Background of Study INTRODUCTION

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of Study

In a daily life people are able to communicate in sensible languages which are understood by the speakers and listeners. Language is an important thing for human life, if you cannot communicate well with people, you will lose lots of things in life. Language has become something very essential in life because language as media of communication between human, without language it is difficult for interaction with other people. According to The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Linguistic, “Language is the phenomenon of vocal and written communication among human beings generally, again as in ordinary usage.” 1 There are two types of language: formal and informal languages both of them can be used for communication with others. However, it seems that the roles of formal and informal languages are quite different from one another. The formal language is used in specific situations such as meeting, public speaking, seminar and others. Meanwhile the informal one is used more often in daily conversations with friends, sibling, relatives, or parents. Thus, the use of informal language is mostly placed more often in daily conversation. Sometimes when people speak, they might use their secret codes which are understood by their group, this language is known as 1 P.H. Matthews, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Linguistic, New York: Oxford University Press 1997.p.48. 1 x slang. People use it in order to make the conversation more colorful, informal, convenient, and friendly. It also prevents the conversation being rigid. According Grolier Encyclopedia, “For the most part, slang is an extension into ordinary speech of the special vocabularies of small groups-professional, criminal, teen age and other”. 2 In reality, slang itself has been introduced since the sixteenth century. Slang is actually a trend: the sooner it comes, the sooner it goes. Slang terms exist in spoken usage since many years ago and nowadays spread anywhere and easily found through mass media, and electronic media. In this paper, the writer will focus only on discussing slang language from a selected movie. The writer will analyze the selected slang words or phrases that used by the movie-stars of the Ocean’s Eleven movie that was produced by Warner Bross production and directed by Steven Soderbergh. Word of slang phrases are usually found adjusted with the new habits or ideas that are developed in a society. In addition, using slang is a way of introducing the new words that enrich a language. Slang regularly strangeness is other social norms, making free use of taboo expressions. “slang vocabularies are particularly rich in certain domains, such as sexuality, violence, and drugs”. 3 According Sornig about definition of slang, he said: 2 Grolier Encyclopedia, vol 17, Grolier International, USA, 1983, p. 305. 3 Wikipedia, Slang, The free Encyclopedia. Accesed on September 24, 2006. http:en.wikipedia.orgwikislang . xi “Slang is frequently faced with different and far more complicated problems of reconstruction than normal philogical etymology, if only because of the variety and obscurity of the source languages, and the various stages of their linguistic and sociolinguistic development and assessment, which have to be taken into consideration”. 4 The uses of slang language not only in the movie but also used in the song. You can find slang in the song as in RNB, Hip-Hop, and Rap genre. While in the movie usually contains social life, social culture and background of identity. In the social life, it can be from of a criminal activity, as described in the Ocean’s Eleven movie. In this movie, it tells about the robbers of casino and it describes about the criminal activity samples. The Ocean’s Eleven movie is one of American comedy and crime movies that was played by Brad Pitt as Rusty Ryan, George Clooney as Danny Ocean, Andy Garcia as Terry Benedict, Julia Robert as Tess, and the other actresses and actors. It tells about Danny Ocean and his ten accomplices plan to rob three Las Vegas casino’s simultaneously. There are many slang words and phrases that are utilized in this movie, so the writer is interested in analyzing the slang languages in the Ocean’s Eleven movie. From that movie, the writer finds some words such as bud, pal, 5 which have the same meaning, these words mean friend. These words can be found in the script 4 Karl,Sornig,Lexical innovation:A Study OF Slang,Colloquialisms and Casual Speech,Amsterdam: john Benjamins B.V,1982, p.8-9. 5 Accessed on April 26, 2007. http:www.dailyscript.comsriptsoceans_11.pdf xii of Ocean’s Eleven movie “who you calling bud, pal? Who you calling pal friend” 6 . The writer also finds the word nuts, “yeah, you gotta be nuts, too. And you’re gonna need a crew as nuts as you are” 7 , nuts it means “mad” , And another sample the writer also finds the word as bucks, “I’d go in for a buck” 8 , the word buck means “dollar”. From the samples above, the writer has difficulty to understand the meaning the words of slang in that movie without consulting the slang dictionary, Oxford dictionary, and other references. To understand the meaning, the writer must see slang the dictionary to find out the real meaning of the slang words in that movie. As the writer put a sample of the word bitch, in the English dictionary it means “unpleasant woman” 9 , but in that movie means “very disagreeable”. It can be understood after consulting the scripts, the slang dictionary and watching the movie directly.

B. Focus of the Study