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in declaratives 5.769, 5 tag questions 2.404, 4 ‘empty’ adjectives 1.923, and 3 avoidances of strong swear words 1.442. The last is precise color terms
feature 0, which does not appear at all in the data classification of Kurt’s utterances in Glee Television Series Season 1. To support the data presentation, the
researcher provides and discusses the evidences of women’s language features uttered by Kurt in Glee Television Series Season 1.
1. Lexical Hedges or Fillers
Lakoff 1975 describes lexical hedges or fillers as one of the characteristics of women’s language features. Lakoff 1975 defines hedges as words that convey
the sense that the speaker is uncertain about what he or she is saying or cannot vouch for the accuracy statement p. 53. Lexical hedges or fillers that Lakoff
1975 means are the frequent use of words such as well, you know, sort of, kind of, I guess, I think, umm,
and oh. The use of hedges by women occurs as a fully legitimation when they are unsure of the fact or statement, and justifiable when they
try to mitigate the possible unfriendliness or unkindness of statement. Lakoff as cited in Holmes 1992, p.316 claims that “hedging devices explicitly signal lack of
confidence and women’s insecurity”. In Kurt’s utterances, lexical hedges or fillers are the most frequent features he used in all episodes, as many as 62 times. He uses
lexical hedges and fillers such as I guess, I think, well, kind of, you know, sort of, oh
and um. In the fourth episode of Glee Television Series Season 1 titled Preggers,
there are 9 lexical hedges or fillers that are used by Kurt. In the beginning of the episode, Kurt was practicing dancing with his friends in his house. He wore a
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unitard, a skintight one-piece garment with long legs and long sleeves; which is usually worn by women. Suddenly, his father came home and asked him what kind
of clothes he was wearing. At that time, Kurt was confused to tell his father about the clothes. In excerpt [1], it shows that Kurt uses filler uh in his utterance while he
is thinking what to say in order to not say something wrong to his father.
[1] KURT: Dad You’re home early. BURT:
Deadliest Catch is on. What are you wearing?
KURT : It’s a unitard, guys wear them to, [uh], work out nowadays. Do
sports. They wick sweat from the body. The filler uh in Kurt’s utterance shows his insecurity. However, it helps to protect
him from the negative effect of his statements. The filler uh that he uses provided him some time to look for the best words he should use in answering his father’s
question. It also prevents him from making any mistakes in his speech. Lexical hedges also appear in some of Kurt’s utterances. In the first episode
titled Pilot, he uses the words kind of to interact with his addressee. When Kurt and his Glee Club friends practiced to sing a new song, one of his friends, Mercedes,
did not want to be a background singer. However, Kurt thought that it was the first time his Glee Club sang well. When he uses the word kind of, there is an indication
that Kurt is lacking confidence in his Glee Club, and he is trying to avoid it in his speech without altering the meaning.
[2] MERCEDES: Oh, hell to the no. Look, I’m not down with this
background singing nonsense. I’m Beyonce, I ain’t no Kelly Rowland. WILL:
Okay, look Mercedes, it’s just one song.
KURT: And it’s the first time we’ve been [kind of] good.
From excerpt [2], the word kind of is used by Kurt to hide his lack of confidence. He is actually not sure of the progress Glee Club has made and whether it is good
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or not. However, instead of showing his uncertainty, he uses the word kind of to hedge his speech in order to hide it.
From all episodes, the hedging Kurt usually uses is I guess. He uses I guess as hedging when he has a conversation with his friends or coach. The excerpt [3] is
one of the evidences the researcher found from all of the episodes of Glee Television Series Season 1
.
[3] MERCEDES: You shouldn’t be ashamed of who you are, Kurt. You
should just tell people, especially the kids in Glee. The whole point of the club is about expressing what’s really inside you, remember?
KURT: I can’t I’m just not that confident, [I guess].
When Kurt’s friend, Mercedes, told him not to be ashamed and to tell the truth to all of his Glee Club members, but still Kurt was afraid. He thought that all of his
friends would not accept him after knowing the facts. From the lexical hedges and the statement that he has said in the excerpt [3], it is clear that he is lacking
confidence. Even though he has clearly stated that he is not confident, he still uses a hedging I guess in order to strengthen his statement.
Briefly, Kurt says some utterances by using fillers and lexical hedges, which do not alter the main idea of his statements. From all the episodes, the researcher
also finds that Kurt underestimated himself; he uses fillers or lexical hedges to strengthen his utterance when he is lack of confidence and avoid making mistakes.
As a result, his addressee is not confused and able to understand what Kurt is saying.
2. Intensifiers
The term intensifier describes the linguistic expression of amplifying the meaning of a descriptive word, often an adjective or adverb, within an utterance.
