CONVERSATIONAL ANALYSIS OF LANGUAGE USED BY GENDERS IN WILL SMITH’S ‘HITCH’ MOVIE

CONVERSATIONAL ANALYSIS OF LANGUAGE USED BY GENDERS IN WILL SMITH’S ‘HITCH’ MOVIE Berdhan Elbytra S-1 English Literature, Languages and Arts Faculty, Surabaya State University, berdhanelbytra@gmail.com   Abstrak Pada dasarnya, bahasa digunakan untuk berkomunikasi dengan orang lain. Selama orang lain memahami makna dan memberikan tanggapan, percakapan sudah dimulai, tetapi banyak orang tidak tahu bagaimana untuk membuka dan menutup percakapan terutama ketika mereka mendekati lawan jenis dengan tujuan untuk memikat mereka. Beberapa mengatakan bahwa mereka takut ditolak dan beberapa mengatakan bahwa mereka tidak yakin bahwa mereka mampu melakukannya bahkan itu hanya berbasa-basi. Fakta ini berlaku untuk setiap manusia di seluruh dunia. Banyak orang berhasil dan banyak orang tidak. Film HITCH memberikan beberapa contoh kegagalan dan kesuksesan dalam mendekati wanita. Penulis disini melihat dari pemahaman bahasa untuk mendekati lawan jenis. Oleh karena itu penulis mengklasifikasikan perbedaan karakter bahasa. Interaksi sosial adalah cara primordial melalui mana usaha dari dunia sosial ditransaksikan, identitas peserta ditegaskan atau ditolak, dan budaya yang ditransmisikan, diperbaharui dan dimodifikasi. (Goodwin dan Heritage, 1990: 283) Dengan meningkatnya gerakan feminis dalam masyarakat Barat pada tahun 60-an dan 70-an dari abad kedua puluh, kenaikan dalam sosiolinguistik dan psikolinguistik seputar hubungan antara bahasa dan jender muncul. Banyak kemajuan berharga dari karya linguistik yang diterbitkan dari para ahli bahasa mengenai ide-ide yang berbeda tentang topik ini. Pembahasan mengenai Gender dan Bahasa ini bermula setelah adanya publikasi buku dari Robin Lakoff “Language and Women’s Place”, dan Deborah Tannen “Gender and Discoure”. Banyak terima kasih terutang kepada Lakoff dan Tannen, yang berhasil menarik perhatian pengamat dalam linguistik, dan telah memimpin kemajuan penelitian di bidang ini menyangkut bahasa dan gender. Karya ilmiah ini mencoba membahas perbedaan bahasa antara laki-laki dan perempuan dalam percakapan di film HITCH, dan percakapan dianalisis dengan teori-teori dalam penelitian ini, misalnya: Karakter Bahasa> Gaya Bahasa> Agresivitas Verbal, Gangguan, dan Pergantian Topik. Hasil analisis data menunjukkan perbedaan karakter Bahasa antara pria dan wanita dalam film HITCH.Penulis mencoba memberikan analisis yang jelas tentang perbedaan percakapan antara laki-laki dan perempuan. Disamping itu, penulis berharap dapat memberikan beberapa pencerahan kepada pembaca tentang perbedaan bahasa disetiap gender demi meningkatkan kompetensi komunikatif mereka dalam berbahasa. Kata Kunci: AnalisisPercakapan (CA), Bahasa dan Gender, Gender danJenisKelamin, Film, Hitch.   Abstract Basically, the language used to communicate with others. As far as others understand the meaning and give a response, the conversation is already begun; but many people do not know how to open and close a conversation especially when they are approaching opposite sex in order to attract them. Some says that they are afraid of being rejected and some says that they are not sure that they are able to do it even it is just a small talk. This fact applies to every human all around the world. Many people made it and many people do not. The HITCH movie gives some of these examples of the failure and the successful approach to women. The writer here sees from the language understanding in order to approach opposite gender. Therefore the writer classifies the language character differentiation. Social interaction is the primordial means through which the business of the social world is transacted, the identities of its participants are affirmed or denied, and its cultures are transmitted, renewed and modified. (Goodwin and Heritage, 1990: 283) With the rising of feminist movements in Western societies in the 60’s and 70’s of the twentieth century, an upsurge in sociolinguistics and psycholinguistics surrounding the relation between language and gender appeared. Many valuable linguistic works were published and linguists advanced different ideas on this topic. It is especially so after the publication of Robin Lakoff’s Language and Women’s Place and Deborah Tannen's Gender and Discourse. Many thanks are owed to Lakoff and Tannen, who successfully draws scholars’ attention in linguistic circle, and has led the progress of research in this field concerning language and gender. This study focuses only on the conversations in HITCH movie and the conversations are analyzed by the theories in the study, for example: Language Character > Language Style > Verbal Aggressiveness, Interruption, and Topic Shift. The result of the data analysis reveals the Language character differentiation between men and women in HITCH movie. The author tries to give a clear analysis about the differences between men’s and women’s language. Meanwhile, the author hopes to give some enlightenment to the readers about language and gender differentiation to improve their communicative competence. Keywords: Conversational Analysis (CA), Language and Gender, Gender and Sex, Movie / Film, Hitch.     INTRODUCTION Differences in the ways that men and women use language have long been interesting to be studied. A significant reason is the lack of agreement over the best way to analyze language. In this research, gender differences in language use were examined using standardized categories to analyze a movie called HITCH. Women used more words related to psychological and social processes. Men referred more to object properties and impersonal topics. Although these effects were largely consistent across different contexts, the pattern of variation suggests that gender differences are larger on tasks that place fewer constraints on language use. Looking at the phenomena of men approaching woman are already familiar to us. They are always trying to attract women so that they have a life companion, who sometimes looks like a little pushy. As stated in ‘Male Sex Drive’ (Hollway 1984) or ‘Men Can’t Help Their Sexually Aggressive Behavior’. Masculinity and femininity, as well as individual women and men, and indeed gender relations, can be represented in particular ways in discourse in a whole range of written and spoken texts (Mills 1995). Even sadder, by their power, they sometimes approach a woman just because they want to clear their head, you know, get in, get off, get out, and tell to the other man the tricks, how to, or tutorial of how to get women easily, yes, that is what they say easy. Quarrel, too, often took place between the opposite genders; it all depends on the language used by each gender. Most of the quarrel happens because men do not understand women, more than the vice-versa. These happened because women never tell what is in their mind literally. Men and women are very different, body and soul, so the way they dress and the language used are different too. Since then appeared misunderstanding between them. Language has been used to communicate, and transfer their mind, so understanding the language becomes the most important thing to get to know each other well. By understanding the language differentiation between men and women, this study hopefully helps the reader to understand each other more than ever. So the misunderstanding between men and women can be reduced. Speak is a social activity. As with other social activities, language activities can be achieved if people are involved in it. In the talk, the speaker and the listener are equally aware that there are rules governing the conduct, use of language, and interpretations of the actions and sayings of his interlocutor. Each participant is responsible for the acts of said action and deviations from the rules of language in social interaction (Alan in Wijana, 2004: 28).Inside there is also a language of communication ethics, and the ethics of communication in itself there is moral. Have the same sense of moral decency containing the doctrine of good and bad deeds. Thus, the act is judged as good or bad deeds (Burhanuddin, 2001:102). Ethics can also be defined as the science of behavior or talk about human behavior, which is considered good and what is evil. Meanwhile, in a simple (Poedjowijatna, 1986: 23) said that specific targets of ethics to human actions are deliberate. Thus, it can be concluded that the realization of linguistic awareness from men to women are not contains a lot of ethics. Suparno (1988: 3) explains in his article, that the diversity of languages ​​is not polite to be a common thing to say especially between men. The Sarcasm actually makes intimacy without bulkhead strata, so that those who use the language variety can be enjoyed by happy and proud to be. Language is a means communication in daily life. As its functions language brings people into relationship with their environment. Language is, therefore, socially learned behavior, a skill that is acquired as we grow up in society (Boey, 1975: 3). According to Holmes (1992: 2), “People usually use language to ask for and to express their feeling of indignation, annoyance, happiness, sadness, admiration, respect, and etc.” People can also share information, experiences or stories, state the idea, opinion, and also deliver the message to others. Language has an important role in the process of social interaction. Language is not only used in oral communication but also it is used for communicate such as writing. Language can be delivered trough movement, code, and symbols. Language is not simply a means of communicating information. It can be concluded that a language is used as a means of communication and as medium for expressing feeling. Communication according to Crystal (2008: 89) it refers to the transmission and reception of information (a ‘message’) between a source and a receiver using a signaling system. The signaling system are speaking system, writing system, or signaling system (body language, hand signal). Either what system used, the most crucial thing in a communication is whether other people understand the meaning or not. Conversation is one of the most prevalent uses of human language. All human beings engage in conversational interaction and human society depends on conversation in order to function: “Social interaction is the primordial means through which the business of the social world is transacted, the identities of its participants are affirmed or denied, and its cultures are transmitted, renewed and modified.” (Goodwin and Heritage, 1990: 283) In this modern era, there are many ways people act to entertain others. One of the entertainments available is movie. It makes some producers, authors, or directors, are working together to attract the viewers through the best quality of their movie. In order to attract the viewers, they create interesting theme which makes good movie, and the casts consist of famous and talented actors who appear in front of the camera, and follow the script. All of those criteria will support the film to deliver the idea of the movie. Film is social script that catches the soul of an era zeitgeist of the society. The audience will feel close to the theme that appears, even as the audience looks themselves. Language is a sign system characterized by arbitrary signs, discrete elements and constraining grammar. “Film signs contain of language, on the other hand, are motivated cannot be neatly separated out, and their combinations only the rather particular rules of certain traditions” (Hill and Gibson, 1988: 5). Based on previous researchers, the study about gender and language differentiation is always interesting to be discussed because many students did this kind of research. It is because many researchers want to support for their own developing or established view and to take claims made by linguists in the past (such as Robin Lakoff’s list of differences between men and women’s language use) and apply these two language data from the present – we can no longer verify Lakoff’s claim in relation to men and women in the USA in 1975, but we can see if they are true now of men and women in our own country or locality. Language and gender involves interpreting the use of linguistic resources to accomplish social ends, (Eckert & McConnell-Ginet, 2005: 79). Language differentiation often start quarrel between men and women, to understanding gender and language and character differentiation between men and women can be seen from language style, language use, and topic. Based on the background of the study, the statements of the problems are: Whatarethelanguagecharacterdifferentiationbetweenmenandwomen in HITCHmovie? SeenfromLanguage Style, andLanguage use Howarelanguagedifferentiationbetweenmenandwomen in HITCH movie? Seen from: Topic and Pattern of Speech With the all the data collection, the questions, and answer, the result of this study is significant for some reasons as follows: It is hoped that this study is usefultoenrichourinsightinlinguisticsin orderto understandwhat the language differentiation between men and women are. Moreoverthis studymayhelpthereadersknowhowtousethetheoriestowardsthesituation of placewherethespeechoccurs in order to make a good conversation. The study examines the language differentiation between men and women in HITCH movie. The study intends to apply the Conversational Analysis (CA) as the main theory and the second theory is Gender and Language understanding in analyzing the conversation between men and women. The figure below is a sequence procedure of data analysis taken from Miles &Huberman which drawn into three structures as follows:           Data Collection Data Reduction Data Display Conclusion: Drawing / Verification                     Figure 1.1: Components of data analysis: Interactive model taken from Miles &Huberman (1994: 12) METHOD This study is a descriptive qualitative research because the data is in the form of utterances uttered by the character in the movie. Most of the data were collected by conducting a non–participant observation. In the non–participant observation the researcher is not involved in any situation in the movie making process. He turn on the DVD on, listen, transcribe, and analyzing the conversation in the Hitch movie based on the theory of Deborah Tannen. According to Bogdan and Taylor in Moeleong (2000: 3) Qualitative research is a research procedure that represents the descriptive data such as words in written and oral from the people and the behavior that can be observed. According to Creswell (2012: 214) a non-participant observation is an observation in which the observer visits a site and records notes without becoming involved in the activities of the participants. The subject of the study is the movie called HITCH. This movie tells about New York’s date doctor, Alex Hitchens. Firstly, Alex Hitchens being the professional date doctor, the ways of him teaching good people to act positively towards women in order to attract them is confirmed to be nearly perfect. There is no doubt that his methods works well. He had been teaching the methods for so many times and he is confirmed by his clients to be the best date doctor in New York because all of them has successfully reach their targets, in this situation is women. Secondly, not like any other romantic movie that played by one or two main characters, this movie played by four main characters (Alex, Sara, Albert, and Allegra) with the different point of view. It means that on the other hand, Alex was a tall handsome man and professional, yet Albert was neither handsome nor professional, and both try to generate a relationship with women that are beautiful. By all means, in this movie there are several conversations between men and women that can be analyzed. This was the main reason why this movie was chosen as the research subject in this study. This study has been conducted in the movie HITCH. The character in the movie that the observer chooses to be observed are using the English language and the main conversation occurs is about how to attract women. Since English had been used in many country, the observer choose the characters that are natives from the United States of America because the English from this country have been institutionalised easier to be heard and learned than anywhere else, and this standard variety, until very recently, have its English are used as reference models for the teaching of English throughout the world (Cheshire, 1991: 3) The source of the data is only from the conversations in HITCH movie. The observer then conduct a research from the dialogues between four main characters in the movie. The data was acheived with comparing the study by Deborah Tannen, and the observer classifies it according to its types. In order to clarified the data, the observer would mention the examples of conversation of how to attract women, and the second is some conversations that has been mentioned is analized and compared to Deborah Tannen's studies. The data is acquired through citation. The technique is need in this study is descriptive qualitative research. Data analysis is a method of analyzing written, verbal or visual communication messages (Cole in (Elo&Kyngas, 2007:1–pdf)). Since the data is from the HITCH movie script, it answers these two kinds of questions: 1)       What are the language character differentiations between men and women in HITCH movie? Seen from: a) Language Style and b) Language use. 2)       How are language differentiations between men and women in HITCH movie? That seen from: a) Topic and b) Pattern of Speech. The procedure consist of three current flows activities: data reduction, data display and conclusion drawing/verification. Nevertheless, before going through three below flows the data firstly was processed. The data obtained were processed by transcribing the result of HITCH movie conversations. The source of the data is only in HITCH movie’s conversation transcript that was being analized in form of written language by using the theory of Language and Gender by Deborah Tannen. In transcribing the data, the researcher used the conversation with several modifications and adaptation. Here are some codes and explanations that are no longer being explained in the future:   Code Explanation / // [...] “...” Bold ( B ) Italic( I ) AH AB AC SM CH MD KC NL TR VM Pauses Interruptions/overlap For comments Previousconversation Word(s) tobefocused on Sippet/quotation Alex Hitchens Albert Brennaman AllegraCole Sara Melas Chip Mandy Casey Neil Tom Reda VanceMunson Table 1.1: Codes and explanations   RESULT AND DISCUSSION Men and women were created to live in pairs, but what often happens is quarrel between them due to differences in the character. Men have harsher character than women; it means that men more often disturb and dominate women. But there are men who really do not know how to approach women, so that the ways they used are wrong although for them it was true. Differences in the character of the language also affect the style of language speech. Men are known more often than women cursing because people judge that if the woman does not deserve to curse because when women curse, they are considered less feminine. As discussed in chapter 1 that men grew following his father's behavior and women followed her mother's behavior, then if all is turned upside down so that all considered improper or inappropriate. Since then women sometimes feel uncomfortable when talking with a man who often cursing and men are also uncomfortable when talking to talkative or tacky women. In this section will be discussed further on the language character differentiation. By understanding the differences in language character, this study expected relationships between men and women can be better understanding each other. So every time the conversation between men and women, they are able to understand the character of his interlocutor. And more than that, they can adjust their personal character with their interlocutor. Language character differentiation can be seen from the language style which consists of: a) topic shift, b) verbal aggressiveness, and c) interruption). From language use, it consist of three characters, they are: a) Hedges, b) Tag Question, and c) Empty Adjective. The next following extracts are taken from the HITCH movie script. Language Character Differentiation 2.  3.  4.  5.  5.1    1.1.  Language Style When a speaker takes a turn in conversation, she or he can begin by explicitly acknowledging the contribution of the previous speaker and can then talk on a topic directly connected with what was gone before. It seems that this is a pattern typically adopted by women. Men on the other hand do not feel they have to make a link with the previous speaker’s contribution; on the contrary, men are likely to ignore what was been said before and to concentrate on making their own point. As mentioned before, language style can be seen from topic shift, verbal aggressiveness, and interruption, thus the following extracts shows it all.   1.2.  Topic Shift As stated in the previous theory, the topics shift tend to be sudden in the conversation of all-men, while women usually build each other’s