Positive Politeness Strategies in James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode Talkshow
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DOI: 10.24843/JH.2018.v22.i03.p31 ISSN: 2302-920X
Jurnal Humanis, Fakultas Ilmu Budaya Unud
Vol 22.3 Agustus 2018: 781-785
Positive Politeness Strategies in James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode Talkshow
Ni Wayan Ika Mahayani1*, Ni Ketut Sri Rahayuni2 [12]English Department - Faculty of Arts - Udayana University 1[[email protected]] 2[[email protected]] *Corresponding Author
Abstract
This undergraduate thesis entitled “Positive Politeness Strategies in James Cordenʼs Interview on Recode Decode Talk-showˮ is interesting to be discussed as an object analysis due to the application of positive politeness strategies used in a communication. The study aims to analyze the types of positive politeness strategies used in James Cordenʼs Interview on Recode Decode Talk-show and to identify the language function of the applications of those positive politeness strategies. The data were taken from the transcript of the conversation in the talk-show. The statements which were used as the data source were the statements of the conversation which were applied the positive politeness strategy. The data that have been collected were classified according to the theory of Brown and Levinson (1978) about politeness strategy to analyze the positive politeness strategies in the conversation of the talk-showʼs transcripts. Furthermore, the language functions proposed by Tillit and Bruder (1985) is also used to identify the functions of the choice of those positive politeness strategies. Based on the theory mentioned above, there were seven strategies of positive politeness strategies found in this talk-show, those are: Notice, attend to H (his interest, wants, needs, goods), Exaggerate (interest, approval, sympathy with H), Seek agreement, Avoid disagreement, Joke, Include both S and H in the activity, and Give (or ask for) reasons.
Keywords: politeness, positive politeness, talk-show
Abstrak
Skripsi yang berjudul “Positive Politeness Strategies in James Cordenʼs Interview on Recode Decode Talk-showˮ menarik untuk didiskusikan sebagai objek analisis karena penggunaan dari strategi kesopanan positif yang digunakan dalam komunikasi. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis tipe – tipe dari strategi kesopanan positif yang digunakan pada saat mewawancara James Corden di acara Recode Decode Talkshow dan untuk mengindentifikasi fungsi bahasa dari penggunaan strategi kesopanan positif tersebut. Data dalam penelitian ini diperoleh dari transkripsi percakapan talkshow tersebut. Pernyataan – pernyataan yang digunakan sebagai sumber data adalah pernyataan – pernyataan didalam percakapan yang menggunakan strategi kesopanan positif. Data – data yang telah dikoleksi tersebut diklasifikan menurut teori dari Brown dan Levinson (1987) tentang strategi kesopanan untuk menganalisis strategi kesopanan positif dalam transkripsi talk-show tersebut. Berdasarkan teori yang telah disebutkan diatas, ada tujuh strategi kesopanan positif yang ditemukan dalam talk-show ini, antara lain: Notice, attend to H (his interest, wants, needs, goods), Exaggerate (interest,
approval, sympathy with H), Seek agreement, Avoid disagreement, Joke, Include both S and H in the activity, and Give (or ask for) reasons.
Kata kunci: kesopanan, kesopanan positif, talk-show
Communication is considered important to everyday life as a part of social life. In doing a communication, one thing that cannot be forgotten is how to maintain a good relationship to others in order not to emerge a sort of conflicts, offensiveness, etc. Hence, in order to do a good and proper communication, the answer is politeness.
It is the best way to express good manners and show our social values to others to make a conversation run well and go smoothly. As Brown and Levinson (1987) stated, politeness strategy is a strategy used to formulate messages in order to save the hearer’s positive face when there are facethreatening acts. Moreover, everyone wants to be understood and not to be disturbed by others. They do not want to lose their “face” during a communication. Loosing face means the assessment of being embarrassed, humiliated or disappointed. “Face” means something that is emotionally invested, and that can be lost, maintained, enhanced, and constantly attended in a communication. It is a kind of respect that individual has for their face-maintaining. Thus, it is necessary to identify the use of politeness strategies and their functions in social communication because considering which is polite or not can help us to understand which communications are considered polite or not to be able to speak politely.
The use of politeness strategy is in any area of communication such as: a real life conversation, movies, interview, talk-show, etc. A talk-show is selected as the data of this study
because the use of politeness strategies applied in the talk-show. Based on the theory of politeness strategy stated by Brown and Levinson (1987), there are four main types of politeness strategy, such as: bald on-record, negative politeness, positive politeness, and off-record.
Moreover, this study would analyze the positive politeness strategies in James Corden’s interview on Recode Decode talk-show’s transcription episode October 20th 2016, when the host, Kara Swisher was interviewing a famous television presenter, James Corden and identify the language functions based on the theory proposed by Tillit and Bruder (1985) about language functions.
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a. What types of positive politeness strategies applied in the James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode talk-show’s transcription?
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b. What are the language functions of the positive politeness strategies used in the James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode talk-show’s transcription?
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a. To analyze the types of positive politeness strategies applied in the James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode talk-show’s transcription.
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b. To identify the language functions of positive politeness strategies used in the James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode talkshow’s transcription.
In this writing, the research method consists of data source, method and technique of collecting data, method and technique of analyzing data, and method and technique of presenting the analysis.
Both of the spoken data (the podcast of the talk-show) and the written data (the transcription of the talk-show) are available in the official website of Recode Decode talk-show, www.recode.net. However, only the transcription is used as the data. The data that would be analyzed is a talkshow episode October 20th 2016 when the host of Recode Decode, Kara Swisher was interviewing a famous television presenter, James Corden.
The talk-show is selected as the data in this study in order to see the types of positive politeness strategies used in interaction between the host and the guest.
Observation method is applied in collecting the data of this study. The data were collected by observing the transcription of the talk-show through note-taking technique in order to collect the data by finding and note which utterances were applied positive politeness strategies.
The data that have been collected would be analyzed using qualitative method because it deals with explanations. The data that have been collected must express positive politeness strategies uttered by the host and also the guest. The analysis would be started by categorizing the data based
on the fifteen positive politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987). Then, the data would be analyzed descriptively. The next step is identifying the functions of the use those positive politeness strategies based on the theory of language functions stated by Tillit and Bruder (1985).
In the following section, the analysis of this study is given.
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5.1 Analysis of Positive Politeness Strategies in James Corden’s Interview on Recode Decode
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A. Strategy 1 – Notice, attend to H (his interest, wants, needs, goods)
The statement “You have a hugely varied background in theater and on the BBC and TV shows and things like that.ˮ shows that Kara Swisher wants to take notice of aspects of James Corden’s condition (noticeable changes, remarkable possessions, anything which looks as though H would want S to notice and approve of it). In this case, Kara’s utterance shows the manner of maintaining and satisfying James’s wants or interests. Therefore, James will feel comfortable to talk to Kara.
The statement which said by the host, Kara Swisher “Iʼm so thrilled to have you!ˮ is using exaggerate strategy (interest, approval, sympathy with H). In this case, Kara applies this strategy to intensify her interest to James because their relation when saying that statement is not too close yet, so she tries to make James feels more comfortable to talk to her and the talkshow would run well.
The statement which applies seek agreement is the statement said by the host, Kara Swisher “Great musical — Zero Mostel was in the original.ˮ On the statement above, Kara claims common ground with James to seek ways in which James is possible to agree with her. In this case, Kara asks for approval to James through the raising tone of ‘safe topic’ that shows Kara allows James to give his agreement about what she has said previously.
The host, Kara Swisher and the guest, James Corden are talking about the number of countries in Amazon. James argues that it is less than 20, but Kara disagrees to James’s opinion by saying “I donʼt know. I donʼt actually know. Itʼs probably more than 20.ˮ She disagrees to James’s opinion by applying avoid disagreement on Hedging Opinion. Kara gently refuses James’s statement. She chooses to be vague about her own opinion, so as not to be seen that she disagrees James’s statement.
The statement that has been said by the host, Kara Swisher “I called it Kara-oke because my name is Kara.” is applied joke to put the guest, James Corden at ‘ease’. In the statement above, Kara tries to joke with James.
On the statement which said by the host, Kara Swisher above “So weʼre going to talk tech in a minute, but letʼs talk a little bit about you.” is applied include both S and H in the activity which shown by the form “letʼsˮ and “weʼre going toˮ. Those forms are actually an inclusive ‘we’ form that
actually means ‘you’ and call upon the cooperative assumptions and thereby redress FTAs to soften her request.
On the statement which said by the host, Kara Swisher “Why are you worried about delivery drones?ˮ, it can be seen that Kara applies give (or ask for) reasons strategy. It is indicated by the use of the word “whyˮ on the statement. Kara tries to include the guest, James Corden in an activity for Kara to give reason as to why she wants what she wants.
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5. 1 Analysis of Language Functions in James Corden’s Interview on Record Decode Talk-show
The statement said by the host, Kara Swisher “You have a hugely varied background in theater and on the BBC and TV shows and things like that.ˮ has a function to introduce and as an address system that consists of giving information about the person being introduced.
On the statement “Whatʼs interesting.” said by Kara means that what has been said by James is interesting according to Kara. In this case, Kara shows her interest to James by giving James a compliment. The statement indicates that Kara likes some aspect of James.
The statement said by the host, Kara Swisher “Right, but theyʼre starting to.ˮ has purpose to disagree in indirect way to the guest. In this case, Kara gently refuses James’s statement by pretending to agree, although she actually does not agree to James’s
statement by taking an agreement to minimize the threat of James’s positive face.
On the statement which said by the host, Kara Swisher above “So weʼre going to talk tech in a minute, but letʼs talk a little bit about you.”, is an indirect way in getting information from the guest, James Corden. It is indicated by the form “letʼsˮ which actually an inclusive ‘we’ form that is really means ‘you’ and call upon the cooperative assumptions and thereby redress FTAs to soften her request. In this case, Kara actually makes a request and asks for information to James about tech and to talk a little bit about himself.
In the talk-show there were seven strategies of positive politeness strategies proposed by Brown and Levinson (1978) and four language functions of the use of those strategies that can be found in the talk-show are four language functions according to Tillit and Bruder (1985) are used.
From what has been mentioned above, it can be concluded that Positive Politeness Strategies are applied in talkshow to make the relation of the guest and host become closer, so they would be more convenient and comfortable in talking and sharing information.
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