CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study Language is
essentially important in
human life as
a means of communication. By
communication, people easily
can share information,
express their ideas and interact
with others. Furthermore, we can understand a language by means of meaning. Everyone who knows a
language can understand what is said to him
or her, and can produce string of words that conveys meaning. In linguistic,
the study that
relates to meaning
is called semantics.
Fromkin (1983:166) states
that semantics is the study of
linguistics meaning. While according to Goddard, semantics is the study of meaning, stand at the very
centre of the linguistic quest to understand the
nature of language
abilities. Semantics is
one of the
branches of linguistics studying
about the meaning,
and it is
considered as a
major branch of
linguistics devoted to the study
of meaning in language (Crystal, 1999:310). Semantics is also at the
centre of the
study of human
mind-though process, cognition
and conceptualization, all these
are intricately bound up with the way which we classify and convey out experience of the words through
language.
When we study language in school or college,
teachers ally teach us the standard
language. As we know, it is ally used in formal situation, for instance, in meeting
seminar, etc. It
is very different
when we got
into the society
or the real community of the language.
People ally use
non standard language
for the informal situation. One of non-standard
language we ally find is slang.
Eble
(1996:1) said that slang is an ever
changing set of colloquial words and phrases that
speakers use to
establish or reinforce
social identity or
cohesiveness within a
group or with
a trend or
fashion in society
at large. Hornby
(1974:807) states that slang is
words, phrases, meanings of words, commonly used in talk among friends
or colleagues, but
not suitable for
good writing or
formal occasions, especially the kind used by and typical of
only one class of persons. The use of slang causes people to feel more intimate with one
another while they are communicating.
Slang is ally popular among teenagers and
adults. Slang is often used in daily life
conversation. The phenomenon
happened around us
such as in
chatting, direct conversation, or
in other social network media. It is seen when teenagers try to use
slang in talking
to other people,
some of them
do not really
understand the meaning of the
slang word itself. They used it
just because of hearing from other people
or just get
the influence of
dialect action from
movie or songs.
This phenomenon has emerged
because slang uses highly informal words and expressions that
are not considered
to be standard
language. Thus, either
adults or teenagers prefer to use it because it tends to be casual
and does not have any grammatical rules.
Slang
is used only
by particular group
of people in certain
territory for particular purposes. It can be seen from teenagers that
use slang to create identity in order to be different from adult Afro-American people.
They use slang to distinguish them from white
people. Sometimes the slang words are not understood by people who are not familiar with them.
Nowadays, the use of slang is getting more
globalized in reality, people often use slang
words in instant
messaging by using
short-formed words when
sending message. Moreover
slang is also
used in America
or English movies
especially movies that focused
on gangster or teenagers lives. The ‘Paul’ is one of movies that use
slang words. In
this movie, there
can be found
some slangs used
by the characters in
communication. It is viewed that the use of slang among the characters in this movie, beside easy to say it because
it refers to simple forms but also reflects the intimate situation.
This
study concerns with
investigating the lexical
and contextual meaning and
the semantic change’s
type of slang
that might appear
in the script
of ‘Paul’ movie. The contextual meaning is the meaning
it has in the situation in which it is used. Here
the example of
lexical and contextual
meaning of slang
used in Paul Movie
Script; A: They think they're so cool.
GRAHAM B:
Hey, are you excited about going to Area 51? CLIVE C: Hell yes.
The word ‘Hell’ in the utterance above is a
slang word. Based on the context, the
real meaning of ‘Hell’ has changed into new different meaning. Lexically ‘Hell’
means
the place believed
to be the
home of devils
and where bad
people go after death.
Meanwhile in the context of Paul
movie script above ‘Hell’ means a phrase
indicating agreement or support. The
new meaning of ‘Hell’ is broader than its real meaning.
By looking at the slang words of Paul movie
script above, some people who use
English as a second or foreign language may get confused in comprehending the meaning of the script, since the slang words
have the specific meaning.
Departing
from the argumentation
above, the study
of slang language
in ‘Paul’ movie script is very
interested how are the characters, especially the teenagers play
the role in
acting that reflected
in their communication
by using American slang.
1.2 Problem of the Study The problems
of this study
are the contextual
and lexical meaning
and the less
or more dominant
type of semantic
change of the
slang words used
“Paul” Movie Script.
1. What
is the lexical and contextual meaning of slangs used in ‘Paul’ movie script? 2.
What is the most dominant slang word used in ‘Paul’ movie script? 3. What
is the type of semantic change that
has less or more dominant for the
slang used in ‘Paul’ movie script? 1.3 Objective of the Study Based on the
formulation of the problems mentioned above the objective of the study are:
1. To identify the
lexical and contextual
meaning of slang
found in ‘Paul’ movie script.
2. To
identify the most dominant slang word used in ‘Paul’ movie script 3.
To identify the
type of semantic
change of the
slang in ‘Paul’
movie script.
1.4 Scope of the Study According to
Moleong (2001:65), the
scope of the
study is the
most determining step
in the qualitative
research. It is
important to restrict
the problem because it helps the Researcher in analyzing
the data. Therefore, the writer focuses on
slang word found in “PAUL” movie script.
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