Background of the Study

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

In social interactions, there are unwritten rules called social norms that are understood and followed by a society. These norms are the rules used by society to define what are appropriate and inappropriate. They indicate the established and approved ways of doing things, of dress, of speech and of appearance. As language is a means of communication in the society, the use of language is bounded by social norms. People use language in the society in order to maintain good social interactions with others. In doing so, people must be able to obey the social norms by performing good attitude or being polite. The act of politeness or being polite may differ from one culture to another. What is considered as polite in one culture does not guarantee that the same act is polite in another culture. For example, it is common and considered as polite for Javanese people to ask their neighbors about what their neighbors are up to when they met in the streets or when the neighbors passed in front of their houses. However, for American, it can be considered as rude. Although the act of politeness is bounded by culture, the importance of being polite to create good social interactions and maintain social harmony is a general need which applies for all culture. Regardless of the culture, when people say “thank you”, “sorry” and “please”, they try to be polite. 2 However, even though politeness is an important aspect of social interaction, violating politeness, or in other words being impolite, is inevitable. Sometimes people do not realize that they offend others by saying or doing the wrong thing, or in other case, because of certain motives they intend to be impolite to others. Culpeper in Bousfield and Locher, 2008:36 defines that impoliteness uses communicative behavio r which intends to cause the target’s “face loss” or what the target identifies to be so. It disguises itself behind utterances such as verbal abuse, threats, bullying, and so on. It is perceived as a big deal today. Many scientific researches revealed that verbal behaviors are potentially more harmful and damaging than physical violence. In addition to the fact that impoliteness can be highly damaging to personal lives, it is necessary to conduct research on impoliteness because it is socially important. Impoliteness is highly salient in public life, especially in the digital era nowadays. It is often reported in the media, notably when it occurs in contexts where it seems strikingly deviant e.g. verbal abuse directed at the president by congressman, verbal abuse that caused suicide. In addition, it is prohibited in public signs, charters, and other legal documents. Impoliteness phenomena do not only occur in daily conversation, but also occur in the dialogues found in various media such as films, books, and television series. Television series is similar to films in a way that they illustrate a certain story by moving pictures. It presents actions, images and words replicating life. Although it is not a real story, the utterances in a movie or TV-series are produced naturally. Thus, it enables people to observe how languages are used. In this case, 3 the researcher chooses a television series entitled Sherlock as the data source of this research. Sherlock is an interesting object to be analyzed in term of impoliteness strategies. Adapting Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s very famous and iconic Sherlock Holmes, Sherlock presents the modern version of the detective story. The British television crime drama modernized the famous 19 th century detective story into a new one in early 21 st century London. Three seasons have been produced, where each of the seasons consists of three episodes with 90 minutes duration. The TV- series is broadcasted through BBC One channel since 2010, when the first season was aired. The second and third season followed in 2012 and 2014. The third season is the most watched BBC drama series for over a decade, when an average of almost 12 million people tuned in for the third series of the detective drama on BBC One. The researcher chooses Sherlock to be analyzed in this research for several reasons. First, this TV-series has a fascinating storyline and brilliant dialogues. The dialogues in Sherlock contain many sarcastic utterances and smart jokes which may carry out some language phenomena, including impoliteness strategies. Second, the main character in Sherlock is an exceptional character. He regards himself as a “high functioning sociopath” since he does not make friends nor understand emotions very well. As a sociopath, an antisocial personality disorder which is characterized by a disregard for laws, social mores and the right of others, Sherlock sometimes fail to feel remorse of guilt. There is a possibility that his inability to properly deal with emotions or to empathize with others leads 4 him to carry impoliteness act or rude behavior. Third, Sherlock has been nominated for numerous awards across a variety of category, including BAFTAs, Emmys and Golden Globe. It has been nominated for 42 awards and has won 24 awards currently.

B. Research Focus