STANDARD AMERICAN ENGLISH AND AFRICAN AMERICAN VERNACULAR ENGLISH (AAVE) IN THE HELP (2011) BY TATE TAYLOR

Undergraduate thesis, BINUS.

School of English Literature
Faculty of Language and Culture

Author YULIANA, MELISA and Wiannastiti, S.Pd., M.Pd., Melania (2013)

ABSTRACT
This thesis discusses Standard American English and African American Vernacular English (AAVE) in The Help(2011)
by Tate Taylor. The purpose of this research are to describe the syntactical features of SAE and AAVE used by the main characters in The Help, to find out social factors influential in the use of both varieties; SAE and AAVE between main–minor characters and both main characters when they are doing conversation. The data was taken from the script the movie that had been codified based on the scenes. There were 16 scenes with 1032 utterances and writer focused to main characters only. It was found 9 of 14 syntactical features of AAVE used by Aibileen, black main character and 9 syntactical features of SAE used by Skeeter, white main character. Social factors had big impact in changing language when someone was doing conversation. In formal situation, Skeeter and Aibileen used standard form to her boss due to professionalism and formality. In informal situation, Skeeter and Aibileen use d AAVE or informal language to her friends to show solidarity. The last, English varieties happened to both Skeeter and Aibileen when they were doing conversation in both formal and informal situation. In formal, Aibileen used formal language to Skeeter due to higher background status. In informal situation, Aibileen used AAVE to Skeeter and so does
Skeeter.

Keywords: Syntactical features, Standard American English, AAVE, English varieties, social factors.