A study of code switching of President Soeharto's speech on his official visit to Suriname in 1995 - Widya Mandala Catholic University Surabaya Repository

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CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

Chapter I
INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background of the Study
The
without

place

of

language

language

language in

society

society

is

not

exist.

would

crucial

for

Therefore

is connected not only to the real world

in

its

ability to symbolize but also to social world of speakers.
The

choice

of

repertoire may
speaker
spoken

to

specific item

express

or a group
and

differences,
Kess

a

the

of

attitudes

speakers,

perhaps

from

where

the

linguistic

and beliefs of

of the persons

there

are

a

being

intra-group

the entire social context.

(1976:105)

says that

in general, certain

groups

speaking different dialects may find themselves in particularly advantageous or disadvantageous position by
of the
lar form
of

social
of

uniform

connotations
speech.

attached

However,

to their

particu-

societies are not composed

individuals who speak some varieties

same language. Most societies are composed
groups,

some larger,

virtue

some smaller,

of

the

of a number of

some in the

majority,

some in the minority.
Taking Indonesia as an example,
almost

all

we

the inhabitants of Java speak

would

find

Indonesian

that
and

2

Javanese

and

speech

there

varieties

prestigious

are
come

still dialect variations.
to

qualities,

be

while

considered
others

as

Some
having

not.

do

They

consider their variety of language as the prestigious

one

and ostracize anyone deviating from it.
Indonesia

the

is a multilingual community and since

mastery of more than one language is normal

ability

then

and

to use two or more languages freely and

the

fluently

is a common phenomenon. Wallwork (1957:53) says that in
multilingual
different

community, there is a choice of a number

languages.

Savile (1976:42)

claims

speaker of any language is limited to a single
code

although

monolingual

i s

limited

that

a
of
no

linguistic

to

switching

varieties or registers within a single language.
In

line

with Savile, Roger T. Bell

(1976:110)

also

says that there is no individual who speaks only one code.
In other words, there is no one who uses only one language
in communicating with another. As a result, code switching
is most likely to happen in any speech community.
Elgin

(1979:109)

says

that code

switching

is

the

linguistic competence of speakers of moving back and forth
among

languages,

demanded
necessities

by

the

dialects
social

and

registers with ease

situation or their

own

and it is obviously a survival skill.

as

inner

3

Dell Hymess (1962:351) states that code switching is a
common term for alternate use of two or more languages
varieties of a language and studies of code-switching
among

the most important development in

or
are

socilinguistics.

If a given speaker is observed during his daily round, all
the

features of his speech may show code

total repertoire of some speakers is

switching.

The

greater

than

far

others. Some are bilinguals and some are community leaders
with

a

wide

range of styles

reflecting

their

varying

relationships and activities.
In

Indonesia,

one

of the

leaders

President

i s

Soeharto.

He

range

styles reflecting his bilingualism. He

of

President
during

of

to

delivered

a

detached

a

Republic

of Indonesia,

may

a

wide

as

switch

the
codes

meet some Javanese there and officially
speech

from

follow

the

to them.

Indonesia

The

quite

development

people

have

along time, so

language.

As

occasionally switched the code
President

been

of Indonesian language.

made President Soeharto give a speech

he

he

do

Indonesian.
in

Javanese

language. What makes it more interesting to the writer
that

to

they

result, they could not communicate well in

It

good

his daily routine. On October 28, 1995 he went

Suriname

not

is a Javanese and he has got

into

Soeharto possesses a wide

is

Indonesian
range

of

code

resources

people,
known

To

Indonesian

the Indonesian language is an almost

universally

code

or

speech

among

the

repertoire.

educated.

It

is

the

language. This is due to many factors. Malay,

national

the language

from which Indonesian developed, was used as an
language

at

lower

government levels

colonial Government,

by

auxiliary
the

Dutch

Indonesian then was adopted as one of

the symbols of the early nationalist movement (one people,
one

homeland

given

and one language) on October 28,

exclusive official

during
war.

the

status and strong

1928

encouragement

Japanese occupation during the

second

That policy was continued by the Indonesian

ment after independence on August 17,
It

is

the fact that

competition
especially

for
from

its

Javanese,

as
the

the

govern-

a

serious
language

national

language

of

dominant ethnic group. Therefore Indonesian
not

world

1945.

Indonesian never had

place

Indonesia's
language

the vernacular of anyone prominent Indonesian

group.
their

It is

acceptable

vernacular

to

all

Indonesians

is. There are two kinds

language

namely

standard

Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia

bahasa
Soeharto

Indonesia
switched

Daily

resmi).

or

into Daily

this

of

is

ethnic
whatever

Indonesian

Indonesian

and

sehari-hari

dan

Ordinary

In

and

speech,

Indonesian

President

language

when

5

speaking in Javanese.
Javanese
the

most

language

its

spoken
own

ethnic

language

characteristics.

differences are

Javanese

for

more

In

Javanese

marked

it

is

the

configuration

in

combinations

provide a

or combinations

wide

range

indication of status and social distance. Age
of

friendship

distance

when

become

is

of
many
the

for

and

degree

the major determinants of

social

speaking Javanese,

Javanese language

a

very

levels used in an interaction that is important. The
possible

in
says

(196:2~-0)

of some three to six levels from very low to
and

is

particular,

strongly

than in Indonesian. Geertz

it

the variates of Javanese language are ordered

series
high

commonly
has

variety

that

numerically dominates the nation and

unique

so

the

of

case

the

because of its particularly

marked levels and the elaborate etiquette governing

their

use.
Tanner (1967:137)

says that Javanese is the vehicle of

the traditional culture and social
but

not

of

(1967:~0)

the
says

activities of
that

since

life of an ethnic group
a

modern

nation.

She

Indonesian can not be

used

to indicate extremely fine distinctions
can Javanese,

it

of

the

rank

as

is regarded as a more suitable linguistic

vehicle for the newer, more democratic national

ideology.

6

Indonesian is not only a convenient way for
different

Indonesians of

ethnic backgrounds to talk with each other

it also symbolized

their

common

group

but

membership

and

nationality.
may wish to

At that time, President Soeharto
certain

code

perhaps

familiarity

wish

as

an

expression
with

solidarity

the addressee. He

may

to affirm his status by his choice of certain

On

of

pressure

from

situation. Thus for political,
may

addressee

also
code.

language

the

or

the

social or business reasons,

find it expedient or even necessary

particular
Hoffman

the

a
and

the other hand, his choice of certain code may be

result

he

of

use

or code in a

specific

(1991:110) states that code

to

speak

a

interaction.

switching

involves

the alternate use of two languages or linguistic varieties
within the same utterances.
While

Holmes (1992:50) says

of code switching

that one of the

reasons

is probably the lack of vocabulary

and

he also affirms that when speaking people will often use a
term

language

from their mother tongue or first

they do not know how to say it
Di Pierto

(197:~)

because

in their second language.

says that code switching often goes

unnoticed

by

the speakers themselves.

occasion,

President

Soeharto

may

In fact,

have

code

on

that

switched

7

without

realizing what he was doing. At other

times,

he

found himself deliberately switching from one language

to

another in order to achieve some desired goal or effect.
In this study,
of code switching
his

the writer tried to analyze the reasons
from President Soeharto's speech during

official visit to Suriname on October 28,

for this purpose,

!995

and

the writer writes a thesis entitled

Study of Code-Switching of President Soeharto's Speech

"A
on

His Official Visit to Suriname in 1995."

1.2. The Statement of the Problem
In line with the background of the study,
investigated is formulated as follows
#For

what

the question

:

reasons did President Soeharto

code-switched

from Javanese to Indonesian ?

1.3. The Objective of the Study
This study is intended to answer the above

research

question. The objective then is formed as follows :
#To find the reasons why President Soeharto code-switched
from Javanese to Indonesian.

1.4. The Signicance of the Study
This study hopefully can be a good input to enrich the

8

sociolinguistic
likely

studies. Besides,

to be considered as input

the findings

are

in the field

of

most
second

language teaching-learning.

1.5. The Limitation of the Study
This
subject

study

is

limited in the

following

under study is the speech by

ways:

President

Soeharto
in 1995.

addressed to Surinamese during his official visit
Because
switching
limit

the

writer would like to

displayed

in the speech,

this study by making a

analyze

the

the writer

list of probable

the

code

tried

to

causes

of

the code switching that will be elaborated in chapter two.
Those
many

probable
experts'

causes of code-switching are
views

such as Dell Hymes,

taken

Janet

from

Holmes,

Charlotte Hoffman, Scotton,etc.

1.6. Theoretical Framework

This

thesis

sociolinguistics
and

discourse

sociolinguistics
society.
subjects,

i s

based

on

the

theories

that cover bilingualism, code
analysis.

Hudson

of

switching
defines

(1980:1)

as the study of language in relation

Furthermore,

he also

says

that

like

sociolinguistics is partly empirical and

to

other
partly

9

theoretical,
bodies

partly

a matter of going out

and

of fact and partly of sitting back

amassing

and

thinking.

While about bilingualism, Weinreich (1953:3) defines it as
''the

practice

alternate

use

of alternately using two
of

languages''.

more than two languages is

correctly

called multilingualism but for convenience it will
treated
code

as bilingualism. Hoffman (1991:110)

switching

languages

or

involves

the

linguistic

alternate
varieties

The

be here

states

that

use

of

two

within

the

same

utterance or during the same conversation.
Discourse

analysis,

is

according

to

Kenworthy

(1991:111) concerned with studying how people use language
in a variety of discourse-conversation,
commentaries,

political

interviews,

speeches,

teaching,

Furthermore, he says that the analysis of spoken
involves

the investigation of what people are

accomplish with
that

can be found in conversation. Thus it

is

very

crucial

analyzing

the

President

Soeharto's

spoken
have

etc.
language

trying

to

their words and with the overall patterns

that the above theories are related
i t

spoken

data.

discourse.

to

understand

In this study,
speech

In a

that

to

is very

one

another

them
the
also

spoken discourse,

choices how to convey their meaning

clear

first
focus
be

before
is

can

speakers
and

and

the

called
also

intentions

10

and how to accomplish their goals.
say anything, but
social
that

in practice,

In theory, anyone

speakers are constrained by

convention. Therefore in a sense,
there

are ''rules'' for speaking

rules of grammar in a

can

just

it can

be

said

as

there

are

language.

1.7. Definition of Key Terms
The title of this thesis is "A Study of Code-Switching
of

President Soeharto's Speech on His Official

Visit

to

Suriname in 1995." The prime terms defined in this section
are code switching and speech.
Code switching is the mix up of varieties in the
stretch

of

varieties

speech in which the
at

different time (Hudson,

according to Hudson (1980:2)

1.8. Organization of the
This

thesis

different

1980:56).

Speech,

is actual utterances.

consists

of five

chapters.

The

first

It consists of the Background

the Study, Statement of the Problem,

the Study,

uses

Thesis

chapter is the Introduction.
of

speaker

same

the Objective

of

the Limitation of the Study, Theoretical Frame-

work, Definition of the Key Terms and Organization of

the

Thesis.
The second chapter reviews some literature related

to

11

the study under report.

It discusses the theories and some

opinions that support this study namely

sociolinguistics,

bilingualism, code switching and previous related studies.
The third is concerned with the research
It

discusses

data,

subject,

the

analyzing

the

fourth chapter deals with the Data Analysis,

the

the

the nature of the study, the

methodology.

procedures for collecting

and

data.
The

Findings and the Discussion. The last chapter presents the
Conclusion and the Suggestions concerning the topic
study.

under