REALIZATION OF DISAGREEMENT STRATEGIES 


ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 2, June 2015 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

REALIZATION OF DISAGREEMENT STRATEGIES
BY INDONESIAN SPEAKERS

Wildan Nurul Aini
English Education Program, School of Postgraduate Studies

Indonesia University of Education, Indonesia
Email: wildan.nurul.aini@gmail.com

APA Citation: Aini, W. N. (2015). Realization of disagreement strategies by Indonesian
speakers. English Review: Journal of English Education, 3(2), 239-246

Received: 10-04-2015 Accepted: 25-04-2015 Published: 01-06-2015

Abstract: This study investigates the realization of disagreement strategies employed by
Indonesian speakers. The strategies are then related to the interlocutor’s level of power.
The data is collected using DCT Type B adapted from Azis (2000) and analysed using
adapted disagreement strategies from Muntigl and Turnbull (1998) and Chen (2006). The
results shows that Indonesian speakers tend to use different disagreement strategies to
different level of power of the interlocutor. To the interlocutor with the higher power (the
superior), the speakers tend to use counterclaims and no disagreement strategies. In
addition, to the speakers with the same level of power, the contradiction strategy is
preferred. In the meantime, to the interlocutor with the lower level of power, the speakers
are likely to choose challenge. These various selections of disagreement strategies are also
influenced by concept of FTAs of Brown and Levinson (1987).
Keywords: disagreement, power, face, FTAs

INTRODUCTION
Disagreement is mentioned as an

expression performed as the opposite
view from the speakers (Sifianou, 2012).
Pomerantz (1984, as cited in Fernández,
2013) asserts that this act happen when
assessment is initiated by a speaker to
achieve one more action. The action will
be realized in forms of either agreement
or disagreement. In this case,
disagreement is regarded as dispreferred
action since it usually is being linked to
impoliteness or face-threatening
condition. Therefore, it is usually
mitigated and avoided by the speaker
(Siafanou, 2012).

Since the use of disagreement is
quite risky, speakers tend to use
disagreements in various strategies.
Then, in selecting the strategies, the
speakers tend to consider several factors

such as context, face and politeness
(Siafanou, 2012). Several studies about
disagreement related to these two factors
have been conducted by many
researcher (e.g. Han, and Liang, 2005;
Xuehua, 2006; Fernández, 2013). Besides
context, face and politeness factors, level
of power is also usually taken into
account to determine several
disagreement strategies. It is since
sometimes the speakers, especially
Indonesian, tend to agree with the
statement of the interlocutor with the
higher power, although, in fact, s/he
actually disagrees with it. Therefore, this
study is intended to investigate the
realization of disagreement strategies
employed by Indonesian speakers in
relation to the interlocutor’s level of
power.

mailto:wildan.nurul.aini@gmail.com


WILDAN NURUL AINI
Realization of Disagreement Strategies by Indonesian Speakers

Realization of speech acts are
frequently characterized by the presence
of strategies in conveying the speech acts.
In many speech act studies, several
classifications of strategies are proposed
by the researchers (e.g., Cohen and
Olshtain’s, 1981; Blum-Kulka and
Olshtain, 1984, in apologizing; Blum-
Kulka and Olshtain, 1984, in requesting;
Azis, 2000 in refusing; Al-Omari and
Abu-Melhim, 2013, in promising). Chen
(2005) believes that these classifications
are generally made based on semantic
formulas used to respond the
interlocutor’s statement. Hence, the
speaker’s strategies in a certain speech
act might be identified from several
features within his/her utterances.
Especially in realization of disagreement
speech acts, a number of classifications
of disagreement strategies have been
created by several researchers (e.g. Beebe
and Takahashi, 1989; Dogancay-Aktuna
& Kamisli, 1996; Muntigl and Turnbull,
1998; Lin, 1999 as cited in Chen, 2006).

However, in the current study,
Muntigl and Turnbull’s (1998) and Chen’
(2006) frameworks are adapted and
utilized. This adaptation is intended to
accommodate strategies which are not
covered by one of frameworks, e.g. the
absence of opt-out in Muntigl and
Turnbull (1998). Thus the strategies used
in the investigation consist of no
disagreement (ND), irrelevancy claims
(IC), challenges (CH), contradictions (CT)
and counterclaims (CC).

No disagreement strategy or ND
(Chen, 2006) is used by the speaker
when he/she chooses to opt-out (silent)
or using particular verbal strategies,
such as agreement and avoidance, to
avoid disagreement or arguing with the
interlocutor. Chen, furthermore, explains
that there must be some reasons for the
speaker to use no disagreement

strategies especially when keeping silent.
He mentioned the reasons are in
connection with six aspects, namely:
both the interlocutor’s and the speakers’
positive face (Brown and Levinson, 1987),
conditions for the act of disagreement
(e.g. unimportant, respect, inappropriate
context), relationship of the act with the
speaker’s goal, relationship of the act
with social goals (e.g. for maintaining
relationship), and contextual factors (e.g.
status, social distance, and gender).

Irrelevancy claims or IC (Muntigl
and Turnbull, 1998), on the other hand,
refer to strategies in which the speaker
asserts that the interlocutor’s statement
is out of topic or irrelevant to the present
discussion. This strategy is usually
performed in overlap or without pauses
from the previous statement. Besides,
this strategy is regarded as the most
face-threatening strategies. The next
strategy is challenges (CH) in which the
speaker shows reluctance and doubt in
expressing disagreement by utilizing an
interrogative form, such as when, why,
who, where, whom, and how. Challenges
are typically accompanied by inquiry
regarding the proof of the prior
statements.

Muntigl and Turnbull (1998) also
propose contradiction strategies (CT). In
this strategy, the speaker performs an
opposed statement from the
interlocutor’s. This is usually preceded
by negations or opposition markers such
as no, I disagree, I do not agree, not at all, I
don’t think so etc. However, Chen (2006)
claims that contradictions are not always
preceded by a negation, but it also
occasionally start with contradictory
statement, such as “I thought it was so
boring.” The last strategy is
counterclaims (CC), in which the speaker
uses token or partial agreement using
but (yes, but…). This way is considered as



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 2, June 2015 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

the least face threatening strategy
(Muntigl and Turnbull, 1998) since it is
initiated by pauses, prefaces and
mitigated devices, such as hedges
(Orfano, 2012). Similarly, Fernández
(2013) asserts that this mitigated device
is to soften the treat to the hearer’s face.
In short, the counterclaims is used to
indirectly disagree with the interlocutor
by agreeing the proposition first to
minimize the FTAs, and then followed
by the speaker’s claim.

The use of strategies in the
speech acts, e.g. disagreement, is usually
affected by social distance, power
differential, and ratio of imposition
(Brown and Levinson, 1987). These

elements affect the degree of face-threat
to be redressed by appropriate linguistic
strategies. However, in this study, the
disagreement strategies will be
discussed mainly in relation to the
different level of power.

METHOD
This research involved four male

(40%) and six female (60%) postgraduate
students from of one state university in
Bandung. The participants’ age ranges
from 23 to 26 years old. Besides, they
come from different origins in Indonesia
with different language background. The
details of the information can be seen as
follow:

Table 1. Information details of the participants
Variables Categories
Origins West Java(30%)

East Java(10%)
West Sumatra(10%)
Tidore(10%)
Lampung (20%)
Medan(10 %)
Aceh(10%)

First Language Bahasa Indonesia (60%)
Sundanese (10%)
Minang (10%)
Javanese (10%)
Aceh (10%)

Daily Language Bahasa Indonesia=60%
Bahasa Indonesia and Sundanese= 30%
Bahasa Indonesia and Minang=60%

A survey design was employed in
this study. Bell (2005) asserts that a
survey is generally aimed at attaining
information from a representative
sample of certain population by asking
the same questions to them. In this study,
the respondents were asked the identical
information about their disagreement
strategies by using a Discourse
Completion Test (DCT).

To obtain the strategies of
disagreement from the respondents, a
Discourse Completion Test (DCT) is

used. First adapted in 1982 by Blum-
Kulka for a speech act investigation, the
DCT is a questionnaire consisting several
discourse or situation in which the
respondents of the study are required to
write the response of the given situation
(Varghese and Billmyer, 2011). However,
Nurani (2009) indicates that the use of
the DCT frequently gets criticisms
because of its disadvantages, such as
unnatural data (Huock and Gass, 1995),
oversimplification of complex interaction
(Brown and Levinson, 1987), and



WILDAN NURUL AINI
Realization of Disagreement Strategies by Indonesian Speakers

inability to get emotional information
from the response in depth (Beebe and
Cummings, 1995). Nevertheless, the
DCT is still widely used to examine
several speech act strategies (Aziz, 2000)
since it allows researchers to “collect
large amount of data in a relatively a
short time” (Nurani, 2009: 670) and
applicable for respondents with different
cultural background (Huock and Gass,
1995).

The DCT employed here was
adapted from the DCT Type-B
developed by Aziz (2000). This kind of
DCT provides multiple choice and open-
ended questionnaire which allows the
respondent to select one of given
strategies then fill possible responses for
the chosen strategy. In this study, the
DCT consists of three different situations
in Bahasa Indonesia which indicated
setting and level of power of the
interlocutors. The given situations were
designed to elicit the respondents’
disagreement, which is also in Bahasa
Indonesia.

After being collected, the data from
the DCT were analyzed using categories
of disagreement strategies adapted from
Muntigl and Turnbull (1998) and Chen
(2006). Based on this adapted categories,
disagreement strategies can be divided
into: no disagreement (ND), irrelevancy
claims (IC), challenges (CH),
contradictions (CT) and counterclaims
(CC).

No disagreement strategies as
mentioned by Chen (2006: 41) are the
situation where the speaker prefers to be
silent (NDs) or to use verbal strategies,
such as agreement (ND: Ag) and
avoidance (ND: Av), rather than
disagree with the interlocutor’s
statement. Then, irrelevancy claims refer

to a disagreement strategy in which the
speaker claims that the interlocutor’s
statement is irrelevant to the present
discussion. On the other hand, challenge
strategy is for the one where the speaker
questions and/or asks for proves the
interlocutor’s statement by using
interrogative words (e.g. what, why, when,
where, who, and how). Another strategy is
contradictions. Here, the speaker bluntly
disagrees with the interlocutor statement
by saying no, I don’t or I disagree. The last
is counterclaim strategy in which the
speaker partly agrees by expressing
agreement at the beginning yet being
followed by alternative claims (e.g. Yes,
but…).

Next, after being categorized, the
data will be discussed with regard to the
level of power or superiority. The level
of power involved in this study are
higher power (superior), equal power
and lower power (subordinate).
Considering this superiority levels, it can
be seen whether or not the disagreement
strategies chosen by the participants for
those categories different each other.
Furthermore, it will also discuss the
“why” of the participants’ preferences in
expressing certain disagreement
strategies.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The collected data from the DCT are

then classified and analyzed using
adapted classification of disagreement
strategies from Muntigl and Turn (1998)
and Chen (2006). After the classification
and the analysis, the realization of
disagreement strategies used by
Indonesian postgraduate students in this
present study is obtained. The general
results of the data analysis are presented
in the following table:



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 2, June 2015 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

Table 2. Disagreement strategies employed by the Indonesian postgraduate students
Strategies

Level of Power

Higher Power
(Superior)

Equal Power Lower Power
(Subordinate)

TOTAL

Contradictions (CT) 1 5 3 10
Counterclaims (CC) 4 - 1 4
Challenges (CH) - 2 4 6
Irrelevant Claims (IC) - - - -
No
Disagreement
(ND)

Silent (NDS) 2 2 1 5
Avoidance
(ND:Av)

3 1 - 4

Agreement
(ND:Ag)

- - 1 1

TOTAL 10 10 10 30

In the following section, the findings
and discussions will be presented in
relation to the level of power or
superiority of the interlocutor.

Disagreement strategies used to the superior
(higher power)

From the analysis results, it is found
that the strategies utilized by the
participants are: contradiction (10%),
counterclaims (40%), no disagreement:
silent (20%), and no disagreement:
avoidance (30%).

Looking at the data, it seems that
the participants prefer choosing
strategies which possess less face
threatening acts, such as counterclaims
(Muntigl and Turnbull, 1998) and no
disagreement: silent and avoidance.
Counterclaims can be easily identified
from its structure (yes, but…) and its
features such as mitigating devices
(Orfano, 2012). One of the mitigating
devices used in this strategy is hedges.
For example:

Counterclaims
R1: Mungkin benar yang Bapak
sampaikan tadi, tapi menurut
saya keduanya memiliki
kelebihan dan kekurangan, …
(Perhaps, what you have just
said is right, but I think both

of them have strength and
weaknesses…)

The word “mungkin/perhaps” and
“menurut saya/I think” are the hedges or
mitigating devices utilized in the
counterclaims strategy. The use of
hedges here seems an indicator of the
participants’ caution in expressing
disagreement to the interlocutor. This
might happen since the interlocutor is
his/her lecturer who has the higher
power. So, there is no place for the
participant to exercise the power.

This cautious action is also visible
by the use of another strategy, no
disagreement. So, rather than disagree
with the lecturer, the other participants
choose to perform silence and avoidance,
as the safer strategies. Apparently, this is
intended to avoid conflicts with the
lecturer. As R9 who chooses silence, she
expresses that the choice of being silent
is to avoid arguing with the lecturer.
This is due to, as Fairclough (2001) states,
the ability of more powerful participants
to control and constrain the contribution
of the less powerful participants.
Similarly, with respect to this, Chen
(2006) suggests that one of the reasons of
speakers’ silence in a conflict talk is
contextual factors, such as higher status,
social distance, and unfamiliarity.



WILDAN NURUL AINI
Realization of Disagreement Strategies by Indonesian Speakers

The last is in the contradiction
strategy. Although the strategy is
basically used to directly disagree, in this
case, the statement used is also still
carefully expressed. For instance:

Kalau menurut saya keduanya
punya sisi kekurangan dan
kelebihan. Tapi, calon X tersebut
dirasa lebih banyak sisi
positifnya pak/bu.
(I think both of them have
positive and negative sides,
but, I feel the X candidate has
more positive sides.)

Although the example above is a
contradict strategy, the hedges “I think”
is still used. The may be seen as
speaker’s effort to minimize the FTAs or
as speakers’ respect to the one with the
higher power. In this case, Fernández
(2013) asserts that this mitigated device
is to soften the threat to the hearer’s face.
This kind of effort is essential especially
for the disagreement to the higher power
since the bigger gap between the
speaker’s and the interlocutor’s power,
the higher the face-threat is (Brown and
Levinson, 1987).

Disagreement strategies used to interlocutor
with equal power

In the meantime, when facing the
interlocutor with the same level of
power, such as classmates, the
participants use different composition of
disagreement strategies. The strategies
consist of contradictions (50%),
challenges (20%), no disagreement: silent
(20%) and no disagreement: avoidance
(10%).

Different from the strategies used to
the superior, the use of contradictions by
the participants seems dominant.
Another strategy employed is challenges
in which the speaker feels doubt about

the proposition so that s/he asks for
proof (Muntigl and Turnbull, 1998).
These two strategies are classified by
Chen (2006) into direct disagreement. It
means that the speaker bluntly refute
others’ opinion by stating the opposing
statement. For example:

Contradiction
Belum tentu, elektabilitas itu
naik turun. Dengan visi misinya
saya yakin presiden pilihan saya
akan terpilih
(Not really, electability is
dynamic. With his vision and
mission, I believe my choice
will win.)
Challenge
Wah, iya ya? Kata siapa tuh
lebih unggul? Ada surveynya ga?
(Was it? Who said he is
winning? Is there any survey?)

Unlike contradiction in the previous
context (disagreement to the superior),
the contradiction strategies in the first
example shows blunt disagreement
device –belum tentu/not really—and
expression of certainty—saya yakin/I
believe. Besides, in the second example
also it is apparently that there is no
doubt of the speaker to “attack other’s
competency” (Muntigl and Turnbull,
1998 as cited in Orfano 2012) by asking
the proof of the statement—‘is there any
survey?’ These elements, somehow,
express the speaker’s tendency to
aggravate the interlocutor’s face. That is
no wonder that Orfano (2012) mentioned
challenges as ‘moderate cost of face.’

This, again, might be caused by the
power factor. In this occasion, the power
of the speaker and the interlocutor is
equal. This power equality, furthermore,
allows both of the speaker and the
interlocutor to directly and frankly
disagree with any of their statement. It is



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education ISSN 2301-7554
Vol. 3, Issue 2, June 2015 http://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE

since they have the same chance to
exercise their power, so they cannot
control or hinder contribution of one
another (Fairclough, 2001).

Disagreement Strategies used to the
Subordinate (Lower Power)

Meanwhile, the result shows that
various strategies also employed by the
participants to disagree with the one
with the lower power, e.g. younger
brother/sister. The strategies include
contradiction (30%), counterclaims (10%),
challenges (40%), no disagreement: silent
(10%) and no disagreement: agreement
(10%).

The most frequently used strategies
in disagreeing with the subordinate are
contradictions and challenges. Basically,
those dominant strategies are the same
as those which are used to the equal
power. But, in this context, challenges
strategies has a bigger number than
contradictions. As it has been mentioned
previously, challenges are so called
moderate cost of face (Orfano 2012) since
the possibility of interlocutor’ losing face
is bigger than the counterclaims
strategies (low cost of face) but smaller
that the irrelevancy claims strategy (high
cost of face). In relation to this, Muntigl
and Turnbull (1998) also state that
challenge is an undesirable perception,
attitude and action which are attributed
to addressee. So, it means that in
disagreeing with the subordinate, the
participants tend to sacrifice the
interlocutor’s positive face.

For this situation, level of power is
not the only factor. The choice of
challenge strategies is also in association
with social distance or closeness of the
speaker and the interlocutor. As
mentioned by Brown and Levinson (1987
as cited in Grundy, 2008: 197), there are
three aspects in determining the degree

of face-threatening acts, namely social
distance, power differential, and ratio of
imposition. It means that the lesser the
gap between social distance and power
differential, the smaller degree of face-
threat to be redressed by appropriate
linguistic strategy. Thus, although the
power of the speaker is higher than the
interlocutor and the nature of challenge
strategy is ‘moderate cost of face’
(Orfano, 2012), this strategy would not
really cause a high degree of face-threat
since the interlocutor—participants’
sister/brother—has close social distance,

CONCLUSIONS
It can be concluded that the

Indonesian speakers tend to use
different disagreement strategies to
different level of power of the
interlocutor. To the interlocutor with the
higher power (the superior), the
speakers tend to use counterclaims and
no disagreement strategies. In addition,
to the speakers with the same level of
power, the contradiction strategy is
preferred. In the meantime, to the
interlocutor with the lower level of
power, the speakers are likely to choose
challenge. These various selections of
disagreement strategies are also
influenced by concept of FTAs of Brown
and Levinson (1987).

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Realization of Disagreement Strategies by Indonesian Speakers

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