Emphatic Stress Kurt Hummel’s Language Features

36 Television Series Season 1 , Kurt Hummel applies this feature in his speech and it appears 12 times or in 6.769 of his utterances reflecting women’s language features. The researcher provides some evidence from the selected episode. The first evidence can be found in the fourth episode titled Preggers. The raising intonation on declarative feature occurs when Kurt was auditioning for the role of kicker in the football team. The utterance can be seen in excerpt [19]. [19] KURT: That was good, right? FINN: Aha, yeah. KURT: [That was good?] Excerpt [19] shows how Kurt raises his intonation after he kicks the football. The ball that goes all the way through the uprights at a high velocity makes him asks his friend, Finn, whether it is good or not and Finn says yes. Hearing Finn’s answer, Kurt raises his intonation when he says that was good? since he is still not sure of what he has done. He applies it in order to ask for confirmation from his addressee whether his kick is satisfactory or not. [20] KURT: So, [they just kicked her out?] FINN : Yeah. Gave her half an hour to pack. Father set the timer on microwave. The second evidence can be seen from the excerpt [20]. It is taken from episode tenth from Glee Television Series Season 1. When Kurt and Finn are talking about Quinn, Kurt raises his intonation when he says they just kicked her out? to get a confirmation from Finn about Quinn’s condition. Raising intonation on declaratives is also found in the eighteenth episode. He applies it when Kurt’s father talked to Kurt that it was hard to do things together because Kurt was a bit different. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 37 [21] BURT: Maybe I got carried away doing stuff with Finn, but you know, I told you this thing with you was going to be hard. KURT: Thing with me. [You mean being gay?] BURT: Yeah. Being gay. Look, I will fight to the death for your right to love whoever you want. In that situation, Kurt wants to ask his father confirmation about what he means by saying you mean being gay? as seen in the excerpt [21]. In short, Kurt Hummel applies raising intonation on declaratives in his speech which are usually used by women. Women use them when they are hesitant and need confirmation from each other. Here, Kurt also use the feature since he is hesitant or not sure with himself. He needs confirmation from his addressee to make him convinced. Most of this feature’s utterance used by Kurt were in the form of yes-no questions.

7. Tag Questions

Lakoff 1975 proposed that tag questions are used when a speaker is stating a claim, but lacks full confidence in the truth of that claim. The examples of tag question are isn’t it?, right?, and don’t we? appear in the final statement. Holmes 1986 states that there are two functions of tag questions; they are modal meaning and affective meaning. The affective meaning is divided into two, they are facilitative, and softening. In Glee Television Series Season 1, it is found that Kurt applies this feature five times. The researcher provides the evidences taken from episodes 4, 8, 17 and 20 below. [22] KURT: That was cool, [right?] [23] KURT: Well, we can’t have that, [can we?] 38 [24] KURT: And loaded with empty calories. You know why they call them slushes, [don’t you?] [25] KURT: Ever since you separated from your wife, you’ve spent a lot of late nights watching reruns of Law and Order, [haven’t you?] [26] KURT: If you’re gonna say something, say it loud, [right?] From the excerpts above, Kurt used the tag questions ‘right?’ twice, and ‘don’t you?’ , ‘haven’t you?’, and ‘can we?’ once. When Kurt has finished kicking the ball in the football player audition, he asked Fin about his kick. As can be seen in the excerpt [22], Kurt asks that was cool, right?. The researcher assumes that Kurt actually knows that his kick is good. However, he facilitates other to agree with what he has said, by using right as a tag question. Excerpts [23] and [24] are taken from episode 8. From excerpt [23], the researcher believes that Kurt knows that Glee Club cannot let Finn be kicked from the football team. Therefore, he asks we can’t have that, can we? to ask for his friends’ confirmation. Kurt also tries to ask confirmation from his teacher, Mr. Schue by applying a tag question as can be seen in the excerpt [24]. He needs confirmation whether Mr. Schue knows why people named the drink slushes. In the excerpt [25] that is taken from episode 17, Kurt uses tag question as softening function. It happened when Kurt was being interrogated by Mr. Schue about the G-list. In the middle of the interrogation, Kurt asked Mr. Schue whether he spent his time to watch the rerun of one television program. When Kurt asks him, he applies tag question haven’t you? as can be seen in the excerpt [25]. The tag question expresses that Kurt is softening his utterance because he is concern for Mr. Schue’s feeling as his addressee.