Olive Penderghast`s speech acts in easy a movie.

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ABSTRACT
Dewi, Tusita Maina. (2015). Olive Penderghast’s Speech Acts in Easy A Movie.
Yogyakarta: English Language Education Study Program, Sanata Dharma
University.
Speaking and exchanging opinion has already become the daily activities of
students at school. The students always interact to each other. It is important for
the students to know and understand how to speak appropriately. It is because the
society already has a rule or a norm how someone should speak to others.
Actually studying speech acts can help people including the students to know how
to speak appropriately.
The analysis of this research is about the speech act change in the Easy A
movie. This movie tells about Olive who is an unpopular teenager who suddenly
becomes famous as a “naughty” school girl. Supporting her new image, Olive’s
speech acts also change. The researcher makes two research questions which are

answered in this research. The questions are: (1)What types of speech acts are
used by Olive in Easy A movie? (2) what is the difference of speech acts used by
Olive when her character transforms in the movie?
The first finding is related to the types of speech acts. There are five types
of speech acts analyzed in this movie. Those types of speech acts are explained by
Searle (1999). Using the theories from Searle (1999), the researcher analyzes
Olive’s dialogues in Easy A movie whether those dialogues are assertive type,
commisive type, directive type, expressive type, or declarative type. After that,
those classified dialogues are presented in a percentage table.
The second finding is about the change of Olive’s speech acts. In the movie,
it shows that Olive uses powerless speech acts when she is unpopular and then she
uses powerful speech acts when she becomes famous as a “naughty” school girl.
The researcher analyzes this speech act change issue. Then the data gathered is
presented in a form of percentage table.
Key words:, Easy A movie, powerful, powerless, speech acts, sociolinguistics

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ABSTRAK
Dewi, Tusita Maina. (2015). Olive Penderghast’s Speech Acts In Easy A Movie.
Yogyakarta: Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, Fakultas Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan
Universitas Sanata Dharma..
Bercengkrama, dan bertukar pikiran telah menjadi kegiatan pelajar seharihari. Para pelajar akan berinteraksi dengan pelajar lain ketika mereka berada di
sekolah. Hal itu menunjukkan bahwa penting bagi pelajar untuk mengerti
bagaimana cara berbicara yang benar. Ini dikarenakan dalam bermasyarakat
sudah ada aturan dan norma-norma dalam berbicara. Dengan mempelajari
Speech acts, orang-orang akan terbantu khususnya para pelajar untuk
mengetahui bagaimana cara bicara yang layak.
Penelitian ini akan menganalisa perubahan penggunaan speech acts pada
film Easy A. Film tersebut menceritakan seorang remaja bernama Olive yang
tiba-tiba menjadi terkenal sebagai perempuan “nakal” di sekolahnya. Untuk
mendukung perubahannya, Olive merubah speech acts yang ia gunakan. Peneliti
membuat dua pokok pertanyan untuk mempelajari isu ini, yaitu: (1) Apa tipe-tipe

speech acts yang digunakan Olive di film tersebut? (2) Apakah perbedaan speech
acts yang digunakan Olive ketika karakternya berubah di film?
Untuk menjawab pertanyaan pertama, peneliti mempelajari tentang tipetipe speech acts. Terdapat lima tipe speech acts yang dianalisis. Kelima tipe
tersebut telah dipaparkan oleh Searle (1999). Dari teori Searle (1999), peneliti
menganalisis dialog Olive di film Easy A, apakah Speech acts tersebut termasuk
dalam tipe assertive, tipe commisive, tipe directive, tipe expressive, atau tipe
declarative.
Untuk pertanyaan kedua, peneliti menganalisa transformasi speech acts
yang digunakan Olive. Olive menunjukkan perubahan penggunaan speech acts.
Ketika ia belum terkenal, Olive menggunakan powerless speech acts; ketika dia
mulai terkenal sebagai perempuan “nakal” di sekolahnya, Olive lebih banyak
menggunakan powerful speech acts. Isu inilah yang dianalisa oleh peneliti.
Kata Kunci:, Easy A movie, powerful, powerless, speech acts,sociolinguistics

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OLIVE PENDERGHAST’S SPEECH ACTS
IN EASY A MOVIE
A SARJANA PENDIDIKAN THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree
in English Language Education

By
Tusita Maina Dewi
Student Number: 111214124

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM
DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION
FACULTY OF TEACHERS TRAINING AND EDUCATION
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
YOGYAKARTA

2015

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OLIVE PENDERGHAST’S SPEECH ACTS
IN EASY A MOVIE
A SARJANA PENDIDIKAN THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
to Obtain the Sarjana Pendidikan Degree
in English Language Education

By
TusitaMainaDewi
Student Number: 111214124

ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM
DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION
FACULTY OF TEACHERS TRAINING AND EDUCATION
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
YOGYAKARTA
2015
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STRIVING FOR SUCCESS WITHOUT
HARD WORK IS LIKE TRYING TO
HARVEST WHERE YOU HAVEN’T
PLANTED
-DAVID BLY-

I WOULD LIKE TO DEDICATE THIS THESIS
TO
MY MOTHER AND MY FATHER

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STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY

I honestly declare that this thesis, which I havewritten, does not contain the work
or parts of the work of other people, except those cited in the quotations and the
references, as a scientific paper should.

Yogyakarta, July 30, 2015

The Writer

Tusita Maina Dewi
111214124

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LEMBAR PENYATAAN PERSETUJUAN
PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH UNTUK KEPENTINGAN AKADEMIS
Yang bertanda tangan di bawah ini, saya mahasiswa Universitas Sanata Dharma:
Nama
Nomor Mahasiswa

: Tusita Maina Dewi
: 111214124

Demi pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan, saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan
Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul:

OLIVE PENDERGHAST’S SPEECH ACTS
IN EASY A MOVIE
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 izin dari saya

maupun memberikan royalty kepada saya selama tetap mencantumkan nama saya
sebagai penulis.
Demikian pernyataan ini saya buat dengan sebenarnya.
Dibuat di Yogyakarta

Pada tanggal: 30 Juli 2015
Yang menyatakan

Tusita Maina Dewi

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ABSTRACT
Dewi, Tusita Maina. (2015). Olive Penderghast’s Speech Acts in Easy A Movie.
Yogyakarta: English Language Education Study Program, Sanata Dharma
University.
Speaking and exchanging opinion has already become the daily activities of
students at school. The students always interact to each other. It is important for
the students to know and understand how to speak appropriately. It is because the
society already has a rule or a norm how someone should speak to others.
Actually studying speech acts can help people including the students to know how
to speak appropriately.
The analysis of this research is about the speech act change in the Easy A
movie. This movie tells about Olive who is an unpopular teenager who suddenly
becomes famous as a “naughty” school girl. Supporting her new image, Olive’s
speech acts also change. The researcher makes two research questions which are
answered in this research. The questions are: (1)What types of speech acts are
used by Olive in Easy A movie? (2) what is the difference of speech acts used by
Olive when her character transforms in the movie?
The first finding is related to the types of speech acts. There are five types
of speech acts analyzed in this movie. Those types of speech acts are explained by
Searle (1999). Using the theories from Searle (1999), the researcher analyzes
Olive’s dialogues in Easy A movie whether those dialogues are assertive type,
commisive type, directive type, expressive type, or declarative type. After that,
those classified dialogues are presented in a percentage table.
The second finding is about the change of Olive’s speech acts. In the movie,
it shows that Olive uses powerless speech acts when she is unpopular and then she
uses powerful speech acts when she becomes famous as a “naughty” school girl.
The researcher analyzes this speech act change issue. Then the data gathered is
presented in a form of percentage table.
Key words:, Easy A movie, powerful, powerless, speech acts, sociolinguistics

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ABSTRAK
Dewi, Tusita Maina. (2015). Olive Penderghast’s Speech Acts In Easy A Movie.
Yogyakarta: Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris, Fakultas Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan
Universitas Sanata Dharma..
Bercengkrama, dan bertukar pikiran telah menjadi kegiatan pelajar seharihari. Para pelajar akan berinteraksi dengan pelajar lain ketika mereka berada di
sekolah. Hal itu menunjukkan bahwa penting bagi pelajar untuk mengerti
bagaimana cara berbicara yang benar. Ini dikarenakan dalam bermasyarakat
sudah ada aturan dan norma-norma dalam berbicara. Dengan mempelajari
Speech acts, orang-orang akan terbantu khususnya para pelajar untuk
mengetahui bagaimana cara bicara yang layak.
Penelitian ini akan menganalisa perubahan penggunaan speech acts pada
film Easy A. Film tersebut menceritakan seorang remaja bernama Olive yang
tiba-tiba menjadi terkenal sebagai perempuan “nakal” di sekolahnya. Untuk
mendukung perubahannya, Olive merubah speech acts yang ia gunakan. Peneliti
membuat dua pokok pertanyan untuk mempelajari isu ini, yaitu: (1) Apa tipe-tipe
speech acts yang digunakan Olive di film tersebut? (2) Apakah perbedaan speech
acts yang digunakan Olive ketika karakternya berubah di film?
Untuk menjawab pertanyaan pertama, peneliti mempelajari tentang tipetipe speech acts. Terdapat lima tipe speech acts yang dianalisis. Kelima tipe
tersebut telah dipaparkan oleh Searle (1999). Dari teori Searle (1999), peneliti
menganalisis dialog Olive di film Easy A, apakah Speech acts tersebut termasuk
dalam tipe assertive, tipe commisive, tipe directive, tipe expressive, atau tipe
declarative.
Untuk pertanyaan kedua, peneliti menganalisa transformasi speech acts
yang digunakan Olive. Olive menunjukkan perubahan penggunaan speech acts.
Ketika ia belum terkenal, Olive menggunakan powerless speech acts; ketika dia
mulai terkenal sebagai perempuan “nakal” di sekolahnya, Olive lebih banyak
menggunakan powerful speech acts. Isu inilah yang dianalisa oleh peneliti.
Kata Kunci:, Easy A movie, powerful, powerless, speech acts,sociolinguistics

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This would be a great opportunity for me to express my gratitude to those
who supported, helped, and facilitated me in the process of making and finishing
this thesis.
First of all, I would like to thank Sang Buddha. With His miracle, and
companionship I could study in Sanata Dharma University until this thesis could
be accomplished. When finishing this thesis, I could feel His bless in every
moment.
Second, I would like to present my greatest gratitude toward my mother,
Siti Ariyati, S.Ag., my father, Tursiman, S.Ag., and my young brother, Ganang
Puja Gautama. They had always been my greatest motivation to finish my thesis
and graduate as soon as possible. They always encouraged me when I was
working in my thesis.
I also would like to send my gratitude to my advisor, Paulus
Kuswandono, Ph.D. for his guidance. I would like to thank for his support and
also help. His patience and suggestion helped me a lot during my thesis making.
He never forgot to encourage me to stay strong and also to struggle more in
finishing this thesis.
My deepest gratitude also addressed to all my beloved best friends, Arum,
Priska, Nadia, Nurita, Sandra, and Agatha for the courage and motivation, and
also for the thesis discussion to help me to understand the theories. The time when
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we struggled together and when we were crazy together were the great moments. I
also would like to thank those who had same advisor as me, Denik, Siska, Mike,
Fani, Vitha, Vianney,and Inka for all of the information related to our thesis
consultation class and also the fun and laughable moments when we were bored
and dying.
Bunch of thanks are also given to my friends from PBI batch 2011,
especially class C and also my academic advisor, Yuseva Ariyani Iswandari,
S.Pd., M.Ed.for their companionship during my study process in Sanata Dharma
University.
Sincerely,
Tusita Maina Dewi

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE .......................................................................................................... i
APPROVAL PAGES .............................................................................................. ii
DEDICATION PAGE ............................................................................................iv
STATEMENT OF WORK’S ORIGINALITY ....................................................... v
PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI ......................................................vi
ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................... vii
ABSTRAK ............................................................................................................. viii
ACKNOWLWDGEMENTS...................................................................................ix
TABLE OF CONTENTS ........................................................................................xi
LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................... xiii
LIST OF APPENDICES....................................................................................... xiv
CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION
A. Research Background ..................................................................................... 1
B. Research Questions ......................................................................................... 8
C. Research Objectives ........................................................................................ 8
D. Research Benefits ........................................................................................... 8
E. Problem Limitation ....................................................................................... 10
F. Definition of Terms ....................................................................................... 11
CHAPTER II.REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
A. Theoretical Description.................................................................................. 13
1. Speech Acts ........................................................................................... 14
2.The Powerful and Powerless Speech Acts .............................................. 19
B. Theoretical Framework ................................................................................... 23
CHAPTER III.RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
A. Research Method ............................................................................................ 25
B. Research Subject............................................................................................. 27
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C. Research Instruments ...................................................................................... 28
D. Data Analysis Technique ................................................................................ 29
E. Research Procedures ....................................................................................... 32
CHAPTER IV.RESEARCH RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A. Olive Penderghast’s Speech Acts ................................................................... 36
1. Assertive Type of Speech Acts ............................................................... 37
2. Directive Type of Speech Acts............................................................... 39
3. CommisiveType of Speech Acts ............................................................. 40
4. Expressive Type of Speech Acts ............................................................ 42
B. The Difference of Speech Acts Use before and after the Transformation of
Olive’s Character in the Movie ..................................................................... 45
1. Before the Transformation of Olive’s Character..................................... 47
2. After the Transformation of Olive’s Character ....................................... 49
CHAPTER V.CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
A. Conclusions ................................................................................................... 52
B. Recommendations ......................................................................................... 55
REFERENCES ...................................................................................................... 57
APPENDICES........................................................................................................ 60

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LIST OF TABLES
Table 3.1. Example of table of speech act typeutterances ......................................... 31
Table 3.2. The Percentage of Speech Act Types Used by Olive................................ 31
Table 3.3. The Percentage of Powerless and Powerful Speech Act Used by Olive .... 32
Table 4.1. Assertive Speech Acts Examples ............................................................. 37
Table 4.2.Directive Speech Acts Examples .............................................................. 39
Table 4.3.Commisive Speech Acts Examples ........................................................... 41
Table 4.4.Expressive Speech Acts Examples ............................................................ 43
Table 4.5. The Percentage of Speech Act Types Used by Olive................................ 44
Table 4.6. The Percentage of Powerless and Powerful Speech Act Used by Olive .... 51

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LIST OF APPENDICES
Appendix A: Easy A movie review .......................................................................... 59
Appendix B: Synopsis of Easy A movie ................................................................... 61
Appendix C: Olive Penderghast’s dialogues which contain powerfulspeech acts ..... 64
Appendix D: Olive Penderghast’s dialogues which containpowerlessspeech acts ..... 69

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CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

The first chapter of this thesisdiscusses the background of the research,
research question, research objectives, research benefits, problem limitation, and
definition of terms. Each of them is explained and presented in this chapter. The
background of the research contains the issues related to the topic which is
discussed in this research. Next discussion is about the research questions. Based
on the issues in the background section, the reseacher makes two research
questions which become the indicators of the gaps in the scope.
After that, there is the discussion about the purposes of this research which
is conducted in the research objectives. Next, the benefits and the advantage from
this thesis are explained in the research benefits. Then the researcher also provides
the limitation of the questions which are studied in the problem limitation. For the
last section in this chapter, the researcher clarifies the definition of the terms.

A. Research Background
Communication is very important for everyone, whether it is spoken or
written. Living together in a society, people need to communicate with the
others. Communication itself actually is a bridge of human relationship.
Backlund (1989) states that “communication is important to enhance the
relationship to the self, others, and society” (P. 5).Communication is essential

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for human life. In every field such as education, work, and daily activities,
communication is used. That fact makes everybody deals with communication
matter. That is why the problemin communication becomes a source ofproblem
for people. It is shown in the movie, Easy A.
As a part of society, people will interact with each other. Aitchison
(1998)explains that human is very special compared to animals. It is because
humanbeing can say what they want. They can also understand numbers and
sentences which make the communication easier. In other words, they can
express themselves freely. It makes them different from other creatures.
Communication can be doneusing many ways, such as by conversation,
facial expressions, and also body language. Actually, people own
skillinchoosing the way they want to use when they communicate. They can
use whatever way which is appropriate in their situation at that moment.
There are five reasons why the researcher chooses woman speech acts as
the topic of this study. First, the researcher is inspired by the other researchers
who have the same topic. Second, speech act is an interesting topic to be learnt
as stated by Bach (1979). Third, studying speech act is useful to explain and
describe what people want through their speech. Fourth, because women
speech acts are unique, learning speech act help people to avoid
misunderstanding when they talk to a woman. The last reason is the researcher
wants to discover the power in women’s speech.
There are some researchers who research the same topic, speech act
topic, such as the thesis entitled “An Analysis on Rose Bukater’s Speech Acts in

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Titanic Movie” by Aurelia Anindita (2014). She discusses the speech acts and
also the meaning behind those acts. The researcher follows that part. However
the researcher adds some other theories and also discusses a different issue
which is shown in the second research question of this research. The
inspiration comes from the previous research which is conducted by Anindita.
This is actually the first reason why the researcher chooses this topic.
Actually when people speak, they also do an action. It is called speech
act. In the linguistics field, the term, speech act, is actually famous as a kind of
act which is done through a speech. Bach (1979) says about speech act as act of
communication and it can be found in the conversation. He also says that
studying speech act is always interesting. That fact makes the researcher
motivated to do this research and it is the second reason why the researcher
does this research.
The third reason to conduct this research is that it is useful to understand
what people want through their utterances. It is because communication can be
used to accomplish so many things. Through communication people can
deliver information, make request, ask questions, make bets, tell joke,
compliment, ask forgiveness, give warning, etc.Women also use speech acts to
accomplish those things. Surprisingly, women speech acts are really unique.
When they speak, sometimes the meaningof their speeches are misunderstood
by the listeners. That is actually the next reason to conduct this research. By
learning speech acts, people can avoid misunderstanding.For some reasons
women speeches give some different meanings to the listeners. In this case, the

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listeners who misunderstand can be anyone. That is why this research will be
useful to other people, whether they are men or women. It makes them know
what actually a womanwants and tends to say behind her speech.
The last reason of conducting this research is to discover the power in
women speeches. Knowing the power of people speeches actually is very
important. It is because in the society, there are some norms to be obeyed when
someone speaks. One of those norms is the use of powerin someone’s
utterance, in other words people should understand about powerful and
powerlessspeech acts.Understanding the power of speech acts can leadpeople
to be more careful in choosing words when they speak.
This research is about the speech act change phenomenon inEasy A
movie.Why the researcher chooses this movie is becausethe audiences of this
movie are mostly the teenagers or the students.Actually, the children who want
to watch this movie must be accompanied by their parents because of the
language and the prurient attitude of the characters in the movie. The fact that
this movie is watched by teenagers around the world makes the researcher
motivated to learn about this movie. The researcher hopes thatthe teenagers and
also the students can learn the language especially about what speech they can
use freely and what speech they shall use carefully.If the bad speech acts
example in the movie are copied by the teenagers,it can bring a bad impact to
them, for example, they can be seen as impolite people by their listener.
This movie also provide a speech act change issue. The movie depicts
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are a lot ofpowerful speeches used and those powerful speech acts are
discussed in this research. It makes the researcher can give many examples of
powerful speech acts. This way, the students can understand easily about those
speech acts.
This research is about Olive’s speech acts inEasy A movie.The speech
acts are in the Olive’s dialogues which are taken from the movie script.Movie
is an interesting medium to be researched.It is because the researcher can learn
about the language not only through the dialogues but also through the action.
It is different when conducting research based on a book. Learning language by
watching movie helps the students to get a real example of people
conversation.
Movie as a learning medium gives the students benefits. Kruesmann
(1999) agrees in using movie as a learning medium because movie has some
benefits. The benefits are familiarity, flexibility, cross-cultural connectivity,
and content density. In education field, the greatest challenge for educators is
to use the new technologies to help the teaching activities. Movie can help the
students learn languagebecause students nowadays are familiar with television,
computer, and internet. The students can always use those to find the movie.
Movie is also flexible. It is pointed by Kuzma and Haney (1998) that recalling
the student memory by using the traditional tools like books or blackboard is
not as effective as using movie. Movie stimulates the students simultaneously
visually and verbally. The use of more senses leads the students to imprint the
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Cross-cultural connectivity gives the students benefit in engaging the
emotions by bringing together information, narrative, and visual which give
many opportunities for finding chords of resonance with existing student
experience.The students can feel the real situation from the movie they
watch.A movie can be a great vehicle to students to get that benefit.Another
benefit of using movie as a learning and teaching medium is the content
density of the movie. In a movie, there are many issues and problems. It can
challenge the students to be a problem solver in their real life if the same
problem occurs, for example, in the movie Easy A, it can be seen how a
sentence, which is spoken by Olive, can suddenly change her image. That issue
is researched in this thesis. The movie which is studied is Easy A. The
researcher uses and learns further about woman’s speech acts in this movie.
Easy A movie actually tells about an average high school girl named
Olive Penderghast. Even in the opening narration, Olive herself tells the
audience that she is "invisible" and "anonymous". Unfortunately her quiet life
changes into a mess. A good girl like her suddenly gains the reputation as the
school's No. 1 bad girl after her white lie about a boring weekendturns into the
school-wide buzz. Like the other teenagers, Olive only wants to be popular.
When Olive’s best friend, Rhiannon, asks Olive to join her dinner with her
parents, Olive refuses the offer by telling a white lie. Unfortunately because of
Rhiannon, the exaggeration gossip reaches the ear of Marianne. Marianne is
the promoter of one of a religious freak club. This gossip is spread at the whole
school and it gets bigger.

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That situation makes Olive a famous bad girl. She gains fans and also
haters. Olive must deal with many people because of this. Although she says to
everyone that her being a bad girl is just gossip which is not true, no one
believes her. That makes her decides to go with the flow. She begins to dress
and act provocatively so that she can stand out. Her change is not only noticed
by the students in her school but also her favorite teacher, Mr. Griffith. Mr
Griffith also notices and worries about her change. The only people who trust
and are open-minded about Olive situation are her parents.
Olive never thinks that her little games give many negative effects for
her. She realizes that it is time for the truth to come out. With a little help from
a long-time crush, Woodchuck Todd, she attempts to let all people know that
she is so far from being a bad girl.
Although there are so many problems, Olive can solve them.In the end
people know what the truth is.Finally, she can act and speak as the way she
is.This movie is fun and it teaches many lessons to the audiences.One of the
lessons is about the bad effect of not speaking the truth or what we call a lie
even when it is a white lie. Sometimes the smallest lie can come back to haunt
the person who does not tell the truth. People can learn that they must think
about the reputation that may be gained from their liebefore the regret comes.
The researcher analyzes the speech acts used by Olive Penderghast in the
movieEasy A. Besides analyzing the type of Olive’s speech acts, the researcher
also analyzes the change of Olive speech acts in order to make her new
character stronger.

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B. Research Questions
There are two research questions in this study. They are:
1. What types of speech acts are used by Olive in Easy A movie?
2. What is the difference of speech acts used by Olive when
hercharacter transformsin the movie?
C. Research Objectives
This research has two objectives. This study is conducted to find out how
speech acts are employed in the conversation in the movie, especially Olive’s
speech acts. The other objectives are to find the answer for the research
questions.The first research question iswhat type of Olive’s speech acts from
Easy A movie are. In this case the researcher analyzes Olive’s speech acts types
by using the theory from Searle (1999). There are five type of speech acts.
They are assertive, directive, commosive, expressive, and declarative.
The second research question which should be answered is the different
in speech acts use before and after the transformation of olive’s character in the
movie. The researcher analyzes what speech acts Olive uses before she changes
her attitude and after that. There is a difference speech acts use when Olive
speaks when shebecomes a naughty school girl.

D. Research Benefits
After all, this research will give the benefits toward the readers. In this
case, the researcher hopes that this study will be beneficial for those who deal
with language. Those people are:

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a. English Students
This study is related to English linguistics. This research will help the
students in learning that, especially sociolinguistics. The students are
expected to understand the meaning of the act behind a speech, for
example by asking a question, actually someone can order the listener to
do something.
English students can get the benefit such as applying appropriate
speech acts in the learning process. By doing that, the students also can
avoid misinterpretationof the meaning and misunderstanding the message
in their conversation.The researcher also believes that the students will get
an idea to study the language using a movie and learn about the language
deeper after they read this study, for eaxmple about the speech acts.

b. English Lecturers
The result of this study hopefully can be an additional data for the
lecturers in teaching English, such as the additional data in learning speech
acts, especially woman speech acts. In order to encourage the students to
be creative in searching the media to learn, the lecturers can use this study
as an example that learning speech acts actually can be from everything,
not only from book. It is expected that the teacher can motivate the
students to use movie as the learning source.

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c. Other Researchers in the Same Field
This research is expected to help the other researchers who work in the
same field. This study can be a reference for them to learn and comprehend
deeper about speech acts. The researcher also offers to learn the other
linguisticstopics for example the swear words, men’s speech acts, or politeness.
Those topics are also important to be learnt. The future researchers can used
those topics to contribute the study of sociolinguisticsfield.

E. Problem Limitation
For this study, the researcher usesthe theories and also sources which are
related to the women speech acts. The script of Easy A movie is also used to
conduct this research.This study uses the theory of content analysis, so the
researcher attempts to find out the necessary information which is related to
this research in the movie. The first limitation of this research focusesonly on
Olive’s dialogues on the movie. It is because the researcher wants to study
about woman speech act. Easy A movie is an subject that helps the researcher
to learn about woman speech act. It also means that the researcher does not use
men dialogues or other women dialogues.
The second limitation is the researcher learns only Olive’s conversation
when she has the interlocutor. The movie shows that Olive actually has
conversation with people and also her computer. The researcher does not
analyze all of Olive’s utterances. In other words, the speech acts which are
intended to be analyzed are those which are delivered to people.

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F. Definition Of Terms
a. Speech Act
Sadock (1974) states that“speech acts mean the acts which are done in
the speaking process.” (p. 45) Another explanation is stated by Searle
(1974). He explains that speech acts are utterances that refer to the process
of uttering. Activity or action in this case is a process controlled by an
agent. It brings the understanding that speech act is an act which is done
when someone speaks.

b. Powerful and Powerless Speech Acts
A word has its own power when it is spoken by a person. people can
use a powerful word or a powerless word. That will make someone’s speech
act becomes either powerful or powerless. There is a factor why people use
either powerful or powerless speech acts. That factor is someone’s status in
society. The higher someone’s status in the society society, the more
powerful speech acts will be used by that person. The same statement also
stated by O’Barr (1980) who conclude that the speech styles, whether it is
powerful or powerless, were status related.

c. Politeness
Politeness is a term that is commonly used in society. It is because that
term is very important when people interact to others in the society.
Politeness can be seen as a tool to keep people away from conflict. The idea

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that politeness should be understood as strategic conflict-avoidance can be
found in Brown & Levinsonn (1987) theory of politeness. They said that
“the basic social role of politeness is in its abilityto function as a way of
controlling potential aggression between interactional parties” (p.1).

d. Easy A movie
This movie is a comedy romance movie. It is directed byWill Gluck.It
is also produced by Will Gluck with the help from Zanne Devine as the
second producer.The researcherprovides some examples of Olive’s
dialogues of this movie. Thosedialoguescontain the speech acts. They are
used as the data which are analyzed for this study. The full review of Easy A
movie can be seen in Appendix A.

Those are the background, research questions, research objectives,
research benefits, problem limitation, and definition of terms which are used in
this research. The next chapter discusses the theories to support and help the
researcher in the process of analyzing the data.

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CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF RELATED STUDY

There are two main parts of this chapter. Those two arethe theoretical
description and the theoretical framework. In the theoretical description, the
theoretical review of this researchis provided. The last part isthe theoretical
framework. In the theoretical framework, the researcher explains the relation
between the theories and the research question of this research. The researcher
uses the theories provided to answer the research questions.
A. Theoretical Description
In this section, the researcher discussesthe theories which are related to
women speech actsand the power in women utterances. The term of speech acts
aredescribed in detail. The power in women speech acts are analyzed to help the
researcher to answer the research questions.
There are some terms which come up in speech act discussion, such as the
components of speech acts, types in the speech acts,direct and indirect speech,
women politeness, and also the powerin women speech. They are discussed
because they can help the researcher to understand women speech acts. The
researcher writes some definitions, descriptions, and elaborations as the
theoretical foundation of the study.

13

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1. Speech Acts
Language is an important tool of communication for human. Language is
used to deliver information from one person to another. Actually, speaking a
language is more than just to communicate. In other words, people do an act
behind their utterances.
According to Searle (1999), “speaking a language is performing speech acts,
acts such as making statements, giving requests, asking questions or making
promises” (p. 36).Searle (1999) shares that speech acts are actually the basic unit
of linguistics communication. They are performed for their proper meanings in
the whole utterances.
Another definitionof speech act is also studied by McGregor (2009). Hesays
that “speech is fundamentally a social act of doing things with words” (p. 142).It
explains that when a person talks to someone else actually that person does not
only speak but alsodoes an act. In social life, people do a conversation not only
to go around the bush; sometimes they also have purposes in doing conversation
such as stating, asking or ordering.
Meanwhile Austin (1962) states “speech act is doing a certain thing by saying a
certain word or group of words” (p. 94).The purpose is to show that thefunction of

language is not only for making true or false statements. Austin proves that there
are undoubtedly more functions of language that can be learnt. One of them is
that people can do an action by saying something.
Speech act is introduced firstly by Austin (1962). He introduces the basic
terms and the area of study for speech acts or what he calls the performative.

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Performativeis historically the first speech act to be examined and studied within
the other theories of speech act. Austin (1962) defines a performative as an
utterance which contains a special type of verb, a performative verb, by force of
which it performs an action. He definesperformative utterance as utterance
which:
[...] do not ‘describe’ or ‘report’ or constate anything at all, are
not ‘true or false’; and [...] the uttering of the sentence is, or is
part of, the doing of an action, which again would not normally
be described as saying something.(1962:5)
Austin (1962) explanation is supported by Wardhaugh (1992) who says that
in using a performative, a person is not just saying something but is actually
doing something. Performative utterance is what people understand now as
speech actwhere “the uttering of the words is[...] the leading incident in the
performance of an act, [...] the performance of which is alsothe object of the
utterance” (Austin 1962). The examples of the utterances are:
1) ‘I do’ [in a marriage ceremony]
2) ‘I name this ship the Queen Elizabeth’ [in a ship opening party]
(1962, p.5)
Austin (1962) describes the utterances above that “they do notdescribe my
doing what I should be said in so uttering to be doing or to statethat I am doing
it: it is to do it”(p.6). It explains that those utterances are said to perform an
action not only to report information. The sentence is said to convey another
meaning from the speaker.

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As explained by Searle (2010), speech actis formed from three basic
components. They are locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary.The other
experts like Sadock (1974) and Austin (1962) also discuss the definition of the
three components.
a. Locutionary act is simply the speech act that has taken place.It is locutionary
act when ‘to’ say something is to do something. It shows the act which the
speaker means to convey. Sadock (1974) adds locutionary act as “act that is

performed in order to communicate” (p. 8).A speaker needs to speak in
order that the listener understands what the speaker wants. Thus,
locutionary is performed by the speaker. For example:
-

We find the defendant not guilty

-

The temperature of this room is too hot and it makes me sweat too much.

The speaker here does not only want to give the audience an information. In the
first example, the speaker wants to clear the defendant from his/her guilty. The
speaker here wants to change the defendant’s situation. Meanwhile the second
speaker actually performs an act of command or request his/her listener to solve
the speaker’s problem, in other words the speaker wants his/her listener to do
something about speaker’s complaint.
b. Illocutionary actis the real action which is performed by the utterance.
Illocutionary is explained by Austin (1962) too. Hesays that “an illocutionary
act will happen when ‘in’ saying something then an act is performed, such

as ‘in’ ordering someone one is ordering someone” (p.99).Illocutionary act

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is actually the actual word of the message. Different from the locutionary
act which can be found in the speaker utterance, the illocutionary can be
found in the message which is carried in the speaker utterance.
e.g.

It is hot................................................statement
Would you open the door? .................request
Wait for me! ......................................order
Do you see my son? ..........................question

c. Perlocutionary actis the effect of the utterance on the listener. According to

Austin (1962), “Perlocutionary being when ‘by’ saying something an act is
performed, as in ‘by saying x I was y-ing him’: ‘by saying stop I was
warning him’” (p. 108).Perlocutionaryact makes the hearer to react to the
speaker’s message. The typical examples of perlocutionary act areinspired,
persuaded, impressed, deceived, emberassed, misleaded, intimidated, irritated,
annoyed, angry, etc.

This research discussesa study about five kinds of speech acts. Those speech
acttypes are explained by Searle (1999). Hestatesthat “there are five different
types of speech acts based on illocutionary points”(p.148).They are assertive,
directive, commisive, expressive, and declarative.
The first, assertivetypeis the act that commit a hearer to a proposition.

Assertive statementis potentially true or false. It is based on the speaker whether
the utteranceis the fact or not. It is because when a person says an assertive
speech, he/she believes with what he/she says.The examples of assertivetypeare

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definitions, descriptions, assertions, statements, and so on. For example: “No
one makes a better cake than me.”
The second one is directive type. Searle (1999) states that “this typeis an

action to try to get the hearer to behave in such a way as to make his behavior
match the propositional content of the directive” (p.148).In this case, the speaker
directs a demand or a request to his/her audience. The state of mind of the
speakers when they use directive type is wanting someting. Speaker wants
something that his/her listener can do. This category houses such things as
orders, demands, instructions, and so forth. For example:
-“Could you close the window?”
- “Go away Ellen!”
Next, the third is commisive type which is shown when a speaker's utterance

commits the speaker to undertake a course of action proposed in the utterances
propositional content which was stated by Searle (1999). The commisive speech
act used by the speaker in the situation when the speaker commits him/herself to
a future course of action. The speaker intends to do something either for
him/herself or for his/her listener or even for other people. Promises, vows,
pledges, and verbal contracts are in this category. For example: “I willmeet you
tomorrow.”
The fourth, Searle (1999) explains that “expressive typeis utterance whose

point is to express the sincerity condition of the speech act” (p. 149).The purpose
ofusing expressive type isto convey the speaker’s feeling toward his/her listener.

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Expressive speech acts are things like condoling, thanking, apologizing,
congratulating, and all acts that can only be performed through expressing ones’
inner feelings. For example: “I am sorry that I lied to you.”
The last one is declarativetype whichgives out a point, or forces, ora

declaration to bring about a change in the world by representing it as having
been changed. This kind of speech act is used in an important matter or situation
only, such as war, wedding vow, court, etc. For example: “I pronounce you
husband and wife.”

2. The Powerful and Powerless Speech Acts
In the society, the speech acts which are performed by women must be
different from men.It is because in the society there is an unwritten rule about it.
Men who have more power and position in the society than women tend to use
powerful speech acts when they comunicate. Men use powerful speech acts
because those utterances show assertive, dominant, and certainty in them.
Sheldon (1997) has studied the located patterns of verbal and physical
assertiveness in men’s social organization. She finds that “insistence and brute
force can be acceptable strategies for trying to get what one wants” (p. 223).
Men make use of physical intimidating, physical force, refusal, threat. They
actively attempt to extend conflict without trying to make a solution.
As for the women , they usually use a feminine conflict style (Sheldon,
1997). According to Sheldon (1997), “Women possess verbal negotiation skills

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that enable them to confront without being very confrontational” (p. 61). She
adds that those verbal negotiation skills are the skills to speak indirectly and to
soften the blow while delivering their own wishes.It shows thatpowerless speech
acts are used by the women. Powerlessspeech act often contains more polite
forms, hedges, hesitation, disclaimer, intensifier, empty adjective, tag questions,
and hypercorrect grammar. Meanwhile, the absence of those indicators is the
existance of powerful speech act. It is supported by Lakoff (1975a, 1975b) in her
book, Language and Woman’s Place. O’barr and Atkins (1980) also states that
polite forms a