PHRASE AMBIGUITY IN THE JAKARTA POST READER’S … · ON FOREST FIRE HAZE IN INDONESIA . ... Dr. Fr. B. Alip, ... Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul

PHRASE AMBIGUITY IN THE JAKARTA POST READER’S FORUM SECTION

ON FOREST FIRE HAZE IN INDONESIA

AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra

in English Letters

By

AGUSTINA RENIE ARUM SARI

Student Number: 124214064

ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS

FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

YOGYAKARTA 2017

PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI

ii



AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra

in English Letters

By



ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAM DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS

FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

YOGYAKARTA 2017


iii

A Sarjana Sastra Undergraduate Thesis



By



Approved by

Dr. Fr. B. Alip, M.Pd., M.A. 9 February 2017 Advisor Arina Isti’anah, S.Pd., M.Hum 9 February 2017 Co-Advisor


iv

A Sarjana Sastra Undergraduate Thesis



By AGUSTINA RENIE ARUM SARI


Defended before the Board of Examiners On 20 February 2017

and Declared Acceptable

BOARD OF EXAMINERS

Name Signature

Chairperson : Dr. Fr. B. Alip, M.Pd., M.A. ____________

Secretary : Arina Isti’anah, S.Pd., M.Hum ____________

Member 1 : Dr. Bernardine Ria Lestari ____________

Member 2 : Dr. Fr. B. Alip, M.Pd., M.A. ____________

Member 3 : Arina Isti’anah, S.Pd., M.Hum ____________

Yogyakarta, 28 February 2017 Faculty of Letters Sanata Dharma University Dean

Dr. Paulus Ari Subagyo, M.Hum.


https://www.usd.ac.id/profile_detail.php?id=00195

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STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY

I certify that this undergraduate thesis contains no material which has been previously submitted for the award of any degree at any university, and that, to the best of my knowledge, this undergraduate thesis contain no material previously written by any other person except where due reference is made in the text of the undergraduate thesis.

Yogyakarta, 7 February 2017

Agustina Renie Arum Sari


vi

LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH UNTUK KEPETINGAN AKADEMIS

Yang bertanda tangan di bawah ini, saya mahasiswi Universitas Sanata Dharma

Nama : Agustina Renie Arum Sari Nomor Mahasiswa : 124214064 Demi pengembangan ilmu pengetahuan, saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul


ON FOREST FIRE SMOG IN INDONESIA Dengan demikian saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan Universitas Sanata Dharma hak untuk menyimpan, mengalihkan dalam bentuk media lain, mengelolanya dalam bentuk pangkalan data, mendistribusikan secara terbatas, dan mempublikasikannya di internet atau media lain untuk kepentingan akademis tanpa perlu meminta izin kepada saya maupun memberikan royalti kepada saya selama tetap mencantumkan nama saya sebagai penulis.

Demikian pernyataan ini saya buat dengan sebenarnya.

Dibuat di Yogyakarta

Pada tanggal 7 Februari 2017

Yang menyatakan,



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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to give my biggest gratitude to both my parents, Fransiscus

Borgias Agus Sumarta and Mathilda Susanti, for their love and full support to me

in finishing this study. I thank my mother for her hard work so that their children

can get good education, and my father for always be there whenever I need his

help. I am so grateful to have them in my life. Finishing this thesis was not an

easy task for me since during the time, I had other tasks to do as I work as an

employee in a company and as a freelancer at the same time. In my hardest time,

they never forgot to give me their support and attention.

I also would like to thank my thesis advisor, Dr. Fr. B. Alip, M.Pd., M.A.,

who patiently helped me. I thank him for all his time and advice for me in

finishing this thesis.

I would like to thank my big brother, Purba, for his advice, company, and

support. Although he rarely comes home, he always spares his times to

accompany me to go to places that I like and discusses the problem that I have in

finishing this thesis.

My gratitude also goes to my best friends Shuko, Angel, Tjia, Rissa, and

the rests of my friends that cannot be mentioned one by one. I thank them for their

supports and companies, for reminding me to finish my thesis as soon as I can.

Lastly, I would like to thank all the people who have helped and supported

me in my study in English Letters Department, Sanata Dharma University. The

years I have spent in this campus will not be as meaningful as it without them.



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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE……………………..………………………………………. ii APPROVAL PAGE…………………………………………………….… iii ACCEPTANCE PAGE ………………………………………………….. iv PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH…….. v STATEMENT OF ORIGNALITY……………………………………… vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………… vii TABLE OF CONTENTS………………………………………………… viii LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………….. x ABSTRACT……………………………………………………...……….. xi ABSTRAK…………………………………………………………………. xiii CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the study ................ ......................................... 1 B. Problem Formulation ...................... ........................................ 3 C. Objectives of the Study ........................................................... 4 D. Definition of Terms ................ ................................................ 5

CHAPTER II REVIEW OF LITERATURE

A. Review of Related Studies……..……………………..………. 6 B. Review of Related Theories……………………………..…….. 8

1. Theory of Phrase a. Noun Phrase ………………………………….……… 8 b. Verb Phrase…………………………...………............ 9 c. Adverbial Phrase ……………………..……...........…. 9 d. Adjective Phrase ……………………………..........… 10 e. Prepositional Phrase ………………………..........….. 10

2. English Phrase Structure …………………………...….... 10 3. Tree Diagram ………………………………………….... 11 4. Semantic Meaning and Interpretation …………….…..... 12 5. Semantic Theories of Ambiguity ……………….…….... 13

a. Types of Ambiguity …………………………..…….. 13 (i) Lexical Ambiguity…………………….……….... 13

1) Polysemy…………………………..………... 14 2) Homonymy………………………………….. 14

(ii) Structural Ambiguity……………………………. 15 1) Different ways of words grouping…………… 16

C. Theoretical Framework ……………………………………….. 17

CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY

A. Object of the Study…………………………………..……….. 18 B. Approach of the Study………………………………………… 18 C. Method of the Study…………………………………………… 19


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CHAPTER IV ANALYSIS RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

A. Ambiguous Phrases…………………………………………… 23 1. Noun Phrases………………..…………………………..... 23 2. Verb Phrases………………………………………..…..... 24 3. Adjective Phrases……………………………………….... 25

B. Types of Ambiguity………………………….……………….. 25 1. Lexical Ambiguity……………………...……………....... 26 2. Structural Ambiguity…………………..………………..... 42

CHAPTER V CONCLUSION

A. Conclusion........…………..…………….……………….……. 47 BIBLIOGRAPHY ……………………………………………………… 49 APPENDICES Appendix 1: Table of Data …………………………………... 51 Appendix 2: The Jakarta Post Article …………………….... 58 Appendix 3: The Jakarta Post Article ……………………..... 59


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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 Phrase Structure Rules ……………………………………….... 11 Table 2 Percentage of Ambiguous Phrases ……………………………… 23 Table 3 Ambiguous Phrases ……………………………………………. 24 Table 4 Types of Ambiguity ……………………………………………. 27 Table 5 Lexical Ambiguity ……………………………………………... 28 Table 6 Structural Ambiguity ……………………………...............….... 42


ABSTRACT

SARI, AGUSTINA RENIE ARUM. PHRASE AMBIGUITY IN THE JAKARTA POST READER’S FORUM SECTION ON FOREST FIRE SMOG IN INDONESIA. Yogyakarta: Department of English Letters, Faculty of Letters, Sanata Dharma University, 2016.

Language is essential for human life due to its function as a medium for people to communicate with each other. With language, people can express their feelings, ideas, and emotions. As a social creature, people use language by forming words so that they can deliver messages and information to one another in a form of spoken and written one. Even though language has a very important role in communication between people, language has its weakness in delivering message. Sometimes, people experience miscommunication by using language. Miscommunication mentioned before may happen when utterance, whether spoken or written, is ambiguous, by means that their utterance have different interpretations.

In this study, the writer identifies common phrases in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia that causes ambiguity. The writer also identifies what kinds of ambiguity are observed in the phrase. The writer analyzes the dominant phrases that cause ambiguity, the kinds of ambiguity, the interpretations of the ambiguity found, and the frequency of each kinds of ambiguity found.

The data used in conducting the study were obtained from the articles in The Jakarta Post official website, www.thejakartapost.com. The writer picked two articles randomly from the 37 articles that have been gathered from 4 August 2015 when the issue was spread and became a big public attention until 2 December 2015 when the fire was eventually put off. In order to solve the problem, the writer uses semantic and syntactic approaches. Semantics, the study of meaning abstracted away from those aspects that are derived from the intentions of the speaker, is used to find a phrase which is identified as the cause of the ambiguity. The writer needs semantic approach in order to identify what types of ambiguity that occur in the phrases. The syntactic approach is used to identify structural ambiguities which occur in the phrase. Since the writer analyses the ambiguous phrases found in the Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia, these approaches can be used. Since the study is Document (Content) Analysis of Qualitative research, the writer only uses theory in analyzing the data. The writer focuses on analyzing the content of the ambiguous phrases found in the Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia.

The results of this study shows that in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia published on 2015, there are 26 phrases that cause ambiguity found. They are 20 noun phrases and 6 verb phrases. Based on the data, the most frequent kind of phrase that causes ambiguity is noun phrase.


http://www.thejakartapost.com/

xii

From 26 ambiguous phrases found, there are 22 lexically ambiguous phrases, and 4 structurally ambiguous phrases. Therefore, the writer concludes that ambiguous phrases found in the Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia gathered from 4 August 2015 until 2 December 2015, 84.6% are lexically ambiguous, and 15.4% structurally ambiguous.


xiii

ABSTRAK

RENIE, AGUSTINA. PHRASE AMBIGUITY ON READER’S FORUM SECTION OF THE JAKARTA POST DISCUSSING THE SMOG CAUSED BY FOREST FIRE IN INDONESIA. Yogyakarta: Program Studi Sastra Inggris, Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Sanata Dharma, 2016.

Manusia membutuhkan bahasa sebagai sarana untuk berkomunikasi satu sama lain. Melalui bahasa, manusia mengekspresikan perasaan, pemikiran, dan emosi mereka. Sebagai makhluk sosial, manusia menggunakan bahasa dengan merangkai kata kata sehingga mereka dapat mengekspresikan pesan dan informasi kepada orang lain baik secara lisan maupun tertulis. Walaupun bahasa dalam hal ini sangat penting bagi manusia, bahasa memiliki kelemahan atau kekurangan dalam menyampaikan pesan dan informasi. Kadangkala, manusia mengalami kesalahpahaman ketika menggunakan bahasa sebagai sarana untuk berkomunikasi. Kesalahpahaman ini terjadi ketika kata kata yang mereka rangkai dapat diartikan berbeda atau yang biasa kita sebut ambigu.

Skripsi ini membahas frase ambigu, frase yang memungkinkan terjadinya lebih dari satu interpretasi. Frase ambigu dapat kita temui dalam kejadian sehari-hari, baik lisan maupun tertulis. Pada skripsi ini, Penulis membahas frase ambigu yang terdapat di Forum Pembaca (Reader’s Forum) dari salah satu media cetak terkemuka yang ada di Indonesia yaitu The Jakarta Post. Pada penelitian ini, Penulis menganalisa frase ambigu yang terjadi secara tertulis. Penulis mengumpulkan data dari artikel artikel pada bagian Forum Pembaca di koran The Jakarta Post yang membahas wabah asap yang disebabkan kebakaran hutan di Indonesiayang terbit dari tanggal 4 Agustus 2015 hingga tanggal 2 Desember 2015.

Dalam studi ini, penulis menggunakan teori semantic dan teori sintaks, khususnya teori ambiguity untuk menganalisis data-data yang telah didapat. Dengan teori semantik, teori yang mempelajari arti dari ungkapan, penulis menganalisis frase apa yang menjadi peyebab terjadinya ambigu dan juga tipe dr ambigu yang terjadi pada frasa. Dengan teori sintaks, penulis menguraikan struktur struktur kalimat yang dapat dibentuk dari frasa yang ambigu. Penulis mengumpulkan data dengan metode studi pustaka, melalui halaman website resmi The Jakarta Post yaitu di www.thejakartapost, dan menggunakan metode deskriptif dalam menganalisa data yang terkumpul. Metode deskriptif merupakan metode untuk membuat kesimpulan dengan cara mengumpulkan, mengklasifikasi, dan menginterpretasi data. Penulis dituntut untuk mendeskripsikan data berdasarkan formulasi masalah dan menyelesaikan masalah tersebut.

Setelah data-data dikumpulkan dan dianalisis, penulis menampilkan hasil analisis dalam bentuk persentase. Dari 26 frase ambigu yang ditemukan, terdapat 22 frase ambigu secara leksikal dan 4 frase ambigu secara struktural. Dari frase-frase ambigu yang ditemukan, 20 dari 26 frase ambigu disebabkan oleh frase kata benda (Noun Phrase). Dapat dikatakan, frase ambigu yang terdapat di artikel artikel pada bagian Forum Pembaca di koran The Jakarta Post yang membahas wabah asap yang disebabkan kebakaran hutan di Indonesiayang terbit dari tanggal


http://www.thejakartapost/

xiv

4 Agustus 2015 hingga tanggal 2 Desember 2015 terdapat 84.6% ambiguitas secara leksikal dan 15.4% ambiguitas secara struktural.


CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the study

Language is essential for human life due to its function as a medium for

people to communicate with each other. Chomsky (1979:88) states that language

serves essentially for the expression of thought. In addition, Sapir (1921:8) states

that language is a purely human and non-instinctive method of communicating

ideas, emotions and desires by means of voluntarily produced symbols. With

language, people can express their feelings, their ideas, and their emotions. As

social creatures, people use language by forming words so that they can deliver

messages and information to one another in the form of spoken and written form.

With spoken or written language, people can communicate with each other

both directly and indirectly. Nowadays, with the developments of technology,

people can communicate with each other through many ways. It has been easier

for people to gain any information about what happens even in other parts of the

world.

Written language is important for people since people cannot always talk

to others directly. It happens because of distance, time, and a lot more reasons.

There are a lot of types of written language, some of which are business letters,

news articles, novels, scripts, and song lyrics.


2

Today, English is still considered as an international language that plays

an important role as a medium for a lot of people from different countries around

the world to communicate. Crystal (2003: 2) states

“These are the kinds of statement which seem so obvious that most people would give up hardly a second thought. Of course English is a global language, they would say. You hear it on television spoken by politicians from all over the world. Wherever you travel, you see English signs and advertisements. Whenever you enter a hotel or restaurant in a foreign city, they will understand English, and there will be an English menu. “

There are a lot of media using English as the medium to communicate with people

globally. Thus, a lot of people around the world learn this language and use the

language so that their ideas, feeling and emotions can be shared globally through

media of communication such as websites, magazines, and newspapers. In

Indonesia, one of daily English newspapers published in the country is The

Jakarta Post.

Even though language has a very important role in communication

between people, language has its weakness in delivering message. Sometimes,

people experience miscommunication in using language to communicate.

Miscommunication mentioned before may happen when utterance, whether

spoken or written, is vague or ambiguous by means that their utterance may not be

delivered clearly or may have different interpretations. Ambiguity describes a

linguistic phenomenon whereby expressions are potentially understood in two or

more ways, an ambiguous expression has more than one interpretation in its

context (Asher, 1994:90).


3

While ambiguity is a phenomenon when an expression has more than one

interpretation in its context, vague expression is a word that has more than one

referents, in which the referents share similar features happens because things in

the world do not come in clear, distinct categories (Malmkjær, 1996:394). In

addition, Jurafsky (2009:549) states that vagueness is closely related to ambiguity.

Like ambiguity, vagueness can make it difficult to determine what to do with a

particular input on the basis of its meaning representations. Vagueness, however

does not give rise to multiple representations. An example of this is in the phrase

‘I want to eat Italian food’. A vague representation of the meaning of this phrase

may be appropiate for some purposes, while a more specific phrase may be

needed for other purposes.

There are two types of ambiguity: lexical ambiguity and structural

ambiguity (Mihalicek and Wilson, 2011: 227). Since the data observed in this

study are written data, the writer uses theory of lexical and structural ambiguity.

In addition, in this study, the writer is going to focus more in ambiguity than in

vague expression.

Based on the phenomenon mentioned before, the writer was interested in

conducting a research related to ambiguity. Thus, in this study, the writer

analyzed phrasal ambiguity found in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post

newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia. The writer

chooses to discuss the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia because when the

writer started writing the thesis, this issue was happening and was the hottest topic

of the period.


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B. Problem Formulation

Based on the above, the problems are formulated as below

1. What common phrases in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post

newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia cause

ambiguity?

2. What kinds of ambiguity are observed in the phrases, lexical or structural?

C. Objectives of the Study

In this thesis, there are two objectives. Firstly, the writer would like to find

out what common phrases in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post

newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia that causes

ambiguity. The data used in conducting the study have been obtained from the

articles in The Jakarta Post official website, www.thejakartapost.com. The

articles have been gathered from 4 August 2015 when the issue was spread and

became a big public attention until 2 December 2015 when the fire was eventually

put off. From the 37 articles found, the writer picked two articles randomly.

After that, the writer would like to identify whether the ambiguities

observed in the phrases are lexical or structural. This study is limited to lexical

and structural ambiguity found in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post.

The writer focuses on lexical and structural ambiguity using semantic and

syntactic approaches. The writer interprets the ambiguity found with Semantic

theory.



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D. Definition of Terms

Phrase ambiguity is described as a phenomenon when an

expression/phrase may be understood in two or more ways in its context.

Because of the arbitrariness between the sign and its referents, multiple meanings

seem to be usual (Asher, 1994:90).

Reader’s forum of The Jakarta Post is a forum provided by The Jakarta

Post Newspaper for it’s reader. In this forum, The Jakarta Post Newspaper’s

readers can share what their idea or opinion related to news that are published by

The Jakarta Post, or in brief the readers responses to news that are published by

The Jakarta Post.


CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

A. Review of Related Studies

Studies on ambiguity have been conducted by some people. One of them

is the study that has been conducted by María Teresa Sánchez Roura (1995). In

her study, she focuses on syntactic ambiguity resourceful applications in the

creation of jokes. In the end of her study, she concludes that ambiguity may be

seen as an obstacle in case it can make a misunderstanding between people, and

also may be seen as something beneficial in the way it can make people laugh and

can deliver more ideas in economical way (less words; usually in advertising).

Another study on ambiguity was conducted by Chiara Bucharia (2004) in

her article. In this paper, she analyzes ambiguities found on the newspaper

headlines and divides it into three main categories of lexical, syntactic, and

phonological ambiguity. The study is based on 135 verbally ambiguous headlines

found on web sites that lead the reader to interpret it as something humorous.

Eventually, it is concluded that the most dominant ambiguous headlines happen in

the form of syntactic ambiguity. In the case of lexical ambiguity, the main cause

of it is the homonymy of the lexical items in the headlines.

Another one was conducted by Mutiara Sekar Utami (2013). Mutiara

Sekar Utami conducted a study of lexical and structural ambiguity in the Reader’s

Forum of The Jakarta Post. The data were taken from the Reader’s Forum of The

Jakarta Post official website, www.thejakartapost.com. In her study, she identifies



7

ambiguous words, phrases, or sentences in The Jakarta Post newspaper. The

second problem that she analyzes is the part of speeches that cause the ambiguity.

She also tries to find whether or not tree diagram can be used to solve structural

ambiguity. In the end of her study, she concludes that there are 47 words and 7

phrases considered as ambiguous, and that ambiguous words and phrases found

are mostly belong to noun class. She also concludes that tree diagram can help to

visualize structural ambiguity well.

Another study on ambiguity has also been conducted by G. Khamahani

(2013). In his writing, he focuses on structural and lexical ambiguity in English

newspaper headlines written by native and non-native journalists. He provides

some guidelines for the recognition of ambiguous newspaper headlines of two

specific newspapers in a certain country. He identifies the ratio between structural

ambiguity and lexical ambiguity in English newspaper headlines written by native

and non- native journalists. In the end of his writing, he concludes that the amount

of structural ambiguity and lexical ambiguity are not the same in the two sets of

headlines. Both structural and lexical ambiguities in English newspaper are found

more in foreign newspaper headlines.

On the studies mentioned above, all of the data were taken from

newspaper (either from the headlines or the article). In this thesis, the writer

conducted a study on phrasal ambiguity in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta

Post newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia. In the end

of this thesis, the most dominant types of phrasal ambiguity in Readers Forum

section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in


8

Indonesia were to be revealed. Although the topic is accidently similar to the

study that has been conducted by Mutiara Sekar Utami in a way that the data used

in this study is also taken from Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post, the

articles that the writer used in conducting the study are different. Thus, the ratio of

the types of phrasal ambiguity and its analysis may be different in different

articles and topic. This study is an attempt to improve the study that has been

conducted by Mutiara Sekar Utami and other studies related to this topic.

B. Review of Related Theories

1. Theory of Phrase

A phrase is a word or a group of words that behaves as a single unit

(Jurafsky, 2009: 385). Fromkin (2000:96), in addition, define phrase as groups of

words where only members of particular lexical category may occur. Phrases

combine words into a larger unit that can function as a sentence element. Phrase is

an item of a particular category that may be accompanied by paraphernalia such as

modifiers and other types of items (Napoli, 1993: 50)

a. Noun Phrase

A noun phrase is a sequence of words surrounding at least one noun

(Jurafsky, 2009: 386). It is the sequence of a noun and its complement (Fromkin,

2000:121). A noun phrase consists of a noun as the head word and other words

(usually modifiers and determiners) which come after or before the noun and

modify the noun. A noun phrase may include single words like ‘she’ or ‘Michael’

and phrase like ‘the house’ and ‘Russian Hill’ (Jurafsky, 2009: 385). The whole


9

phrase works as a noun in a sentence as in‘Harry the Horse’ (Jurafsky, 2009:

386), and father of Goneril (Fromkin, 2000:121).

b. Verb Phrase

A verb phrase in English consists of a verb followed by assorted other

things; for example, one kind of verb phrase consist of a verb followed by a noun

phrase. It is a combination of main verb, its auxiliaries, its complements and other

modifiers. For example: ‘prefer a morning flight’, ‘leaving on Thursday’

(Jurafsky, 2009: 389).

c. Adverbial Phrase

Cambridge Dictionary for Advanced Learners (2008: 43) describes adverb

phrase (adverbial phrase) as phrase that consists of one or more words. The

adverb is the head of the phrase and can appear alone or it can be modified by

other words. Adverbs are one of the four major word classes, along with nouns,

verbs and adjectives.

Schachter (1985) as quoted in Jurafsky’s book page 126 states that in a

sentence ’Unfortunately, John walked home extremely slowly yesterday.’, all the

italicized are adverbs.

d. Adjective Phrase

Adjectives can also be grouped into a phrase calles an adjective phrase. It

can has an adverb before the adjective. Example: the ‘least expensive’ fare

(Jurafsky, 2009: 396).


10

An adjective phrase is a group of words that functions like an adjective in

a sentence. It consists of adjectives, modifier and any word that modifies a noun

or pronoun.

e. Prepositional Phrase

Jurafsky (2009:126) believes that prepositons occur before noun phrases;

semantically they are relational, often indicatng spatial or temporal relations,

whether literal (on it, before then, by the house) or metaphorical (on time, beside

herself).

A prepositional phrase generally has a prepostion followed by a noun

phrase. It is often used with times and dates. The examples of it are ‘to Seattle’,

‘on Wednesday’.

It consists of a preposition, objects of preposition (noun or pronoun) and

may also consist of other modifiers. Some example of it are ‘on a table’, ‘near a

wall’, ‘in the room’, ‘at the door’, and ‘under a tree’. A prepositional phrase can

function as an adjective, adverb, or even as a noun.

2. English Phrase Structure (Context Free Grammar)

The most commonly used mathematical system for modelling constituent

structure in English and other natural languages is the Context Free Grammar

(CFG) or also called Phrase Structure Grammar. A context-free grammar consist

of a set of rules and productions, each of which expresses the ways that symbols

of the language can be grouped and ordered together (Jurafsky, 2009: 387).

Phrase Structure Rules are used to show patterns of syntactic combination

so that we can see the patterns of a phrase or a sentence. They contain only names


11

of syntactic categories. No actual linguistic forms are shown in it (Mihalicek and

Wilson, 2011: 226).

Below are the table of Phrase Structure Rules stated by Mihalicek and Wilson. Table 1 Phrase Structure Rules

Rules Function S → NP VP Sentence can be formed by combining Noun Phrase (NP) and Verb Phrase (VP)

allows VPs to combine with their subject NP to form a sentence

NP → Det N Noun Phrase can be formed by combining Determiner (Det) and a Noun (N)

allows determiners to combine with a noun to form an NP

N → Adj N Noun can be formed by combining Adjective (Adj) and Noun (N)

allows attributive adjectives to be noun adjuncts(a word or phrase that provides added information)

VP → VP Adv Verb Phrase can be formed by combining verb phrase (VP) and adverbs (Adv)

allows adverbs to be VP adjuncts

VP → TV NP Verb phrase can be formed by combining transitive verbs (TV) and noun phrase (NP)

allows transitive verbs to combine with their object NP to form a VP

VP → DTV NP NP Verb phrase (VP) can be formed by combining ditransitive verbs (DTV) and noun phrases (NP)

allows ditransitive verbs to combine with their object NPs to form a VP

VP → SV S Verb phrase (VP) can be formed by combining sentential complement verbs (SV) and complement S

allows sentential complement verbs to combine with their complement S to form a VP

PP → P NP Preposition phrase (PP) can be formed by combining prepositions and noun Phrase (NP)

allows prepositions to combine with their complement NP to form a PP

N → N PP Noun can be formed by combining noun (N) and preposition phrase (PP)

allows PPs to be noun adjuncts

VP → VP PP Verb Phrase can be formed by combining verb phrase (VP) and preposition phrase (PP)

allows PPs to be VP adjuncts


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3. Tree Diagram

Akmajian, Demers, Farmer, and Harnish (2001:172) state that tree

diagram is encoded structural information of the linear order of words in a

sentence, the categorization of words into parts of speech, and the grouping of

words into structural continuents of the sentence. It is a list of structural properties

that a phrase or sentence must conform to.

In addition, Akmajian, et al (2001:183) states that tree diagrams (phrase

markers) can represent a certain variety of structural and relational concepts. In a

theory of syntax using phrase markers to represent syntactic structure, the

explanation of the phenomenon of structural ambiguity is straightforward. An

unambiguous sentence is associated with just one basic phrase marker, while a

structurally ambiguous sentence is associated with more than one basic phrase

marker. With a tree diagram, we have simplified the structure in the diagrams by

using triangles for certain phrases rather than indicating the internal structure of

the phrases.

Tree diagram is a linguistic way to represent the grouping of a

phrase/sentence. In the case of ambiguity, tree diagram can be used to show or

describe interpretations of an ambiguous phrase/sentence.

4. Semantic Meaning and Interpretation

A language is often defined as a conventional system for conveying

messages. Moreover, communication can be accomplished only because words

have certain meanings (Akmajian, et al, 2001:228). Hirst (1984:132) states


13

I will exclude from semantic interpretation any consideration of discourse pragmatics; rather, discourse pragmatics operate upon the output of the semantic interpreter. Thus, semantic interpretation does not include the resolution in context of anaphors or definite reference, or of deictic or indexical expressions, or the recognition and comprehension of speech acts, irony and sarcasm, metaphor, or other nonliteral meanings. These exclusions should not be thought of as entirely uncontroversial; while few would advocate making speech act interpretation part of semantic interpretation, Moore argues that definite reference resolution, as well as certain "local" pragmatic matters, must be resolved during semantic interpretation. Semantics is the study of meaning abstracted away from those aspects that

are derived from the intentions of the speaker. Semantic is different with

pragmatics. Semantic interpretations are excluded from the speaker/the writer

intended meaning. For example, in sentence “John kissed his wife, and so did

Sam”( http://cs.nyu.edu/), the speaker intended to say that John kissed John’s

wife, and Sam kissed Sam’s wife. In semantic, this sentence is ambiguous. It can

be interpreted as John kissed his wife, and Sam kissed her too, John kissed Sam’s

wife, and Sam kissed her too, or Sam and John kissed their own wife.

5. Semantic Theories of Ambiguity

Ambiguity is described as a phenomenon when an expression may be

understood in two or more ways in its context because of the arbitrariness

between the sign and its referents multiple meanings seems to be usual (Asher,

1994:90). In a simple way, if we can have two or more interpretations from an

expression (usually lead to confusion), We can say that that expression is

ambiguous.


14

a. Types of Ambiguity

i. Lexical Ambiguity

Lexical ambiguity happens when a word or phrase has more than different

referents which are nevertheless clearly noticeably similar in some respect (Asher,

1994:90). If the ambiguity lies only in one single word, we call it lexical

ambiguity (Quiroga-Clare, 2003). The ambiguity where a single phonological

word correspond to distinct expressions that differ in meaning, syntactic

properties, or both, is called lexical ambiguity (Mihalicek and Wilson, 2011:226).

In a simple way, if a word has different meanings, it is lexically ambiguous. One

example of it is in the sentence ‘I put a straw in my cup’. In this sentence, straw

has more than one reference. It can refer to wheat and a thin tube used for sucking

up a drink. Thus, the sentence contains lexical ambiguity.

The meaning of a words can vary enormously given the context (Jurafsky,

2009: 612). When a word has different meanings, it may lead to ambiguity. In

written language, when a word has different senses/meaning, it may be considered

as polysemy or homonymy.

1) Polysemy

Jurafsky (2009: 612) states that when a word has two senses and the two

senses related semantically, it can be called polysemy. In many cases of

polysemy, the semantic relation between the senses is systematic and structured. It

may be partially synonymous in that they share one or more meanings with other


15

words. Get can mean ‘procecure’ (as in ‘I’ll get the drinks’), ‘become’ (she got

scared), and ‘understand’ (I get it).

Below is an example of ambiguity caused by polysemy:

“Call me a taxi!”

In the phrase above, call may means ‘to address’and ‘request something to come’.

Because of the polysemy in the word call, the phrase can be interpreted as

‘address me a taxi!’ and ‘request a taxi to come for me!’

2) Homonymy

The senses of a word might not have any particular relation between them.

It may be almost coincindental that they share an orthographic form. For example,

‘bank’ as a financial constitution and ‘bank’ as slouping mound seems relatively

unrelated. The two senses are homonyms and the relations between the senses is

one of homonymy (Jurafsky, 2009: 612). Homonymy in a phrase may lead into

ambiguity.

Below is an example of ambiguity caused by homonymy:

I’ll wait by the bank (www.literarydevices.net).

In the phrase above, bank may means ‘a building of a financial constitution’ and

‘a slouping mound’. Because of the homonymy in the word bank, the phrase can

be interpreted as ‘I’ll wait beside the financial constitution building’ and ‘I’ll wait

in the edge of a river.

ii. Structural ambiguity

The theory of structural ambiguity claims that the ambiguity may happens

in a sentence/phrase because of its grammatical structure. It is in writing that


http://www.literarydevices.net/

16

grammatical ambiguity is particularly noticeable, where more than one structural

interpretation is possible (Asher, 1994:90-91).

3) Different ways of words grouping

In specifying the structure of a sentence, we specify (1) the linear order of

words and (2) the possible grouping of the words. Although a phrase or a sentence

consists of a single set of unambiguous words, those words can be grouped in two

different ways (Akmajian 2001:155)

In addition, in a theory of syntax using phrase markers to represent

syntactic structure, the explanation of the phenomenon of structural ambiguity is

straightforward. An unambiguous sentence is associated with just one basic

phrase marker, while a structurally ambiguous sentence is associated with more

than one basic phrase marker (Akmajian 2001:183)

An example of structural ambiguity caused by different ways of words

grouping is in the phrase The cop saw the man with binoculars (Mihalicek and

Wilson, 2011:227).

This form corresponds to two distinct sentences. The first sentence means

that the man whom the cop saw had the binoculars. The second sentence means

that the cop used the binoculars to see the man. In this case, the ambiguity arises

because the prepositional phrase with the binocular can be either a VP adjunct or

a noun adjunct. The sentence in which the prepositional phrase is a VP adjunct

means that the cop was the one with binoculars. The sentence in which the PP is a

noun adjunct and modifies man means that the man whom the cop saw had the


17

binoculars. This kind of ambiguity is called structural ambiguity (Mihalicek and

Wilson, 2011:227)

C. Theoretical Framework

The related theories mentioned before are going to be used to solve the

problem formulation of this study. The theory of English Phrase Structure

Grammar is used to identify the common phrases that cause ambiguity. The writer

analyzes it with the theory of English Phrase Structure Grammar.

The theories of ambiguity and the theory of causes of ambiguity are used

to identify and analyze the types of ambiguous phrases that are found in The

Jakarta Post Newspaper discussing the haze caused by forest fire in Indonesia.

The writer identifies the possible interpretation of each ambiguous sentence

through the theories. As an example, when the writer finds an ambiguous phrase

like “John marries Teressa.” The writer identifies the types of that ambiguous

sentence. Based on the theory that the writer uses, the phrase is lexically

ambiguous. The sentence can be interpreted as ‘John performed a ceremony in

which Teressa and her lover get married’ or ‘John became the husband of

Teressa’.

The explanation is different when the writer finds a structurally ambiguous

sentence. When a sentence is identified as a structurally ambiguous sentence, the

writer explains the interpretations of the sentence through a tree diagram.


CHAPTER III

METHODOLOGY

A. Object of the Study

In this study, the writer analyzed the ambiguous phrases found in the

Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the haze

caused by forest fire in Indonesia. The data used in conducting the study have

been obtained from the articles in The Jakarta Post official

website, www.thejakartapost.com. The articles have been gathered from 4 August

2015 when the issue was spread and became a big public attention until 2

December 2015 when the fire was eventually put off. From the 37 articles found,

the writer picked two articles randomly to be used as the object of this study.

B. Approach of the Study

In conducting the study, the writer uses semantic and syntactic approaches.

Semantics is the study of the meaning of linguistic expressions. It is the study of

meaning abstracted away from those aspects that are derived from the intentions

of the speaker. A language is often defined as a conventional system for

conveying messages. Moreover, communication can be accomplished only

because words have certain meanings (Akmajian, et al, 2001:228). It is used to

find a phrase which is identified as the cause of the ambiguity. The writer needs

semantic approach in order to identify what types of ambiguity that occur in the

phrases.



19

The syntactic approach is used to identify structural ambiguities occur in

the phrase. Since the writer analyses the ambiguous phrases found in the Reader’s

Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the haze caused by

forest fire in Indonesia, these approaches can be used.

C. Method of the Study

In conducting the study, the writer used Document/Content Analysis of

Qualitative research. Content analysis focuses on analyzing and interpreting

recorded material such as public records, textbooks, letters, films, tapes, diaries,

themes, reports, and so on within its own context. When researchers use content

analysis in their study, they have to establish the authenticity of the document

itself and also the validity of its contents. Qualitative researchers do their

researches by focusing on the total picture, a whole picture, rather than breaking it

down into variables. They try to understand a phenomenon by concerning its

complete systems. The goal of their research is to get a holistic picture and depth

of understanding (Ary, 2002:27)

In this study, the writer studies a linguistic phenomenon called ambiguity.

The writer studies the dominant grammatical phrases that cause ambiguity, the

kinds of ambiguity, the interpretations of the ambiguity found, and the frequency

of each kinds of ambiguity found. Since the study is Document (Content)

Analysis of Qualitative research, the writer only uses theory in analyzing the data.

The writer focuses on analyzing the content of the ambiguous phrases found in the

Reader’s Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the haze

caused by forest fire in Indonesia.

1. Data Collection


20

The data used in conducting the study were obtained from the articles in

The Jakarta Post official website, www.thejakartapost.com. The articles were

gathered from 4 August 2015 when the issue was spread and became a big public

attention until 2 December 2015 when the fire was eventually put off. From the 37

articles found, the writer picked two articles randomly to be used as the object of

the study and thus from these two articles, the data be obtained.

First, in order to collect the data, the writer obtained the articles related to

forest fire in Indonesia on 2015 from the official website of The Jakarta Post

newspaper, www.thejakartapost.com. This website is more complete than the

printed version since the printed version of this newspaper and the online version

(short and brief version) are also provided in this website.

Secondly, after all the articles were collected, the writer reads the articles

one by one, sentence by sentence to find ambiguous phrase. The ambiguous

phrases found are used as the data.

2. Data Analysis

This study focuses on interpretations of phrases. Therefore, the writer

analyzed the data by interpreting the ambiguous phrase found on the Reader’s

Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the haze caused by

forest fire in Indonesia.

Secondly, using theory of ambiguity, the writers decides what kind of

ambiguity happens in the sentence. The writer classifies it into the two types of

ambiguity: structural ambiguity and lexical ambiguity.




21

Thirdly, the writer decided the types of phrase that cause the ambiguity

through English Phrase Structure theory. Phrase Structure Rules are used to show

patterns of syntactic combination so that we can see the patterns of a phrase or a

sentence.

Then, for lexical ambiguity, the writer paraphrases the phrase to show

possible interpretation of the ambiguous phrases. For structural ambiguity, the

writer uses tree diagram to show the possible interpretations.

Fifthly, after analyzing all the ambiguous phrases found, the writer

decided their percentage of it so that in the end, the writer identified the most

common grammatical phrases with ambiguity and the most common type of

ambiguity.

In analyzing the meaning of the phrases further, the writer uses the fifth

edition of Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English for Advanced Learners

as the guidelines to the meaning.


CHAPTER IV

ANALYSIS RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS

In this chapter, the writer analyzes and discusses the collected data. This

chapter answers the problems stated in Chapter I based on the theory mentioned in

Chapter II. The writer identifies what common phrases in Readers Forum section

of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in

Indonesia that causes ambiguity. After that, based on the semantic theory of

ambiguity, the writer identifies whether the ambiguities observed in the phrases

are lexical or structural.

In this study, the writer uses ambiguous phrases found in Readers Forum

section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire

in Indonesia as the data. The data used in conducting the study have been obtained

from the articles in The Jakarta Post official website, www.thejakartapost.com.

The articles have been gathered from 4 August 2015 when the issue was spread

and became a big public attention until 2 December 2015 when the fire was

eventually put off. From the 37 articles found, the writer picked two articles

randomly to be used as the object.

Based on the study, there are 26 phrases that cause ambiguity found. They

are 20 noun phrases and 6 verb phrases. Based on the data, the most frequent kind

of phrase that causes ambiguity is noun phrase. From 26 ambiguous phrases

found, there are two kinds of ambiguity identified. They are lexical ambiguity and



23

structural ambiguity. There are 22 data of lexical ambiguity and 4 data of

structural ambiguity. In other words, 84.6% of it are lexically ambiguous and

15.4% of it are structurally ambiguous.

C. Ambiguous Phrases Data

In order to answers the problem number 1 stated in Chapter I, the writer

needs to find out what common phrases in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta

Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia cause

ambiguity. By reading and analyzing the articles, the writer finds out that there are

two kinds of phrases in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta Post newspaper

discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia that cause ambiguity. They

are noun phrases and verb phrases. As mentioned in Chapter II, phrase here refers

to a word or a group of words that behaves as a single unit (Jurafsky, 2009: 385).

It may appear as a head with or without its complements. The ambiguity are

usually structural, but many are lexical. Below are the number and the percentage

of each kind of phrases.

Table 2 Percentage of Ambiguous Phrases

There are 20 noun phrases and 6 verb phrases found in the Readers

Forum’s articles of The Jakarta Post newspaper that cause ambiguities. The

phrases can be seen in the table below.

NO TYPES OF PHRASE NUMBER OF CASES

PERCENTAGE

1 Noun 20 76.9% 2 Verb 6 23.1% TOTAL 26 100%


24

Table 3 Ambiguous Phrases and Its Head

NO PHRASE PHRASE TYPE

NP VP 1 This haze problem is a perennial issue affecting

Malaysia and Singapore, and leaders of both countries have been sending letters year in year out to their Indonesian counterparts expressing frustration over their continued inability to resolve it.

√

2 The detrimental impact of the haze on the health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so far.

√


√


√

5 The API reading at Sri Aman, Sarawak on Monday (Aug. 24), was 129, while Kuching and Samarhan recorded 126 and 118 respectively.

√

6 The Indonesian authorities cannot be giving the same old lame excuses that the haze is caused mainly by Malaysian and Indonesian companies.

√

7 The question Malaysians want answered is what are the enforcement authorities doing to enforce stiffer penalties on those companies.

√

8 Indonesia must get cracking in making plans for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again.

√


√


25


NP VP 10 Indonesia must get cracking in making plans

for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again.

√

11 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.

√


√

13 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels.

√

14 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels

√


√


√

17 Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.

√


√


√

20 Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze

√


26

problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.


NP VP 21 Malaysian natural Resources and Environment

Minister Dato’ Sri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar must push his Indonesian counterparts to regionally minimise this annual problem with long-term solutions.

√

22 Malaysian natural Resources and Environment Minister Dato’ Sri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar must push his Indonesian counterparts to regionally minimise this annual problem with long-term solutions.

√

23 It could be true that the perpetrators of this month’s fires are smaller land holders

√

24 the big plantation companies are emulating the Raffles business model

√

25 Today’s business trend is “outsourcing production” (and social costs) to the natives – i.e. the small land owners, who have even less of a clue about sustainable management than the Mercedes Benz-driving city businessmen in Southeast Asian capital cities.

√

26 Hence, collective action is required by joint forces from ASEAN members, which may also consider involving international experts and resources

√


27

D. Types of Ambiguity Found

There are two types of ambiguity proposed by Asher (1994) which are

lexical and structural ambiguity. Based on the ambiguous phrases mentioned

above, it appears that there are 22 cases of lexical ambiguities and 4 cases of

structural ambiguities. Below are the number and the percentage of each type of

ambiguous phrases.

Table 4 Types of Ambiguity

NO TYPES OF AMBIGUITY

TYPES OF PHRASES

NUMBER OF CASE PERCENTAGE

1 Lexical Ambiguity Adverbial Phrase - Verb Phrase 6 Adjective Phrase Prepositional

Phrase -

Noun Phrase 16 SUBTOTAL 22 84.6% 2 Structural Ambiguity Noun Phrase 4 Verb Phrase Adjective Phrase SUBTOTAL 4 15.4% TOTAL 26 100% 1. Lexical Ambiguity

There are 22 lexical ambiguity found in Readers Forum section of The Jakarta

Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia that cause

ambiguity. As mentioned before in Chapter II, lexical ambiguity may occur

because a word (that may function as a head of a phrase) may have multiple

meanings. The ambiguous phrases caused by lexical ambiguities can be seen in

the table below.


28

Table 5 Lexical Ambiguity Table

NO PHRASE 1 This haze problem is a perennial issue affecting Malaysia and Singapore,

and leaders of both countries have been sending letters year in year out to their Indonesian counterparts expressing frustration over their continued inability to resolve it.




5 The API reading at Sri Aman, Sarawak on Monday (Aug. 24), was 129, while Kuching and Samarhan recorded 126 and 118 respectively.

6 The Indonesian authorities cannot be giving the same old lame excuses that the haze is caused mainly by Malaysian and Indonesian companies.

7 The question Malaysians want answered is what are the enforcement authorities doing to enforce stiffer penalties on those companies.







14 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled


29

otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels 15 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise

the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. 16 The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise

the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. 17 Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or

breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.






In data number 1, the phrase ‘leaders’, which is a noun phrase, cause the

sentence become semantically ambiguous. It happened since based on Longman

Dictionary of Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:990), the word

‘leader’ can be defined as follows

1. the person who controls a group, organization, country, etc. 2. the person that is in front of all the others in a race. 3. the best product of a company 4. the main violin player in an orchestra 5. someone who directs the playing of a musical group

The phrase ‘leaders’ has multiple meanings, but based on these meanings, the

more plausible interpretation is ‘This haze problem is a perennial issue affecting

Malaysia and Singapore, and persons who control both countries have been

sending letters year in year out to their Indonesian counterparts expressing


30

frustration over their continued inability to resolve it’ (1) because it is in line with

the context.

In data number 2, the ambiguity arises because of the noun phrase

‘impact’. Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English for Advanced

Learners (2009:879), the word ‘impact’ can be defined as follows

1. the effect that an event, a situation, etc. has on someone or something. 2. the moment when one object hits another.

The phrase ‘impact’ varies in its meaning. Based on these meanings, the phrase in

data number 2 can be interpreted to (1) The detrimental effect of the haze on the

health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed

over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so

far, and (2) The detrimental hitting of the haze on the health and economy of

Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN

meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so far. Between these 2

interpretations, the more plausible interpretation is the first one. This

interpretation is in line with the context.

In data number 3, the phrase ‘haze’, which is a noun phrase, is considered

as the cause of the ambiguity. Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary

English for Advanced Learners (2009:808), the word ‘haze’ has multiple

meanings as follows

1. smoke, dust, or mist in the air which is difficult to see through 2. the feeling of being very confused and unable to think clearly

Based on these meanings, the phrase in data number 3 can be interpreted to (1)

The detrimental impact of the tight smoke in the air on the health and economy of


31

Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN

meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so far, and (2) The

detrimental impact of the feeling of being very confused and unable to think

clearly on the health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also

been discussed over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no

concrete solution so far. Between all these interpretations, the more plausible

interpretation is (1) ‘The detrimental impact of the tight smoke in the air on the

health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed

over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so

far’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 4, the phrase ‘solutions’, which is a noun phrase, cause the

sentence to be semantically ambiguous. Based on Longman Dictionary of

Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1675), the word ‘solution’

can be defined as follows

1. a way of solving a problem 2. the correct answer to a problem in an exercise or competition 3. a liquid in which a solid or gas has been mixed

Based on these meanings, the more plausible interpretation is (1) The detrimental

impact of the haze on the health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans

have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be

no concrete way of solving the problem so far since it is in line with the context.

In data number 5, the phrase ‘reading’, which is a noun phrase is

considered as the cause of the ambiguity. Based on Longman Dictionary of


32

Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1445), the word ‘reading’


1. books or other things that you can read 2. interpretation 3. measurement

Based on these meanings, the more plausible interpretation for data number 5 is

(3) The API measurement at Sri Aman, Sarawak on Monday, was 129, while

Kuching and Samarhan recorded 126 and 118 respectively since it is in line with

the context.

In data number 6, the phrase ‘company’, which is a noun phrase is


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:334), the word ‘company’

has multiple meanings as follows

1. a business organization that makes or sells goods or services 2. when you are with other people and not alone 3. people who are visiting you in your home 4. friends you spend time with 5. a group of actors, dancer, singers, who work together

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1)’ business

organization that makes or sells goods or services’ since it is in line with the

context.

In data number 7, the phrase ‘penalties’, which is a noun phrase, cause the


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1286), the word ‘penalty’


1. a punishment for breaking a law, rule, or legal agreement 2. a disadvantage in sports given to player or team for breaking a rule


33

3. a chance to keep the ball or hit the puck into the goal in a game of football

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘punishment for

breaking a law, rule, or legal agreement’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 8, the ambiguity arises because of the phrase ‘make’,

which is a verb phrase. Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English

for Advanced Learners (2009:1056), the word ‘make’ can be defined as follows

1. to cause something to happen 2. to produce something 3. force 4. to succeed in achieving a particular position, rate 5. to have the qualities that are necessary for a particular job, use, or

purpose

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘to produce

something’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 9, the phrase ‘plan’, which is a noun phrase is considered


English for Advanced Learners (2009:1320), the word ‘plan’ has multiple

meanings as follows

1. something you have decided to do 2. a set of actions for achieving something in the future 3. a drawing similar to a map, showing roads, towns, and buildings. 4. a technical drawing of a building, room, or machine as it would be

seen from above

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘a set of actions for

achieving something in the future’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 10, the ambiguity arises because of the phrase ‘operation’

which is a noun phrase. Based on Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English


34

for Advanced Learners (2009:1225), the word ‘operation’ can be defined as

follows

1. the process of cutting into someone’s body to repair or remove a part that is damaged

2. a business, company, or organization 3. the work or activities done by a business or organization 4. a set of planned actions or activities for a particular purpose 5. the way the parts of a machine or system work 6. a planned military or police action 7. an action done by a computer

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (4)‘a set of planned

actions or activities for a particular purpose’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 11, the phrase ‘fire’, which is a noun phrase is considered


English for Advanced Learners (2009:647), the word ‘fire’ has multiple meanings

as follows

1. flames that destroy things 2. flames for heating/cooking 3. shots fired from a gun 4. a very strong emotion that makes you want to think about nothing else

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1)’flames that destroy

things’since it is in line with the context.

In data number 12, the phrase ‘raging’, which is a verb phrase, cause the


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1432), the word ‘rage’ can

be defined as follows

1. to feel very angry about something and show this in the way you behave or speak


35

2. if something such as a battle, disagreement, or a storm rages, it continues with great violence or strong emotion

3. if a fire or illness rages, it spreads fast and is hard to control 4. to have fun with a group of people in a wild and uncontrolled way

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (3) ‘if a fire or illness

rages, it spreads fast and is hard to control’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 13, the phrase ‘controlled’, which is a verb phrase is


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:369), the word ‘control’ can


1. to have the power to make decision about how a country, place, company, etc is organized or what it does.

2. to limit the amount or growth of something, especially something that is dangerous.

3. to make someone or something do what you want, or make something happen in the way that you want

4. if you control your emotion, your voice, your expression etc., you succeed in behaving calmly and sensibly, even though you feel angry, upset, or excited

5. to make a machine, process, or a system work in particular way 6. to make sure that something is done correctly

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘to limit the amount

or growth of something, especially something that is dangerous’ since it is in line

with the context.

In data number 14, the ambiguity arises because of the phrase ‘pollution’,


for Advanced Learners (2009:1341), the word ‘pollution’ can be defined as

follows

1. the process of making air, water, soil etc. dangerously dirty and not suitable for people to use, or the state of being dangerously dirty


36

2. substances that make air, water, soil etc. dangerously dirty

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘substances that make

air, water, soil etc dangerously dirty’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 15, the phrase ‘climb’, which is a verb phrase is considered


English for Advanced Learners (2009:300), the word ‘climb’ has multiple

meanings as follows

1. to move up, down, or across something using your feet and hands, especially when this is difficult to do

2. to increase in number, amount, or level 3. to move into, out of, or through something slowly and awkwardly 4. to move gradually to a higher position 5. to climb mountains or rocks as a sport 6. to grow up a wall or other structure 7. to move higher in a list of teams, records etc. as you become more

popular or successful 8. to move to a better position in your social or professional life

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘to increase in

number, amount, or level’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 16, the phrase ‘levels’, which a noun phrase, cause the


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1002), the word ‘level’ can


1. the amount or degree of something, compared to another amount or degree

2. a particular standard of skill or ability 3. the height of something in relation to the ground or to another object 4. a floor or area of ground that it is at a particular height, especially

when you can go up or down to other floors or areas 5. a particular position in a system that has different ranks of importance 6. a way of considering or understanding something


37

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘the amount or degree

of something, compared to another amount or degree’ since it is in line with the

context.

In data number 17, the phrase ‘affecting’, which is a verb phrase is


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:28), the word ‘affect’ can be

defined as follows

1. to do something that produces an effect or changes in something or in someone’s situation

2. to make someone feel strong emotions 3. to pretend to have a particular feeling, way of speaking

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘to do something that

produces an effect or changes in something or in someone’s situation’ since it is in

line with the context.

In data number 18, the ambiguity arises because of the phrase ‘health’,


for Advanced Learners (2009:812), the word ‘health’ can be defined as follows

1. the condition of your body and how healthy you are 2. the work of providing medical services to keep people healthy 3. when you have no illness or disease 4. how successful something such as business, organizations, or a

country’s economy

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘the condition of your

body and how healthy you are’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 19, the phrase ‘problem’, which is a noun phrase, cause the



38

Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1382), the word ‘problem’


1. a situation that causes difficulties 2. something wrong with your health or with part of your body 3. a question for which you have to find the right answer

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘something wrong

with your health or with part of your body’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 20, the phrase ‘industry’, which is a noun phrase is


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:898), the word ‘industry’


1. the large-scale production of goods or of substances such as coal and steel

2. businesses that produce a particular type of thing or provide particular service

3. the fact of working hard 4. an area of work which has grown too large (used to show disapproval)

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (2) ‘businesses that

produce a particular type of thing or provide particular service’ since it is in line

with the context.

In data number 21, the phrase ‘minister’, which is a noun phrase, cause the


Contemporary English for Advanced Learners (2009:1112), the word ‘minister’


1. a politician who is in charge of the government department 2. a priest in some Christian churches 3. someone whose job is to represent their country in another country


39

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (1) ‘politician who is in

charge of the government department’ since it is in line with the context.

In data number 22, the phrase ‘push’ which is a verb phrase is considered


English for Advanced Learners (2009:1411), the word ‘push’ can be defined as

follows

1. to make someone or something move by pressing them with your hands

2. to press a button 3. to encourage or force someone to do something 4. to try to persuade people to accept your ideas, opinions etc. in order to

achieve something 5. to increase or decrease an amount, value, or number

Based on these meanings, the more plausible meaning is (3) ‘to encourage or

force someone to do something’ since it is in line with the context.

2. Structural Ambiguity

There are 4 structural ambiguity found in Readers Forum section of The

Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire in Indonesia

that cause ambiguity. The ambiguous phrases caused by structural ambiguities can

be seen in the table below.

Table 6 Structural Ambiguity

NO PHRASE 1 It could be true that the perpetrators of this month’s fires are smaller

land holders 2 the big plantation companies are emulating the Raffles business model 3 Today’s business trend is “outsourcing production”(and social costs) to

the natives – i.e. the small land owners, who have even less of a clue about sustainable management than the Mercedes Benz-driving city businessmen in Southeast Asian capital cities.

4 Hence, collective action is required by joint forces from ASEAN members, which may also consider involving international experts and resources


40

In data number 1, there is a structural ambiguity in the phrase ‘smaller

land holders’. Because smaller can be an adjunct of land and land holders, the

phrase ‘smaller land holders’ can be interpreted to (1) land holders whose land is

smaller, and (2) land holder whose body is smaller. In form of tree diagram, the

interpretation will be as follows

(1) First interpretation

NP

NP NP

smaller land holders

(2) Second interpretation

NP

AdjP NP

smaller land holders

Given the context, from the two interpretations, the more plausible

interpretation is land holders whose land is smaller.

In data number 2, there is a structural ambiguity in the phrase the big

plantation companies. The phrase the big plantation companiescan be interpreted


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to different meanings. In form of tree diagram, the interpretation will be as

follows


NP

Det NP

AdjP NP

The big plantation companies

(2) Second interpretation

NP

Det N’

NP NP

The big plantation companies

In the first interpretation (1), adjective big applies to plantation companies, while

in the second interpretation (2), adjective big applies to plantation.Both of the

interpretations are plausible since both of them are in line with the context. The

context is not enought to decide the more plausible interpretation.

In data number 3, there is a structural ambiguity in the phrase ‘the small

land owners’. The phrase ‘the small land owners’ can be interpreted to (1) owners


42

whose land is small and (2) land owners who has small body. In form of tree

diagram, the interpretation will be as follows


NP

Det NP

NP N

The small land owners

(2)Second Interpretation :

NP

Det NP

AdjP NP

the small land owners

Based on the context, the more plausible interpretation is (1) owners whose land is

small.

In data number 4, there is a structural ambiguity in the phraseinternational

experts and resources. Because of conjunction and, phrase international experts

and resourcescan be interpreted to (1) international experts and resources, and


43

(2) international experts and international resources. In form of tree diagram, the

interpretation will be as follows

i. First Interpretation :

NP

NP NP

international experts and resources

ii. Second Interpretation :

NP

AdjP NP

international experts and resources

If readers only given the sentence in data number 4, both of the interpretations are

plausible since both of them are in line with the context. The context is not

enought to decide the more plausible interpretation. The phrase is ambiguous

semantically.


CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION

Language is essential for human life due to its function as a medium for

people to communicate with each other. With language, people can express their

feelings, ideas, and emotions. As social creatures, people use language by forming

words so that they can deliver messages and information to one another in the

form of spoken and written form.

With spoken or written language, people can communicate with each other

both directly and indirectly. Nowadays, with the developments of technology,

people can communicate with each other through many ways. It has been easier

for people to gain any information about what happens even in other parts of the

world.

Even though language has a very important role in communication

between people, language has its inadequacy in delivering message. Sometimes,

people experience miscommunication in using language to communicate.

Miscommunication mentioned before may happen when utterance uttered by

people, whether spoken or written, is ambiguous by means that their utterance

may have different interpretations.

Analyzing The Jakarta Post newspaper, one of the daily English

newspapers published in Indonesia, the writer finds out that in Readers Forum

section of The Jakarta Post newspaper discussing the smog caused by forest fire

in Indonesia published on 2015, there are 26 phrases that cause ambiguity found.


45

They are 20 noun phrases and 6 verb phrases. Based on the data, the most

frequent kind of phrase that causes ambiguity is noun phrase.

From 26 ambiguous phrases found, there are two kinds of ambiguity

identified. They are lexical ambiguity and structural ambiguity. There are 22 data

of lexical ambiguity and 4 data of structural ambiguity. In other words, 84.6% of

it are lexically ambiguous and 15.4% of it are structurally ambiguous.

Lexical ambiguities that were found occur because of polysemy, a word

that has two senses and the two senses related semantically, and homonymy, a

word that has two senses and the senses might not have any particular relation

between them, while structural ambiguity found happens because of different

ways of words grouping and different types of relation.


46

BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Asher, R.E. The Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics: Volume 1. Oxford, New York, Seoul, Tokyo: Pergamon Press, 1994.

Ary, Donald. Introduction for Research in Education. Belmont: Wadsworth Group, 2002.

Bucharia, Chiara. Lexical and Syntactic Ambiguity as a Source of Humor: The case of newspaper headlines. Youngstown: Youngstown State University, 2004.

Burns, SN & Grove, SK. Understanding Nursing Research. 3rd edition.

Philadelphia: Saunders, 2003.

Cambridge. Cambridge Dictionary for Advanced Learners: Third Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008.

Chomsky, Noam. Language and Responsibility. New York: Pantheon Books, 1979.

Crystal, David. English as a Global Language, Second Edition. New

York:Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Fromkin, Victoria A. Linguistics: An Introduction to Linguistic theory. United Kingdom: Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2001.

Hirst, Graeme. Semantic Interpretation and Ambiguity. Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto, 1984.

Jurafsky, Daniel; H.Martin, James. Speech and Language Processing : An Introduction to Natural Language Processing, Computational Linguistics, and Speech Recognition. New Jersey: Pearson Education, 2009.

Malmkjær, Kristen. The Linguistic Encyclopedia. London and New York: Routledge, 1995.

Mihalicek,Vedrana. Wilson, Christin. Language Files: Materials for an Introduction to Language and Linguistics. Eleventh Edition. New York: The Ohio State University Press, 2011.

Napoli, Donna Jo. Syntax: Theory and Problems. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993.


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Pearson. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English for Advanced Learners: Fifth Edition. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited, 2009.

Roura, María Teresa Sánchez. Syntactic Ambiguity as a Device in British

Humour. Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, 1995 Sapir, Edward. Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech. New York:

Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1921.

Utami, Mutiara Sekar. Investigating Lexical and Structural Ambiguity in The Reader’s Forum Section of The Jakarta Post Newspaper. An Undergraduate Thesis. Universitas Sanata Dharma Yogyakarta, 2013.

Wray, Alison. Projects in Linguistics: A Practical Guide to Researching

Language. London: Arnold, 2004.


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APPENDICES

APPENDIX 1 TABLE OF DATA

No Article Title Date of

Publication Types of Ambiguity Phrase Lexical Structural

1 Your letters: Find concrete solutions to the haze

August 29, 2015

√ This haze problem is a perennial issue affecting Malaysia and Singapore, and leaders of both countries have been sending letters year in year out to their Indonesian counterparts expressing frustration over their continued inability to resolve it.


√ The detrimental impact of the haze on the health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so far.





5 Your letters: Find concrete

√ The API reading at Sri Aman, Sarawak on Monday (Aug.


49

solutions to the haze

24), was 129, while Kuching and Samarhan recorded 126 and 118 respectively.


√ The Indonesian authorities cannot be giving the same old lame excuses that the haze is caused mainly by Malaysian and Indonesian companies.

7 √ The question Malaysians want answered is what are the enforcement authorities doing to enforce stiffer penalties on those companies.

8 √ Indonesia must get cracking in making plans for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again.

9 √ Indonesia must get cracking in making plans for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again.

10 √ Indonesia must get cracking in making plans for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and


50

plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again.

11 √ The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.

12 √ The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.

13 √ The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels.

14 √ The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels

15 √ The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really


51

unhealthy levels. 16 √ The fires which have been

raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels.

17 √ Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry.





22 Malaysian natural Resources


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and Environment Minister Dato’ Sri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar must push his Indonesian counterparts to regionally minimise this annual problem with long-term solutions.

23 Your letters: Business interests ignite forest fires

October 05,2015

√ It could be true that the perpetrators of this month’s fires are smaller land holders

24 √ the big plantation companies are emulating the Raffles business model

25 √ Today’s business trend is “outsourcing production” (and social costs) to the natives – i.e. the small land owners, who have even less of a clue about sustainable management than the Mercedes Benz-driving city businessmen in Southeast Asian capital cities.

26 √ Hence, collective action is required by joint forces from ASEAN members, which may also consider involving international experts and resources


53

APPENDIX 2 THE JAKARTA POST ARTICLES

Your letters: Find concrete solutions to the haze

| Readers Forum | Sat, August 29 2015, 10:02 AM Readers Forum News This haze problem is a perennial issue affecting Malaysia and Singapore, and leaders of both countries have been sending letters year in, year out to their Indonesian counterparts expressing frustration over their continued inability to resolve it. The detrimental impact of the haze on the health and economy of Malaysians and Singaporeans have also been discussed over the years at ASEAN meetings but there seems to be no concrete solution so far. The API reading at Sri Aman, Sarawak on Monday (Aug. 24), was 129, while Kuching and Samarhan recorded 126 and 118 respectively. The Indonesian authorities cannot be giving the same old lame excuses that the haze is caused mainly by Malaysian and Indonesian companies. The question Malaysians want answered is what are the enforcement authorities doing to enforce stiffer penalties on those companies. Indonesia must get cracking in making plans for cloud seeding operations to extinguish the forest and plantation fires in South Sumatra and West Kalimantan that have shrouded Sarawak in foul-smelling haze yet again. The fires which have been raging for days need to be controlled otherwise the pollution will climb to really unhealthy levels. Besides affecting people’s health, especially those who have asthma or breathing difficulty, the haze problem is also impacting on the tourism industry. Malaysian natural Resources and Environment Minister Dato’ Sri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar must push his Indonesian counterparts to regionally minimise this annual problem with long-term solutions. Inability to solve it is also raising concern about the effectiveness of our leadership. I would like to remind our President about the handling of forest fires, which have been going on for too long.


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APPENDIX 3 THE JAKARTA POST ARTICLES

Your letters: Business interests ignite forest fires

| Readers Forum | Mon, October 05 2015, 8:18 AM Readers Forum News Deforestation of two of the world’s largest islands, Sumatra and Kalimantan, really got going back in the 1980s and accelerated in the 1990s, based on earlier deforestation business models provided by Thailand and Malaysia. In one of the world’s largest change of land use from native forest to commercial enterprise, millions of tons of raw logs have been felled in these two large islands, and mostly smuggled to neighboring countries where, for the last 50 years, hundreds of private factories in industrial wood processing estates have made their profits on smuggled Indonesian timber. This decades-long exploitation occurred under the auspices of the corrupt Indonesian regime, with the mandate to make it easy for foreign companies to help themselves to Indonesia’s natural resources at bargain prices. A mixture of foreign and domestic business interests still continues the conversion of land use in these big islands, with little regard to long-term environmental impacts. These are companies motivated by short-term greed. Unfortunately, for the air quality of Southeast Asia in El Niño years, large areas of Sumatra and Kalimantan used to consist of soggy low lying peat forests, which were converted to dry soil plantations by simply digging huge drainage ditches that lowered the water table. Whenever the world experiences an El Niño dry season, such as in 1993, 1997 and 2015, the very land itself catches fire. That is a main cause of this year’s haze. It could be true that the perpetrators of this month’s fires are smaller land holders because the big plantation companies are emulating the Raffles business model. Why bother owning the land, if you only want the products of the land? Today’s business trend is “outsourcing production” (and social costs) to the natives – i.e. the small land owners, who have even less of a clue about sustainable management than the Mercedes Benz-driving city businessmen in Southeast Asian capital cities.


55

Anyway, we only have to put up with smoky skies for a few more weeks. When the new monsoon comes, we can all forget about the haze until the next El Niño year hits. Ilham Budi Jakarta


Documents

PHRASE AMBIGUITY IN THE JAKARTA POST READER’S … · ON FOREST FIRE HAZE IN INDONESIA . ... Dr. Fr. B. Alip, ... Universitas Sanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul