Dániel Z. Kádár is Professor of English Language and Linguistics and Director of the Centre for Intercultural Politeness Research at the University of Huddersfield. He is also Research Professor of Pragmatics at the Research Institute for Linguistics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. He has a long-standing interest in linguistic politeness research and ritual studies, as well as historical and intercultural pragmatics. He has published more than twenty books with Cambridge University Press and other international publishers and many papers in high-impact journals. His recent monographs include Understanding Politeness (with Michael Haugh, Cambridge, 2013) and Relational Rituals and Communication (2013). He is Editor of the Palgrave Handbook of Linguistic Politeness.

• Preface; 1. Introduction; Part I. Ritual and (Im)Politeness - the Basic Relationship: 2. Ritual: its definition, typology and relational role; 3. Ritual and politeness research; 4. Ritual and (im)politeness: the basic relationship; Part II. Ritual, (Im)Politeness, and Moral Aggression: 5. Rites of moral aggression in operation: countering the heckler, and bystander intervention; 6. Voicing the moral order(s) in ritual aggression: morality and/versus (im)politeness in the rite of bystander intervention; 7. De/Ratifying the maintenance/maintainer of the moral order: moral responsibility in events of heckling; 8. Conclusion.

'This pioneering monograph brings together two foundational analytical perspectives on social interaction for the first time. Be prepared for a rewarding intellectual journey that offers a new understanding of omnipresent rituals as the substance of the moral order.' Francesca Bargiela-Chiappini, University of Warwick