Background of the Study

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

English has become a global language which has a great history of its emergence. As the Germanic family of language, English language has been assimilated with Latin, Germany, and French. In the era of British Empire, English language has become the important thing for trading and common language that can unite nations over the entire world. According to Llamzon, on his paper “Essential Features of New Varieties of English,” said that new varieties of English are identifiable with four essential sets of features: ecological, historical, sociolinguistics, and cultural Llamzon, 1983: 100- 104. Based on Llamzon‟s paper, English has united within four aspects of features which become some new variation of English language. The acculturation of English society made English has been expanded from local language through national to international. As a result, there have been many varieties of English or new Englishes around the world, especially in the third world areas such as America, Canada, Africa, Caribbean, India, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Singapore. New literatures in the third world countries are emerged by new Englishes that is giving an influence for people to write some literary works. Cultural features, in Llamzon‟s “Four Essential Set of Features,” refer to the creative writing and a local literature in English. He argued that “works by novelists, poets, and playwrights have demonstrated that English language can... be used as a vehicle for the transmission of the cultural heritage of third world countries” Llamzon, 1983: 104. Based on Llamzon, the importance of creative writing and literature is significant. In this context, the Caribbean is part of third world countries that develops English language with local culture becoming a new literature. There are so many Caribbean authors writing about identity, ethnicity, and language through their story rising out their historical experiences. One of the famous authors is Jean Rhys who wrote the unspoken of the „madwoman in the attic‟ in Charlotte Brontë‟s Jane Eyre into her perspective side in Wide Sargasso Sea. It was the historical novel with its setting in Jamaica and Dominica; it presents the story of a white-creole girl named Antoinette Cosway in the age of colonialism 1830 where the slavery becomes the „trademark‟ of this era. Jean Rhys uses the background of slavery in Jamaica at 1830‟s to describe their condition using „non-standard‟ English reflected by the characters‟ speech in the novel. In this study, the writer wants to find out Caribbean English CE dialect by the three characters that are used in Rhys‟s Wide Sargasso Sea such as Christophine, Amélie, and Daniel Cosway as native people through their speeches although the spoken representation is not served as a phonemic orthography but it is served as written text in conventional spelling. For example, the lack of verb „to be‟ in the statement „I too old now‟ Rhys, 1982:16, whereas Standard English SE states „I am too old now‟, is one of the structure types occurring in the creole language. Next, the writer also observes the sociolinguistic influence of three characters in using their varieties through their participants, settings, topic, status, etc. Observing the Caribbean English spoken in Jean Rhys‟s Wide Sargasso Sea is a challenge for the writer to study more deeply about the variation and the uniqueness of this language. The reason is motivating the writer to make this study. The writer believes that this study may help others to explore more deeply about Caribbean English as a variety of English worldwide and distinguish between the standard and non-standard English language.

B. Problem Formulation