CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
This
chapter presents the background of the study, the statement of the problem, objectives of the study, scope and
limitation of the study, significance of the study, the definition of key terms and
researchmethod.
1.1 Background of the Study Illocutionary acts are utterances which are
performed with the intention of producing
a further effect. According to Renkema (1993: 22), illocutionary acts are the acts which are committed by producing
an utterance; by uttering a promise, a
promise is made; by uttering a threat, athreat is made. For example, in saying, "I will try my best to be at home
for dinner", the speaker performs the speech act of promising to be at home in time.
According to Austin’s preliminary
informal description, the idea of “illocutionary
acts” can be captured by emphasizingthat “in saying something, we do something”. For example, “I sentence you to
ten years imprisonment”. This sentence
is become an action because the speakers say a word to decide the punishment to the prisoner. Then, it can be
concluded that sometimes someone uses
word not only to say things but also he/she uses it to do things. It means that
when someone says something, it has some
action behind it.
Illocutionary acts can be
expressed through oral orwritten language, or in other words, performing illocutionary acts can
be done by uttering or inscribing to express
meanings. Illocutionary acts can also be expressed through sign language, which is expressed by the people who have
speech and hearing impairment. Most humans
acquiring language utilize speech sounds, made up of an utterance act and illocutionary act, to express meanings, but
such sounds are not necessary, which is evident
by the deaf’s ability to communicate through sign language (Fromkin et al., 1997). It means that sign language also
can beused as one of the ways to express
an illocutionary acts.
Sign language is a language
produced by giving markor symbol to represent
something. Sign language, according to Searle (1975), is one of the expressions of speech acts. This kind of
language is used by the people who have hearing
or speech impairment as stated by Neisser (1983), the deaf perceive the world through skilled and practiced eyes;
language is at their fingertips.
In linguistic terms, sign
languages are as rich andcomplex as any oral language, despite the common misconception
that they are not "real languages".
Sign languages are just the same
with oral or spoken language but have different production and grammars. When the deaf or dumb
people produce an utterance or perform
acts such as requesting, advising, apologizing, thanking, or apologizing, which is known as illocutionary act, they have
their own style to perform it.
In this research, the writer
really wants to know about the illocutionary acts that may be performed by using sign
language. Sign language is chosen since it
is also a kind of language but produced by giving mark or symbol to represent something. It is also a kind of language which
is seldom to be observed. So, that is why
the writer is interested in observing sign language rather than spoken language or written texts.
The writer chose Silence movie as
source data. Silence movie is interesting
movie to be observed because of some reasons. First, it is one of the popular Taiwanese movies in 2007. Second, this
movie deals with the study about sign
language. Third, this movie has many illocutionary acts in the conversation which is expressed through sign language.
Fourth, the language used in this movie has
special uniqueness; it is because the language used is sign language, and sign language is languages with their own grammars.
Theydo not share the same grammatical
structures with spoken languages in a given country.
Several studies on illocutionary
acts have been done previously. For example,
Aini (2007) looks at “Sign Language of Hellen Keller in Miracle Worker Movie”. Aini investigates the way
Hellen Keller used sign language through
language acquisition theory. The researcherfinds out some difficulties on spelling verbs for the deaf-blind person.
Handayani (2004) investigates
illocutionary acts used by transsexual people
in Malang. She found four kinds of speech acts: assertive act, directive act, commissive act and expressive act. The most
assertive act performed in this finding
is complaining act.
Chamimah (2006) examined
illocutionary acts used bymentally retarded students in Yayasan Darul Ulum Jombang. She
finds the form of directive act, commissive
act and representative act. The representative mostly performed is assertive. This illocutionary act analysis is
fulfilled by the felicity condition namely
preparatory condition, sincerity condition, prepositional condition and essential condition.
Zen (2007) with her research
“Discourse Analysis ofBush’s Speeches on Democracy Issue through Illocutionary Acts
Theory” finds four kinds of speech acts:
assertive/representative, commissive, expressive, and declarative used by Bush. The speaker delivered messages through
his speech explicitly.
Indriawati (2008) investigated
Illocutionary Acts used by Indonesia This Morning presenters on Metro TV finds four
types of illocutionary acts: representative,
directive, commissive, and expressive used by the presenters of Indonesia This Morning. The presenters do not
use the declarative acts. She also finds
that the presenters also used four functions of illocutionary acts based on the
social purposes: competitive, convivial,
collaborative and conflictive. The most frequent
functions of illocutionary acts were used by Indonesia This Morning presenters on Metro TV are collaborative.
Other conducted by Wildan (2008)
who researches “A Study on Illocutionary
Acts used by The Main Characters in The Boor” and finds the the main characters in “The Boor” used directives,
assertive, commissive, expressive and
declarative.
This research investigates
illocutionary acts on sign language used by the main character in “Silence movie”. To analyze
the data, illocutionary acts theory proposed
by Searle: assertive, directive, commissive, expressive, and declaratives is used. The main difference of this study
from previous ones lies on the different objects that the researchers investigated and
its focus of study: sign language.
1.2 Research Problems Based on the background of the study above,
this research is conducted to answer the
following questions: 1. What types of
illocutionary acts are found in sign language used in Silence movie? 2.
What functions of illocutionary acts in sign language are used in Silence movie? 1.3
Objectives of the Study In line with the
problems stated above, the objectives of the study are formulated as follows: 1. To
explain the types of illocutionary acts found insign language used in Silence movie.
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