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Organization of the Thesis. ... 4
CHAPTER TWO: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
2.6 Types of Non-Observance of Maxims………... 10
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CHAPTER THREE: THE ROLE OF THE NON-OBSERVANCE OF GRICEAN MAXIMS IN PRODUCING HUMOR IN
THE TV SERIES HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER…..14
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION……….. ... 34
BIBLIOGRAPHY……….. 38
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ABSTRACT
Tugas akhir ini berjudul The role of the Non-Observance of Gricean
Maxims in Producing Humor in the TV Series How I Met Your Mother. How I
Met Your Mother adalah sebuah serial drama berjenis komedi. Film ini
mengisahkan persahabatan dan percintaan. Dalam serial televisi tersebut, saya
mendapati para tokohnya melakukan pelanggaran bidal baik disengaja maupun
tidak disengaja.
Untuk menganalisis pelanggaran-pelanggaran tersebut saya menggunakan
teori bidal yang ditemukan oleh Grice. Bidal yang dilanggar di antaranya: bidal
kualitas, kuantitas, relasi dan cara dengan jenis pelanggaran yang ditemukan
berupa flouting, violating dan infringing. Ketika pelanggaran dilakukan, ujaran
tersebut mengandung implikatur. Setelah menganalisis ujaran-ujaran dari para
tokoh, ternyata saya menemukan bahwa bidal kualitas adalah bidal yang paling
banyak dilanggar. Jenis pelanggaran yang sering digunakan adalah flouting.
Pelanggaran yang dilakukan menimbulkan perbedaan tanggapan antara penonton
dan masing-masing tokoh. Hal ini membuat film ini menjadi lebih lucu dan
menarik. Tugas akhir ini bertujuan untuk memberitahu pembaca bahwa peran
Gricean maxims dalam film How I Met Your Mother sangat penting karena
v Maranatha Christian University itu agar komunikasi dapat terjalin dengan baik antara penutur dan mitra tutur,
40
APPENDIX
NO
DATA
TYPE OF
MAXIM
TYPE OF NON-OBSERVANCE OF
MAXIM
1.
Robin : What are you doing here?
Ted : Just for shopping, for dip, I love dip, I know love
42 Marshall : Are we really bailing
Lily : Yeah.
Marshall : Good, cause this thing is empty.
4.
Ted : The 18thcan‟t get here fast enough? Victoria : Wait, the 18th? Oh crap, I can‟t believe I forgot this. I‟m going to be out of town on the 18th.
Ted : Oh, well we can just wait until you get
back. I mean the whole point was not to rush into this.
Victoria : Or could we do it tonight?
Ted : 75th and Amsterdam. (7)
(7) Relation
and Quantity
(7) Flouting
5.
Barney : Especially now that Ted can‟t drink.
Robin : Why?
Barney : Because he‟s pregnant cause he‟s the girl. (8)
43 6.
Painter : Oh my god! This is best work of art. In
all my years teaching I‟ve never seen anything so… (9) Lily : Oh yes and?
Painter : Needless to say, this is art. I can‟t teach you
anything. (10)
(8,9) Quality (8,9) Flouting
7.
Ted : After what she did to Marshall, she
should come back here devastated crawling on all fours
over the broken glass own shame and regret.
Robin : You never chose sides. I respect that.
Ted : She is unbelievable
Marshall : Unbelievable? What‟s unbelievable?
Robin : Ted found a penny on the sub way and it
is old and that is interesting. (11)
44 8.
Virginia : I talked to Aunt Caroline the other
day. Stacy is pregnant again.
Ted : Oh, good for her.
Virginia : Oh dear….oh boy, tell us what it‟s
like being a journalist. (12)
Robin : I‟m just not ready.
(12) Relation (12) Flouting
9.
Ted : By the way, how‟s grandma? She
has not returned my last couple calls.
Virginia : I „m gonna get some juice. (13)
Ted‟s father : You missed a great game last night real squeaker. (14)
(13, 14)
Relation (13,14)
45 10.
Barney : We‟re breaking up?
Shannon : Greg‟s pled, he‟s successful. He
buys me all this cool stuff. (15)
46 12.
Barney: I think there might be some internal bleeding,
probably some feature. We get her to hospital. (18)
Girl : What are you talking about?
Barney : You‟ve had terrible fall. (19)
Girl : No, I haven‟t.
Barney : Really? Because I could swear, you fell
straight out of heaven. Angel (20)
47 14.
Barney : Oh..I let you, but I don‟t have any room.
Lily : You have two bed room apartments. You
have one room just for your suit.
Barney: Hey, I‟m at point in my life where my suits are my
life. (23)
(23) Manner (23) Flouting
15.
Ted : Girls, I got to go, but I‟m leaving you in
very good, if slightly sullied hands
Girl : Don‟t go we don‟t even know your name
to look out for your buildings
Barney : Yeah stay.
Ted : Excuse us for one second.
Barney : Okay you were right. The architect thing
totally works.
Ted : But I‟ve girl friend and I‟ve get back to
work. This project is getting harder and harder.
(24,25)
Quality
(24,25)
48 Barney : Sorry, uh… my intern had to leave. (24)
Girl : Oh well that‟s too bad. By the way I‟m Anna.
Barney : Ted Mosby, Architect. (25)
16.
Lily : Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Mosby
Mr. and Mrs. Mosby : Lily! Hi, Marshall.
Lily : I was just stopping to pick
up some of my things.
Mrs. Mosby : Yes, we were so sorry to hear about your …. You
know the…
Marshall : Lily calling off the wedding
and dumping me.
Lily : I am begging Marshall to take me
back and Marshall is rejecting me.
Mrs. Mosby : I love your hair. (26)
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CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
Communication is a way to exchange thoughts, messages or information.
In communication, people can deliver what they think or want. In delivering
people’s thoughts, sometimes the information is not communicated as desired.
Such a condition is called miscommunication. Miscommunication is usually
exploited in a comedy film to create a humorous scene.
Comedy is a genre of film in which the emphasis is on humor. In a
comedy film, there are two ways to make people laugh, namely by visual and
verbal humor. Visual comedy is a comedy in which the funny thing is built by the
action; on the other hand, verbal comedy is built by the utterance (Steel).
Since this is a linguistic thesis, I do not discuss visual comedy. My thesis
contains the role of the non-observance of Gricean maxims in producing humor in
the television series How I Met Your Mother in characters’ utterances. In How I
Met Your Mother television series the characters often misinterpret the other
characters’ utterances, which will make people laugh. Sometimes the utterances
2 Maranatha Christian University My thesis is related to Pragmatics, the study of speaker’s meaning dealing
with utterances. In Pragmatics, there is a principle called cooperative principle
which is required to have a smooth and clear conversation. In Cooperative
Principle, there are rules of speaking called Gricean Maxims.
A maxim is “the term Grice uses for the four sub principles of his
This is called conversational implicature, which is put forward by H.P. Grice.
Gricean maxims are not only significant in analyzing the conversation in
our daily life but also useful for analyzing the conversation in TV series. The
non-observance of Gricean maxims may lead to suspense or humor.
How I Met Your Mother focuses on a group of friends living in New
York. It is a comedy film which tells about the friendship of five main characters
and how they fall in love. There are five characters who always fail to observe the
maxims: Ted Mosby, Marshall Eriksen, Lily Aldrin, Robin Scherbatsky and
Barney Stinson. The main character, Ted Mosby, is a romantic person who has a
strong desire to get married as soon as possible. Another character is Marshall
Ericksen, Ted Mosby’s best friends. Marshall Eriksen is a lawyer and Lily’s
husband, who has a dream to open a law office for saving the environment. Lily
Aldrin is a kindergarten teacher. She has a dream to become an artist but she
friends, Ted and Marshall, call him a womanizer.
The reason why I choose How I Met Your Mother instead of other comedy
films as my data source is that in most episodes of this film the non-observance of
maxims creates humor. Besides, the characters also have unique personalities
when they are falling in love or in a difficult situation. They say something that is
untrue, give an irrelevant response, give more or less information as well as
unclear information. Because of those reasons, the film becomes interesting and
funny.
My thesis is significant to make people understand what they mean
through the utterances. Sometimes in a conversation, the hearer must guess what
the speaker means to avoid misunderstanding between the speaker and the hearer.
Thus, hopefully both the speaker and hearer will be able to understand each other
more in a particular context of utterances.
1.2 Statement of the Problem
The problems that I will discuss are formulated as follows:
1. What kind of non-observance of maxim is done by the character?
2. What implicature is generated from the utterance when the speaker fails to
observe the maxim?
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1.3 Purpose of the Study
The purposes of doing the research are:
1. To find out the kind of non-observance of maxim done by the character.
2. To find out the implicature that is generated from the utterance when the
speaker fails to observe the maxim.
3. To know how the failure to observe the maxim leads to humor.
1.4 Methods of Research
1.5 Organization of the Thesis
My thesis consists of four chapters. Chapter One is the Introduction, which
contains the Background of the Study, Statement of the Problem, Purpose of the
Study, Method of Research, and Organization of the Thesis. Chapter Two is the
Theoretical Framework; it deals with the explanation of the Pragmatics area.
Chapter Three is the analysis of the data and Chapter Four is the Conclusion, in
which I write my personal comments and opinion of the findings. The thesis ends
34 Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
In this chapter I would like to draw my conclusion based on the findings
that I have got after doing the analysis of the non-observance of Gricean maxims
in How I Met Your Mother TV series. Based on the data that I have analyzed, the
conversational maxims that the character fails to observe are the maxim of quality
(11 data), relation (7 data), quantity (5 data) and manner (3 data). The maxim of
quality fails to be observed most frequently because the characters want to cover
up his/her embarrassing moments. It happens when the characters approach a girl
or a boy or when they fall in love. Besides, it also happens when the characters
have a secret and they tend to lie to others. For example, Barney always
approaches girls while the girls do not want to be Barney’s girl friends. As a
result, Barney usually lies to the girls in order that he can get them.
The next maxim which is frequently not observed is the maxim of
relation. In How I Met Your Mother TV series there are five characters with
different characteristics. In my opinion, the maxim of relation is not observed
basically because the characters try to sound less offensive. They change the topic
35 Maranatha Christian University The other maxim which the characters fail to observe is the maxim of
quantity. The characters give more information which is not required. It mostly
occurs when the characters feel ashamed to express what they want. For example
in data (5), Marshall feels ashamed because he does not have any money but he
does not want to tell this to his wife.
The maxim that is not observed least frequently is the maxim of manner.
In How I Met Your Mother TV series, it happens when the characters respect the
other characters’ feeling. They tend to speak not in an orderly way. The example
occurs in data (22), Barney does not want to admit that he feels ashamed singing
in front of people. Thus, he says something in an orderly way. In this way, the
audience feels entertained while watching How I Met Your Mother as the fact that
the characters do not say the things properly makes this scene funny.
Having analyzed the rise of humor due to the non-observance of Gricean
maxims in How I Met Your Mother TV series, I conclude that there are three
types of non-observance of maxims which the speakers fail to observe, and those
are flouting (20 data), violating (4 data), and infringing (2 data). In my analysis, I
do not find opting out of a maxim and suspending a maxim because this TV series
only focuses on daily activities which have nothing to do with cultures or ethical
things.
From the finding above, the most common type of non-observance is
flouting a maxim. I am of the opinion that this happens because the story of How I
Met Your Mother tells about daily life and love of five people; therefore, in most
data there is no intention to mislead the characters. The fact that the audience is
36 Maranatha Christian University series.
Violating a maxim is another type of non-observance done in How I Met
Your Mother TV series. It occurs when the characters are confused to answer the
question about their secret or real background and thus, they do the misleading to
cover up their secret or real background. From this I conclude that a person who
has the intention to achieve his/her purpose will try to drive into something that
he/she wants.
Infringing a maxim is the least type of non-observance of maxim which
the characters do in How I Met Your Mother TV series. It happens when a woman
has a problem about love and she does not have any idea how to solve it.
Therefore, she gets drunk and says unclear things. This happens for example in
data (2). Besides, this also happens when a man has a deep feeling for a woman
but he cannot express his feeling because of his nervousness as seen in data (1).
From this I conclude that a person who has a deep feeling for a girl or a boy tends
to be nervous and thus, infringing a maxim happens.
In How I Met Your Mother humor is created when the audience knows the
real purpose of the characters’ utterances but the characters do not understand the
meaning correctly. Therefore, there are differences in the responses of the
audience and characters. The different responses can cause How I Met Your
Mother to be funnier. One of the examples is seen in the data (7) when Ted thinks
that girls should not have the sexual relationship before the age of 18. The
37 Maranatha Christian University principle not to have a sexual relationship under 18. When it is revealed that he is
not very strict about his principle, the audience can see that his words are not true.
The conversations between one character and the other characters in How
I Met Your Mother series contain non-observance of Gricean maxims. When the
character answers by another character’s question, he or she usually fails to
observe the maxim. The non-observance of maxims makes people aware that they
do not follow the cooperative principle in speaking. The hearer must look for the
implied meaning from the speaker’s utterance. Finally, I am of the opinion that
the non-observance of Gricean maxims in How I Met Your Mother has an
important role to produce the humor effect and this is something that makes the
38 Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
References
Grice, H.P. Logic and Conversation. New York. 1975
Grundy, P. Doing Pragmactics. New York : Oxford University Press.1999
Thomas, J. Meaning in Interaction: an Introduction to Pragmatics. London and New York: Longman Group Limited. 1995
Yule, G. Pragmatics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1996
Internet Sources
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<http://books.google.co.id/books?id=KFELwzkFhYC&dq=Example+ Non+observance+maxim+of+infringing+a+maxim&hl=en&source=gb s_navlinks_sLoos, Eugene. Glossary of Linguistics Terms. 2004>.
Levinson, S. C. “Presumptive Meanings: The Theory of Generalized Conversational Implicature.“Cambridge. 2000. 25 February 2010 <http://www.sil.org/linguistics/GlossaryOfLinguisticTerms/WhatIsAR elevanceImplicature.htm>.
Mey, J. “Pragmatics: An Introduction.” 2001. 20 February 2010 <http://www.answers.com/topic/gricean-
maxims#Grice.27s_Maxims>.
39 Maranatha Christian University <http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3AyMioM qZtoyoJ%3Akau.divaportal.org%2Fsmash%2Fget%2Fdiva2%3A5829 %2FFULLTEXT01+example+infringing+from+dialog+of+maxim&hl =en&gl=id>.
Steel, M. “The Comedy Material of Mick Steel.” 2007. 1 Maret 2010 <http://steelcomedy.com/>.
Wee, L–H and Cheung, W.H. Y. “An Animated and Narrated Glossary of Terms used in Linguistics.” 2009. 2 Maret 2010
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