The Function of Honorific Term Ité: Cultural Perspectives from Manggarai, Indonesia

Sebastianus Menggo

doi:10.24071/joll.v24i2.7926

The Function of Honorific Term Ité: Cultural Perspectives from Manggarai, Indonesia

Sebastianus Menggo^(1*),

(1) Scopus ID: 57208132011, WoS ID: ABH-6653-2020, Universitas Katolik Indonesia Santu Paulus Ruteng
(*) Corresponding Author

Abstract

Culture pertains to human existence and encompasses the various aspects of a civilization’s way of life. On the other hand, language refers to the complex communication system employed by individuals inside a specific culture or group. Language utilization typically represents the societal customs, cognitive processes, cognitive functioning, historical context, and interconnections within a given human civilization. Utilizing the inclusive personal pronoun "ité" in the Manggarai language facilitates identifying a connection between linguistic elements and cultural principles. This study examines the relationship between the two specified elements, particularly emphasizing the arguments offered. The data were obtained using observations and interviews conducted with fifteen traditional representatives. Subsequently, a qualitative analysis was performed on the collected data. The findings suggest that its utilization in its various manifestations indicates the cultural norms and customs observed by those living in the Manggarai region of Indonesia. Based on the presented data, this study asserts that the first personal pronoun plural inclusive "ité" in the Manggarai language and culture serves as a means for the speaker to communicate politeness and humility towards the hearer or listener. It signifies a genuine respect for the interlocutor, particularly when they hold a high position. In addition, ité shows familiarity, brotherhood, and sincerity in interpersonal relationships by expressing respect, appreciation, and enthusiasm. Furthermore, it functions as a deep gratitude towards the Divine Father.

Keywords

culture communication; honorific term; Manggarai language

Full Text:

PDF

References

Adel, S. M. R., Davoudi, M., & Ramezanzadeh, A. (2016). A qualitative study of politeness strategies used by Iranian EFL learners in a class blog. Iranian Journal of Language Teaching Research, 4(1), 47–62.

Asoulin, E. (2016). Language as an instrument of thought. Glossa: A Journal of General Linguistics, 1(1), 1–23.

Baydak, A. V., Scharioth, C., & Il'yashenko, I. A. (2015). Interaction of Language and culture in the process of international education. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 215, 14–18. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.11.567

Beloglazova, E. V., & Kabakchi, V. V. (2020). Siberia / Sibir / Sibir’ / Sybir: what’s in a name? Journal of Siberian Federal University - Humanities and Social Sciences, 13(12), 1902–1913. https://doi.org/10.17516/1997-1370-0693

Bustan, F., & Liunokas, Y. (2019). The forms and meanings of verbal expressions on the existence of God as a supernatural power in Manggarai language (a cultural linguistic analyisis). International Journal of Innovation, Creativity and Change, 5(3), 442–457.

Chomsky, N. (2006). Language and Mind (Third Edit). Cambridge University Press.

Cordeiro, C. M. (2018). Using systemic functional linguistics as method in identifying semogenic strategies in intercultural communication: A study of the collocation of “time” and “different” by Swedish managers with international management experiences. Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, 47(3), 207–225. https://doi.org/10.1080/17475759.2018.1455601

Daar, G. F., Beratha, N. L. S., Suastra, I. M., & Sukarini, N. W. (2023). The off-record politeness strategy and cultural values of the Belis negotiation speech event: A Sociopragmatic study. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 12(3), 612–622. https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v12i3.48746

Efendi, A., & Sukamto, K. E. (2020). Mbasaaké in family circle: Linguistic socialization of politeness in Javanese. Linguistik Indonesia, 38(2), 165–178. https://doi.org/10.26499/li.v38i2.177

Elsa, H. . (2021). Communication games: Their contribution to developing speaking skills. International Journal of Instruction, 14(4), 643–658. https://doi.org/10.29333/iji.2021.14437a

Ethelb, H. (2015). Using Address Terms in Showing Politeness with Reference to Their Translation from Arabic into English. International Journal of Comparative Literature and Translation Studies, 3(3), 27–37. https://doi.org/10.7575/aiac.ijclts.v.3n.3p.27

Fedosyuk, M. (2020). A taboo on personal names and on the pronoun ty as a component of Russian speech etiquette. Przeglad Wschodnioeuropejski, 11(1), 417–425. https://doi.org/10.31648/PW.5999

Fernández-Mallat, V. (2020). Forms of address in interaction: Evidence from Chilean Spanish. Journal of Pragmatics, 161, 95–106. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2020.03.006

Földes, C. (2021). The network of relationships between language and culture: Retrospect of the research, approaches and description trends. Glottotheory, 12(1), 9–46. https://doi.org/10.1515/glot-2020-2014

Ghasemi, A. A. (2020). Towards a model of intercultural communicative competence in Iranian EFL context: Testing the role of international posture, ideal L2 self, L2 self-confidence, and metacognitive strategies. Journal of Intercultural Communication Research, 49(1), 41–60. https://doi.org/10.1080/17475759.2019.1705877

Gunas, T., Menggo, S., & Jem, Y. H. (2021). The Verbs with the Notion of Eating in Manggaraian Language : Natural Semantic Metalanguage Analysis. RETORIKA: Jurnal Ilmu Bahasa, 7(2), 191–200. https://doi.org/10.22225/jr.7.2.3826.191-200

Ho, A. H. Y., Dutta, O., Tan-Ho, G., Choo, P. Y., Low, X. C., Chong, P. H., Ng, C., & Ganapathy, S. (2019). Thematic analysis of spousal interaction patterns among Asian parents of children with chronic life-threatening illness. BMJ Open, 9(11), 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2019-032582

Holmes, J. (2013). An introduction to sociolinguistics (Fourth Edi). Routledge.

Imai, M., Kanero, J., & Masuda, T. (2016). Culture, language, and thought. Current Opinion PsychologyPsychology, 8, 70–77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.copsyc.2015.10.011

Jama, B. K., Ardika, I, W., Ardhana, I, K., Setiawan, I, K., & Menggo, S. (2020). Metaphor construction in caci performance of Manggarai speech community. Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 11(3), 418–426. https://doi.org/10.17507/jltr.1103.10

Jdetawy, L. F., & Hamzah, M. H. (2020). Linguistic Etiquette: A Review from a Pragmatic Perspective. Technium Social Sciences Journal, 7, 695–717.

Kanaza, F. U. (2020). A Language Function: The Analysis of Conative Function in Meghan Markle’S Speech. Etnolingual, 4(1), 43–55.

Kramsch, C. (2014). Language and culture. AILA Review, 27, 30–50. https://doi.org/10.1075/aila.27.02kra

Kramsch, C. (2015). Culture in foreign language teaching. Iranian Journal of Language Teaching Research, 1(1), 57–78.

Lakoff, R. (1976). Language and woman’s place. Language in Society, 2(1), 45–80.

Light, J. (2009). “Communication is the essence of human life”: reflections on communicative competence. Augmentative and Alternative Communication, 13(2), 61–70. https://doi.org/10.1080/07434619712331277848

Mahmud, M. (2019). The use of politeness strategies in the classroom context by English university students. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 8(3), 597–606. https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v8i3.15258

Mansoor, I. K. (2018). Politeness: Linguistic Study. International Journal of Research in Social Sciences and Humanities, 8(4), 167–179.

Mazari, A., & Derraz, N. (2015). Language and culture. International Journal of Humanities and Cultural Studies, 2(2), 350–359.

Menggo, S., Ndiung, S., & Pandor, P. (2021). Semiotic construction in promoting intercultural communication : A tiba meka rite of Manggarai , Indonesia. Cultura. International Journal of Philosophy of Culture and Axiology, 18(2), 187–210.

Menggo, S., Suparwa, I. N., & Astawa, I. G. (2019). Hindering factors in the achievement of English communicative competence in tourism academy students. Aksara, 31(1), 137–152. https://doi.org/10.29255/aksara.v31i1.235.137- 152

Morgan, W. J., & Guilherme, A. (2015). The Contrasting philosophies of Martin Buber and Frantz Fanon: The political in education as dialogue or as defiance. Diogenes, 61(1), 28–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/0392192115615789

Moser, C., & Devereux, M. (2019). Gender neutral pronouns: A modest proposal. International Journal of Transgenderism, 20(2–3), 331–332. https://doi.org/10.1080/15532739.2016.1217446

Nodoushan, M. A. S. (2019). Clearing the Mist: The Border between Linguistic Politeness and Social Etiquette. International Journal of Language Studies, 13(2), 109–120.

Olan, E., & Belló, P. (2016). The relationship between language, culture and society: Teachers of English as a foreign language (EFL) positioning in society. Gist Education and Learning Research Journal, 12, 72–95.

Pearson, H. (2023). Impersonal pronouns and first-person perspective. Annual Review of Linguistics, 9, 293–311. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-linguistics-031120-102547

Piotrowski, S. (2023). Language and culture in the translation of Specialist texts. Neofilolog, 60(1), 130–145. https://doi.org/10.14746/n.2023.60.1.10

Poolsawad, K., Kanjanawasee, S., & Wudthayagorn, J. (2015). Development of an English Communicative Competence Diagnostic Approach. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 191, 759–763. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.04.462

Pourkalhor, O., & Esfandiari, N. (2017). Culture in language learning: background, issues and implications. International Journal of English Language and Translation Studies, 05(01), 23–32.

Ptasznik, B. (2021). Single-clause when-defining models in English monolingual pedagogical dictionaries. International Journal of Lexicography, 34(1), 112–134. https://doi.org/10.1093/ijl/ecaa021

Ramlan, R. (2018). The Correlation between Language Acquisition and Language Planning. Budapest International Research and Critics Institute (BIRCI-Journal), 1, 20–26.

Richerson, P. J., & Boyd, R. (2020). The human life history is adapted to exploit the adaptive advantages of culture. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 375. https://doi.org/10.1098/rstb.2019.0498

Ross, J. (2019). Father-son expressions of love and intimacy: Social and cultural evolution in contemporary western society. Gender and Love: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, 55–63. https://doi.org/10.1163/9781848882089_007

Sakura, K. N. (2019). Manggarai speech community local wisdom in ireng neka dur ata: Preliminary study of cultural ingistics. Journal of A Sustainable Global South, 3(1), 32–35. https://doi.org/10.24843/jsgs.2019.v03.i01.p07

Sapitri, P. A., Chasanah, A., Putri, A. A., & Paulima, J. (2020). Exploring Brown and Levinson’s politeness strategies: An explanation on the nature of the politeness phenomenon. REiLA : Journal of Research and Innovation in Language, 1(3), 111–117. https://doi.org/10.31849/reila.v1i3.3801

Semana, I. L., & Menggo, S. (2022). Personal pronouns Ite as politeness marker in Manggarai language and culture, Indonesia. EduLite: Journal of English Education, Literature and Culture, 7(2), 356–372. https://doi.org/10.30659/e.7.2.356-372

Semiun, A., & Jeladu, K. (2016). Verb nominalization of Manggarai language: The case of central Manggarai dialect in west Flores Indonesia. International Journal of Language, 4(1), 122–136. https://doi.org/10.15640/ijll.v4n1a13

Sun, L. (2013). Culture teaching in foreign language teaching. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 3(2), 371–375. https://doi.org/10.4304/tpls.3.2.371-375

Susanto, D. (2014). The Pragmatic Meanings of Address Terms Sampeyan and Anda. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics, 4(1), 140–155. https://doi.org/10.17509/ijal.v4i1.606

Wardhaugh, R. (2006). An Introduction to sociolinguistics (5th edi.). Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

Widayati, M., & Sudiyana, B. (2020). The uses of honorifics by president candidate in the campaign news text on national newspapers. International Journal of English Linguistics, Literature, and Education, 2(2), 116–130.

Wu, C., Yama, H., & Zakaria, N. (2023). How do Japanese and Chinese view each other? Understanding the meaning of low-context culture in intercultural communication. Global Networks, 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1111/glob.12440

Yamashita, A. (2019). Polite language forms as markers of an emerging new language order in Nikkei-Brazilian Japanese. Languages, MDPI Journal, 4(49), 1–16. https://doi.org/10.3390/languages4030049

DOI: https://doi.org/10.24071/joll.v24i2.7926