Representation Of Islam: A Text Analysis Of Daniel Pipes' Text-The Muslims Are Coming Teh Muslims Are Coming.

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iii Maranatha Christian University

ABSTRACT

Dalam Tugas Akhir ini saya menganalisis “Representation of Islam: A Text Analysis of Daniel Pipes’ Text The Muslims are Coming! The Muslims are

Coming!.” Dalam teksnya, Daniel Pipes cenderung mendiskriminasi Islam.

Dalam menganalisis teks Daniel Pipes ini, saya menggunakan teori van Dijk. Saya hanya menganalisis tataran mikro saja yang lebih memperhatikan bagian bahasanya. Tataran mikro, ada tiga bagian yang saya analisis, yaitu bagian macrostructure, microstructure, dan superstructure.

Pada bagian macrostructure, saya mencari tahu topik utama yang diangkat oleh Daniel Pipes dalam teksnya tersebut yaitu mengenai ancaman-ancaman dari Islam. Jadi jelas bahwa analisis macrostructure ini bertujuan sebagai langkah awal untuk mengetahui bagaimana Islam digambarkan oleh Daniel Pipes dalam teksnya ini. Pada bagian microstructure, analisis lebih difokuskan pada bahasan tentang

lexicon karena bagian ini terlihat dominan dalam teks. Dalam teksnya, Daniel

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1 Maranatha Christian University

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

When someone writes a book, an article, or other kinds of writing, usually it contains what he/she thinks about something. A writer tries to reflect his/her thought in his/her writing sometimes for the purpose of making the readers like the writing and agree with his/her idea. It is “throughout the world, writing has served an important purpose and has allowed us to express what we feel, our

opinions, and our ideas” (Rodnessy). That is why a writing constitutes the

writer’s expression of feelings and thoughts.

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2 Maranatha Christian University Daniel Pipes, who is an American writer, to reflect his thoughts about Islam by using his writing. In my opinion, he has an intention in his writing. He wants to make the readers, especially the Westerners, agree with his idea about the bad things of Islam that he writes in his writing and have the same perception that Islam is a threat for the Western life.

Thus, it is clear that Pipes has an intention in making his writings as he just focuses on the topic about Islam. He tries to discriminate Islam by assuming that Islam is negative as he has a prejudice that Islam gives something bad to the Western countries and the Westerners.

He wrote many books and articles which discriminate Islam both explicitly and implicitly. In his writings, Pipes tries to control the readers’ mind, especially the Westerners’ minds by representing Islam as a negative one and showing that

Islam constitutes a threat for the Western countries and the Westerners in order to make Islam marginalized. In his books and articles, Pipes tends to give a negative representation of Islam so as to make the Westerners also have a prejudice towards Islam and hate Islam.

Considering that Pipes’ articles are biased and discriminative towards Islam,

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3 Maranatha Christian University In making the text analysis, I use van Dijk’s theory because it really helps

me to analyze Pipes’ ideas about Islam in his articles which discriminate Islam

and how Pipes represents Islam as he wants to control others’ minds by giving a negative representation about Islam through his articles. He believes that Islam is bad and tells the Westerners about the danger of Islam.

In van Dijk’s theory, there are three levels of analysis: macro level, meso

level, and micro level. In this thesis, I limit the discussion to the micro level analysis, which consists of the macrostructure, the microstructure, and the superstructure in order to make it the text analysis.

For the source of data, I will use Pipes’ text, The Muslims are Coming! The

Muslims are Coming!, which I searched in the Internet and this text is in Pipes’ own website. I choose that data because I think it has a biased societal problem and it will be analyzable.

This analysis aims to make other people become more critical towards a text. Since nowadays there are many writings which are biased, this text analysis will be helpful and it will make us more critical about that problem. In the end, hopefully, my analysis can be of great help and contribute a lot to the study of Text Analysis, especially in discrimination cases.

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1.2

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The problems that I analyze in this thesis are formulated as follows:

1. Based on the macrostructure analysis of the text, what are Pipes’ main ideas about Islam?

2. Based on the microstructure analysis of the text, how does lexicon help reveal the representation of Islam in this text?

3. Based on the superstructure analysis of the text, how are the ideas about the representation of Islam arranged in the text?

1.3

PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

The purposes of this analysis are explained as follows:

1. To know Pipes’ main ideas about Islam in the text.

2. To find out lexicon that help reveal the representation of Islam in the text. 3. To know how the ideas about the representation of Islam are arranged in the

text.

1.4

METHOD OF RESEARCH

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1.5 ORGANIZATION OF THE THESIS

I divide the thesis into four chapters. The first chapter is the Introduction, which consists of five parts – Background of the Study, Statement of the Problem, Purpose of the Study, Method of Research, and Organization of the Thesis. Chapter Two contains the Theoretical Framework, which is the elaboration of the theories and approaches to analyze the data. Chapter Three contains the analysis of Pipes’ text. Chapter Four is the conclusion of the analysis. At the end of the

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CHAPTER FOUR

CONCLUSION

In this chapter, I will present some concluding points that are based on the findings of my analysis in Chapter Three. As mentioned in the previous chapter, my thesis analysis is based on van Dijk’s theory and I only analyze the micro

level, which consists of the macrostructure, the microstructure, and the superstructure analyses.

The macrostructure analysis constitutes an analysis which discusses the main topic of the text globally. This analysis aims to know the topic that is defined for discourse as a whole. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the type of Pipes’ text the Muslims are Coming! The Muslims are Coming! is an

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42 Maranatha Christian University Pipes wants to put forward, which in the text is about the threats of Islam or Muslim.

In the text, Pipes shows that the threats of Islam or Muslims are divided into two parts: jihad and Muslim immigrants. By saying this, Pipes obviously wants to represent Islam or Muslims as something negative. Personally, I totally disagree with Pipes’ opinion. In this context, Pipes refers to jihad as a type of terrorism. In

my opinion, jihad is not the same as terrorism. It constitutes the right things based on the Islamic law that Muslims have to do. However, in the text, Pipes has a perception that jihad is terrorism. Some terrorists claim that their actions are based on jihad and it may be the reason why Pipes has such a perception. In fact, jihad is not like what Pipes thinks about.

Moreover, Pipes also mentions that Muslim immigrants are the threats for the Western countries. In this context, Pipes is very explicit in representing Muslim immigrants as something negative. By showing the bad side of Muslim immigrants, Pipes clearly wants to discriminate Islam. Again, I totally disagree with Pipes’ opinion. I think, Pipes only shows the negative side of Muslim immigrants. He does not show their positive side. I think the reason why Pipes does not give the positive side of Muslim immigrants is that he really intends to discriminate Islam. He wants to show the readers the bad side of Muslim immigrants without showing the positive side of Muslim immigrants in order to let the readers assume that Islam or Muslims are bad.

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43 Maranatha Christian University the microstructure analysis besides the lexicon. I do not use the other features because of the limitation of my thesis analysis. Thus, these other features can be used for further researches. Those who are interested in continuing this research can use the other features to analyze this text.

In van Dijk’s theory, lexicon is concerned with the selection of positive

words for “us” and negative words for “them.” In this part, I only focus on the

selection words for “them” as this idea dominates the text. Moreover, I can hardly find the positive words for “us.” For this reason, I can infer that Pipes deliberately

gives the negative words for Muslims exclusively in order to make Muslims marginalized. In this context, by showing the negative words dominantly, the readers will understand easily that Islam or Muslims are bad.

In the text, lexicon used is of various parts of speech – adjectives, verbs, nouns, and adverbs: which contain the negative meaning. These four parts of speech are used more or less in the same portion. By giving the same portion of the four parts of speech in the text, I think Pipes use all the resources that there are in the language to show all bad sides of Islam or Muslims. This obviously makes the impression that Pipes seriously intends to discredit Islam or Muslims.

Furthermore, in analyzing the lexicon, firstly, I use the dictionary meaning to know the literal meaning of the words. Secondly, I also relate the dictionary meaning to the contextual meaning. I conclude that the contextual meaning is more important than the literal meaning as in a text analysis the word meaning is not stable.

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44 Maranatha Christian University to result in the clearer and more accurate meaning. By searching the background of some facts, my analysis can be considered an intertextuality. With the help of other texts, I can understand the writer’s intention more clearly.

In the superstructure analysis, all information of the text is arranged into a scheme. As mentioned in the previous part, the text The Muslims are Coming! The Muslims are Coming! is an argumentative text. Thus, the scheme of this text is arranged from thesis statement, the arguments, and the restatement of position. The superstructure analysis can also be defined as an organization of the ideas which form a scheme in the text. From this scheme, I can know all detailed information that occurs in the text. In this way, it is easier for me to track the ideas. I do not need to read the whole text when I have to focus on a certain point. Thus, it obviously helps me in analyzing the data.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

References:

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English. England: Associated Companies Throughout the World

Paltridge, Z. B. Making Sense of Discourse Analysis. Australia: Antipodean Educational Enterprises

Electronic Publications:

Danielpipes.org. Ed. Daniel Pipes. 1990. 2 March 2010.

http://www.danielpipes.org/198/the-muslims-are-coming-the-muslims-are-coming

Discourse.org. Ed. Teun A. van Dijk. 17 May 2010.

<http://www.discourse.org/.../Analyzing%20racism%20through%20discour se%20analysis.pdf>

Discourse.org. Ed. Teun A. van Dijk. 17 May 2010.

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46 Maranatha Christian University Representation: cultural representations and signifying practices. Ed. Stuart Hall.

<http://books.google.co.id/books?id=dAqycFD4PBsC&pg=PA17&dq=repr esentation+is+the+production+of+the+meaning+of+the+concepts+in+our+ minds+through+language.+It+is+the+link+between+concepts+and+languag e+which+enables+us+to+refer+to+either+the+real+world+of+objects,+peo ple,+or+events,+or+indeed+to+imaginary+worlds+of+fictional+objects,+pe ople,+or+events&hl=id&ei=29XETZyDAovevQPuj6CWAQ&sa=X&oi=bo ok_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Re presentation%20is%20the%20production%20of%20the%20meaning%20of %20the%20concepts%20in%20our%20minds%20through%20language.%2 0It%20is%20the%20link%20between%20concepts%20and%20language%2 0which%20enables%20us%20to%20refer%20to%20either%20the%20real %20world%20of%20objects%2C%20people%2C%20or%20events%2C%2 0or%20indeed%20to%20imaginary%20worlds%20of%20fictional%20obje cts%2C%20people%2C%20or%20events&f=false>

Writinghood.com. Ed. Jack Rodnessy. 2009. 13 May 2010.