76 The writer had some justification for choosing The Inbetweeners as the
data source. First, the major of the conversations in it were done by adolescent characters especially male. Once, Coleman 2012 suggests that male teenagers
have more tendencies to use slang to impress the girl. Besides, Anderson and Trudgill 1990 and Allen 1998 suggest that males often employ slang to covert
prestige because using slang is regarded by having manly and strong qualities as cited in Matiello, 2008. Second, almost all situations in it happen in informal
spoken environment and it is in line with that Mattiello 2008 who that slang occurs in unofficial situation.
C. Instuments and Data Gathering Technique
In this research, the researcher was the main instrument to gather the data. As stated by Cresswell 2005, the researcher functioned as the primary
instrument to collect the data in the qualitative study. This is in line with Merriam
‟s 2002 statement that the researcher is the key for the data elicitation because the researcher is the one who collect the data in the qualitative inquiry.
The writer gathered the data from the existed transcription of the first season of The Inbetweeners television series. The data source has been generated
in Springfield website http:www.springfieldspringfield.co.uk
. The writer downloaded the existed transcript in the website because of the practicality and
accessibility. Thus, the writer did not need to transcribe the conversation laid in The Inbetweeners. The writer found it was impractical and inefficient if all
episodes in the first season had to be watched and transcribed one by one by. In
77 addition, it is the most accessible source, which is complete and inexpensive.
However, to keep the transcript reliability, the writer checked their accuracy by reading the transcript and re-watching the TV series.
This study used protocols to support the human instruments in the data gathering process. The writer also applied coding technique to complete the table.
According to Miles and Huberman 1994, coding is a process of giving tags or labels about the information of the data during the study. Thus, the writer applied
process codes in this study to mark the process of word-formation and slang characteristics.
The writer created the codes for twenty four word-formation types. They are created based on the word-formation theories that are purposed by Akmadjian,
Demers, Farmer, and Harnish 2010 and O‟Grady, Archibald, Aronoff, and Rees- Miller 2010. For example, the writer put a label CW to a slang word which was
coined. In addition, the writer created five codes to mark the slang characteristics.
The codes were made in accordance with Dumas and Lighter 1978. For instance, a slang word was labeled as 3 and 4a if the slang is a tabooed term in ordinary
discourse with persons of higher social status or greater responsibility and if it is a slang word which was used to place of the well-known conventional synonym to
protect the user from the discomfort caused by the conventional item. By designing protocol, the writer believed that it could help to arrange the
data into manageable segment. Thus, the research was more applicable. Moreover,
78 the writer suggested that coding made the data grouping process easier. In the
following part, the writer provides table 3.1. It is the blueprint of table for research instrument employed in this study.
Table 3.1: Blueprint of Research Instrument Table
Title: No
Sentences Slang Characteristics
Word-Formation Processes
Meaning
Code for morphological process:
CW : Coined Word
A : Acronyms
AA :Alphabetical Abbreviation
C : Clipping
B : Blending
GW : Generified Word
PN : Proper Noun
Brw : Borrowing
IC : Internal Change
Spl : Suppletions
R : Reduplication
TP : Tone Placement
Inf : Inflection
Clt : Cliticization
BF : Back-Formation
O : Onomatopoeia
CPS : Change in the Part of Speech
ME : Metaphorical Extension
Brd : Broadening
N : Narrowing
SD : Semantic Drift
RV : Reversal
Cmp : Compounding
Aff : Affixation
Code for slang criterion:
1: Its presence will markedly lower the dignity of formal or serious speech or writing. 2: to imply the users special familiarity either with the referent or with that less statusful or less
responsible class of people who have such special familiarity and use the term. 3: Tabooed term in ordinary discourse with persons of higher social status or greater responsibility
4a: to place of the well-known conventional synonym to protect the user from the discomfort caused by the conventional item
4b: to place of the well-known conventional synonym to protect the user from the discomfort or annoyance of further elaboration.
79 Another table was also provided by the researcher to record the
distribution of word formation in slang words. The writer made a table with twenty four types of word formation process that were mentioned in the
theoretical description parts. By employing this table, the writer could see the most and the least frequent word-formation processes in slang used in The
Inbetweeners TV series. In addition, the table had a function to help the writer to see the types of word-formation processes that were not found in The
Inbetweeners television series. In the following part, the writer provides table 3.2, which is the blueprint to record the word-formation distribution.
Table 3.2: The Blueprint Record of Slang Word-Formation Distribution
Word-Formation Processes Occurrences
Word-Formation Processes Occurrences
Coined Word Tone Placement
Acronyms Cliticization
Alphabetical Abbreviation Back-Formation
Clipping Onomatopoeia
Blending Change in the Part of Speech
Generified Word Metaphorical Extension
Proper Noun Broadening
Borrowing Narrowing
Inflection Semantic Drift
Internal Change Reversal
Suppletions Compounding
Reduplication Affixation
80 After the writer examined the data and grouped the slang words based on
the type of word-formation process by using table 3.1, the writer recorded the distribution word-formation process in table 3.2. The number of occurrences of
those word-formation processes that were found in The Inbetweeners television series could be seen clearly in the table 3.2.
D. Data Analysis Technique