JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching https://e-journal.undikma.ac.id/index.php/jollt Email: jollt@undikma.ac.id DOI: https://doi.org/10.33394/jollt.v%vi%i.6071 January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 p-ISSN: 2338-0810 e-ISSN: 2621-1378 pp. 144-150 JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 144 THE LANGUAGE VARIATIONS USED AMONG SPEAKERS OF SASAK LOMBOK, WEST NUSA TENGGARA 1Sugianto, 1Muhammad Asrul Hasby 1English Lecturer, English Language Education, Faculty of Culture, Management and Business, Mandalika University of Education, Indonesia Corresponding Author Email: sugianto@undikma.ac.id Article Info Abstract Article History Received: October 2022 Revised: December 2022 Published: January 2023 Sasak language is rich of language varieties, both in dialect (pronunciation) and vocabulary. It is a unique language which shows some influences from Java, Bali and Makasar as the neigbouring Islands. The research is aimed at revealing the language variations made by the “sasak” speaker (an Austronesian language family) when they speak “sasaknese”. The research is qualitatively describe how the speakers of sasak stand the existence of their language by renewing, updating it through language variations to gain belonging sense among teens who were gradually used modern languages. For the sake of finding out accurate and valid data on sasaknese language variations used, some related literatures on relevant issues were deeply read and reviewed to provide the supporting data sources. The research data were collected and analyzed in qualitative ways. The model of data analysis were divided into three stages of data analysis, those stages are data reduction where the researcher selects and simplifies the big data into a more simple and readable one. And then display the data where the researcher fits the selected data into tables, matrixes or charts to support reader data display. The last stage is conclusion drawing and verification where the researcher made some verifications data to draw a final conclusion of the research. After all, the reports the language variations exist in sasak language, a language that is spoken by native community who live in Lombok. This local language is now endangered for the ignorances. Keywords Language Variation; Sasak Language; Endangered; How to cite: Sugianto., & Hasby, M.A. (2023). The Language Variations Used among Speakers of Sasak Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, 11(1), pp. 144-150. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33394/jollt.v%vi%i.6071 INTRODUCTION Important to say that “Sasak” is the name of one particular ethnic living in Lombok Island West Nusa Tenggara. Meanwhile, the Sasak language which is also known as “Sasaknese” is a language mostly spoken by all Sasak Ethnic members along with Bahasa Indonesia as the unified language (Syarifaturrahman et al., 2017). The Sasak language is not the only language spoken in Lombok, there are Samawa, and Mbojo language which is spoken by around five to ten percent of the community who live in Lombok (Shibatani, 2008). Sasak Language is only used by the Sasak ethnic group, the majority population of Lombok. The Sasak people acquire Sasak language as their mother tongue or first language which is then followed by learning the Indonesian language as the official language. Sasak language is rich in language varieties, both in dialect (pronunciation) and vocabulary (Sugianto & Kamarudin, 2021). It is a unique language that shows some influences from Java, Bali, and Makasar as the neighboring Islands. As time goes by, many vocabularies were adopted from those neighboring Languages. The Sasak language itself was much influenced by the Balinese and Javanese languages. This fact cannot be denied since the two great kingdoms from Java and Bali, Majapahit and Karang Asem were expanding their territories and involves Lombok wholly. Some facts of words that are really adopted from Balinese is “Cokor” which mean Sugianto & Hasby The Language Variation Used ……….. JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 145 “feet” is also understood Bali and in Lombok (Sugianto & Kamarudin, 2021; Wouk, 1999). In Javanese there is the word “tumbas” which mean “buy” has the same meaning and function in Sasak language. This fact shows that some of the words from that two main islands Bali and Java were adopted into Sasak language (Aridawati et al., 2022; Sugianto & Kamarudin, 2021). However, these adopting words does not mean the three of them are intelligible. The Balinese must learn Sasaknese to fully understand the sasak language as well as Javanese. The Sasak language that is spoken by ethnics live around Lombok in fact has many variations. Those language variations have their own patterns, characteristics and uniqueness in each area of sasak native speakers (Wilian, 2006; Zain et al., 2022). Language is universal because every language has a number of linguistic components such as phonological, morphological, syntactic, and lexicon.. Besides, language is unique because it has its own structure and the system is not necessarily the same as the structure and system of other languages (Chaer, 2003). The language classes do exist among the speakers of Sasak, the language classes are staged into three levels. These three levels are different in terms of user context and the user of the language itself. The first class is the noble class. This language class speaks by the nobles who rules the country, district, or region and person who have money or are wealthy (Aridawati et al., 2022). The second language class is The Madya class. This language class speaks by middle-class family who owns enough money and land. Ordinary class is a language class spoken generally by persons who do activities in a public area like markets, streets, beaches or clubs, etc. Sasak language for a very long time had become a pride for its speakers until the modernization era comes with its pros and cons. Speaking this language affected the social behaviors and habits of the ethnics member which was described to be brave, honest, and responsible society which was then known as “Lombok” As mentioned in literature by Warta (2010), he explained that the word “Lombok” was derived from the word “loumbouk” which mean “be straight” which then symbolized the character of people of Sasak with honest character. Based on the geographic location, the speaker of “sasak language” spread around east Lombok with Ngeno Ngene dominant dialect, while the rest speakers speak Menu-Meni dialect. At the central part of Lombok live the Meriak Meriku sasak speaker with menu meni speakers around 25% of them. Sasak language consists of five dialects; Dialect Kuto- kute, dialect Ngeto- Ngete, dialect Meno- Mene, dialect Ngeno- Ngene and dialect Mariaq-Mariqu (Thoir, 1979). The west Lombok and Mataram the capital city mostly speak Ngeno-Ngene dialect of sasak while Kuto-Kute dialect exist around North Lombok. Here in the study, the statement of problems was formulated through the question “what language variations do the speakers of sasak speak in their daily speaking activity?” with this question then the research objective at finding out what language variations the speakers of sasak. RESEARCH METHOD The descriptive qualitative research method of the research was used in the study where a deepen description reveals the phenomenon of Sasak speakers' interactions using some language variation. The description reveals how the use of language variations can preserve the use of the Sasak language during the modernization and globalization era. The description also explains how dialects happen in a natural setting. The researcher uses a qualitative approach because the data from the information is collected in the form of words or statements that do not require calculations with numbers or statistical analysis on analyzing the data. The description of language variations purely describes the actual data from the intended Sasak speakers. Subjects in this study were the informants who live in Lombok and speak the Sasak language. That criterion is a general qualification before meeting the special qualifications as the research informants. The certain qualification to fulfill for the research informants are firstly Sugianto & Hasby The Language Variation Used ……….. JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 146 the age criteria, that the informant must be up to 30 years old, the second criteria that the informant must be a native speaker of Sasak, thirdly, the informant must be a person with out- beyond insight which is proved by the education levels they took. And the last criterion to meet is that the informant must be a native of the motherland, this criterion is important to make sure the informant represents the area of a language variation. Other sources of research data were also from formerly related research that told about language variations in Sasak. These data sources were then referred to and adapted to meet the specific aim of this research. One of the data sources was from Mahyuni (2006) who revealed the facts about language variations, dialects, and sociolects in Sasak. These could help the research much on mapping the language variations all around Lombok Island. In qualitative research, the instrument is the researcher himself because researchers as a tool that can adjust to the aspects of the situation and may collect a variety of data, Sugiyono (2014: 305). The researcher came to the research field and addressed some related questions to dig up the information for the sake of answering the research questions as the main aim of the research. RESEARCH FINDINGS The research found that the term “language variations” in the Sasak language tend to those different dialects and accents spoken among the Sasaknese (Sasak People). A matter of fact, there is a bit of difference between that definition confirmed to the former language variations definition addressed in the earlier chapter of this writing. By and large, it is known that the term language variation refers to regional, social, or contextual differences in the ways that a particular language is used. Variation between languages, dialects, and speakers is known as interspeaker variations rather than language variation. Variation within the language of a single speaker is called intraspeaker variation, and the finding of the study reported that this kind of variation is widely speared among Sasak speakers. The study of language variation involves many aspects of language. The language variation can be in terms of phonemes, morphemes, syntactic structure, and the shifting meaning of the words or sentences from the former meaning in a particular language. All aspects of language (including phonemes, morphemes, syntactic structures, and meanings) are subject to variation. As one of the main issues in the study of linguistics, language variation has its formal study which is known as variationist sociolinguistics or sociolinguistics. The language variation itself, according to John Benjamins (2002) divided into three types of variation those variations are dialectal variation, linguistic variation, and sociolinguistic variation. Linguistics Variation refers to the alternation between elements is constrained by the linguistic context in which they occur. With sociolinguistic variation, speakers can choose between elements in the same linguistic context, and the alternation is probabilistic. Furthermore, the probability of one form being chosen over another is also affected in a probabilistic way by a range of extra-linguistic factors. Linguistic variation plays a vital role in the study of language use since it is impossible to study the language forms used in natural texts without being confronted with the issue of linguistic variability. A data fond from one of the former Linguist named Mahyuni (2006) from Mataram University stated that Sasak dialects can be classified into some classifications. The first classification is said to be Ngeno- Ngene dialect. This dialect of sasak is spoken by the people of Lombok who live around central west coast of Lombok and central east to north east coast of Lombok. The second classification is known as Meno- Mene dialect. This language variation is spoken by the people of Lombok who live around Praya, central Lombok. The third classification is Ngeto- Nggete dialect. This dialect is spoken by the people live around East Lombok like in Suralaga and Sembalun. The fourth classification is Kuto- Kute dialect. The dialect is spoken by the people around north to east of the northern coast of Lombok, like in Tanjung, Santong, Bayan, and other civilizations live in north part of Lombok Island. The fifth Sugianto & Hasby The Language Variation Used ……….. JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 147 is Meriaq-Meriku dialect. This dialect belongs to south central area around Bonjeruk, Sengkol and Pujut at cetral Lombok distict. As the time flies, the Meriak Meriku dialect now much been spoken in east Lombok as well, like in Labuapi and Gerung. Those various dialects address different language variation in each parts of Lombok. In addition, the research reported that there is another dialect that also play dominant role in sasaknese speakers. The dialect is Menu-Meni dialect. The dialect seems tobe forgotten by many researchers. The specific reason of not involving this dialect into some language variation classifications is not yet been found. The fact, this Menu Meni dialect is widely spoken by the sasaknese speaker around south east of Lombok like in Jerowaru, Sakra, and keruak. Even this dialect often been used by the most singer of sasak to sing their song instead of using any other dialects like Kuto Kute or Ngeno Ngene. Among that language classification in Sasak, the are also found the data so called “language class” The language class does exist among the speakers of sasak, the language classes are widely staged into three stages in sasak. These three level are different in terms of used context and the user of the language itself. The first class is noble class. This language class speaks by the nobles who rules the country, district or region and person who much money or are wealthy. The second language class is The Madya class. This language class speaks by the middle class family who own enough money and land. Ordinary class is a language class speaks generally by the persons who do activities in a public area like markets, streets, beaches or clubs etc. The noble class of Sasak often speaks a language that is assumed to be polite language. These noble classes appear to use some noble title following their regular name. The noblest title exist in sasak is “Raden” for man who born from the kingdom side. This title is addressed to man only, meanwhile the woman noble uses “Lale”. This noble title might be found different from other parts of Lombok like in the north part of Lombok which tends to use “Dende” instead of “lale”. In the central part of Lombok the noble community of society may choose “Lalu” as the noble title and “baiq” for the woman noble. This noble society is categorized into “menak” category, this category spokes high class of sasak language variations called “tiang-nggih” The “tiang nggih” language variation is the opposite of “aoq ape” language variation. Tiang enggih is used to respect the speaker to whom it is spoken. Meanwhile the “aoq ape” emphasizes on the friendship, familiarity, and casualty. It can be spoken to anyone along the street and get new friends. Conversely, the “tiang nggih” is not for “street talking” it was used by the former kings and queen of sasak. It addresses highness, and caould be assumed “mocking” when it is spoken to non menak. Thus, being polite in English never be the same with being polite in sasak. DISCUSSION Language Variations Reflects Class in Sasak An old and classic language must stand and go through generations. Let us say the examples of old languages like Javanese, Arabic, or Anglo which are the origin of English now had gone through thousands of years even decades, yet still many speakers loyally speak those languages (Aridawati et al., 2022). What makes them stand from the flows of globalization and modernization? Surely there are some characteristics, uniqueness, and variations that make them special and could not be replaced by any other languages in the modern era. As well as in Sasak language, there are some language aspects that still exist and depend on the existence of using Sasak language in society (Sukenti et al., 2016; Wouk, 2006). If one says that language used by the society reflects their social class, it seems to be true and happened in sasak language speaking. This research found that the different class of societies in sasak tend to use different language class. This language high-class level can be used to speak to those who assumed to be a noble one where it is not applicable to those who belong to lower class of the society (Sugianto Sugianto & Hasby The Language Variation Used ……….. JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 148 & Kamaruddin, 2021). In short, it is said that high class language variation applied to those who high pride or noble family. The research reported that saying “Enggih tiang sampun medaran” is something awkward if it is addressed to those who categorized “commoner” or people in general. Saying “aok wahq tak mangan” is more applicable variation. Saying this utterances assumed more friendly and casual. A foreigner who learn sasak language is recommended to study the commoner variations. With some considerations, that foreigners can make more friends faster than using the noble variation one (Syarifaturrahman et al., 2017). The use of commoner variations is widely can be found in daily communication in sasak. This commoner variation are considered more flexible and contains various vocabularies differences than in noble one (Zain et al, 2022; Archangeli et al., 2020). In fact, the research found that the vocabulary to address the word “eat” can be “medaran” “medahar” in noble class. Conversely, a commoner can use many expressions to address the same word, those are like “mangan”, “nelen”, “kakan” or the angry use only variations like “ngerodok” “ngeredek” takgatih” “takdarak”. Those language variations can be classified into three variations that reflects three class of societies. Noble variation is respectful. They use a respective variation of language (Krats, 2006; Pappas, 2021). Not every one from any class of society can use and understand this sasak language variation. Commoners use the middle-class variations where every one from any class of society can address this variation. For this casual and flexible, this variation of the sasak language is worth to learn for those who want to learn the sasak language. The third variation is used for those who are angry or those who so called “rude”. The use of this language variation may lead those who speak it into conflict with the hearer or the person to whom they speak. For this reason, this sasak language variation can not be found in villagers speaking. Instead it can be found in the bus station or crowded places with high criminal levels. The research report found three utterances that when someone say these in sasak language can bring three different responses: “silak de bekelor” then the speaker is respected with honor. “aneh te mangan” then the speaker is friend and treated so friendly. “mah tie ngerodok” then the fight might happened between the speaker and the person to whom he speaks. From the finding utterances, it is clear that language variation in sasak reflect the class of people who speak it (Fahruddiningrum, 2019; Setiawan, 2017). However, those language variations are used according to it situation because sometime you do not always deal with good person. Good language variations result good responses when it is used in good situation (Alkapitani et al., 2017). Beyond those three variations and classes, there are two variations that are assumed to be “rude” when it is used to another society group who do not speak that language variation. The research found that society from western part of Lombok (around Narmada, Lingsar, and Gerung) is offended when person from southeast part of lombok (around Jerowaru, Sukaraja, Keruak) welcomed and served them to have some dishes by saying “silak de jamban” which mean “silahkan disantap” or “please enjoy the meal” the responses given can be terrible even fighting might happen, because to them the variation is assumed into “rude” variation (Austin, 2013). Conversely, when the western part society of Lombok please the southeast part society to have the meal by saying “aneh silak entak wah” the possibility of being offended is hundred percent because to them using this language variation is so “angry” level to them. This variation of language is only used by the person who are getting angry and bring the opposite meaning which mean “what a shame, you do not eat that meal!!”. Seeing this facts, it is concluded that a language variation that categorized standard and polite to one group of society might not when it is spoken to other societies. Sugianto & Hasby The Language Variation Used ……….. JOLLT Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, January 2023. Vol.11, No.1 | 149 CONCLUSION Language variation used reflects the class of speakers who speak the language. The Sasak used language variations to address the social levels, they speak a polite version to speak to nobles, elders and parents. They communicate the casual variation to speak to friends, acquaintances, and foreigners that they meet. They speak another variation (rude variation) when they meet certain situations (like anger, damning, or swearing). Regardless of the rude variations, the existence of these Sasak language variations can indeed prevent the Sasak language itself from being abandoned by the teen speakers that now begin to appreciate using the Sasak language with variations. The existences of language variations make the new experience in using the Sasak language. Even some native speakers who have already been introduced to any kind of social media have now used variations on sasak language to speak on their channels like facebook, youtube, Instagram or TikTok. They use sasak language to grasp the attention from their viewers and followers by showing the uniqueness of the language variations the use. Even the national radio and tv announcers, TVRI and RRI NTB greeting the audiences by saying “hallo semeton sasak, napi kabar, semoga sehat selalu” this casual variation to hearth and closer to the audiences. Indeed, this variation is not applicable to the highest level of social society in Lombok. Instead of saying “hallo semeton sasak, napi kabar, semoga sehat selalu” it is considered to be more and politer to say “hello kadang-jari senamian, dumogi rahayu” however the first variation is more accepted and widely used that the feeling it brought more familiar and friendly. To sum up, the language variation used, implicitly addresses the speaker's social class. The high-class society uses noble titles following their name. They speak menak language “tiang nggih” the second class tends to be more flexible with their casual “aoq-ape” variation. They make friends easily, everyone who speaks the same variation is relative. The lower class speaks “rude” they use slang and terms that only understood by their social community. REFERENCES Alkapitani, M., Syahdan, S., & Priyono, P. (2017). The enrichment of new vocabularies in Sasak language because of gold mining spreading in Sekotong west Lombok. International journal of social sciences and humanities, 1(3), 182-193. 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