Kinds of politeness strategies employed by the characters in the dialogue in giving command in the novel “THE RED PONY”

3. Kinds of politeness strategies employed by the characters in the dialogue in giving command in the novel “THE RED PONY”

After analyzing the data, I found four strategies of Brown and Levinson theory, namely: Bald on Record, Positive Politeness, Negative Politeness and Bald off Record. These are the following explanations:

a. Bald on Record

Based on the data analysis, there are 17 data for bald on record strategy. Using the strategy, a speaker directly addresses the hearer as a means of expressing his/her needs. The speaker does not do any effort to minimize threats to the hearer’s face. The most direct approach is using imperative forms. There is no mitigating device used by the speaker such as ‘please’, ‘would you’, etc. There are several ways in expressing bald on record strategy.

In some cases, the characters which employ bald on record strategy, usually used imperative form such as in the conversation between Billy Buck and Jody, in data number Datum 09/BO/Sup-Sub: “You run up to the house for a while.” The speaker employs imperative with ‘you’. This strategy will give more effect to the hearer. This strategy gives more stress to the command; the effect is the hearer has no choice expect obeying In some cases, the characters which employ bald on record strategy, usually used imperative form such as in the conversation between Billy Buck and Jody, in data number Datum 09/BO/Sup-Sub: “You run up to the house for a while.” The speaker employs imperative with ‘you’. This strategy will give more effect to the hearer. This strategy gives more stress to the command; the effect is the hearer has no choice expect obeying

In the datum number: Datum 16/BO/Eql, the conversation between Carl Tiflin and Ruth Tiflin such as in this utterance: “Now don’t you start anything.” Carl and Ruth are socially equal because they are husband and wife. There is no worry talking to people who have the same status. So he can command his wife baldly in the conversation above. Besides it can be seen from the utterance, the utterance is in the form of an imperative sentence.

Then in the conversation between Carl Tiflin and Bily Buck in Datum 13/BO/Sub- Sup: “Let him alone” the utterance still employs bald on record strategy. It is in the form of imperative sentence. From the social context, Billy is under Carl because of the strained situation at the time, and then he employs the strategy with high tone in delivering command.

From the data above can be concluded that there are several ways in expressing bald on record strategy in delivering a command. I found that the characters have a superior position to subordinate mostly employ the command using bald on record strategy. For the case in Datum 13/BO/Sub-Sup, there will be several reasons why the character employed bald on record strategy in delivering a command and will be discussed in the next subchapter.

b. Positive Politeness

Based on the data analysis, I found 4 data for Positive Politeness strategy. The strategy seeks to minimize the threat to the hearer’s positive face. They are used to make the hearer feel good about himself, his interest or possessions, and are mostly used in situations where the characters know each other fairly well. The strategy also expresses solidarity, friendliness, in-group reciprocity. It can be seen in these data:

In the data number: Datum 02/PP/Sup-Sub, the conversation between Carl Tiflin and Jody Tiflin, Carl as Jody’s father asking Jody to go with him tomorrow morning so

he employs the command to Jody to go to bed early such as in this utterance: “You’d he employs the command to Jody to go to bed early such as in this utterance: “You’d

Another data such as in the conversation between Billy Buck and Jody Tiflin in Datum 06/PP/Sup-Sub: “We’ll go down and cover him up after we eat, then.” The command as in the bold sentence is employed with positive politeness. It can be seen from the using of the word we in the sentence. The word we includes both Jody and Billy Buck in the activity. This shows that they belong to the same group having the common goal. In Datum 12/PP/Sup-Sub has the same analysis with this datum but it was different situation and condition.

In Datum 21/PP/Sup-Sub, the conversation between Ruth Tiflin and Jody Tiflin:”You’ll have to do it after this every other morning.” In this situation Ruth employs the politeness strategy where they know each other well as a mother and son. This command is presented indirectly with low intonation.

From the data above, it can be concluded that the command which using positive politeness strategy mostly delivered by the speakers which have superior status and they employ the strategy because the relationship between the characters is intimate and know each other well.

c. Bald Off Record

From the data analysis, I found 4 data for this strategy. To lessen threat on hearer’s face, a speaker sometimes does not say what he or she means directly, by employing indirectness. It is one of the strategies used to reduce the risk of damaging hearer’s face.

It can be seen from the conversation between Carl Tiflin and his son in Datum 13/OR/Sup-Sub: “Hadn’t you better come with me?” The utterance is in the form of rhetorical question, this indicates that the speaker employs off record strategy indirectly. The utterance is not real question; there is a meaning behind the utterance.

To make easier to understand, the kinds of politeness strategy can be drawn in the following table:

Table 1.1 Kinds of Politeness Strategy

Politeness Strategies Way of Expression BALD ON RECORD

1. The speaker employs the command with “you”.

2. The speaker employs the command with negative imperative (no-verb)

3. The speaker expresses the command with high tone.

POSITIVE POLITENESS

1. The speaker expresses the command with low tone.

2. The speaker using the word “we” in the command.

BALD OFF RECORD

1. The speaker employs the command in the form of rhetorical question

2. The speaker employs the command indirectly in the form of statement.