CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the study Language is primary tool for communicating. Every language has several entities that may not be owned by the other languages, on the other word, language is special and unique. The uniqueness of the language is strongly influenced by the culture of native speaker. Therefore, the language varies cross-culturally. Language also become a tool for social interaction whereas every interlocutor has their own style that can be heard when doing conversation. Moreover, the manner of conversation that is done by people is an important thing that should be more considered. According to Yule (1996), people who involved in interaction indirectly make the norms and principles that arise in the community as their politeness standards (Yule, 1996). Language often expresses the speaker's identity, as well as regional languages in Indonesia such Betawinese, Javanese, Sundanese etc. According to research that was conducted by The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) found more than a hundred of regional languages in Indonesia have been extinct. One of regional languages that still exist today is Betawi language, which is almost as old as the name of the area where the language is developed, Jakarta. Formed since the 17th century, Jakarta has various ethnicities, races, and social backgrounds, and the original community uses Betawi language as their language of daily life . Betawi language is derived from Malay, and so many Sumatra or Malay Malaysian terms are used in Betawi. One example is the word "Niari" which means today or “hari ini” in Indonesian. Although there are similarities with the Malay Malaysian, but this language has been mixed with foreign languages, such as Dutch, Portuguese, Arabic, Chinese, Bugis, Sumatera and many other languages (Muhadjir, 2000). Homogeneous societies are formed naturally called Betawinese. The name Betawi itself was given from the Dutch in colonial era and became popular as ethnic Betawinese in 1918 by Mohammad Husni Tamrin when establishing associations "Kaum Betawi”. Furthermore, the history of Betawinese, Betawi ethnic is divided into two parts according 1 2 to the outline region Betawi culture; Mid Betawi (Betawi tengah) and Suburb Betawi (Betawi Pinggiran). Pluralism that exists in the society of Betawi is giving big impact on the language use. The typical of the Betawi language is changing the suffix /a/ to /e/. e.g the words 'siape', 'dimane', 'ade ape', 'kenape' (kebudayaanindonesia.net). Although, Betawi language is derived from Malay, it is different from what happens in the Malay language, where /e/ in the Malay language has an accent that is not as sharp as in the Betawi language. Suffix /e/ in Betawi is /e/ with sharp accents such as /e/ in the word 'net'. The emphasis of suffix /e/ of the Betawi language make the language heard louder or sharper. People outside the Betawi ethnic and rarely hear Betawi people's conversation, usually will directly assume that the Betawi language is rude. The paradigm in society is corroborated by the Betawi language which is say 'you' and ‘I’ with 'lu and 'gua'. A little difference in saying a few words between Mid Betawi and Suburbs Betawi. For example, if Mid Betawi says 'muatannya' to 'muatannye' (changing the suffix /a/ to /e/), in the Suburb Betawi (Betawi Ora) the word 'muatannya' is usually referred to 'muatanah'. Betawi Ora is still using suffix /a/ and adds the letter 'h' in the end. In this example of conversation of Betawinese when a son asks for money to his father in front of the son’s friends. Son : “Pak, bagi duit?” “ Dad, give me some money?” Father : “Minta duit aja kerjaan lu tiap hari” “You always asking for money everyday” In that case, the father answered the request of his son with a rather rude tone or doing Face Threatening Act (FTA). Brown and Levinson (1987) say, FTA is the situation when the hearer feels uncomfortable from being threatened by the speaker, although everyone expects their public self-image to be respected or called Face Wants (Yule, 1998). In addition, the body language of the speaker also contributes to give the 3 impression that Betawi language is rough or impolite. Whereas, any language that is used in a conversation should use appropriate languages to express politeness, even it is colloquially. The one who did research about Betawi language is Filia (2012). In her study entitled “Alih Bicara dalam Percakapan Bahasa Indonesia Dialek Betawi”, she found phonological variant of particle Indonesian phatic like yak, ye, si . Rising intonation at the end of the speech tends to be used. Moreover, turn talk given is identified with high intonation. The tendency to use high intonation is not interpreted as a lower level of politeness. She adds, according to the informants there is a misperception that the high tone is an annoyance or anger. Another study about Betawi language is from Prima Gustiyanti (2011) which entitled ”Interferensi Bahasa Betawi dalam Pemakaian Bahasa Indonesia di dalam Surat Kabar Pos Kota ”. In her study, she found that the interference in the Betawi language usage in the Indonesian newspaper Pos Kota occurs at the level of morphological, syntactical and lexical. Moreover, the forms of words in the morphology are ngabur, nyontek, ngafalin, ngurusin . The examples of Betawi language interference at the level of syntax are deh, dong, kok, sih , and at the level of lexical form of vocabulary are bakal, bilang, betah, ogah, gede, lantas . The two previous studies were conducted toward the use of language that reveal Betawi language in Indonesian and use direct conversation and a newspaper as the medium of studies. This research differs from the previous studies, in which it focuses on the usage of strategies of politeness by Betawi family. It is interesting to know how the family members apply politeness in the family. 1.2 Problem Formulation This research is about the application of politeness strategy in Betawinese family and the problems are formulated as follows: 1. What kinds of politeness strategies are used by the family members in their daily conversation? 4 2. Why do the family members use these strategies in the daily conversation? 1.3 Scope and Limitation The scope of this research is Betawinese family from Suburb Betawi which consist of two parents and 4 children (3 daughters and 1 son). This study is limited in daily conversation by the 6 family members. In addition, the analysis focuses on politeness strategies in Betawinese family. 1.4 Goal(s) and Function(s) This research has several objective goals which are: 1. To find out the politeness strategies (Brown & Levinson, 1987) that are used by the family member in their daily conversation. 2. To find out why these strategies of politeness are used in by the family members. This study can be a reflection to the family members to know the extent to which they have applied politeness in everyday conversation. Furthermore, this study also can be a reference for the reader to implement politeness in every conversation to either the older age or even the younger age. .