Defense mechanism adopted by the protagonists against the terror of death in K.A Applegateâ`s animorphs.

(1)

vii ABSTRACT

WIBISONO, MIKAEL ARI, Defense Mechanism Adopted by the Protagonists Against the Terror of Death in K.A Applegate’s Animorphs. Yogyakarta: Department of English Letters, Sanata Dharma University, 2016.

Death is something that every living thing in this world cannot avoid. Sooner or later death will come and claim the living things’ life. When someone is forced to face death (or in other word face the terror of death) it will create a reaction inside that person’s mind related to the death which he or she faces. Usually the reaction caused by such even is fear. Fear can be one of things that affects one’s psychological condition.

This study has three objectives. First, this study describes the characteristic of the protagonists in Animorphs. Second, after describing the protagonists and understand their characteristics, this study wants to analyze the kind of terrors which are faced by the protagonist. Third, after understanding the terror and the character’s reaction towards it, this study wants to analyze the kind of defense mechanism that they use, and how they apply it in their daily life

This study used library research methods. First the writer read the main source of the study which is all of the Animorphsnovels. Second the writer selected thirteen books and conducted close reading on them. Third the writer then studied from books, journals, and studies which has a relation with the problem on the novel. Finally the writer analyzed the relation between the studies/theories and the novel. The primary source of this study is K.A Applegate’s Animorph, while the secondary sources are books and journals about psychology, terror, and defense mechanism. The approach used in this study is psychological approach, because this study wants to analyze the psychological condition of the protagonists.

The problems that the protagonists of theAnimorphs have are how their life is endangered because of the Yeerks’ invasion. This study discovers that the protagonists of Animorphs choose their defense mechanism based on their characteristic. Jake, who is considered to be a responsible person, adopted a defense mechanism called anticipation (realistic planning). Rachel, who is the most reckless and the bravest member of the team adopted a defense mechanism called courage (bravely facing any trouble). Marco, who likes to make a joke out of everything adopted a defense mechanism called humor (Entertaining himself and others). Tobias, who is a loner, adopted a defense mechanism called dissociation (distancing himself from others). Cassie, who is a pacifist and hates violence adopted a defense mechanism called withdrawal, because she prefer to run away from conflict or violence rather than facing it.

(2)

viii ABSTRAK

WIBISONO, MIKAEL ARI, Defense Mechanism Adopted by the Protagonists Against the Terror of Death in K.A Applegate’s Animorphs. Yogyakarta: FakultasSastraInggris, UniversitasSanata Dharma, 2016.

Kematian adalah hal yang tidak bisa dihindari oleh semua mahkluk hidup di bumi, cepat atau lambat seseorang akan mengakhiri hidupnya atau dengan kata lain mengalami kematian. Ketika seseorang dipaksa untuk menghadapi kematian, sebuah reaksi akan muncul di pikiran orang tersebut yang disebabkan oleh bahaya kematian. Reaksi yang biasanya muncul akibat menghadapi kematian adalah rasa takut. Rasa takut adalah salah satu hal yang memiliki pengaruh besar pada kondisi psikologis manusia.

Penelitian ini memiliki tiga objektif. Pertama penelitian ini membahas karakteristik dari para protagonis novel Animorphs. Kedua, setelah mengetahui karakteristik para protagonis, penelitian ini membahas teror yang dihadapi oleh para protagonis. Ketiga, penelitian ini membahas mekanisme pertahanan ego yang digunakan oleh para protagonis untuk melawan teror tersebut

Penelitian ini menggunakan metode kajian pustaka, langkah pertama yang diambil oleh peneliti adalah membaca kelima puluh empat novel Animorphs yang merupakan sumber utama dari penelitian ini. Langkah yang kedua, peneliti memilih enam belas buku dari lima puluh empat buku untuk dianalisa lebih mendalam. Langkah yang ketiga, peneliti menyaring dan menganalisa buku, jurnal, dan penelitian yang berhubungan dengan penelitian ini. Langkahterakhir, peneliti menganalisa hubungan antara permasalahan yang diajukan dengan teori dan penelitian yang ada di buku dan jurnal. Sumber utama dari penelitian ini adalah novel Animorphs karangan K.A Applegate. Sumber sekundernya terdiri dari berbagai buku dan jurnal yang berkaitan dengan psikologi, terror, dan

mekanisme pertahanan ego. Pendekatan yang digunakan oleh penelitian ini adalah pendekatan psikologis. Karena penelitian ini menganalisa kondisi psikologis dari para protagonis.

Masalah yang dihadapi oleh para protagonist dari novel Animorphs adalah terancamnya hidup mereka karena invasi dari Yeerks. Penelitian ini

menyimpulkan bahwa para protagonis menggunakan mekanisme pertahanan ego berdasarkan sifat dan karakteristik mereka. Jake yang dianggap paling dewasa dan bertanggung jawab menggunakan mekanisme yang disebut anticipation

(mempersiapkan rencana dalam segala situasi). Rachel, karakter yang paling pemberani menggunakan mekanisme courage (beranimelawanmasalah). Marco, yang kesehariannya suka bercanda dalam segala situasi menggunakan mekanisme humour (menghibur diri sendiri dan orang lain). Tobias yang seorang penyendiri menggunakan mekanisme withdrawal (menjauhkan diri dari orang lain). Cassie yang paling lembut serta membenci pertikaian darah menggunakan mekanisme bernama withdrawal (melarikan diri dari masalah karena tidak tahan dengan masalah tersebut).

(3)

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra in English Letters

MIKAEL ARI WIBISONO Student Number: 124214015

ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS

FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

YOGYAKARTA 2016

(4)

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra in English Letters

MIKAEL ARI WIBISONO Student Number: 124214015

ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS

FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

YOGYAKARTA 2016

(5)

(6)

A SarjanaSastra _{Undergraduate Thesis} DEFENSE _MECIIAMSM_{ADOPTED BY TITE}

PROTAGOMSTS AGAINST THE TERROR OT OTATTT _{IN K.A APPLEGATE'S}

AAUMORPHS By

Mikael Ari Wibisono Student Number:

lz4ll4}ls

Defended before the Board of Examiners On August 25,2A16

and Declared Acceptable

BOARD OF EXAMINERS Name

Chairperson Secretary Member I Member2 Member 3

Dr. F.X. Siswadi, M.A.

Dra. Sri Mulyani, M.A.,

ph.D

/

Dr. F.X. Siswadi, M.A.

Drs. _{HirmawanW[ianarkq M.Hum.} Elisa DwiWardani, _S.S.,_M.Hum

Yogyakarta, August 31

z}rc

Faculty of Letters

Dharma University

fr'.arrr

s41

s"

_{-_#}

1,ffi

QG*l(tls

srst*\. \ tQrtnR<{l

(7)

STATEMENT OT' ORIGINALITY

I

certiff that this undergraduate

thsis

contains no material which has be€n previously submitted for the award of any other degroe at any universiry,

that, to the best of my knowledge, this undergraduate thesis contains no material previously written by any other person except where duo reference is made in the text of the undergraduate thesis

Yogyakarta, July 14, 2016

(8)

LEMBAR PERNYATAA}I PERSETUJUAI\ PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH UNTUK KEPENTINGAN AKADEMIS

Yang bertanda tangan di bawah ini, saya mahasiswa Universitas Sanata Dharma

Nama

:Mikael Ari Wibisono

NomorMahasiswa :124214015

Demi pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan, saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yangberjudul

DEFENSE MECHANISM ADOPTED BY THE PROTAGONISTS AGAINST THE TERROR OF DEATH IN ICA APPLEGATE'S

ANIMORPHS

Beserta perangkat yang diperlukan (bilaada). Dengan demikian saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan Universitas Sanata Dhanna hak unfuk menyimpan, mengalihkan dalam bentuk media lain, mengelolanya dalam bentuk pangkalan data, mendistribusikan secara terbatas dan mempublikasikannya di internet atau media lain untuk kepentingan akademis tanpa perlu meminta ijin kepada saya maupun memberikan royalty kepada saya selama tetap mencantumkan nama saya sebagai penulis.

Demikian pemyataan ini saya buat dengan sebenarnya

Dibuat di Yogyakarta Pada tanggal 14 Juli 2016

Yang menyatakan

\,ig

(9)

vii

THE MORE YOU

KNOW

THE MORE YOU

FORGET

(10)

viii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to Jesus Christ, for the protection and blessing given to me. He protected me from harm, ensuring that nothing will harm me in writing this thesis.

I also would like to express my gratitude to Drs. HirmawanWijanarka, M.Hum, my thesis advisor who has guided me in writing this thesis. He patiently notified me about mistakes which I made repeatedly, until I fix those mistakes. He also told me about various things which helped me in writing this thesis, from how to write this thesis in proper format to trivial things which I still considered as important and helpful. I will not forget to give my gratitude to Mrs. Elisa DwiWardani, S.S., M.Hum for her willingness to become my thesis co-advisor. She has helped me in correcting several additional mistakes which I made in writing this thesis.

My gratitude also goes to my parents and brothers whom I love so much. They often remind me to write my thesis. They often scolded me if I did not write my thesis. They expressed their love toward me through their scolding because I believe that they want me to graduate as soon as possible, after that I am able to fully struggle with the next stage of my life.

I also would like to thank my friends who have accompanied me in writing this thesis, Cicilia Dwi Saputri, Putri Ekarini, Theresia Anggraini, Bambang Listyanto, Yoseph Odipus, and Yakobus Joko. They have given me motivation, encouragement to quickly finish this thesis. I would like to give special gratitude towards Cicilia Dwi Saputri, who have helped me in fixing the format of this

(11)

thesis. She patiently guided me in writing this thesis in the proper format. Somehow I believe that if they did not often invite me to write thesis together, it would be hard for me to build enough motivation to finish my thesis.

I also would like to say thank you to people who have provided a place for me to write my thesis, the Library of Sanata Dharma University, LUK café, Smart Lounge and Mini Library at Lippo Mall, and KFC joint at Merbabu Hotel. The existences of these places have helped me find a good place to write my thesis.

(12)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE………..ii

APPROVAL PAGE………iii

ACCEPTANCE PAGE………..iv

STATEMENT OF ORIGINAILITY………....v

LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH………....vi

MOTTO PAGE………...vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS………...vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS………x

ABSTRACT……….xi

ABSTRAK……….xii CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION………...1

A. Background of the Study………...1

B. Problem Formulation……….4

C. Objectives of the Study……….4

D. Definition and Terms……….5

CHAPTER II: REVIEW OF LITERATURE………..6

A. Review of Related Studies………6

B. Review of Related Theories………..10

C. Theoretical Framework……….16

CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY………...18

A. Object of the Study………...18

B. Approach of the Study………..20

C. Method of the Study………..21

CHAPTER IV: ANALYSIS………23

A. The Description of the Protagonists’ Characteristics……….23

B. Terrors Faced by the Protagonists, and Their Impact to the Protagonists……….………32

C. Defense Mechanisms adopted by the Protagonists………38

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION………..48

BIBLIOGRAPHY………51

APPENDICES………..53

Appendix 1………53

(13)

ABSTRACT

(14)

xii

ABSTRAK

mekanisme pertahanan ego. Pendekatan yang digunakan oleh penelitian ini adalah pendekatan psikologis. Karena penelitian ini menganalisa kondisi psikologis dari para protagonis.

Masalah yang dihadapi oleh para protagonist dari novel Animorphs adalah terancamnya hidup mereka karena invasi dari Yeerks. Penelitian ini

(15)

1 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

Every living thing in this world will eventually die; we do not know when we will experience it. We usually never care about it in our life because our daily life runs as normal as usual. But what if our life is terrorized by death or in other words we are faced with a situation which could endanger our life.

The impact of being under the terror of death may change people’s

personality completely, for example, it may change a person with happy go lucky attitude into someone with a gloomy mood. In worst case it may also cause

someone to lose their sanity. The impact also may disturb people’s social life, for

example the fear makes them depressed and scared enough as the result it will be hard for people to socialize with others. In K.A Applegate’s Animorphs, The protagonists of the books face this kind of situation; their life is terrorized by an alien race known as Yeerks. The protagonists have to risk their life multiple times

to protect themselves and planet earth from the Yeerks’ secret invasion.

Fear can be one thing that affects one’s psychological condition the most;

every person in this world has different reaction toward fear. Some people may not show any reaction of fear whenever they were facing certain terror which

(16)

tough in front of other people while in fact they were scared inside. People like this usually want to show other people that he or she is fearless, and ready to face anything, sometimes people like this also want to be a role model for the people around him/her so that they too can be as fearless as he/she is. There are also people who like to run from the trouble. They tend to deny the fact which is happening in front of them. They pretend that nothing happen, they are trying to believe that everything is fine, but inside their heart they know that the terror is exist and it is unavoidable.

Self-esteem, it is argued, safeguards people against the ill effects stemming from many of life's problems. This premise assumes that people with high self-esteem, in contrast to those with low self-esteem, will behave in more socially acceptable and responsible ways, will somehow be more resilient to life's vicissitudes, will generally display higher achievement in conventional pursuits, and will ultimately possess greater socio emotional well-being (Burns, 1979; Covington, 1992)

Both Burns and Covington believes that self-esteem development is really important, as they believe that it will help protecting our mind from any kind of terror towards it and it will make it easier for us to think of a solution to overcome the terror.

Self esteem itself is more like our confidence toward our self; this confidence is the one which is usually used by human to show their courage. People who have lots of self esteem are usually more courageous or confident in facing almost any kind of situation than people who have less self esteem. People with low self esteem will more likely be shaken or confused whenever they were facing dangerous situation.

(17)

It is interesting to analyze how people react toward something which terrorizes their mind. The different reaction shown by people is usually caused because of their natural personality. For example, people who naturally have a brave and courageous personality usually react against such condition nearly without showing any fear in front of people, but that’s not always the case because sometimes there are also people who response to terror by clearly showing their fear even though naturally they have a brave and courageous personality.

It seems that the level of terror also affect how people react towards it, the

bigger the terror the more it affect people’s mind. For some if not most people,

terror of death is the biggest terror of their life. Whenever they are facing this terror they cannot control their fear and thus it greatly affects their daily life.

B. Problem formulation

Based on the background of the study mentioned above, this study will analyze these three problems

1. How the protagonists’ characteristics are described in the story?

2. What are the terrors faced by the protagonists and their impact to the protagonists?

3. What kind of defense mechanisms are utilized by the protagonists based on their characteristics?

(18)

C. Objectives of the Study

The objective of this study is divided into three parts. First this study wants to analyze how the protagonists are described in the novel. As stated in the title, in which this study wants to analyze how the protagonists react to certain terror, it is important to understand how the protagonists are described in the novel. The first problem focuses on describing their characteristic, how they interact with other people.

Second, after describing the protagonists and understand their characters, this study wants to analyze what kind of terrors which are faced by the protagonist. This study also explains how those terrors are able to strike the protagonist both physically and mentally

Third, after understanding the terror and the character’s reaction towards

it, this study wants to analyze what kind of defense mechanisms which are utilized by the protagonists to help themselves coping against anything which is caused by the terror.

D. Definition and Terms

The word terror mentioned on the title is something which causes very strong feeling of fear (Merriam Webster, 2015)

Defense mechanism is psychic procedures for avoiding painful admissions or recognitions (Peter Barry, 1995: 98)

(19)

5 CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

A. Review of Related studies

Therese Holm (2001) studied about the use of language in several children’s book, which among them is Animorphs. According to Holm, the language in Animorphs is somewhat cliché-filled and flat, she is referring to the use of repetitive expression or passages that seems to be bit turgid in front of adult reader. For example: “He just looked at me with those deep, troubled eyes –eyes I can now see only in my memory” (Animorphs 1999: 56).

This style of writing is usually brushed off by adult reader. They consider it as badly written. Yet for those who usually cares about the plot of the book rather than the writing style prefer this kind of writing style because it made it easier for them to read.

Roger D. Sell (2002) compared Animorphs with the famous children show known as Power Rangers, both media has two similarities. First, the main plots of both stories are about five teenagers who are given a special power to protect their planet from evil.

Second, the unification of the group (from both media) somehow erase the individuality from each person. They become more care to each other more than they care about their own wellbeing. Roger symbolizes this as the need of erasing individuality for the sake of a greater good (in Animorphs the greater good refer to protecting the planet from yeerks’ invasion)

(20)

Roger symbolizes the protagonists’ ability to morph into any creature that they touched as children’s metamorphosis into adult hood. When they leave their human body to morph into animal form, they leave their normal human mind and body into something new, something which they never know before, something which sometimes are dangerous for them. for the sake of saving other people, it is similar to children who has to leave their childish personality in order to find something better and new for their development.

He also stated that the protagonists’ ability to morph can also be viewed from negative perspective, from this perspective the morph can be symbolized as people who want to cast away their identity, or people who try to throw away their old identity because they feel more comfortable in their new identity.

Dr Edwin Bakker and Dr Beatrice De Graaf study that something like terrorist attack or terrorist threats can cause a shock to some people. They will be terrorized or traumatized by those events that may disrupt people’s psychological condition.

Terrorist attacks, and even terrorist threats, can be considered traumatic events. Such events are defined in the “Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV” as an event in which the person experienced, witnessed, or was confronted with an event or events that involved actual or threatened death or serious injury, or a threat to physical integrity of self of others (Edwin Baker, 2014:5).

According to them, the differences of fear shown by people whenever they were experiencing this event were not caused by the level of the terror. The difference is caused by the perception, imagination and vulnerability of targeted audiences or otherwise involved parties. In other words each people have different ways of perceiving their fear when they were terrorized by such event.

(21)

Fear should not be considered merely as a negative reaction to threats and attacks. In fact, fear of danger is a very natural and useful emotion. Fear is a survival mechanism. Fear of terrorism can encourage people to take the necessary precautions and actions (Edwin Baker, 2014: 2).”

They also believe that fear does not always bring negative effect, people can use that fear as stepping stone so that they can overcome that situation. This is related with the previous statement that each person have different reaction of fear, it is up to them to manage their own fear. They can let the fear consume their mind, or they will try to overcome those fear.

“Recall the valence prediction that fearful and angry individuals will make risk-averse choices across gain and loss frames when compared with individuals who are low in dispositional fear and anger. The appraisal-tendency approach generates the same prediction for fearful individuals. However, it differs for angry individuals, predicting that they will make risk-seeking choices across frames.”(Lerner, 2001: 3-4).

Jenifer S Lerner and Dacher Keltner analyze about the result of human’s fear and anger. They study that human’s fear may cause severe result to themselves or even to everyone around them. The result is caused by people’s behavior when they were affected by strong emotion like fear and anger.

In the end, what makes this study different from the previously mentioned studies is that this study explores the relation between the protagonists’ characteristics with their mental condition. This study also focuses on analyzing how the protagonists of Animorphs utilize certain defense mechanism to cope against the terror. This study also analyzes the development of the protagonist caused by the terror, how the terrors mold the protagonist into a different kind of person which depends on how well they suppress the terror.

(22)

B. Review of related Theories 1. Terror Management Theories

Because this thesis explores someone’s reaction whenever they face something which terrorize their mind, this thesis adopts terror management theory.

Terror management theory is a theory which revolves around the management of self esteem to control psychological conflict which is caused by facing the terror of death. This theory is proposed by Seldon Solomon, Jeff Greenberg, and Tom Pyszczynski

Self-esteem is sought because it provides protection against the fear of death, the fear of death is rooted in an instinct for self-preservation that humans share with other species. Although we share this instinct with other species, only we are aware that death is inevitable--that is, that our self preservation instinct will inevitably be thwarted.

(Greenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1986: 1).

This theory seems to assume that self esteem management is important in coping against fear. Self Esteem can provide protection to one’s mind because it will reduce the thought of fear as long as people can manage their self esteem really well. terror management theory, increased self-esteem

According to terror management theory, increased self esteem should enhance the functioning of the cultural anxiety buffer and thereby provide protection against death concerns. In effect, high self-esteem should reduce the effects of MS on worldview defense.

(Greenberg, Pyszczynski, & Solomon, 1986: 6)

People who have more self esteem is believed by this theory to be able to control their behavior and fear in front of other people whenever they were facing terror of death.

(23)

Mruk (1999) also agreed that self esteem is an important factor in defending our mind from threatening factor. Mruk believed that people with high self esteem will be able to develop a better control toward threatening thought. a People with either dispositionaly high or experimentally enhanced

self-esteem exhibit less anxiety and anxiety-related defense in response to threatening stimuli. High self esteem has also been shown to decrease defensive responses to thoughts of death.

(Harmon-Jones, 1997)

On the other hand, according to Mruk (1999) the mind of people with low self esteem will more likely be affected when they are experiencing threatening stimuli that could affect their mind. Their emotion will be susceptible to various negative effect because the lack of self esteem.

People with lower trait self-esteem tend to experience virtually every aversive emotion more frequently than people with higher self-esteem. Trait self-esteem correlates negatively with scores on measures of anxiety, sadness, depression, hostility, anger, social anxiety, shame, guilt,

loneliness, as well as general negative affectivity and neuroticism. (Mruk, 1999)

In summary terror management theory believes that it is important for people to manage their self esteem really well. Because if they want to have better control toward threatening thought, increasing their self esteem is useful to maintaining their control toward their mind/emotion. The more self esteem people have, the more they can control their emotion toward threatening stimuli. On the other hand, people with low self esteem will more likely be unable to control their emotion toward threatening stimuli

(24)

2. Theory of Characterization

In fiction especially in Novel, characters or casts always exist inside of it. In a novel character is the one responsible for what happen in the story, they are the actor who is involved with what happen in the story.

Thus in every novel there is a term known as Characterization.It is how the character in the story are described, their appearance, personality, and how they interact with the plot. Minderop (2005) stated that in novel there are two methods that are usually used to characterizing the character inside the novel, they are:

a. Direct method

Direct method characterization is done by the writer itself. The writer, without the use of any character inside the novel explicitly mentioned the characteristic of the character inside the novel.

b. Indirect method

Indirect method characterization is usually done by ignoring the existence of the writer. The characterization is done through the characters inside the novel itself. Usually one character will describe the characteristic of another character. Minderop (2005:) stated that characterization in a novel involves six things;

i. Through the dialogue or conversation between each characters

From the conversation between character we may gain information about the characters inside the novel, for example; Person A is talking to person B, in

(25)

their conversation person A discuss about Person C, in it he describes who is person C, his characteristic, his personality, how person C interact with each other. In some cases person A will reveal about himself, either to another character (person B for example) or to the reader.

ii. The setting of the conversation

In fiction or even in reality, the setting of the conversation will affect the characterization process, for example people who converse in a public area will have less serious discussion compared to those who converse in a more private area, thus their conversation will be affected by the situation, because when people wanted to talk about other people in a public area they are cautious with other people who may hear the conversation. They are afraid if their conversation is heard and eventually known by that person or they afraid that they may broke that people’s reputation

iii. The character which is discussed or characterized

This refers to the characters which being characterized in the conversation in a novel, we can call this character as the object of characterization because he/she is the one being described by other characters.

iv. The mental condition of the character

Mental condition is one of characteristics of the character inside the novel. The mental condition of a character can be seen from how they talk, interact with

(26)

other people, and dealing with their problem. Sometimes mental condition of a character is mentioned explicitly by another character.

v. Intonation, dialect, and vocabulary

Intonation will reveal the nature of a character, the level of intonation when a character is talking will determine their personality (Minderop : 34). Vocabulary is also important in determining the characteristic of a character, for example, we can learn that a character is a polite and kind character if he/she tends to use polite words when speaking other people. On the other hand a character which tends to use harsh, rude, or impolite words can be easily identified as a character with an impolite characteristic. From the use vocabulary we can also imagine the background of a character.

vi. The action of the character.

Aside from how they speak, how the characters act and behave in the story also can give us an image of their characteristic. For example we can know that a person has short temper emotion by analyzing how that person tends to do something unpredictable like injuring other character when he/she is irritated.

3. Theory of Defense Mechanisms

Defense mechanism is psychic procedures for avoiding painful admissions or recognitions (Peter Barry, 1995: 98). Defense mechanism is utilized by people (both consciously and unconsciously) to defend their mind from psychological attack after certain event.

(27)

George Valliant studied about defense mechanism and introduced a version of defense mechanism based from his idea. He classified defense mechanisms into four levels, Psychotic, Immature, Neurotic and Mature.

a. Psychotic Level Defense Mechanism

Psychotic level defense mechanism is commonly used to alter the reality of the user’s mind. Thus the users of this type of mechanisms are often looked by other people as insane or crazy. The mechanisms which are included in this level are: (Valiant, 1992: 243-244)

i. Delusional projection

Delusions about external reality, the user of this mechanism imagine about an imaginary situation different from the actual situation.

ii. Denial

Refusing to accept the reality, they believe that the situation around them is not real.

iii. Distortion

Crude reshaping of external reality to fit the victim’s mind, this is similar with delusional projection only in this mechanism the user tries to imagine the current situation into their liking

(28)

Immature level defense mechanisms often alter distress engendered by threat. Although it will take some times before the user is able to heal their problem, the change caused by using this mechanisms is really significant, they will have a lot of improvement in relationships with other people . The mechanisms of this level are: (Valiant, 1992:244-245).

i. Projection

Attributing one’s unacknowledged feeling toward others, this mechanism involves sharing what is hidden inside the user’s mind to other people.

ii. Schizoid fantasy

Tendency to use fantasy to escape from the problem, the user fantasize about something which is able to ease up their stress

iv. Passive-aggressive behavior

Aggression toward others caused by passivity, the user annoy other people around them by suddenly acting passively

v. Acting out

Direct expression of unconscious wish or impulses, the users express their hidden actual feeling to other people consciously or unconsciously.

(29)

c. Neurotic Defense Mechanisms

Neurotic level defense mechanisms alter private feelings or instinctual expression. To the beholder they appear as individual quirks or neurotic hang-ups. They often can be dramatically changed by conventional, brief psychotherapeutic interpretation. The mechanisms of this level are: (Valiant, 1986: 786-794).

i. Repression

The mechanism which involves withholding one’s feeling in their mind, the user usually tried to hold their true feeling inside their mind in order to hide it from other people.

ii. Withdrawal

Removing oneself from the reality, the user of this mechanism prefer to cut their ties to other people or the community around them to avoid painful strike to their mind

iv. Isolation

The mechanism in which the user cut the ties between their emotion with reality. The users of this mechanism tend to face certain annoyance without involving their natural emotion.

v. Displacement

(30)

vi. Undoing

Attempting to undo threatening thought, the user of this mechanism try to repent their threatening behavior by doing the opposite of said behavior.

d. Mature Level Defense Mechanism

Mature level defense mechanisms are commonly found among emotionally healthy adults and are considered mature, even though many have their origins in an immature stage of development. They have been adapted through the years in order to optimize success in human society and relationships. The use of these defenses enhances pleasure and feelings of control. These defenses help to integrate conflicting emotions and thoughts, whilst still remaining effective. Those who use these mechanisms are usually considered virtuous (Valiant, 1992: 239-246).

The mechanisms of this level are:

i. Altruisms

Instinctually gratifying service to others, the user of this mechanism try to make their mind feel better by making other people satisfied with what the user do to them.

(31)

ii. Anticipation

It is a defense mechanism which involves realistic planning for future events. The users of this defense mechanism literally anticipated the danger and making a plan in order to prevent the situation from causing disturbance to the user or people around them.

iii. Acceptance

This mechanism is the opposite of denial, the users of this mechanism positively accepting their actual situation.

iv. Patience

The defense mechanism in which the users patiently endure their current difficult circumstances until it passes away.

v. Humor

Expression of ideas or feelings that brings pleasure to oneself or others. Sometimes the users of humor sarcastically jokes about the current situation in order to cheer the users or the people around them.

vi. Courage

The willingness to face a certain threat, the user of this mechanism prefer to face the problem head on rather than run away from it.

(32)

C. Theoretical Framework

Terror management is used to solve the problems that study have from analyzing the novel (Animorphs). The first problem may not be answered by applying the theory, as the first problem is about finding out what is the source of the terror, and how that terror were able to incite fear in the protagonists’ mind. Terror management theory can be applied to solve the second and third problem, the second problem is about what is the effect of the terror, this is related to the level of self esteem that the protagonists of the novel (Animorphs) has. Because all protagonists have different kind of self esteem the effect of the terror will also be varied. This study analyzes the level of self esteem that each of the protagonists possess, and see how does it helps the character in defending their mind or emotion against the terror of death from their enemies. As stated before in previous section that terror management theory deal with the management of self esteem, thus the study will adopt that theory to see the management of self esteem inside the novel.

George Valliant’s defense mechanisms will be used to analyze how the characters of Animorphs cope with their situation. What kind of defense mechanism that they will adopt to help them coping with their problem, what is the result of using that defense mechanism, whether they are able to manage their situation by using the defense mechanism or not.

This thesis fused the application of Terror Management Theory and Defense Mechanism, because this thesis believed that both theories can be synchronized to solve the problem. Theory of Terror Management will be used to

(33)

understand how the character react to the terror, or in the word how the terror affected the protagonists, are they scared, or will they fight back against the terror. After learning their behavior toward the terror this thesis analyzed what kind of attempt which they used to fight the terror which lingered in their mind.

Minderop’s characterization of characters in a novel will be used to further understand the nature of the character of Animorphs. It is difficult or maybe impossible to analyze the protagonists’ reaction toward the terror if we do not understand the characteristic of the protagonists.

(34)

CHAPTER III

METHODOLOGY

A. Object of the Study

Animorphs is a series of novel written by K.A Applegate, the whole story consists of 54 books. There are also ten spin-off series which even tough are not really important to the main story it still has relation with the main story. The series was published by Scholastic, the first main book was published on June 1996 while the last book was published on May 2001.

Animorphs is written in first person style, the story is told by a narrator which is none other than the protagonists themselves. Each book is narrated by different character, for example book one is narrated by Jake while book two is narrated by Rachel and so on. Only the last book which had different style of narration, the last book is narrated by all of the character.

Twenty six books of Animorphs series were written by ghostwriters. Typically, K. A. Applegate would write a detailed outline for each book, and a ghostwriter, would spend a month or two writing the actual novel. After this, Applegate, and later her series editor, Tonya Alicia Martin, would edit the book to make it fit in with the series' tight continuity. Ghostwriters are credited for their help in the book's dedication page.

(35)

The books was re-released from May 2011 to September 2012, but because of tepid sales, the re-release version only released eighths of the original fifty four books.

On 1998 Animorphs series were adapted into television series by Nickelodeon; the series is split into two seasons, 20 episodes on season one, and 6 episode on season 2. The series lasted approximately 20 minutes (minus commercial).

The television series is not a complete adaption, although it borrows lots of element from the books, not all of the story in the books was adapted into the series. Animorphs had also been adapted into several video games, not only that a toy line based on Animorphs were also made in 1999, but the commercial was rather unsuccessful so the sale was cancelled.

The story of Animorphs is about five teenagers who accidently involved in an alien war. The story begins when the five teenagers walk from a shopping mall together through a construction site. On the construction site they meet with an alien named Elfangor. This alien tells the five teenagers about an alien race called Yeerks which is about to invade planet earth, after Elfangor gives them a special power. These five teenagers must risk their life multiple times to save their planet from the Yeerks. Yeerks is a parasite-like alien race which has similar form as

slugs, they are able to enter people’s head and then control those people from

(36)

Animorphs cannot trust anyone about their secret identity, anyone can be invaded by yeerks, neighbor, teacher, friends, and even their family.

The elements of the story is about war (because they fight against the yeerks) survival and horror ( because they risked their life multiple times), freedom (because they fight to liberate earth and other planets from the yeerks).

B. Approach of the Study

This thesis uses psychological approach, because the study deals with how people are coping with a condition that cause terror to their mind, this approach is used to get better understanding the relation between the protagonists’ characteristics and their psychological condition.

Psychological approach itself as the name suggests analyzed the ”Victim”, and then learned their faulty behaviors and habits, along with damaging words, thoughts, interpretations and feedback that affect strategies for daily living after receiving a certain psychological attack or in this case, the terror of death. Psychological approaches assume that many disorders result from mental, behavioral, and social factors, such as personal experiences, traumas, conflicts, and environmental conditions. (Paris, 1997)

Paris (1997) stated that human characters in literature works were not simply functions in a text or encoded messages from the author, but they were imagined human beings whose characteristics made sense in motivational terms.

(37)

Thus a psychological understanding about these characteristics will make the

literature works more fascinating. Because if we analyze the characters’

psychological condition, we will get better understanding about

Thus, by using psychological approach, this study analyzes how the terror affect the character inside the novel, what kind of reaction is shown in the novel, and find out why they show that reaction. This approach is used in relation with one of the theory which is used in this study, which is the terror management theory. As terror management theory analyze how the protagonists manage their self esteem to cope against the terror, the psychological approach is used to jelp

finding it out and also learn the relation between the terror and the character’s

reaction.

C. Method of the Study

The study adopts library research method, the researcher gathered various data and theories which is relevant with the study by looking it from a various book and other source. There is no interviewing some people in gathering the data, because the data in this study is purely from books and other written material (like journal from a website for example). The source itself is books which contain important information related to the theory which is used in this study and also written material which contain information which is able to help this study.

The main source of this study is K.A Applegate’s novel Animorphs. Altough the

writer did read the entire fifty books, only eighteen from fifty four books were chosen to be used to analyze the protagonists. The chosen book are book #1, #3,

(38)

#4, #5, #6, #7, #10, #11, #15, #16, #17, #19, #21, #22, #25, #27, #33, and #34 The reason why only eighteen books were chosen is because the chosen book was

enough to describe each of the protagonists’ characteristic. The protagonists’

characteristic also doesn’t change at all. In book #15 Rachel is described as brave

and reckless, in book #54 Rachel is still brave and reckless. It doesn’t mean that

the other book doesn’t have any kind of description regarding the protagonists’

characteristic. It is just that if this study used all the data from the entire series, this study will lose its primary focus and will just become a study about explaining Animorphs in general. The secondary data are Peter Barry’s The Beginning Theory, Edwin Bakker’s Towards a Theory of Fear Management in the Counterterrorism Domain: A Stocktaking Approach, Ernest Becker’s The Denial of Death, and George Vaillant’s Ego Mechanisms of Defense: A Guide for Clinicians and Researchers. Other sources also include journal and studies which has relations to this study.

The first step that the writer did was reading all of the fifty four Animorphs novels. After finished reading all of the novels, the writer chose sixteen books from the fifty four novels which considered important in helping the writer on working on this thesis and reread them thoroughly again in order to fully understand the problem which is faced by each of the protagonists. The writer then studied from books, journals, and studies which has a relation with the problem on the novel. Finally the writer analyzed the relation between the studies/theories and the novel.

(39)

CHAPTER IV

ANALYSIS

As stated in the title, this research adopted the terror management theory to analyze the problem. Terror management theory concern with how to deal or treat a psychological attack caused by various thing related to terror (which in this

study’s case is terror of death) to human’s mind and analyze what happen inside

their mind when they are dealing with the trouble. This thesis also analyzed how the protagonists adopt defense mechanism in order to cope with the terror. The analysis in this study will be split into several parts based on the number of problem that it has.

A. Description of the Protagonists’ Characteristics.

Minderop stated that there are several ways of describing a character in a story. K.A Applegate, the writer of this story seems to characterize or describing the characters inside the story from the opinion of other character, instead of directly mentioning it herself, by using the third person perspective. The novel Animorphs is told from the first person perspective, each book is narrated by each protagonists, telling the story from their own perspective (for example book one is

told from Jake’s perspective, because he is the narrator of said book, and then book two is told from Rachel’s perspective and so on). Thanks to this method it is easier for the reader to analyze the character itself, because by looking at the way

(40)

they describe other character, and also their expression and emotion when speaking, it is easier for the reader to analyze the character inside the novel.

1. The Description of Jake’s Characteristics

The First character to be described is Jake, from other character’s

perspective (from books which is narrated by any character other than Jake), Jake is the kind of person who has the charisma as the leader of the team. Other characters often look up into him whenever they need a decision in any situation (especially difficult ones). Rachel, in book seventeenth stated that Jake is a very responsible person, he is described as someone who is needed on a team.

But it was tricky, see, because we knew Jake, my cousin and our sort-of leader, might get all tense and righteous on us. Not that he's that way at all. He isn't. But he's very responsible. Someone has to be, and it sure isn't me. (Animorphs #17, 1996:2).

Jake is also depicted to be kind and humble as well, as although he often be considered as the de facto leader of the team and often becomes the one who gives command to the team, he does not want to be called as leader. This is proven whenever he is called by prince by Ax, because of his leadership, Jake dislike that, and he often reminds Ax to not call him prince.

<l am Aximili-Esgarrouth-lsthil.> We all just kind of stared.

"Ax," Marco said. "Pleased to meet you" <Who is your prince?>

One by one we looked at Jake.

"Oh, give me a break," Jake said. "I am not anyone's prince." But the Andalite had stepped forward.

He bowed his head and lowered his tail.

<I will fight for you, Prince Jake, until I can return to my cousins.> (Animorphs #4, 1996:61).

(41)

Even though Jake does not consider himself as the leader of the team, he cares greatly about the safety of his friends, he often feel responsible whenever his plan does not go as planned and eventually put him and his friend in danger. He often shown worried and scared whenever his friends are put in danger. Jake’s responsibility is one of the reason why his friends tends to rely on him in making a decision.

In accordance to Terror Management Theory, where the management of self esteem is very important in fighting the terror in people’s mind, Jake has a good control toward his self esteem; he is able to keep his emotion in check even in a dangerous situation. Numerous times throughout the series, the protagonists other than Jake describe him as the person capable of handling certain situation which no other protagonists is capable of, like giving the right strategy in the middle of a battle.

If we Animorphs have a leader, it's Jake. He's strong, inside and out, and really good looking, also inside and out. I mean, he's just an amazingly cool guy. Jake has had to grow up a lot in a very short time. It's weird to be a kid, and yet act like some kind of a general or something. We all decide the big stuff together. But when we're in a fight, it's Jake who has to make the little decisions a lot of times, the little decisions that could leave one of his friends dead.

(Animorphs #9, 1997:10)

Jake’s capability in controlling his self esteem is the reason why he is chosen by his friend to be leader of Animorphs. Based on his friend’s decision, we can see that Jake is the person who can control his self esteem better than his friend. Even though Jake is capable of managing his self esteem, that does not mean he cannot get worried or scared. Sometimes when his decision goes wrong

(42)

and put his entire friend in danger, Jake will show his fear and confusion. He gets scared because he feels responsible for what happen to his friend.

2. The Description of Marco’s Characteristics

Marco is the second character to be described in this study. In the story, Marco only lives with his father, they mother was believed to be missing on the sea and presumed dead by everyone. After the accident, his father was greatly depressed that it caused him to quit his job.

“Marco and his dad live in a garden apartment complex. One of the older ones, on the far side of the big neighborhood where Jake and Rachel both live. I'd only been over there a couple of times. I think Marco is kind of embarrassed because he doesn't have much money. He used to live in a house just down the street from Jake. But that was when his mother was

still alive, and before his father had a breakdown and quit his job.”

(Animorphs #4, 1996:42).

Marco’s mother who was believed to be dead is actually alive; she was

infested by a Yeerks known as Visser One, the highest ranking Visser in Yeerks world. Before he learned that fact, he is reluctant in becoming Animorphs, become the guardian of the earth, because he does not want to make his dad to lose another family member again. After learning the truth about his mother, Marco became determined to fight against the Yeerks and defeat them, in order to

save his mother from Visser One’s control.

Even though Marco’s family is in a devastated condition Marco, is

depicted as the kind of guy who likes to make fun or joke on anything. He often makes fun of everything, even in a most dire situation he still able to make a sarcastic comment, which intended to either cheer up his friend, or he just

(43)

annoyed by the situation. His habit of making jokes is sometimes able to irritate a person to a certain degree. Sometimes he make a joke about something which is not suitable to his or their current condition, and sometimes he accidentally make

a joke which can hurt other people’s feeling. Rachel often disliked Marco’s joke, Marco and Rachel often argued with each other, this is caused by Marco’s

constant annoying comment toward Rachel, regarding her personality.

Sometimes, Marco’s joke can be seen as an attempt to hide his true feeling

(shy, fear, etc) in a certain condition. He once stated it himself that he makes jokes to defend his mind from anything that may harm his inner mind. His habit to make a joke also can be seen to hide his sadness because of the loss of his mother. He

doesn’t want other people to know his inner mind. He forces himself to make other people believe that Marco is the guy who likes to crack a joke.

“My dad stood for a long time, looking down at the white marble

headstone. It has my mom's name. The day she was born, the day she died. And a message that says, "No wife, no mother, was ever more loved, or more deeply missed."

My dad and I stood a few feet apart. We didn't say anything. We both just kind of cried.

You probably wouldn't think I was the kind of guy who would cry. Mostly I don't. Mostly I make jokes about things. It's better to laugh than to cry, don't you think?

I do, even when the world is scary and sad, especially when the world is

scary and sad. That's when you need to laugh.” (Animorphs #5: 81) Compared to Jake, Marco has less control toward his self esteem. In the story, whenever Marco was put in a dire situation, he was overwhelmed by the fear in his mind. For Example in book #21, After the Animorphs morphed into a flea in order to infiltrate a meeting between world leaders, Marco was unable to control his transformation back into his human form. If Marco did not able to

(44)

transform back in time, he will be stuck in the form of flea for the rest of his life. This caused him to panic and made him unable to control his transformation even further.

3. The Description of Rachel’s Characteristics

In term of appearances Rachel is depicted as beautiful, she always wears clothes which made her looks like a beautiful model. Despite Rachel’s beautiful, model-like appearances, her personality is bold and reckless; Her friends considered her as the type of person who always jumped into action.

I guess most guys would say Rachel is prettier. Personally, I don't think of her that way because she's my cousin. But Rachel does look like some kind of blond supermodel. Not that Rachel acts like Ms. Fashion. Just the opposite if there's danger, Rachel is right there, usually a few steps ahead of anyone else. (Animorphs #6, 1996:11).

From the quotation above, Rachel is described as the kind of person who prefer to challenge the danger or terror rather than running away from it.

<Hammerheads!> I yelled. <Hammerheads!>

We drove down beneath the surface, and there they were: hammerhead sharks.

<There must be ten of them!> Tobias said.

<Ten of them against five dolphins and a tiger shark,> Rachel said. <We can handle it.>

(45)

there are other times when I just want to slap her. We had fought sharks before. We had won, but it had been a close call. Very, very close. And there were more sharks this time.

<Easy, everyone. We don't know they're going to attack us.> Jake said, as calmly as he could with ten sharks heading straight for us.

(Animorphs #15, 1998:35)

In book #15, The Animorphs encountered more than ten hammerhead sharks while on a reconnaissance mission under the sea. Despite the overwhelming odd, Rachel prefers to fights all the sharks rather than run away from them. She even shows disappointment when all of her friends decided to run away from the shark.

I have been afraid many times since becoming an Animorphs. But this was bad. There are few things as horrifying as watching a shark come at you. Knowing he intends to eat you.

<0kay, look, we don't need this fight,> Jake said. <Let's get out of here.> <Just run away?!> Rachel asked in outrage. <You're welcomed to stay behind, Rachel,> I said.

(Animorphs #15, 1998:35)

Rachel’s recklessness can be clearly seen from quotations above, she is the kind of person who likes to face the problem head on rather than run away from the problem.

Aside from her bold and reckless characteristics she is also described as short tempered person. Even though she often shown to be brave in facing a certain dangerous situation, whenever she deems the odd to be too overwhelming for her to handle, or she dislikes a certain situation so much she will be unable to control her self esteem. Her inability to control her self esteem is shown through her outburst anger and showing an irresponsible attitude. She once decided to skip school after being told that it is impossible to win the war against the Yeerks by an Omniscient creature called Ellimist. Her action causes an argument between

(46)

her and her teammates; they berated her for how she skips school and run amok in a morph form. Rachel’s control toward self esteem is not as good as Jake’s control toward his. Rachel is unable to conceal her inner feeling. Another example is on book #22, in which a boy named David angered Rachel so much that she wants to kill him.

I was going to hunt him down and destroy him.

No, not destroy. That was a weasel word. It was vague, meaningless. I was going to kill him. I felt sick inside. It might have been the morphing that was annihilating my internal organs and replacing them with the primitive organs of a housefly. Or it might have been the feeling that comes from rage and hate.

(Animorphs #22 1998: 13)

The quotation above is told from Rachel’s perspective; in the quotation

Rachel shows her desire to kill David. She questioned whether her desire to kill David is because of her inner rage or not. Another example is from book #33, in this book Rachel loses her self control and wants to kill an enemy named Taylor because Rachel can’t forgive what Taylor did to Tobias.

Rachel's claws closed on Taylor's neck, crushing her esophagus. She was turning blue, suffocating. "Help!" she rasped pitifully. "Someone help me!"

<Rachel! No. Rachel, don't do it!>

<She dies, Tobias. For what she did to you, she dies.> She moved as if to slam Taylor against the wall.

<No!> I yelled. <Rachel. No.>

Rachel turned to look at me, hesitated. Then dropped Taylor like a crumpled candy wrapper. The sub-visser fell to the floor and scrambled for the door.

(Animorphs #33 1999: 80)

From the examples above, it is safe to assume that whenever Rachel is angered enough, she will do irrational act without any second thought. The

(47)

judgment that she believes murder are the solution to the problem. Her decision to

murder someone shows that she can’t control her self esteem, because she can’t

find any other solution other than murder whenever she is angered.

4. The Description of Cassie’s Characteristics

The character of Cassie in the novel is depicted as the character that brings moral value to the team; and like Jake she shows great concern toward the well being of her teammates. She is kind and empathetic; her caring nature may cause her to be able to sense other people’s feeling. Because of this she often acts as the therapist of the team.

Several times in the story, whenever a certain character is put on a deadly

situation, she will comfort that character. The perfect example of Cassie’s

kindness and concern toward her teammates is in book fourth when Marco nearly

gets himself killed by a shark; Cassie came to Marco’s house the day after the

incident to make sure that Marco does not get terrorized by that scary experience. From the case above we can learn that Cassie cares greatly about her friends’

wellbeing, she can’t put her mind at ease until she truly sure that her friend is

alright

Another instance is when Cassie helps Marco to morph back into human in book twenty first. Marco is having some difficulty in morphing back from flea to human form, and he almost gets trapped in the flea form. She comforted Marco through the process to help him morphed back into human form. Cassie’s kind and caring attitude seems to be originated from her daily life; Cassie’s parents are

(48)

both vets, her mother worked as a doctor in a zoo, while his father runs a wildlife clinic in their barn. Cassie often helped her father on taking care of the injured animal. It can be assumed that Cassie unknowingly creates a bond toward the

animal, that bond perhaps what makes her care greatly about other creature’s life.

Her habit of to taking care an animal may affect the way she saw the life of other creature. Several times in the books Cassie often angry or became irritated if she saw animal is being endangered or mistreated by human. In book fifteen Marco commented that Cassie is not the type of person who likes to create a plan which could endanger themselves, but if it is about saving a mistreating an animal she will do anything to save it.

It was Cassie's idea, oddly enough. Normally she'd be the last person to ever cook up a harebrained scheme. But this involved mistreating animals. And you don't want to mess with animals when Cassie is around.

(Animorphs #15, 1996:2)

In summary, Cassie is the type of person who cares greatly about the well being of her friends. She likes to comfort her friend whenever she feels that her friend is in danger or in some sort of trouble both physically and mentally.

Unfortunately, her kind and caring attitude make it hard for her to control her self esteem. Whenever Cassie is involved in something violence, she cannot tolerate that action and she will run away from it. This is shown in book nineteenth, when she along with her team slaughters an army of controlled Hork-Bajir. She is terrified by her action of killing the Hork-Bajir that she decides to quit the team, in order to avoid the violence war.

(49)

5.The Description of Tobias’ Characteristics

As described by him and other characters Tobias is the type of character who tend to create a gap between himself and society or in other word Tobias is

an outcast. Tobias’ condition (him being an outcast) is caused by his family’s

condition. Both of his parents are dead by the beginning of the story, Tobias live under the care of either his uncle or his other relatives (he moved from one relative to another) and according to Tobias himself, none of his relatives did not really care about him.

In school Tobias did not have much friends, he often became the object of bullying by other students. His lone wolf nature was further magnified when he was accidentally misused his morphing ability which caused him to become a red tailed hawk for the rest of his life. Thus he was completely cast away from normal human life.

Asides from fighting the Yeerks Tobias also faced with the problem of his new life. In the beginning Tobias was having a difficulty in adjusting to his new life, he was heavily devastated when he killed a rat for the first time because he was unable to cope with his new instinct. He is a human who have to live with a body and instinct of a hawk. Tobias, at first finds it difficult to cope with his new condition. His first kill made him believe that his human mind was gone; he believed that he was a hawk, so he began to stay away from his human friends and began to life as a red tailed hawk

The next few days were like a long, slow dream. I stayed away from Jake's house. I did not communicate with my friends. I disappeared.

(50)

I found a place for myself. It was perfect red-tail territory - the place where I had made my first kill. A nice meadow surrounded by trees. Not far off there was a marshy area that was good, too. Although there was another red-tail who had a territory over there, so I couldn't hunt there often. I spent my days hunting. Sometimes I would ride the high hot winds and watch the meadow. Sometimes I would sit in a tree and watch till some unwary creature ventured out. Then I would swoop down on it, snatch it up, kill it. Eat it while the blood was still warm (Animorphs #3, 1996: 50). It is not until later in the same book that he was convinced by his friends that even though his body was a red tailed hawk, he still had human mind, he was still Tobias.

Tobias can be described as the lone wolf of the team; he is the type of person who prefers to be alone rather than interacting with other people. Even

though Tobias has a lone wolf attitude that he doesn’t mean he completely

secluded himself from people around him. Tobias only prefers to be alone especially whenever he is in distress. Before the series began, other characters confess that they only know little about Tobias. His lone wolf attitude may have been caused by his family and social background.

Regarding how Tobias handles his self esteem, he has his own way of coping with his current situation. Whenever Tobias is faced with situations which cause discomfort or even distress in his mind, he tends to hide into seclusion.

B. Terrors Faced by the Protagonists and its Impact to the Protagonists

The source of terror in this book is mainly the Yeerks and death. The fight against the Yeerks has pushed the mind of the protagonists to the limit. As stated in terror management theory, human is the only species which is able to realize that death is inevitable. This combination of an instinctive drive for

(51)

self-preservation with an awareness of the inevitability of death creates the potential for paralyzing terror.

So when the Animorphs are put in a dangerous situation in which their life is endangered because of their fight with their Yeerks, it automatically creates a terror in their mind.

Have you ever watched those old war movies where the Americans would be heading for some enemy beach? You know, they'd be in a little boat, riding through the surf, getting ready to jump out on a beach that was going to be chewed up by machine-gun bullets and mortars? That's what this felt like. Like we were pretty calm now, but in a few seconds it was going to be life and death. Things would happen very fast. And none of it was going to be good (Animorphs #10, 1997: 84).

The paragraph above which is told by one of the protagonists, Marco, explains the situation of the war against the yeerks, the fight against the yeerks is

described as war where someone’s life is at stake at any second. The protagonists of the Animorphs are just junior school student, perhaps their age are around 15-16, so it is safe to assume that the level of terror may be amplified because the victim of this terror is just a middle school student, perhaps their level of self esteem is not really ready to handle such condition, whereas it is stated that self esteem is really important in maintaining the terror to our mind. So when the terrors are attacking their mind, and their mind and self esteem is not up for the challenge just yet, especially at the beginning of the story.

“So what?” I shot back. "You heard the Ellimist. We're doomed. It's going

to be Yeerks one, humans zero. We lose. So who cares about anything? Who cares if I skip school to go flying?” (Animorphs #7, 1997:54).

The example above shows us how the condition has made the character (Rachel) scared that she does not even care about anything. According to Terror

(52)

management theory, this phenomena may happen because the sufferer doesnot have enough self esteem when they were facing the terror, because they are not ready with the condition and thus the condition shaken their mind.

The condition of being scared or terrified will affect their daily life, like the example above how Rachel was so terrified that it made her to skip school. The condition of being terrified caused different effect to the protagonists; this may be related to how well they can manage their self esteem.

In Rachel’s case we can see that the condition of being terrified has made her ignorant to several other things (like she did not really care about skipping the school because she believed that sooner or later she will die anyway). Probably

Rachel’s management toward her self esteem at that moment is not at good

condition, thus causing her to panic and becoming ignorant.

The terror of the yeerks also greatly affected the protagonist’s daily life, it

changed the way the protagonists lived their life. The terror changed the way the protagonists do their daily activity, for example, in book four one of the

protagonist, Cassie stated that even just for the sake of going to Rachel’s house

along with her friends, they have to go separately in order to avoid any suspicion

that they intentionally gathering at Rachel’s house, in addition they even have Tobias as surveillance to check whether there is anything suspicious around or not.

In a very short time we had all grown accustomed to a world of fear and danger. We had arrived at Rachel's house separately. We had each checked to make sure we weren't being followed. We had planned the afternoon in advance to be sure that Rachel's mom and her two sisters would be out.

(1)

APPENDICES

Appendix 1: Summary of K.A Applegate’s Animorphs

The story of Animorphs revolves around five teenagers, Jake, Marco, Cassie, Rachel, and Tobias, who meet with Elfangor an alien who is being chased by his enemies. Elfangor, who is in a critical condition, gives the teenagers a gift. The gift is a power which enables the teenagers to morph into any creature that they touched.

After obtaining the power, they learn that the Earth is being invaded by a race of aliens called the Yeerks, a slug like parasitic species who infest humans through their ear canals and take complete control of human’s body, turning them into what is called a controller. The humans, who become controller are still self aware about their condition, but they can’t do anything to their own body because the Yeerk in their head has complete control over their body and their action. The Yeerks do not invade the earth through open conflict, instead they choose to secretly infest the human through a subtle mean (for example, secretly infesting the governor through a hospital).

Elfangor tells the teenagers to use their new power to fight against the Yeerks in order to stop their invasion. At first, the teenagers do not really believe about what happen in the construction site, they believe that it is just a dream. After they learn that some people are actually become controller, including Jake’s older brother, Tom, they decide to fight against the yeerk in order to stop them

(2)

Marco decides to name themselves as Animorphs, the Animorph fight against the yeerks numerously, ruining their plans one after the other. In book #3 the Animorphs invade the Yeerks’ ship to break the ship’s camouflage system in order to reveal the Yeerks’ invasion to the public. In book #4, the Animorphs races against the Yeerks to discover an Andalite ship which is trapped under the sea. In the ship they find an Andalite called Aximili Esgarrouth Istill, or Ax for short, which become their allies in fighting the yeerks. In book #5 they invade Mr Chapman’s house (Mr Chapman is their principal who happens to be a high ranking controller) to steal a Z space transponder.

In book #7 the Animorphs learns that the Yeerks have infested an entire hospital staff, which enables them to turn the patient of that hospital into a controller. They also learn that their governor, who is a presidential candidate plans to have surgery on that hospital. In order to prevent the Yeerks’ plan to turn the governor into a controller, they invade the hospital and sabotage it from inside. In their attempt to sabotage the Yeerks infested hospital, Jake is accidentally becomes a controller. Fortunately the Animorph quickly learn that Jake is being infested by a yeerks, they trapped Jake inside a barn for three days to let the Yeerk inside his head dies from starvation.

In book #15 the Animorph prevent the Yeerks attempt to make an army of hammerhead shark. The Yeerks plan to use the Hammerhead Shark to help them defeating the Leerans, an aquatic alien race. The Yeerks want to infest the Leerans in order to gain their ability to read the minds of other creature.

(3)

Starting from book #51 until the last book (#54) the fight against the Yeerks becomes known to the public. In book #52 the Yeerks abandon their subtle strategy and begin to openly attack the human.

Asides from fighting the Yeerks, sometimes the Animorphs also face other problem. In book #24, the Animorphs fight against other aliens known as

Helmacrons. In book #25, the Animorphs is ordered by the Ellimist to prevent Crayak’s attempt in annihilating an alien race called Iskoort. In order to prevent Crayak’s plan, the Animorphs have to defeat the Howler, a powerful alien race which serve as Crayak’s foot soldier.

Appendix 2: General Information about the Alien Races in Animorphs

In Animorphs there are several alien race involved in the story, some plays major role in the story, while other just play minor role in the story.

1. The Yeerks

The most significant alien race in Animorphs is The Yeerks. Yeerks are parasite-like alien who have the ability to completely control other creature’s body. They achieve this by entering the creatures head (through ear holes when infesting human) and then move into the creature’s brain.

The Yeerks as a race of parasite slug, do not need a regular food in order to stay alive, they need to be irradiated with an energy source known as the Kandrona ray

(4)

At first, the Yeerk is just a race of parasite slug who can only infest a creature native to their home world known as Gedds and have primitive technology. Seerow, an Andalite who leads the first expedition to the Yeerks’ home world, pitied the Yeerks, who are highly intelligent, but have a very limited technology.

He also teaches the Yeerks about science and technology. He even build a portable Kandrona generators. As time goes, the Yeerks who are now an advanced alien race betrayed Prince Seerow, they attack the Andalites on the Yeerks homeworld and start their plan to conquer the galaxy.

2. The Andalite

The Andalites are an advanced race of aliens. They are the primary race fighting the Yeerks and are known throughout the galaxy for their advanced technology.

The Andalites’ physiology is similar to centaur. Their lower body are similar in appearance to deer, it has two legs on the back and two on the front. Their upper body is similar to human’s torso, there are two hands on their upper body. Andalites have a tail on their back which is similar to scorpion’s tail. On their head there are two eyes, two ears, one nose, and two stalk eyes which give them 360 degree vision. The Andalites do not have a mouth, they communicate with others through telepathy. The Andalites eat by using their front legs, they use it to crush the grass and absorb its nutrients.

(5)

Andalites have very advanced technology, they have very advanced spaceships which is capable of traveling through space really fast. Their notable technology which play a major role in the story is their morphing technology. The morphing technology allows anyone the ability to morph into any animal. In order for someone to morph into other animal, they need to touch that animal to acquire its DNA. For example, if someone want to morph into a dog, they need to touch the dog to acquire its DNA, after gaining that person will be able to morph into a dog anytime he or she desires. The animal’s DNA will be recorded in the morpher’s system, so if someone already acquire an animal’s DNA, they are able to morph into that animal whenever they want without having to touch the animal again.

Andalite, like the Yeerks also play a major role in the story. Andalites are the primary race of aliens who are fighting the Yeerks. Seerow, an Andalite, is the main cause of the Andalite-Yeerk war. Elfangor, the person who give the protagonist the access to the morph technology is also an Andalite. Ax, one of the Animorph is also an Andalite. Tobias is half Andalite, his father is Elfangor, while his mother is human. Furthermore, the main antagonist of the story, Visser Three (later becomes Visser One) is a yeerk which infest the body of an Andalite

3. Hork Bajir

Hork Bajir are a race of dinosaur-like alien who is completely enslaved by the Yeerks. In appearance, The Hork-Bajir have strong reptilian bodies with leathery skin. They have snake-like necks with a sharp beak at the end of their

(6)

heads, tyrannosaurus-like feet, three claw-tipped fingers. Their most notable feature is that they have huge, long blades all over their bodies.

Altough Hork-Bajir are scary in appearance, they are a race of peaceful alien. Their long blades are only used to cut the tree for them to eat. Hork-Bajir is not very intelligence, the way they communicate to other race are difficult to understand.

As stated before, originally Hork-Bajir are a race of peaceful alien, unfortunately all of them are enslaved by the Yeerks. The Yeerks utilized the Hork-Bajir as their main shock troops, thanks to the Hork-Bajir’s fearful physiology.

4. Taxxons

Taxxons also serve as the Yeerks’ shock troops. Taxxons are a race of insectoid alien, in general, Taxxons resemble huge centipede. Taxxons are very carnivorous; they have a strong desire to consume meat. Taxxons’ strong desires toward meat also make them a cannibal. Taxxons will eat other Taxxons when they want to, sometimes they even eat their own body. Ax once cut a Taxxon in half and it began to eat the other half of the body.

Taxxons unlike Hork-Bajir is a willing ally to the Yeerks. They are willing to help the Yeerks just because they was promised by the Yeerks a lots of meat if they agree to help the Yeerks.

Defense mechanism adopted by the protagonists against the terror of death in K.A Applegateâ`s animorphs.

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

lz4ll4}ls

ph.D

/

z}rc

fr'.arrr

s"

_{-_#}

1,ffi

I

thsis

ad

Nama

\,ig

THE MORE YOU

KNOW

THE MORE YOU

FORGET

Parts

Dokumen yang terkait

The personality structure and defense mechanism of the main character in the house at the end of the street film

An Analysis of Michael Foster’s characteristics and his personality problem in the call through psychological approach by sigmund freud.

THE DEFENSE MECHANISM OF RAINA PETKOFF IN GEORGE BERNARD SHAW’S ARMS AND THE MAN PLAY: The Defense Mechanism Of Raina Petkoff In George Bernard Shaw’s Arms And The Man Play: A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM OF JOHN OTTWAY IN CARNAHAN’S THE GREY MOVIE (2011): Defense Mechanism Of John Ottway In Carnahan’s The Grey Movie (2011): A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM OF JOHN OTTWAY IN CARNAHAN’S THE GREY MOVIE (2011): Defense Mechanism Of John Ottway In Carnahan’s The Grey Movie (2011): A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM IN SIDNEY SHELDON’S DEFENSE MECHANISM IN SIDNEY SHELDON’S ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK?: A PSYCHOANALYTIC APPROACH.

DEFENSE MECHANISM IN THOMAS HARDY’S THE DEFENSE MECHANISM IN THOMAS HARDY’S THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE: A PSYCHOANALYTIC APPROACH.

DEFENSE MECHANISM Defense Mechanism In Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull: A Psychoanalytic Approach.

SELF DEFENSE MECHANISM OF CHRIS McCANDLESS IN INTO THE WILD BY JON KRAKAUER.

THE DEFENSE MECHANISM AND THE STRATEGY OF KATNISEVERDEEN IN SUZANNE COLLIN’S “THE HUNGER GAMES”

Dukungan

Links

Defense mechanism adopted by the protagonists against the terror of death in K.A Applegateâ`s animorphs.

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

ANIMORPHS

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

lz4ll4}ls

ph.D

/

z}rc

fr'.arrr

s"

-_#

1,ffi

I

thsis

ad

Nama

\,ig

THE MORE YOU

KNOW

THE MORE YOU

FORGET

Parts

Dokumen yang terkait

The personality structure and defense mechanism of the main character in the house at the end of the street film

An Analysis of Michael Foster’s characteristics and his personality problem in the call through psychological approach by sigmund freud.

THE DEFENSE MECHANISM OF RAINA PETKOFF IN GEORGE BERNARD SHAW’S ARMS AND THE MAN PLAY: The Defense Mechanism Of Raina Petkoff In George Bernard Shaw’s Arms And The Man Play: A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM OF JOHN OTTWAY IN CARNAHAN’S THE GREY MOVIE (2011): Defense Mechanism Of John Ottway In Carnahan’s The Grey Movie (2011): A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM OF JOHN OTTWAY IN CARNAHAN’S THE GREY MOVIE (2011): Defense Mechanism Of John Ottway In Carnahan’s The Grey Movie (2011): A Psychoanalytic Approach.

DEFENSE MECHANISM IN SIDNEY SHELDON’S DEFENSE MECHANISM IN SIDNEY SHELDON’S ARE YOU AFRAID OF THE DARK?: A PSYCHOANALYTIC APPROACH.

DEFENSE MECHANISM IN THOMAS HARDY’S THE DEFENSE MECHANISM IN THOMAS HARDY’S THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE: A PSYCHOANALYTIC APPROACH.

DEFENSE MECHANISM Defense Mechanism In Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull: A Psychoanalytic Approach.

SELF DEFENSE MECHANISM OF CHRIS McCANDLESS IN INTO THE WILD BY JON KRAKAUER.

THE DEFENSE MECHANISM AND THE STRATEGY OF KATNISEVERDEEN IN SUZANNE COLLIN’S “THE HUNGER GAMES”

Dokumen yang Anda mencari sudah siap untuk unduhkan

_{-_#}