Smart People Ethnology

This research used Qualitative descriptive method. The research characteristic of this method is the description didn’t judge whether the data is right or wrong. It should describe “what exist” in a particular condition in a situation. The data collected was taken from sample of speech act in movie ‘Smart People’. Analyzing the data used the pragmatic approach. It used to relate actors’ and actress’ utterances and their function in the dialogue of movie. The main source of the data was the utterances of the movie ‘Smart People’. Collecting the data used ethnography fieldwork way (or observation). Wolfson (1983) stresses using “ethnography fieldwork” as the only reliable method of data collection about the way speech acts function in interaction. It can be done through taking notes, audio recording or video tapes, etc (cited in Sahragard, 2005:258). In this case, taking the notes toward utterances appeared in the movie is done. In analyzing …show more content…
In this aspect, I found: offering, promising and threatening. In this movie, the example of offering can be found, such as ‘So, How about that I offer you, 20 dollars for your trouble?’ This was uttered by Lawrence to The Parking Lot Attendant. He offered accounts of money to The Parking Lot Attendant so that he can take his car. In the example of promising is ‘I am going to be home in a few hours, could you save me a little bit?’. This was uttered by Lawrence to his daughter. In this case, her daughter called and asked him for having dinner together but he could not. Furthermore, he promised that he would be at home in a few hours. The example of threatening is ‘If this gives me brain damage, I will kill you’. This was uttered by Vanessa to her uncle. In this case, her uncle forced Vanessa to smoke a little roll of marijuana. Thus, she threatened him if it could give damage for her