A STUDY OF THE USE OF BLACK ENGLISH IN AFRO-AMERICAN MOVIES ENTITLED BAD BOYS I AND II, AND RUSH HOUR 1 AND II

  A STUDY OF THE USE OF BLACK ENGLISH

  IN AFRO-AMERICAN MOVIES ENTITLED BAD BOYS I AND II, AND RUSH HOUR 1 AND II A THESIS Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree in English Language Education By

  A STUDY OF THE USE OF BLACK ENGLISH

  IN AFRO-AMERICAN MOVIES ENTITLED BAD BOYS I AND II, AND RUSH HOUR 1 AND II A THESIS Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree in English Language Education By

  

STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY

I honestly declare that this thesis, which I have written, does not contain the work

or parts of the work of other people, except those cited in the quotations and

references as a scientific paper should.

  

Yogyakarta, February 22, 2011

The Writer

Leonna Hertanu

06 1214 035

  

ABSTRACT

Hertanu, Leonna. 2011. A Study of the Use of Black English in Afro- American

Movies Entitled Bad Boys I and II, and Rush Hour I and II

  . Yogyakarta:

English Language Education Study Program, Department of Language and Arts

Education, Faculty of Teachers Training and Education, Sanata Dharma

University.

  This research discusses about Black English which is used in

Afro-American movies. The movies used are Bad Boys I and II, and Rush Hour I

and II which are chosen because they portray social environment needed by the

researcher. The researcher has two reasons why she is interested on the topic.

First, she considers that Black English has its own history made it as a unique

language based on its historical background as the survived language which exists

and develops. Besides that, it also arouses many controversies during its time and

it is amazing to find that when it is widely used by people around the world, some

of people disagree with its existence.

  The problems to answer in this research are: 1) What are the expressions

of Black English used in the movies? 2) What are the linguistics features of the

Black English used in the movies? And 3) How is the Black English used by the

speakers in the movies influenced by its social factors?

  This research is a qualitative research which provides insight into complex

models of human thought and language use and it looks directly at communication

via texts and transcripts so, it is considered as a content analysis research. It uses

Afro-American movies entitled Rush Hour I, Rush Hour II, Bad Boys I, and Bad

Boys II as its subjects that are analyzed by using two instruments; human instrument and document.

  Based on the analysis, it can be concluded that most of the expressions of

  

assimilation and deletion. There are two results gained from the data for

assimilation, the first one is the process of assimilation which changes the sound

[ŋ] into sound [n] such as kickin’, playin’, runnin’, doin’, nothin’, and trippin’. The

phonological process of it is called progressive assimilation. The second one is the

process of assimilation which changes the last syllable into nearby sound in the

beginning of the second phrase such as lemme and gimme. The examples of

deletion can be seen as happens in see’em, put’em, and c’mon. But not only that,

another linguistics feature of Black English is the interfaces between morphology

and syntax which happens because some words in Black English experience

morphological phenomena such as ain’t, gotta, gonna, wanna, and outta and those

words trigger a problem in the sentence they belong to and distract the structure of

the sentences. The third one is pure morphology which is marked by the

occurrence of clipping and cliticization such as happens in the word roaches and

y’all. The fourth is pure syntax which is marked by the omission of auxiliaries

such as to be (is, am, are), do, does, did, have, has in order to make the sentence

simpler. The last is pure semantics which is marked by the use of slang and swear

words. When the results are analyzed from its sociolinguistics aspect, it is found

that most men in the sample movies always use swear words when they talk to the

same gender; especially when they are angry or dislike about something (as an

expression of grumble) but sometimes they also use swear words but in less

frequency and by condition of close relationship between the male speaker with

their opposite gender addressee. It is also found that male speakers often use slang

words when they talk to the same gender than the opposite gender although

sometimes they do. But in some cases, male speakers talk more polite (in terms of

the use of swear words) to opposite gender. Overall it can be concluded that the

power relations of Black English speakers are influenced by many social factors

such as gender, age, identity, and other factors can result differently because in a

context it can be high but in another context, it can be low or even the same

  

ABSTRAK

Hertanu, Leonna. 2011. A Study of the Use of Black English in Afro- American

Movies Entitled Bad Boys I and II, and Rush Hour I and II . Yogyakarta:

Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, Jurusan Pendidikan Bahasa dan Seni,

Fakultas Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan, Universitas Sanata Dharma.

  Penelitian ini membahas tentang Black English yang digunakan dalam

film Afrika-Amerika. Film yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini berjudul Bad

Boys I dan II, dan Rush Hour I dan II yang dipilih karena film-film tersebut

mampu menggambarkan gambaran lingkungan social yang dibutuhkan oleh

peneliti. Peneliti memiliki dua alasan mengapa dia tertarik dengan topik ini.

Alasan yang pertama adalah peneliti menganggap bahwa Black English memiliki

sejarah sendiri yang membuat bahasa tersebut menjadi suatu bahasa yang unik

jika didasarkan pada latar belakang sejarahnya sebagai bahasa yang tetap ada dan

terus berkembang. Di samping itu, bahasa ini juga menimbulkan banyak

kontroversi pada jamannya dan sangatlah luar biasa menemukan bahwa pada saat

bahasa ini digunakan oleh banyak orang di seluruh dunia, ada beberapa orang

yang masih tidak setuju dengan keberadaannya.

  Dalam penelitian ini, terdapat tiga masalah untuk dijawab,yaitu: 1) “Apa

saja ungkapan-ungkapan Black English yang digunakan di dalam film- film

tersebut?” 2) “Apa saja ciri-ciri linguistik dari Black English yang digunakan di

dalam film-film tersebut?” 3)”Bagaimana Black English yang digunakan oleh si

pembicara di dalam film dipengaruhi oleh faktor-faktor sosialnya?” Penelitian ini merupakan penelitian kualitatif yang memberikan pengertian

tentang buah pikiran manusia yang complex and penggunaan bahasa dan juga

melihat secara langsung pada bentuk komunikasi melalui teks dan transkrip jadi

penelitian ini menggunakan content analysis sebagai metode penelitiannya.

Penelitian ini menggunakan film-film Afrika-Amerika yang berjudul Rush Hour I,

Rush Hour II

  , Bad Boys I, dan Bad Boys IIsebagai subyek penelitian yang akan

  

dalam bentuk ekspresi menyapa , berterimakasih , dan memberi pujian dan

kemampuan berbicara transaksional dalam bentuk menawarkan sesuatu. Namun

tidak hanya menunjukkan kecendrungan-kecendrungan tersebut, tapi

ekspresi-ekspresi tersebut juga memiliki beberapa karakter linguistik. Pertama,

hubungan antara fonologi dan morfologi yang ditandai dengan terjadinya asimilasi

dan penghilangan. Ada dua hasil data untuk asimilasi, yang pertama adalah proses

asimilasi yang mengubah bunyi [ ŋ] menjadi bunyi [n] misalnya yang terjadi pada

kata kickin’,playin’ doin’, nothin’, dan trippin’. Proses fonologi dari proses

tersebut disebut asimilasi progresif. Asimilasi yang kedua adalah proses asimilasi

yang mengubah suku kata terakhir dalam suatu kata menjadi bunyi terdekat yang

mengawali frase kedua seperti pada kata lemme dan gimme. Contoh untuk

penghilangan dapat dilihat seperti yang terjadi pada kata see’em, put’em dan

c’mon.

  Namun bukan hanya itu, karakter linguistik lain dari Black English adalah

hubungan antara morfologi dan sintaksis yang terjadi karena ada beberapa

kata-kata dalam Black English mengalami peristiwa morfologi seperti yang terjadi

pada kata ain’t, gotta, gonna, wanna, dan outta dan peristiwa tersebut

menyebabkan masalah dalam kalimat dan mengganggu struktur dari kalimat

tersebut. Yang ketiga adalah morfologi murni yang ditandai dengan terjadinya

pemotongan dan persingkatan kata yang tidak bertekanan seperti yang terjadi pada

kata roaches dan y’all. Yang keempat adalah sintaksis murni yang ditandai

dengan terjadinya penghilangan kata pelengkap misalnya to be (is, am, are), do,

does, did, have, has yang bertujuan untukmembuat kalimat menjadi lebih

sederhana. Yang terakhir adalah semantis murni yang ditandai dengan adanya

kata-kata ucapan popular dan umpatan. Jika hasil dari analisis penelitian ini dilihat

dari segi ilmu bahasa sosialnya, hasil yang ditemukan adalah bahwa kebanyakan

tokoh pria di dalam film-film contoh tersebut selalu menggunakan kata-kata

umpatan saat mereka berbicara pada orang yang memiliki jenis kelamin yang

sama dengan si pembicara; khususnya saat mereka marah atau tidak suka tehadap

suatu hal (sebagai ekspresi bersungut-sungut) tapi kadang kala mereka juga

menggunakan kata-kata umpatan dengan frekuensi yang lebih sedikit pada lawan

jenis jika hubungan mereka dekat. Hasil lain juga ditemukan bahwa pembicara

pria lebih sering menggunakan kata-kata popular terhadap sesama jenis mereka

  

LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN

PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH UNTUK KEPENTINGAN AKADEMIS

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

Nama : Leonna Hertanu

  Nomor Mahasiswa : 06 1214 035

Demi pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan, saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan

Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul:

  

A Study of the Use of Black English in Afro-American Movies Entitled Bad

Boys I and II, and Rush Hour I and II

Beserta perangkat yang diperlukan (bila ada). Dengan demikian saya memberikan

kepada Perpustakaan Universitas Sanata Dharma hak untuk 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 dari saya

maupun memberikan royalti kepada saya selama tetap mencantumkan nama saya

sebagai penulis.

  Demikian pernyataan ini saya buat dengan sebenarnya. Dibuat di Yogyakarta Pada tanggal: 1 April 2011

  

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Firstly, I would like to express my greatest gratitude to Jesus Christ for

His blessings so that I still have time to finish my thesis successfully and proudly

to present it for all of my beloved lecturers, family, and friends. I like to address

my deepest thanks to my dearest lecturer, my thesis advisor, and my sponsor

Carla Sih Prabandari, S. Pd., M. Hum.

  I really appreciate her guidance, advice,

corrections, time, and patience during the process of writing this thesis. I would

like to extend my sincere thanks go to all PBI lecturers, who have guided me

during my study, especially Bu Ndari, Bu Frida, Bu Lanny, Pak Ouda, Pak

Punto, Pak Heru, Pak Prast, Pak Nunung, Pak Hanandyo, Bu Marni, Bu

Yuseva, Bu Mita, Pak Chosa, Pak Bambang, Bu Tri, Pak Gunawan, Pak

Purba, Pak Prayitno, Pak Markus, Bu Indriani, and Bu Henny. I really

appreciate their teachings, helps, attention, love and care to me as their student. I

also thank PBI administration staffs (Mbak Tari and Mbak Dani) for their kind services during my study. My special appreciation goes to all my classmates in PBI, especially

Theresia Tika Kusumasari, Niken Hapsari, Exnasia Retno Handayani,

Yurista

  Pratiwi and many others that I can not mention one by one here. They

are really nice friends and it has been a great experience knowing them all. Once

again, I thank all of my friends that support me and give me encouragement. I

really appreciate it.

  I also would like to give my special thanks to my dearest boyfriend Evan Surya Wijaya for his love, encouragement, attention, and care. I thank him for being a good counselor whenever I have problems.

  Finally, yet important, I want to thank those who have helped me during

the process of writing this thesis whose names I can not mention here one by one.

  Yogyakarta, February 22, 2011

  

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE.......................................................................................................... i

PAGES OF APPROVAL...................................................................................... ii

STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY.................................................. iv

ABSTRACT........................................................................................................... v

ABSTRAK..............................................................................................................vii

LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI................................. ix

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS...................................................................................x

TABLE OF CONTENTS.................................................................................... xii

  

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION........................................................................... 1

A. Research Background.......................................................................1 B. Problem Limitation.......................................................................... 3 C. Problem Formulation....................................................................... 4 D. Research Objectives......................................................................... 4 E. Research Benefits............................................................................. 5 F. Definition of Terms..........................................................................5

CHAPTER II: REVIEW OF LITERATURE .........................................................7

A. Theoretical Descriptions.................................................................. 7

  1. Black English...............................................................................7

  a. The Definition of Black English .............................................7

  b. The History of Black English..................................................8

  c. The Characteristics of Black English ......................................9

  

CHAPTER IV: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION................................................ 28

A. The Expressions of Black English Used in the Movies..................................................................................28

  4. Pure Syntax ..............................................................................40

  c. Low Power Relationship of the Speaker............................... 51

  a. Same or Equal Power Relation between Main Characters...................................................... 50 b. High Power Relationship of the Speaker.............................. 51

  2. Power Relation .........................................................................50

  b. Male to Female Relationship................................................ 49

  a. Male to Male Relationship.................................................... 47

  1. Gender ......................................................................................46

  C. Social Factors Influencing the Use of Black English in the Movies.................................................................................46

  5. Pure Semantics .........................................................................43

  3. Pure Morphology .....................................................................40

  1. Expressive Utterances ..............................................................28

  2. The Interfaces between Morphology and Syntax.....................37

  b. Deletion .................................................................................36

  a. Assimilation ..........................................................................33

  1. The Interfaces between Phonology and Morphology ..............33

  B. The Characteristics of Black English Used in the Movies..................................................................................33

  4. Phatic Utterances………..........................................................31

  3. Referential Utterances ..............................................................31

  2. Directive Utterances ................................................................30

  

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS ....................................53

A. Conclusions.................................................................................... 53 B. Suggestions ....................................................................................56

  

subtopics. The first is research background which presents the reasons why the

researcher is interested on the topic. The second is problem limitation which

confines the topic so that it is discussed specifically. The third is problem

formulation which contains the problems to be discussed in the research. The

fourth is the objectives of the research. The fifth is the research benefits. The last

is the definition of terms which is aimed to give clear definition about Black

English and Afro-American movies.

A. Research Background

  Black English has several famous names in its usage in society. Some

people usually named it as African American English; Black Vernacular; Black

English Vernacular (BEV); or Black Vernacular English (BVE), which is an

  2

language. The researcher considered it as the survived language in terms of its

unique background of struggle until its condition in the eyes of world’s

perspective now. Years earlier the language was used only for slaves at the era of

   

  

slavery and the slave trade in 1916 in order to communicate with their masters

(Smitherman, 1986: 5). Since that era, this language has experienced many

improvements in terms of the users and the people’s perception. Finally, the

language survive and now many users use it. It does not considered as the

language for slave anymore because many people use it especially young people

who are in their age of finding themselves. In the researcher’s opinion, this

language is now considered as stylistic language (definition: language that

pertains with style) so that many people use it as a life style, they use the language

whenever it is appropriate to use. A good example for that is Agnes Monica’s

album entitled “Whaddup A..?!” which shows that Black English is not only used

by people in English speaking countries, but also people throughout the world.

  Contrary to its fame as a stylistic language, Black English also arouses

many controversies during its time. Some Creolists, such as John Dillard, William

  3

in fact, there is no significant clarification from both Creolists and other linguists

(

  

Smith and Crozier; 1998:113-114). It is amazing to find that this language

arouses many controversies when it is also widely used by people around the

world. In other words, people admit the language by using it and also judge that

the language as not suitable to be used as media of communication in their

society.

B. Problem Limitation

  The fact that English is an International language make some people aware

that they need to understand more about the language. Those people do some

researches and find out that there are many kinds of English such as; American

English (Am E), British English (Br E), Singapore English (Sing E), Black

English (BEV), and others. Inside the language itself, there is different language

features and accents which supports the fact that each language has its own unique

and characteristics especially the language of Black English that is usually used

by Afro-American (African-American) people.

  4

for showing the condition of social environment and social factors needed so that,

the researcher concludes that not all Afro-American movies can be used for this

research.

C. Problem Formulation

  This research is formulated into three research questions covering the aspects that the researcher is curious about.

  1. What are the expressions of Black English used in the movies?

  2. What are the linguistics features of the Black English used in the movies?

  

3. How is the Black English used by the speaker in the movies influenced by its

social factors?

D. Research Objectives

  This research discusses the expressions of Black English and also the way

it is used by the speakers in the sample movies (Rush Hour I, Rush Hour II, Bad

Boys I , and Bad Boys II). This paper is intended to:

  5 E.

Research Benefits

  This research gives benefits in linguistic aspect. This research aims at

finding the language input of Black English in some examples of Afro-American

movies. It is aimed to enrich the language input in Black English as the researcher

assume that many people does not know a lot about the expressions of Black

English.

  It is also purposed to give some samples of the situation and the condition

of Black English occurs in the movies and gives the readers the understanding of

it as portrayed in the movies.

F. Definition of Terms 1. Black English

  Black English here has two definitions. The first is this term has the same

meaning with Ebonics that was originally intended and sometimes used for the

language of all people of African ancestry; since 1996 it has been largely used to

refer to African American Vernacular English (distinctively non-standard Black

  6

social dialects of black people" especially those who have adapted to colonial

circumstances (Williams; 1975 as cited by Baugh, 2000). The second definition is

for Black North American people.

  The word Afro-American is a term used to refer to Black Americans or

African-Americans. It means that they are citizens or residents of the United

States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa. So, the term

Afro-American movies mean movies that most of the actors and actresses are

Afro-American or portraying the life of Afro-American people.

In this research, the researcher uses Bad Boys I and II and Rush Hour I and II, as

the movies analyzed.

  8

   

  

is divided into two parts. The first is the theoretical description of the research and

the second is the theoretical framework of the research covering all the theories in

the first part which are summarized into one main idea that is clear and coherent.

A. Theoretical Descriptions

  This part is divided into four topics. The first topic is Black English which

covers the definition of Black English, its history, and its characteristics. The

second topic is Standard English. The third topic is Creole. The last topic is the

theory of language use in society.

  8

   

  Oakland School Board. According to Robert William, Black English or Ebonics may be defined as "the linguistic and paralinguistic features which on a concentric continuum represent the communicative competence of the West African, Caribbean, and United States slave descendant of African origin. It includes the various idioms, patois, argots, idiolects, and social dialects of black people" especially those who have adapted to colonial circumstances (Williams; 1975 as cited by Baugh, 2000).

  The beginning of Black English’s history was the development of Black English back to the time of slavery and slave trade. So, the history of Black

English must date back to about 1619 when a Dutch vessel landed in Jamestown

with a cargo of twenty Africans. (Smitherman, 1986) During the slave trade,

ships collected slaves from several different nations rather than just trading with

one nation. The basis that justified this action was that; Africans from different nations spoke different languages and could not communicate with each other, and thus were incapable to unite and overthrow the ships’ crew.

  9

   

  

their masters in some way. Thus, all slaves had to learn at least some degree of

English vocabulary. This established English as a common language among slaves and the only one language that all slaves had in common. Linguists suggest that Africans developed a pidgin language with the English language providing the vocabulary.

  William Labov (Labov, 1969) stated that there are several special

features of Black English Vernacular that can be seen by these four subtitles in

his journal of Ann Harbour School District Board; Martin Luther King Junior Elementary School.

  1) The Tense and Aspect System of Black English Vernacular The most prominent and the most frequent of the BEV aspect is habitual

be , as in She be sick. This habitual be is very important because it does not exist

in any other American dialect.

  The concept of aspect is the hardest to understand, if it is compared with

  10

   

  The tense-aspect system in BEV is built on three words with long vowels: be, do, and go. In BEV, some consonants /l, s, z, r, d, v/ are more often missing than present, but final /n/ does not disappear entirely. If it is not heard as a consonant, it is heard as a nasal quality of the preceding vowels. The basic aspect system is made up of six words, namely: Be Do Go

  Been Done Gon’ The three root words carry the same basic meanings as other dialects of English. Be refers to existence, do to action, and go to movement. But in the auxiliary they become specialized: be indicates a special kind of habitual or repeated state, do has lost its content, and is used to emphasize other actions or carry the negative particle n’t, and go indicates a sense of movement towards confrontation, as in standard English go and. In short, the special features of the BEV tense and aspect system can be mean as following:

  Be “habitual,” applied to events that are generally so

  11

   

  Gon’ “future and less really so” 2) English Inflections in Black English Vernacular

  BEV is often described as a series of absences. It looks like an over-

simplified language “without grammar” for most people. It is said that BEV has

no plural, no past tense, and no possessive.

  Some English inflections are present more often in BEV than in other

dialects. One of these is the plural. While Standard English has no plural

inflection in words like deer, sheep, and fish the corresponding Black English

Vernacular plurals are regular deers, sheeps, and fishes.

  The problem found with past tense is related to regular verbs ending in

• -ed

  , where the signal of the past tense is confined to a single consonant, /t/ or

/d/. This signal, in some ways, sometimes absent and present but it can be seen

by several ways: First, it is always present more often than /d/ or /t/ in consonant

clusters that do not signal the past tense, like fist or old. Second, when –ed

follows a/t/ or /d/ as in wanted and a vowel breaks up the cluster, the final –ed

  12

   

Another problem is the parallelism of the case auxiliary and verb to be.

  The finite forms is and are are sometimes present in their full-form, sometimes in contracted form, and sometimes entirely missing.

  

In short, the portrait of BEV inflections can be drawn of three distinct

situations: features entirely absent from the underlying grammar of BEV, features present in the grammar but variably deleted to a point hard to retrieve, and features that are generalized beyond the point of the standard language:

  ABSENT VARIABLE GENERALIZED Subject-verb agreement: Regular tense [ed] Regular plural [s] 3rd singular [s]

  Possessive[s]: noun Contracted copula [s] Possessive [s]: absolute adjuncts & [r] form 3) Loss of Information at the Ends of Words

The Black English Vernacular loses information at the ends of words in a

  13

   

• The deletion of final /t/ or /d/ can give: In simple words:

  Cold= coal Must= muss Tent= ten

  Field= feel Paste= pace Pant= pan

  In the regular past tense:

  Rolled= roll Missed= miss Fanned= fan

  

Healed= heal Faced= face Penned= pen

In the past tense of irregular verbs:

Told= toll Lost= loss Went= when

Held= hell Bent= ben Meant= men

  With the general merger of /i/ and /e/ before /n/: Penned= pinned= pen= pin

  14

   

  Sold= soll= sore= so With the more common Northern pronunciation: Sore= Saul= saw Cord= called= cawed

  4) Ambiguities of Tense and Aspect The inconsistency results in multiple ambiguity, shown in this input- output diagram: Teacher’s production Heard as Intepreted as They will be there Future

  →They’ll be there They be there Habitual be They would be there Conditional

  →They’d be there They have been there Present perfect →They’ve been there

  They been there Remote present perfect They had been there

Past perfect →They’d been there

  The two situations where the grammatical information of classroom

English may be neutralized and open three-way interpretation by the listener.

  

When a teacher uses Standard English said they will be there,it is heard as they

  15

   

  (a) Long nasal e: They haven’t = They ain’t= They ‘e’ They aren’t= They ain’t= They ‘e’ They didn’t= They ain’t= They ‘e’

  (b) Long nasal o: They are going to= They gon’= They ‘o’ They do not= They don’= They ‘o’ They will not= They won’= They ‘o’

  

From the example above, it concludes two future forms and one present tense

form, all expressed in the same vowel in BEV.

  Standard English is a term to name English which is in good arrangement

of its grammar. In other words, English is formal language that is used to speak in

  16

   

  

highest degree of power, wealth and prestige. Subsequent developments have

reinforced its social character, the fact that it has been employed as the dialect of

an education to which pupils, especially in earlier centuries, have had differential

access depending on their social class background. (Trudgil; 1999: 117-128 as

published in Tony Bex & Richard J. Watts; 1999) 3.

Creole

  Creole is a native language or local language used as media of

communication in a society. According to Encyclopaedia of Britannica (1768),

Creole is composite or pidgin language that has become established as the native

language of a speech community. The examples are Haitian Creole (derived from

French), Louisiana Creole (derived from French), Melanesian Pidgin (derived

from English), and many others. Typically, a Creole arises when the speakers of

one language become economically or politically dominant over speakers of

another language or languages, particularly if the latter are illiterate. At first, a

simplified or otherwise modified form of the language of the dominant group

comes to be used for communication between members of the different groups. At

  17

    4.

Theory of Language in Use

  According to Hymes (1964), language varies according to its uses as well

as it users. It depends on where and to whom it is used, as well as who is using it.

  

The addressees and the context affect our choice of code or variety. There are

some features influenced the speech style in a range of context which vary in

formality, looking at the interaction of the formality and status dimensions. The

first is the relationship between the addressee and the addresser. The better you

know someone, the more casual and relaxed the speech style you will use to them.

People use considerably more standard forms to those they don’t know well and

more vernacular forms to their friends. So, the speaker’s relationship to the

addressee is crucial in determining the appropriate style of speaking and how well

you know someone or how close you feel to them. Relative social distance/

solidarity is one important dimension of social relationship. The degree of social

status or solidarity between people is decided by relative age, gender, social roles,

whether people work together, or are part of the same family.

  Second is the age of addressee. People usually talk differently to children

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    B.

Theoretical Framework

  Black English, which is in some way known as Creole, is not a Creole in

other way because it is a developing language as people can see from its history.

  

Based on its history, it is known as pidgin that had been developed by the need of

American to develop a new language to communicate with their African slaves

(Stoller, 1975). In a real sense, this new language was a mixture of West African

languages (such as Ibo, Yoruba, and Hausa) and English (Smitherman, 1986).

  

That is why Black English and Standard English in some way are the same but in

some others are also different in their characteristics and usage. As in Labov’s

statement (Labov, 1969), there are several special features of Black English

Vernacular that can be seen when the language is used. It can be seen, by the tense

and the aspect system, the inflections which are used in the language, loss

information at the ends of Black English words, and the ambiguity of the tense

and aspect of Black English. Based on the characteristics of Black English stated

by Labov, some samples of the Black English are needed to be found in order to

adjust with the use of Standard English and to translate into Standard English.

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addressee who does not have the same origin or the same social background with

him/her. In this case, the speaker who are Afro-American and speaks Black

English will also speak Black English with the addressee who is also Afro-

American, but he will not speak Black English with the addressee who is not

Afro-American. That is why the situation needed to be understood in order to be

able to analyze the use of Black English in social context.

  

that was used in doing the research. The second is the subject of the research and

the background why the researcher chose them as the subject of the research, the

third is the instrument used in gathering the data and also in analyzing the data.

The fourth is the result of the data gathered by the researcher. The fifth is the

analysis of the data. Finally, the sixth is research procedure which elaborates the

procedure in doing the research.

A. Research Methods

  This research is a qualitative research because this research focused on

understanding social phenomena from the perspective of the human participants in

the study. The data were collected in natural setting, the same thing showed in

Afro-American movies as the subject of this research.

  21

    B.

Research Subject

  The research subjects in this research were four African-American movies

entitled Rush Hour I, Rush Hour II, Bad Boys I, and Bad Boys II. The researcher

chose those four movies because they have several criteria that the researcher

needs in doing her research, such as the existence of social interaction between

Afro-American and other nationalities such as: American, Mexican, French,

Cuban, Jamaican, Russian, Chinese, and Puerto Rican) and the supporting social

environment between Afro-American and those nationalities so that the real

condition of social interaction can be achieved.

  The first movie was Rush Hour I. The movie was directed by Brett Ratner

and Adam Greenberg, produced by Arthur M. Sarkissian, Jonathan Glickman, and

Roger Nirbaum. The leading roles of this movie were Chris Tucker, Jackie Chan,

Tom Wilkinson, Chris Penn, and Elizabeth Pena. It was a one-hour and thirty-

th

seven-minute length movie. This movie first released in September 18 1998 by

New Line Cinema.

  22

   

  

he has greatly underestimated his Hong Kong counterpart, who has seen through

his ruse. Giving Carter the slip, Detective Lee landed in the middle of the FBI's