Rapport Management Model - the complexities of navigating interpersonal relations
In previous posts you might have learnt about Face-Threatening Acts and how different attitudes to (im)politeness might lead to different interactional styles between cultures. These are all very useful to be aware of before going on a year abroad. Here we would like to introduce a concept that builds on politeness theory, but takes a different, deeper take on how people manage interpersonal relations.
Helen Spencer-Oatey's model of Rapport Management offers a new, broader framework for conceptualising how relations between people are navigated and negotiated in social interactions and helps researchers highlight where culture might play a significant role in interactions.
For international and year abroad students, managing rapport (harmony-disharmony) among their peers is especially crucial, as they are often separated from their usual social networks, and interacting with fellow students but with different cultural backgrounds is their only means of socialising. As such, for us the most interesting part of the model will be elements it identifies, which can be subject to cultural variation.
What are the 3 bases of rapport?
Spencer-Oatey conceptualised 3 bases of rapport: face sensitivities, sociality rights and obligations, and interactional goals. According to the model, each of these need to be taken into account when managing rapport, as any behaviour that impacts them will affect relational dynamics between the participants of an interaction.
Face sensitivities:
We focus on Brown and Levinson's concept of positive and negative face in terms of politeness in a different post, so here we just want to point out Spencer-Oatey's three-level perspective on it. According to this model, face can be affected on not just an invididual level, but also an interpersonal level and a group level. This is essentially a deeper take on a similar concept as 'positive face' - the intricacies of wanting to be appreciated and approved of others, i.e. seen in a positive light.
Like how you might not monologue about SuperWhoLock in a new environment to save individual face, but on a fandom post on Tumblr you might claim that knowledge as value in terms of your role in the social group.
Sociality rights and obligations:
This base of rapport elaborates on how besides face sensitivities, people develop expectations for behaviour and interactional styles based on the rights and obligations tied to their roles within a social network. Not every role will percieve a certain speech act as face threatening or at least not in the same way.
Think of it like this - within a family, could a grandparent not request a grandchild to bring them a book while using an imperative form? But if the grandchild were to order the grandparent to bring them something, that would surely not look good for them. In this sense, making a request with an imperative was within the rights of one social role and was not percieved as an FTA, but that is not the same for everyone.
Interactional goals:
Interactional goals were the third factor introduced by Spencer-Oatey and added only later to the model. We have talked about how speech acts served specific purposes and similarly, people have specific goals when interacting with others.
These goals can be transactional (task-focused), relational (relationship-focused) or a mixture of both and how one goes about achieving them can be very dependent on culture.
So, how does culture affect rapport management?
Now that we know what base concepts the model consists of - and so, what things to keep in mind when building rapport with new, intercultural peers - we can move on to what specific elements of intercultural interactions may be subject to cultural variation.
Let us highlight a few elements that Spencer-Oatey mentioned in her article, when discussing the model:
people's assessments of the context
underlying values, like level of respect for hierarchy
preferred interactional styles (e.g. level of (in)formality, directness/indirectness)
lingusitic conventions for the use of terms and phrases
an inventory of strategies available in a language (e.g. the existence of honorifics)
Congratulations for making it through another one of our theory-based posts! We hope that reflecting on everything you've just learnt about rapport management will help you navigate the art of establishing new social networks in an intercultural environment. Now you know what differences to look out for - the rest is up to you. We will definitely be cheering for you :)
