An analysis of formal links used in the English translation of Shahih Bukhari

ABSTRACT

This research is focused on analyzing the formal links in the English translation of Shahih Bukhari. The formal link is a way of getting text hang together or has unity. It is also considered to help the readers to be able to recognize correct and incorrect sentences. So, the translation text is chosen as the data source of this research. Furthermore, Shahih Bukhari is chosen since there are formal links in every hadith. This study analyzed the types of formal links and the formal links functions in the hadiths. For that reason, this study is intended to describe the types of formal links used in the hadiths of the English translation of Shahih Bukhari and describe the formal links functions in the hadiths.

This research uses descriptive qualitative research method in which the data are taken from the hadiths of Shahih Bukhari chapter 8, Prayers. All of the data are going to be analyzed based on Guy Cook’s theory of formal links.

The findings of the study on the formal links show the all types of formal links: verb form, parallelism, referring expression, repetition, substitution, ellipsis, and conjunction used in the English translation of Shahih Bukhari. The researcher finds that every hadith used referring expression. The function verb form in one sentence can influence and limit the verb form in the next sentence, so it makes an interesting and logically connected the sentence. For parallelism is to connect two clauses or two sentences by repeating the word from one clause or sentence to another. Referring expression is used to indicate the reference pronoun. Repetition is used to make stressing and decrease the ambiguity in the hadith while substitution and ellipsis are to make the sentence simpler and more efficient, and the conjunction is used to indicate cause and effect relationship, contrast, causation and also to add more information.

From those findings, theoretically, the theory of Guy Cook in formal link is expected to give contribution on discourse analysis of English Translation of Shahih Bukhari. Practically, this research is useful for teachers, students, and all of the English learners who intense to construct their ability to know a fact inside language or formal link in writing. And for further research, it would be better to use different and more corpuses as the object of the study.