Communicative imposition defines the degree of pressure that is explicated by a Speaker in different communicative situations. Each culture has its own standards of the amount of pressure possible in verbalization of different speech acts, for example, requests. Discrepancy of such norms may cause cultural shock and communicative failure. The present article examines the norms of communicative imposition typical for Russian and American culture. It analyzes linguistic resources aggravating and mitigating imposition, outlines possible problems salient for cross cultural communication and offers some methods of their solving.