THE ANALYSIS ON CONVERSATIONAL TOPICS SELECTED BY MEN AND WOMEN IN LEGALLY BLONDE’S MOVIE SCRIPT WRITTEN BY KAREN McCULLAH LUTZ AND KIRSTEN SMITH: A SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDY OF LANGUAGE AND GENDER THESIS written by Wahyuni Fajaria Agustin 110110101004 ENGLISH DEPARTMENT FACULTY OF LETTERS JEMBER UNIVERSITY 2015

Abstract

Men and women have different characteristics in the use of language. They have differences in the amount of talk and the topic-selections in conversations. In reality, women tend to be more talkative than men. But, men sometimes become more talkative than women in particular occasions influenced by conversational topics and the group of interactions (in same sex or mixed sex interaction). This study uses a movie script entitled Legally Blonde written by Lutz and Smith (2000). The aims of the study are (1) to know what kinds of conversational topics selected by men in mixed sex interactions in which men become more talkative than women in Legally Blonde’s movie script; (2) to know what kinds of conversational topics selected by women in mixed sex interactions in which women become more talkative than men in Legally Blonde’s movie script; (3) to know the reasons why men are more talkative than women if they discuss particular conversational topics in Legally Blonde’s movie script and vice versa.