Maranatha Christian University
ABSTRACT
Dalam penulisan skripsi ini, saya menganalisis
representasi “
self
”
dan “
other
” dalam sebuah teks yang ditulis oleh
seorang pemimpin grup
rasis Ku Klux Klan di Amerika yang bernama Thomas Robb. Saya
menggunakan metode analisis teks dalam proses analisis data.
Thomas Robb adalah seorang pendeta yang juga merupakan
pemimpin pusat dari kelompok Ku Klux Klan, sebuah grup aliran keras dari
Amerika yang memiliki keterkaitan erat dengan praktek rasisme yang
terutama ditujukan bagi kulit hitam. Tercatat dalam sejarah bahwa Ku Klux
Klan sudah melakukan banyak praktek kekerasan seperti pembunuhan,
penganiayaan, pembakaran, dan lain lain.
Dalam skripsi ini, saya mengaplikasikan fitur-fitur
coherence
dari
analisis teks, seperti referensi, substitusi, konjungsi, dan kohesi leksikal.
Selain itu, saya juga menggunakan fitur-fitur
transitivity
, yaitu
processes
,
mood
, dan
theme-rheme
. Hasil analisis data menunjukkan dengan jelas
bahwa Thomas Robb mempresentasikan
other
secara negatif, dan
self
secara positif.
Saya berharap skripsi ini dapat memberikan banyak kontribusi dalam
studi tentang rasisme dan juga membuat para pembelajar linguistik tertarik
Maranatha Christian University
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS ... i
ABSTRACT ... ii
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION ... 1
1.1 Background of the Study ... 1
1.2 Statement of the Problem ... 4
1.3 Purpose of the Study ... 5
1.4 Method of Research ... 5
1.5 Organization of the Thesis ... 5
CHAPTER TWO: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ... 6
2.1 Coherence ...,,,,,,,,,,,,... 7
2.1.1 Reference ... 7
2.1.2 Substitution ... 8
2.1.3 Ellipsis ... 8
2.1.4 Conjunction ... 8
2.1.5 Lexical Cohesion ... 9
2.2 Transitivity ... 9
2.2.1 Processes ... 10
2.2.2 Mood ... 11
2.2.3 Theme-Rheme ... 11
CHAPTER THREE: POSITIVE SELF-PRESENTATION AND NEGATIVE OTHER-PRESENTATION IN PASTOR THOMAS ROBB’S TEXT ... 13
CHAPTER FOUR: CONCLUSION ... 35
BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 39
40
APPENDIX
DATA:
"There is a race war against whites. But our people - my white brothers and
sisters - will stay committed to a non-violent resolution. That resolution must
consist of solidarity in white communities around the world. The hatred for our
children and their future is growing and is being fueled every single day. Stay firm
in your convictions. Keep loving your heritage and keep witnessing to others that
there is a better way than a war torn, violent, wicked, socialist, new world order.
That way is the Christian way - law and order - love of family - love of nation.
These are the principles of western Christian civilization. There is a war to
destroy these things. Pray that our people see the error of their ways and regain
a sense of loyalty. Repent America! Be faithful my fellow believers."
<http://www.kkk.com/>
LIST OF TABLES:
Table 1. The Use of Personal Pronoun as Reference
Presuming Reference Referring to
But our people – my white brothers and
sisters –will stay…
Pastor Thomas Robb and the white
41 ...my white brothers and sisters – will
stay…
Pastor Thomas Robb
The hatred for our children and their
future…
Pastor Thomas Robb and the white
people
The hatred for our children and their
future…
our children Pastor Thomas Robb &
the white people’s children
Stay firm in your convictions the white people (including Pastor
Thomas Robb)
Keep loving your heritage… the white people (including Pastor
Thomas Robb)
Pray that our people see the error… Pastor Thomas Robb and the white
people
…our people see the error of their ways
and regain…
our people Pastor Thomas Robb
and the white people
Be faithful my fellow believers Pastor Thomas Robb
Table 2. The Use of Substitution
Substitution Substituting for
That resolution must consist of… non-violent
That way is the Christian way… better
These are the principles of… law and order – love of family – love of nation
42
– love of nation
Table 3. The Use of Positive Words and Their Further Descriptions
Positive Words Further Description
non-violent solidarity in white communities around
the world
Table 4. The Use of Antonymy
Antonymy
Negative Meaning Positive Meaning
(1) There is a race war against… But our people… committed to a
non-violent resolution
(4) The hatred for our children and their
future is growing…
Keep loving your heritage and keep
witnessing to others that there is a
better way
(8) (And) keep witnessing to others…
wicked, socialist, new world order
That way is… law and order – love of
family…
(8) (And) keep witnessing to others…
violent, wicked, socialist…
That way is… love of family – love of
nation
43 violent, wicked, socialist (
Communists other as atheists), new
world order
as Christians) –law and order…
Table 5. The Use of Processes
No. Clause Process
1
There is a race war against whites existential
2 But our people - my white brothers and
sisters - will stay committed to a non-violent
resolution
material
3 That resolution must consist of solidarity in
white communities around the world
relational
4 The hatred for our children and their future
is growing
material
5 And is being fueled every single day material
6 Stay firm in your convictions material
7 Keep loving your heritage material
8 (And) keep witnessing to others that there
is a better way than a war torn, violent,
wicked, socialist, new world order.
material
9 That way is the Christian way - law and
order - love of family - love of nation
44 10 These are the principles of western
Christian civilization
relational
11 There is a war to destroy these things existential
12 Pray that our people seethe errorof their
ways andregain a sense of loyalty
material
13 Repent America! material
14 Be faithful my fellow believers relational
Table 6. The Use of Mood
No. Clause Mood
1 There is a race war against whites declarative
2 But our people - my white brothers and sisters - will
stay committed to a non-violent resolution
declarative
3 That resolution must consist of solidarity in white
communities around the world
declarative
4 The hatred for our children and their future is
growing
declarative
5 And is being fueled every single day declarative
6 Stay firm in your convictions imperative
7 Keep loving your heritage imperative
8 (And) keep witnessing to others that there is a better
way than a war torn, violent, wicked, socialist, new
45 world order
9 That way is the Christian way - law and order - love
of family - love of nation
declarative
10 These are the principles of western Christian
civilization
declarative
11 There is a war to destroy these things declarative
12 Pray that our people seethe errorof their ways and
regain a sense of loyalty
imperative
13 Repent America! imperative
14 Be faithful my fellow believers imperative
Table 7. The Presentation of Self and Other in Clauses (1), (2), (3), (4), and
(5)
No. Clause Self Other
1 There is a race war against whites. - Negative
2 But our people - my white brothers and
sisters - will stay committed to a
non-violent resolution.
Positive -
3 That resolution must consist of solidarity
in white communities around the world.
Positive -
46 future is growing.
5 And is being fueled every single day. - Negative
Table 8. The Imperative Mood in Clauses (5), (6), and (7)
Clause Command
6 (his people to) stay firm in your convictions
7 (his people to) keep loving your heritage
8 (his people to) keep witnessing to others that there is a
better way than a war torn, wicked, socialist, new world
order
Table 9. The Use of Theme-Rheme
No Theme Rheme
1 There is a race war against whites
2 But our people – my white brothers and
sisters
will stay committed to a non-violent resolution
3 That resolution must consist of solidarity in white communities
around the world
4 The hatred for our
children and their
future
47 5 (The hatred for our
children and their
future)
(and) is being fueled every single day
6 Stay firm in your convictions
7 Keep loving your heritage
8 (and) Keep witnessing to others that there is a better way than
a war torn, violent, wicked, socialist, new world
order
9 That way is the Christian way – law and order – love of
family – love of nation
10 These are the principles of western Christian civilization
11 There is a war to destroy these things
12 Pray that our people (=theme A) see the error of their
ways (=rheme A) and regain a sense of loyalty
(=rheme B)
13 Repent America
14 Be faithful my fellow believers
LIST OF FIGURES:
Figure 1. The Use of Conjunction
48
Figure 2. Lexical Strings displaying Repetition & Synonymy
loyalty
whites Synonymy
non-violent resolution Repetition faithful
Repetition my white brothers Synonymy
that resolution Repetition stay committed
in white communities Synonymy
stay firm
Figure 3. Lexical String displaying Theme and Rheme Patterns
There is a race war against the whites
theme (1) rheme (1)
theme (4) rheme (4)
theme (5) rheme (5)
theme (11) rheme (11)
theme (12) rheme (12) = theme A rheme A
49
But our … and sisters will stay committed to … resolution
theme 2 rheme 2
theme 3 rheme 3
theme 6 rheme 6
theme 7 rheme 7
theme 8 rheme 8
theme 9 rheme 9
theme 10 rheme 10
theme 12 rheme 12 = theme A rheme B
1 Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The United States of America is a multiethnic country. The people who
live there come from various countries with various cultures. Thus, a lot of
differences can be found among them. These differences can lead to the
subordination of members of various groups based on their race. Paula S.
Rothenberg states in her book Race, Class, and Gender in the United States
that:
One of the first things we notice about people when we meet them
(along with their sex) is their race. We utilize race to provide clues about
who a person is. This fact is made painfully obvious when we encounter
someone whom we cannot conveniently racially categorize, someone who
is, for example, racially “mixed” or of an ethnic or racial group with which
we are not familiar. Such an encounter becomes a source of discomfort
and momentarily a crisis of racial meaning (14).
This tendency of people categorizing others based on racial differences is the
2 Maranatha Christian University Racism is defined by Martin N. Marger in his book, Race and Ethnic
Relations, as “the belief that humans are subdivided into distinct heredity groups
that are innately different in their social behavior and mental capacities and that
can therefore be ranked as superior and inferior…” (27).
In America, racism has been a major problem since the day America was
founded. One of the undeniable proofs of racism in America was the practice of
slavery in the early days. Besides, racism has often played a central role in
conflicts between groups of people. And yet, it has been particularly used against
minorities such as Native Americans, African-Americans, and many other races.
Among the groups which are promoting and continuing the terrible problem, there
is a group named Ku Klux Klan.
The history of Ku Klux Klan began in the middle of the 19th century. The
group was founded by the veterans of Confederate Army, and the purpose is
solely to react against Radical Republican by attempting to restore white
supremacy in the wake of Civil War. With a lot of records of intimidation and
violence aimed at the colored people and the Jews, the group was prosecuted
under the Civil Rights Act in 1871. However it rose again, reaching a membership
peak of five million in the 1920s. In the times of the Great Depression in 1929,
the group was slowly diminished. During World War II, the group began to revive
because the idea of white supremacy was again popularized by the Nazi. At the
same time, the American society seemed to consciously turn against the group
during this period as never before. As a result, law enforcement agencies were
successful in bringing down the group in the 1970s. The present Ku Klux Klan is
composed of small independent groups that spread all over America. However,
since Pastor Thomas Robb became the head of the group, the group has been
3 Maranatha Christian University
themselves as superior and all too often racism is used “to legitimate the unequal
distribution of the society’s resources, specifically, various forms of wealth,
prestige and power” (Marger 27). White-skinned people of European origin like
them view themselves as innately superior in “intelligence, temperament and
other primary attitudes, beliefs and behavioral traits” (Marger 28). This tendency
is strengthened by the fact that they outnumber the native American and other
races that inhabit America. This fact leads Pastor Thomas Robb, together with
his Ku Klux Klan people, to think that they are innately superior to others and it
creates a thought in their mind of legitimizing the use of power to oppress the
minority.
In terms of transparency, it seems quite interesting to study the practice of
Ku Klux Klan nowadays. In the early days, they obviously were very transparent
in practicing racial discrimination, but it was not the same as it is in the present
day. The acting director of the group, Pastor Thomas Robb, and his Ku Klux Klan
people tend to go “soft” in an attempt to be accepted publicly. They try to spread
issues that they have logical reasons why they do so and why they should not be
claimed entirely wrong. For that reason, I analyze the practice of racial
discrimination by Pastor Thomas Robb that is especially targeted at the
4 Maranatha Christian University In making the analysis, I will apply text analysis as the major linguistic
theory in my thesis. The reason why I choose text analysis is that this study
device seems to be very helpful in revealing how the speaker represents himself
and others. The study of text analysis covers structure, diction, and coherence.
The three linguistic areas help me a lot to elaborate my data in order to have
more detailed analyses. Therefore, the significance of my study is to show that
Pastor Thomas Robb is undoubtedly a racist, and why he is the kind of person.
This is my reason for choosing the topic of this thesis. Basically, I am challenged
to know more about Pastor Thomas Robb and the Ku Klux Klan because in my
opinion he, as well as the group, is very interesting to study.
For the data, I choose a speech of Pastor Thomas Robb’s that I have
searched from the Internet. The data I have chosen present a discourse that is
linguistically analyzable. I will first analyze the data in the text by scanning and
detecting anything that is categorized as text analysis. In the process, I use the
subfields of text analysis such as structure, diction, and coherence to elaborate
my analysis. In the end, hopefully, my analysis can be of great help in
contributing more on the study about racism to Indonesian linguists who are
interested in discussing a similar topic.
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
In this thesis, I would like to analyze the following problems:
1. How is the self represented in the text?
2. How is the other represented in the text?
3. What are the linguistic instruments used to represent the self and the
5 Maranatha Christian University
1.3 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
The purpose of my study is:
1. to know how the self is represented in the text.
2. to know how the other is represented in the text.
3. to know what linguistic instruments are used to represent the self and the
other.
1.4 METHOD OF RESEARCH
The method used is library research. I begin the research for this thesis
by finding and reading some books that are relevant to the topic discussed. I also
search for some further explanation about the concept of text analysis on the
Internet. After that, I browse and collect the data from the Internet. I mainly focus
on finding the data in Ku Klux Klan’s official website in order to avoid irrelevant
and misleading information. Finally, I draw a conclusion of what has been
discussed.
1.5 ORGANIZATION OF THE THESIS
I divide the thesis into four chapters. The first chapter is Introduction,
which consists of Background of the Study, Statement of the Problems, Purpose
of the Study, Method of Research, and Organization of the Thesis. Chapter two
contains the theoretical framework, in which I present some approaches that I
use to analyze the data. Chapter Three is the analysis of the text. The last
chapter, Chapter Four, is the conclusion of the analysis. At the end of the thesis, I
35 Maranatha Christian University
CHAPTER FOUR
CONCLUSION
In this chapter I would like to give my personal opinions of the findings
that I have got from my analysis in the previous chapter, which discusses the
positive self-presentation and negative other-presentation in Pastor Thomas
Robb’s text through the structure and diction.
I find that in the text, the presentation of the self, which refers to Pastor
Thomas Robb and his Ku Klux Klan, is implicitly positive. In the implicit way,
Pastor Thomas Robb argues that white people are far better than any other
people. According to him white people are in fact the righteous one. It is for the
reason that white people, which specifically refer to himself and his Ku Klux Klan,
are the ones who are righteous in the religious way because they are thought to
hold dearly the principles of Christianity, which are law and order, love of family,
and love of nation.
Besides, he wants to put the stress on the fact that it is the white people
who are on the right track since they are the ones who are in favor of non-violent
resolution. Besides, Pastor Thomas Robb also implies that he and his Ku Klux
Klan are positive people as he tells his people to keep being faithful.
In my opinion, the whole idea of how Pastor Thomas Robb presents
36 Maranatha Christian University imposing perception in the reader’s mind that he and his Ku Klux Klan are
righteous. They, as white people, the chosen race, should be superior to all the
other races. Thus, when related to the background of the text, the fact that the
position of the most powerful man in the United States of America falls to an
African-American, a non-white man, such as Barack Obama, really bothers him.
That is why Pastor Thomas Robb writes this text. He wants to confirm his worries
toward what is going on in the country, which, according to him, is at the edge of
chaos.
In the text, I also find that Pastor Thomas Robb implicitly presents the
other, which refers to non-white people, in negative ways. I find that Pastor
Thomas Robb describes non-white people as a group of people who are wicked
and hateful as they are thought to have the terrible hidden agenda to change the
whole system of the entire world by first destroying the written laws of the United
States of America, and then creating a new tyrannical world government.
Moreover, non-white people are also thought to have an intention to destroy the
elements of Christianity, which again leads them to the suggestion that they are
atheists. I also find that it is the non-white people who are bad people because
they are warlike and sinful. I also find that non-white people are also thought to
be all atheists and that is just an obvious indication that confirms that they are
bad people because in the eyes of the writer, Pastor Thomas Robb, who is a
religious man, people without God are undoubtedly negative. In my opinion, this
whole idea of how Pastor Thomas Robb presents the non-white people in
negative ways is for the purpose of creating the perception in the reader’s mind
that people other than white people are cruel and bad people. It seems that there
is no goodness in them because everything about them is negative, and thus
37 Maranatha Christian University In the process of analyzing the text, I apply the linguistic tools of text
analysis such as coherence and transitivity. In terms of coherence, I use
reference, substitution, conjunction, and lexical cohesion. Specifically, in lexical
cohesion, I use repetition, synonymy, and antonymy to analyze the text. In terms
of transitivity, I use all the three sub-fields: processes, mood, and theme-rheme.
In processes, I find the material processes, relational processes, and existential
processes in the text. In mood, I find the text is filled with declarative clauses and
imperative clauses. In theme-rheme, I manage to link the theme and the rheme
of every clause, which leads me to two most important messages of the text,
English grammar, both the structures and the functions, holds a key role to digest
what the text is all about. It is because the mastery of English grammar helps me
to figure out the meaning and the function of the text. Figuring out the meaning
and the function of the text can lead to the representation. Then, the
representation of the self and the other, which is the main topic of my thesis, can
be revealed.
Besides, I also find that the general knowledge about politics, history, and
faith is important in order to analyze the text. In the knowledge of politics, I can
figure out what the term new world order is. Through the knowledge of history
and faith combined with politics, I can figure out how socialists link to
communism, and eventually to atheism.
In my opinion, the topic of my thesis, which is about the issue of racism,
38 Maranatha Christian University groups such as Aryan Nations, the National Alliance, National Socialist
Movement, and so on. Those groups have the same view as held by Pastor
Thomas Robb and his Ku Klux Klan because they are also racist groups that
project their hatred toward the non-white people. Thus, I do hope that my thesis
can be of benefit to further study of text analysis, particularly to representation in
39 Maranatha Christian University
BIBLIOGRAPHY
References:
Alvarado, Manuel, Robin Gutch & Tana Wollen. Learning the Media. London:
Macmillan, 1987
Halliday, M. A. K. and Ruqaiya Hasan. Cohesion in English. London: Longman
Group Limited London, 1976
Gerot, L. and Peter Wignell. Making Sense of Functional Grammar. Sydney:
Antipodean Educational Enterprises, 1994
Marger, M. N. Race and Ethnic Relations: American and Global Perspectives.
Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Company, 1991.
Martin, J. R. and David Rose. Working with Discourse. London: Antenaeum
Press, 2007
McCarthy, M. Discourse Analysis for Language Teachers. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2009
Rothenberg, P. S. Race, Class, and Gender in the United States. New York:
Worth, 2007.
Electronic Publications:
Welcome to the Ku Klux Klan! Ed. Thomas Robb. 2009. 9 July 2009.
