Dina Rachmawati: An Analysis of the Violations 25 AN ANALYSIS OF THE VIOLATIONS OF COOPERATIVE PRINCIPLE IN THE WEEKLY HUMOR (HUMOR PEKAN INI ) IN PIKIRAN RAKYAT NEWS PAPER Dina Rachmawati Universitas Sultan Ageng Tirtayasa ABSTRACT Jokes are CP-violating Text, and at least violate one maxim of Grice‟s Cooperative Principle. This study found that maxim of Manner and maxim of Quality are the most common places for the violation. Jokes violated the CP by giving obscure expression, unnecessary prolixity, and by giving false evidence/fact. The study concludes that the first, violations are manipulated to provoke laughter and amusement. Second, both jokes producer and readers share the same common knowledge. Keywords: Gricean Principle, Cooperative Principle, Jokes A. Inroduction In every communication we expect our interlocutor to be cooperative, and to get the true information from them as well as expecting that our interlocutor will not misinterpret what we are trying to convey. As cited by Grice that conversation is a cooperative effort wherein each speaker gives contribution to reach the goal of the conversation. However, there are many times people do not cooperative to each other as in the case of jokes as supported by Attardo Salvator in journal of pragmatics that jokes are CP-violating texts, and they involve the violation of (at least) one maxim of Cooperative Principle (CP). Previous study conducted by the writer: An Analysis of the Violations of Cooperative Principle in TPI Comedian Competition has also shown that joke indeed violated CP. The violations occurred in all maxims of Cooperative Principle. 34, 52% occurred in maxim of Quality, 6, 45% in maxim of Quantity, 1, 19 % in maxim of Relevance, and 57, 73% took place in maxim of Manner. That finding shows that the comedians tended to violate maxim of Manner and maxim of Quality in performing their jokes. Moreover, the violations were carried out through giving unnecessary prolixity, obscure expression, and giving false evidence/ fact. In conclusion, giving unnecessary prolixity, obscure expression and false evidence were the best way to trigger laugh and amusement. However, TPI Comedian Competition was a live comedy performance where the jokes were carried out orally. The jokes might be accompanied by paralinguistic feature such as gesture and intonation to trigger laugh and amusement which were missing and undetected in the analysis of the writer‟s previous research. Triggered by that reason in this research the writer wanted to analyze the violations of cooperative principle in the written form which is assumed free from paralinguistics feature. To specify my research I took jokes which were published weekly in Pikiran Rakyat news paper to be the source of my study. It is because the jokes were made by readers hence I assumed that they are more “fresher” than the other printed/ written jokes and they are free from paralinguistic features. Moreover, this research was conducted within the framework of the following questions: ELTIN journal, Volume 2/I, April 2014 26 1) Where do the violations occur? 2) How do they violate the Cooperative Principle? To make a reliable study, the researcher designed the steps of the research into; First Data Collection: the data were gain firstly by collecting Weekly Humor column in Teropong supplement in Pikiran Rakyat news paper which was published once within two weeks on Monday. Than picked out jokes which showed the phenomena of violations of Cooperative Principle. The data were taken from Teropong supplement which were published on, 11 th September and 11 th December 2006, 22 nd January, 26 th March, 9 th and 23rd April 2007 and 19 jokes were collected. Furthermore, for the analysis the researcher divided the jokes based on the type of maxim that was violated. Then finally, the researcher analyzed the manner of the violations. B. Literature Review 1. The Cooperative Principle The theory of Cooperative Principle (CP) and its related maxims aroused from the same tradition of ordinary language philosophy when Grice and J.L. Austin worked together in the 1940s to 1950s. Grice believed that in conversational interaction people share the same assumption that they work on the same set of rules. Moreover, he believed that conversation is a cooperative behavior, where both speakers and their interlocutor have to follow certain rules in order to get mutual goal of their conversation that is achieving effective communication. And Grice called it as Cooperative Principle. CP stated that make your contribution such is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged. To work out this principle Grice proposed four maxims (Thomas, 1995: 63-64): a. Maxim of Quantity The main point of this maxim is the amount of information given by speakers to the interlocutor. Under the category of quantity fall the fallowing maxims: 1) Make your contribution as informative as is required (for the current purposes of the take exchange). 2) Do not make your contribution more informative than required. b. Maxim of Quality This maxim concerns the quality of information which is given by speakers to their interlocutor. It falls into more specific maxims that are: 1) Do not say what you believe to be false. 2) Do not say that for which you lack adequate evidence. c. Maxim of Relevance This maxim is concerned with relevancy of contribution made by speaker in a talk exchange. Under the category of Relevance there is only one maxim, that is: 1. Be relevant. d. Maxim of Manner This maxim is concerned with the way or how speakers say what they have to say not to what they say. In this principle fall some maxims: 1) Avoid obscurity of expression. 2) Avoid ambiguity. Dina Rachmawati: An Analysis of the Violations 27 3) Be brief (avoid unnecessary prolixity). 4) Be orderly. 2. The Nature of Jokes As has been mentioned earlier that the claim that all jokes involve the violation of (at least) one maxim of the CP. This fact is supported by many researchers as Grice stated that irony and humor might be connected to violations of the conversational maxims and Searl in Attardo (1991: 541) defines jokes as a “parasitic form of communication where normal input/ output conditions do not hold. The process of understanding utterances produced by speaker (comedians) that their utterances mean a joke or is intended to generate humor take some process. According to Attardo (1991: 55) the process run as follows: first the hearer processes the text is mislead by the violations of the principle of cooperation, backtracks and misinterpret the information provided in the text on the basis of humor maxims, switch to the non-bona-fide of humor, and reacts accordingly (i.e. laughing, smiling etc). Moreover, Attardo believed that joke is a communicative text since joke works in interactions between people and that (at least some) jokes convey some information. And joking is a successful interpersonal and/or communicative exchange. C. Findings and Discussions This research found that violations of CP occurred only in two maxims of CP, which is maxim of Quality and maxim of Manner. The analysis also revealed that from all violations, most of them occurred in maxim of Manner (15 violations) and only 4 violations in maxim of Quality. The examples of the violations are presented by two examples (1) and (2): (1) Ratna: “Ni, kalau bahasa Inggrisnya Selamat Pagi apa? Ari: “Good Morning.” Ratna: “kalau selamat berenang?” Ari: “Nggak tahu, Good swimming, mungkin.” Ratna:” bukan. Good Jubar.” (2) “kenapa kamu pukkul Agus, Pak? Apa kesalahannya? Bela si ibu. Ayah yang tidak mau tahu berkata: “tidak ada. Tapi besok ia akan terima rapot sekolah, sedangkan aku akan ada di luar kota besok. Example (1) shows a dialogue which involved two participants. The first participant, in the first question Ratna asked the second participant, Ari about the English equivalent of selamat pagi. And Ari managed to answer the first question. Then Ratna proposed second question about the English equivalent of selamat berenang and Ari answered it by saying I don’t know, probably it’s good swimming. Ratna corrected Ari‟s question by stating that the correct English equivalent for selamat berenang is Good Jubar. By saying that, Ratna has given false evidence/ fact to Ari. It is because Good jubar is not the English Equivalent of selamat berenang. Good jubar is actually a wordplay/ pun of Sundanese kecap panganteur: gujubar when a thing or someone gets into water. It indicated that Ratna‟s answer Good Jubar has violated maxim of Quality. Example (2) shows a dialogue between a husband and his wife. They are arguing about their son. The wife thought that their son was innocent and asked his husband why he was tortured. Than her husband answered that there was nothing wrong with their son, it just that he wouldn‟t have ELTIN journal, Volume 2/I, April 2014 28 been there when their son received academic report. The utterance “tidak ada. Tapi besok ia akan terima rapot sekolah, sedangkan aku akan ada di luar kota besok” indicated that the husband has violated maxim of Manner because he did not answer the question clearly. In the first question he said that there was nothing wrong with their son while in the second answer tapi besok ia akan terima rapot sekolah, sedangkan aku akan ada di luar kota he implied that his son academic report would be bad. Therefore, their son should be tortured because he wouldn‟t have been out of town. The analysis also showed there are three ways the violations were carried out. From 19 violations, 13 violations were carried out through giving obscure expression, 2 violations by giving unnecessary prolixity, and 4 violations were carried out by giving false evidence/ fact. (3) Seorang ibu muda yang sudah beranak dua mendatangi Dokter untuk memberi nasihat soal KB. Ibu:”Dokter, saya ingin ikut KB. Tapi saya tidak mau pakai IUD. Takut. Saya tidak mau minum pil dan suntik nanti gendut. Saya juga tidak mau tubektomi.” Dokter:”hhnn suami ibu?” Ibu:”suami saya juga tidak mau pakai kondom apalagi vasektomi. Bagaimana dong Dok?” Dokter:”minum air jeruk saja.” Ibu:”air jeruk?apa benar-benar sip?” Dokter:”iya, minum air jeruk saja dan jangan berbuat yang lain-lain!” (4) Seorang pria pergi ke kantor polisi dengan tujuan ingin menemui pencuri yang semalam berhasil masuk ke rumahnya dan berniat untuk mencuri. “oh, tidak boleh. Kau akan dapat kesempatan berbicara dengan dia di pengadilan. Tenanglah jangan emosi,” kata polisi yang bertugas saat itu. “oh tidak, tidak…bukan begitu!,”kata pria tersebut. ”aku ingin menemuinya hanya ingin sekedar bertanya, bagaimana dia bisa masuk ke dalam rumahku tanpa membangunkan istriku! Padahal, aku sudah mencoba hal itu selama bertahun-tahun, tapi tidak pernah berhasil.” (5) seorang tentara yang bertugas di Timur Tengah sudah jenuh dan capai menjaga di wilayah konflik itu. Dia ingin pulang tapi situasi belum memungkinkan. Akhirnya dia menghadap ke atasannya minta cuti dengan alas an istrrinya akan melahirkan. Permohonan cuti dikabulkan. Temannya yang mengetahui hal itu bertanya. “kapan persisnya istri mu melahirkan?” “sembilan bulan lagi, dihitung dari kedatangganku di rumah.” Example (3) was a story about a patient who is asking for advice to her doctor how to avoid pregnancy without using protector and without implanting tubektomi or vasektomi. Hence, the doctor advised her to drink orange juice. The doctor‟s answers/ advise: “minum air jeruk saja.” and ”iya, minum air jeruk saja dan jangan berbuat yang lain-lain!” have violated CP in Maxim of Manner by giving obscure expression. It is because his answer was unclear: how can we avoid pregnancy by just drinking orange juice. However, the doctor‟s answer meant/ implied something else, which is you are stupid because there is not other ways to avoid pregnancy is they did not want to use protector, tubektomi or vasektomi. Example (4) showed a dialogue between a man asking for permission to see a man who robbed his house to a policeman. The policeman did not permit his and advice him to see him in the Dina Rachmawati: An Analysis of the Violations 29 court. Then the men said that he just want to ask him how he managed to get into his house without waking up his wife. The man utterance: “oh tidak, tidak…bukan begitu!,”kata pria tersebut. ”aku ingin menemuinya hanya ingin sekedar bertanya, bagaimana dia bisa masuk ke dalam rumahku tanpa membangunkan istriku! Padahal, aku sudah mencoba hal itu selama bertahun-tahun, tapi tidak pernah berhasil.” showed the phenomena of CP violation which occurred in maxim of Manner. The violation was performed by giving unnecessary prolixity (verbosity) in that conversation context. Example (5) tell a story a about a shoulders who are asking for a leave because his wife was about to give birth her baby. Then his request was approved. And one of his friends asked him when his wife will give birth her baby and then he asked that his wife would give birth the baby nine months after his arrival at home. The utterance “sembilan bulan lagi, dihitung dari kedatangganku di rumah.” Contradicted the fact that he asked a leave for his wife would give birth baby. Hence, he has performed a violation by giving false evidence/ fact. D. Conclusions After all the procedure to answer the questions of the research have been conducted and the analysis showed the findings some conclusions can be drawn. First, joke tends to violate Cooperative Principle, the maxim of Manner and Quality become the common places of the violations. It is because they have tremendous effect in provoking laughter and amusement. Second, both jokes producers (comedians) and readers (audience) share the same common knowledge. Hence, the joke can be perceived or understood by the readers/ audience as have been intended by the jokes producers. No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR 1 Hadi : Buat tiga pertanyaan dengan satu jawaban! Farah : Mana ada tiga pertanyaan yang jawabannya hanya satu. Hadi : ada. Farah : misalnya? Hadi : di kebun binatang ada apa? Kera, mas. Di Kamar mandi sedang apa? Keramas. Kaki kamu kenapa? Keras, mas 2 “kenapa kamu pukul Agus, Pak. Apa kesalahannya?? Bela si ibu. Ayah yang tidak mau tahu berkata:”tidak ada. Tapi besok ia akan terima raport sekolah, sedangkan aku akan ada di luar kota besok. 3 Peter : hei, kenapa engkau memakai sepasang kaus kaki yang aneh seperti itu, yang sebelah kanan biru dan yang sebelah kiri hijau. Jim :iya betul-betul aneh, aku ELTIN journal, Volume 2/I, April 2014 30 No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR juga bingung. Soalnya di rumahku masih ada lagi satu pasang kaus kaki yang persis sama dengan kaus kaki yang aku kenakan ini. 4 Tersebutlah seorang juragan yang terkenal pelit bernama Abdul. Pada suatu hari Abdul pergi ke sebuah plasa dan melewati rumah makan. Dia berhenti sebentar, dilihatnya pada dinding kaca rumah makan tersebut ada ditempel sebuah brosur yang menarik perhaiannya “MAKAN SEKARANG, CUCU ANDA YANG AKAN BAYAR”. Abdul melihat hal itu sebagai sebuah kesempatan. Dia masuk ke rumah makan tersebut dan memesan sebanyak- banyaknya dan pesanan dimakan sampai puas. Setelah selesai, ia segera hendak berlalu dari tempat tersebut. Belum sempat melewati pintu dia dihalang oleh seorang pegawai yang menyodorkannya selembar bon makan. Abdul: ”Bagaimana kau ini, di ditukan disebut, Makan sekarang, yang bayar nanti cucu saya.” Pegawai: “Betul pak, tapi bapak lihat dulu bon ini, ini bukan bon makanan yang bapak makan tadi. Ini adalah bon makanan kekek anda yang dulu makan di sini. Jadi giliran bapak membayarnya sekarang!” 5 si badrun akan pergi merantau ke luar kota. Sebelum pergi, ayah berpesan: Ayah: “ Nak, jaga diri baik-baik yah!kalau di sana kamu harus pintar-pintar bergaul dengan orang. Kalau kamu bertemu sama orang ajaklah bicara. Kalau misalnya kamu ketemu dengan tukang sayur, bicaralah tentang Dina Rachmawati: An Analysis of the Violations 31 No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR sayur. Kalau kamu bertemu dengan tukang tahu, bicaralah tentang tahu. Kalau kamu bertemu tukang lontong, bicaralah tentang lontong. Si Badrun berpikir sejenak, “kalau aku bertemu dengan ketiganya sekaligus, bagaimana? Ayah: “oh, kalau itu bicaralah tentang gado-gado!” 6 seorang pencuri sandal jepit di pabrik sandal tidak terima putusan hakim Hakim : “kamu saya vonis 3 tahun penjara. Maling : “Saya tidak terima Pak Hakim.” Hakim : “kenapa?” Maling : “sya pikir krisis di Indonesia masih berlangsung 5 tahun lagi, makanya hukum saya 5 tahun 3 bulan saja! 7 Suatu waktu, Dirjen Pajak melakukan dengar pendapat dengan DPR.”adalah suatu kehormatan bagi kita sebagai warga Negara untuk membayar pajak dengan tersenyum.,”ujar sand dirjen memaparkan programnya. “alhamdullah, tadinya kusangka pajak harus dibayar dengan uang”ujarnya dengan tersenyum. 8 seorang tentara yang bertugaw di Timur Tengah sudah jenuh dan capai menjaga di wilayah konflik itu. Dia ingin pulang tapi situasi belum memungkinkan. Akhirnya dia menghadap ke atasannya minta cuti dengan alas an istrrinya akan melahirkan. Permohonan cuti dikabulkan. Temannya yang mengetahui hal itu bertanya. “kapan persisnya istri mu melahirkan?” “sembilan bulan lagi, dihitung dari kedatangganku di rumah.” ELTIN journal, Volume 2/I, April 2014 32 No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR 9 suatu waktu ada tes wawancara untuk penerimaan tenaga guru sekolah dasar. Seorang dari Madura tampak sedang diwawancara. “apa Bapak tahu, bagaimana hubungan Pancasila dengan Undang-Undang Dasar 1945?” Tanya seorang penguji. “eeee….saya kira hubungan mereka harmonis. Selama ini tidak ada masalah. Mereka baik-baik saja. Alhamdullilah! Jawabnya polos. 10 siapa yang mengkumandangkan adzan di TV setiap hari? Itu mah si Saat!” “loh, dari mana kamu tahu namanya?” “kan di tv juga dijelaskan, mari kita ikuti saat azan Magrib.” 11 Ratna: “Ni, kalau bahasa Inggrisnya Selamat Pagi apa? Ari: “Good Morning.” Ratna: “kalau selamat berenang?” Ari: “Nggak tahu, Good swimming, mungkin.” Ratna:” bukan. Good Jubar.” 12 Ocin dan Onah bermain tebak- tebakan di halaman rumah. Ocin:” Serangga apa yang paling sehat?” Onah:”Belalang..kupu-kupu..siang makan nasi, kalau malam minum susu.” Ocin:”Danau apa yang lucu?” Onah:” Danau, Kaninau, Indrau.” 13 Seorang penjual obat berpromosi di depan pasar. Penjual:”Mas..Mas silahkan mampir, ada obat mujarab dari saya.” Sidik:”Obat untuk penyakit apa saja?” Penjual:”semua jenis penyakit ada obatnya.” Sidik:”kalau sakit pilek?” Penjual:”minum obat saya, hilang pilekna.” Dina Rachmawati: An Analysis of the Violations 33 No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR Sidik:”kalau sakit batuk?” Penjual:”minum obat ini hilang batuknya.” Sidik:”kalau sakit kepada?” Penjual:”minum obat saya, hilang kepalanya.” 14 Suatu hari terjadi kecelakaaan sepeda motor di depan rumah seorang mantra kesehatan. Tak lama kemudian seorang pemuda menolongnya. “Beruntung Anda terjatuh dekat rumah mantra Karim, jadi saya tidak perlu repor-repot membawa bapak ke rumah sakit.” “kamu lebih beruntung Nak, tidak perlu report-repot memanggil mantra, karena aku mantra Karim yang kamu maksud.” 15 Seorang pengendara motor tengah melajukan mobilnya di jalan tol. Tiba-tiba handphonenya berbunyi dan segera dijawab. Ia mendengar suara istrinya sedang mengingatkan untuk berhati-hati, “Papi, saya baru saja dengar bahwa ada sebuah mobil yang berjalan dengan arah yang salah di jalan tol. Tolong berhati- hati.” “Gila!!Bukan Cuma satu, tapi ada ratusan jumlahnya!” kata sang pengendara. 16 Seorang ibu muda yang sudah beranak dua mendatangi Dokter untuk memberi nasihat soal KB. Ibu:”Dokter, saya ingin ikut KB. Tapi saya tidak mau pakai IUD. Takut. Saya tidak mau minum pil dan suntik nanti gendut. Saya juga tidak mau tubektomi.” Dokter:”hhnn suami ibu?” 17 Ibu:”suami saya juga tidak mau pakai kondom apalagi vasektomi. Bagaimana dong Dok?” Dokter:”minum air jeruk saja.” Ibu:”air jeruk?apa benar-benar sip?” Dokter:”iya, minum air jeruk saja ELTIN journal, Volume 2/I, April 2014 34 No Sample of Expression Violations to Maxims QUAL QUNT RLV MNR dan jangan berbuat yang lain- lain!” 18 Seorang pria pergi ke kantor polisi dengan tujuan ingin menemui pencuri yang semalam berhasil masuk ke rumahnya dan berniat untuk mencuri. “oh, tidak boleh. Kau akan dapat kesempatan berbicara dengan dia di pengadilan. Tenanglah jangan emosi,” kata polisi yang bertugas saat itu. “oh tidak, tidak…bukan begitu!,”kata pria tersebut. ”aku ingin menemuinya hanya ingin sekedar bertanya, bagaimana dia bisa masuk ke dalam rumahku tanpa membangunkan istriku! Padahal, aku sudah mencoba hal itu selama bertahun-tahun, tapi tidak pernah berhasil.” 19 Dua perampok sedang merencanakan target operasinya. “Bank yang ada di tengah kota ini, besok kita rampok,” ujar si jabrik pada rekannya. “maaf bos, sebaiknya jangan bank yang itu.” “memang kenapa?kamu takut?” “bukan begitu bos. Uang hasil rampokan kita pekan lalu , saya simpan di bank itu. References Attardo, S. (1999). Irony as Relevant Inappropiateness. Youngstwon State University. Attardo, S. (1993).Violations of Conversational Maxims and Cooperation: the case of Jokes. Journal of Pragmatics. North Holand. Levinson, S.C.(1983). Pragmatics: London: Cambrige University Press. Thomas, J. (1995). Meaning in Interaction. London: Longman.