Illocutionary acts in relation to politeness strategies as shown by the seventh semester English education students in their written messages.

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ABSTRACT

Saputri, Gisa Maya. (2016). Illocutionary Acts in Relation to Politeness Strategies as Shown by the Seventh Semester English Education Students in Their Written Messages. English Language Education Study Program, Department of Language and Arts Education, Faculty of Teachers Training and Education, Yogyakarta: Sanata Dharma University.

This study analyzed illocutionary acts and politeness strategies which were shown in written messages of seventh semester students of English Language Education Study Program sent to their lecturers. The students had to communicate with the lecturers due to some needs and condition. In doing the communication, the students might have written communication by using some media, text message and email for instance. Moreover, the students would show the acts of doing something, which are called illocutionary acts, in their messages. In showing the acts, the students would also show their politeness, by using some strategies, to the lecturers who have higher social status than they do.

In this study, there are two problems to be answered. The first is (1) What are the types of illocutionary acts that appear in written messages of seventh semester students sent to the lecturers? The second is (2) What strategies of politeness do seventh semester students of ELESP tend to use in their written messages sent to the lecturers? Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the types of illocutionary acts and the politeness strategies which were used by the students in their written messages sent to the lecturers.

This study was a qualitative study which focused on discourse analysis. The researcher used discourse completion test in designing the questionnaire to obtain the data for this study. The data gathered was analyzed using the theory of illocutionary acts by Searle (1969) to find out the types of illocutionary acts in students’ messages and the theory proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987) about politeness strategies.

The finding showed that illocutionary acts appeared in people’s responses to some cases or situations, such as directive (the act of requesting) and expressive (the act of apologizing). In this study, people’s responses were different from one to another even when facing the same case. However, most of the participants of this study gave the similar acts when they were facing a certain situation. In showing the acts, the participants showed politeness because they communicated with people who had higher social status than they did. They used some strategies to show their politeness. Most of the participants showed negative politeness as their politeness strategy when communicating with the lecturers. Few of them showed the strategy of bald on record in their messages sent to the lecturers. Keywords: written messages, illocutionary acts, politeness strategies

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ABSTRAK

Saputri, Gisa Maya. (2016). Illocutionary Acts in Relation to Politeness Strategies as Shown by the Seventh Semester English Education Students in Their Written Messages. Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, JPBS, FKIP, Yogyakarta: Universitas Sanata Dharma.

Penelitian ini meneliti tentang illocutionary acts dan strategi kesopanan yang muncul dalam pesan tertulis yang dikirimkan oleh mahasiswa semester tujuh dari Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris kepada dosen mereka. Dikarenakan beberapa kebutuhan dan kondisi tertentu, mahasiswa diharuskan untuk berkomunikasi dengan dosen. Dalam berkomunikasi, mahasiswa dapat berkomunikasi secara tertulis dengan menggunakan media, seperti pesan teks dan email. Selain itu, mahasiswa akan menunjukkan aksi berbuat sesuatu, yang dinyatakan sebagai illocutionary acts, di dalam pesan tertulis mereka. Dalam menunjukkan aksi tersebut, mahasiswa juga akan menunjukkan strategi kesopanan mereka kepada dosen yang berstatus lebih tinggi dari mereka.

Dalam penelitian ini, terdapat dua rumusan masalah yang akan dijawab. Pertama, (1) Apa macam tipe illocutionary acts yang tampak dalam pesan tertulis dari mahasiswa kepada dosen? Kedua, (2) Apa strategi kesopanan yang cenderung digunakan oleh mahasiswa dalam pesan tertulis mereka kepada dosen? Maka, penelitian ini meneliti tipe illocutionary acts dan strategi kesopanan yang digunakan oleh mahasiswa dalam pesan tertulis mereka kepada dosen.

Penelitian ini merupakan penelitian kualitatif yang berfokus pada discourse analysis. Peneliti menggunakan discourse completion test dalam menyusun kuisioner untuk memperoleh data. Data yang terkumpul dianalisa menggunakan teori tentang illocutionary acts dari Searle (1969) dan teori dari Brown dan Levinson (1987) tentang strategi kesopanan.

Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa illocutionary acts muncul dalam tanggapan kita dalam suatu kasus atau situasi, sebagai contoh directive (aksi meminta) dan expressive (aksi meminta maaf). Dalam penelitian ini, tanggapan partisipan dapat berbeda satu dengan yang lain bahkan ketika menghadapi kasus yang sama. Tetapi sebagian besar partisipan menunjukkan aksi yang sama ketika mereka menghadapi kasus yang sama. Dalam menunjukkan aksi tersebut, partisipan juga menunjukkan kesopanan karena mereka berkomunikasi dengan orang yang berstatus lebih tinggi dari mereka. Mereka menggunakan beberapa strategi untuk menunjukkan kesopanan. Sebagian besar partisipan menunjukkan strategi negative politeness ketika berkomunikasi dengan dosen. Sebagian kecil partisipan menunjukkan strategi bald on record dalam pesan tertulis mereka. Kata kunci: written messages, illocutionary acts, politeness strategies

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ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN RELATION TO POLITENESS

STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

A SARJANA PENDIDIKAN THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree

in English Language Education

Gisa Maya Saputri Student Number: 121214063

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION FACULTY OF TEACHERS TRAINING AND EDUCATION

SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY YOGYAKARTA

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ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN RELATION TO POLITENESS

STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

A SARJANA PENDIDIKAN THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree

in English Language Education

Gisa Maya Saputri Student Number: 121214063

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION FACULTY OF TEACHERS TRAINING AND EDUCATION

SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY YOGYAKARTA

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vi ABSTRACT

students‟ messages and the theory proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987) about

politeness strategies.

The finding showed that illocutionary acts appeared in people‟s responses to some cases or situations, such as directive (the act of requesting) and expressive

(the act of apologizing). In this study, people‟s responses were different from one

to another even when facing the same case. However, most of the participants of this study gave the similar acts when they were facing a certain situation. In showing the acts, the participants showed politeness because they communicated with people who had higher social status than they did. They used some strategies to show their politeness. Most of the participants showed negative politeness as their politeness strategy when communicating with the lecturers. Few of them showed the strategy of bald on record in their messages sent to the lecturers. Keywords: written messages, illocutionary acts, politeness strategies

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vii ABSTRAK

Saputri, Gisa Maya. (2016). Illocutionary Acts in Relation to Politeness Strategies as Shown by the Seventh Semester English Education Students in Their Written Messages. Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, JPBS, FKIP, Yogyakarta: Universitas Sanata Dharma.

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viii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to send my deep gratitude to my Jesus Christ for giving me such a challenging yet meaningful life. I thank Him for always being patient in listening to all of my stories that I have sent through my prayers. Second, I would like to send my sincere thankfulness to my superb university, Sanata Dharma University, which has given me such an unforgettable experience in the last four years. I thank my campus for giving me a four-year full scholarship so that I can have a precious chance to study in one of the best study programs in Indonesia. I fulfill my promise to graduate exactly in four-year study.

Then, my gratitude goes to my beloved parents, Bambang Sulistijono, who has become my role model to be a hard-working man, and Helena Nana Dwi Astuti, who is never tired in giving me support and reminding me to pray. For my little brother, Raka Dian Saputra, I really appreciate his support through his critical questions which make me always think hard. The next gratitude is for my grandparents, who always give their blessing in every step that I take.

I would like to send my gratitude to my thesis advisor, Bapak Drs. Y.B. Gunawan, M.A. for his meaningful guidance since the beginning of my thesis journey. I thank him for being such a good father who is care and patient in looking after his children. I also thank him for always giving me positive words that motivate me a lot. Next, I would also like to thank my academic advisor, Bapak Agustinus Hardi Prasetyo, S.Pd., M.A., for his guidance since the beginning of my college study. He has taken a part to form me as a tough student

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in my college life. My special thanks go to all lecturers of English Language Education Study Program and all of its members, especially for students in batch 2012. I thank my family in Small Class C, it is such a blessing to have them all as my friends. I thank them for coloring my life.

I would also like to thank my best companions in my teenage life. I thank my very best friend, Gregorius Hugo Himawan, as the one who always supports me excluding my family. I thank God everyday that I have such a great partner like him. I would also like to thank his family for being my second family whom I really love. I also thank my best friends in PBI, Emilia Dyah Puspita and Floryberta Kusuma Putri. Both of them are smart and beautiful, but I will not forget their craziness. I hope we can grow and be successful together. Then, I would like to express my thankfulness to my loyal best friends since I was in kindergarten, Monica Sindhi Vania Putri Damar Sari, Gregorius Dedy Mahendra, Anna Tri Prasidhani Juniasri and Stefani Putri Moya. I thank them for staying beside me to be my friends for so many years. God has been so good to give me friends like them all. I would also like to thank my Ganesh group; Adit, Angga, Gratia and Mbak Dewi, for making SPD in our last semester becomes a fun and memorable course.

In the end, I would like to thank everyone who has given me support, guidance and prayer. I may not be able to write their name in this limited paper, but I will always stick their name in my heart. May all human beings be good and be happy.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE ... i

APPROVAL PAGES ... ii

STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY ... iv

PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI ... v

ABSTRACT ... vi

ABSTRAK ... vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ... viii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ... x

LIST OF TABLES ... xii

LIST OF FIGURES ... xiii

LIST OF APPENDICES ... xiv

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION ... 1

A. Research Background... 1

B. Research Problems ... 5

C. Problem Limitation ... 5

D. Research Objectives ... 6

E. Research Benefits ... 6

F. Definition of Terms ... 8

CHAPTER II. REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ... 11

A. Theoretical Description ... 11

1. Speech Acts ... 12

2. Politeness ... 15

3. Written communication ... 21

4. Review of Related Studies ... 22

B. Theoretical Framework ... 24

CHAPTER III. METHODOLOGY ... 28

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B. Research Setting ... 30

C. Research Participants ... 30

D. Instruments and Data Gathering Technique ... 32

E. Data Analysis Technique ... 34

F. Research Procedures ... 37

CHAPTER IV. RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ... 40

A. Types of Illocutionary Acts Shown by the Students ... 40

B. Politeness Strategies Used by the Students ... 49

CHAPTER V. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATION... 59

A. Conclusions ... 59

B. Recommendation... 61

REFERENCES ... 64

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xii

LIST OF TABLES

3.1 The Types of Illocutionary Acts on Students‟ Written Messages

Based on the Scenarios ………..36

3.2 The Politeness Strategies Shown by the Students………...37

4.1 The Predicted Use of Illocutionary Acts based on the Scenarios………41

4.2 The Illocutionary Acts Shown by the Participants ……….44

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xiii

LIST OF FIGURES

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xiv

LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix A. The Questionnaire………67 Appendix B. The Sample Results of the Questionnaires………...70 Appendix C. Table Result: The Types of Illocutionary Acts on Student‟s

Written Messages based on the Scenarios………101 Appendix D. Table Result: Politeness Strategies Shown by the Students……..106 Appendix E. Questionnaire Blueprint ……….111

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1 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

In the introduction part, there are six sections which will be discussed. The first section is research background. In this section, the researcher will discuss the background of the research which contains the reason why the researcher chooses the topic and a brief description about the theory of illocutionary acts and politeness which is used in this research. The second section is the research problem, which contains the problem formulations that have to be answered by doing the research. The third section is problem limitation. In this section, the researcher discusses the scope limit and focus of the research. The fourth section of introduction part is research objectives, which explains the purpose of the research. The fifth section is research benefits. This section identifies the benefits or advantages of this research for some parties. The last section is definition of terms, which gives brief explanation about the specific terms used in the research.

A. Research Background

As a human being, we live in a heterogeneous society which consists of different types of people. In order to be able to socialize with other people, we have to communicate in an appropriate way. Here, language plays an important role in communication as the main tool for interacting. According to Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams (2003), we live in a world of language. We talk to our friends

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when we come together, we talk to our family and relatives, we talk to strangers in the street, we talk to our pets, even we talk to ourselves when there is no one to answer. According to Chaer and Agustina (1995), language can be used to express our idea, send messages and convey our meaning (p. 19). It is impossible to make people understand what we want and feel without communicating using language. The communication using language itself can be held in two different ways, namely the written and spoken way. If we are communicating with others in a written way, there must be media for helping the communication. Some of the media that can be used to do the written communication are text message and email. Fromkin, Rodman and Hyams (2013) say that by having written communication, we mean the visual systems for representing the language (p. 546). Moreover, written communication is also said as a basic tool of civilization.

According to Searle (1969), in doing the communication, we are performing human linguistic behavior (p. 12). It means that our communication is done using linguistic elements, namely words, grammar, context, speech or writing and symbols. In addition, the communication itself can be referred as linguistic communication. Searle (1969) adds that all linguistic communication will involve linguistic acts (p. 16). When we use a language, we perform speech acts in terms of making statements, giving commands, asking questions, making promises, and many more. Speech acts are defined as the basic or minimal unit of linguistic communication. The acts can be in the form of requesting, commanding, apologizing, questioning, and so on. Those acts are considered as complete speech acts which are named as illocutionary acts. When people do illocutionary acts, it

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means that they do something, requesting and apologizing for instance. It means that we do the speech acts, particularly illocutionary acts, when we are uttering our intention to do something to people through communication, both in written and spoken ways.

Besides the language and the media that influence our communication and also the illocutionary acts that we perform, we also have to consider the way we communicate and interact with other people. Politeness becomes one important aspect that has to be considered in communication. It deals with both linguistic factors and social-cultural values in the community. Most people may think in a simple way regarding politeness; as long as we say please or thank you then it will make our utterances become more polite. In fact, politeness is not only saying please and thank you (Goffman, 1971, p. 90). We also have to deal with the intonation and tone of voice, word choice and the addressee (Holmes, 2001). This means that if we are talking to a person who is older and has higher social status than we do, we have to be more polite rather than if we are talking to a person who is younger and has lower social status than us.

In order to be polite in communication, we have to pay attention to the way we communicate with and speak to others. Some strategies can be applied to show our politeness in communicating with others. Those strategies can be applied to show our politeness when we are performing certain speech acts, particularly illocutionary acts. The strategies to show politeness when we are doing some acts in conversation will ease the conversation and build good connection between the speaker and interlocutor.

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Based on the background knowledge about language as a communication tool, speech acts as the main part of linguistic communication and politeness as the important way in doing the communication, the researcher was interested in doing a research about illocutionary acts in relation to politeness strategies as shown in written messages by the students of English Language Education Study Program (ELESP). Here, the students were in the seventh semester of ELESP of Sanata Dharma University. The researcher considered the seventh semester students were appropriate as the sample of this research because they had learned English as a second language for around three years. They were also expected to know the theory of speech acts and politeness and how to deal with it in everyday communication. Moreover, students in the seventh semester, which is the last year in the college, had to communicate with the lecturers, particularly their thesis advisors, more than with others. In order to communicate with the lecturers, the students might use media, text message and email for instance. Therefore, the researcher focused on the illocutionary acts and politeness strategies which were

shown in students‟ written messages when they were communicating with their

lecturers.

The issue of politeness becomes a sensitive issue, especially in the educational field. Sometimes, the lecturers comment on students‟ politeness which can be seen from their messages. By observing around the campus, the researcher concluded that most of the lecturers thought that some of students‟ messages were categorized as „impolite‟, particularly when the students wrote their messages in English. This issue triggered the researcher to explore more

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about politeness in a research. In fact, there are some researches on politeness that have already been conducted before. Most of the studies on politeness focus on the spoken form which may be uttered in daily interaction. However, the researcher would focus on the written form of students‟ utterances, as seen in their text message and email, in doing this research.

B. Research Problems

Based on the background of the study which is explained above, the problems which will be analyzed are formulated in the form of questions as follows.

1. What are the types of illocutionary acts that appear in written messages of seventh semester students sent to the lecturers?

2. What strategies of politeness do seventh semester students of ELESP tend to use in their written messages sent to the lecturers?

C. Problem Limitation

This study will only be focused on speech acts and politeness in everyday communication, particularly regarding the language choice of seventh semester English Education students of Sanata Dharma University. Moreover, the analysis will be specified on the illocutionary acts and politeness strategies that appear in written messages, text message and email for instance. The messages were written by the students and addressed to the lecturers, who have higher power and social

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status than the students do. The researcher will only analyze the types of illocutionary acts and politeness strategies which appear in students‟ written messages sent to their lecturers.

D. Research Objectives

There are two objectives which will be analyzed in this study. The two objectives are elaborated as follows.

1. To discover the types of illocutionary acts that appear in the written messages of seventh semester students sent to the lecturers.

2. To analyze the politeness strategies that seventh semester students of ELESP tend to consider in their written messages sent to the lecturers.

E. Research Benefits

The researcher intends to make this research as the contribution for some parties in relation to language. Furthermore, there will be three parties that are expected to take the benefits from this study. Those parties are English lecturers, English learners and future researchers.

1. English lecturers

This research will encourage the lecturers of English Language Education Study Program to develop the material related to politeness in the more practical way. It is because this study will provide the written messages from the students and the lecturers may see whether those messages are polite or impolite. If the

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messages are considered as impolite, it means that the lecturers may not only teach the students about politeness theoretically but also practically. The lecturers may ask and encourage the students to send the messages in English rather than in Indonesia and giving feedback related to students‟ messages. Later on, the lecturers may set an agreement with the students which says that if the students‟ messages are still considered as impolite, the lecturers will not give any responses. It will give the real challenge for the students to be polite in communicating with the lecturers, specifically in written ways. This research will also give information on the way students show their politeness to the lecturers, particularly when the students send the written messages to the lecturers. Therefore, the lecturers can

give more attention to students‟ language choice when the students send the

written messages to them personally. 2. English learners

This research will enrich students‟ knowledge about speech acts and

politeness. The students can find the proper expression to express their politeness. Moreover, this research can motivate the students to use English in their written messages and also to be more polite to the lecturers. The students will also be more aware of their way in sending the written messages to the lecturers so that it will not be considered as rude or impolite.

3. Future researchers

This research can be used as a reference for future researchers in conducting a study related to pragmatics field, specifically which focuses on speech acts and politeness. In this research, the future researchers may find useful

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theories, knowledge and references related to speech acts and politeness in everyday communication.

F. Definition of Terms

In order to give better understanding on some specific terms used in this research, the terms will be explained and defined more as follows.

1. Speech acts

According to Austin (1962), speech acts are defined as the actions which are performed in saying something. The action which is performed when an utterance is produced can be analyzed into three different levels, namely locutionary acts („what is said‟), illocutionary acts („what is done in uttering the

words‟), and perlocutionary acts („what is done by uttering the words‟) (Cutting,

2002, p. 16). In this research, the level of speech acts which will be analyzed more is the illocutionary acts.

2. Illocutionary acts

Illocutionary act is a kind of speech acts which performs an act of doing something (Searle, 1969). The speaker will utter their intention to do some action to the interlocutor. Searle (1969) categorizes illocutionary acts into some categories, namely assertive (the act of suggesting, complaining, stating, reporting), directive (the act of requesting, ordering, advising, commanding, inviting), commissive (the act of promising, vowing, offering, refusing, volunteering), expressive (the act of thanking, congratulating, apologizing,

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regretting) and declaration (the act of resigning, dismissing). In this research, the illocutionary acts are the acts which are shown by the students when they communicate with the lecturers.

3. Politeness

According to Watts, Ide and Ehlich (2005), politeness can be seen as the behavioral constraints which may help people in the society to achieve “effective social living” (p. 2). Moreover, politeness also refers to a concept of “presentation

of self” in the interpersonal relationship that is important to maintain social

interaction with its individual and group goals. In this research, politeness is related to language choice provided by the students in social interaction with the lecturers.

4. Politeness strategies

Brown and Levinson (1987) have conducted a deep study on politeness, specifically on the strategies of politeness. Based on their study, politeness strategies are used to arrange the statement or utterances in order to show an awareness of the face when face threatening acts (FTA) is likely to happen. FTA itself is defined as the acts which may threaten the face wants of the hearer and/or the speaker (Brown & Levinson, 1987). Brown and Levinson also define face as public self-image which every member of society wants to claim for himself. There are four strategies of politeness which are proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987), namely bald on record, positive politeness, negative politeness and off record (p. 92). In this study, politeness strategies will deal with students‟ language

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choice in order to minimize the face threats in their written messages sent to the lecturers.

5. Written communication

Communication is defined as the way in which the process of giving, receiving or exchanging messages is understood by both the speaker and also the hearer(s). McQuail and Windahl (1993) also describe that communication can be

any of „an action on others, an interaction with others and a reaction to others‟ (p.

5). Communication itself can be held in two ways, namely spoken and written ways. In the written form, the messages are transformed using written symbols, via words and sentences for instance. Hence, written communication can be defined as the way of giving, receiving or exchanging the written symbols which happens between two people or more. Written communication may be held in the form of letters, faxes, emails, reports, memos and even advertisements. In this research, written communication which will be used is in the form of text message and email.

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11 CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

This chapter consists of two sections. The first section is theoretical description which will enlighten the readers about any relevant theories of this research. The theories of speech acts, politeness and written communication will be elaborated more in this section. The second section is theoretical framework. This section summarizes the major theories which will be the framework to solve the research problems.

A. Theoretical Description

This section discusses three theories which are closely relevant to the study conducted in this research. The theories are about speech acts, politeness and written communication. Since this study focuses on illocutionary acts, the theories of speech acts will be focused more on the theory of illocutionary acts. The theories of politeness will also be presented as the other main focus of this research. In the theories of politeness, sociolinguistics is presented because politeness is under the scope of sociolinguistics. Then, the theories about politeness as pragmatics study are also elaborated because this study focuses on the utterances which are used based on the context. The theory of written communication will also be elaborated since this study focuses on the illocutionary acts and politeness strategies shown in written messages.

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1. Speech Acts

The term speech acts is used to describe the acts which are performed by the speakers through their utterances. When people are speaking, they do not only concern about grammatical structures or linguistic meaning of the utterances but also perform the acts which will ease the hearer to convey speaker‟s meaning (Yule, 1996). According to Searle (1969), speech acts can be differed into three acts, namely an act of saying something, an act of doing something and an act of affecting someone. Those three acts may appear in the utterances which are used to understand the meaning carried out by the words.

According to Austin‟s theory (1962), there are three kinds of speech acts which are differed one to another. The three kinds of speech acts are named as locutionary acts, illocutionary acts and perlocutionary acts. The explanation of each of the terms will be illustrated as follows.

a. Locutionary Acts

Locutionary acts perform the acts of saying something. It contains the actual meaning of the utterances (Searle, 1969). These acts show what is said by the speaker, containing the form of the words which are uttered (Cutting, 2002, p. 16). Locutionary acts also describe the literal meaning of something. When the speaker says something, he or she is conveying the meaning literally. As the

example is when the speaker says, “It is getting dark.” The sentence means that

the speaker thinks of the situation in the room which is getting dark because the day will be over. He or she really means what he or she says literally (Searle, 1969).

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b. Illocutionary Acts

According to Searle (1969), illocutionary acts perform the acts of doing something. Speakers may communicate their intention to do something by speaking the words. Cutting (2002) adds that illocutionary acts mean the specific function and purpose of the words that the speakers have in mind (p. 16).

Searle (1969) categorizes the illocutionary acts based on various criteria. The categorization consists of five types and those types are elaborated more as follows.

1) Assertive

Assertive is an act which commits the speaker to the actual case or something which is true. It is an act in which the words state what the speaker believes (Cutting, 2002, p. 17). It includes the act of stating, suggesting, boasting, complaining, claiming, reporting, etc (Leech, 1983, p. 105). As the example is the

utterance, “I feel grateful.” In the utterance, the speaker wants to say or report to

the hearer(s) that he/she is grateful. The utterance is merely reporting (Austin, 1962, p. 79).

2) Directive

Directive is an act which is used to make the hearers perform some particular action. It intends to produce some effects through action by the hearer. Directive includes the act of ordering, commanding, requesting, advising, recommending, etc (Searle, 1969). As the example is when the speaker says, “Please pass the salt.” By speaking that utterance, the speaker gives the request to the hearers and makes the hearers pass the salt (Searle, 1969, p. 53).

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3) Commissive

Commissive is an act which commits the speaker to the future action. The speaker may perform a particular action in the future by doing the act of commissive. It includes the act of promising, vowing, offering, etc. As the

example is in the utterance, “I shall do my best.” The utterance shows that the

speaker performs the act of promising (Austin, 1962, p. 77). 4) Expressive

Expressive is an act which has a function to express the feeling of the speaker. It particularly shows attitude or emotion toward some specific things through utterances. It includes the act of thanking, congratulating, pardoning, apologizing, blaming, praising, condoling, etc. As the example is in the

utterances, “I am willing to apologize,” and “I am sorry to have to say …” The

utterances show the act of apologizing (Austin, 1962, p. 80-81). 5) Declaration

Declaration is an act which expresses a declaration that may change a particular matter. Searle (1969) says that this category is special since it is performed by some institutional frameworks, judges and ministers for instance. Declaration includes the act of resigning, dismissing, christening, naming, excommunicating, appointing, sentencing, etc.

c. Perlocutionary Acts

Perlocutionary acts perform the acts of affecting people. These acts use language as a tool which will give such effects to the hearer. According to Searle (1969), perlocutionary acts include the act of persuading, amusing, embarrassing,

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intimidating, boring, imitating or inspiring the hearer(s). As the example is “Take a look at yourself. You are the most beautiful woman I have ever met.” The purpose of that utterance is to give effect of amusing to the hearer (Searle, 1969).

All linguistic communication will involve linguistic acts in which communication is not only about sentences, words or symbols but also production of the sentences, words or symbols in the performance of speech acts (Searle, 1969, p. 16). In showing our politeness to the interlocutor, we do not only focus on language use but also the acts that we perform. The acts can be in the form of illocutionary acts in which we utter words and sentences in certain context and condition in order to do something.

2. Politeness

Politeness is defined as the phenomenon which describes the way someone puts something as the result of speaker‟s cognitive assessment of the social context (Holtgraves, 2002, p. 38). Furthermore, according to Holmes (1992), politeness is a behavior which expresses positive concern for others (p. 5). Being polite here can be shown by speaking in a positive way in order to make the conversation runs smoothly. Brown and Levinson (1987) also state their own understanding about politeness. In their theory, politeness is related to psychological state, something that is emotionally invested, that can be lost, maintained or enhanced, and must be constantly attended in interaction (p. 60). In order to control the psychological state in the interaction, Brown and Levinson (1987) also imply some strategies of politeness. Politeness itself is studied under the scope of sociolinguistics and pragmatics study.

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a. The Role of Politeness in Sociolinguistics

Sociolinguistics is explained as the study of the relationship between language and society (Holmes, 2001). The study of sociolinguistics may discuss why people tend to use different language in a certain context and the way people convey social meaning. Politeness belongs to sociolinguistics study since it focuses on the way language is used differently in a certain society. The study of politeness will be more related to a search for its markers in everyday conversations. Holmes (1992) states that being polite is a complicated business in any language (p. 296).

However, politeness is difficult to learn because people have to understand not only the language but also the social and cultural values of a community. Therefore, understanding the social values, which belongs to sociolinguistics study, is needed in order to speak politely.

b. The Role of Politeness in Pragmatics

Leech (1983) states that pragmatics deals with the meaning which is defined to be connected with a speaker of the language (p. 6). Moreover, Leech defines pragmatics as „the study of meaning in relation to speech situations‟ (p. 6).

In pragmatics‟ theory, language cannot be separated from context and principles

of language use (Levinson, 1983). Therefore, pragmatics focuses on how language is used by people in a certain context or situation.

This study can also be stated as pragmatics study because it analyzes the language use and its meaning in relation to a speech context or situation. People must consider their language use according to the social context of the

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conversation so that their utterances will be considered as polite. The context in pragmatics may cause people to speak explicitly and/or implicitly (Yule, 1996). When people speak implicitly, they will talk about their intention indirectly. According to Leech (1983), the more indirect the statement is, the more polite it will be.

Politeness becomes an important factor in pragmatics study because it may help people to find out why people are often so indirect in conveying their meaning. It will also cover the reason why people give politeness a high rating in a certain situation.

c. Negative and Positive Face in Politeness

Face is stated as public self-image which everybody wants to claim for himself (Brown & Levinson, 1987). There are two kinds of face, namely negative face and positive face.

1) Negative face

Brown and Levinson (1987) define negative face as the want of every member of society that his or her action be unimpeded by others (p. 62). It is also stated as the desire for autonomy (Holtgraves, 2002). It can be simplified that every individual has their own want to be free from impediment or not to be restricted by others. Hence, it focuses on freedom of action and freedom of imposition.

2) Positive face

Positive face is defined as the want of every member of society that his or her wants be desirable to at least some other members (Brown & Levinson, 1987).

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It is stated as the desire for connection with others (Holtgraves, 2002). It means that every individual has their own wants and desires and they want their wants and desires to be accepted and appreciated by others.

d. Face Threatening Act (FTA) in Politeness

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), FTA is defined as the act which may threaten or run contrary to the face wants of the addressee and/or the speaker. The acts that may threaten or violate someone‟s face can be done by verbal or non-verbal communication. FTA can threaten or violate negative or positive face. As the example is request may threaten the hearer‟s negative face because they restrict autonomy. Besides, disagreement can threaten the hearer‟s positive face because they may minimize the solidarity between the speaker and the hearer. e. Politeness Strategies

Brown and Levinson (1987) state that politeness strategies are kinds of strategies which formulate an expression which is less threatening for the hearer‟s face in order to save their face (p. 91). People may use politeness strategies to arrange the statement or utterances in order to show an awareness of the face when face threatening acts (FTA) is likely to happen. There are four strategies of politeness based on Brown and Levinson (1987) which are classified as follows. 1) Bald on record

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), bald on record is used whenever the speaker wants to threaten hearer‟s face, by doing the FTA, in a maximum efficiency more than he or she wants to save hearer‟s face (p. 95). Hence, bald on

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record is said as the least polite strategy (Holtgraves, 2002). Actually, it is also stated as the complete absence of politeness.

By doing this strategy, it means that the speaker may do the acts in the most direct, clear and concise way. The maximum efficiency is very important in this strategy. It can be shown in the examples which show the urgency as in “Help!” and “Look, the point is this …” When the speaker speaks as if maximum efficiency is important, he or she will provide metaphorical urgency as can be seen in the second example. Bald on record can also be found in advice or

warning as in, “Careful! He’s a dangerous man.” The imperative sentence which

includes offer can also be bald on record as in, “Don’t bother, I’ll clean it up.” This strategy can be used when the speaker and the hearer have close relationship so that politeness is not really a matter for both sides.

2) Positive politeness

Based on Brown and Levinson‟s (1987) theory, positive politeness is an

action directed to the hearer‟s positive face, in which they want to be accepted and appreciated (p. 101). This strategy is used to indicate that the speaker wants to enclose his or her relationship with the hearer. Positive politeness‟ utterances can be used as a kind of metaphorical extension of intimacy for the purpose of interaction, even with strangers. Therefore, the speaker may speak with an element of exaggeration to imply that he or she sincerely wants the hearer‟s positive face to be enhanced.

The use of positive politeness with exaggeration serving to mark the

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have!” People can also emphasize the utterance by using familiar address terms (honey, mate, pal, bud) as in, “Here mate, I was keeping that seat for a friend of mine.” Moreover, a direct satisfaction of others‟ desire for respect, sympathy, interest and so on is also the example of this strategy (Holtgraves, 2002).

3) Negative politeness

According to Brown and Levinson (1987), negative politeness is an action directed to the hearer‟s negative face, in which they want to have freedom of their own action (p. 129). It is used to minimize imposition in the hearer. This strategy is also said as „the heart of respect behavior‟ which fills the etiquette books (Brown & Levinson, 1987). The characteristics of this strategy are specific, focused, being indirect and often said in long sentences.

This strategy can use conventional indirect forms in the utterances as to

request someone to shut a door by saying, “Will you shut the door?” “Can you

shut the door?” “Are you able to shut the door?” “I want you to shut the door,” and so on (Holtgraves, 2002). The other way to show negative politeness is by

using hedges to avoid assuming anything related to the hearer‟s belief or desire.

The use of hedges can be shown in “if clause” for relevant condition as in “Close

the window, if you can.” Negative politeness can also appear when the speaker communicates implicitly that he or she does not want to impinge on the hearer. As

the example is in the utterance, “I know you’re busy but could you give me a

hand?” Begging for forgiveness can also be showed using this strategy. By apologizing, the speaker can communicate his/her wants not to impinge on the

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4) Off record

Off record is stated as the prototype of indirect communication

(Holtgraves, 2002). It is a communicative act in which the speaker‟s utterances

contain more than one particular intention. Therefore, the hearer needs to interpret speaker‟s utterances in order to know what the main intention is (Brown & Levinson, 1987). The indirectness of this strategy allows the speaker to do the FTA without taking responsibility for doing it and leave it to the hearer to decide how to interpret it. Off record can be shown in the form of sarcastic irony as in “That’s brilliant,” where actually it is not. Another way to show this strategy is in

the form of rhetorical question as in, “Did someone leave the light on?” when the

speaker expects the light to be off.

Politeness is one of the main issues in language use that has to be considered when we talk to others. It is a behavior which can create positive environment in the conversation. In showing our politeness, we must pay attention

to the hearer‟s face or self-image so that we may not threaten their face. The act of

threatening hearer‟s face as wellas speaker‟s face may influence the conversation

and the degree of politeness. In order to control the degree of politeness in the conversation, some strategies of politeness can be applied by both the speaker and the hearer.

3. Written communication

Communication is a way for a speaker to influence the hearer(s) by making him (or them) perceive, understand, feel or do some particular things (Linell, 2002). The speaker and the hearer will understand the messages which are given,

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received and exchanged by doing communication. Besides, McQuail and Windahl

(1993) describe communication as any of „an action on others, an interaction with

others and a reaction to others‟ (p. 5). Communication can be held in two different ways, namely in spoken and written way. Written communication is the way people give, receive or exchange the messages by using discrete symbols, letters and words for instance (Linell, 2002). In doing written communication, people may use some media. The media can be in the form of emails, text messages, letters, faxes, reports, memos and even advertisements.

4. Review of Related Studies

This section contains some previous studies which are closely related to the focus of this research which is illocutionary acts in relation to politeness strategies as shown in written messages. There are three related studies which have been done by Nabilah Fairuz Al-Bantany (2013), Katrina Pariera (2006) and Elmianvari and Kheirabadi (2013).

a. Nabilah Fairuz Al-Bantany (2013)

Al-Bantany (2013) conducted a research entitled “The use of commissive speech acts and its politeness implication: A case of Banten gubernatorial candidate debate”. The purpose of this research was to examine the use of commissive speech acts in the debate and the realization of politeness in the use of speech acts. This study was a qualitative study which processed the data gathered by downloading the debate. The data were analyzed using the theory of speech acts by Searle (1969) and the theory of politeness by Brown and Levinson (1987). The result of this research showed that commissive speech acts appeared in the

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debate for 53% of the utterances. Moreover, politeness could be seen in those utterances which were uttered by all of the candidates in relatively the same way. b. Katrina Pariera (2006)

Pariera (2006) conducted a research entitled “The use of politeness strategies in email discussion about taboo topics”. This research aimed to analyze the politeness strategies, based on Brown and Levinson‟s (1987) theory, which were used in a series of email sent to close friends and to strangers. The participants of this research were 29 university students who were on controlled age (21-29 years old) and all of them were native speakers of American English. The researcher used discourse completion test (DCT) proposed by Billmyer and Varghese (1996) to gather the data. The data were gathered from online survey program which asked the participants to write down the email about four taboo pictures provided by the researcher. The participants had to write the email both to their close friends and to strangers. After gathering the data, the researcher compiled and coded those emails based on the theory of politeness strategies by Brown and Levinson (1987). The result of this research stated that Brown and

Levinson‟s framework on politeness did not accurately predict how politeness

would be used in email. Some predictions were correct but most of them were in

contrast with Brown and Levinson‟s prediction for face-to-face interaction.

Politeness strategy which was mostly used in email was negative politeness to enclose intimacy. However, there was a decrease of negative politeness strategies when there was a decrease in intimacy, something which people might not see in face-to-face interaction.

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c. Elmianvari and Kheirabadi (2013)

Elmianvari and Kheirabadi (2013) conducted a research entitled “The study of EFL students‟ requests based on politeness theory”. They analyzed whether politeness theory proposed by Brown and Levinson (1987) was applicable to data elicited from EFL students attending a language institute in Iran or not. The participants were 21 female Iranian who learned English as foreign language. Their age ranged from 17 to 26 years old. The participants, who were students, were asked to email their teacher as a class activity and make a request in an appropriate and polite form. After the emails were gathered, they were analyzed based on Holtgraves and Yang‟s (1992) coding scheme. The researcher

measured the degree of politeness showed in the students‟ email request. The

finding showed that almost all of the emails could be considered as polite and only two of them located somewhere in the middle of politeness‟ scales. Based on the finding, the researchers could conclude that most of the students expressed their requests in a polite, formal and indirect way through long sentences in attempt to save the negative face.

B. Theoretical Framework

This research aimed to analyze the illocutionary acts and politeness strategies shown by the participants, who were seventh semester students of English Language Education Study Program, in their written messages. Furthermore, this study focused on two research problems as stated in the first

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chapter which are to analyze illocutionary acts and politeness strategies shown in the written messages. In order to answer those research problems, the researcher relied on the theories proposed by Searle (1969) and Brown and Levinson (1987).

The first research problem aims to analyze the illocutionary acts which tended to appear in the written messages of seventh semester students sent to the lecturers. The researcher used the theory of speech acts, particularly related to illocutionary acts, proposed by Searle (1969) to answer this research problem. Searle (1969) proposes that speech acts can be divided into three categories, namely locutionary acts, illocutionary acts and perlocutionary acts. This research focused on illocutionary acts that may appear in students‟ utterances shown in their written messages. Illocutionary act itself is divided into five categories, namely assertive, directive, commissive, expressive and declaration. Based on the data which were gathered through questionnaire, the researcher could classify

students‟ messages into those five categories of illocutionary acts. The

classification might describe the illocutionary acts which appeared in students‟ written messages.

The second research problem is going to analyze the politeness strategies which tended to be used by the students in their written messages sent to the lecturers. The theory of politeness strategies by Brown and Levinson (1987) was used as the main theory to answer this research problem. There are four kinds of strategies on politeness based on Brown and Levinson‟s theory, namely bald on record, positive politeness, negative politeness and off record. The researcher used the four strategies to classify the utterances of the seventh semester students of

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ELESP which could be seen in their written messages. Based on the classification, the researcher analyzed the politeness strategy which was mostly used by the students when they sent written messages to the lecturers.

The relation of illocutionary acts and politeness itself can be seen in

Leech‟s (1983) theory. Leech states that politeness is often a function of both: the

standing features, such as the social distance between participants, and the dynamic features, such as the kind of illocutionary acts which are made by the speaker to the hearer (request, advice, command, etc) in order to produce appropriate politeness based on certain situation. Therefore, in this research, the focus was more on the function of politeness as dynamic features which used illocutionary acts to produce politeness by conducting politeness strategies.

In our society, we must communicate with other people in a certain context and situation. As the example is in the educational context, the students have to communicate with the lecturers due to some needs and condition. Here, language is used as the media for communication to express our meaning. When we are communicating, especially in a written way, we have to consider the language that we use because it may differ from one social context to another. The reason why we use different language in different social context to express our meaning is to show politeness. One way to be polite in communicating is by using some strategies of politeness. Those strategies can be shown in our acts, particularly illocutionary acts, because we have to focus on both the language use that shows our politeness and the acts that we perform to the interlocutor.

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Figure 2.1 Diagram of Theoretical Framework Students

Written communication (Linell, 2002 and

McQuail & Windahl, 1993)

Speech acts (Searle, 1969)

Locutionary acts

Illocutionary acts

Perlocutionary acts Politeness Strategies

(Brown & Levinson, 1987)

Bald on record

Positive politeness

Negative politeness Off record

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28 CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY

This chapter contains six sections. The first section is research method. The researcher discusses the type of the method which was used in this research. The second section is research setting. The place and the time where and when the research was conducted are described in this section. The third section is research participant. The researcher describes the subject of the study as well as the method of sampling which was conducted. The fourth section is instruments and data gathering techniques. In this section, the research instruments used in this study will be explained together with the techniques of collecting the data. The fifth section is data analysis technique. The researcher talks about the way of analyzing the finding in order to answer the research problems. The last section is research procedures. The researcher describes the steps on doing this research from the beginning until the end.

A. Research Method

The researcher used a qualitative study as the method of this study. This research belonged to a qualitative study because the data were presented in the form of words and sentences. According to Ary, Jacobs and Sorensen (2010), qualitative study will apply words and images in order to provide the answers to the research problems (p. 419). The purpose is to contextualize the findings by

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focusing on the understanding of concept and meaning. Therefore, the findings of this study would rely on words and only minor use of numbers was provided. Moreover, this research also belonged to discourse-analytic research. According to Wood and Kroger (2001), discourse analysis is „a perspective on social life that contains both methodological and conceptual elements‟ (p. 3). It analyses the issue which becomes the viewpoint of our social life and the issue will be analyzed using the appropriate methods and also the concept that we gain theoretically. Hence, discourse analysis involves both theoretical and methodological elements. By doing discourse-analytic research, the researcher would not only analyze language as a tool or medium for communication but also as a text and talk in social practices.

Discourse analysis is primarily an analysis which is carried out by using words rather than using numbers or quantitative techniques (Wood & Kroger, 2001, p. 136-141). Wood and Kroger (2001) adds that discourse analysis is concerned with what people are doing or not doing, how they are doing it, and how it is connected to other things rather than with how often they are doing it, or how much they are doing it (p. 136-137). However, quantification may be helpful for selecting the data. In the analysis, it may help the researcher to select a particular feature that occurs frequently or rarely. Potter and Wetherell (1987) state that the coding of discourse data is an improvement over the use of questionnaires in which the selection of meaning is almost neglectful of the

participant‟s views (as cited in Wood & Kroger, 2001, p. 137). Therefore, this

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presenting the data for analysis of what the participants were doing and how they were doing it.

B. Research Setting

This research was conducted in December 2015. In order to collect the appropriate data, data collection took place in the English Language Education Study Program (ELESP) campus, Sanata Dharma University. The data collection was done on December 10th, 2015 at 3.30 p.m. in Multimedia Laboratory of Sanata Dharma University. It was carried out after Interpreting class, which was taken by seventh semester students of ELESP. There were 24 students who participated in this research. The data collection took around 20 minutes until all of the participants finished filling in the questionnaires.

C. Research Participants

The participants of this research were the seventh semester students of English Language Education Study Program (ELESP) of Sanata Dharma University Yogyakarta. The students were from batch 2012. There were 24 students who were asked to fulfill the questionnaires provided by the researcher. The number of students who were asked to participate in this study was considered as appropriate since it was a sample of 15% from all students in seventh semester of ELESP in batch 2012. Each of the students would provide four different responses based on the four cases in the questionnaire. Hence, there

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were 96 data which were gained from 24 participants. The seventh semester students were chosen as the object of the study because they were English learners who had learned English for around three years. Hence, their proficiency in English language use was expected to be better than that of lower semester students. These students were expected to understand the theory about speech acts, particularly on illocutionary acts, and the theory of pragmatics, particularly related to politeness, and also its practice in everyday life. These students also had big chances to interact and communicate with their lecturers due to their needs of having consultation and gaining feedback from the advisor on doing their thesis. Most importantly, seventh semester students were prepared to graduate soon from ELESP and face the real work field. Therefore, these students had to equip themselves with strong knowledge about English, including the ability to show politeness in their acts, both in spoken and written form.

In order to choose the participants, the researcher used purposeful sampling technique. According to Lodico, Spaulding and Voegtle, purposeful sampling is a sampling procedure which is mostly used in a qualitative research (2006). It is because qualitative researchers choose the participants based on their characteristics and knowledge as they relate to the research questions being investigated. Moreover, purposeful sampling is stated as a procedure where the researcher analyzes the people who are familiar and have specific knowledge about the topic which is investigated (Lodico, Spaulding & Voegtle, 2006). In this research, the researcher chose the seventh semester students who attended Interpreting class, which belonged to class B. Interpreting is a compulsory course

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for seventh semester students in ELESP. The researcher chose Interpreting class B instead of the other classes because this class consisted of 15% of the whole members of seventh semester students of ELESP. There were 24 seventh semester students who became the participants of this study. The students also had already had knowledge about pragmatics study. Moreover, the researcher also belonged to this class, which made it easier to distribute the questionnaire and gather the data.

D. Instruments and Data Gathering Technique

The researcher used questionnaire as the instrument employed to carry out the study. According to Ary, Jacobs and Sorensen (2010), questionnaire is a list of questions which are sent to all of the members of a sample group (p. 379). The members of the sample group will give their responses to the questions written in the questionnaire. Moreover, questionnaire can be provided in two types of questions, namely open-ended and close-ended questions. In this research, the type of questionnaire used was open-ended question where the participants did not have limited choice in giving the answers (Cohen et al, 2000). Furthermore, the questionnaire used in this research was administered using discourse completion test (DCT) by Blum-Kulka (1982). According to Pariera (2006), DCT is the most popular instrument in collecting the sociolinguistics data. Pariera adds that DCT uses a „constructed environment to elicit certain parts of discourse and to use the findings to make predictions about natural language‟. DCT provides some scenarios and asks the participants to write down their responses based on those

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scenarios. Hence, this method is criticized as being an ineffective tool in the study of spoken language due to vast differences between spoken and written language (Billmyer & Varghese, 1996). On the contrary, the same problem do not occur in using DCT to analyze written language since the gap between authentic written discourse and DCT elicited written discourse is not that great. Therefore, DCT was used as the instrument to gather the data in this study.

The researcher designed four scenarios which were used in the questionnaire based on DCT theory proposed by Blum-Kulka (1982). Blum-Kulka

(1982) says that DCT consisted of „incomplete discourse sequences‟ that represent

socially differentiated situation (p. 198). Each of the discourse sequences presents a short description which describes the setting, the social distance between the interlocutors and their status relative to each other. In the end, informants are asked to respond on each of the discourse sequences. In this research, after designing the scenarios, the researcher consulted some of the seventh semester students of ELESP to confirm whether those scenarios were feasible in their university life. Moreover, the researcher also asked an expert of this field, who was the thesis advisor, to assess those scenarios for the sake of clarity and comprehensibility. Based on the feedbacks, some word-changes and modifications were made in order to achieve the proper language use and the cultural feasibility. Therefore, after doing all of those processes, the validity of this research was ensured.

In gathering the data, the researcher distributed the questionnaire to the participants who had been chosen using purposeful sampling technique. The

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participants were 24 seventh semester students of ELESP of Sanata Dharma University. They were given 20 minutes to fill in the questionnaires.

E. Data Analysis Technique

The questionnaire used in this research was administered using discourse completion test (DCT). The researcher referred to the theory of discourse completion test by Blum-Kulka (1982) when designing the questionnaire. The DCT itself was in the form of questionnaire containing four brief scenarios to elicit a particular speech act. In this research, the researcher designed four

different scenarios in the questionnaire which aimed to know the speaker‟s

responses to the addressee who had higher social power and status than the speaker did. The speaker here was the student and the addressee was the lecturer. The four scenarios presented in the questionnaire can be seen as follows.

Scenario 1 You want to have consultation with your lecturer (advisor) related to your thesis/proposal seminar. But, you cannot meet him/her in person to arrange the schedule. So, you send the text message to him/her personally to ask for permission to have consultation. What do you write in your message?

Scenario 2 You are doing your final project for a course. The lecturer allows you to send the draft of your final project to his/her email so that he/she can check it. You are planning to send

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your draft as an attachment to your lecturer via email. Write down the introductory message of your email.

Scenario 3 You are on your way to finish your final project for a course. You have to present your project to the whole class as the final test. But, before presenting your project, the lecturer asks you to send him/her your power point slides. You have sent the power point slides right before the deadline. But, when you check your work again, you find some mistakes on it and want to revise it. So, you decide to resend the email with the revised slides. What do you write on your email?

Scenario 4 You will have consultation on your thesis/proposal seminar with your advisor on a specific day. You have arranged the schedule together with your lecturer and you have prepared yourself to have the consultation. But, on the D-day, you get a trouble (getting sick or having an accident) that makes you unable to come to your consultation. You want to inform your lecturer about your condition and reschedule the consultation by sending him/her text message. Write down your message. The scenarios were designed based on the natural situations which might happen in academic field, particularly in campus. The scenarios involved the students as the speakers and also the lecturers as the addressees. In order to answer the first research problem, the researcher classified the types of acts which were shown by the participants when they responded to the scenarios on the

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questionnaire. The acts here belonged to illocutionary acts which could be categorized into five, namely assertive, directive, commissive, expressive and declaration. The theory of illocutionary acts and its categories was based on Searle‟s theory (1969). The researcher categorized the students‟ responses for each of the scenarios based on those categories in table 3.1. Based on the categorization, the researcher would conclude the types of illocutionary acts seen in students‟ written messages when they responded to the case in the scenarios.

Table 3.1: The Types of Illocutionary Acts on Students’ Written Messages based on the Scenarios

Students Scenarios Type of Illocutionary Acts

Assertive Directive Commissive Expressive Declaration

Student 1

S1 S2 S3 S4

Student 2

S1 S2 S3 S4

Then, the researcher focused more on participants‟ politeness when they showed their acts to the lecturers. The data would be categorized using table 3.2. The researcher categorized the students‟ responses into four strategies of politeness based on the theory from Brown and Levinson (1987). Based on the categorization, the researcher could conclude the politeness strategies which were

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mostly used by the students when showing the illocutionary acts in communicating with the lecturers in written way.

Table 3.2: The Politeness Strategies Shown by the Students

Students Scenario

Politeness Strategies Bald On Record Positive Politeness Negative

Politeness Off Record

Student 1 S1 S2 S3 S4 Student 2 S1 S2 S3 S4

The categorization belongs to coding process. Lodico, Spaulding and Voegtle (2006) explain coding as the process of data analysis which identifies different segments of the data that describe an issue and labels these segments using category names (p. 305). In analyzing the data of this research, the researcher used axial coding which develops connection between main categories and subcategories (Ary, Jacobs & Sorensen, 2010, p. 465)

F. Research Procedures

Here are the research procedures that were done by the researcher. 1. Deciding the topic

This step was taken at the very beginning of the research. Before starting to do the research, the researcher had to decide the topic which would be analyzed in

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the research. The researcher was interested in linguistic field, particularly pragmatics. In connection with that, the researcher chose the topic related to pragmatics which became the main interest of the researcher in academic field. Therefore, in order to know whether the topic was researchable or not, the researcher had consultation with the thesis advisor to gain feedback.

2. Formulating the research problems

After having the topic which was accepted by the thesis advisor, the researcher started to formulate the research problems. The research problems had to be significant with the topic and the main purpose of the research. The whole research which was conducted would have to answer those research problems. The researcher formulated two research problems as stated in the first chapter. 3. Reviewing the literature

The research which was conducted by the researcher had to be based on theories. Therefore, the researcher needed to review lots of theories related to the topic. The theories which were reviewed were not only the theories of pragmatics, particularly speech acts and politeness, but the researcher also reviewed the theories of the research technique and method which was conducted in this research. A large number of theories were needed to validate this whole research. 4. Designing and distributing the questionnaire

In order to collect the data for this research, the researcher used the questionnaire as the instrument. Hence, before collecting the data, the researcher needed to design the questionnaire first. The questionnaire was designed by adapting discourse completion test (DCT). First, the researcher designed the

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S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 13

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Direct, clear

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Begging for forgiveness

Student 14

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 15

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Direct, clear

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 16

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Direct, clear

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 17

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Begging for forgiveness

Student 18

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

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Begging for forgiveness

Student 19

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Begging for forgiveness

Student 20

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 21

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 22

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 23

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

S4 Conventional indirect

Student 24

S1 Conventional indirect

S2 Conventional indirect

S3 Conventional indirect

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APPENDIX E

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Questionnaire Blueprint

o Scenario Specific Theory General Theory

1 You want to have consultation with your lecturer (advisor) related to your thesis/proposal seminar. But, you cannot meet him/her in person to arrange the schedule. So, you send the text message to him/her personally to ask for permission to have consultation. What do you write in your message?

a. “Where possible, the lecturers may ask a learner how they can best meet students‟ needs and keep checking if they are being met.”

(Mortiboys, Ann. 2010, p. 112)

b. “A student asks a teacher for an extension for finishing a seminar paper.”

(Blum-Kulka, 1982, p. 211)

The situation is not exactly the same as the theory, but the context is slightly similar. The situation is

designed based on students’

need in the study.

“Education as a process of

communication there should be something special about the messages of the information transmitted by the educators. The

information transferred by education is special because the messages explicitly convey knowledge about our physical and social environment and practical skills to solve problems. However, implicitly, these messages convey a whole complex of ideological ideas as well, of which

education itself is one, maintained by the information rulers. (Epskamp, C.P. & Boeren, A.J.J.M., 1979, p. 19) 2 You are doing your final

project for a course. The lecturer allows you to send the draft of your final project to his/her email so that he/she can check it. You are planning to send your draft as an attachment to your lecturer via email.

Write down the

introductory message of your email.

a. “It is instructive to conceptualize the task as one of generating effective independent learning hours and thinking of the teaching input necessary to achieve this.”

(Mortiboys, Ann. 2010, p. 104)

b. “A university professor promised to return the student‟s term paper that day (but didn‟t finish reading it.)” (Blum-Kulka, 1982, p. 211)

(5)

The situation is not exactly the same as the theory, but the context is slightly similar. The situation is

designed based on students’

need in the study.

3 You are on your way to finish your final project for a course. You have to present your project to the whole class as the final test. But, before presenting your project, the lecturer asks you to send him/her your power point slides. You have sent the power point slides right before the deadline. But, when you check your work again, you find some mistakes on it and want to revise it. So, you decide to resend the email with the revised slides. What do you write on your email?

a. “The motivated learners are likely to do the required inter-session directed tasks and possibly more. Others may perceive that there is no penalty for not doing such work and that they can get by without it.”

(Mortiboys, Ann. 2010, p. 104)

b. “A student is late again for a meeting with a friend with whom she is working on a joint paper.”

(Blum-Kulka, 1982, p. 212)

The situation is not exactly the same as the theory, but the context is slightly similar. The situation is

designed based on students’

need in the study.

4 You will have consultation on your thesis/proposal seminar with your advisor on a specific day. You have arranged the schedule together with your lecturer and you have prepared yourself to have the consultation. But, on the D-day, you get a trouble (getting sick or having an accident) that makes you

a. “There are usually two categories of reason why a learner would not attend a class session: personal reasons (such as illness or other priorities related to family or work) or they cannot see any value in attending.”

(Mortiboys, Ann. 2010, p. 87)

(6)

unable to come to your consultation. You want to inform your lecturer about your condition and reschedule the consultation by sending him/her text message. Write down your message.

b. “A student borrowed her professor‟s book, which she promised to return that day, but forgot to bring it.” (Blum-Kulka, 1982, p. 212)

The situation is not exactly the same as the theory, but the context is slightly similar. The situation is

Illocutionary acts in relation to politeness strategies as shown by the seventh semester English education students in their written messages.

ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN RELATION TO POLITENESS

STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN RELATION TO POLITENESS

STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

APPENDIX E

Questionnaire Blueprint

References for Questionnaire Blueprint

Blum-Kulka, S. & Olshtain, E. (1982). Requests and apologies: A cross-cultural

study of speech act realization patterns (CCSARP). Applied linguistics, 5(3),

196-213.

Epskamp, C.P. & Boeren, A.J.J.M. (1979). Education and communication: A

conceptual framework. The Netherlands: The Hague.

Mortiboys, A. (2010). How to be an effective teacher in higher education:

Answers to Lecturers’ Questions

. Berkshire: Open University Press.

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Illocutionary acts in relation to politeness strategies as shown by the seventh semester English education students in their written messages.

ILLOCUTIONARY ACTS IN RELATION TO POLITENESS

STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

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STRATEGIES AS SHOWN BY THE SEVENTH SEMESTER

ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDENTS

IN THEIR WRITTEN MESSAGES

APPENDIX E

Questionnaire Blueprint

References for Questionnaire Blueprint

Blum-Kulka, S. & Olshtain, E. (1982). Requests and apologies: A cross-cultural

study of speech act realization patterns (CCSARP). Applied linguistics, 5(3),

196-213.

Epskamp, C.P. & Boeren, A.J.J.M. (1979). Education and communication: A

conceptual framework. The Netherlands: The Hague.

Mortiboys, A. (2010). How to be an effective teacher in higher education:

Answers to Lecturers’ Questions

. Berkshire: Open University Press.

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