Interlanguage Pragmatics of Suggestion by Indonesian EFL Learners

Abstract

This study is pragmatic study on Indonesian EFL learners in interlocutors to express giving suggestion strategies. This study was conducted to analyze the suggestion strategies and politeness strategies used by Indonesian EFL learners by using qualitative approach. Subjects of this study are twenty of first semester and twenty of third semester by Indonesian EFL learners in Java. Data for this study is taken from respondents through the Discourse Completion Task (DCT) which consisted of nine situations with different familiarities and social status. Respondents in each semester are asked to write the expression of giving suggestion to complete the DCT. Their responses are collected to be analyzed based on the suggestion strategies by Guerra and Martinetz and also to be analyzed based on the politeness strategies by Brown and Levinson. The findings of the study show that most of the respondents from Indonesian EFL learners utilized Direct Suggestion in the form of performative verb and imperative, followed by Conventionalized Forms Suggestion in the form of possibility, should, conditional, recommend, interrogative forms. The other finding that Indonesian EFL learners utilized Bald On-Record strategies of politeness in their giving suggestion.