This document discusses linguistic politeness and cross-cultural communication. It identifies six types of linguistic utterances and explains how directives can be imperative, interrogative, or declarative. Directives depend on social distance, status, and formality. Imperatives are common between close relationships or subordinates, while interrogatives and declarations are used between less familiar people. Speaking politely involves considering others' feelings and cultural values through positive politeness like solidarity or negative politeness like respect. Questions acceptable as greetings differ across cultures. Understanding sociolinguistic rules is important for cross-cultural communication.