A Semantic analysis on Ali’s and Irving’s Translation of Surah Al Waqi’ah

ABSTRACT

Language is essentially important in human life as a means of communication. In communication, we have to understand what people say by knowing means of meaning. Therefore, we need to learn several linguistic branches such as semiotic, morphology, pragmatic and semantics. Semantics is one of a branch of linguistics study about the meaning in language. Arabic is one of the second languages which have spread out all over the world. Surah Al Waqi’ah is one of the surah in the Holy Qur’an which has many usages and uniqueness. This great and touchable surah has sobriquet as surah of wealth by Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) because of its great usages. Concerning to those, the researcher chooses one surah of Holy Quran that is surah Al Waqi’ah as the object of the study, specifically the English translation of surah Al Waqi’ah by A. Yusuf Ali and T. B Irving. As we know, both translators are famous translators who have spread out all over the world and have many authorization and contribution to Islam. The problems of this study are based on the researcher’s reasons in choosing this surah, they are kinds of meanings found and messages involved in surah Al Waqi’ah. The researcher limits the discussion of her study based on the problems of the study; the three kinds of meaning and messages involved. The researcher divided the surah into two categories according to the number of divisions of surah Al Waqi’ah. This study uses descriptive qualitative method because the data are in the form of words of written form than number, and the researcher would analyze and interpret the research object of surah Al Waqi’ah. The researcher takes some steps to obtain the data, which are by looking for the English translation of surah Al Waqi’ah, reading, comprehending, and understanding the English translation of surah Al Waqi’ah, selecting and categorizing the data which are related to the problems of study, analyzing the categorized data and make conclusion. After conducting the study, the results of this study are as follows, the first, there are three meanings involve in this surah, while the second there are two messages found which are moral message and religious message. The researcher expects this study could give a good contribution to the English teacher and English students. Further, it is expected to be useful for the other researcher who is eager to know more about semantics. The researcher recommends to next researchers who are interested in conducting the same fields in semantics not to limit the discussion just as the previous researcher does it before, but also expands deeply the analysis about semantics.