THE PROCESS OF COMPARATIVE DEGREE OF ADJECTIVE IN TOBA BATAK.

(1)

rfiiE P'ROCESS

Of COMFARATIVE

DEGREE

OF ADJECTIVE IN TOBA BATAK

A THESIS

~

w

tbl:l

~ug!illh

Applied Uagadsdr.s

Gnld•te

Progr~m

In

f'artial

fulflllateat

el

~. ~ju!m~~emt.fl fo~

the

~of

MOISTER HUMANlORA

NA DHARMA SIBURIA

Stude-nt Index No. 015010008

MlliK PERPUST

AKAAN

f

UNIMEO

1

ENGLISH

AFfiJED

LI~GUISTICS

GRADUATE PROGRAM

STATE

Ul'IIVEKSITY

Of' MEDAN

(2)

THESIS

THE PROCESS OF COMPARATIVE DEGREE OF

ADJECTIVE IN

TOBA

BATAK

Arranged and Proposed

by

DRA TERUNA DHARMA SIBURIA

Student Registered Number 015010008

Has been defended be fore the

Thesis

Exam1nation Committee on

Febn1ary

26, 2005

and declared to have

fulfilled the

requirements

First Consultant,

English

Applied Lin~Ttli sties

1 - h ~a d ,

Prof. Dr. J awasi Naibaho .N 1 P. 130flt'5W>O

Graduate Director,

UNIMED

(3)

(psa(m 23

{Jl psafm

6y

([)avid]

'You, LCYR!J), are my sliepli£rd. I tvif[never 6e in need.·

'You fet me rest in _fo{ds

of

green grass. 'You fed me to streams

of

pea.cejuf waur;

ana 'You refresh.~)' lifo.

'You are true to 'Your name,

ancf'You fed me afone tfte titJ!it patli.s.

I may wafk,tfirougfi valleys as d'arf..as tfeatli,

Gut I won't 6e afraitl 'You are witli 1114,

aiitf~our sliepliertfs rod mak.§s me foef stife.

'You tread me to a fiast, wliife my enemies watcli. 'You fzonour me as your guest,

and'Youfilt'my cup untifit overflar.J.,Js.

I asked for health that I might do greater things;

I was given infumity that I might do better things.

I asked God for strength that I might achieve;

1 was made weak that I might learn to obey.

I asked for riches that 1 might be happy;

I was given poverty that I might be wise.

I asked for power and the praise of men;

I was given weakness to sense my need of God.

I asked for all things that I might enjoy life;

I was given life that I might enjoy aJI things.

I got nothing I asked for but everything I hoped for; In spite of myself, my prayers were answered

-I

mn

among all men most richly blessed.

Take my l ife , and let it be

consecrated, Lord, to Thee;

Take my moments and my days,

Let

them

flow in

ceaseless prai se.

Take

my

silver and my gold,

Not a mite would

I

withhold;

(4)

AKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work is only about a small portion of the whole system of the Toba

Batak language and has been completed in a protruded time due to the writer's

scanty knowledge m the system.

Somehow this work could not have been completed

j.f

not without the

ncrosity of his honorable consultants, Professor

DR.

Maruli Butarbutar,

l\ILA., and Professor DR. Daulat Purnama Tampubolon, M.Sc., who have been

painstaking rendered their academic as well as fatherly advice to the writer that

~gg"('ci him on to the finish line.

Profitsc thhnks to thern both :md may they live to see better lives during

their retirement p:?riod.

To God the omniscient, the omnipresent >tnd omnipotent, ;a feeling o f

boundless gratitude has g}\vg,ys been offered, for it is He who h2.s protected,

g,·oided, and taught him in his

daily

movement through His loving care tb::tt

have alsp made this work possible.

"Prof"t:ssor Dr. Jawasi

Naib:::~ho,

.LvLPd, Hemt of the LTBT Program, and

1\-lrnc. Dra. :\lelsuri, M.A., the Secrc:'tary, who have paid so much c:1re fo:r the

(5)

The whole L TBI staff for the opportunity and sharing their knowledge

during the writer's stay at this institution should also deserve and share his

feeltng of indebtedness at this timely opportunity.

His parents, brother and sisters, all the in-laws, niece and son, none can

be offered to them except the same feeli.ng of thankfulness and prayers and

may Goa the Merciful bless them all; professors, instructors or tutors his

prayers are always with them.

The writer is of the feeling that mistake may still be abound

in

this work.

He is still learning the language and constructive criticism directed to the

(6)

ABSTRACT

Indra Teruna Dharma Siburian. 015010008. The Process of Comparative Degree of Adjective in Toha Batal<. Thesis. English Applied Linguistics,

Graduate Program, State University of Medan. 2005

This work deals with the process of constructing Toba Batak comparative

degrees of adjectives, a speck of: the grammar of the ethnic language.

The method of study applied to obtain the data is hbrary research and then

compare it to the spoken forms by the educated style or standard variety and in

e comrn

The findings of the research and the educated speech on one side and the

common everyday speech fall into two categories, that is, that common

everyday speech is affected

by

free variation, and, on the other side,

by

following the so-called standard V9.riation. This happens since in the comrnon

everyday speech of the native speakers, they use their language without ever

giving an extr::~ thought to it much like they do breathing. Speakers ~vr":~ to

imitate one anothe..- without being aware that tLc speech one is copying is also

convoluted.

ln closing> this work :dcci'IT1Pts to put tree v:1riations into their correct forms ~~~-1sed on phonological processes that leaJ to natural use of the comparative

dt;b[:.::c in the language concerned.

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2.10 AClix::Jtion

(8)

2.11

Conceptual Frame

26

Chapter Three: Research Method

28

3.1

Research Design

28

3.2

The Technique of Collecting Data

28

3.3

The Technique for Analyzing Data

29

Chapter Four: Research Analysis

30

4.1

Toba Batak System of Adjectives

30

4.2

Syntactical Characteristics

30

Through Infixation -urn- or Prefixation urn-

31

4.4 Semantic Feahtres 40

4.5

TB

Adjective Porms

40

4.6 Morphophonemic Process in TB Comparative Adjectives

411-4. 7 Morphophonemic Rule for the Comparative Degree ofTB Adjectives 47

Chapter .Five: Conclusions flnd Suggestions

5.1 Conclusions

S.2 Suggestions

Bibliography

Appendix

48

(9)

4s-Chapter One

INTRODUCTION

MILIK PERPUST

,iKAAN

UNIMEO

I

Language lies at the central part o

c.e.~bcial

process

and it has so many other functions to perform m the life of human bein~ .

lbrough language we can improve our knowledge. In other words, there

almost no human activities they can perform without language.

Language as communication is something inevitable in and to our lives.

No group of people without a spoken language has ever been discovered. \X'e

nmnot imagine this life could have been V<'ithout. lungtwge, no matter which

one is used to communic::m::. Language, however, is recognized as the: most

perfect instrum.ent of communication.

Lnnguagc phys ><n ;mportant role in our lives, Hs it: fi.mctions to con vey

:ntorrnatton as its cornmuntcative ti..mction, to rnaintain social relationships

with others on certain things; and for language t:o function, it lu1s to have a

setting. To people \vho use

it

no matter if they belong to n race, religion, creed

or dhnicity, c8ch !las t1.s own different uniqueness fron1 one another.

Besides ;ts social co n ventional aspects, \Ve know thnt g rae~ ot races

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2

the human race itself. Different cultures or ethnic groups divide reality into

different semological units, different semantic, phonological and syntactical

features.

There are about 5000 living languages today as there are as many

nations, countries or ethnic groups. As we said before, each ethnic group has

its language no matter how we define it. Indonesia, for exrunple, has over four

hundred ethnic languages as there are as many ethnic groups, such as the

Bataks, the Javanese) and others. (Llamzon, 1972)

The

Toba Batak language helongs to Malayo Polyoesi:m (Gleason, 1961;

470) with other four subdivisions; Simalungun, Karo, Pakpak ~md Angkola

l\1andailing, all are found in North Surnatra. The Toba Batak lan.bn..wge,

henceforth abbreviated TB, is spoken in Toba S:amosir, North Tapanu!i

regencres, some in Central Tapanuli, Dairi and other :::1reas where speakers

migrated.

1.1

The Background .

.Languages j lfC often chssd:ler1 lingu[st~cnl!y 3c:cord ;ng tn the wny in

which they put morphemes l(>.Q_-c·ther to form words. The chssiE(·;Jtio n ;;; oft,·n

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3

The TB, as the writer's second language, has its specific characteristics in

verb and noun formations and a little bit in the formation of the comparative

degrees of adjectives since TB speakers 1n genera.! use Predicate-Subject pattern

in expressing their opinions (fampubolon, 1986; 13 and Tampubolon, et all,

1980; 14), such as:

p

grulg.ng_

!

sweet otatoe s

s

want~.

t

mother our

This construction rs opposed to that of the n::Jt;c>nal languagt,

Indonesian, and to those of mosr European bnguages the \l?rtter has observed.

This has intrigued the wr;ter to study a little portion of the bngt12ge in the hope

th;Jt the topic of this re5earch could be used by other rt'searchers or \Vritcrs

::~sa

prop lo help interested people mutunlly understf-lnd the langt-Jage and the

speHkcrs and '' rnt-~ns u!-· nat;onal integration nnd tolerance of this 1Iltdtiethnic

natron.

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4

b. Inflectional affix (the process of forming comparative degree).

c. Meaning point of view.

1.3 The

Problem

of the Study

In this proposal, the problem eflcountered is formulated as the following:

1. How is the process of constructing TI~ comparative degL"ees

adjectives?

2. \\1_hnt_is_{f1e domiwmt usc}_{of comparative degree ofTB}_{ad jectives?}

1.4 The Objective of the Study

The object.ives of this rest'arch are to ga;n reEable dat:::~ on the process of

G:J[mtng the comparntin~ degree of adjective:; through the references. The

description wdi provide clear mfomw.tion on the dwrncteristics of thl':

comparati ve degree of adjectives, the morphological process of fonning the

cornparativf degrees and the meaning.

Tb~s n senrc h !s expected to bcc()Jnc an anxdiary to the prev;ous rcscan) 1

(13)

5

of local languages as a resource to establishing and maintaining the local

(14)

Chapter Five

CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

---.:.:,"-·-a

1

MILIK PERPUSTAK!lAN

t

UNIMEP

. ... ... _

5.1 Conclusions

One of the grammatical aspects of language 1s speech sounds, and

speech sounds are the nature of language itself, and, therefore, leam1n

bnguage is learning the sound systems of that language. To this end, the Toba

Batak language is not exempted.

The phonology of language is concerned with the study of sounds and

sound patterns. The sound pattern of a given language refers to the set of

sounds that happens on and on in the

language,

the permissible combinations

a

or arrnngements of these sounds in words, and the p:rocess of udding, deleting,

or ch>mg1ng sounds. These processes affect most languages, but it should not

he overloohd that hnguages are unique llnd that no two bnguages are exactly

the same and these facts apply well to Toba Batak as they can apply as a whole

to the language and tbe comparative degree of adjectives as welL

The

basis for the a.ssumption provided before is based on the standard

'\\Tttten and spoken To5u Batak by referring to th;e two standard somces for the

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50

source is worth mentioning, which is van der Tuuk's

A Gmmmar ofToha Batak

written over a century ago

(1861).

After the datil for this study have been collected and classified

phonologically and later they are compared to the spoken, everyday use, it was

discovered that it is either alternative choices or analogy or, free variation (this

work p.34) that predominates the use of the generic prefix

um-

in the idiolect

of some people and therefore becomes their dialect, in which the m is later

modified phonologically by the initial phoneme of the base Toba Batak

adjectives irrespective of whether it is a vowel or a consonant, such as:

balga ---+ ubbalga 'bigger'

denggan ---+ uddenggan 'better'

godang _~ uggodang 'more'

z

hatop _~ ukkatop 'faster'

jonok _~ u)J:m:Jk 'nearer'

~

koras ---+ ukk:Jms 'more rough'

leleng ---+ ullsl8IJ 'longer'

malo ---4 umrnab 'smartt>r'

neang ,..., tl!HlS>HJ 'lighter'

e.9

'

. kl '

posn - - 4 uppJsa more :;tr. y'

f();'J _---+_u_rD~-< _'uglier'

sol hot __ , uss~l!-ut 'rnorc i.CJti!n:Jtc'

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51

timbo ---+ uttibbo {taller'

The writer would rather opt to call these convoluted uses as a case of

hypercorrection and analogy that have affected a speaker to use the generic

prefix urn- in which the rn is influenced

by

the initial sound of the base Toba

Batak adjectives no matter which phonemes, vowels or consonants. But after a

careful observation on Toba Batak adjectives beginning with b, rn, and p, they

an

should be prefixed with urn- in w hich the m is affected by the b , m , and p

to become ub-, umm-.• find up- respectively, and with umrn- including all base

adjectives beginning with the vowels a-, e-.,

i-,

o-, and u- such as the examples

previously presented; whereas adjectives beginning with

g-,

h-,

j-,

k-, 1-,

n-, r-,

s-, and

t-, they

should be infixed with

-wn-

in writing and undergo some

a

mo rphernic changes ~ such as the stress movement. In that sense the

companltivc adjectives denggan, godang, hatop, jonok, koras, leleng,

n eang, roa, solhot, :md timbo should take the forms dumenggan,

gurnodang, humatop , jurnonok, kumoras, lumeleng, numeang, rumoa,

surnolhot, and turnimbo respectively and the overgeneralized prefix u ~ ~

ud-, 111:h uh-, uj -, uk- ul ~ , un--, u r-, us-, and ut-- in the speech some dialect

spe<1kcrs. A T oba B~tak clan (marga) Situmorang derived from si-, an article

and torang, 'bright, clear' is inllxecl wirh - urn- to Forrn Situmorang, ir hm;

n f"vf'r been confused -.vitl1 Siuttorang, a sol;d pro,)f of the intlxat1on proce ss.

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52

5.2 Suggestions

Members of a given society would choose their leader from runong those

figures who really represents their aspirations and ideals. This is one of the

reasons why a representative spokesperson becomes the symbol of the people's

aspirations, values and ideals because his speech/ spoken language surpasses the

manner and quality other figures do not possess or cannot prove outright on

The so-called standard variety has always become goal of every speaker

of a language in his 8ttempt to study the language depending on what:

sense

~ s

contained in the term standard.

After reshtdying the whole research data, the writer carne to sugg;est that the

uses of the prefix urn- and infix -urn- fall right mto a segment of the

phonological rules of Toba Batak

affix~tion

gs well as to morphophonemic

changes, which all Toba Batak speakers ought to attend to.

Just because a speaker might not be fully aware of his use of his own

language (as most native speakers of a language are not) and because they take

the bnguage for granted much like they do breathing and walking, mistakes or

even errors in spr>ak;ng tb eir language tend to multiply especially when anorhe r

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53

If

a native speaker ofToba Batak were no longer interested in improving

and maintaining his own language, who else would, especially when the latter is

a foreign to the system?

What are we to say when an alien, such as Dr. van der

Tuuk

had not done

anything to the Toba Batak language? Would we leave it dead and forgotten?

(19)

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Aitchison, Jean. 1978. Li1~11istics. New York: Henry Holt and Company

Ban)Sun, I~abar, et al. 1984.

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_ ...:::-.,....---.2003.

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Jakarta:

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Curme, 0.

George.

1993.

A Grammar ~{Engli.rh Language. Volurne I:

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Speech. Connecticut: Verbatim.

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(20)

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