explanations - Marama may not have received the information about the meeting, she may not have under stood that she was required to attend, or she may simply have failed to ensure Jan was informed that she could not come. However, whatever the reason, Marama’s non-appearance at an important meeting with an external stakeholder resulted in embarrassment for Jan, a senior manager, and had the potential to derail some sensitive negotiations. Although she gives Marama the benefit of the doubt, was that M Y misunderstanding (line 2), Jan neverthe less feels obliged to follow the incident up with Marama’s line manager, Heke, in part to prevent a recurrence, but also to get him to organise some ‘damage control’ in the form of another meeting. In doing so, she enters into problematic discourse of a different kind, a discourse where the interplay between the enactment of power and politeness is especially foregrounded, an area which is the explicit topic of later sections of this chapter.
