CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of Study

Language is a communication tool used by people to interact with others.

Language is essential for human survival. By using language, people can communicate their thoughts and feelings to others. The countries in the world have various languages. English is the international language. Although English is the first language in the world, but the each country has the pronunciation and grammar are different, for example, , , .

Singaporean English which has pronunciation and grammar are unique and different from other countries. is a Developed Country. English is the official language, that always used by the Singapore society every day as a conversation in I not Stupid Movie, in which the main characters always use English when speaking at home and office. Natives of Singapore have more than one language, called bilingual. “Singaporeans speak in their first language, such as Chinese (Mandarin),

Malay, Tamil, and English (Chew, 2007, pp.73-93)”.

English used in Singapore is called Singlish. For people who are used to listening to English accent in western movies, they will have difficulty in understanding the conversation in Singlish (Singaporean English) for the first time.

Singlish impressed as simple English, using grammar and spelling which are common in western countries, with a heavy mix of Mandarin and Malay. Singlish is a mix of English with other languages mixed into English (Lim, 2004, pp.117-126).

“Style is a language variation which reflects changes in situational factors such as addressee, settings, task or topic (Holmes, 2000, p.1)”. “According to 1 2

Fairclough (2003, P.162), characteristics of styles are realized in quite a range of linguistic features. First, phonological features: pronunciation, intonation, stress, rhythm. Second, vocabulary and metaphor – one area of vocabulary which varies with identification is intensifying adverbials such as ‘dreadfully’, ‘awfully’,

‘frightfully’, and so forth, as well as swear-words which function in a similar way

(‘bloody’, ‘sodding’, etc.) messages about both social identity (e.g. social class)”.

Language variations caused by social interaction activities undertaken by people or groups are very diverse, and due to the speaker that are not homogeneous.

Lim (2005) studied about Tone in Singlish. She has found that the presence of tone, or the evolution of tone-language prosody, is perfectly possible in a contact variety, if the feature pool of its ecology allows for it. Tone has been noted to be a real feature, occurring in genetically unrelated languages spoken by geographically contiguous speech communities. Because Singlish is always considered to be a variety of English (as opposed to an “English-based creole”), there tends to be resistance in English linguistics circles to the idea that tone exists in Singlish. As the early English speakers in Singapore, the Peranakans, with Baba Malay as their vernacular, may well have been the community of speakers whose influence on

Singlish has been most significant and persistent.

The writer’s research is different from previous one, because I not Stupid

Movie is a Singapore comedy, tell about the life, struggles and adventures of office’s communities and one family in Singapore. The writer is interesting to analyze singlish, discourse particles, style, and language choice used by the main characters when they are talking to family, teachers, and friends as being portrayed in the I not

Stupid Movie. They are not discussed in the previous studies. Singlish sentence structure is actually similar to Indonesian or Mandarin may also, where we can ask 3 questions directly through the sentence, such as: "Do you want it?” which in Singlish

"want or not?”

1.2 Problem Formulation

The problems that the writer would like to discuss in this chapter are :

1. What Singlish discourse particles are used by the characters in the

movie?

2. What factors influence the characters in using Singaporean English

style?

1.3 Scope and Limitation

The scope of this research is Singaporean English discourse particles and social factor styles. The study is limited to speech of the main characters in the I not

Stupid Movie.

1.4 Goal and Function

This research’s goals are:

- To find out Singlish discourse particles are used by the characters in

the movie.

- To find out factors influence the characters in using Singaporean

English Style.

The function of this research for the readers is to get more valuable knowledge on the use of style in I not Stupid Movie. The writer hopes this paper will be useful for readers who are interested in sociolinguistics subject, especially about style.

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1.5 Research Methods

According to (Kumar & Ranjit, 2005 ), the research method is the primary means used to achieve the research objectives and determine the answers to the problems presented. Research method is a very important part in doing the research.

1.5.1 Data Sources

The research is done with browses a reliable website to find a good

movie to be explored. Then from the website, I found the movie, entitled I

not stupid and instantly I watched I not Stupid Movie. After watching the

movie, finally I decided to analyze Singlish and took Singlish’s theme as a

final research paper. Collection of theories be found from books, google

scholar via web, collecting evidence from the media and website, and

take it from the Anggrek’s library or Kijang’s library in Binus

University, and PKBB’s library in Atma Jaya University. According to

(Weller & Romney, 1988), "Data is one of the most important aspects of

research studies and vital". Research conducted in various fields of study

may differ in methodology, but each of these studies is based on data

that are analyzed and interpreted to obtain accurate information. The data

sources of this research are movie in I not Stupid and Conversation by the

main characters.

1.5.2 Data Collection

In this paper, the research has primary data, where the data got

directly from media sources, such a I not stupid Movie (2002) by Jack

Neo. The writer’s reason choose the media of movie, because the movie is 5 very interesting to be analyzed and the story of this movie is a real portrait of daily life family and office’s communities in Singapore.

Initially, I watched I not stupid Movie as many as one time, with the purpose, to know the storyline’s of I not Stupid Movie and can better understand what is Singlish. After that, I not Stupid Movie watched again for the second time, in order to better understand the main character conversation. In compiling the data, I use of techniques such as watching and listening to a conversation by the main characters in the movie is very important, to show the context, style, and language. After listening conversation of the main characters, I am going to write one by one conversation by the main characters when talking to friends, teachers, boss and families in a piece of paper.

1.5.3 Data Analysis

After the data are collected, First, they are grouped based on context, class, and discourse particles. Second, the data are analyzed based on language style and social factors that influence the conversations that used by the main characters. After the data are completely analyzed, the results show the answers of the problems stated in Chapter 1.

1.5.4 Time

The research is going to do for 5 months, from February until

July. In the first month, I am going to determine source of data. In the second month, I am going to collect the data. In the third month, I am going

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to analyze the data. In the fourth month is concluding the result. And the

last month is to make summary in Indonesia.

1.5.5 Place

The research got the materials about Singlish from Kijang’s library

or Anggrek’s library in Binus University, PKBB’s library in Atma Jaya

University and Google scholar via web. The research is going to be done by

the writer of English Department Faculty of Language and Culture in Bina

Nusantara University, Kemanggisan, Jakarta Barat.

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CHART OF RESEARCH METHODS

Start

Browsing a reliable website

Determining Source of Data Watching the movie firstly

Watching the movie secondly

while taking notes

Collecting Data

Collecting conversation by main character in piece of paper

Grouping the conversation into

context, social class, and discourse particles

Analyzing the use of language Analyzing Data style and social factors

Make interpretation from conversation analysis

Concluding the Result Problems in research answered

End