Euphemism used in Political speeches of Julia Gillard

ABSTRACT

The topic of euphemism being an interested topic to be analyzed in order to get deeper information and understanding the implied messages behind words, it is related to the characteristic of euphemism that euphemism is used to hide the unpleasant idea, even when the term for them is not necessarily offensive. This study has three problems, it concern in the types and functions of euphemism. To solve those problems, the writer used the theory of euphemism by Allan & Burridge (1991).

Descriptive qualitative is used as the research design of this study, it deals with the data that are in the form of words, phrases and sentences rather than numbers. And the writer does not give any treatment in collecting the data. While, the data of this study are collected from the political speeches of Julia Gillard’s happened which the script taken from the credible source, the official website of Prime Minister of Australia http://www.pm.gov.au/, and the videos from www.youtube.com. The data were analyzed through the process of categorizing, analyzing, and drawing the conclusion from the result of the analysis. The key instrument of the study is the writer herself.

The result of the study found that in the political speeches of Julia Gillard there were nine types of euphemism: 1) idiom, 2) associative engineering, 3) circumlocution,4) metonymy,5) acronym and abbreviation,6) metaphor,7)denial,8) hyperbole, and 9) synecdoche, and seven functions of euphemism:1) to convince, 2) to order or request, 3) to promise, 4) to accuse, 5) to criticize, 6) to reject or refuse, and 7) to question, which investigated from all of the classification of euphemism have been expounded.

From this study, the writer suggests to the further writer to have deeper and more specific analysis in interesting issues as the object. For example euphemistic idiom in political debate since it the most frequently used by people to hide negative meaning actually they want to express. Debate consists of many euphemism words produced since debater have to control every single words produced in order to look smoothen even though actually the meaning is not as smooth as produced. Politic area is suggested since it always discuss about current issues and many social conflict inside which very interesting to be investigated.