CHILD SPEECH ACT ACQUISITION Sanggam Siahaan Rumondang Miranda Marsaulina

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1 CHILD SPEECH ACT ACQUISITION Sanggam Siahaan Rumondang Miranda Marsaulina ABSTRACT This article is about the acquisition of the speech act of a child, a two and a half year Indonesian baby girls. The problem of the research is what knowledge does child know to communicate her intention to the people around her at her current age? The research is based on the children speech act theory discussed by Clark (2003). The research design is categorized as to a case study. The technique of the data collection is by following the subject through a naturalistic observation to record what she has said to communicate her intentions to the other people around her (Clark and Clark, 1977). The data is analyzed based on the relation between what has been said and the context. The meanings of each utterance is assessed by assuming that the subject has said something to communicate an intention and by drawing them based on the rich context of the utterance. The findings of the research shows that Leoni s knowledge of the speech act, which she uses in her communicative interaction includes drawing attention, showing objects, offering, requesting, marking membership in a society, to be polite, to be persuasive, to negotiate to solve conflict, and to distinguish actual event from play. Key words: acquisition, speech act, intention I. INTRODUCTION Language is a set of rules used by human as the tool of communication. As a set of tool, it is not an inheritance, but it is acquired through a long process of learning involving some stages i.e., crying, babbling, cooing, one word utterance, two word utterance, and more than two word utterance. A qualitative study based on an observation on what and how the children say their intentions in their interaction with the other people around them can reveal the information on what the children learn on their path to use the language as the tool of the social communication. This paper deals with a research on what and how Leoni New Mercy Siahaan, a 2.5-year Indonesian baby-girl, say to communicate her intention to the people around her. The study is to try to find out what she possibly learned about the speech act in nurture to her social communication. This study departs from a critical question if the evidences showing her ability to produce the types of the utterances at her current age is to show that she is learning speech act or not. Accordingly, the problem, which is going to answer in this paper, is what knowledge does Leoni know to communicate her intention to the people around her at her current age? 2.1. Language Acquisition II. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK Language acquisition is the study, which accounts the children language development in a natural setting. It refers to the children s development on the language comprehension and production (Paivio and Beg, 1981: ). This means that Language Acquisition concerns with the children s naturalistic way to produce and interpret language as the tool of their social communication from the beginning up to the last of their development. Accordingly, O grady and Dobrovolsky (1996: ) state that it refers to the phenomenon of the linguistic development with the end result process is actually a grammar i.e., the mental system that allows people to speak and understand a language. They say that the phenomenon undergoes a process of a sequential stages that include babbling from the age of six months up to twelve months, the one-word stage from the age of twelve months up to eighteen months, the two-word stage within a few month after their one-word stage, the telegraphic stage i.e., a longer and more complex grammatical structure after a period of several months during their speech is limited to one- and two-word utterance, Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 1 of 9

2 and the later stage in the years following the telegraphic stage to the acquisition of the complex grammar that underlies the adults linguistic competence. Both Clark and Clark (1977) and Gleason and Ratner (1998: ) similarly agree that language acquisition is a sequential process of children s language acquisition: first, from no-word stage to one-word stage; then, to two-word stage; and next, to the stage of the utterance of five to six words approaching the adult like utterance. So, language Acquisition is a study dealing with the naturalistic process in which children acquire the competence and the ability in interpreting and producing the language as the tool of the social communication The Precursor to Speech The precursor to speech is the stage before the children first words. According to Paivio and Begg (1981) this is the time when children develop their sensory motor ability. At this period, according to Gleason and Ratner (1998: 358), parents in the society anticipate the children s competences by imputing them intention although before the intentions are there. For a certain period of time, this affects what Clark and Clark (1977) say that the children undergo a sequential processes of differed imitation, object permanence, discovery of tool, and symbolic. All these processes occur just before the first word stage The One-Word Utterance The one-word stage is the period when children produce their first utterance. At this period, according to Clark and Clark (1977), children classify objects around them into five types i.e., moveable objects, mover objects, objects as places, objects as recipients, objects as instruments. At their twelve months age, they know fifty words. According to Paivio and Begg (1981), they know words of concrete objects around them, but not of abstract one or words of action, or words of adjective. According to Gleason and Ratner (1998: 359), even at the single-word stage children appear to be using their language to signal a variety of intentions, such as negation, recurrence, non-existence, and notice. This means that they refuse something by saying no or ask for more of something by saying more. According to Barret (1995) children know 200 to 300 words at eighteen months and use them to express their intention in the form of holophrastic expressions in the context of situations (Cf. Clark and Clark, 1977; Gleason and Ratner, 1998; and Paivio and Begg, 1981). So even at this stage children are developing their competence and ability to produce and interpret the speech act, which is not similar to the adult speech act The Two-Word Utterance According to Paivio and Begg (1981: 216) at the age between eighteen months and two years, children begin to produce two-word utterances. It is also called as the pivot grammar. According Braine (1963) the pivot grammar has two words in which are divided into pivot and open classes according to certain criteria. Pivots are a small class of words that occur often such as want ball, want milk, or want shoe, and open class is large but such words occur less often such as ball, milk, and shoe. Pivot words have a fix position and always occur in the first position as with want in want ball, or only in the second position as with on in blanket on and take on, and in combination with open class word. These two-word utterances, according to Brown (1973), are also called as rudimentary two-word sentences. These are words of the one-word stage, which are combined into short utterances. In English this lack of articles, preposition, inflection, or any other grammatical modification, which are well formed in the adult utterances. According to O Grady and Dobrovolsky (1996: ), the two-word utterances are the mini sentences, which illustrate a very early sensitivity to the feature of sentence structure. At this stage, children syntactic categories are noun, verb, and adjective. At this stage, according to Clark and Clark (1977), children are able to differentiate noun cases in relation to a verb in a group of two words. The cases are agent, experiencer, goal, location, and object. At the two-word stages children are able to combine the words of the one-word stage into short sentences containing the pivot and open words with the competence and the ability on the interpretation and production of the nouns according to their cases The Three Word Utterance Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 2 of 9

3 At this stage children learn the word order. They miss function words such as article, preposition and auxiliary. The sentences in they learn to arrange the words resemble the word order used in telegrams. Accordingly, O grady and Dobrovolsky (1996:446) label them as in the telegraphic stage. They note some representative utterances from the first part of this period as follows: Chair broken Daddy like book. What her name? Man ride bus today. Car make noise. Me wanna show Mommy. I good boy. The evidence shows appropriate word order. Further, it is said that from the age of two on, children s language development id rapid and they move relatively two- and three-word stage to a broad range of syntactically intricate sentence types in the space of just a few months. The followings are sample utterances from a child s speech over a 12-month period: Age Sample Utterances 28 months Play checkers. Big drum. I got horn A bunny-rabbit walk. 30 months Write a piece a paper. What that egg ding? I lost a shoe. No, I don t want to sit seat. 32 months Let me get down with the boots on. Don t be afraid a horses. How tiger be so healthy and fly like kite. Joshua through like penguin. 34 months Look at that train Urusula brought. I simply don t want put in chair. Don t have paper. Do you want little bit, Cromer? I can t wear it tomorrow. 36 months I going come in fourteen minutes. I going wear that to wedding. I see what happens. I have to save them now. Those are not strong mens. They are going sleep in wintertime. You dress me up like a baby elephant. 38 months So it can t be cleaned? I broke my racing car. Do you know the light went off? What happened to the bridge? Can I put my head in the mailbox so the mailman can know where I are and put me in the mailbox? Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 3 of 9

4 2.6. Later Stage Children at this stage learn the complex grammar. According to Clark and Clark (1977), children arrange long utterances of 5 to 6 or more than 6 words. At his stage, they learn the rules of the adult language. According to Pavio and Begg (1981: 215) from three to five years, children produce sentences of all types in which any of them are incomplete in terms of adult grammars and some sentences are not under stable. Further, they say that children increase the length and complexity of their sentences from five years to maturity, and they continue to grow their vocabulary to old age. According to Gleason and Ratner (1993: ), children during the later elementary school years are able to paraphrase which allows them to write reports without copying from a book. This means that they must have a fairly developed lexicon and syntactic abilities to restate sentences in different ways The Speech Act Acquisition The study on the children s Speech Act acquisition deals with their ability in the production of language in maintaining contact with people and getting others to do thing for them. According to Gleason and Ratner (1998: ) maintaining contact with the other people and getting others to do things for them are the children s early social intentions, which are described by researchers as the pragmatic aspects of language. According to Bates (1976) and Halliday (1975) the social intention that children put into their language as since the one-word stage include drawing attention to the self, for instance hi; showing objects, for instance see and ball; offering, for instance the child says, there to offer an adult a toy; and requesting objects activities, for instance more. Those examples show that children engage communicative acts into their sentences in our society. In maintaining contact with the other people, as children grow physically and mentally, they get more skill in using language because they also learn how to do thing with language. According to Clark (2003: 321) children learn to use any form of language for many functions or a specific function can be conveyed by many forms, and they learn using the forms to mark their membership in the society, to be polite, how to be persuasive, to negotiate to resolve conflict, to distinguish actual event from play. Children, as Clark (2003) also says, learn that specific forms can be used for specific functions depending on the speaker, addressee, setting, and preceding conversation. This means that in a certain context of situation, children learn how to use a certain form of language for communicative functions such as: 1. to draw attention; 2. to show objects; 3. to offer; 4. to request; 5. to mark membership in a society; 6. to be polite; 7. to be persuasive; 8. to negotiate to solve conflict; and 9. to distinguish actual event from play. Children learn speech act to express their intention, which is termed as the functions of the language forms they use. According to Clark and Clark (1977) children speech acts can be divided into two, they are the direct speech act and the indirect speech act. The type of direct speech act that children use is the same with the form of the language they use. This means that the possible literal meaning of the one- or two-, or three-, or more that three-word utterance is the same with their intention. The second type is the indirect speech act. It is the type, which they use is different from the form of the language they use. This means that the possible literal meaning of the one- or two-, or three-, or more that three-word utterance is different from their intention. As a comparative to the adults language, according to Austin s theory (1962), speech act is doing a certain action by just saying a certain word provided the felicity condition is fulfilled. The felicity condition is the external condition of the language. It is the aspects of the context of the situation. So by using a word or a group of words having a literal meaning in an appropriate felicity condition, the adult can do the action such as making statement, interrogation, request, promise, etc. Children can produce a similar speech act by learning it from the adult language. The matter in which their language forms are not well grammatically constructed is their relative approximation to the adult language through their development. III. THE RESEARCH METHOD This research is a single cases study. The purpose is to give a description on the types of the speech act acquisitions of an individual Indonesian child-girl of 2.5 years old. It is also to give an explanation on how Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 4 of 9

5 the child produces each type of those speech acts. The research data is taken from a Batak Toba Child whose name is Leoni New Mercy (2.5. years old) of a family consisting the father (44 years old), mother (42 years old), the eldest son (17 years old), the second eldest daughter (15 years old), the middle son (9 years old), the second youngest son (6 year old), the youngest daughter i.e., Leoni New Mercy herself (2.5. years old). The other member of the family is the grand mother (70 years old). The family is bilingual. They speak Indonesian and the Batak Toba language proportionally. The technique of the data collection, as according to Clark and Clark (1977: 299), is conducted by following the subject through a naturalistic observation to record what she is using to communicate her intentions to the other people around her and to take notes about the relation between what she is saying said and the context. The data analysis is based on the rich context of the utterance and the meaning of each utterance said by the subject in the context is drawn based on the assumption, as according to Clark and Clark, 1977: 299), to communicate intention which is classified by the children speech act theory established by Clark (2003: 321) Drawing Attention IV. DATA ANALYSIS Leoni draws attention by calling (saying) the family member s (any of the children) name more than one time and holding their hand. She also does that by holding or pointing the object of her interest. She draws the other people s attention by the verbal action that is accompanied by a non-verbal action. Leoni: Neng... icing Neng...Neng... (holding Fine s right hand and pointing at a cat) Itu ucing. Fine: Ya...Ya... Ya... Hush Showing Objects Leoni shows an object to a person by calling the person (Mama to the mummy or Papa to the daddy, or Bang to an older boy, or Kak to an older girl, or the name of a child) as she points at the object. Leoni: Pom! Bom bom (showing Dippos a candy at her right hand) Dippos: Ee... bon-bon adek. Hore adek punya bon-bon. Minta abang Ni... Leoni: Nggak mau Offering Leoni makes an offer by saying a verb followed by addressing or saying the name of a person ((Mama to the mummy or Papa to the daddy, or Bang to an older boy, or Kak to an older girl, or the name of a child). Then she continues doing a verbal action such as giving the person she is calling the thing she is offering. Leoni :Tambu pa! (taking some rice with a spoon and putting it on the fathers plate) Ya...! Ya...! Ya...! Tambu, ya! Papa : Terima kasih, ya! Leoni : Ya! Requesting Leoni makes a request by saying a verb followed by addressing or saying the name of a person ((Mama to the mummy or Papa to the daddy, or Bang to an older boy, or Kak to an older girl, or the name of a child). The she sometimes continues crying to strengthen the request. Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 5 of 9

6 Leoni: Makan Ka!... Makan Ka! Makan Ka...(Crying as calling the name of her elder sister) Fine : Apa? Papa : Fine!, Kasih makan Adek! Leoni: Makan aku Neng! Fine : Ayo makan yo! Note: In some occasion Leoni also makes the request by an open imperative, such as in Makan aku Neng Marking the Membership in a Society Leoni marks the membership of her family by saying the demonstrative article ini or itu before or after saying a common noun in referent with any member of the family with the first singular person possessive article ku like in Mamaku, Bapakku, abangku, kakakku. Leoni: Ini Mamakku! Fine : Mamakku! Leoni: Nggak! Mamakku ini.! Ini mamakku! Fine : Ini Bapakku! Leoni: Bapakku! Bapakku itu! Fine : Nggak! Bapakku ini! Mamakku ini! Leoni: Bapakku ini! Mamakku ini! Fine : Ini Adekku! Leoni: Abangku! (Crying) Fine : Ya, Ya, Ya! Abangmu itu! Leoni: Fine, Mak! Mother: Oh...! Kak Fine ini! Abang Oni itu Kak! Fine: Ya, Ya, Ya! To be Polite Leoni signals her politeness to a person by lengthening the vowel of the addressing expression she uses to the person she is speaking to. The strategy is accompanied by a smiling. Leoni: Papaaaa (smiling)...papa ma! Itu papa ma! Father: Anak papa sayang! Mana mama Sayang? Mana mama? Leoni: Itu mama, pa! Masak mama, Pak! (holding the father s hand, then pulling the father to the kitchen and showing the mother cooking in the kitchen) Father/Leoni: Mama! Mama: Oni! Papa sudah pulang ya? Oni: Papa udah pulang ma! To Be Persuasive Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 6 of 9

7 Leoni persuades a person for an agreement to let her have something in a process. She makes the first attempt of her persuasion by saying a Non-Yes No Question. Second, she strengthens her persuasion by saying a Yes-No question for many times. At last, she completes her persuasion by saying a statement. She also persuades a person for an agreement to do something by a Yes-No question. Leoni: (Putting her right hand into the father s pocket. Holding some coins in the pocket) Apa ini pa? (First attempt of the Persuasion) Uang papa? (Strengthening the persuasion) Father: Ya uang papa itu sayang!? Leoni: Uang pa! (Taking out the coins from the pocket to strengthening the for the persuasion the second time) Father: Uang papa itu sayang! Leoni : Uang papa ini? Uang ya?! Ya! Ya pa ya! (Holding the father s chin) Uang Oni Pa ya! (Perpecting the persuasion) Fine: Uang papa itu Oni! Oni : Uangku, uangku ini! Fine: Oni : Ayo kita pigi yo! Kasih uang papa! Uang papa ini Ka? (persuading to do something) (returning the coin into the father s pocket) Uang papa ya! Ya! Fine: Leoni: Ayo...! Dada papa...! Ayo pigi jalan-jalan yo! To Negotiate to Solve Conflict Leoni says a statement to negotiate an option. She uses a direct refusal like ngak mau to solve a conflict. She uses a statement to terminate the conflict. At last she says an exclamatory to say sorry for the conflict. Fine: Pake celana dek, ya! Leoni: Ya! Fine: Yo, pake celana ini yo! Leoni: Itu pake! Itu celana! (Negotiating an option) Fine: Ini, ini celana, yo! Leoni: Nggak mau! (Solving a conflict) Dippos: Pakai ini dia kak! Fine: Ini ya? Celana Oni ini! Cantik ya! Oni: Ya! Ini celanaku (termnating the conflict) Fine: Oh ya! Celana oni ini! Pande oni ya! Oni: Cantik kan Kak! (saying sorry for the conflict) Fine: Ya! Ayo! To Distinguish Actual Event from Play Leoni imitates doing what the other person has done to distinguish a play from an actual event. Mama: Pake baju nak ya! Oni: Nggak mau ah! Mama: Ayolah! Biar pigi kita jalan-jalan. Oni: Nggak mau ah! Mama: Nangis aku ya! (pretending to cry) Lolo: Nangis mama, Oni! Pake dek bajumu! Ayo! Biar jangan nangis Mama! Ayo pake! Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 7 of 9

8 Oni: Mak, mak, mak! Mama: Pakek baju dek, ya! Ayo! Ini nah! Oni: mama, mama! (imitating by pretending to cry) Johannes: Tape, tape! (putting a book on his head and walking around in the sitting room) Leoni: Apa bang! Apa itu! Dippos: Annes jual tape dek! Abang jual lapet ya! (also walking around) Lapet, lapet. Lapet-lapet! Leoni: (going taking some cloth, then coming with the cloth on the head) Ma, lapet, lapet (Imitating) Ini pa, lapet, lapet! Papa: Beli lapet lah oni! Oni: (laughing again and again) Lapet, lapet, lapet, lapet! (Continuing the imitation) Papa: udah ito udah! Ayo kita ke kota yo! The kids: Hore! FINDINGS The findings on the knowledge of Leoni to communicate her intention to the people around her at her current age based on the data analysis are as follows: 1. Drawing attention by calling the family member or saying their name as holding their hand and pointing at the object of her interest. 2. Showing an object to a person by calling the person as pointing at the object. 3. Offering something by addressing or saying the name of a person and doing a verbal action such as giving the person the thing she is offering. 4. Making a request by saying a verb followed by addressing or saying the name of a person ((Mama to the mummy or Papa to the daddy, or Bang to an older boy, or Kak to an older girl, or the name of a child). The she sometimes continues crying to strengthen the request. In some occasion Leoni also makes the request by an open imperative, such as in Makan aku Neng. 5. Marking the membership of her family by saying the demonstrative article ini or itu before or after saying a common noun in referent with any member of the family with the first singular person possessive article ku like in Mamaku, Bapakku, abangku, kakakku. 6. Politeness is made to a person by lengthening the vowel of the addressing expression she uses to the person she is speaking to. The strategy is accompanied by a smiling. 7. Persuading a person for an agreement to let her have something in a process. She makes the first attempt of her persuasion by saying a Non-Yes No Question. Second, she strengthens her persuasion by saying a Yes-No question for many times. At last, she completes her persuasion by saying a statement. She also persuades a person for an agreement to do something by a Yes-No question. 8. Negotiating an option by using a direct refusal like ngak mau to solve a conflict. Using a statement to terminate the conflict. At last saying an exclamatory to say sorry for the conflict. 9. Distinguishing an actual event from a play by imitates doing what the other person has done. Conclusion CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION Based on the findings of the research, it is concluded that Leoni has the knowledge of the speech act, which she uses in her communicative interaction with the people around her. The type of the knowledge that she Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 8 of 9

9 has includes about drawing attention, showing objects, offering, requesting, marking membership in a society, to be polite, to be persuasive, to negotiate to solve conflict, and to distinguish actual event from play. She communicates her intentions based on her knowledge on the speech act. Leoni communicates her speech acts by using all the types of the utterances she is able to produce. She communicates her intentions by using the one-word utterances, the two-word-utterances, and the utterances of more than two words. She sometimes combines verbal action and non-verbal actions such as pointing at something or holding it to communicate her intentions. Suggestion This research suggests the others to conduct a comprehensive research studying the speech act of the children of the different ages. They are suggested to conduct the researches to the different children of the different cultures background in Indonesia. Those projects can reveal the facts of the children language acquisition in Indonesia. New theories in the field can be established for the sake of the development of the national contribution to the universal knowledge on the children language acquisition. REFERENCES Austin, J.L. How to do Things with words. Cambridge: Harvard University Press Grice, H.P. Logic and Conversation, in Cole and Magan Barret, M. Early Lexical Development. In P. Pletcher & B. MacWhinney (Eds.), The Handbook of Child Language. Cambridge: Basil Blackkwell Bates, E. Language and Context: The acquisition of Pragmatics. New York Academic Press Braine, M. The Ontogeni of English Phrase Structure: The First Phase. Language, 39, Brown, R., A First Language: The Early Stages. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press Clark, Herbert H. and Clark, Eve V. Psychology and Language: An Introduction to Psycholinguistics. New York: Harcourth Brace Jovanovich, INC Clark, Eve V. First Language Acquisition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Gleason, Jean Berko and Ratner, Nan Berstein. Psycholinguistics. Fort Worth: Harcourt Brace College Publisher Halliday, M. Learning how to Mean: Explorations in the Development of Language. New York: Arnold O Grady, William and Dobrovolsky. Contemporary Linguistic Analysis: An Introductiom.Toronto: Copp Clark Ltd Paivio, Allan and Begg, Ian. Psychology of Language. USA: Prentice Hall, Inc Pascasarjana-Universitas HKBP Nommensen Page 9 of 9