AN ANALYSIS OF GRAMMATICAL AND LEXICAL COHESION ON THE EDITORIALS IN THE JAKARTA POST

The purpose of this study is to describe the types of grammatical and lexical cohesive devices in the Editorials of The Jakarta Post official website, entitled “A Return to Tolerance” and “City’s Red Marks”. The writer deliberately has selected the editorials since they were both comprehensible and also were included in Editor’s Choice segment. By concerning on these two aspects, the writer assumed that these editorials consisted of cohesive devices that contribute to the readability of the discourses. This study uses descriptive qualitative research design with content analysis as approach. The objects of this study were two selected editorials, which are “A Return to Tolerance” and “City’s Red Marks” of The Jakarta Post official website. Simple random sampling was applied to select the editorials. The data analysis of this study is formulated as follows: determining The Jakarta Post as the source of data, accessing The Jakarta Post official website, searching the articles published on Editorial’s Choice segment, selecting two articles of editorial to be analyzed, typing the data into word processing program, numbering each paragraph and sentence of the articles, reading the selected articles comprehensively, identifying the cohesive devices used in the articles, and sorting the cohesive devices to be analyzed. This study discovers the following findings. Almost all types of cohesive devices were found in the editorials. (1) The grammatical cohesive devices found in the editorials were reference (personal and demonstrative), and conjunction (adversative and additive). There was no substitution nor ellipsis found in the editorials. Furthermore, (2) the lexical cohesive devices found in the editorials were reiteration (repetition, synonym and superordinate) and collocation. The writer proposes several suggestions to students of English Department, teachers of English Department, and further researchers. Students of English Department should deepen their understanding of the concept of cohesion to underpin their skills in English, especially reading and writing skills. Teachers of English Department should introduce and teach the concept of cohesion in reading and writing courses. Finally, the writer suggests further researchers to use this study as a reference in conducting further study related to cohesion concept