A case is made for a broader approach to the study of politeness strategies, as has been demanded increasingly by linguists working on non-Western languages. Using data from a role-played dialogue involving a request in the Southern Bantu language Zulu, speakers are first located culturally, then the sequence of vrebal utterances as a whole is discussed and integration of verbal and nonverbal channels of communication is examined. It is concluded that status plays a crucial role in negotiating interactions in Zulu, and that posture, gesture, and gaze contribute substantially to marking status. This raises the question of whether, by ignoring nonverbal channels in the consideration of Western politeness strategies, linguists have not inadvertently neglected an important additional dimension of verbal interaction. Contains 29 references. (Author/MSE)