Grammatical features of Afro-American Vernacular English (AAVE) used by the characters of “How She Move” movie

ABSTRACT

This research studies about grammatical features of Afro-American Vernacular English (AAVE) used by the characters on “How She Move” movie that proposed by Trudgill as main theory. The aim of this research is to find out and explain the kind of AAVE grammatical features used by the characters on “How She Move” movie scripts and it is also to discover the using of those features viewed by socio-cultural perspective. Therefore, the research will give deep information about AAVE grammatical features and help the readers know the socio-cultural reason that influenced the using of those features in the conversation.

This research is conducted using descriptive qualitative which explains the kinds of AAVE grammatical features along with their reasons of using those features based on socio-cultural point of view. The data are in the form of utterances that are produced by five characters (Bishop, Raya, Michella, Faye, and Quake) of “How She Move” movie. There are twenty data analyzed on this research. The data are analyzed firstly by making table to identify the utterance, after that classifying the utterances into AAVE grammatical features. Then, those features are analyzed based on the theories of AAVE grammatical features. Finally, those features are analyzed based on socio-cultural perspective.

In the finding, it is found that there are seven AAVE grammatical features that are used by the five characters (Bishop, Raya, Michella, Faye, and Quake). They are, Zero Copula, invariant ‗be‘/habitual ‗be‘, completive done, remote past marker BIN (been), absence –s of third singular person in present tense form, negation, and question formation. Furthermore, there is one type that is found, is existential ‗it‘. Zero copula is produced by omitting to be ‗are‘, invariant ‗be‘/habitual ‗be is used to indicate that the event is repeated (habitually), completive done is appeared to express that the action is completed, next BIN is produced to signal that the event is happened in remote past, the omitting mark of –s if the subject is third singular in present tense form, „ain‟t‟ and double negation is used to represent I am not, are not, is not in present tense, and have/has not in perfect tense to negate the verb. In addition, it is also found that the using of AAVE grammatical features is influenced by socio-cultural background, like identity, solidarity, and setting. Hopefully, this research becomes as a new brilliant idea for further researchers.