TENSES USED IN THE E-MAILS
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TENSES USED IN THE E-MAILS
Yanbin Gamaliel Sinurat
Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Udayana
Abstrak
Studi ini bertujuan untuk menganalisa penggunaan tenses pada e-mail serta melihat kalimat tidak terstruktur dalam e-mail. Data diperoleh dengan memilih secara acak lima email dari account bali6@mgholiday.com. Teori functional grammar yang dikemukakan oleh M.A.K Halliday digunakan sebagai landasan teori untuk menganalisis permasalahan yang diambil. Hasil studi menunjukkan bahwa, pertama, ditemukan enam macam tenses pada data yakni present perfect tense, past tense, past continuous tense, present continuous tense, present perfect continuous tense,and simple present.Kedua, penggunakan kata yang tidak terstruktur masih ditemukan pada data, misalnya penggunakan look forward to here from your end more business news for mutual growth.
Kata Kunci: email, M.A.K Halliday, kalimat terstruktur
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1. Background
English is the international language that is used by many people around the world and becomes an important language in many countries, even in Indonesia, especially in Bali. Nowadays, a lot successful foreigners develop their business in Bali. The amount of travel agencies, restaurants, handicrafts, until big scale exportimport companies, hotels, villas, even travel increased all around Bali. To communicate between one to another organization, they use many kinds of communication. One main communication used is e-mail.
Electronic mail, most commonly abbreviated email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages. E-mail systems are based on a store-and-forward model in which e-mail server computer systems accept, forward, deliver and store messages on behalf of users, who only need to connect to the e-mail infrastructure, typically an e-mail server, with a network-enabled device for the duration of message submission or retrieval.
In writing email, the writers, especially for those who do not speak English as his first language, have to master the knowledge of writing the English language. One basic aspect in writing is combining the idea by expressing it through sentences. Sentences in English language are not easily written since it has its own structure. Through this study, the writer would like to analyze the tenses used in e-mails as first problem and followed by analyzing the ungrammatical sentences used in the e-mail. To get reference about this issue, a thesis entitled Formal English Used in the Speech of President George W. Bush and Its Context of Situation which was proposed by Tan (2007) was used since it gave contribution in understanding the formal English. Even the previous study did not give clear explanation about ungrammatical sentence, at least the differentiation of two different types of sentences was known.
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2. Problems of The Study
Based on the background mentioned above, the writer wants to show people how to make an email in appropriate way and grammatically so the information sent in an e-mail is understandable. To give a concern relating this issue, there are two main problems discussed. The problems can be formulated as follows:
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1. What types of tenses are found in the e-mails?
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2. How the ungrammatical sentences used in emails?
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3. Aims of The Study
The aims of study in this study:
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1. To find out the tenses used in e-mails.
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2. To analyze the ungrammatical sentences used in e-mails.
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4. Research Methodology
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4.1 Data Source
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The data type used in this study is primary data. The data include any research based on the primary sources. In this research, the primary data are emails. The data were taken from the emails from one of the staff in MG Holiday Bali Tour and Travel. The email addressed for this data was bali6@mgholiday.com. There is no one having used the email in that account as the data to be analyzed. The writer found more than hundreds of emails in that account. To get the corpus data, five emails were randomly chosen.
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4.2 Method and Technique of Collecting Data
The data were collected by identifying the sentences in emails from bali6@mgholiday.com. There were five emails randomly chosen as the data. Only one until three sentences in each email were analyzed later. The data was obtained from documentary research and use note taking technique.
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4.3 Method and Technique of Analyzing Data
The data were analyzed using qualitative method. Qualitative method is used to explain characteristic of the data by giving clarification of the data. There are three steps in analyzing the data, those are:
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1. The sentence tenses were identified.
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2. It followed by explaining the sentences found based on the theory of tense. The theory used was theory of functional grammar proposed by M.A.K Halliday.
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3. The result of the analysis was presented through the descriptive method in order to make the approach easier to be grasped.
Text one indicates that, the sender of his email uses Standard English and grammatical sentence. The first grammatical sentence is in Present Perfect Tense. It can be illustrated as in sentence below.
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Example 1 and 2:
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(1) I have enjoyed my tenure here.
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(2) You have provided me during my time at the Royal Beach Seminyak Bali.
Sentence (1) indicates that, it is in Present perfect tense. The word ‘have’ is followed by the third form of verb ‘enjoyed’. It is concord with the subject I in that sentence construction. Meanwhile, the sentence (2) indicates that the sentence construction has the same pattern as in sentence (1) even though it has different subject and other word class. The word ‘provided’ is categorized as third form of verb cause it is followed by the present perfect’s marker ‘have’. Thus, the sentences are categorized as grammatical construction because they are suitable with the pattern of present perfect.
The example of ungrammatical sentence in e-mail can be elaborated as follows.
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Example 3:
For further assistance may you need with The Royal Beach Seminyak Bali, please feel free to contact: Mr I Nyoman Wira Maharjaya.
Sentence (3) indicates that, the grammatical sentence is wrong. It can be proved by the placing modal ‘may’ in front of object ‘you’. Even though, the implied meaning of this sentence construction is to inform that, the object ‘you’ may contact Mr. I Nyoman Wira Maharjaya which has been pointed.
The first tense found is Past Continuous Tense. The applying of the tense is proved by the sentence construction below.
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Example 4:
We were working professional after completion of Master of Tourism Administration Degree from Himachal Pradesh University …
Sentence construction (4) explicates that, the sender of this e-mail expresses his idea by using past continuous tense. The existence of the auxiliary ‘were’ is concord with the subject ‘we’ in that sentence. The verb ‘working’ is appropriate in this context because verb should be attached suffix –ing when it occurs after to be. The rest words in this sentence construction are the adverb of that sentence. This sentence is categorized in Past Continuous.
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Example 5:
We have taken new initiative to provide the personalized and professional Travel related services here in the Himlayan Hills.
Sentence (5) is expressed in present perfect tense. It is indicated by the using third form of verb ‘taken’. This tense is used to tell the idea of the sender in this e-mail, that he/she has already made agreement to anticipate the services quality in the travel.
In the second e-mail, there is one ungrammatical sentence. This sentence is written as below.
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Example 6:
Look forward to here from your end more business news for mutual growth.
Sentence (6) indicates that, there is usual dialect made by the speaker. Thus, he/she makes mistakes in writing. Perhaps, he intends to say ‘look forward to hear from you and more business news’ but he/she makes mistakes in constructing the sentence.
Recently, Julia Roberts and Tony Blair visited with their families.
Sentence (7) has no auxiliary verb. The sender of this e-mail uses full verb, namely; visited. Thus, there is pattern of Past tense which is applying verb in sentence construction. The figure below is the past tense formula.
Subject + VII + Object + Adverb
The third e-mail has one ungrammatical sentence. The ungrammatical sentence expressed by using jargon in tourism term. Thus, the sentence is understood by those who are working in tourism sector only. The ungrammatical sentence is expressed as below.
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Example 8:
Beating all comers from throughout all other provinces of Indonesia.
The word ‘beating’ in sentence construction (8) cannot be translated by taking the meaning in dictionary. But it should be correlated with term in tourism sector. Beating in dictionary means ‘hitting’
The fourth e-mail contains two tenses. Those tenses are simple present tense and present continuous tense. Those tenses are dominantly used. Consider the sentences below.
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Example 9:
Bali Golf and Country Club wishes to thank you for your valued support during past years.
Sentence construction (9) indicates that the applying verb ‘wishes’ is wrong. The sender of this email intends to say that, there are two participants in
this sentence will thank. The expression occurs in present time thus the verb ‘wishes’ form appears. Nevertheless, the sender of this message did not consider the application of simple present tense. Thus, he/she makes mistakes in constructing the idea in that sentence. Actually, the verb ‘wishes’ must be ‘wish’ because the subject in that sentence is plural, namely; Bali Golf and Country Club. Example 10:
We are now offering our Ancora Golf institute golf lesson charges at preferential tour operator.
Sentence (10) is expressed in present continuous tense. The verb ‘offer’ is expressed in progressive form, namely; offering. The verb ‘offer’ is changed into ‘offering’ in order to make correlation with the existence of to be ‘are’. In addition, to be ‘are’ is concord with the subject of that sentence because it is plural.
In the text of the fourth e-mail, the writer finds one ungrammatical sentence. The ungrammatical sentence is not understood well because it uses the specific term in tourism sector. Consider the sentence construction below.
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Example 11:
All golf rates will continue to include complimentary driving range balls, plus for clients
Sentence (11) contains a specific term in tourism sector, namely; driving. Lexically, the word driving means riding. It is appropriate to express an idea, for instance; riding motorcycle or running car. Nevertheless, the word driving is used in this sentence. Thus, automatically, the appropriate meaning of this word, especially in this context, understood by those who are working in tourism sector only.
The fifth e-mail is dominantly expressed by using simple present tense and Present future tense. The two sentences below are taken to be the representative sample of the application of Simple present tense in the text.
Example 12 and 13:
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(12) We hope this note finds you well.
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(13) We are pleased to confirm below reservation with confirmation number 2967469 for period august 26-29, 2011 at 1 unit of One Bedroom Villa in FS Jimbaran
Sentence constructions (12) and (13) are expressed in simple present tense. The sentence construction (12) contains full verb, namely; ‘hope’. It is in first form because the context of this sentence is in present time. It is not attached by other morpheme like –s because the subject of the sentence is in plural. Thus, the application of verb should be based o the pattern of the tense pattern. Meanwhile the sentence construction (13), to be ‘are’ is used because there is no verb. Thus, to be ‘are’ appears to link the subject ‘we’ and the complement of the sentence. Even though there is verb ‘to confirm’ in the sentence, but the main idea of the sentence is in the concept of the word ‘pleased’. Thus, the existence of the clause to confirm below reservation with confirmation number 2967469 for period august 26-29, 2011 at 1 unit of one bedroom Villa in FS Jimbaran is the supporting idea of that sentence.
In the text of the fifth e-mail, there are two ungrammatical sentences. Those sentences are expressed in specific terms in tourism sector. For the detail, let consider the sentences below.
Example 14 and 15:
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(14) Please advice the flight details.
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(15) Providing 147 unique panoramas of the idyllic sandy crescent below-Four Seasons Resort Bali at Jimbaran Bay.
Sentence construction (14) contains term Flight details. This term cannot be understood by those who are not focusing on the tourism sector. Meanwhile, there is also a mistake in exploring idea in that sentence. By considering the word ‘please’, thus the following word that is appropriate to the context should be ‘verb’ not ‘noun’. Thus, by consulting deeply about the word class of the word ‘advice’, it involves in noun. Then, the appropriate word for that position is ‘advise’. Meanwhile, sentence (15), the sender of the message uses jargon ‘the idyllic sandy crescent’ which is understood by those who are working in tourism sector only.
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6. Conclusion
After examining and explicating the data in previous chapter, the writer deduces that, e-mail text in MG Holiday Travel contains of;
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1. There are seven tenses applied in the e-mail. Those tenses are used to express the message sender’s intends becomes understandable. Those tenses are present perfect tense, past tense, past continuous tense, present continuous tense, present perfect continuous tense, and simple present.
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2. Ungrammatical sentences in the e-mail are dominant in specific terms in tourism sector. For instance; the flight details, the idyllic sandy crescent, driving range ball, and Beating. In addition, there is another ungrammatical sentence expressed by using the usual spoken language, namely; Look forward to here from your end more business news for mutual growth.
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7. Daftar Pustaka
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