Discourse Analysis of a Song Lyric Entitled “Creep”

I

INTRODUCTION

Creep, is a popular song among teenagers and even elders. Here is a video clip of the song we are going to discuss:

 

                 1.    Background

Through language, people can express their ideas, wishes, thought, and desires.  Language has to be learned and used in social community, method which the existence of language is beyond understanding (Ramelan, 1992 : 14). Language plays an important role in human life. With language, we can communicate and express our ideas, our feeling and also share information with other people. One way to communicate with language is by using music.

The word “music” was derived from Greek word “musike” taken from the name of God which led the world of art and science (Wiwik, 1997:413). The primary subject matters of music are feelings and sounds. These imply that the content of music is a revelation of feelings and sounds and that music gives us more sensitive understanding of them. According to Webster (1983:781) “music is the science of art ordering tones or sounds in succession, in combination and in temporal relationship to produce a composition having unity and continuity as well as rhythm, melody, and harmony as its elements”. Greek philosophers and ancient Indian philosophers defined music as tones ordered horizontally as melodies and vertically as harmonies.

M. Stubbs' textbook (Stubbs 1983:1), discourse analysis is defined as:

a)      concerned with language use beyond the boundaries of a sentence/utterance,

b)      concerned with the interrelationships between language and society and

c)      as concerned with the interactive or dialogic properties of everyday communication.

Discourse analysis is how texts relate to contexts of situation and context of culture, how texts are produced as a social practice, what texts tell us about happenings, what people think, believe etc, and how texts represent ideology (power struggle etc.)

In discourse, whether we realize it or not, we have learnt about pragmatics and speech act. Both of them are the two aspects or theory in discourse analysis that can not be separated. They give influence each other. For example, if we want to say something politely, we have to consider the theory of speech act. And we also can say something using pragmatics theory especially in the social-relational aspects of and certain situation. So, pragmatics theory in discourse is at the basis of an interest in face and politeness phenomena. One entrance to the study of politeness phenomena can indeed be built around the observation that language users often depart from the conditions of optimal information exchange because sometime we also can do the false statement when we want to say something to somebody.

The phenomenon of song lyric is so impressive which make people feel admiration because they are very interesting. The lyric has its own way to send the message to the reader.

Brown (1993: 228) defined that discourse as everything from single spoken conversation to lengthy written text (article, book, and the like). Discourse is communicative event involving language in context. Discourse Analysis is the functional analysis of discourse. Discourse analysis in sometimes contracted with analysis, which focuses on the format properties of language (Rankema, 1993: 34). Discourse is language about the sentence that we may begin to expect exhibit a structure on the sentence, which is compression an expectation that may unwarranted.

In this study, the writer will focus on the implication meanings of the Radiohead’s song lyric entitled “Creep”.

                 2.    Problems

There are many people who like to listen to this song, but they don’t really know the true meaning of this song, especially in Indonesia. So the writer specifies the problem through the following question:

What is the message of the lyric song entitled “Creep” by Radiohead?

                 3.    Objectives

The writer ‘s hopes is that after reading this paper, the readers can be able to know the true meaning of this song, so they not just able to sing it and listen to it, but they can also understand it. And also the writer would like a little bit to evaluate the use of some words or dictions that many of Indonesian people consider it as a rude word while, in fact, the words are not rude. It just the common language used by the native speaker to communicate in their daily live.

 

II

REVIEW OF THE RELATED LITERATURE

Before going to the material, first, I want to explain about the definition of text and discourse. To define and describe the scope of study of Text Linguistics and Discourse Analysis and to establish the differences between them both is not an easy task. Suffice it to say that the terms text and discourse are used in a variety of ways by different linguists and researchers: there is a considerable number of theoretical approaches to both Text Linguistics and Discourse Analysis and many of them belong to very different.

1.      Text

Text might be said that the term of the text is restricted to written language. Modern linguistics has introduced the concept of text that includes every type of utterance. For examples, text may be a magazine article, a television interview, a conversation or a cooking recipe. Besides that, according to the De Beaugrande and Dressler (1981), text is defined as communicative events which have seven criteria; there are cohesion, coherence, intentionality, acceptability, informative, situational, and textual.

2.      Discourse

The term of discourse is restricted to spoken language. Discourse is influenced by contexts of situation and context of culture, how texts are produced as a social practice, what texts tell us about happenings, what people think, believe etc, and how texts represent ideology (power struggle etc). Discourse competence refers to the selection, sequencing, and arrangement of words, structures, and utterances to achieve a unified in spoken. This is where the top-down communicative intent and socio-cultural knowledge intersect with the lexical and grammatical resources to express message and attitudes and to create coherent texts.

3.      Pragmatics

Pragmatics is a subfield of linguistics which studies the ways in which context contributes to meaning. Pragmatics encompasses speech act theory, conversational implicature, talk in interaction and other approaches to language behavior in philosophy, sociology, and linguistics. It studies how the transmission of meaning depends not only on the linguistic knowledge (e.g. grammar, lexicon etc.) of the speaker and listener, but also on the context of the utterance, knowledge about the status of those involved, the inferred intent of the speaker, and so on. In this respect, pragmatics explains how language users are able to overcome apparent ambiguity, since meaning relies on the manner, place, time etc. of an utterance. The ability to understand another speaker's intended meaning is called pragmatic competence. An utterance describing pragmatic function is described as metapragmatic. Pragmatic awareness is regarded as one of the most challenging aspects of language learning, and comes only through experience.


Pragmatics is the study of the aspects of meaning and language use that are dependent on the speaker, the addressee and other features of the context of utterance. This principle seeks to account for not only how participants decide what to do next in conversation, but also how interlocutors go about interpreting what the previous speaker has just done. This principle is the broken down into specific maxims: Quantity (say only as much as necessary), Quality (try to make your contribution one that is true), Relation (be relevant), and manner (be brief and avoid ambiguity). Pragmatics theory also was introduced in target language studies, such as socio-cultural knowledge and mental models.

4.      Lyric

Lyrics (in singular form Lyric) are a set of words that make up a song. The writer of lyrics is a lyricist or lyrist. The meaning of lyrics can either be explicit or implicit. Some lyrics are abstract, almost unintelligible, and, in such cases, their explication emphasizes form, articulation, meter, and symmetry of expression. The lyricist of traditional musical forms such as Opera is known as a librettist.


Lyric derives from the Greek word lyrikos, meaning "singing to the lyre". The word lyric came to be used for the "words of a song"; this meaning was recorded in 1876. The common plural (perhaps because of the association between the plurals lyrics and words), predominates contemporary usage. Use of the singular form lyric remains grammatically acceptable, yet remains considered erroneous in referring to a singular song word as a lyric.


Lyrics can be studied from an academic perspective. For example, some lyrics can be considered a form of social commentary. Lyrics often contain political, social and economic themes as well as aesthetic elements, and so can connote messages which are culturally significant. These messages can either be explicit or implied through metaphor or symbolism.  

III

METHOD OF THE STUDY

1.      Research Approach

In conducting this study, the writer used the qualitative approach which means that the data were analyzed qualitatively.

Berg (1989: 2) states that “quality refers to the what, how, when, and where of a thing-its essence and ambience. Qualitative research thus refers to the meanings, concepts, definitions, characteristics, metaphors, symbols, and description of things.” The data in this study is in the form of paraphrasing the song lyrics of “Creep” by Radiohead.

2.      Object of the Study

The data of the study is from Radiohead’s song entitled “Creep”. Radiohead are an English alternative rock band from Abingdon, Oxfordshire, formed in 1985. The band consists of Thom Yorke (lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, beats), Jonny Greenwood (lead guitar, keyboard, other instruments), Ed O'Brien (guitar, backing vocals), Colin Greenwood (bass guitar, synthesizers) and Phil Selway (drums, percussion).

Radiohead released their first single, "Creep", in 1992. The song was initially unsuccessful, but it became a worldwide hit several months after the release of their debut album, Pablo Honey (1993).

Creep is a famous song in the world. Many people sing this song to express their feeling of broken or unrealized love. And it is for the person who feels that they are the ugly or weird person.

3.      Sources of the Data

There are two kinds of data in this research: main or primary data and secondary data.

3.1  Main Data

The main data was taken from Radiohead’s song entitled “Creep”.

3.2  Secondary Data

The secondary data were taken from the relevant sources from the internet that may support the analysis and find the answer from the problems.

4.      Procedures of Collecting Data

The procedure of collecting the data in this study was divided into several steps:

4.1  Reading

In the first step, the writer will read and re-read and also listen to the song in order to get the meaning and the feeling.

4.2  Analyzing

Next is analyzing the words which need to be explained to find the meaning.

4.3  Reporting

The data which had been analyzed will be drawn in the form of conclusion by paraphrasing the song based on the implicated meaning.

 

IV

FINDING AND DISCUSSION

1.      Material

“Creep”

When you were here before,
Couldn't look you in the eye
You're just like an angel,
Your skin makes me cry

You float like a feather
In a beautiful world
I wish I was special
You're so fuckin' special

But I'm a creep,
I'm a weirdo
What the hell am I doin' here?
I don't belong here

I don't care if it hurts,
I wanna have control
I want a perfect body
I want a perfect soul

I want you to notice
when I'm not around
You're so fuckin' special
I wish I was special

But I'm a creep
I'm a weirdo
What the hell am I doin' here?
I don't belong here, ohhhh, ohhhh

She's running out again
She's running out
She run run run run...
run... run...

Whatever makes you happy
Whatever you want
You're so fuckin' special
I wish I was special

But I'm a creep,
I'm a weirdo
What the hell am I doin' here?
I don't belong here

I don't belong here...

2.      Discussion

Well, the theme of the song is about the lack of confidence of the song writer. The song talks about feelings of self inadequacy when in a relationship. The song is about him (or anyone for that matter) who doesn’t think they are good enough to be with someone. Maybe it really doesn´t matter the opinions of the others, maybe he isn´t sarcastic in those lyrics, maybe he really sees himself like that. He felt that he was weird and do not have any braves to express his feeling to the girl who he loves very much.

This song is the most pure and beautiful love song ever written, it is honest and painful and divine and ugly just like love. Your skin makes me cry - the feeling of being consumed by someone and feeling totally inadequate is the most brutal emotion ever. I’m sure that everybody had ever felt like this situation where sometimes we fell so hard to express our feeling to somebody we love. Here the writer of the song really doesn’t know about what will he does after all of thing that he has already done to the girl. It can be seen in the sentence “What the hell am I doin' here? I don’t belong here”. The sentence indicates that the writer stuck in his own feeling and intends to give up, but in his deep feeling, he wants to express his feeling, indeed.

Everyone in this world surely wants to have everything to be perfect, but nothing is perfect in this world.

Remember people, you don´t  feel like the titles you have or what other  people think (this can only make you think if its right or no), but is rather how you feel about yourself, maybe he is not comfortable with himself, maybe what he sings really is what he was feeling, or feeling right now I don't know.

Many people think (in Indonesian version) that this is the impolite song because of the using improper words such as the word “fucking” in “You're so fuckin' special”, it’s not sarcastic, It’s sincere, the word “fucking” here is to express degree comparison of “very”, so the meaning of  “fucking “ here is “very”. It can be seen if we change the word “fucking” with “very”, (“You're so very' special”) I think it will not change the meaning of the song; instead it will make the meaning clearer.

The other word that looks like rude is in the word “What the hell am I doin' here?”, once again this is not such kind of rude language. This is a common sentence that used by native speaker in daily live to asking something that not clear enough.

In understanding the meaning of the song, as I have already talked, we must know the meaning of the words and also know the using of idiom that used by the native speaker in order we are not judge that it is kind of rude word.

V

CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

This last chapter presents the important points from the whole discussion in the study. Besides, it also suggests some recommendation for the readers or listener.

1.      Conclusion

The discussions from the previous chapters are summarized to accomplish the objectives of study. By doing analysis of implication meaning of the song, I find the Tenor of discourse from song lyrics which is being analyzed. I find that the implicated meaning is not easy to understand. It needs to be analyzed in order to get the meaning.

The information of the spoken language can be gotten from listening to the song which is recorded on a tape or any kind of media. Sometimes somebody tried to get information only by listening, although the recording also provided with the song book which contains the whole lyrics of the songs that tells to the reader the message given by the composer. They would find some difficulties when they tried to get the information without reading the lyric. That is the reason why the lyric of the song become such an important part in getting the information from the spoken language taken from the song.

2.      Suggestions

Some recommendations in this section are addressed to the readers or listener, but especially to the English students in order that they can enhance the literary skills by doing discourse analysis. In addition, they can get a new point of view in appreciating news item text which gives contribution improving journalism discourse. I recommend that researchers who conduct the same issues get more thorough and unequivocal knowledge about discourse analysis.

REFERENCES

Alba-Juez, Laura. 2009. Perspectives on Discourse Analysis : Theory and Practice. England : Cambridge Scholars Publishing

Celce-Murcia M, Olshtain E (2000) Discourse and Context in Language Teaching. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge

Clarke, Martin. Radiohead: Hysterical and Useless. 2000. ISBN 0-85965-332-3

Halliday MAK, Hasan R (1976) Cohesion in English. Longman, London

Laurence R. Horn and Gregory Ward. (2005) The Handbook of Pragmatics. Blackwell.

Mey, Jacob L. (1993) Pragmatics: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell (2nd ed. 2001).

Randall, Mac. Exit Music: The Radiohead Story. 2000. ISBN 0-385-33393-5

Yule, George (1996) Pragmatics (Oxford Introductions to Language Study). Oxford University Press.

Adolescent Literacy

Common Myths about Adolescent Literacy 

 

1.      Myth: Literacy refers only to reading.

Reality: Literacy encompasses reading, writing, and a variety of social and intellectual practices that call upon the voice as well as the eye and hand. It also extends to new media—including non-digitized multimedia, digitized multimedia, and hypertext or hypermedia.

2.      Myth: Students learn everything about reading and writing in elementary school.

Reality: Some people see the processes of learning to read and write as similar to learning to ride a bicycle, as a set of skills that do not need further development once they have been achieved. Actually literacy learning is an ongoing and non-hierarchical process. Unlike math where one principle builds on another, literacy learning is recursive and requires continuing development and practice.

 

3.      Myth: Literacy instruction is the responsibility of English teachers alone.

Reality: Each academic content area poses its own literacy challenges in terms of vocabulary, concepts, and topics. Accordingly, adolescents in secondary school classes need

explicit instruction in the literacies of each discipline as well as the actual content of the course so that they can become successful readers and writers in all subject areas.

 

4.      Myth: Academics are all that matter in literacy learning.

Reality: Research shows that out-of-school literacies play a very important role in literacy learning, and teachers can draw on these skills to foster learning in school. Adolescents rely on literacy in their identity development, using reading and writing to defi ne themselves as persons. The discourses of specific disciplines and social/cultural contexts created by school classrooms shape the literacy learning of adolescents, especially when these discourses are different and conflicting.

 

5.      Myth: Students who struggle with one literacy will have diffi culty with all literacies.

Reality: Even casual observation shows that students who struggle with reading a physics text may be excellent readers of poetry; the student who has diffi culty with word problems in math may be very comfortable with historical narratives. More important, many of the literacies of adolescents are largely invisible in the classroom. Research on reading and writing beyond the classroom shows that students often have literacy skills that are not made evident in the classroom unless teachers make special efforts to include them.

 

6.      Myth: School writing is essentially an assessment tool that enables students to show what they have learned.

Reality: While it is true that writing is often central to assessment of what students have learned in school, it is also a means by which students learn and develop. Research shows that informal writing to learn can help increase student learning of content material, and it can even improve the summative writing in which students show what they have learned.

 

Understanding Adolescent Literacy

 

Overview: Dimensions of Adolescent Literacy

In adolescence, students simultaneously begin to develop important literacy resources and experience unique literacy challenges. By fourth grade many students have learned a number of the basic processes of reading and writing; however, they still need to master literacy practices unique to different levels, disciplines, texts, and situations. As adolescents experience the shift to content-area learning, they need help from teachers to develop the confi dence and skills necessary for specialized academic literacies.

Adolescents also begin to develop new literacy resources and participate in multiple discourse communities in and out of school. Frequently students’ extracurricular literacy proficiencies are not valued in school. Literacy’s link to community and identity means that it can be a site of resistance for adolescents. When students are not recognized for bringing valuable, multiple-literacy practices to school, they can become resistant to school-based literacy.

 

1) Shifting Literacy Demands

The move from elementary to secondary school entails many changes including fundamental ones in the nature of literacy requirements. For adolescents, schoolbased literacy shifts as students engage with disciplinary content and a wide variety of diffi cult texts and writing tasks. Elementary school usually prepares students in the processes of reading, but many adolescents do not understand the multiple dimensions of content-based literacies. Adolescents may struggle with reading in some areas and do quite well with others. They may also be challenged to write in ways that conform to new disciplinary discourses. The proliferation of high-stakes tests can complicate the literacy learning of adolescents, particularly if test preparation takes priority over content-specifi c literacy instruction across the disciplines.

 

2) Multiple and Social Literacies

Adolescent literacy is social, drawing from various discourse communities in and out of school. Adolescents already have access to many different discourses including those of ethnic, online, and popular culture communities. They regularly use literacies for social and political purposes as they create meanings and participate in shaping their immediate environments.

Teachers often devalue, ignore or censor adolescents’ extracurricular literacies, assuming that these literacies are morally suspect, raise controversial issues, or distract adolescents from more important work. This means that some adolescents’ literacy abilities remain largely invisible in the classroom.

 

3) Importance of Motivation

Motivation can determine whether adolescents engage with or disengage from literacy learning. If they are not engaged, adolescents with strong literacy skills may choose not to read or write. The number of students who are not engaged with or motivated by school learning grows at every grade level, reaching epidemic proportions in high school. At the secondary level, students need to build confi dence to meet new literacy challenges because confident readers are more likely to be engaged. Engagement is encouraged through meaningful connections.

A. Student Choice:

·         Self-selection and variety engage students by enabling ownership in literacy activities.

·         In adolescence, book selection options increase dramatically, and successful readers need to learn to choose texts they enjoy. If they can’t identify pleasurable books, adolescents often lose interest in reading.

·         Allowing student choice in writing tasks and genres can improve motivation. At the same time, writing choice must be balanced with a recognition that adolescents also need to learn the literacy practices that will support academic success.

·         Choice should be meaningful. Reading materials should be appropriate and should speak to adolescents’ diverse interests and varying abilities.

·         Student-chosen tasks must be supported with appropriate instructional support or scaffolding.

B. Responsive Classroom Environments:

·         Caring, responsive classroom environments enable students to take ownership of literacy activities and can counteract negative emotions that lead to lack of motivation.

·         Instruction should center around learners. Active, inquiry-based activities engage reluctant academic readers and writers. Inquiry based writing connects writing practices with real-world experiences and tasks.

·         Experiences with task-mastery enable increased selfeffi cacy, which leads to continued engagement.

·         Demystifying academic literacy helps adolescents stay engaged.

·         Using technology is one way to provide learner-centered, relevant activities. For example, many students who use computers to write show more engagement and motivation and produce longer and better papers.

·         Sustained experiences with diverse texts in a variety of genres that offer multiple perspectives on life experiences can enhance motivation, particularly if texts include electronic and visual media.

4) Value of Multicultural Perspectives

Monocultural approaches to teaching can cause or increase the achievement gap and adolescents’ disengagement with literacy. Students should see value in their own cultures and the cultures of others in their classrooms. Students who do not fi nd representations of their own cultures in texts are likely to lose interest in school-based literacies. Similarly, they should see their home languages as having value. Those whose home language is devalued in the classroom will usually fi nd school less engaging.

 

A. Multicultural Literacy across All Classrooms:

·         Multicultural education does not by itself foster cultural inclusiveness because it can sometimes reinforce stereotypical perceptions that need to be addressed critically.

·         Multicultural literacy is not just a way of reading “ethnic” texts or discussing issues of “diversity,” but rather is a holistic way of being that fosters social responsibility and extends well beyond English/language arts classrooms.

·         Teachers need to acknowledge that we all have cultural frameworks within which we operate, and everyone— teachers and students alike—needs to consider how these frameworks can be challenged or changed to benefi t all peoples.

·         Teacher knowledge of social science, pedagogical, and subject-matter content knowledge about diversity will foster adolescents’ learning.

·         Successful literacy development among English Language learners depends on and fosters collaborative multicultural relationships among researchers, teachers, parents, and students.

·         Integration of technology will enhance multicultural literacy.

·         Confronting issues of race and ethnicity within classrooms and in the larger community will enhance student learning and engagement.

B. Goals of Multicultural Literacy:

·         Students will view knowledge from diverse ethnic and cultural perspectives, and use knowledge to guide action that will create a humane and just world.

·         Teachers will help students understand the whiteness studies principle that white is a race so they can develop a critical perspective on racial thinking by people of all skin colors.

·         Multicultural literacy will serve as a means to move between cultures and communities and develop transnational understandings and collaboration.

·         Ideally, students will master basic literacies and become mulitculturally literate citizens who foster a democratic multicultural society.