Greeting – Greeting Types of Adjacency Pairs in the Modern Script of Romeo and Juliet Movie

ROMEO: Don’t saints and pilgrims have lips too? JULIET: Yes, pilgrim—they have lips that they’re supposed to pray with. P : 1. Romeo, 2. Juliet S : Juliet Balcony LF : question-answer APACT-1S5P5Q-A+Q The above conversation is between Romeo and Juliet. They are having a conversation about pilgrims. In the first part of the pair, Romeo asks a question to Juliet whether saints and pilgrims have lips and Juliet answers “Yes”. She states that they have lips, too. It can be seen that the first part of the conversation is the question and the second part is the answer. According to the theory of adjacency pair, this conversation is a question – answer adjacency pair. The same theory is also applicable to the next conversation, which is the conversation between Juliet and Romeo when Romeo hides in the dark and Juliet stands in her room balcony. It is the time when Juliet thinks about Romeo, the person she has met in the party the night before. The conversation between both of them is scripted as follows. 4:05 JULIET: I haven’t heard you say a hundred words yet, but I recognize the sound of your voice. Aren’t you Romeo? And aren’t you a Montague? ROMEO: I am neither of those things if you dislike them. P : 1. Romeo, 2. Juliet S : Juliet Balcony LF : Question-Answer APACT-2S2P3Q-A-Q The conversation above clearly shows that Juliet asks Romeo several things related to his identity. It seems that Juliet has been attracted to Romeo after they met in the party just a night before. Juliet asks from her room balcony whether the person in the dark beneath her balcony is Romeo, the person she met in the party. Juliet says that although she only hears few words from Romeo during the party, as seen from the statement “I haven’t heard you say a hundred words yet.”, she still recognizes him from the sound of Romeo, the son of Montague family “...but I recognize the sound of your voice. Aren’t you Romeo? And aren’t you a Montague?”. Romeo answers it by stating “I am neither of those things if you dislike them” which means he is approving all that Juliet says. Romeo admits he is the son of Montague family. The conversation above can be said as question –answer adjacency pairs because the first part of the conversation is the question and the second part is the answer. There is one more example of question answer adjacency pairs as seen in the conversation below. The conversation is still between Juliet and Romeo. Juliet is wondering how Romeo could get into her house, reach her room balcony, and hide in the middle of the darkness. The script is as follows. 4:06 JULIET: Tell me, how did you get in here? And why did you come? The orchard walls are high, and it’s hard to climb over them. If any of my relatives find you here they’ll kill you because of who you are. ROMEO: I flew over these walls with the light wings of love. Stone walls can’t keep love out. Whatever a man in love can possibly do, his love will make him try to do it. Therefore your relatives are no obstacle P : 1. Romeo, 2. Juliet S : Juliet Balcony LF : Question-Answer APACT-2S2P3Q-A+S The conversation in the example above is about Juliet who asks Romeo “Tell me, how did you get in here? And why did you come?”. She is wondering how Romeo could get in to her house that has high walls and she is also surprised that he is very brave. The Montague is the enemy of Juliet’s family and Romeo can be killed if one of Juliet’s families finds him. Romeo answers that he flies over the wall with the wing of love. “I flew over these walls with the light wings of love” Romeo says. He answers the questions and at the same time tries to flatter Juliet that her love could make Romeo do anything, including putting his life in danger just to meet his love. It is clearly seen that from the conversation, the first part of the adjacency pairs is Juliet who asks questions toward Romeo, and Romeo answers the questions in the second part. According to theory of adjacency pairs, the conversation above can be said as a question-answer adjacency pair. There are 19 more question-answer adjacency pairs in the movie with a similar pattern.

c. Request – Refusal Acceptance

The third type of adjacency pair is request – refusalacceptance R-RA. It is the type of adjacency pairs whose first part contains request and the response contains a refusal or acceptance toward the request. In Romeo and Juliet movie, there are 15 occurrences of request – refusalacceptance adjacency pairs. Three of them are described as follows. 4:07 JULIET: Oh, do you think we’ll ever meet again? ROMEO: I have no doubts. All these troubles will give us stories to tell each other later in life. P : 1. Romeo, 2. Juliet S : Juliet Balcony LF : Request-Acceptance APACT-3S5P3R-FA+R The conversation above is between Romeo and Juliet. It is the usual secret meeting between them under the Juliet’s balcony. They always have their romantic time at night, when all people sleep and no one knows that Romeo slips into Juliet’s house. The first part of the conversation is more likely a request rather than a question. Juliet says “Oh, do you think we’ll ever meet again?”. Juliet’s statement can be interpreted as a request to Romeo that they should meet again in the future. By asking whether they will meet again, Juliet puts her hopes that Romeo would see her again. As a response, he has no doubt that they will meet again and he is willing to face troubles just to meet her. The second part is Romeo’s acceptance of Juliet’s request and ensures that they will meet every day in the same time and at the same place.