LEXICAL DENSITY AND GRAMMATICAL INTRICACY IN DEBATERS’ SPEECHES

Putry Amelia, Tengku Silvana Sinar, Tengku Thyrhaya Zein

Abstract


This paper entitled “Lexical Density and Grammatical Intricacy in Debaters’ speeches (Case Study of National University Debating Championship 2018)” discusses the lexical density and grammatical intricacy to identify the level of lexical density and grammatical intricacy in debaters’ speeches conducted by means of descriptive qualitative method. The theories supporting this thesis are the ones proposed by Ure, Halliday, and Simon Quinn. The data source in this thesis were debate speech from Main Grand Final round of NUDC 2018 which are Opening Government team (Prime Minfister and Deputy Prime Minister) and Opening Opposition team (Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Leader of the Opposition) taken from youtube video of NUDC 2018, Malang. The data in this study were lexical items for lexical density and clauses for grammatical intricacy. The step passed in this analysis are collecting the data by transcribing the debate speech into text, identifying the lexical items and clauses, and concluding the analysis. The result of this thesis shows that lexical density and grammatical intricacy of Prime Minister = 40.95 % and 3.43, Deputy Prime Minister = 42.44% and 2.72, Leader of the Opposition = 46.14% and 2.91, and Deputy Leader of the Opposition = 47.90% and 3. Thus, both the level of lexical density and grammatical intricacy in debaters’ speeches account for higher density and intricacy, so debaters’ speeches represent much information due to many lexical items as the proportion of running words and indicate that clause complex is more dominant than simple sentence.


Full Text:

PDF

References


Byrne, D. (1991). Techniques for Classroom Interaction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Castello, E. (2008). Text complexity and reading comprehension tests. Bern: International Academic Publishers

Daller, H., van Hout, R., & Troffers-Daller, J. (2003). Lexical richness in the spontaneous speech of bilinguals. Applied Linguistics, 24/2, 197- 222.

Eggins, S. (2004). An introduction to systemic functional linguistics (2nd Ed.). New York: Continuum.

Freeley J, Austin and David L. Steinberg. (2009). Argumentation and Debate: Critical Thinking for Reasoned Decision Making. Boston: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.Halliday, M. A. K. (1985a). An introduction to functional grammar. London: Arnold.

Halliday, M. A. K. (1985). Spoken and Written Language. Hong Kong: Oxford University Press.

Halliday, M. A. K. (1985). Spoken and Written Language. Victoria: Deakin University

Halliday, M. A. K and Matthiessen. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar. London: Hodder Headline Group.

Halliday, M. A. K. (2008). Complementarities in language. Beijing: The Commercial Press.

Johansson, Victoria. (2008). Lexical diversity and lexical density in speech and writing. Lund University: Lund University Press.

Patton, M. and Cocharn, M. (2002) A Guide to Using Qualitative Research Methodology. Médecins Sans Frontières, Paris.

Shan, L. (2005). The Effect of Debate on Oral Communication Skills among University Students in Taiwan: A case study. National Tsing Hue University, Taiwan.

Smith-Harvey, Neill. (2011). The Practical Guide to Debating Worlds Style. New York, London: International Debate Education Association.

Ure, J. (1971). Lexical density and register differentiation. In G. E. Perret & J. L.M. Trim (Eds.). Applications of linguistics: Selected Papers of the Second International Congress of Applied Linguistics (pp. 443-452). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.




DOI: https://doi.org/10.30743/ll.v4i1.2519

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Fakultas Sastra 
Universitas Islam Sumatera Utara (UISU), Medan
Jl. Sisingamangaraja Teladan Medan 20217
Telp. (061) 7869911, e-mail: language_literacy@sastra.uisu.ac.id