Focus of the Study Research Question Objectives of the Study Significances of the Study Research Methodology

ways of speaking, expressing and implementing the politeness rules. The expected politeness strategy is different from the fact in the interview. The hypothesis proposed is Obama’s emotional closeness to Indonesia. His childhood spent in Menteng Dalam made Indonesia as the integral part of him, as he said in his speech in university of Indonesia some moments ago, not as the other. Therefore, power difference means nothing in relation to the language usage and choice of expression. Nababan, therefore, was considered as a close friend who should be treated intimately. The truth of this hypothesis will be proven in this research.

B. Focus of the Study

This research is limited only in pragmatics analysis of politeness concept. The object of research is the interview between Putra Nababan and Barack Husein Obama in the White House, March 22 nd 2010.

C. Research Question

According to the background of the study, the writer formulates the questions of the research as: 1. What kinds of politeness strategy were chosen by Putra Nababan in interviewing Barack Obama? 2. What kinds of politeness strategy were used by Barack Obama when communicating with Putra Nababan? 3. How dominant is the power difference influence in implementing politeness strategy in the interview?

D. Objectives of the Study

These research objectives are: 1. To know the politeness strategies used when people from different power level communicate. 2. To know how dominant the influence of power difference is in interlocutor’s choice of politeness strategy.

E. Significances of the Study

The writer hopes that this research will be: 1. Benefit to theoretical development of politeness concept in pragmatics. 2. Useful to the society in choosing the strategy of communication when they speak to people with different level power from various cultures.

F. Research Methodology

1. Method The data in this research is utterances from the interview between Putra Nababan and Barack Obama. Therefore, the qualitative method is used. A research with qualitative method is a research relied on verbal and non numerical data as the basis of analysis and of solving the problem appears. 10 10 Muhammad Farkhan, Proposal Penelitian Bahasa dan Sastra Jakarta: Cella, 2007, p. 2. 2. Data Analysis The collected data is analyzed using the politeness theory of Brown and Levinson. It is also supported by the theory from Jonathan Culpeper, Geoffrey Leech, Jenny Thomas and Helen Spencer-Oatey. The process of analysis is in some steps, i.e.: a the writer looks for the video of interview between Putra Nababan and Barack Obama and its script b The writer watches the video and looks at its script c the writer uses the mentioned politeness theories in analyzing the utterances to know the Nababan’s and Obama’s strategies of politeness and the power difference influence in choosing the strategy of politeness. 3. Unit of Analysis The unit of analysis in this research is the interview between Putra Nababan and Barack Husein Obama. 4. The Instrument of Research The instrument of the research is the writer himself. The writer analyzes the interview using the mentioned theories of politeness. 5. Place and Time This research starts on December 2010, at the department of English Letters, State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta and will be ended on February 2011. 8

CHAPTER II THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK