ALPHABET http://alphabet.ub.ac.id/index.php/alphabet Email alert: click here Subscriptions: click here Reprints: click here Terms of use: click here Apology Strategies Used by Chad Griffin Addressed to The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Danar Bawana Rama, Sri Endah Tabiati and Indah Winarni Alphabet / Volume 01 / Number 02 / Oktober-November 2018, pp. 88-94 doi: 10.21776/ub.alphabet.2018.01.02.01, Published online: November 2018 Link to this article: click here How to cite this article : Rama, D.B.., Tabiati, S. E., & Winarni, I. (2018). Apology Strategies Used by Chad Griffin Addressed to The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community. Alphabet, 01(02), 88-94. doi: 10.21776/ub.alphabet.2018. 01.02.01 Request Permissions: click here Apology Strategies Used by Chad ©2018, by Study Program of English, Faculty of Griffin Addressed to The Lesbian, Cultural Studies, Universitas Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Brawijaya ISSN: 2615-630x (print) Community 2615-6296 (online) Vol. 01, No. 02 Danar Bawana Rama 1 Sri Endah Tabiati 2 Indah Winarni 3 Abstract Apology Strategies is a study of speech act investigating how people use language as a mean to repair certain condition between speaker and hearer. There are many ways for people to deliver an apology. We often experience and hear a speaker apologizes without saying the word “sorry” or “apologize”. This article dis- cusses Chad Griffin’s apology as the HRC (Human Right Campaign) leader to the LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender) Community. The result of this research shows that there are twenty-one apology utterances delivered by Chad Griffin. From those utterances there are ten utterances are identified as belong to the category of Indirect Apology strategy, thirteen utterances belong to the category of Remedial Sup- port, three utterances belong to Direct Apology Strategy and only one utterance is as Evasive Strategy. Keywords: apology strategies, LGBT, HRC (Human Right Campaign). Apology strategies are only a part of linguis- to Bergman and Kasper (1993), an apology is tics aspects that is called speech act. Language defined as compensation because an offense learners are not familiar with apology strategies done by a speaker is inflicting a kind of damage because it is rarely discussed in class while learn- and it is costly for the hearer. It is in line with ing speech act. Austin (1962) has stated that a the opinion of Bataineh & Bataineh (2006) that speech act is doing an action by using words. A apology strategies are the methods used by indi- successful speech act is when the three aspects viduals to perform the speech act of apology of it are complete. In line with the previous such as a statement of remorse and reparation. statement, Yule (1996) highlighted that there are There are many studies on apology having been three related acts of an action which is done or done nowadays since apology is a common ex- performed by producing utterances. Those are pression of everyday life. Conducting a study on namely, locutionary act, illocutionary act, and apology means dealing with something natural perlocutionary act. that is found on a daily basis by using language. Additionally, Searle (1976) has proposed According to Olshtain and Cohen (1983), when five-way classifications of illocutionary as gen- social norms are violated, normally an apology eral functions of speech acts. Those are direc- should follow to reestablish the social relation- tives, representatives, expressives, commisives, ship between the doer and the complainer. and declaratives. In this article, we focus on the In another source, Goffman (1971) views expressive classification because the apology is apologies as remedial interchanges serving to re- included as an expressive speech act. According establish social harmony after a real or virtual 1 Faculty of Cultural Studies, Universitas Brawijaya. Jalan Veteran, Malang Indonesia. E-mail: danarrama26@ gmail.com. 2 Faculty of Cultural Studies, Universitas Brawijaya. Jalan Veteran, Malang Indonesia. E-mail: [email protected]. 3 Faculty of Cultural Studies, Universitas Brawijaya. Jalan Veteran, Malang Indonesia. E-mail: [email protected]. Rama, Apology Strategies Used by Chad Griffin 89 offence. Furthermore, Blum Kulka, House and apologies used by men and women. She argued Kasper (1989) stated that concerning the notion people often assume that the utterances used by of face, apologizing is threatening the speaker's women are different from those used by men, positive face because the speaker admits that especially concerning politeness. Women are of- she/he has offended the hearer's face. There are ten considered more polite than men because of various ways for people to deliver an apology their social roles. In many communities, women expression, so-called as apology strategies are regarded as the ones who are responsible for (Trosborg, 1995). He continued that there are transmitting politeness and cultural value. Fitri- five strategies in apology strategies, namely: opt- ani was interested in knowing the facts about ing out, evasive strategies, indirect strategies, direct strat- the differences of utterances used by women egies, and remedial support. Their categories and men. The result of her study was quite sur- support those five strategies, and its sub- prising because most of the female chose not to categories support each category. This study apologize when they made mistakes, while male used Trosborg’s theory to analyse the apology respondents chose to apologize when they utterances delivered by Chad Griffin. made mistakes explicitly. It leads to the social In this study, we investigate the apology thought and social label that says, “women are strategies used by Chad Griffin at his 2014 more polite than men”, is not characteristically Southern Comfort Conference speech. Chad so in her study. Griffin is a political strategist who starts his car- The present study aims to investigate the rier in the press office of President Bill Clinton’s apology strategies used by a certain person to White House at the age of 19, becoming the find out the meaning and the purpose of the youngest West Wing staffer ever. Chad Griffin apology and also to figure out why there are was born on July 16, 1973, Hope, Arkansas many people dislike the apology but still accept (Lockwood, 2017). Griffin is the current presi- it. At the end of Griffin’s speech, it seems that dent of HRC (The Human Rights Campaign), LGBT and transgender community accepted which is America's largest civil rights his apology as can be seen from the video organization working to achieve lesbian, gay, bi- posted on YouTube. At the end of the video, it sexual, transgender and queer equality. HRC can be seen that people who attended the con- also represents more than 1.5 million members ference clapped their hands and many of them and supporters across the United States. As the shed tears as they seemed to accept Griffin’s largest national lesbian, gay, bisexual, apology. However, after the speech, many peo- transgender and queer civil rights organization, ple expressed their dislikes toward the speech. it envisions a world where LGBTQ people are One of those who disliked the apology was Bar- ensured of their basic equal rights, and can be ney Frank or Barnett Frank by the real name open, honest and safe at home, at work and in (Busey, 2014). the community (Human Rights Campaign, n.d.). Its mission is to improve the lives of METHOD LGBTQ people worldwide by advocating for In conducting the research, we used a speech equal rights and benefits in the workplace, en- as the data source while the data were all utter- suring families are treated equally under the law, ances, which were considered as apology utter- and increasing public support around the globe. ances by the speaker in his speech. The speech In this research, we investigate Griffin’s 2014 was about the inequality of transgender people, apology addressed to the LGBT people. He and also about LGBT. The speaker is the presi- apologized for his failure to represent and serve dent of HRC who stands for (Human Right the LGBT people over the years and because Campaign). We obtained the speech from many issues are surrounding the equality for YouTube, which means that the speech is in the LGBT people (Merevick, 2014). form of video. The phenomenon of LGBT has A previous study on apology strategies done been the trending topic all over the world for by Fitriani in 2012 examined the differences of the past several years. 90 , Vol. 01, No. 02, Okt - Nov 2018: 88-135 In this research, Chad Griffin’s speech was happening before that night.” (minimiz- used as the source of the data. In our opinion, ing the degree of offence) speech is more natural since it is a monologue and developed by him. Unlike another script, Description such as dialogue made by a certain person to be The utterances that highlighted in the bold used by another person and it has a different sentence was the first apology strategy utter- purpose. Also, this speech was chosen because ances by Chad Griffin in his speech. Before say- we found several apology utterances, which ing those utterances, he explained about his sit- were involved from the beginning up to the end uation regarding the certain transgender confer- of the speech that can be analyzed using Tros- ence. He was not there at the conference at that borg’s theory of apology strategies (1995). We time. The conference was held after some applied several steps to analyze the data. Firstly, transgender women were murdered in Ohio in we classified the data into five strategies of apol- 2013. As the president of HRC, he should have ogy based on Trosborg’s theory.