ENGLISH LANGUAGE POLITENES OF TOURIST GUIDES IN BALI
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e-journal of linguistics
ENGLISH LANGUAGE POLITENES OF TOURIST GUIDES IN BALI
I Ketut Murdana e-mail: [email protected] Language Services Centre Nusa Dua Bali Tourism Institute
Prof. Dr. Made Budiarsa, M.A. e-mail: [email protected] Study Program of Linguistics, School of Postgraduate Studies, Udayana University
Prof. Dr. Drs. I Made Suastra, Ph.D. e-mail: [email protected] Study Program of Linguistics, School of Postgraduate Studies, Udayana University
Prof. Dr. Aron Meko Mbete e-mail: [email protected] Study Program of Linguistics, School of Postgraduate Studies, Udayana University
ABSTRACT
This paper deals with the ways used by tourist guides (TG) in Bali to express their politeness to foreign tourists (FT) through several speech acts, such as greetings the FT, welcoming the FT to Bali, introducing themselves to the FT, thanking the FT, and apologizing to the FT. The research is conducted in several tourist objects at two Regency and Municipality in Bali, which are Badung Regency and Denpasar Municipality. The research result reveals that the tourist guides employ those speech acts to express their English language politeness to the foreign tourists (FT). Those speech acts are also used to perform their friendliness in providing tour guide services to the FT.
Key words : politeness, speech act, greetings, welcomings, introducing oneself, thankings, apologizings
ABSTRAK
Makalah ini membahas cara-cara yang digunakan oleh pramuwisata (PW) di Bali untuk mengekspresikan kesantunannya kepada wisatawan mancanegara (WM) melalui sejumlah tindak tutur seperti ucapan salam tegur sapa kepada WM, ucapan selamat datang di Bali kepada WM, memperkenalkan diri kepada WM, ucapan terima kasih kepada WM, dan ucapan permohonan maaf kepada WM. Penelitian ini diadakan pada beberapa objek wisata yang ada di dua Kabupaten/Kota di Bali, yaitu Kabupaten Badung dan Kota Denpasar. Pengambilan data dilakukan dengan metode observasi non-partisipatif, wawancara, dan merekam percakapan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa pramuwisata (PW) menggunakan tindak tutur tersebut di atas untuk mengekspresikan kesantunan berbahasa Inggris kepada wisatawan mancanegara (WM). Tindak tutur tersebut di atas juga digunakan untuk menunjukkan keramahtamahan PW dalam memberikan jasa layanan pemanduan wisata kepada WM.
Kata-kata kunci : kesantunan, tindak tutur, salam tegur sapa, selamat datang, memperkenalkan diri, berterima kasih, permohonan maaf
1.Introduction
A language is used as a means of communication in the process of communication, and the language used in communication process should consider the aspects of language politeness. Language politeness refers to the language use (sentences, words, expressions) which certains politeness features such as the use of politeness maskers like “could”, “ “please”, “thank you”, and so on (Geertz, 1970:296). The use of language politeness in the process of communication besides needing to note down the language components, it also needs to consider other factors, such as speech partners, communication background, and so on which are derived from politeness principles in speaking used in the community where a speaker is a member of it (Leech, 1983:16).
Related to the above views, this article deals with the English language politeness of tourist guides (TG) in guiding foreign tourists in Bali. In this article the researcher explores the ways used by the TG to express politeness to the FT through several speech acts like greetings, welcomings, introducing oneself, thankings, and apologisings. A speech act, as Austin
(1962:109) implies that when someone is saying something she/he is normally also doing something. In that way, people may perporm more or less polite interactions. Related to this matter, Holmes (1995: 8) states that some of the speech acts like greetings, thankings, apologizing, and so on can function as to express politeness.
Research on language politeness has been conducted by many researchers, either by foreign researchers or Indonesian ones. Research carried out by foreign researchers such as Lakoff (1973), Brown and Levinson (1978), Leech (1983), Tanaka (1988), Fraser (1990), and so on; while research conducted by the Indonesian ones, such as Mahmud (2008), Simpen (2008), Kristianto ( 2009), Budiarsa, et al (2010), Sosiowati (2013) , and so on.
2.ResearchMethod
The research on English language politeness of tourist guides (TG) in Bali employs qualitative research approach which is based on the philosophy of phenomenologys. The research aims at finding out and explaining some speech acts used by the TG to express his/ her language politeness to the FT. The study is carried out at two Regency and Municipality, namely Badung Regency and Denpasar Municipality, for about three months that is from June 2012 up to August 2012.
The data was collected by using non-participation observation methods, interviews, and conversations recordings. The research instruments used for collecting data are digital recording tool in the form of tape recorder, interview guidelines. The data collected in this study is qualitative data which are lingual data in the form of words, phrases, sentences. The data are primer data because they are collected directly from the data source. The data sources in this research are English speaking tourist guides with the total number of twelve persons as samples which are selected using purposive sampling techniques. The lingual data of resource samples
are processed by using qualitative descriptive analysis method, which is the used of identity method. Then, the data is presented, described and interpreted to the withdrawal of some conclusions.
There are a number of speech acts used by the TGs to express their English language politeness to the FTs, which are greetings, welcomings, introducings, thankings, apologisings, can be presented as follows.
Since the main job of a tourist guide is to provide services to people or tourists, which are domestic tourists and the foreign ones, so politeness, friendliness, and smile are manners which always need to be performed by the tourist guides to the tourists (Ardana, 2013:36). Therefore, as the reflection of those manners, whenever and wherever the tourist guides meet the tourists they always have to greet them. Related to this, Bonvillain (1993:104) states that greetings function to begin communicative interactions or to acknowledge the presence of others. The speech acts which is used to express politeness by the tourist guides is locutionary kind of speech acts, that is the one which is used to state something, in this case, to express greetings to the foreign tourists (Searle, 1962: 23).
Greetings in the guiding proceses is usually initiated by the tourist guides as the one who provides services, then responded by the foreign tourists. But, greetings can also be initiated by the foreign tourists first, then it is responded by the tourist guides. It depends on the situations and conditions. Based on the speech situations, greetings can be expressed in two ways, namely in formal way by saying “ good morning”, “good afternoon”, “good evening” , and so on; and in informal way, by saying “hi”, “hello”, “how are you going”, “what’s going on, and so on
(Jendra, 2010 : 43-44), (Mahmud , 2011: 42). Some examples of greetings expressed by the tourist guides can be presented as follows.
Extract 1 : A tourist guide is guiding foreign tourists
A TG, TG3 (INA) – Data1(TG3-1), is guiding a group of FTs from Australia in the tour programs of Sanur – Uluwatu – Ubud.
TG 3-1: “So , selamat pagi, good morning, Ladies and Gentlemen. So from here I shall take you straight to Uluwatu.”
As the speech situation context is formal, which is in the tour guiding program from the hotel where the foreign tourists stay to the tourist object, so the TG3-1 also uses a formal and polite greeting expressions to the FTs as in “So, selamat pagi, good morning, Ladies and Gentlemen”. The greeting expressions are also common greetings used by other TGs in guiding the tourists, either domestic tourists and the foreign ones.
Extract 2 : A tourist guide is guiding foreign tourists
A TG, TG 11 (IMS)- Data 1 (TG 11-1), is guiding a group of FTs (cruise) from Australia in the tour programs of Benoa Harbour – Batubulan – Celuk- Kintamani.
TG 11-1 : “Number ten? Here we are. Good afternoon. Nice to meet you”.
The greetings expressions uttered by the TG 11-1 is also in a formal speech situation context, that is in the tour guiding programs handled by the TG 11-1. In this case, the greetings expressed by the TG 11-1 is “Good afternoon. Nice to meet you”, which is very formal and polite. This kind of greeting expressions is also used by other tourist guides to perform their politeness and friendliness manners to the foreign tourists.
The Foreign Tourist (FT) who come to Bali for the first time may come through several arrival entrances, such as Ngurah Rai International Airport, Benoa Harbour, Ubung Bus
Terminal, and so on. The arrival in Bali is received proudly and happily by tourist guides (TG). And as the reflection of their pride and honor to the FTs, the TGs try to provide and or to do the best for the FTs, and one of them is to express a warm welcome to Bali to the FTs and this welcoming expressions at the same time is also to perform politeness and friendliness manners to the FTs (Ardana, 2013 :35).
The welcoming expressions to Bali to the FTs can be expressed by using expressive function of speech acts. The expressive function of speech acts is used to state something, in this case to welcome foreign tourists to Bali (Searle, 1962:23). Some examples of welcoming expressions used by the TGs to the FTs can be presented as follows.
Extract 3: A tourist guide is guiding foreign tourists
A TG, TG 5 (IKS) –Data1 (TG 5-1), is guiding a group of foreign tourist (FT) (cruise) from Australia in the tour programs of Benoa Harbour – Taro Elephant Safari – Ubud.
TG 5-1 : “Good morning, Ladies and Gentlemen. Welcome to Bali. Welcome home for those who come many times to Bali. So it’s me. My name is Subandira, but people called me Bandi, just Bandi. Our driver is Wayan Arsana”.
The welcoming expressions uttered by TG 5-1 to the FT is very formal and polite. This is because before saying welcoming to the FT, TG 5-1 also expressed greetings to the FT by saying “Good morning, Ladies and Gentlemen”, then he continued to say “Welcome to Bali” to all the FTs, and then he says welcoming to the FT who have been to Bali many times by saying “welcome home for those who come many times to Bali.” The welcoming expressions to Bali is also used by other tourist guides to welcome the foreign tourists as to perform their politeness and friendliness manners to the foreign tourists.
Extract 4 : A tourist guide is guiding foreign tourists
A TG, TG 11 (IMS) –Data 1 (TG 11-1), is guiding a group of foreign tourists (cruise) from
Australia in the tour programs of Benoa Harbour – Batubulan – Celuk – Kintamani.
TG 11-1: “ So, good afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen. And we welcome you on the island of Bali. And we also welcome you on our trip today, but your trip today is little bit late.”
TG 11-1 uses welcoming expressions to Bali to the FT formally and politely, this is because before saying welcoming the TG 11-1 also expresses greetings to the FT by saying ”so, good afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen”, then TG 11-1 expresses welcoming to Bali to the FT by saying “And we welcome you on the island of Bali” and this expression is followed by “And we also we welcome you on our trip today”. The kind of speech acts used to express welcoming to Bali by the TG 11-1 is the locutionary kind of speech acts. The welcoming expressions is also a common expression used by other tourist guides to perform their politeness and friendliness to the foreign tourists.
A professional tourist guide, besides needs to express greetings and welcoming guests to Bali, he/she also needs to introduce himself/herself to the guests being picked up at Ngurah Rai Airport, Benoa harbour, and at other places, and or to the foreign tourists being guided to the tourist objects and or to the tourist attractions. The introducing of oneself and others need to be carried out to smooth the following communication process with the foreign tourists. Several things which are needed to be delivered in the introducing process by the TG are telling names, either short name or the complete one, saying expressions of “I am very pleased to meet you”, and so on (Ardana, 2013:46).
The kinds of speech acts used by the TG for expressing language politeness in introducing himself and the driver to the FT is locutionary kind of speech acts, which is the speech act used to state something, in this case to introduce himself and other people to the FT (Searle,1962 : 23). Some examples of utterances for introducing himself which are expressed by the TG using locutionary kindof speech acts can be presented as follows.
Extract 5 : A tourist guide is guiding a foreign tourist
A TG, TG 2 (ISD)-Data 1 (TG 2-1), is guiding a FT from England in tour programs of Sanur – Batubulan – Celuk – Sukawati – Mas – Ubud – Kintamani.
TG 2-1 : “So, good morning once again Miss Lesly. It’s nice to meet you this morning, ya. And once again, first of all I would like to introduce my name. My name is Surya and the driver’s name is Jering. Jering because his hair is standing.”
The speech acts used to express language politeness by TG 2 -1 is introducing speech act functions for introducing himself and the driver to the FT. Utterances used by the TG for introducing himself ad the driver is formal, this is because before introducing himself TG 2-1 also greets the FT by saying “So, good morning once again Miss Lesly. It’s nice to meet you this morning, ya”.Then he continues to introduce himself and the driver by saying “And once again, first of all I would like to introduce my name. My name is Surya and the driver’s is Jering.”Utterances used to introduce himself and other people by the TG 2-1 are expressed by using locutionary kind of speech acts. Those expressions are commonly used by the TGs to show their politeness and friendliness to the FT.
Extract 6: A tourist guide is guiding a group of foreign tourists
A TG, TG 12 (IWA) –Data 1 (TG 12-1), is guiding a group foreign tourists from England in tour programs of Nusa Dua - Tanah Lot – Taman Ayun – Bedugul.
TG 12-1 : “Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen. First of all, I would like to introduce myself. My name is Ari for short. My complete Balinese name is I Wayan Arinata. I’m the first born child in my family.”
TG 12-1 uses locutionary kind of speech acts to introduce himself to the FT in expressing his language politeness. The utterances used to introduce himself by TG 12-1 is very formal and polite. This is because before introducing himself TG 12-1 also greets the FT very formally by saying “Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen”. Then, he continues to introduce himself also in a very formal way by saying “First of all, I would like to introduce myself. My name is Ari for short. My complete Balinese name is I wayan Arinata.” Utterances used by TG12-1 for introducing himself are also common expressions used by other TGs for introducing themselves in order to show their politeness and friendliness to the FT.
Thanking is one of the speech act functions, which is expressives function of speech act, used by the TGs to express their language politeness to the FT. This is in line with what (Aijmer, 1996:34-35) states that thanking is one of the functions of expressive function of speech actswhich is used to express the speaker’s psychological state towards state of affairs or a person. Furthermore, Aijmer says that positive affective speech acts can also be used to express thanking or compliments.
In relation to this, that the thanking expressions used the TG to the FT is likely more to be in the forms of compliments to the FT for coming back to visit Bali. Some examples of thanking expressions used by the TG to the FT can be presented as follows.
Extract 7 : A tourist guide is picking up the Tourist
A TG, TG 1(IWS) –Data 6 (TG 1-6), is picking up a group of FTs from Australia at Ngurah Rai Airport and take them to the Hotel in Nusa Dua Tourist Resort.
TG 1-6 : “Thank you very much for coming back again to see us in Bali. Thank you so much”.
Expressives is a speech act function which is used by TG 1-6 in saying his language politeness to the FT, that is to express thank you to the FT. The TG 1-6 thanking expression to the FT is very formal and polite, since the situation context is also very formal, that is at the FT pick up time at Ngurah Rai Airport. In this case, the TG 1-6 thanking expression is more then just giving compliments to their coming back to Bali by uttering “Thank you very much for coming back again to see us in Bali. Thank you so much.” So, the TG 1-6 thanking expressions is expressed to state or perform the TG psychological state to the FT as well as to show politeness and friendliness of the TG to the FT.
Extract 8 : A tourist guide is excorting a foreign tourist
A TG, TG2 (ISD) – Data 6 (TG 2-6), is guiding a FT from England in the tour programs of Denpasar – Batubulan – Celuk – Mas – Ubud – Kintamani.
TG 2-6 : “So, Thank you very much for joining this tour. I will give you a map.”
This is another expressions function of speech acts used by TG 2-6 in expressing his language politeness, which is to express thank you to the FT for joining the tour programs guided by the TG 2-6. Thanking utterances expressed by TG 2-6 to the FT is very formal and polite, where he says “So, thank you very much for joining this tour” considering that the TG 2-6 has just known the FT which is being guided. In this case, the TG 2-6 thanking expressions addressed to the FT functions as compliments to the FT for her participation in the tour programs handled by TG 2-6. The TG 2-6 thanking expressions is also a common expression used by other TGs to show politeness and friendliness to the FT.
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3.5 Apologising
Apologising is one of the expressive functions of speech act used by tourist guides (TG) in expressing language politeness in guiding foreign tourists (FT). Apologising, according to Holmes (1995:154) is a polite speech act used to restore social relations following an offence. Meanwhile, Aijmer (1996:81) states that an apology is a strategy used by people as a means to obtain their communicative goals, and one example of the strategy is demanding forgiveness which is expressed by using expressions of: “pardon me”, “excuse me”. Related to this, apologizing used by the TG to the FT is the the form of “excuse me” expression. Some examples of apologizing of speech act used by the TG can be presented as follows.
Extract9 : A tourist guide is guiding foreign tourists
A TG, TG 5 (IKS) – Data 6 (TG 5-6), is guiding a group of FTs (cruise) from Australia in the tour programs of Benoa Harbour – Taro Elephant Safari – Ubud.
TG 5-6: “Excuse me, this way. This way, please.”
The TG 5-6 uses expressive functions of speech act to express politeness in apologizing to the FT. TG 5-6 apologizing function of speech acts is expressed by saying “Excuse me”which is a demanding forgiveness strategy. This strategy is also commonly used by other TGs to express their apologies the FT. By this way, the TG shows politeness and friendliness manners to the FT. Extract 10 : A tourist guide is guiding a of group foreign tourists
A TG, TG 8 (INS)- Data 6 (TG 8-6), is guiding a group of FTs from Singapore in the tour programs of Luwus mongoose coffee – Bedugul.
TG 8-6 : “Excuse me, you see we have many trees down there. That’s where the animal lives”.
This is another apologizing which is expressed by using expressive function of speech acts performed by TG 8-6 in order to express language politeness, using demanding forgiveness
strategy of “excuse me” to the FT. The TG 8-6 apologising expression is also used by other TGs as to show their politeness and friendliness manners to the FT.
Based on the discussions on the speech acts used by the tourist guides (TG) to express their language politeness to the foreign tourists (FT), which are greetings, welcomings, introducings, thankings, and apologisings, some conclusions can be withdrawn from this research as follows. Firstly, greetings expressions which are used by the TG to express their language politeness are very formal and polite. These expressions indicated the politeness and friendliness manners showed by the TG to the FT. Secondly, the welcoming expressions of speech acts used by the TG to express their language politeness are also very formal and polite. The welcoming expressions are extended forms of greetings expressions, because before uttering welcoming to the FT, the TG also says welcoming to the FT. Thirdly, the introducing expressions also show that the TG are polite and friendly to the FT. Fourthly, the thankings expressions uttered by the TG to the FT are also formal and polite. The thankings expressed by the TG to the FT are in the forms of compliments to the FT. And fifthly, the apologisings expressions of speech act used by the TG to the FT are also formal and polite. The apologisings are expressed by the TG using “excuse me” as a demanding forgiveness strategy to the FT.
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