Commissive And Expressive Illocutionary Acts And Their Intended Meanings In Steel’s The Cottage
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ISSN: 2302-920X
Jurnal Humanis, Fakultas Ilmu Budaya Unud
Vol 16.3 September 2016: 7 - 14
Commissive And Expressive Illocutionary Acts And Their Intended Meanings In Steel’s The Cottage
Anak Agung Putu Rina Dewi1*, I Made Rajeg2, I Made Netra3 123English Department Faculty Of Arts Udayana University 1[[email protected]] 2[[email protected]] 3[[email protected]] *
Corresponding Author
Abstract
Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui dan menjabarkan tipe – tipe tindak ilokusi kategori commissive dan makna di balik tindak ilokusi tersebut. Pemaknaan berpatokan pada konteks situasi yang digunakan dalam novel The Cottage karya anielle Steel, yang diterbitkan tahun 2002. Dialog dalam novel adalah populasi data penelitian ini. Hasil dari analisis menunjukan bahwa dalam novel The Cottage digunakan beberapa tipe Commissive dan Expressive, yakni: memberikan salam, menawarkan, berjanji, mengancam, mencegah seseorang melakukan sesuatu, ekspresi atas ketidaksukaan terhadap sikap seseorang, mengharapkan, berterima kasih, dan meminta maaf. Makna tindak ilokusi yang ditemukan adalah memohon, menasihati, menawarkan, mengancam, menyadarkan, memberikan selamat, dan meminta maaf.
Kata kunci : tindak ilokusi, commissive, expressive
Language is such an essential feature of human life which helps human live socially in verbal and non-verbal communication. Through language, human may share ideas and information as intended. Frequently, in the intention of the speakers to utter a sentence, or known as speakers’ meaning, there might be more than one meaning conveyed. Speakers also usually perform acts or forces in their utterances. These kinds of performed action are called speech act. According to Austin (1962), speech act is the act of making an utterance in which the speakers are performing a certain kind of acts, such as: giving, asking, questioning, promising, offering, etc. Austin (1962) also classified speech act into 3 levels : (i) locutionary act or the act of saying something, (ii) illocutionary act or an act the speakers intend to do something by producing an
utterance, and (iii) perlocutionary act or the act done by the hearers affected by what the speakers have said. Illocutionary act is considered the core of speech acts. It is closely related ro the speakers’ intention. It is the act of making a statement, offer, promise, etc. This act can be classified into 5 categories according to Searle (1979), namely, assertive, directive, commissive, declaration, and expressive. This study focuses on two kinds of illocutionary acts. They are commissive and expressive illocutionary acts. These levels were chosen, because from the data source, they are used the most in accordance with the theme of the story, romance. Besides, this study is also aimed to find out how the context of situation supports to reveal the intended meanings. It is also considered necessary to point out the response of the hearer after the illocutionary acts are uttered to know how successful the acts are.
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1. What types of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts are used in the novel?
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2. What are the intended meanings of each type of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts used in the novel The Cottage, and how the context of situation supported the meaning of each illocutionary acts?
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1. To identify the types of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts used in The Cottage.
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2. To analyze the intended meanings of each type of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts used in the novel The Cottage, and investigate how the context of situation support the meaning of each illocutionary acts.
The data were taken from a novel, The Cottage by Danielle Steel published in 2002. The story is about Cooper Winslow, a star of the silver screen for decades, who is in for a major surprise. He is broken. And with no major roles coming his way, Coop is faced with the heartbreaking prospect of selling his beloved home of forty years, or at least, renting out the gatehouse and part of the main house. A huge blows to Coop; his whose debonair attitude allows him to escape reality much of the time. His new tenants, Mark Friedman and
Jimmy O'Connor, are busy coping with problems of their own. Mark's wife of sixteen years just walked out, and Jimmy recently lost his own wife to a devastating illness. However, everything changes when Mark's teenage son and daughter move in. Suddenly, The Cottage is transformed with music blasting from every corner, teenagers on skateboards crashing into vintage cars, and a never-ending parade of young starlets streaming in and out to visit Coop.
Documentation method was applied to collect the data, starting by reading all chapters thoroughly, noting down the samples, and selecting them. Furthermore, there was no respondent or informant involved in this research since the data were taken from the novel. The collected data were then analyzed using the theory of classification of speech act by Searle (1979). They are assertive, directive, commissive, expressive, and declaration. The analysis of this study is also supported by the theory of context of situation by Halliday consisting of field of discourse, tenor of discourse, and mode of discourse.
After the data were collected, it was followed by method and technique of analyzing. The analysis was presented by showing the data in the form of sentences. The utterances which were analyzed were in bold and italic types.
There were some steps that were followed in analyzing the data :
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1. Identify the types of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts within the novel and the context of situation that influenced the meanings of illocutionary acts at the same time while reading the novel. Each time the data found, it was noted down with the page numbers.
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2. When the identification of each type of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts in the novel done, the data then classified by its types based on the theory of classification of illocutionary acts by Searle (1979). Then, the intended meanings of each type of illocutionary acts used within the novel were also explained.
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3. Then, it was continued by analyzing the theory of context of situation, proposed by Halliday (1989), in affecting the intended meanings in a particular situation was explained.
Searle (1979 : 14) conveys that “commisives are those illocutionary acts whose point is to commit the speaker to some future course of action”. It also has a goal to commit the speaker to carry out action or bring about some states of affairs. The kinds of actions which belong to this category are promising, threatening, intending, vowing to do or refraining from doing something.
(CU-40/47) I’ll go out and scrub floors myself to keep you
Liz : No, he isn’t Coop… but I’m leaving….”
Coop : “Don’t be silly. I would rather sell The Cottage than have you leave, Liz. I’ll go out and scrub floors myself to keep you”
Liz : “It’s not that….. I’m getting married, Coop.”
The Analysis of the Illocutionary Act
Liz just told Coop that she was planning to leave, not because Abe had fired her or so, but because she was getting married. It was a huge slap for Coop that he had to face the reality that some parts of his house had to rent and now the only person he got would leave him. The circumstance is not only tough for Coop, but also Liz. She did not want to let Coop stand by himself in facing the problems.
This utterance (CU-40/47) becomes part of the commisive because it commits the speaker to some future course of action also it has a goal to commit the speaker to carry out action or bring about some states of affairs. The locutionary act is that Coop will scrub the floors himself to keep Liz. The illocutionary act of the utterance is to refrain to do something, in this case, Coop refrained Liz to leave so he would not be alone. He thought she was silly to leave him all alone.
Refraining is one of 4 kinds of actions that are categorized as commissive. As a result of the illocutionary act uttered by the speaker, Coop, Liz as the hearer gives
response that she was going to be married which can be interpreted that she can no longer stay.
(EU-61/61) “Hello, Liz. Is he here?”
Liz : “Hello, Abe. It’s nice to see you.”
Abe : “Hello, Liz. Is he here?”
Liz : “Not yet. But he’ll be back any minute. He had a meeting about a lead part”.
The Analysis of the Illocutionary Act
This could be easily categorized as the expressive illocutionary act that this is the act of wishing which is performed by asking “Hello, Liz. Is he here?” Abe was hoping that Coop was there because he desperately had to talk to Coop, and the act of wishing belongs to expressive. It is also because the utterance expresses psychological states and or statement of the speaker’s feeling that caused something by what the speaker or hearer does but still it was about the speaker’s experience.
The locutionary act of the utterance is asking Liz whether Coop was there or not. The illocutionary act is wishing that Coop was there so Abe can talk directly to Coop about the problem. The perlocutionary act that Liz answered that Coop was not there yet that he had a meeting about a lead part.
Liz : No, he isn’t Coop… but I’m leaving….”
Coop : “Don’t be silly. I would rather sell The Cottage than have you leave, Liz. I’ll go out and scrub floors myself to keep you”
Liz : “It’s not that….. I’m getting married, Coop.”
This conversation happened in the library of Cooper Winslow’s house, The Cottage. The house was spectacular, huge, decorated with expensive things, and supported by complete facilities that would spoil people who live in.
Cooper Winslow and Liz were involved in the conversation. Liz as his assistant surprisingly told Coop that she would like to resign because she was getting married. It was not an easy decision to make, but she had to or she would lose her chance to have a family. Coop treated Liz liked his own sister, liked his own family, and he felt she is the only that he got. Knowing that Liz planning to leave to marry her fiancée he was sad; he thought he would be alone from then and his life was going to be a mess because Liz always helped him manage his life.
The utterance is in Direct – Non Literal form presented by Coop to ask Liz for not leaving him that the mode of the sentence is appropriate with the purpose of the speech – asking Liz to stay -, but the meaning of the words is different from the intended meaning of the speaker, for instance, by saying that it was silly that she planned to leave Coop alone and he said that he would scrub the floor only to have her stay.
In accordance with the context of situation explained earlier, the intended meaning here is begging Liz to stay. He felt like she was the only person he got and without her, his life was going to be even tougher than before.
(EU-61/61) “Hello, Liz. Is he here?”
Liz : “Hello, Abe. It’s nice to see you.”
Abe : “Hello, Liz. Is he here?”
Liz : “Not yet. But he’ll be back any minute. He had a meeting about a lead part”.
This conversation happens in the library of Cooper Winslow’s house, The Cottage. The house was spectacular, huge, decorated with expensive things, and supported by complete facilities that would spoil people who lived in.
Liz and Abe were involved in the conversation. Liz as Coop secretary had greeted Abe, and in return Abe asked where Coop was. They both were working for
Coop, but Liz was being too loyal that she secretly had crush on Coop so she attempted to suit him in every situation and did not want him to be unpleased. Unlike Liz, Abe was a-straight-to-the-point person that he said what actually happened without making things up.
The utterance is presented in Direct – Literal form that in uttering it the mode of speech is the same as the meaning of the words or the sentence when it was uttered.
Seen from the analysis of the context of the situation, the intended meaning of the utterance is hoping that Coop is home because it was often that when they had appointment Coop was away or would come home late but actually their meeting was crucial.
6 CONCLUSION
In relation to the discussion presented above, there are two conclusions that can be summarized related to the problems discussed.
In terms of types, all types of commissive and expressive illocutionary acts are found in novel The Cottage by Danielle Steel published in 2002, they are: promising, offering, intending, refraining (commissive), and thanking, congratulating, apologizing, wishing, greeting, and attitude (expressive). Commisive is focused on commiting to so some future course of action, and expressive shows the speaker’s feeling and experience.
Based on the context of situation, the intended meanings found are advising, begging, offering, threatening, greeting, hoping, realizing, apologizing, and congratulating.
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