As the effort to have the insight into the existing status of a local language in Indonesia, especially in the academic setting viewed as the respected discourse, this current study aims to delineate the attitudes of millennial students towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses. 42 responses reflecting respondents’ perspectives towards the issue were collected via a qualitative questionnaire. To reveal the view of participants on the issue under the context of higher education, responses in the forms of 62 clauses were analysed by the transitivity framework of Halliday and Matthiessen. The findings of this SFL study shows that lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses were viewed by 74% of Sundanese and non-Sundanese participants in positive ways while the rest addressed it with negative attitudes. The positive attitudes were respectively represented in material, mental, relational, and existential processes while the negative attitudes were constructed sequentially in relational, material and mental, verbal, and existential clauses. The main reasons in the positive attitudes as revealed by the transitivity analysis are associated with the need to maintain and preserve local language especially Sundanese via the academic channel.
It has been known that Indonesia with its above-average cultural diversity has over 700 local languages spread from islands to islands. The numbers of local languages Indonesia reach 706 (
Those mothers as the participants of the study believed that if their children have good communication skills in Indonesian then they will have good achievement in the academic world that will subsequently affect their success in the profession world after graduation. To conclude, the participants believed that to be accepted in a good job, their children must have good skills in Indonesian and this, to mention one, was done by not speaking their mother tongue to their children.
The phenomenon of shifting mother tongue or local language to another language especially national language in the family is also underpinned by
Thus, figuring out how speakers or language users view their native language has become one of attempts to reveal the status of language existence in certain community or society. It is not denied that native users either as an individual or as a group have image on the languages that they or their environment speak. This is especially noticeably apparent in a multilingual society, for example, Indonesia. Indonesian people are commonly raised with local languages as their mother tongues and with the national language as their second language. This implies that Indonesian people in average are multilingual language users. This multilingualism may subsequently lead to the distinct attitude towards the image of different languages they speak.
Attitude can be viewed as “a feeling or opinion about something or someone, or a way of behaving that is caused by this” (
Theoretically, language attitude is defined as “the attitudes which speakers of different languages or language varieties have towards each other’s languages or to their own language” (
The attitude that native users address to their language may have possibility of affecting the sustainability of their languages. Positive attitudes towards their own local language can contribute to more sustainable existence of the language itself while negative attitude for various contexts may result in language shift even language loss in the long term. The library research conducted by
To the present time, there have been studies scrutinizing people’s language attitudes towards certain languages. The study of
Another study scrutinizing peoples’ attitude towards their ethnic languages was conducted by
Attitude towards ethnic language can also be viewed in relation with cross-cultural intermarriage phenomenon as found in the study carried out by
To date, most studies on the attitude towards local languages have been limited on the context outside academic setting. One of a few studies that indirectly related attitudes towards local language in the academic area is the study of
In this current SLF transitivity study, the concept of language attitude is linked to existing status of Sundanese language in the academic setting especially when the language is used as code mixing apart from the use of Indonesian language. Code mixing based on Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics is viewed as “a mixing of two codes or languages, usually without a change of topic” (
phenomenon of employing different languages within the same topic occurs commonly in the multilingual context. In the context of Sundanese language with its native speakers surpassing thirty million, for example, the language is sometimes code-mixed with Indonesian language especially when it is used for multilingual classroom contexts.
Based on the general as well as empirical background and reviews above, this SFL-transitivity study aims to answer:
1)What language attitudes do millennial students address towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses?
2)What meaning making is represented in the positive and negative attitudes towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses?
This qualitative SFL study investigating the language attitudes of millennial students towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses applied Hallidayan transitivity system as the unit of analysis. The participants in this study are millennial university students studying in Bandung. Millennial generation or generation Y based on the
For the data of this SFL-transitivity study, responses of 42 millennial student participants were gathered and analysed based on clauses. 22 Sundanese millenial students and 20 non- Sundanese (Aceh, Batak , Bugis , Minang , Javanese, Malay, and Sasak ) participated in completing and sending back the questionnaire responses. This number of 42 participants is beyond the expectation of researchers.
The answers along with the questions in this questionnaire- based study were stated in Indonesian. Prior to this, the theory for classifying of language attitudes as proposed by
The general purpose of this study is to reveal the attitudes of millennial students towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses. Specifically, it aims to depict how the meaning making is represented in the attitudes of participants. Based on the findings of this SFL qualitative questionnaire study, of 42 millennial Sundanese and non-Sundanese university students in Bandung, 31 participants or 74 % addressed positive attitudes to lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses, as long as the portion is less compared to the Indonesian language. Participants agreed that lecturers’ use of Sundanese once at a time for accompanying the national language bring positive impacts. Even the majority of non-Sundanese participants agreed with the use of Sundanese as an addition to Bahasa Indonesia. In contrary, 26% or 11 participants (5 Sundanese and 6 non-Sundanese) addressed negative attitudes towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses. Further details of participants’ attitudes towards lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses are provided in the following
| Participants | Positive attitude | Negative attitude |
| Sundanese | 17 | 5 |
| Non-Sundanese | 14 | 6 |
| Total | 31 | 11 |
In terms of the ethnicity of participants, both Sundanese and non-Sundanese respondents have either positive or negative attitudes. In other words, there is no noticeable correlation between ethnicity and the tendency of responses. The majority of each group in both ethnics addressed lecturers’ code mixing to Sundanese with positive attitude while the rest coming from both groups address it with negative attitude. For the portions of expected Sundanese to be employed in the classroom, in general, most participants agreed that the adoption of Sundanese by lecturers in the classroom should range from 10 to 20 per cent. This rate was gathered from open ended questionnaire questions without any predetermined scales by the researchers.
Based on the findings of the current SFL questionnaire- response scrutiny on the process of meaning making in relation with the positive and negative attitudes, four types of processes (material, mental, relational, and existential) exist in the responses of positive attitudes, while in the responses containing negative attitude there are three verbal processes apart from the mentioned four categories of processes. The responses with positive attitude are mainly
realised in the forms of material clauses followed with mental, relational, and verbal clauses respectively as provided in
| Process types | Positive attitude | Negative attitude |
| Material | 18 | 6 |
| Mental | 10 | 6 |
| Relational | 7 | 9 |
| Verbal | - | 3 |
| Existential | 2 | 1 |
| Behavioural | - | - |
| Total | 37 | 25 |
In material clauses, 10 of 18 clauses represent the activities of promoting or sustaining local languages especially Sundanese. All goals in the 10 clauses represent Sundanese language (8 occurrences) and local language (2 occurrences). For the first participant, 9 of 10 actors are made elliptical or hidden. Other experiences apart from activities of language conservation deal with personal reasons such as increasing knowledge about Sundanese language, experience related with academic benefit in the classroom, and few miscellaneous experiences. The processes related with the activities of conserving local languages are realised by melestarikan (preserve), menjaga/mempertahankan (maintain), etc. One of those phenomena is depicted below.
Material ProcessMaterial ProcessGoal
From the data of responses with negative attitudes, the occurrences of material clauses are in the second position in terms of frequency. 6 material clauses representing the negative attitudes, 3 are related with the experiences on academic or classroom matters while the rest is about general and personal experiences outside the classroom context. One of material clauses in the responses representing experiences on the academic context is shown in the following extract.
Material ProcessGoal
Further, in mental processes, of 10 mental clauses, 7 processes represent the experiences of understanding local language especially Sundanese, 2 mental experiences are related with academic benefit in the classroom and 1 deals with personal matter. Most second participants in the mental clauses represent Sundanese language as the phenomenon with elliptical sensers. The major processes of mental clauses found in the responses of positive attitudes belong to the cognitive aspect realised by mengenal/mengetahui (know), mempelajari (learn), ngerti (understand) dan kuasai (master) as exemplified below.
| LebihMental | mengenalknowProcess | better | budayabahasasunda "lemes".the culture of Sundanese low-intonation languagePhenomenon |
In reference to the data of responses with negative attitudes, mental clauses are equally distributed with material clauses. Among 6 mental clauses representing the negative attitudes, 5 are related with the negative experiences on academic or classroom matters while the rest is about personal experience outside the classroom context. All sensers in the academic experiences refer to students while all second participants (phenomenon) refer to Sundanese . One of mental clauses in the responses representing experiences on academic context is shown in the following extract.
SenserMental ProcessPhenomenon
Third, for the processes of making relation, 4 of 7 clauses in the positive attitudes represent the general importance of knowing and learning Sundanese for individuals as realised in the attributes of suatu kepuasan tersendiri (a self-satisfying thing), penting (salient), unik pisan euy (very unique), and bentuk pembelajaran untuk memahami bahasa selain bahasa ibu (a way of learning on understanding other languages other than on e’s mother tongue). Further, 1 R elational clause in the positive attitudes builds on relation between the use of Sundanese and the instruction strategy for academic benefit while 2 clauses link the use of Sundanese to the strategy in language maintenance or conservation. One of clauses used to give attribution to conserving local language is given below.
| CarrierSelinganpenggunaanbahasasundadisela-selaperkuliahanThe use of Sundanese once at a time during lecturing | Relation ProcessMerupakanis | Attributesalahsatustrategidalampelestarianbahasadaerah.one of strategies in preserving the local language. |
From the data of responses with negative attitudes, the occurrences of relational clauses surpass other types of processes. 9 relational clauses representing the negative attitudes, the majority is related with the experiences on academic or classroom matters while the rest is about personal experience outside the classroom context. Carriers in the academic experiences in general refer to students while the majority of attributes represent their cultural backgrounds. One of relational clauses in the responses relating students to their ethnic background is shown below.
| KarenatidaksemuamahasiswaSince not every studentCarrier | berasalisRelation Process | darisukusundafrom Sundanese ethnicAttribute |
The last category of process found in the responses of positive attitude refers to existential clauses. One of two existential clauses in the data of positive attitudes is used to represent the existence of academic benefit and the other reveals the existence of general benefit of Sundanese words. The existential clause revealing the academic benefit is exemplified below.
| AdaThere isExistential Process | sesipenyegaranketikabelajara session of refreshing when learning.Existent |
On contrary, based on the data set of responses with negative attitude, the only one existential clause represents the existence of students coming from outside Sundanese background. This indicates n egative stance towards lecturer s ’ code mixing to Sundanese . The only-one existential clause in the negative-attitude response is given below.
| AdaThere areExistential Process | yangberasal dariluarsukuSunda.ones coming from outside Sundanese ethnic.Existent |
The last type of process found in the negative-attitude responses but is absent in the responses with positive attitudes is verbal clause or the process of saying experiences. In the former , 3 occurrences of employed verbal processes construe the saying activities in the classroom with lecturer as the sayer and academic utterances as the verbiage. This adoption of verbal clauses indicates the possibilities that lecturer s ’ code mixing to Sundanese can cause academic drawbacks to students other than Sundanese . One of verbal clauses found in the negative-attitude responses is depicted below.
| harusmengulangmust repeatVerbal Process | kalimat yang tidakdimengertiolehmahasiswa yang bukansukuSunda.sentences that are not understood by non-Sundanese students.Verbiage |
Based on the findings of this current study, it has been reported above that around 74% of millennial participants addressed positive attitudes to lecturer s ’ code mixing to Sundanese during courses. This phenomenon implies that millennial students with their traits of more-academic perspective, above-average literacy skills in IT, and high familiarity with social media are still aware of the importance of local languages.
Even the majority of non- Sundanese participants in this study addressed positive attitudes to Sundanese . This phenomenon of respect and awareness with other cultures apart from their own hints that millennial university students have good sense of unity. Most important, both Sundanese and non- Sundanese millennial student participants are sensitive to promoting local languages especially Sundanese . They are still aware of the struggling existence of local languages in the middle of national and international languages. The positive attitude of millennial studen t participants towards lecturer s ’ code-mixing to Sundanese during courses in general also implies their stance for making use of academic discourse as one of medium for maintaining the existent of local languages especially Sundanese . Apart from the academic context, the study of
Other previous studies on the attitude of native speakers towards local languages in Indonesia to some extent have also reported that local language users still view their ethnic language in positive ways but in terms of contexts other than academia. Most previous studies have not related the phenomenon of language attitudes with academic setting especially classroom context. One previous study that connects the academic context to students’ attitude towards their native language refers to the investigation of
Different with the study of
From the linguistic aspect, further findings of this SFL study have revealed that the distributed processes in the responses with positive attitudes are material, mental, relational, and existential respectively while those in the responses with negative attitudes contain relational processes in the first position, material and mental in the second place, verbal in the third and existential in the fourth rank. In the data set of positive-attitude responses, the processes of meaning making realized in the material, mental, relational, and existential clauses majorly establish the importance of preserving local languages especially Sundanese through the academic channel. In the negative-attitude responses, the processes of meaning making realized in relational, material, mental, verbal, and existential clauses give priority to the negative impact of using Sundanese on the academic aspect especially for non- Sundanese students.
The most noticeable distinct feature of meaning making processes between the responses of positive attitudes and those with negative attitudes is the distribution of material and relational clauses. The most frequent adoption of material clauses in the positive-attitude responses is in line with their function for making action meanings. As proposed by
In another side, the most frequently used relational instead of material clauses in the data set of negative responses focus more on establishing connection between the millennial student participants and their non- Sundanese cultural or ethnic backgrounds. Because of these traits, the code m ixing to Sundanese by lecturers might negatively affect their academic achievement. This representation is in line with the role of relational processes for establishing values. When experiences are symbolized in relational clauses, the perspectives addressed to an issue can be affected (Reath, 1998).
Millennial students’ a cceptance to welcoming lecturer s ’ code mixing to Sundanese in this current study provides two distinct sides of interpretation. First, this phenomenon might reflect that Sundanese language is still considered as the prestigious native language with its sustainable status. As claimed by
The insight into the attitudes of millennial s tudents towards the code-mixing to Sundanese during courses is expected to contribute to field of Sociolinguistics in Indonesia, especially to the issues of language policy. As it is known, in the bilingual even multilingual country, English functions as its foreign language while Indonesian in general serves as the second language after the local languages spoken as the mother-tongues of the overall society. It is expected that the academic setting viewed as the respected world can be a medium for the co-existence of national, international, and local languages.
The findings of this SFL questionnaire-response scrutiny reveal that the majority or 74% of millennial student participants in the study addressed posi tive attitudes towards lecturer s ’ code mixing to Sundanese . Based on the transitivity analysis, the most frequently employed processes in the responses of positive attitudes refer to material clauses followed with mental, relational, and existential clauses. In the responses containing negative attitudes, processes of relation building appears in the highest number with equally distributed material and mental clauses in the second position, verbal experiences in the third place, and existential clause in the fourth rank. Material, mental, and relational clauses in the positive-attitude responses in general represent the importance of promoting and preserving local languages especially Sundanese via the academic channel. In the negative-attitude responses, overall the relational, material, mental, and verbal clauses hint the importance of effectively mastering academic content in the classroom by avoiding or challenging to use of Sundanese during courses.
Further, the highest occurrences of material processes in the positive-attitude responses indicate the importance of taking action to protect Sundanese language. This indirectly might imply that academic discourse community in higher education institutions has responsibility to maintain native languages especially Sundanese . In the negative-attitude responses, on the other hand, the most frequently used relational processes linking attributes of students to their cultural or ethnic backgrounds can be interpreted as a language strategy for increasing students’ awareness towards their academic achievement. This possibly points out that academic discourse community in higher education institutions must be aware of its role as knowledge producer or academic building initiator.
A part from its findings, this study only made use of responses from 42 millennial student participants. It is assumed that the limited participants willingly to respond to the questionnaires in the present study were due to the demand to write open-ended answers. Further studies can employ larger numbers of participants and can involve participants under the contexts other than Sundanese language.
We would like to express our gratitude to the millennial university students who have participated in this study by writing and submitting their responses on-line. Further, in terms finance, this study was conducted with individual finance.
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