Flouts of the Cooperative Principle Maxims in Sby's
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ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554 Vol. 1, Issue 1, December 2012 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE FLOUTS OF THE COOPERATIVE PRINCIPLE MAXIMS IN SBY’S PRESIDENTIAL INTERVIEWS Fahrus Zaman Fadhly Department of English Education, University of Kuningan, Indonesia E-mail: [email protected] APA Citation: Fadhly, F. Z. (2012). Flouts of the cooperative principle maxims in SBY’s presidential interviews. English Review: Journal of English Education, 1(1), 57-70 Received: 12-10-2011 Accepted: 21-11-2013 Published: 01-12-2012 Abstract: This paper analyzed the presidential interviews of the President of Republic of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudoyono (SBY), based on Grice’s theory of the Cooperative Principles (CP). This study employed a qualitative research design and the data were three transcripts of interview discourse between SBY and eight Indonesian journalists obtained through the presidential official website: http://www.presidentsby.info. The research investigated the ways of SBY in flouting the CP maxims in his presidential interviews and the functions of the flouts were. The research revealed that SBY flouted all the CP maxims and the maxim of Quantity was frequently flouted. Meanwhile, there were four ways used by SBY in flouting the CP maxims, i.e. hedging, indirectness, open answer and detailed element. The function of the flouts, i.e. face saving acts (FSA), self-protection, awareness, politeness, interestingness, control of information, elaboration and ignorance. This research also revealed that CP maxims of Grice are not universal. Keywords: flouts, maxim, cooperative principles, SBY, presidential interview INTRODUCTION Keenan, 1976; Levinson, 1983; Sperber A speaker does not always explicitly say and Wilson, 1986; Schiffrin, 1994; Brown what she or he means much more than and Yule, 1996; Van Dijk, 1998; Saifullah, his or her utterance actually utters 2002; Mooney, 2004), and (3) politeness (Thomas, 1995). In another case, a (Goffman , 1967 in Haverkate 1988; speaker may also provide information Lakoff, 1973; Brown and Levinson, 1978; that intentionally confuses or misleads Leech, 1983; Matsumuto, 1988; Kitao, the hearer (Keenan, 1976). Therefore, for 1989; Mao, 1994; Holmes, 1995; the sake of a successful communication, Wilamová, 2005; and Zhang and You, both speaker and hearer should 2009). mutually cooperate with each other. It was Grice, an English language Since, without cooperation, interaction philosopher, who firstly introduced the would be counterproductive. term ‘conversational implicature’ in a In pragmatics study, there are at series of lectures at Harvard University least three big themes that are largely in 1967. In Grice’s paper (1975) entitled discussed, i.e. (1) speech act (Austin, ‘Logic and Conversation’, Grice promotes 1962; Searl, 1970; Searl, Keifer and the CP which then republished by Davis Bierwisch, 1980; Blum-Kulka and (1991), and Jaworski and Coupland Oldstain, 1984; and Kasper, 1989), (2) (1999). Further, in order to elaborate his conversational implicature (Grice, 1975; theory, Grice wrote an article entitled FAHRUS ZAMAN FADHLY Flouts Of The Cooperative Principle Maxims In Sby’s Presidential Interviews Further Notes on Logic and Conversation in Sperber and Wilson (1986) Syntax and Semantics edited by Cole suggested that maxims of CP become (1978). only one: maxim of Relation. They drew The study of cooperative attention to the central importance of principles (here after called CP) is sub- relevance decisions in reasoning and theory of conversational implicature. communication. They proposed an The CP rules the members of account of the process of inferring communication in order that the relevant information from any given conversation will be coherent. In utterance. To do this work, they used realizing the CP, Grice (1975) suggests what they called the "Principle of that contribution to talk should be Relevance": namely, the position that guided by four maxims as subordinate any utterance addressed to someone rules or sub-principles of CP, i.e. the automatically conveys the presumption maxim of Quantity, the maxim of of its own optimal relevance. Quality, the maxim of Relation and the Levinson (1983) explored his maxim of Manner as follows (further disagreement on the maxim of relation. explanation will be elaborated in In his view, the maxim of relation raises Chapter II). over-implicature what are uttered by the Since its emergence, CP has speaker. Gricean maxims are also attracted a lot of linguists’ attention and criticized as the barriers in using critiques and until now it still invites language. Meanwhile, Leech (1983) says controversy in accordance with its that no principle can be absolutely universality, practicality, and applied. He even says that the maxims contradiction within the principles as may also be contrary one another. pointed out by Keenan (1976), Levinson According to Leech, there is a politeness (1983), Sperber and Wilson (1986), principle with conversational maxims Schiffrin (1994), Brown and Yule (1996), similar to those formulated by Grice. He and Van Dijk (1998). lists six maxims: tact, generosity, According to Keenan (1976, p. 23), approbation, modesty, agreement, and CP is not universal by claiming that: sympathy. The first and second form a pair, as do the third and the fourth. The Malagasy, for example, follow a These maxims vary from culture to completely opposite Cooperative culture: what may be considered polite Principle in order to achieve in one culture may be strange or conversational cooperation. In their downright rude in another. Meanwhile, culture, speakers are reluctant to share Schiffrin (1994), Brown and Yule (1996) information and flout the maxim of and Van Dijk (1998) attempt to critically quantity by evading direct questions develop the Grice’s theory in Discourse and replying on incomplete answers Analysis. because of the risk of losing face by According to Schiffrin (1994), committing oneself to the truth of the activity of discourse analysis can information, as well as the fact that methodologically be done through having information is a form of pragmatic approach especially by using prestige. CP of Grice. Yule (1996) develops CP by correlating the presence of hedging and indirectness in an utterance. Yule (1996) ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554 Vol. 1, Issue 1, December 2012 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE points out that the use of hedging and for the sake of the truth. Having done indirect speech tend to flout CP maxims. these things, there will be no more lies Hedging is frequently used as sign of between us.) awareness, while indirectness is From the above statement, SBY frequently used to show positive declared during the third year of the his politeness. Meanwhile van Dijk (1998) government (first period), he flouted the develops Critical Discourse Analysis maxim of manner as indicated by words, (CDA) in text of news. According to him, “…therefore next I will use clear in CDA, a discourse is also analyzed as a language” and “I think it’s the time to representation of social practice which is work in a more concrete way and use correlated to situation, institution and clear language”. Maxim of manner social structure. Therefore, van Dijk suggests that speakers have to try (1998) identifies five characteristics that presenting meaning clearly, concisely have to be considered in CDA, i.e. act, orderly, and avoid ambiguity and context, history, power and ideology. obscurity of expression (Grice, 1975). Despite the criticisms, a lot of Based on the brief overview research focuses on the CP maxims. The above, I was encouraged to explore the study of CP maxims generally concerns phenomenon of the SBY’s language the flouts of utterance. This present regarding social and political issues in study explored the flouts of CP made by the moments of presidential interviews the President of Indonesia, Susilo whether or not he would consistently Bambang Yudoyono (SBY) in his observe CP maxims. The present study presidential interviews. The use of was purposely designed to identify the SBY’s language was interesting to be ways of SBY in flouting the maxims of investigated when delivering his ideas, CP in his presidential interviews and opinion or even objection related to figure out the functions of flouts of CP social and political issues. To public, for applied by SBY in his presidential example, SBY (Antara, Dec 26, 2006) interviews. declared that: As mentioned above, this present Pemerintahan yang saya pimpin telah study focused on the flouts of CP which memasuki tahun ketiga, karena itu ke includes realization and function of the depan saya akan lebih menggunakan flouts. It also focused only on one person, bahasa terang. i.e. SBY and one area of topic of (The government I lead has been interview, i.e. related to public interest. entering the third year, therefore next It also focused on three transcripts of I will use ‘clear language’). SBY’s presidential interviews chosen as On the day after that, to Kompas the samples. Such a consideration was (Dec 27, 2006) he proposed: taken, since those interviews are still one Bekerja lebih konkret dan menggunakan area of topic in various situations both bahasa terang, saya kira sudah formal and informal. The topics of saatnya. ...kurang katakanlah kurang, baik interview were extremely controversial katakanlah baik, tidak baik katakanlah related to the public’s interest at that tidak baik. Dengan demikian tidak ada time, i.e. (1) The SBY’s objection on DKP dusta di antara kita. and foreign fund issues, (2) the Lapindo (I think it’s the time to work in a more mudflow disaster, and (3) the 100 days concrete way and use ‘clear of SBY’s government and Century Bank language’. ...bad or good will be said FAHRUS ZAMAN FADHLY Flouts Of The Cooperative Principle Maxims In Sby’s Presidential Interviews scandal. Those topics had also became present study was identified through the national media’s headlines and qualitative procedures i.e.