CONVERSATIONAL FEATURES ACROSS GENDER IN RULES DON’T APPLY: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC ANALYSIS

Abstract

This research is aimed at describing the conversational features performed by the men and women in mixed-sex conversations in Rules Don’t Apply and describing the motivating factors causing the different usage of conversational features between the men and women found in the movie. This research employed mixed methods: qualitative and quantitative. Therefore, the data were in the form of utterances taken from the conversations of the characters in Rules Don’t Apply. The theories applied were in the field of gender and communication proposed by Judy Cornelia Pearson (1985) and Deborah Cameron (1985). The results of this research show that there are ten among twelve conversational features which performed by the men and women in mixed-sex conversations in Rules Don’t Apply. The most appearing feature is silence which occurs 19 times (26.03%) then followed by the use of hedges with 15 data (20.55%). Overlaps cover 11 data (15.07%), controlling the topic 7 data (9.59%), and interruption consists of 5 data (6.85%). Talk time occurs 5 times (6.85%), profanity 4 times (5.48%), and compound request emerges 4 times (5.48%). Vocabulary consists of 2 data (2.74%) and the lowest data is reached by tag question which only occurs 1 time (1.37%). There are two major factors which cause the different usage of  conversational features between the men and women in mixed-sex conversations in Rules Don’t Apply namely subculture and gender role which rank first with 47 data (64.38%) and dominance hierarchies which appear 26 times (35.61%). The findings suggest: (1) there is no certainty which sex performs a particular feature as it depends on the context of the conversation; (2) men are likely to dominate women in a mixed-sex conversation although their social class is lower compared to the women.

Keywords: sociolinguistics, conversational features, Rules Don’t Apply