BILINGUALISM AMONG THE ADOLESCENTS IN BADUNG REGENCY, BALI
on
e-Journal of Linguistics
BILINGUALISM AMONG THE ADOLESCENTS IN BADUNG REGENCY, BALI
I Nyoman Muliana
e-mail: [email protected] Warmadewa University, Denpasar
Prof. Drs. I Made Suastra, Ph.D.
e-mail: [email protected]
Study Program of Linguistics, School of Post Graduate Studies, Udayana University
Prof. Dr. Made Budiarsa, M.A.
e-mail: [email protected]
Study Program of Linguistics, School of Postgraduate Studies, Udayana University
Dr. Ni Made Dhanawaty, M.S.
e-mail: [email protected]
Study Program of Linguistics, School of Post Graduate Studies, Udayana University
ABSTRACT
This paper presents a discussion of bilingualism among the adolescents in Badung Regency, the Province of Bali. It aims to explore the bilingualism situation and the existence of Balinese Language among them. The discussion is based on participant observation to the adolescents and it is based on Sociolinguistic Theory. The result of the discussion shows that the adolescents in Badung Regency are bilinguals of Balinese and Indonesian languages. They use Balinese language in all their communicative activities, except some females occasionally showed the use of Indonesian language. Their conversations both in Balinese and Indonesian languages are also followed by code mixing of the words and phrase of Indonesian, Balinese, and English languages. The result of the discussion also indicates that Balinese language still used and maintained by the adolescents in Badung Regency.
Key Words : Bilingualism, Adolescents, Badung Regency
I Introduction
Bilingualism is a situation in which someone or a group of people can use more than one language for communication. The situation can be easily found in communities with members who are open to other community and in this modern era such communities are there all over the world. Now people are in competitions of contacting and meeting others for different purposes, such as friends, educations, trading, business, etc. The contacts and the meetings others of different language background will result a consequence, they must be able to use the language of the other community and they are in a bilingualism situation and they are bilinguals.
Many linguists have showed bilingual communities as the results of their researches. Price (2007) found that the people of Madawaska community in Maine, one state of the United States of America are bilinguals. They speak French and English because the state is in the border of the United States of America to Canada. Jamai (2008) did his research to Morocan migrants in Britain who came to Britain in 1950. As migrants, the Morocan people must be able to speak English in order to communicate with the local people. The Morocan people in Britain are bilinguals with an ability of using Morocan-Arabic and English. Wardhaugh (1986) shows bilingualism situation in Singapore where people must be able to speak more than two languages because the country has four formal languages; English, Mandarin, Tamil, and Malay. In Indonesia, almost all communities are in bilingualism situation as showed by some researchers; Yuliawati (2008), in her research to people of Pandaran, West Java, found that most of them are bilinguals with the ability of using three languages, such as Sundanese, Javanese, and Indonesian. A research of Indonesian linguist inspiring the writing of this paper is the research conducted by Adisaputra (2010) to the adolescences in Stabat, Langkat Regency, North Sumatera. The regency changed when it was opened for rubber plantations that invited many migrants of different ethnics in Indonesia rushed the regency. Adisaputra found that the adolescences in Stabat become bilingual with three different languages; Stabat Malay, Javanese, and Indonesian.
This paper discusses the bilingualism situation among the adolescents in Badung Regency, Bali. There are some reasons to discuss the situation in this regency and the one is as has been stated above. First, Badung is one of the regencies of Bali that has been massively developed this last decade, especially the western part of the regency. Many villages in that part have changed into urban areas. Second, the development of that area has invited people of different ethnics of Indonesia coming there. They are Javanese, Sasaknese, Sumatranese, and so on. Some of them are expatriates and foreign visitors. Many of them are permanent residents and build their own houses. Many of them are also not permanent residents and these migrants rent rooms at home stays of local people. Third, Balinese local people in the area are progressing a lot economically due to the development and tourism sector in Bali. Fourth, people of different ethnics live so close to Balinese local people that they have many chances to contact among them. These situations certainly influence each other in their connection to the bilingualism situation of the adolescences. It can be assumed that they are bilinguals with abilities of using at least Balinese and Indonesian languages.
The discussion in this paper includes the bilingualism situation and language choice made by the adolescents in Badung Regency. It aims to see how the adolescents use the
languages and the meaning of the bilingualism toward the existence BL among them. The discussion is presented qualitatively based on Sociolinguistic Theory.
II Concept and Theoritical Framework
-
2.1 Concepts
-
2.1.1 Adolescent
-
The concept of adolescent used in this paper is quoted from Sarwono (202:14) stating that there are two criteria used to determine adolescent. The criteria are age limitation and marital status. The age limitation for adolescent is between 11 to 24 years old and unmarried. These criteria are used to determine adolescent based on the following considerations.
-
1) 11 years old is an age at which generally secondary sexual signs begin to appear
(physical criteria).
-
2) In many Indonesian communities, at the age of 11 years old one has grown up traditionally and religiously so that he/she is not behaved as children (social criteria).
-
3) At the age, there are signs of soul perfection, such as achievements of self identity, genital phase, and cognitive and moral peaks (psychological criteria).
-
4) The age of 24 years old becomes maximum limit to give chances for those who are at the age still depends on his/her parents.
-
5) Marital status is the most determining because it has an important meaning in our society. Someone who is married, at any age, is considered and behaved as adult.
The concept of verbal repertoire is quoted from Nababan (1993:5) who states that the term of verbal repertoire is used for all languages and language varieties mastered and known and used by someone in relationship, work, and other businesses. Everyone can master and use many varieties of his mother tongue or his first language and some varieties of his second language, a language that does not become his first language, but it is widely used in a community where he lives or works. He often masters one variety (sometimes two varieties) of a foreign language or another language he knows. The adolescents at Buduk Village seem to have verbal repertoire as defined by Nababan. They may acquire BL as their first language (FL) because their parents are Balinese people speaking BL. They can also speak IL as the second language they acquired from schools or communications with people of other ethnics around them.
This paper applies two approaches in Sociolingustic Theory, such as bilingualism and language choice. The approach of bilingualism is quoted from Weinreich (1953) stating that bilingualism is the ability of using two languages in communication. This definition of bilingualism is neutral and acceptable for explaining the bilingualism situation of the adolescents at Buduk Village. As stated at the part of verbal repertoire, the adolescents can use BL and IL. Language choice is also part of Sociolinguistic Theory studying language (languages) choose by someone or a group of people to communicate to others. The Fashold (1984:180) defines that language choice is one’s ability to use two languages or more and he/she has to choose one of the languages in accordance to its function. The activities of language choice as stated by Fashold is also found at the communication activities of the adolescents at Buduk Village and it is also described in the part of the discussion of this paper.
III Research Method
The discussion made in this paper is a qualitative discussion so that all data needed for the discussion are the languages uses done by the adolescents at Buduk Village. The location of the research of this paper is at Buduk village, Badung Regency. This village has situational criteria as described in the introduction. The adolescents as the data source for the discussion of this paper were limited on their ages from 11 to 24 years old of both males and females. The data were all collected by using participant observation method in order to carry out direct observation to languages uses among the adolescents.
The observation to adolescences at Buduk Village showed that they are bilinguals. It could be seen from their abilities in using two languages: Balinese language (BL) and Indonesian language (IL). They acquired BL as their mother tongue and IL from their schools. All of them have good abilities in using those languages in communications. However, there seems a problem in the relation to their mastery on BL. As a local language, BL has its speech levels having relations to traditional classification of Balinese people well-known as caste system and the elders. The levels consist of kasar ‘rude’, madia ‘middle’, and alus ‘formal’. The levels are shown by the use of different vocabularies. For example, the word “eat” can be stated with three different words for each of the levels: ngamah is for the kasar, medaar is for madia, and ngajeng is for alus. The adolescences show a tendency that they cannot use the alus level. They can only use the kasar and the madia ones.
They may be two reasons supporting the inability of the adolescents in using the alus level of BL. First, it can be caused by a common situation for Balinese people that
things related to their tradition are only comprehended and carried out by the elders. This situation automatically influences the use of the alus Balinese language in which it can only be used by the elders. Second, the social situation of Balinese people has changed a lot especially those who live in urban areas such as in Badung Regency. Soon after the reformation occurring in Indonesia in 1999, people felt equality socially and viewed the caste system as a traditional and old matter. It seems that the situation also influences the adolescences at Buduk Village at viewing that there is no usage to learn and use the alus level of BL. The elders of Balinese people seem to accept such situation that the adolescences do not speak the alus level of Balinese language to them.
This part discusses the use of languages among the adolescents at Buduk Village. It aims to see which of the two languages mentioned above tend to be used and how they use them. The discussion presents the languages use of each sex of the adolescents and it is completed with examples of their dialogs. All the dialogues were taken from their communications in informal situations with different topics. A model of writing is letters is used in order to identify the languages in each dialog; the italic letters are BL, the bold letters are the IL, and the capital letters are English language.
Communication among male adolescents shows a tendency of using BL. This language is used everywhere, in any situation, and for all topics they communicate each other. But, they cannot avoid the use of words of other languages such as IL and English because BL do not have such words.
Dialog 1 :
Participant 1 : Dija montor cie?
‘Where is your motorbike?’
Participant 1 : Nu sid Raie.
‘Still at Rai’.
Participant 2 : Kenapa?
‘What’s wrong?’
Participant 1 : Mesine meTUNE-UP.
‘The machine is tuned-up’
Participant 2 : Ci kel milu EVENT?
‘You will join an event?’
Participant 1 : Aa. di Klungkung.
‘Yes, in Klungkung’.
Dialog 1 is a conversation between two participants and both of them are adolescences. Participant 1 is about 15 years old and participant 2 is about 14 years old. The topic of the dialog 1 is taking to a friend. Participant 1 wanted participant 2 to take him to a friend named Rai who is a motorcycle mechanist. The dialog was in informal situation and both participants use Balinese language. Both of them spoke short utterances and some of the words belong to the kasar lever Balinese language, such as the pronouns wae ‘I’ and ci ‘you’. But, the participants did not use these two pronouns to show rudeness to the interlocutor, they were used to show intimacy between the participants.
The conversation made by the participants in dialog 1 shows code mixing in the use of English words in the Balinese language utterances. The English words are TUNE-UP and EVENT. The use of the English words cannot be avoided by the participants of dialog 1 because Balinese language does not have any word for expressing the two meanings of TUNE-UP and EVENT. However, the participants and the adolescences in general are already familiar with the words. TUNE-UP means that any reparation made to a motorbike machine in order to increase its power. Meanwhile, EVENT is a word that is a word recently familiar to adolescences meaning an event of motorbikes off road that is appearing recently in Bali.
The following is dialog 2 between three participants and they are all adolescences. The dialog made by the participant occurred at participant 1’s house.
Dialog 2 :
Participant 1 : Ci lari nae!.
‘You have to run!’
Participant 2 : Tuni wae JOGGING jak Ade.
‘This morning I did jogging with Ade’.
Participant 3 : Nyos aliange pelatih ken bapane.
‘Nyos is given a trainer by his father’.
Participant 2 : Timpal bapane to. Polisi.
‘It is his father’s friend. A police’.
Participant 3 : Ha..ha… selem ia jani.
‘Ha..ha….now he is black’.
Participant 1 : Apa gen tesne?
‘What are the tests?’
Participant 2 : Renang, lari, kesehatan. Tes kesehatan gen pendo.
‘Swimming, run, health. Health test is twice.
Participant 1 : Mmih!.
‘Wow!’
Participant 3 : Ha..ha.. Pragatne mase nombok.
‘Ha..ha…The end is bribing’.
The topic the participants in dialog 2 talked is about tests of applying to be a police. At the time of the conversation, there was an employment of applying for becoming a
police and one of the participants did the application. All participants in dialogs 2 use BL to do their conversation. They used short utterances as the common BL of adolescences at a talk, but there are some words and a phrase of other languages used as code mixing in their Balinese utterances. The first word is from English, JOGGING. BL does not have any word to express JOGGING meaning running slowly for an exercise. Meanwhile, BL only has one word to say an action of running, that is melaib that tends to refer the meaning of running fast. The other words are from IL such as renang ‘swimming’, lari ‘run’, kesehatan ‘health’, and nombok ‘bribing’. Some of these words can actually be found in Balinese language, such as renang ‘swimming’ is ngelangi but this word is only used for stating an action of swimming in general and not specific for sport so that people only use renang. The word kesehatan ‘health’ has only its adjective form in BL, it is seger ‘healthy’. One participant also mixes IL word tes ‘tes’ with BL suffix –ne having form and meaning of possession. A phrase of IL is also used in the dialog, that is tes kesehatan ‘health test’. BL does not have this phrase so that participant 2 could not avoid to use it in his BL.
The two dialogs presented above can represent the language use of male adolescents at Buduk Village. The participants observation made showed that male adolescents at Buduk Village tend to choose only BL for communication among them for any topics and any situations. The use of BL by the male adolescents is also followed by code mixing of IL and English language. The percentage of the phenomena is not very high due to the absence of the words and phrase in BL.
Female adolescents at Buduk Village show language use that is similar to the males. They use BL for their communications as done by two girls in the following dialog.
Dialog 3 :
Participant 1 : Enggal dik, Nik!
‘Hurry up, Ta!’
Participant 2 : Nah. Bin dik.
‘OK. A little more’.
Participant 1 : Enggalen dik!
‘Hurry up!’
Participant 2 : Nyi ba mandi?
‘Have you taken a bath?’
Participant 1 : Ya, suba.
‘Yes, I did’.
Participant 2 : Nah. Mase sing ada nyen.
‘OK. There isn’t anybody there’.
Participant 1 : Pak Made ba di banjar.
‘Mr. Made is already at banjar’.
Participant 2 : Beh?
‘Is he?’
Participant 1 : Aku nepuken.
‘I saw him’
The participants of dialog 3 are two girls of different ages, participant 1 is 18 years old and participant 2 is 13 years old. The conversation occurred at participant 1’s house when participant 2 picked up participant 2 to go to banjar, the Balinese community hall for a Balinese dance training. They both communicate each other in BL and the BL conversation made by the two girls in dialog 3 reflects a conversation popularly used by adolescents. It can be seen from the short utterances used by the participants and some words of IL used as code mixing, such as the pronoun aku ‘I’. BL actually has forms of pronoun referring to the first person singular which are popular in the participants’ region, such as wae, yang, and cang. But, the use of aku reflects that the speaker just wants to show a variation and it is only used by certain speakers. There is also another IL word mandi ‘take a bath’ used in the dialog 3 that is more familiar used by Balinese speakers especially the adolescents instead of its BL, manjus. The conversation of dialog 3 also shows an interesting use of BL that can be seen from the use of nyi, a pronoun for female second person. In BL this pronoun belongs to kasar level, but the speaker did not use it for showing rudeness, she used it as an expression of intimacy to participant 1.
The observation to the language use of the adolescents at Buduk Village also showed that there were some of them use IL. The following dialogue is one example of the use of IL found at female adolescents’ communication.
Dialog 4 :
Participant 1 : Kamu dah dapat satuanya?
‘Have you got the story?’
Participant 2 : Satuanya yang itu ja ku pakai.
‘I did. It is the story that I use’.
Participant 3 : Aku pinjam ya?
‘Can I borrow it?’
Participant 2 : Yee. Cari ja di GOOGLE!.
‘Hmm. Just find it at GOOGLE!.
Participant 1 : Kita nyeritain atau kumpul aja?
‘We have to tell the story or just collect it?
Participant 2 : Ah. Ndak ngerti aku.
‘Hmm. I don’t understand’.
Participant 3 : Gurunya gabeng sekali.
‘The teacher is not clear’.
The participants of dialog 4 are female adolescents. They are all about 13 years old and the students of a junior school. The topic they were discussing was about the BL assignment of satua ‘story’ given by their BL teacher. They did the conversation at a parking area of an internet counter when they were trying to find the assignment. Such use
of IL is occasionally found to female adolescents at Buduk Village and they usually employ code mixing of words of other languages in their IL use as seen in dialog 4. The words are satua ‘story’, gabeng ‘unclear’, and GOOGLE. As other words of internet services, the word GOOGLE cannot be found yet in IL, but the words satua and gabeng are actually there in IL as cerita for satua and tidak jelas for gabeng. But, the use of these two BL words indicates certain meanings. The speaker used the word satua to give a stress on the message she sent that the story is of BL and not of other language. The word gabeng is frequently used by Balinese people when using IL in informal situation. As the participant 3 in dialog 4, she seemed to prefer to use it reflecting that she wanted to give stress on the message of being unclear with the BL gabeng.
The occurrences of IL use among the female adolescents cannot be predicted whether they use it for certain reasons as topic or situation of conversation. And, in fact, the observation to the girls and most of the female adolescents at the village showed the facts that at home and in other occasions they mostly or only use BL. But, seen from some occurrences of IL as done by the girls can give a meaning. They used IL as at the dialog may be caused by their intention to show a prestige. This meaning can be concluded from the occurrences of the use of IL by the girls itself. They tend to use IL among them only at public areas that seem that they use IL only to show a prestige.
The observation and the discussion made on the language use by the female adolescents at Buduk Village indicate that the adolescents in Badung Regency are bilinguals of BL and IL. They acquired BL as their mother tongue and IL from their schools. Their abilities in using BL are very good for communicative purposes among them. Some of the adolescents also showed the use of IL, this activity is just done by the females. Their actions of using IL are not constant that which mean that they do not always use IL in every communication, such as at home they use BL. The conversations of the adolescents at Buduk Village both in BL and IL are also followed by code mixing of the words and phrase of IL, BL, and English. Of all the observation conducted to language uses by the adolescents at Buduk Village can represent that BL is still used and maintained by the adolescents.
V Conclusion
Some points of conclusions can be obtained from the discussion of the language use among the adolescents at Buduk Village.
-
1) Verbal repertoire of the adolescents at Buduk Village consists of BL and IL.
-
2) The adolescents at Buduk Village can use BL and IL well for communicative purposes among them.
-
3) The language use among the adolescents at Buduk Village can represent that BL maintains among the adolescents in Badung Regency.
Bibliography
Adisaputera, A. 2010. “Kebertahanan Bahasa Melayu Langkat : Studi Kebahasaan terhadap Komunitas Remaja di Stabat, Kabupaten Langkat”. (dissertation). Denpasar : Program Doktor, Program Studi Linguistik, Program Pascasarjana, Universitas Udayana.
Jamai, A. 2008. “Language Use and Maintenance among the Moroccan Minority in Britain”. (dissertation). UK : European Studies Research Institute (ESRI) The School of languages, University of Salford.
Fashold, R. 1987. The Sociolinguistic of Society. Oxford : Basil Blackwell.
Nababan, P.W.J. 1993. Sosiolinguistik : Suatu Pengantar. Jakarta : PT. Gramedia Pustaka Utama.
Price, J.E. 2007. “The Status of French among Youth in a Bilingual American-Canadian Border Community: The Case of Madawaska, Maine”. (dissertation). Indiana : The Department of French & Italian, Indiana University.
Sarwono, Sarlito Wirawan. 2002. Psikologi Remaja. Jakarta : PT. RajaGrafindo Persada.
Yuliawati, S. 2008. Situasi Kebahasaan di Wilayah Pangandaran: Suatu Kajian Sosiolinguistik tentang Pergeseran dan Pemertahanan Bahasa. Bandung : Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Padjadjaran.
10
Discussion and feedback