ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN THE MOVIE OF “MY NAME IS KHAN”
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ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN THE MOVIE OF
“MY NAME IS KHAN”
By
SRIE PUSPITASARI
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT
FACULTY OF LETTERS UDAYANA UNIVERSITY
Abstrak
Dalam komunikasi sehari-hari, seseorang tidak hanya menggunakan sebuah ungkapan untuk mengungkapkan sesuatu tetapi juga melakukan sesuatu. Suatu ungkapan dapat mengandung sebuah tindakan seperti menyuruh, berjanji, berterimakasih, dll. Oleh karena itu, diperlukan adanya suatu interpretasi dan pemah aman diantara penutur dan petutur guna menangkap pesan yang terkandung dalam sebuah ungkapan. Sehubungan dengan hal tersebut, teori tindak tutur yang dikemukakan oleh Austin dan dikembangkan oleh Searle berusaha untuk memberikan suatu pemahaman tentang tindak tutur sebuah ungkapan. Terdapat dua tujuan dalam penelitian, untuk mengklasifikasikan jenis-jenis tindak ilokusi dan menjelaskan fungsi dari jenis-jenis tindak ilokusi tersebut melalui ungkapan-ungkapan yang terdapat di dalam film My Name is Khan.
Kata kunci: ungkapan, jenis, fungsi
In terms of communication, there are two kinds of meaning, sentence meaning called sense and utterance meaning called the force of the utterance (Levinson, 1983:18). The first one is the meaning of what has been said directly by the speaker but the other one is another meaning or sometimes called intended meaning. It cannot be denied that a certain communication must involve the context where the conversation takes place. Besides, the force in the utterance of the speaker will have meaning which can be interpreted variously by the hearer. This kind of situation when the communication involves both the language and the context belongs to pragmatics - the study of language and its context.
Austin (1962) proposed the theory of speech acts and developed by Searle (1979) in which he tried to provide the classification of illocutionary acts including assertive, expressive, directive, commissive, and declarations acts which further become the focus of this study as well as the functions of those types through the utterances in the movie of My Name is Khan.
Based on the background explained above, there are two problems formulated as follows:
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1. What types of illocutionary acts are found in the movie of My Name is Khan?
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2. What are the functions of those illocutionary acts in the movie of My Name is Khan?
Related to the problems above, the aims of the study are as follows:
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1. To classify and to describe the utterances in the dialogue found in the movie entitled My Name is Khan into the types of illocutionary act.
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2. To explain the function of those illocutionary acts found in the movie of My Name is Khan.
The data of this study were taken from the form of spoken languagefrom the utterances in the movie of My Name is Khan downloaded from the internet. This movie is a famous one since it has religious background, especially for Moslem. Since the movie used two different languages, Indian and English, only the utterances in English were taken from the movie. It was chosen since it is relevant and there might be a lot of utterances during the movie that can be taken as the data of this study.
This study is a library research and used the method of observation. Therefore, there were no respondents or informants involved in this study. The first step is the movie My Name is Khanwas downloaded from the internet. Second, the movie was
continually watched to ensure which conversation in the movie used English and the ones used Indian. Third, the whole conversations which used English were written down. Fourth, the related utterances were written down and classified into five types of illocutionary acts including assertive, directive, expressive, commissive, and declarations acts. Fifth, the related context of situation that involved in the collected utterance was written down.
The methods used were qualitative and descriptive which analyzed based on the theory of the types of illocutionary acts proposed by Searle (1979) which provided five types of illocutionary acts and the theory of ethnography communication proposed by Hymes (1972) abbreviated to SPEAKING to refer Setting and scene, Participant, End, Act sequence, Key, Instrumentalities, Norm, and Genre.
Rizvan Khan : “Mehnaz Herbal Beauty Products. All of them.
Mehnaz Herbal Beauty Products will make you glow like a newly-wed bride.”
A woman : “I'm divorced."
Rizvan Khan : “We have nothing for the newly-divorced.”
The point of assertive class is to commit the speaker to something’s being the case, to the truth of the expressed proposition. There are several conditions underlying the assertive class. One of them is the preparatory condition of the assertive class, that is,the S has evidence (reason, etc) for the truth of P. In the same way, inthe dialogue the woman has evidence for the truth that she is divorced which resulted in her complaintofRizvan’s statement.
Basically, there are several functions of the assertive acts namely informing and complaining. However, looking at several context of situation involved in this conversation which contains the intended meaning of the utterance, it shows that the utterance contains the function of complaining. Regarding to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, to complain is to say that one is dissatisfied or unhappy. The conversation takes place in the saloon between Rizvan and the woman where Rizvan is introducing a new product to the woman. It was situated in informal occasion. In
that moment, the woman tried to state the utterance to complainofRizvan’s statement about the product which is not suitable to her. In addition, Rizvan at that time is explaining the product to the wrong person. Therefore, she used flat tone to support the making of the complaint.
: “Oh my God, my knee is bleeding.”
: “I'm sorry, but I can't repair your knee.
: “But can you at least help me please.
: “Help? Yes, I can do that”
:”Yes, thanks.”
The illocutionary point of directive act consists of the fact that they are attempts (varying degrees) by the speaker to get hearer to do something. Besides, from the essential condition, it is counted as an attempt to get the hearer to do something. In the same way, the speaker, Joel tried to get the hearer, in this case,Rizvan to do something that is helping him from the accident and his utterance counted as an attempt to get Rizvan to help him.
According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, beg is to ask for something as a gift or as charity especially ask it earnestly or humbly. It is supported by several context of situation involved in the conversation which contains the intended meaning of the utterance to show the function of begging. The conversation took place at the bus stop especially in the evening when Rizvan was waiting the bus alone. It is between Rizvan and Joel, who had fell down from his bike and got bleeding. He humbly stated the utterance in which he tried to get Rizvan to help him.
: “Please, please. Please cut my hair, Please.
: “Yeah. And I am dying to cut your hair. “.
: “Now cut my hair”
: “But maybe later?”
The point of the commissive acts is to commit the speaker (in varying degrees) to some future course of action, for instance promising, offering, etc. The direction of fit is world to word as in directive acts but it is the future action of the speaker not the hearer. In addition, there are several conditions underlying this class. The first is the
propositional content in which the utterance contains the future action of the speaker. The second is the preparatory condition in which the hearer wants the speaker to perform an action. Therefore, in the same way, the utterance uttered by the speaker contains the future action in which she will cut Rizvan’s hair later after she has finished handling the customer. It is also supported by the preparatory condition in which Rizvan want Mandira to cut his hair.
The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary states that verb promise has a meaning to assure somebody that one will give or do or not do something. The conversation above involved several context of situation in which it contains the intended meaning of the utterance to conclude the function of the illocutionary acts in it. The conversation took place in the saloon when Mandira was handling a customer. In the meantime, Rizvan asked her to cut his hair. Unfortunately, she could not do that since she was still handling a customer. Therefore,she promised him to do it later as soon as she finished handling the customer.
Police staff : “It's a big catch, Rizvan. You are free to go
now. You are free.”
Rizvan Khan : “Okay”
The illocutionary point of this class is to express the psychological state, for example, thanking, apologizing, congratulating, etc. there is no direction of fit. In performing the expressive acts, the speaker is neither trying to get the world to match the words nor the words to match the world, rather the truth is presupposed. The preparatory condition of this class is an event is the hearer’s interest and the speaker believes that the event is in the hearer’s interest. In addition, the sincerity condition of expressive acts is the speaker is pleased at the event (the hearer’s). In the same way, the speaker, the police staff does believe that the event happened at the time is Rizvan’s interest since he could get free from the jail to meet the president. Besides, the speaker is pleased at the event; therefore, she expresses it through the utterance.
The verb congratulate, according to the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary is to tell somebody that one is pleased about his good fortune or achievements. It is
supported by the context of situation involved in the conversation. The dialogue took
place in the police office where Rizvan was arrested because he was accused of being a terrorist who intended to endanger the President of the USA. It is between the police staff and Rizvan in which the police wanted to congratulateRizvanfor he could get free now since he had helped the police to catch the elder of the terrorist. The
police in expressing it makes her voice hearted and says it twice to emphasize that she
is really happy for that.
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5.5 Declarations
President USA Rizvan Khan President USA Rizvan Khan
President USA Rizvan Khan President USA Mandira Rizvan Khan President USA
: “Your name is Khan.”
: “Yes.”
: “And you're not a terrorist.”
: “Oh no, no I'm not a terrorist. No. And this is my son. He.he wasn't a terrorist either. My son.
: “I know.”
: “You know.”
: “I'm so sorry for your loss.”
: “Yeah, thank you.”
: “He's sorry.”
: “All of us share this world before brief moment in time. And I'm honored to share the time of Rizvan Khan. Rizvan has reminded us that for fixing the world, there is no difference of race and religion.”
Those illocutionary acts which effect immediately changes in the institutional state of affairs are called declarations for example, declaring, christening, pronouncing, excommunicating, etc. Besides, there will be several conditions underlying this class. The essential condition of declarations acts is that it is counted as bringing about immediate changes to the institutional state of affairs. In addition, the preparatory condition of this class is that the speaker’s authority in such institution to lay down decision successfully. In the same way, the decision of the President of the USA to declare that Rizvan and other Moslem in the USA are not terrorists successfully performed since the speaker who state it is the one who has an authority in a country especially in the USA. It also support by the immediate changes toward how the American subjected the Moslem.
The Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary defines the verb declare, has a meaning to announce something especially in formal way. It is supported by the context of situation involved in the conversation such as the setting and scene, participants, ends, act sequence, key, and genre. The utterance belongs to the kind of speech since it was stated in the formal situation and in front of thousands of American citizens. It took place between Mandira, Rizvan Khan, and the President of the USA. Before the speech, the president has got an earful from the mass media about Rizvan, a Moslem who had done many things to help the government of the USA. The president implicitly declared that Rizvan Khan and other Moslem in the USA are not terrorists by heartedly saying the name of Rizvan Khan to the all of the citizens.
Based on the analysis there are two points that can be concluded. The first, the analysis of the illocutionary acts based on the theory proposed by Searle (1979) about the taxonomy of illocutionary acts, there are five types of illocutionary acts found in the movie of My Name is Khan including assertive act, directive act, commissive act, expressive act, and declaration act. The second is the analysis of the function of those five types based on the theory of ethnography communication proposed by Hymes (1972). From the analysis, there are several functions foundfor those five types namely complaining for the assertive acts, begging for the directive acts, promising for the commissive acts, congratulating for the expressive acts, and declaring for the declarations acts.
Austin, J.L., 1962.How to Do the Things with Words,Oxford University Press, New York.
Hornby, AS., 2005. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, fourth edition, Oxford University Press, Oxford.
Hymes.D., 1972.“Toward Ethnography of Communication: The Analysis of Communication Events”. In Giglioli 1972:22-24.
Schiffrin, Deborah., 1994. Approach to Discourse,Blackwell, Cambridge.
Searle, J.R., 1969. Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Languages, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Searle, J.R., 1979. Expression and Meaning: Studies in Theory of Speech Acts,Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
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