Linguistic Features And Functions Of Women Language With Specific Reference To Soul Surfer Movie
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ISSN: 2302-920X
Jurnal Humanis, Fakultas Ilmu Budaya Unud
Vol 17.2 Nopember 2016: 180 - 186
Linguistic Features And Functions Of Women Language With Specific Reference To Soul Surfer Movie
Ni Made W.B. Megasari Bintang1*, Ni Wayan Sukarini2, A.A Sagung Shanti Sari Dewi3
123English Department Faculty Of Arts Udayana University
1[[email protected]] 2[[email protected]] 3
Corresponding Author
Abstrak
Telah diketahui secara umum bahwa wanita dan pria memiliki cara yang berbeda dalam berkomunikasi seolah-olah mereka menggunakan bahasa yang berbeda. Dalam bidang sintaksis, pria cenderung menggunakan kalimat langsung, sedangkan wanita lebih sering menggunakan kalimat tak langsung. Ada berbagai macam fitur-fitur bahasa yang mencirikan bahasa wanita. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengidentifikasi dan menganalisa jenis-jenis fitur tersebut beserta fungsi dari setiap jenis fitur. Jenis-jenis fitur bahasa wanita beserta fungsinya dikelompokkan dan dianalisa berdasarkan teori dari Lakoff (1973), sedangkan teori dari Dell Hymes (1974) digunakan untuk menganalisa konteks situasi dalam setiap data yang ditemukan. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa dari enam tipe fitur bahasa wanita, ada empat tipe yang ditemukan. Fungsi dari setiap tipe berbeda-beda dan sangat berkaitan erat dengan konteks situasinya.
Kata Kunci: fitur bahasa wanita, bahasa wanita, konteks
Language plays an important role in society. It functions as a means of communication to create social relationship within society. In recent years, an approach to linguistic research has been developed which focuses upon language in use within the speech community. The term is called sociolinguistics.
Sociolinguistics covers the knowledge of how people speak differently in different social contexts. It is also concerned with the identification of the social functions of language and the ways it is used to convey social meaning (Holmes, 1992:1). In sociolinguistics, language can be differentiated by the gender of the participants – men
and women. Men and women are so different in the means of communication that it is almost as if they speak separate languages.
There are many differences in men’s and women’s language. The syntactic differentiations between men and women deal with directive speech. Men often use directive phrases such as “do this now” while women will use more indirect phrases like “why don’t we do this for awhile?”. The initial study of women language is associated with Lakoff and her book entitled Language and Woman’s Place (1973) displaying the linguistic features of women as the reflection of women powerlessness. “The marginality and powerlessness of women is reflected in both the ways women are expected to speak, and the ways in which women are spoken of”.
Different from Lakoff, one perspective derives from the works of Erving Goffman (1961). According to Goffman, Power does not inhere in any particular action in itself. Rather, an act acquires meaning only as a "move" in a "game." Before addressing the "powerfulness" of any given language feature, we should determine within which linguistic game in this movie is being played.
Many researchers have explored women language to figure out its characteristics and its speech functions. However, there are still many pros and cons of women language. Thus, women language becomes a very interesting subject to be analyzed.
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1. What types of women’s linguistic features are found in Soul Surfer movie?
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2. What are the functions of those women’s linguistic features found in Soul Surfer
movie?
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1. To identify the type of women’s linguistic features found in Soul Surfer movie
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2. To analyze the functions of women’s linguistic features as represented by female
characters in Soul Surfer movie
The data of this study were taken from the dialogue between each character in the Soul Surfer movie. The data used in this study are some utterances uttered either in the same sex conversation or in different sex conversation. Soul Surfer movie is an American biographical sports film directed by Sean McNamara. The movie released in April 8, 2011. The story was based on the 2004 autobiography Soul Surfer: A True Story of Faith, Family, and Fighting to Get Back on the Board by Bethany Hamilton.
The method used in collecting the data was documentation method. Documentation method involves the study of existing documents in the form of written or electronic documents. The data obtained by watching the movie as well as reading the movie script. There are several techniques used in collecting the data. It includes; observing the utterance uttered in the movie carefully followed by observing the context of the situation, reading the movie script carefully, repeatedly and intensively while watching the movie in order to get a good understanding of the data. Other technique used was the note-taking technique to jot down the women’s linguistic features found in the data. The last step in collecting the data was selecting and noting the relevant data which were considered linguistic features of women’s language.
The study uses descriptive-qualitative method in analyzing the data. Qualitative means that the data were analyzed by describing specific situation or phenomenon found in the movie in order to get better understanding of some aspects in women’s language. Then, the result described descriptively.
The types and functions of women linguistic features theory by Lakoff (1973) was used to analyze the types and functions of women linguistic features found in the data. The SPEAKING model theory by Hymes (1974) was also used to analyze the context of situation to support the analysis of the function of women linguistic feature.
There are four types of women linguistic features found in the Soul Surfer movie. The analysis of one data described as follow.
Bethany : Go ahead, tell me how everything’s going to be okay
Tom : Yeah, that’s me. Mister jump-right-in-and-fix-it.
If I could just keep my mouth shut for once.
Bethany : I’m done, aren’t I?
There are two participants involved in this conversation – Bethany and Tom. The conversation takes place at the beach when Bethany was alone and sad due to her disability to win the competition with one arm. Her father, Tom then tried to cheer her up by accompanying her. This triggered the conversation above when Bethany uttered I’m done, aren’t I?. Robin Lakoff in her book Language and Woman Place 1973 explained that the characteristics of a tag question is, it is a midway between an outright statement and a yes no question. It is less assertive than a statement yet more confident than a question. A tag question has many purposes depending on the context of the situation. One of them is to discuss personal feeling or opinions. Departing from this theory, it can be concluded that Bethany’s utterance I’m done, aren’t I? can be categorized as a tag question in which it shows us that Bethany used kind of question that is a midway between a statement and a question. In addition, the purpose of her utterance is to discuss her personal feeling. She wanted to tell her father that she is tired of her disability and does not want to compete in the surf competition again. Thus, according to Lakoff theory, Bethany’s utterance above has the characteristic of women’s linguistic features as part of syntactical feature – tag question.
Ethnography of SPEAKING:
Setting and Scene : This conversation takes place at the surfing in the beach at noon.
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ISSN: 2302-920X Jurnal Humanis, Fakultas Ilmu Budaya Unud Vol 17.2 Nopember 2016: 180 - 186 | |
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Participants |
: There are two participants involve in this conversation; Bethany and her father - Tom. |
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Ends |
: The purpose of Bethany’s utterance is to show her feeling that she felt so frustrated. |
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Act Sequence |
: Bethany lost in the competition made her feel like she is a failure that she will not surf again. |
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Key |
: Bethany seems sad when she uttered her utterance |
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Instrumentalities |
: The conversation above is delivered in totally oral speech. |
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Norms |
: As a daughter, Bethany supposed to talk politely to her father. |
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Genre |
: This conversation is an authentic conversation as how Bethany confessed her sadness by saying that she will not surf again. |
The SPEAKING model by Dell Hymes above shows that there are two participants in the conversation; Bethany and Tom. They have a very close relationship as a father and daughter. The conversation above is caused by Bethany’s sadness and depression that she suffered after her lost in the surf competition. She felt frustrated and lost her hope to become a professional surfer as she only has one arm. Thus she uttered “I’m done, aren’t I?”. As it has been explained above, this utterance can be categorized as a tag question in which it is a midway between an outright statement and a yes- no question. It is also less assertive than a statement, but more confident than a question. Lakoff in her book Language and Woman Place 1973 mentioned some purposes of tag questions. One of those purposes is to discuss personal feelings or opinions. In this context, this purpose is suitable with the context above. Bethany uttered “I’m done, aren’t I?” shows implicitly that she is frustrated and sad. This utterance did not seek for confirmation from the addressee or to show her hesitant.
There are four of six types of women’s linguistic features found in the Soul Surfer movie. They are: particles, evaluative adjectives, tag-questions, politeness in requests and orders. The result of the analysis of the study shows that Lakoff theory can mostly be applied in the data. In the syntactical feature – politeness in requests and orders, the Lakoff’s theory was not applied well as how the analysis shows that man and woman have the same chance in using syntactical feature – politeness in requests and orders.
Some functions of women’s linguistic features are found in the data. Functions of each type of the features closely related to the context in which it is used. Each type of women’s linguistic features found in the movie displays different functions and reasons.
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