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Figure 2.3 Tree Diagram of a Phrase
From Figure 2.3, it can be seen that Art and N are connected to the same symbol NP which makes them to form a single constituent. As well as, NP and Prep are
connected to the same symbol PP. The last example is that Art, N, and PP are connected to the same symbol NP and make a single constituent.
To be precise, constructing tree diagram as seen in Figure 2.2 needs evidence whether it is true and represented the way it should or not. Akmajian
et.al 2001 mentioned that the tree diagrams shows the theories of syntax and also has empirical evidence p. 188.
B. Theoretical Framework
This part is aimed to provide the theories used in order to answer the research questions. Three research questions arise regarding the study of lexical
and grammatical ambiguity in Reader’s Forum section in The Jakarta Post newspaper. The research questions are:
1. What words are lexically ambiguous in the Reader’s Forum section of The
Jakarta Post newspaper?
36 2.
What phrases are structurally ambiguous in the Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper?
3. How do the tree diagrams enable the researcher to resolve structural
ambiguities? In order to answer those three research questions, the researcher reviews theories
related to ambiguity and also tree diagrams. However, there are only some particular theories used as the main theories, while others will support the major
theories. The first research question is about finding the possible ambiguous word
or sentence. Of course, the researcher only focuses on the lexical and structural ambiguity. Therefore, the researcher uses the theories of types of ambiguity
especially lexical and structural ambiguity. In analysing the data, the researcher would like to apply Grenat and Taher’s 2008 theories on lexical and structural
ambiguity. However, before applying Grenat and Taher’s 2008 theories, the researcher would first apply Leech’s 1981 theory of meaning. In the study, the
researcher would like to understand the conceptual meaning which is also known as denotative meaning. After knowing the denotative meaning of the sentences,
the researcher continues with applying Grenat and Taher’s 2008 theories. They state that lexical ambiguity deals with homonym and also polysemy which make a
sentence or expression has more than one meaning. In structural ambiguity case, the one that triggers the ambiguity is the connection or the relation of the words.
After answering the first research question, the researcher will focus on the lexical ambiguity more. The lexical ambiguity data would consist of words which are
37 ambiguous. The researcher would like to categorize the lexically ambiguous
words based on their part of speech. In doing so, the researcher would use table to help the researcher to categorize the data. The data categorization is based on
Aarts 1997 theory on parts of speeches or word classes. Aarts 1997 mentions that there are 7 parts of speech. Those classification are nouns, verbs, adjectives,
prepositions, adverbs, conjunctions, and interjections. The answer of the first research question is aimed to show the frequency of the lexical ambiguous part of
speech. Then, the researcher would also analyze the structurally ambiguous phrases in order to complete the answer of the second research question. In doing
so, the researcher would categorize the structurally ambiguous phrases based on their types of phrases.
The third research question is aimed to show the function of tree diagram in solving the confusion of structural ambiguous phrases. In answering the
research question the researcher would refer to the theories of tree diagram and also structural ambiguity proposed by the linguists Akmajian et.al 2001, Grenat
and Taher 2008, and Mihalicek and Wilson 2011.
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CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY
In this section, the researcher presents the method used in the study. The methodology used aims to answer the three research questions as stated in Chapter
I: what words are lexically ambiguous in Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper? What phrases are structurally ambiguous in Reader’s Forum
section of The Jakarta Post newspaper? How do the tree diagrams enable the researcher to visualize the possible interpretations of each structural ambiguous
sentencephrase? The researcher formulated those research questions because the researcher would like to find and analyze the ambiguity found in the newspaper.
In this research, the researcher uses The Jakarta Post newspaper as the source of data. In doing the study, the researcher uses particular methodology to make the
research systematic. Therefore, in this chapter, the researcher provides research method, research setting, research participantsubject, instruments and data
gathering technique, data analysis technique, and research procedure.
A. Research Method
In this study, the researcher conducted qualitative research. Ary, Jacobs, and Sorensen 2010 explain qualitative research as a research that studies social
phenomena p.22. Meanwhile, Fraenkel and Walen 2009 state that qualitative research focuses more on the understanding of situations and phenomena p.15.
