An Analysis of English Users in Reading and Speaking Text

An Analysis of English Users in Reading and Speaking Text in EFL

Textbooks in Curriculum 2013 used by the First Graders of Junior and

Senior High School

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree of

Sarjana Pendidikan

Damaris Fajar Dewanti

112008065

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LIERATURE

SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

SALATIGA

2013

ii



Senior High School

THESIS



Sarjana Pendidikan


112008065

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LIERATURE

SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

SALATIGA

2013

iii



Senior High School

THESIS



Sarjana Pendidikan


112008065

Approved by:

Nugrahenny T. Zacharias, Ph. D. Christian Rudianto, M.Appling.

Supervisor Examiner

iv

COPYRIGHT STATEMENT

This thesis contains no such material as has been submitted for examination in any course or

accepted for the fulfillment of any degree or diploma in any university. To the best of my

knowledge and my belief, this contains no material previously published or written by any

other person except where due reference is made in the text.

Copyright@ 2013. Damaris Fajar Dewanti and Nugrahenny T. Zacharias, Ph. D.

All rights reserved. No part of this thesis may be reproduced by any means without the

permission of at least one of the copyright owners of the English Department, Faculty of

Language and Literature, SatyaWacana Christian University, Salatiga.


v

PUBLICATION AGREEMENT DECLARATION

As a member of the (SWCU) Satya Wacana Christian University academic

community, I verify that:

Name : Damaris Fajar Dewanti

Student ID Number : 112008065

Study Program : English Education

Faculty : Language and Literature

Kind of Work : Undergraduate Thesis

In developing my knowledge, I agree to provide SWCU with a non-exclusive royalty free

right for my intellectual property and the contents therein entitled:

AN ANALYSIS OF ENGLISH USERS IN READING AND SPEAKING TEXT IN EFL

TEXTBOOKS IN CURRICULUM 2013 USED BY THE FIRST GRADERS OF JUNIOR AND

SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL

along with any pertinent equipment.

With this non-exclusive royalty free right, SWCU maintains the right to copy, reproduce,

print, publish, post, display, incorporate, store in or scan into a retrieval system or database,

transmit, broadcast, barter or sell my intellectual property, in whole or in part without my

express written permission, as long as my name is still included as the writer.

This declaration is made according to the best of my knowledge.

Made in : Salatiga

Date : September 4th

, 2013

Verified by signee,


Approved by

Thesis Supervisor Thesis Examiner

Nugrahenny T. Zacharias, Ph. D. Christian Rudianto, M.Appling.

1



Senior High School

Abstract

The study was conducted to examine the representation of the main characters in EFL

(English as Foreign Language) textbooks used by the first grade of Junior and Senior High

School. There were two textbooks were analyzed, Bright (Zaida, 2013) and Pathway to

English (Sudarwati& Grace, 2013). These books were analyzed due to the changing of the

KTSP (Kurikulum Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan) into the new curriculum, curriculum 2013.

The study focused on analyzing the speaking and reading text with the representation of main

characters refers to Kachru (1985) categorization of Inner circle, Outer circle, and Expanding

circle country. The data were analyzed quantitatively. The findings showed that the two

textbooks tended to represent Indonesian main characters as English users in Expanding

circle countries. Moreover, there were three categories being represented through the text

such as Inner circle, Outer circle, and Expanding circle countries other than Indonesia.

Several main characters from ethnic groups in Indonesia were also found in the text. One

implication from the results is that if the textbooks provide a dominant role for Indonesian

main characters which is part of the Expanding circle countries, teacher can try to add some

additional materials about the users of English in Outer circle countries. So that the students

might understand that English users are not limited to the Inner circle Countries (Matsuda,

2002).

Keywords: Inner circle, Outer circle, Expanding circle

Introduction

As a student of English Department (ED) of Satya Wacana Christian University,

Salatiga, I had to take a Teaching Practicum course which required me to teach in a real

school context. In this process, I had to act and behave like a real teacher. Teaching

Practicum course also required me to get engaged with some English textbooks material used

by the English teachers. When I took a look at some textbooks, I realized that English

language had different functions in different parts of the world. The main characters of

English users in the textbooks were significant for the students. They might assume that

2

English belongs to a certain country because of the main characters which was represented in

the textbooks. The main characters were the name that existed and represented in the

textbooks which belonged to a certain country.

The diversity of the main characters existed in the textbooks urged me to have a

research study about the representation of main characters in the EFL (English as Foreign

Language) textbooks. The reason was because nowadays English users were not only from

the Inner circle country, but also people outside the Inner circle country learned and used

English as their foreign or second language. The textbooks used in this research were based

on, curriculum 2013, that Ministry of Education and Culture of Indonesia legitimized. The

transition of Curriculum KTSP (Kurikulum Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan) 2006 to curriculum

2013 by the Ministry was so fast. Temporarily, curriculum 2013 was only implemented for 1st

and 4th

grade Elementary School, and 1st grade Junior and Senior High School (WID/ES,

2013). This transition attracts my attention to use the new textbooks of curriculum 2013 as

the object of this research study. Though the changing of curriculum was not triggered by

representation of English users, this study aimed to know the representative of Inner, Outer,

and Expanding circle countries in the new curriculum 2013 textbooks.

Knowing that there were differences of main characters from different English

speaking country, this research study was guided by the following research question: What

kinds of main characters are represented as English users in 7th

and 11th

grade Indonesian

EFL textbooks? The reason why I choose this topic was because I wondered whether the new

textbooks in Junior and Senior High School used different representation from English

speaking country or not. The fact that nowadays, in the era of English as International

Language (EIL), the inclination for textbooks needed to be EIL-oriented. As McKay (2012)

said that “EIL material should be relevant to the domains in which English used in the

particular learning context” and “EIL materials should include examples of the diversity of

3

English varieties used today” (p.81). So, it was important topic to be studied in order to find

out whether the textbooks analyzed had already included the variety of English user(s) or not.

Matsuda (2002), in her study of the representation of users and uses of English in

beginning Japanese EFL textbooks suggested that the textbook that is used for the research

tended to emphasize the Inner circle countries. Matsuda analyzed seven textbooks which

were approved by Monbusho (Ministry of Education in Japan). The result from the study

showed that the Inner circle orientation in the representation of English users and use in the

textbooks used in the research resembled the view of the ownership of English held by

Japanese secondary students.

There were three categorizations of countries that reflected the main characters in

which English used as stated in McKay (2002). The first was Inner circle country (i.e., The

United Kingdom, The United States, Australia, Canada, and New Zealand) (Kachru, 1985).

In the Inner circle country, the majority of people learned English as their first language.

English become their primary language beside spoken another language at home. Beside that

English also become the numerous languages which perform in the society. Outer circle

countries were used English as their second language. These countries were former colonies

of inner circle countries, English was institutionalized. That English language used in

intranational communication (e.g., language of law, medium of education), linguistic

nativization had taken place, and literary works were created in variety of English, despite

other languages (usually indigenous languages) still maintain important functions (Kachru,

1992). Other than that, people from Expanding circle country as a foreign language use it for

international rather than intranational communication. English did not have important

functions like it had in the Inner or Outer circle country.

4

As the number of people who use English was growth, the functions of it were also

increased. The worldwide spread of English has changed the demographics of the population

of English users. English become the most popular modern language studied in the

Expanding circle countries (Graddol, 1997). In Expanding circle countries, English was

growing vast because this language was studied in school as the foreign language. Here,

Indonesia was in the Expanding circle area since English language was used and learned as a

foreign language. Moreover, the spread of English in Indonesia was very fast because of the

government regulation that English ought to be taught in school. As a response, almost all

students in Indonesia learned English and owned English textbooks. It means by almost all

students in school in Indonesia learned English and have textbooks to help them learn

English.

Since almost all students in Indonesia learned English as their foreign language

(Imperani, 2012), students ought to understand that English used as an international language.

They had to aware of inner circle, outer circle, and expanding circle countries users so that

they were not assumed that English belong to Inner circle countries. Textbooks, which

become the most significant sources of various English users, might play an important role to

their understanding about English as an international language in. Furthermore, textbooks

also played an important role in EFL classrooms. According to Bardovi-Harlig (1996),

textbook is a high prestige source that EFL students tend to perceive because they do not

receive much from the outside classroom. Textbooks made an influential input source for the

students and a place where the logical understanding about the presentation of English

classrooms and student’s beliefs and also the perception of the English language begin.

Furthermore, by conducting this study, it was aimed to analyze what kinds of main

characters were represented as English users in the EFL textbooks in Indonesia. Moreover,

because of Indonesia population, which consisted of 300 different ethnic groups (Czermak,

5

Delanghe & Weng, 2003), this research was also aimed to analyze what kinds of ethnic

groups in Indonesia which were represented in the textbooks. The new curriculum had been

made legitimate, that was curriculum 2013; I would conduct this research by using the new

textbooks based on the new curriculum. Since the curriculum 2013 legitimated only for the

first year of junior (7th

grade) and senior (11th

grade) high school, this research would

investigate the textbooks from grade 7th

and 11th

only. So, by knowing what kinds of main

characters were represented the English users, teacher could teach the students about the

worldwide spread and understanding of English as International language; that the students

might not assume that English belongs to a certain country. In regard of the aims of this

study, a research question appeared to investigate this matter: What kinds of main characters

are represented as English users in 7th

and 11th

grade Indonesian EFL textbooks?

Theoretical Framework

The aim of the study was to analyze the representation of English users in the

textbooks used by 7th

and 11th

grade. The focus would be the speaking and reading context

only, due to the differences of the materials in the textbooks. According to Kachru’s

categorization of countries in which English used as stated in McKay (2002), there are three

categorizations, those are:

1. Inner circle countries

Inner circle country was for countries where English used as their primary language,

such as Australia, Canada, and The United States. English was not used only by the native

speaker or people in Inner Circle countries, but also between native speaker and nonnative

speaker and between nonnative speakers (Graddol, 1997). The fact, the role of nonnative

speakers in composing the form and a function of the English language had increased. As

Graddol (1997) stated that native speakers may think that English language may belongs to

6

them, but they who speak English as second or foreign language will determine its world

future.

2. Outer circle countries

Outer circle country was for countries where English used as their second language,

such as India, Philippine, and Singapore. As Matsuda(2002) believe that the representation of

English users from Outer circle and Expanding circle countries in the textbooks should be

more than the representation English users from Inner circle country, so that the textbooks

would help students to understand that English users were not limited to the Inner circle

countries only. Therefore, by having an understanding in English as International Language

(EIL) that English users were not limited to the Inner circle countries, the students had an

awareness of the diversity of English use today so that they were better prepared in

international context (McKay, 2012).

3. Expanding circle countries

Expanding circle country was for countries where English use as their foreign

language, such as Indonesia, Korea, and Japan. As stated before that Indonesia was one of the

Expanding Circle countries which was learned and used English as the foreign language.

Indonesia was in archipelago of over eighteen thousand islands, has a rich and diverse multi-

cultural heritage. There were over 300 different ethnic groups that spoken over 700 languages

(Czermak, Delanghe &Weng, 2003). It means that there were more than thousands of people

who learned English as their foreign language. The diversity of Indonesia would show up in

this study, by knowing how many kinds of ethnic groups are existed in this country. By

knowing numerous kinds of ethnic groups, the worldwide spread of English in Indonesia

could be seen as Graddol (1997) stated about the worldwide spread English as international

language. Kirkpatrick (2010) also argued that Indonesia is multilingual country which is

learned English as lingua franca.

7

The Study

Research Question

The study was guided by the following research question:

What kinds of main characters are represented as English users in 7th

and 11th

grade

Indonesian EFL textbooks?

Textbook Selection

The focus of the analysis would be the main characters of representation in speaking

and reading contents from the textbooks. Menteri Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan (Ministry of

Education and Culture) in the new regulation No 68 in 2013 about basic structure and

curriculum framework in First High School (Junior) / Islamic Junior High School and No 69

in 2013 about basic structure and curriculum framework in High School (Senior) / Madrasah

Aliyah determined that the new curriculum will be realized from academic year

2013/2014.Due to the new curriculum, this research used only two books which had been

printed from the same publisher. The first book was Bright, An English Course for Junior

High School Students by Nur Zaida (2013) published by Erlangga. This book has 195 pages,

8 units, and 4 skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing). The design of the book was

easy to follow for students in the first grade of Junior High School. Each unit has a lot of

activities on listening, speaking, reading, and writing skills that tended the students to be

more active in practice English.

The second book that I analyzed was Pathway to English, for Senior High School

Grade X by Th. M. Sudarwati and Eudia Grace (2013) published by Erlangga. This book has

255 pages, 11 chapters, 4 skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing), and also language

for aesthetic. The design of the book was suitable for students in the first grade of Senior

8

High School. Each chapter has different theme to help students to think critically about the

existing theme. The analysis of these two books focused on the main characters in the

speaking and reading texts. The reason was because the difference of the books level which

made the contents of the skills also different, so by choosing reading and speaking skills it

would make the research easier to conduct. This research only analyzed two textbooks due to

the limitation of books I had. The analysis was done to find out what kinds of nationality and

what kinds of Indonesian ethnic groups were represented in the textbooks from the speaking

and reading texts.

Instrument of data collection

The data of representation of main characters in the EFL textbooks used by 7th

and

11th

grade were collected from the two English textbooks. The data were only collected on

the speaking and reading contents only due to the differences of the materials. From Bright

textbook, the speaking contents were represented by the picture of bubbles while the reading

contents were represented by the picture of open book. Moreover from Pathway to English

textbook, the speaking contents were taken from the Speaking part and the reading contents

were taken from the Reading part of the book. The reason why I used these books was

because these books were the new published books and adapted from curriculum 2013. The

data was analyzed quantitatively. Look at the Table 1 below:

Table 1: Checklist of selected main characters from the textbooks

No Chapter Skills

(Speaking /

Reading)

Character

Name

Nationality (IC/OC/EC

other than Indo/unknown)

Topic Notes

Note: IC=Inner circle, OC=Outer circle, EC other than Indo=Expanding circle other than Indonesia

9

After that, I counted the total number of the main characters based on their nationality, such

as Inner circle (IC), Outer circle (OC), Expanding circle other than Indonesia (EC other than

Indo), and Unknown. For unknown categorize, these main characters did not have any

explanation of their nationality. After that, I wrote it down in table. Look at the Table 2

below:

Table 2: The percentage the nationality of main characters represented in the textbooks

Textbook Indonesia IC OC EC other than Indonesia Unknown

Bright

Pathway to

English (PE)

Total

Since the aim of the study was also to analyze what kinds of ethnic groups of Indonesia in the

textbooks, after done collecting data from Table 2, I would get data of how many Indonesian

main characters which were represented in the textbooks. Based on the former data, I wrote

down the data in a table and counted the total number of the main characters represented as

ethnic groups in Indonesia. Look at the Table 3 below:

Table 3: The percentage of Indonesian main characters as ethnic groups represented in the

textbooks

Textbooks Ethnic Groups in Indonesia represented in the textbooks

Bright (BR)

PE

Total

Moreover, having the percentage helped me to draw a chart as the data display in my finding

and discussion part.

10

Procedures of data collection and data analysis

The study used quantitative data analysis. The textbooks (Bright, An English Course

for Junior High School Students and Pathway to English) that were analyzed were two books

used by Junior High School and Senior High School. The textbooks analyzed were for the

first graders of Junior High (7th

grade) and Senior High (11th

grade) due to the new regulation

of the new curriculum 2013 nowadays.

After having the textbooks, I started to analyze them. First of all, I read and tried to

found the speaking and reading texts. After I finished reading and selecting the texts, I wrote

down the name of the main characters that represented the certain categorization in a table.

Results and Discussion

This section illustrated the number of nationality of the main characters that were

represented in the EFL textbooks used by the first grade of Junior High School and Senior

High School in the new curriculum of 2013. Table 4 below represents where the percentage

of the main characters in each textbook came from and the number of words uttered by those

characters in the main speaking and reading text. The table below was based on Matsuda

(2002).

Table 4: The representation of Nationality of the main characters in speaking and reading text

Textbook Indonesia IC OC EC other than Indonesia Unknown

Bright 40 (66%) 21 (34%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%)

PE 18 (49%) 12 (32%) 3 (8%) 2 (5%) 2 (5%)

Total 58 (59%) 33 (34%) 3 (3%) 2 (2%) 2 (2%)

11

Furthermore, figure 1 represents the data display of the nationality of the main characters in

the textbooks:

Figure 1: The representation of Nationality of the main characters in speaking and

reading text

As seen from the table and the data display above, it was clearly shown that there

were five kinds of nationalities that were represented by the speaking and reading texts in the

EFL textbooks used in this research. From the texts, 59% represented from Indonesia, 34%

represented inner circle countries ( including United States and Australia), 2% represented

expanding circle country other than Indonesia (from Japan), 3% represented outer circle

country (including Singapore and Philippine), and 2% represented unknown characters that

could not be identified the nationality. From data above, it could be seen that the textbooks

used in this study tended to represent Indonesian main characters.

More than half of Indonesian main characters in both textbooks gave impression that

Indonesian used English often. By learning English as their foreign language, Indonesian saw

that English is important; the widespread demand for English was here for the foreseeable

future. English become a vital skill that ought to be learned by the citizens from early an of

age as possible, if their respective countries were to modernize and to be able to participate in

59%

34%

3% 2% 2%

Indonesia

IC

OC

EC other than Indonesia

Unknown

12

My Daily Activities

I am Akbar, a junior high school student in Lampung. As a student, my daily routine is studying

at school, but I also do many activities besides going to school.

From Monday to Saturday, I get up at 5 o’clock. Then, I make my bed, do some exercise and a

have a shower. After breakfast, I go to school by bicycle. It takes me about 30 minutes from my house to

my school. Usually, I study at school until 12.30 p.m. I return home at 2 p.m. In the afternoon I attend

English and computer courses. I always get home just in time for dinner at 7 p.m. After dinner, I read

books or prepare for school in my room while my parents are watching television in the living room.

I am free at weekends. On Sunday mornings, I get up later than usual. Then, I often go shopping

downtown with my friends. Sometimes we go for a picnic in the countryside. On rainy Sundays, I stay at

home reading books and listening to music.

I am quite happy with my daily activities.

Source: Bright (Nur Zaida, 2013), Unit 4, page 83

today’s globalized world as decided by Ministries of Education throughout East and

Southeast Asia (Kirkpatrick, 2009).

I also found that there were also several main characters from different ethnicity in

Indonesia. In paragraphs below, I would discuss the nationality of the main characters from

the textbooks from the highest to the lowest percentage.

Indonesian main characters

The first main character was from Indonesia. One example of the nationality of the

main characters that represented Indonesian character was in the reading text that described

about daily activities. The following text, Text 1, is one example of the main characters of

Indonesia:

Text 1

As stated in text above, it was shown that the main characters’ name was Akbar. He is

a junior high school student in Lampung (paragraph 1). Lampung is one of the cities in

Sumatra Island which is located on the south part of Sumatra Island. Cortazzi and Jin (1999,

p.203) note that knowing Indonesian culture as students’ own culture helps them to be aware

of their own culture. It is hoped that through the existence of this text in textbook, it could

13

make students aware of Indonesian geographic factors as being significant by the Indonesian

students. Moreover, another purpose including this text in the textbook perhaps to make

students think of Indonesians also speak and use English.

Table 5 illustrated the number of ethnicity in Indonesia that showed up in the both

textbook. Indonesia, an archipelago of over eighteen thousand island, had a rich and diverse

multi-cultural heritage. There were over 300 different ethnic groups that were spoken over

700 languages (Czermak, Delanghe & Weng, 2003). The examples of the ethnic groups were

Javanese, Sundanese, Balinese, Ambonese, Lampungnese, etc. According to SIL

International (2001), Indonesia had many islands and each island had several kinds of ethnic

groups. Different ethnic groups also had different indigenous name based on its ethnic group.

Therefore, from the name of the main characters in the textbooks that used in this research,

the diversity of Indonesia would show up. Not only had the Javanese which was the largest

ethnic groups at 45% of the total population been used in the textbooks, but also other

ethnics.

Table 5. The representation of Indonesian main characters in reading and speaking texts

From the data gathered, there were several ethnic groups of Indonesia that were

represented in the textbooks reading and speaking text. Figure 2 represents the data display of

the representation of Indonesian main characters in reading and speaking text with the name

of the ethnic groups:

Textbo

ok

Javan

ese

Balin

ese

Lampung

nese

Cirebone

se

Bandung /

Sundanese

Jakartanese Kupang

nese

South Sumatra /

Palembangnese

Unknown

Bright (0%) 2

(5%) 1 (3%) 1 (3%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%) 36 (90%)

PE 5

(28%) 1

(6%) 0 (0%) 0 (0%) 2 (11%) 2 (11%) 1 (6%) 2 (11%) 5 (28%)

Total 5 (9%) 3

(5%) 1 (2%) 1 (2%) 2 (3%) 2 (3%) 1 (2%) 2 (3%) 41 (71%)

14

Figure 2: The representation of Indonesian main characters in reading and speaking texts

The table above showed the number of ethnicity from the main characters in both

textbooks. The ethnicity which were represented in the textbooks were Javanese 9%, Balinese

5%, Lampungnese 2%, Cirebonese 2%, Bandung/Sundanese 3%, Jakartanese 3%,

Kupangnese 2%, South Sumatra/Palembangnese 3%, and for 71% is unknown. It could be

seen that the Indonesia main characters represented only eight ethnic groups, and the other

was unknown. In paragraphs that follow, I would discuss the Indonesia main character

represented in the textbooks.

Another example of Indonesian main characters that represented in the textbooks was

Javanese main characters. The example of the Javanese main characters was Text 2 below:

Text 2

9%

5% 2%

2%

3% 3%

2% 3%

71%

Javanese

Balinese

Lampungnese

Cirebonese

Bandung/Sundanese

Jakartanese

Kupangnese

South Sumatra/Palembangnese

Unknown

Dialogue 3| Salma is introducing her father to Ms Yuniarti.

Salma : Dad, I’d like you to meet Ms Yuniarti Sugianto. She is my teacher.

Gunawan : I am Gunawan. How do you do Ms Sugianto? Pleased to meet you.

Ms Yuniarti : How do you do? Pleased to meet you.

Source: Bright (Zaida, 2013) Unit 1, Page 10

15

On the text, it was clearly seen that Salma, Gunawan, and Yuniarti Sugianto were the

name of typical Javanese. I was Javanese and lived in the Javanese people community. Those

names were familiar in our society that most of the people still use name with preface (Su-)

like in the name Sugianto. Another example was my parents name, my father’s name is

Suwarto and my mother’s is Sukarsih. Both of them are Javanese and their name has preface

(Su-). Besides that, Gunawan was also Javanese name that Javanese people still use in their

society.

Another example of Indonesian main characters that represented in the textbooks was

Balinese main characters. The example of Balinese main characters is Text 3 below:

Text 3

Ketut was indigenous name from Bali. Bali was a province of Indonesia which was

located between Java and Lombok. Balinese usually used their indigenous name to make an

identity of their children. In the text above, the name Ketut means the fourth children of the

family. Meanwhile, Firman was an Indonesian name means commandment or God’s word.

Besides that, Hendrik also an Indonesian name even though it is absorbed from Inner or

Outer circle country. Moreover, the text above was taken between the Indonesian main

characters that were supported by a picture refer to the Indonesian people.

To make it clear for the analysis, below was another example of Indonesian main

characters that represented as the main character in the textbook. Look at Text 4:

3. Ketut : Which one is Lisa?

Firman : She is sitting between Salma and Hendrik.

6. Ketut : I can’t find the can. Do you know where it is?

Hendrik : Look! It’s on the chair.

Source: Bright (Zaida, 2013), Unit 3, Page 55

16

Text 4

Ananda Mirza Iryanti was clearly stated as Cirebonese, because she was born in

Cirebon and going to school at SD Nagari 1 Cirebon (paragraph 2, line 1). Cirebon was a port

city on the north coast of the Java Island; the exact location was in the province of West Java.

In the text above, Mirza was also known as an Indonesian traditional dancer. She was good at

Jaipong dance. Jaipong was a traditional dance from West Java. Children and teenagers

nowadays tended to choose modern dance to learn than traditional dance which was their

heritage. The reason why this dance included in this text above, perhaps to maintain the

intangible cultural heritage (UNESCO, 2003). Moreover, by knowing the additional

explanation that students got from the text, students might understand that Indonesian people

was one of the user English language.

The other example of Indonesian main characters was Kupangnese which is the

people from Nusa Tenggara Timur (NTT) or East Nusa Tenggara. In this research,

Kupangnese represented 2% of the Indonesian main characters. The example of Kupangnese

main character is Text 5:

This is Ananda Mirza Iryanti. You can call her Mirza.

Mirza was born in Cirebon, 8 June 2001. She is a student of SD Nagari 1 Cirebon. She won the best

dancer consecutively in Cirebon for three years, 2010, 2011 and 2012. She is a popular young dancer in

Cirebon. She always dances perfectly. She practices every day. She started dancing when she was seven

years old. She is good at Indonesian traditional dances, especially Jaipong.

In the future Mirza does not want to be a doctor or an engineer. She wants to be a professional dancer.

She wants to master traditional dances.

Source: Bright (Zaida, 2013), Unit 8, Page 189

17

Text 5

The text above was a comment from an article in the newspaper. It was clearly stated

that Henrietta Manu was from NTT Kupang.

In the textbooks, there were 71% of the main characters could not be identified their

ethnic groups. The reasons that they could not be identified are:

1) There was no additional information or explanation about their ethnic groups.

2) The name was too common, so that it could not be identified as the member of one

ethnic group.

3) The name of the main characters was adapted from inner circle country or other

country.

Those three reasons made the selection of which main characters was the member of which

ethnic groups so hard. I decided to put them in the unknown group to make the collection of

data easier.

The findings above showed that the widespread English as the language which was

learned by countries outside the Inner circle countries was true. As Crystal (2003a:67-69;

2003b: 108-109) noted that about 750 million speakers of English as a foreign language is

speakers from the countries of Expanding circle. That is potentially a lot of Indonesian are

users the English language to communicate with and the widespread of English use in

different places in the world. As Lauder (2008) believes that the extremely widespread use of

Henrietta Manu – NTT Kupang

This is typical for government installations. Operation and maintenance should be well-budgeted and

appropriately allocated. Operation and maintenance is often difficult to verify, hence many

opportunities to steal public funds. How ironic!

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati& Grace, 2013), Chapter8, Page 167.

18

English means that there is a great deal of variation in the English which is used in different

places.

Inner Circle (IC) country

The next nationality that I wanted to discuss now was from inner circle country. In the

Inner circle country, the majority people learn English as their first language, such as

Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States. English become their primary

language even they speak another language at home. Beside that English also become the

numerous languages performs in the society of the Inner circle countries (Kachru, 1985). An

example of the main character from inner circle country is Text 6 below:

Text 6

Horace was an example of the main characters from inner circle. In the text above, it

was stated that Horace was from Melbourne, Australia. Another example of Inner circle main

characters that represented in the textbook was in the following text, Text 7, below:

Text 7

To be honest, I must say that some principals prefer making money than paying attention to the students. It is

difficult to find the principals and teachers who are exemplary figures. Brawls have frequently occurred in the

same area for years, but there has been no effort to take preventive actions.

(Horace – Melbourne Australia)

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati& Grace, 2013), chapter 9, page 188

Michele and I are deeply saddened by the lost of life, injuries and damage that have occurred as a result of

the recent earthquake and tsunami in West Sumatra.

At the same time, I am heartened and encouraged by the remarkable resilience of the Indonesian people and

the commitment of their Government to rapidly assist the victims. Meanwhile, our thoughts and prayers are

with the Indonesian people and all those affected by this tragedy.

26 October 2006

Barack Obama

President of the United States

Washington, DC

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati& Grace, 2013), Chapter 7, page 136

19

Barack Obama was the main character from the text above who comes from inner circle

country. He was the President of the United States. In the text above, he wrote a letter of

condolence for Indonesia. Even though the topic was about earthquake and tsunami in

Indonesia, the main character was from inner circle country.

The findings supported Kachru (1985) that the main characters of the text were from

Inner circle country categories. English become a part of the country’s important institutions,

and it plays a primary language in the society.

Outer Circle (OC) country

Outer circle country was former colonies of inner circle countries, English was

institutionalized. English language had acquired an extended range of uses in intranational

communication (e.g., language of law, medium of education), linguistic nativization had

taken place, and literary works were created in that variety of English, although other

languages (usually indigenous language) still maintained important functions (Kachru, 1992).

In the textbooks that used for this research, there were two countries that represented outer

circle country. There are Singapore and Philippines. An example of the main character from

outer circle country was Text 8 below:

Text 8

As seen from the text above, Vince Gill was from Singapore. Singapore was the

country which uses English as one of the official languages and also a former colonies of the

I personally feel that the deaths of two high school students in Jakarta reflect the poor quality of our

educational system.

Many teachers these days do not instill in their students the value of humanity.

(Vince Gill – Singapore)

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati&Grace, 2013), Chapter 9, Page 188

20

United Kingdom as the inner circle country. Another example that represents the outer circle

country main character was Text 9 below:

Text 9

From the text above, Henry and Fangasan were two people from Manila, Philippine.

Philippine was one of the outer circle countries because English was the official language of

the country beside Tagalog language. The percentage of the main characters from outer circle

countries in the textbooks was fewer than I expected. This result was different as Matsuda

(2003) stated that, “(…) textbooks can include more main characters from the outer and

expanding circles and assign these characters larger roles in chapter dialogues than what they

currently have.” (p.724). The finding showed that the main characters are from Singapore and

Manila which are included in Outer circle area. English become a part of the countries’

important institutions and plays an important “second language’ role in a multilingual setting.

Stop Giving Alms to Beggars

The City Social Welfare and Development office in Manila, Philippines appealed to the public to refrain from

giving alms to beggars. The authorities are very concerned with this matter for several reasons.

Firs, the beggars are abusing people’s generosity. Children and babies are sometimes used t gain sympathy.

Some beggars don’t use the money people give them for essential needs such as food. “Once I saw a child I

gave money to because he said he was very hungry. But then a few minutes later I saw him using the money to

bet in some gambling games he and his pals were into,” said Henry, a bank teller in Manila.

Second, the local authorities are having difficulties with the entry of beggars, who regularly come up to Manila,

usually on holidays and occasions where the number of tourist normally increase. When the authorities notice

the group is here again, they advise them to go back to their hometown. But after they are sent home, they

always come back. “This is why we ask the public not to give alms because it gives them a reason to come

back,” said Fangasan, one of the local authorities.

Third, giving alms to beggars doesn’t help them in the long run and actually hurts them by taking away their

motivation to work. “We tell them to go back to their hometown because there are poverty alleviation projects

in their towns,” Fangasan added.

“Thus, stop giving alms to beggars from now on because it will increase the number of beggars coming to

Manila and it will not give them freedom from poverty,” said Fangasan.

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati&Grace, 2013), Chapter 11, Page 239

21

Expanding Circle (EC) country other than Indonesia

The next nationality was from expanding circle country other than Indonesia. From

the textbook that I used in the study, there were two countries that included in expanding

circle country. Those countries were Japan and Manila. Expanding circle country was a

country that the people learn English as a foreign language and used it predominantly for

international, rather than intranational, communication (Matsuda, 2002). An example of the

main character from expanding circle country other than Indonesia is Text 10 below:

Text 10

From the text above, it was clearly stated that the main character’s name was from

expanding circle country. Naoto Kan was from Japan and he was the Prime Minister of

Japan. The widespread of English was not only in Outer circle countries but also in the

Expanding circle countries. The text above showed that English users in the Expanding circle

country use English as their foreign language because they recognized the importance of

English as international language but which were not given English any special official status

(Lauder, 2008).

I am deeply saddened to hear that there were so many people who suffered and were killed by an earthquake on

25 Oct. in Mentawai, West Sumatra, and the Mount Merapi eruption on 26 Oct. in Yogyakarta.

From the bottom of my heart, I convey my condolences to the families of the people who were killed and pray

for the injured victims to immediately recover.

Naoto Kan

Prime Minister of Japan

Tokyo

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati& Grace, 2013), Chapter 7, page 137

22

Unknown

There was 2% of unidentified main characters’ nationality. These main characters did

not have any explanation of their nationality. The example of unknown main character was

Text 11 below:

Text 11

On the text above, Theresa Kok was represented unidentified main character. There

was not any explanation or additional information which explains who Theresa Kok is.

Based on the analysis above, there were four categories of main characters

represented in the textbooks. If I combined the number of Indonesian main characters and the

main characters from expanding circle countries other than Indonesia, the percentage was still

bigger than the inner circle countries. The inclusion of users in the outer circle and the

expanding circle countries that students were unfamiliar with would help them see that

English uses were not limited to the inner circle countries (Matsuda (2003), p. 725).

Dear Achmad,

Last Sunday was a fine day and the first thing I did in the morning was to go to Bukit Cemara Park to

lead a mutual aid to clean up the park.

I used to go to this park to walk and exercise at least once a week, but I have been unable to do

so lately die to final examinations. After hearing some complaints from some jogger friends who used to

jog in this park, I went to my headmaster to organize the mutual aid activity starting at 9 a.m.

When I arrived at the park, my jogger friends told me that the park ha been cleaned up in the

past few weeks and the contractor of the park even reinstalled the pillar of the gate which had been

broken for half a year.

My friends and I walked around the park to pick up rubbish for about an hour. Then, I rushed

back home to take a quick shower.

You know what, my body ached after all that work. I had a great appetite during lunch. After

lunch, I went back home and slept for two hours and a half. Oh my God, I have not slept a bit earlier

that night.

Oh God, age is catching up. I did not realize my body had been so exhausted after that one hour

of mutual aid.

You know, the funny thing is, I hardly have time to clean up my own home, I used to hire a

part-time maid to do it, and now I went to sweep and clean up the park. Hahaha!

Cheers,

Theresa Kok

Source: Pathway to English (Sudarwati&Grace, 2013), Chapter 10, Page 214-125

23

Conclusion

The purpose of this study was to analyze what kinds of main characters are

represented in the EFL textbooks in curriculum 2013 used by first grade of Junior and Senior

High School. The results of this research study revealed important points related to the main

characters represented in the EFL textbooks mentioned. Based on the data analysis and the

discussion, the two textbooks tended to represent Indonesian main characters as included in

Expanding circle countries. Other main characters represented were included Inner circle

countries (Australia, The United States), Outer circle countries (Singapore and Philippine),

Expanding circle countries other than Indonesia (Japan) and unknown categories.

In addition, there were two things that become the limitation of this study. The first

thing was the textbooks used in this study were only textbooks for the first grade of Junior

and Senior High School. It was due to the reason why the government legitimized the

curriculum 2013 to the first graders of Junior and Senior High School. The second things

were the contents from the textbooks that I used in this research. I only used the speaking and

reading text in the textbooks due to the differences of the textbooks level. The third thing was

the total number of the textbooks used in this study itself. The reason why my study only

used analyzed two kinds of textbooks was because of the limited books I had. Therefore,

having an adequate amount of time available it was hoped that further study would be able

analyze more than two books used by Junior and Senior High Schools students. Based on the

results in this study, the following points are recommended:

1) Besides Indonesian main characters, the teachers could add additional materials/

texts about other Expanding circle categories. It was because the result of this

study seemed that the Indonesian main characters (such as Papuanese, Ambonese,

Borneo, and Maduranese) represented in the textbooks quiet a lot. Therefore, a

variety of materials about other Indonesian ethnic groups was also needed.

24

2) It was very clear that the result of this study showed Outer circle country were

very limited (3%). It was necessary to put several texts that include the main

characters from Outer circle countries. So that the students could get more

knowledge about the English users from Outer circle countries.

One implication from the results was that if the textbooks provide a dominant role for

Indonesian main characters which was part of the Expanding circle countries, teacher could

try to add some additional materials about the users of English in Outer circle countries. By

adding some additional materials that had some different English users from different

categories (Kachru, 1985), the student might understand that English was not limited to Inner

circle countries, but it was now use as international language that people in the world could

use English. As believed by McKay (2012) that one central goal of English as International

Language materials needs to provide students with an awareness of the diversity of English

use today so that they are better prepared in international context. Moreover exposure to

Outer circle and Expanding circle countries other than Indonesia through representation of

English users in those countries would help students understand that English users are not

limited to the Inner circle Countries (Matsuda, 2002).

25

Acknowledgement

First of all, I would like to thank to Jesus Christ for all His kindness, strength, and

bless. Also, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my thesis supervisor,

Nugrahenny T. Zacharias, Ph. D. in giving me her time, suggestions, support, and also

guiding me patiently during my consultation time so that I could finish my thesis. I would

also show my appreciation to my examiner, Christian Rudianto, M.Appling., for his

willingness in reading and examining my thesis.

I also thank to Bapak, Ibuk, and dek Natan for their patience, support, prayers and

care. Also to all ED lecturers and friends, 2008’ers, and my beloved friends: Dewa, Tyas,

Bintang, Vitus, Mayang, Wimbo, and Nita. I would never forget experiences we have shared

together and I would say thank you so much for your time, help and support so that I could

start and finish my thesis. Finally, I would say thank you for Dudu, Citra Poko, and Yayas for

their help in the completion of my thesis writing.


26

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Documents

An Analysis of English Users in Reading and Speaking Text